Guild Wars 2

That is all pretty debatable. I will agree in a full SR build with toughness and vitality I last pretty long as well against 2 or 3 people. However, I wasn’t saying it should be numerical for that reason. I was suggesting an alternative to the exploit of meager damage doing just as much as large sums when distributed the right way. Have 2 of your buddies throw a bunch of bleeds on you with no extra condition damage. Your bar will vanish just as fast as if someone hit your for large sums of damage. If it was your actual health your would see the difference in damage where as in DS it is potentially the same.

Maybe a numerical value might entice people to stick to that build base but no more then I see the obscene amount of bunker guardians I’m guessing. In my opinion, if it’s my special mechanic why shouldn’t I be able to take full advantage of it. I feel we should as our burst ability is not quite on par as other classes.

Either way though, one other alternative would be to make the bar register as 130%. It’s not exact but it still can retain the current allocation of hp per 1% that would equal the benefits of using the SR line. We would also feel the difference in time gained by taking SR, and it could semi counter act the condition problem I am seeing. Some might see it as an exploit, some will say its just a price to pay for extra beef. It’s all debatable and it’s all opinion. I would just like to actually feel a difference is all, as it stands now it’s minute at best. Could just be me.

The better thing to point out besides OP thoughts and observations is how damage functions against percentage. If each 1% is say 1000hp and you are being attacked in amounts of 2-3k, then you would lose 2-3%. This also means if you get hit for 100 points of damage you still lose 1% even though it is not 1000 points of damage. Now, think of conditions. They tick at low intervals. So by this standard you are not taking the full amount of damage DS is supposed to provide. It’s great for hard hits but anything under the 1% interval is wasted hp loss. 1000hp for each percent is a stretch and only used to illustrate my point easier. In actuality it’s about 200 or so hp per 1%. But given that notion if you add 30% from SR it just makes each 1% interval bigger instead of allowing more damage absorption because conditions will still tick it away just as fast. The only real gain is from the bigger hits. As the OP stated there is no longer duration, you still get off the same amount of hits you would normally.

Feels pretty poorly done at this point. Even if it means more work they should have a numerical value. The way it is now you can exploit it by dropping a bleed ticking for 30 damage every second and be just as effective if not more so then an actual all out attack. Just to clarify to those who don’t know, you can’t use any abilities, as those that could remove the condition, nor will you even know its there because of the UI design when engaging the form.

One last bit of salt for the wound is that gluttony (+5% LF to LF gaining abilities) does nothing. At least at a faster gain of life force it could be feasible to accept this but it’s most likely not going to get fixed as it is probably working as intended. Such a crucial trait I would think would have been #1 on the list as it is a great add to any build and for only 5 points. A topic many people complain they have a hard time dealing with in certain builds is LF gain. It may just be my opinion but it makes sense to me. Go figure, right?

aww… super sad face. I was really hoping the video would be up to view while im on lunch break. However, some of these posts are hysterical.

OP i know you are trying to help the community with your thread here but honestly i think the manner of playing a guessing game was a mistake. I know most people want to see a build or video proof, but even with having to try and get it up on youtube it would probably have been better to get the video up then make this thread.

I am still looking forward to see this thing in action. I have run a similar build but im not a fan of the utilities and weapons you are using, but its close to the same as mine. I also agree with some of the above posters saying this is not a easy build to work with. In my opinion it really just comes off as another conditions build, but due to the lack of focus in curses or spite you have to know how to maximize your condition damage.

Ill check back later.

@Serapita

Thanks for that. I was really curious. Actually i had mentioned in another post about a build that is very similar to this. Only difference being that its using 10 in spite for retaliation on DS and ignoring the 10 extra points in Blood Magic for mark of evasion. I also make sure to get DS cooldown to 5 seconds from 10 to constant DS dance. I was waiting on the patch to see if they fix soul reaping before i test it though. Its one of those builds that just focuses purely on adding all abilities you can do DS transform and then popping in and out while using choice skills to hamper and bleed out your oppenent.

It could be very overpowered assuming gluttony works correctly ( and I mean “adds” 5% to each LF gaining ability, some people seem to think it could be multiplicative). With the ability to rapidly fill up your LF bar and jump in and out constantly you would become very hard to kill. But seeing as how you dont increase your life force bar by 30% because of the broken tree nor does that first trait actually work….. DS can only be modified to have extra abilities on use. I would also be using a split of power and condition damage as from my experience your dps is better that way. I know most ppl swear by conditionmancer, but doesnt make sense that your traits seem designed to benefit half direct damage and half conditions in either spite or curses without that being the goal. To each their own i guess.

Now i really want to see this build in action if that is indeed what he is using. I can see how he said make creative use of the regeneration. I remember reading a post about how it can help stack bleeds by dodging at your oppenent for those extra stacks of bleed while also giving yourself regen… not to mention you can use a blast finisher if you happen to dodge into a combo field with that trait. Most people just didnt seem to find it justifiable to waste a dodge for damage.

@Cempa

That’s one of the 20/0/20/20/0 variations I mentioned before. Good staff focusing on that build. Although I think the original poster is using a conditions based builds as I have seen some of his other posts in different threads in which he talks about how he plays. He actually put up a link in a build posting thread as well. It’s too bad that the link doesnt work right. Only thing i see is 10 in curses after the page loads.

Fiesbert.9816:

This is the build you are looking for http://tinyurl.com/d9r7e34
I won’t tell too much though, you have to figure out how to use it yourself. Its insanely powerful.

@Shoebix

community doesnt really suck, when you have something legit to put out there. I made a thread about death shroud tree not giving the 30% increase and it gots lot of constructive feed back as well as eventually 2 weeks later an actual red post regarding the validity of whether it was true or not. Safe to say I can officially say that the Soul Reaping tree is broken. 30% increase to crit, not to DS. Im sure we also all know that gluttony is also broken, although not confirmed directly in any red post for that particular detail.

When you have someone claim that a class is overpowered with such class mechanics not working properly, or at all as in the above statement, then yeah… there is gonna be some people out there that are gonna say you are trolling or just flat out talking trash. It’s no big secret that a lot of people in this community think the necro needs a lot of work. Im not saying the poster is full of it, but i dont exactly think his opinion is spot on either. After i see the video ill judge for myself. He could always help us along by giving us some kind of details… but he chose not to, and furthermore to just tease us with some kind of hint: regeneration. He is asking for flames.

@barti

i was just going to suggest the same idea. i have used a minion based build where my minions would attack and give me health. I could care less what they were hitting although, if they all attacked the same target it would be a quick death for that person with the 30% increase in damage from power tree. The key to that build was just to keep that health siphon flowing. 78 from minion attacks, 38 with the 50% extra from my attacks (damage from wells also give 38 per tick), and if i subbed a well for a minion and had the 30 points for GM wells trait it would also be an additional 42 on well ticks.

Basically drop well of suffering and focus your minions and you have a lot of health comming at you, nevermind using staff #2 for the actual regen buff. I would be sporting a cleric amulet with this build too. Basically i hit like a wet noodle but if you ignored my pets people died. I was also really hard to kill 2v1 and 3v1 would usually be what would happen to me when they realized i was a pain in the kitten

I never consider this to be OP though…. considering wells/minions are extremely situational and not always working out how you planned. If i got caught with everything dead or moa’d it be over.

If its a variation of the 20/0/20/20/0 split build then i’m not gonna be surprised. it works and there are slight variations here and there but its just another vampire build that can work really well, but once you have someone with half a brain who knows to get rid of pets or just to not stand in the circles… kinda falls apart. Everyone has heard the arguements against the build various times.

Still would like to see the video though. For all i know it could be something completely different, but like an above poster said its most like another variation of a powerbuild. If it works for you then more power to you.

@craygz

I cant really account for what class does exactly how much damage in any given spec. The only thing I can account for is what I have gotten hit with. Firstly, I am not really agreeing with the 25 cap. Just putting it out there because i’d hate for people to look at it as that because it becomes a you vs. me kinda thing. I am just trying to theorize why they would implement the cap.

Second, from my perspective burst damage is large but comes in spurts. Theif unloads 25k damage in 3 seconds, 10 seconds later rinse and repeat. Just an example and not the exact numbers. I myself alone can maintain a stack of 15 or more. They tick for 100 to 125 depending on buffs and gear and set up im using. thats 1500 per second of damage. It doesnt go away and with time and rotations and probably better gear I can make that stack a little more and possibly hit for harder considering some necro’s say they do about 140 a tick. In that respect, I really think if there were no cap, most people would logically pick conditions to do damage because its sustained and it hits like a truck after a given amount of time.

Taking that into account if “everyone” were to jump on that band wagon and you fight a dragon it could really hurt the event. If something that is supposed to be a fight for 20 min gets cut to 5 min cause you have 50 people doing 20 bleeds ticking at 140 every second and the bosses health bar just melts away… you might get a different tune out of people. Maybe people will say the events are too easy, or things are too short, perhaps everyone will roll conditions and create a bottle neck to trait choices because people could possibly deem it the most “viable” source of damage for pve or whatever…

Honestly I have no real numbers to back anything up. But I have played enough games to know that in most encounters or player teams or set ups or tournements… call it what you will the DoT’s should never be ignored along with standing in the fire. For a player to use that system, there has to be a control somewhere. Sure I see where the cap hurts most players. However, I never seem to have a problem getting gold in DE. That is just me so I can not speak for everyone. More to the point, maybe the cap should be higher. Most people seem to think 25 is too small, if they raised it to 50 would it be better… noone really knows.

I just thought it would be a possible reason as to why they would want to put a cap there in the first place.

I do see your arguement of how a bunch of people using conditions lose their overall dps. That is where maybe a higher cap could be implemented. If it was based off a 5 man group I think that would be the sweet spot, I just think that anything more then that basing would make large scale events rediculous. Even if the devs added extra health to the boss should that possiblity hit that they melt away, then what happens? If you dont have condition based players at the event it takes a millenia to kill the thing. I dont know, either way the devs are the final judges on this kind of thing. They know the potential of what the DoTs in their game can or can not do. Perhaps it is for a reason altogether different then what I think. But I don’t think you should overlook the possibly reprecussions that could happen if they just altogether threw out the cap.

If I was thinking of quitting, what would have to be in the next patch to change my mind?

hmm, I love my necro, but I also am at the very limits of my patience with this class. I have started a mesmer as the gameplay is similar and trying the elementalist just didn’t feel like it had any oomph outside of daggers. I am a staff man. I just like the astheitcs of it. Scepter is also a nice look as well.

I would like to see gluttony and feel the difference of that 30% Life Force for maxing out the Soul Reaping line. I honestly just want to be able to do a 10 split down the line and max out that tree. I really want to see just how far you can push that form, but it is pretty much a pain to do so when your life force generation can not get the proper gains that it needs and everyone complains about, nor the boost to the longevity of the form via that 30%.

There are other gripes, but most are trivial to me. Considering i only use minions as a health generator at 78 per smack I could care less what they are hitting as long as they smack something, which they do. Also the abilities that concern power builds also don’t really bother me as if the above said trait line worked properly I would consider my low burst damage out put appropriate considering how I could potentially be extremely tanky. I think most other problems aside from the above mentioned and some choice bugged utilities have been addressed. The ideas about overhauling our trait layout and buffs for certain things is all opinion based by the people here on the forum so those we can rule out as well as I am talking about what needs to get fixed and not what I would like to see happen.

I wouldn’t necessarily quit the game just cause my class isn’t immediately fixed. In other games I have waited way longer then what has passed already. I just would like the basic mechanics to work properly. In my off time from the necro I will just try out other classes. I can tell it’s getting bad when I find I am using my free time to post on the forums instead of actually going and playing my necro, or the game in general for that matter.

I dont really have too many QoL issues. The glowing thing sounds cool. I personally just would like to look a little more evil in our forms. A nice touch to Deathshroud would be some green glowing eyes shining out from that cloud of blackness around us. Also nice to throw onto Plague. Kinda weird how it looks like I am stealth inside of a black bug swarm too. Wouldn’t mind that being removed entirely and just keep the swarming black cloud flying around.

As odd as this will sound, that “AaaaaaWHOOOO” sound doesn’t really bother me. I am most of the time looking at buffs and debuffs and not entirely focused on my character so the sound at least lets me know im still attacking.

almost forgot to mention two important things. sorry i got lost in the rotation advice i put out.

one being the reason for 25 limit would most likely be if there were no limit then most people would use conditions. at the moment of 100 stack it is basically ticking 10k a second… assuming you are any kind of decently condition geared, that would instantly drain any big boss forget little veterans or mobs. I make stuff melt with my necro when I focus purely on bleeds in a group. My ticks with food buffs are at about 125… easily can be made more if I get some of the exotic gear and fit the slots with plus bleed duration and extra condition damage.

The second thing was to say that it is possible to hit 25 all on your own as a necromancer. It is tough, but if you get the right timing and have everything off cooldown and don’t miss a beat you can hit it with the above rotation I mentioned. You also have to have the best of the best gear and set up with traits and runes and such. But, at the point of 25 stuff melts… seriously melts. It happens briefly so don’t expect to epidemic the surrounding mobs or people. But still tossing 15 or more steady bleeds to anything near by is still going to hurt.

I myself am not so great at the combo, but here and there I see it happen in those choice moments.

@Gryph

switching weapons wont be that bad if you accomodate for the time of weapon swap back to scepter…

example being scepter 1, 1, 1… after poison lands follow up wtih 2, then dagger 5, BiP, throw back with dagger 4… then assuming you have Geomancy on both weapon sets you weapon swap but go to DS (weakening shroud), hit skill 2 (dark path), pop out, staff 2, 3…. weapon swap back for another geomancer… then rinse and repeat. Constant stacking… assuming you are awesome at never missing a beat and laying on your target. I’d like to think being necromancers we are the only class that can just keep adding bleeds in that manner, although I know thats not true as I have seen other classes slam 10 on me in a matter of 2 key strokes…. I also tend to stick with one class and have not ventured past warrior, theif, mesmer low levels to be in any position to make assumptions about them.

But yeah, I actually posted this combo in another thread the other day about mastering death shroud. Assuming you are using a pvp set up from the mists, that can get you about 18 bleeds. Probably more if you focus on extending your duration. In pve, the target will most likely be dead way before you can rinse and repeat, so just hit epidemic and watch any poor unfortunate souls catch the reprecussions of standing too close.

In my opinion I dont think it’s over powered. This being considered as I would think this would soley be applied to our weapon skills. It would be nice to be added to all our skills. Currently, we get 3% from staff 1 which is slow. Many people complain that they see little to no life force gains from using scepter 3. We also get about 8% w/o interruption on axe 2, as well as another 9% from focus assuming it bounces each time. We also get about 6% from using the dagger 1 skill in succession which requires you to be in melee range, even more cause to have a faster build up of Life Force.

With all skills having cooldowns, aside from dagger 1 and staff 1, and the idea that you just don’t want to spam your skills at random just for Life Force, adding 5% in isnt really that big of a deal. It could be a little over board if every skill gained this additional 5%. I am in favor of this. However, many people may disagree with me. I myself find that in certain modes of play I struggle to gain Life force (PvP being a main one considering you start each match at 0). Other times I have more then enough to go around (mostly PvE as I rarely need to use my DS due to my main state of play being world roaming and not dungeon play).

I also know there are many necormancer players who also struggle to gain life force at times as well. The way I see it, whenever I played the warrior class I had to do little to no effort and my adrenaline bar would be full. I never found myself looking down and having to put any effort or worry that I had to fill my bar to use the F1 skill. Aside from the warrior class in general being extremely well balanced and a breeze to play in terms of damage and utility, the F1 skill does some amazing damage at times as well. If they can have that resource so easily and readily available, whats the difference if a necro can jump in and out of DS at a moments notice. When we can’t then we tend to be at a great disadvantage. Considering our damage outputs are laughable, aside from bleed damage, being able to generate life force quicker should balance the equation of having small damage but higher survivability through constant use of DeathShroud.
In my opinion, it just makes sense in that manner. I’m sure many will agree that the tradeoff is sound in that respect, not overpowered.

I agree. Personally, as I just stated in a post not 5 seconds ago, I do not understand how arenanet is making balance calls and adjusting classes mechanics when they haven’t seen a proper match up against each other with “full working, non bugged, appropriate class mechanics.” How do you compare utilities,traits, skills when certain ones are broken and others are not?

I actually have been thinking about that today. I did some reading about all the nerfs they did. And considering I spent the past few days testing vitality, toughness, and health gains from DS instead of playing, it really feels like DS is completely under par from what it should be….

Been doing a lot of Death Shroud testing the past few days and thought I’d chime in here. See the threads mentioning Death Shroud Health Pool and Soul Reaping not giving the 30% bonus to life force.

As for this thread…

If the actual tree that supported Death Shroud worked properly or was just more in tune and not bugged one could perform some very nice feats. Assuming you had a way to up your boon time outside of traits you could have a stat set up of lets say the Knights Amulet from the mists. That being power, vitality, and toughness. With these stats and grabbing all the 10 point markers for Death Shroud in your traitlines as well as a full 30 in Reaping (as per your own preference) you could be very combative.

Acting much like a elementalist who swaps attunement constantly you would just need to shroud dance constantly, this can be a lot considering you can drop it to a 5 second cool down. That is every 5 seconds getting retaliation, causing weakness, losing a condition, and assuming you are smart and staying near your team or group (dungeon or pvp)… you can also heal with life transfer(skill 4 in DS).

Many people would argue that its a waste considering how fast you will burn out your Life Force, but again, if it worked properly and gluttony (the very first trait) worked… you would get 8% per staff auto attack as well as 8% for every mark someone steps on (traitable to 3% in Soul Reaping up to 8% im assuming with Gluttony). 5 smacks is 40%… you will do considerably more hits in that 5 seconds out of DS… So every time you pop out it could fill quite a lot.

Now imagine you actually got an extra 30% life force (assuming your lifeforce pool matches your actual hp)… this would essentially be like when you jump into Plague or Lich… you get 100% and 50% extra hp respectively for those two forms, minus a certain % degrading per stacking of 1000hp. So now, not only would you have this near constant source of protection, but as well it would be near the health capability of one of your Elites…

With all this in mind, imagine how hard it could be to kill something like that. You are getting brief moments to hit the persons actual hp, and all the time effects you are popping on them are being ticked off 1 by one every 5 seconds…. as well as them popping out to heal every 25 seconds. So every fifth time they pop out if you haven’t managed to kill them not only do they heal up, but potentially any conditions you have on them, they use to fully heal up with the added bonus of hp per condition…

All this is assuming that the trait line works… I could go into further detail, like mentioning using weapon swap cool downs as a added bonus to your form ( you can swap weapons while in DS and you will recieve the bonus or perform the effect ). There are a few more things that can be done to further master the form. But this is all under the idea that Soul Reaping would actually function.

In reality because this is all theory crafting the above set up may not work great at all… but it would be nice to test it out if the trait line worked. Just food for thought as to what “possibly” could be done with it. In my opinion, I can see some concern here. Maybe an explanation as to why staff auto is so slow, or perhaps why life blast is slow and low damage as well. If they weren’t… and the traits worked… you’d never get them out of DS and they would hit substantially too hard for being able to perma shield like that….

Just food for thought.

My actual set up is geomancer with weakening shroud, scepter/dagger, staff… i use DS to stack a lot of bleeds. Also requires you to stand on your enemy, but thats the trade off I guess.

Rotation (assuming starting with scepter/dagger) is 2,5,1,1,1,F1,skill2,weapon swap,F1,2,3…. your enemy should have quite a few bleeds as well as be frozen and close to death… do a few staff smacks and be done with him. Should anyone be stupid enough to be standing too close, hit epidemic and proceed to repeat. In sPvP the combo is a lot harder to pull off, but if you do… people die, especially with ticks at high intervals( potentially 140ish…. with BiP and rabid amulet/Undead Runes).

I’ll check back later for any responses. I tend to ramble so my post may be a little off here and there.

thanks gamefreak, I also noted that you referred my post in the other thread I have been following. Thanks for that as well.

I hope that my ramblings have given some peice of mind to the masses trying to “master the Death Shroud.”

In all honesty, if it were to work the way I think it is supposed to… I can see the concern for being considered OP.

first off, im impressed that these two threads are still going from the other day. I started one and someone else had begun another. Both are full of great info and data on the subject.

But as to respond to striker, there is a problem with finding a consisten source of flat damage. Orginally in my calculations I was using burn damage from a bon fire, it would tick a damage followed by 342 and repeat with those two numbers. However, that first number would tick based off your HP bar. So in essence, if it is ticking at a health based percent of damage it would essentially give you the same damage regardless of what health you were at causeing you to die at the same rate as anyone else.

I then switch to a damage that would tick at intervals of sixty damage for 20 ticks. Some people have debated as this may be a bad source to test with. I may need a higher base number with a steady flow, or perhaps the damage incoming in itself is just a bad source considering it is from a self bleed (Blood is Power). Regardless, in my findings with or with out the traits I would arrive at about 48% life force. It would also be the same number if I added or took away vitality to my health pool. For this reason me, and some others, tend to think DS is entirely % based and works by rounding to the nearest interval (percent) when calculating damage.

Some people also seem to find that vitality will scale up with your life force. With this idea, there are 2 problems I find. The first being that when you adjust your health up your life force bar will go down and the % reading will be at the amount of life you had before you added extra vitality. This indicates that our LF bar is exactly the same amount as our actual health bar. The second problem is that when people test for how much possible health they have in their life force bar they all get different numbers. Some may think that there is a middle ground that they are missing as to being the culprit for the difference in results.

However, I never get this problem when I calculate in the respective manner for health in Plague or Lich form. You get a flat base increase in both. 100% increase to Plague and a lesser amount for each bit of Vitality you stack to up your actual health pool. This meaning that the more health you add to your character the more that 100% will drop (about 4-5% per 1000hp from my calculations). Lich form works the same way as well, although starting at a 50% increase.

Sorry if this is a repeat of information. I just have been posting about this everywhere the past few days. I am at an end for my testing. I recently did some sPvP and ran around with the condition set up (weapons not the traits) with only 30 points in Soul Reaping. First game I made sure to take note of certain burst damage players and keep an eye on my combat log while they beat on me. The second game I went with a completely stock set up (no traits). As I can not do any hard math to back my findings I will just say that it felt to me as though Soul Reaping had no real effect on me lasting longer in DS. The only difference I did note was that using a carrion jewel instead of rabid made me live longer due to the increase in health. This being my actual health and not DS.

From what I have seen, my previous posts about little damage rapidly depleting my DS bar and high burst damage being able to decently mitigate the damage, lead me to believe more in the sense that my original idea (Deathshroud being percent based) is more then likely true. We seem to have 100% life to match our own health bar in the DS. The two other forms we have increase in increments of 50%. This being in a manner likely because if the SR trait would work correctly you could make your DeathShroud to fall in the mid ground by upping it to 130% of your actual HP, making it close to an elite but not exactly. This being extremely helpful to those who would like to use the Elite Pet as opposed to Plague or Lich. The actual problem being though that the incoming damage is rounded around because DS is % based. I feel more that the 30% increase is just not working. But I am trying to be fair and assume there is a glitch or problem with the calculations.

I can make tons of assumptions and theories here, but the truth of the situation is that no matter how many ways I test this Life Force bar I have way too many discrepancies in data and there are also a lot of variables when choosing a damage source to test appropriately. Whether we like it or not the Devs are the only real people who know if this is working “as intended” or if is broke… purposely or not.

Gluttony doesnt work. After testing it out here and there I see no increase no matter what skill I use. I always get 10% for my kills. I have seen 11% here and there, but can’t seem to think anything of it then it being a fluke as I will get 10% gains multiple times in a row.

As for DS I was almost sure that I have heard from sources that it is supposed to be based on actual hp numbers. I’ve heard that when it comes to calculating numbers in general that this game has some really round about ways of doing it as if it is to disuade you from being a math geek about it. Makes me think this is just yet another attempt at keeping us in the dark with how the mechanic actually works by showing a percentage. Idk…

going to sleep.

sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep…. maybe food… nom nom nom….

My main gripe with this class, as well as other scholar/magic type classes… Aren’t the caster classes supposed to cast stuff… why are we using melee weapons and more to the point required to be up close and personal. I never once played a game where the casters were close quarter combatants. I do understand that it can be plausable, but seriously, our hardest damage should be from range and weapons like staff, scepter, and focus. I know that is a matter of opinion, but the whole change up of how the caster classes are played in this game feels like the reinvention of the wheel… like, why would you fix something that isn’t broke kind of deal.

Im sure there are those who will understand the point i am trying to make. As for everything else I totally agree with as well. I just would mainly like to feel more like a caster type. If I wanted close quarters there is a theif warrior and guardian I could roll.

@Arianna

In regards to the Plague and Lich forms I believe i stated the percentages at which they become effected.

That being Plague almost doubles your HP on a character with base health, while Lich gives an almost an addition 50% health (1.5x your normal hp). Both get deminishing returns based on stacking more vitality, from my calculations about 4-5% (more or less) is dropped off the total value in these forms for each 1000 points of added hp to your character.

I actually did the math every 1000 health. At 18372 hp you were put at 36692 health in Plague, and 27532 in Lich. If you add 1000 hp you get 37692 in Plague, and 28532 in Lich. If you do the math its between those percentiles for each 1000 points gained.

As for the analogy I mentioned before, Im pretty sure that is how our mechanic works. I just need to find a way to test it with consistant burst numbers. I too have felt the same way about my DS form. I find that sometimes it feels extremely squishy although I know I am not taking severe damage as I can read the outputs in my combat log. Other times with high burst damage, that I know can amount to more then the smaller ticks of damage from other sources, I find I easily eat the large hit and keep it moving with very little life force lost.

As i have stated many times before in prior posts, I originally thought the bar expanded on our hp pool by adding a slightly larger one then our own. Although now I am pretty sure the two bars are identical in hp, and only grow (or should grow) with an increase to Soul Reaping Traits… although I think the bar should be indicated as 130% instead of the 100%. Honestly, I feel that it supposed to work like that, and for that reason alone is why I see no difference in number value when test traited or untraited.

Overall, I dont think deathshroud is a bad form. If used in the appropriate manner (large hit absorbtion, combo’ing, using the shroud dance in a manner to add buffs -retaliation/fury/stability – , or add debuffs – weakening shroud -) it is a real nice tool. However, not gaining an additional 5% life force from skills that add to my life force pool “as well” as not getting the additional 30% life force added into my bar really hurts the potential of the mechanic. So many people complain about generating life force or that it dissapates to fast in certain situations… if these traits actually worked all that complaining would dissappear ( aside from the regular cry babies who have to nit pick at every little detail ), but over all deathshroud would feel tanky as intended.

I am not saying that I dont feel the tankiness of our class, I do. Especially in PvE. I pretty much have face to face chats with veterans. I rarely worry about moving out of the way of stuff unless it is a champion or im in a dungeon. However, in sPvP and WvW certain attack methods that shouldnt really be blazing through my DS just destroy me. (example being sometimes a theif will try to jump me and I catch on and eat the hit -normally a 10 to 15k hit – and only a portion of my DS bar is gone, but if someone like a ranger unloads a series of fast shots at me which can equal the same damage… the bar is gone.)

I guess maybe this is just really another post supporting the threads for fix Gluttony and now “can we get that 30% we spent the points on?”

Idk, its late by me and im rambling at this point. Any other findings post here or in the other thread im watching. I will check back again later or tommorow.

@Ascii

I like your info, but I am wondering how you tested to get your results. I find that it seems like there are a lot of variables in there by the differences in damage. Also were there just 3 straight forward tests, or did you replicate each test several times to get the exact same answer….

I only ask because I used Blood is Power to get 1200 points of damage on myself and sat in DS for 10 seconds. This meaning for the duration of the incoming damage I was in DS. Also that 10 seconds would negate 40% of my life force bar. Each tick of damage was a constant 60. This test can be repeated exactly every time.

There were no random crits, nor were there an inconsistancy of auto attacks that say they hit for 400 but hit between 380 and 422 and sometimes crit for 588 to 634. The numbers are all straight from thin air but you get the idea.

I changed amulets around for different hp amounts and found that with or with out Soul Reaping I would have about 8% damage every time. I will let you do the math on what my hp would be, but I should not have the same damage amount to life force if I am changing my HP value, or more importantly to me —-> adding 30% life force from traits. That 8% should get smaller with each upgrade due to a larger pool of health for my DS.

I myself need to do more testing because I have an idea that my results will change if I use a large spike of damage as to several small hits of 60. I currently have no way of getting a consistent hit from something that is a large enough number though so it is hard to get a proper result.

• Just in case. I dont want you to think I am trying to imply anything against you or bring down your findings. I just am curious is all. Some people shared their methods as well as their findings in the other thread so we could better understand how the mechanic in itself may or may not be working.

@Arianna

Im sure by the other thread you mentioned, you mean mine. I have ton a lot of testing in the past day and today.

Findings:

- Your life force drains by percent (4%/sec) regardless of how much hp you have or how much points you invested in Soul Reaping. It will always deplete at the same speed unless you use Trait II (3%/sec)

- By changing your vitality around you will notice a fluxuation of the life force bar which adjusts accordingly in a manner that implies the DS hp is equal to your regular health bar.

ie- if you have base health in the mists at 18,372 and add a soilders amulet it will drop to 74% because 74% of 24,812 is 18,372. The 24,812 being your new total hp with soilders amulet.

- We also know, or at least I do, that if you jump into plague form at base health in the mists you get a 100% increase to hp. Lich form gets a 50% increase to hp. These numbers drop about 5% or so for each 100 vitality you add to your base health.

ie – if I add 1000 hp to my character I will get a 95% boost in Plague form instead of the 100%.

• I mention this only because I originally thought we recieved a 20% boost to hp in DS and could match Lich form by traiting into DS with 30 points.

- Also I have found regardless of hp or trait points spent into the Soul Reaping line that the damage out puts the same remaining life force.

ie – I take 3000 points of damage in DS. I have 0 points invested in Soul Reaping. My life force drains about 8%. I then invest 30 points into Soul Reaping. I take that same 3000 points of damage and find that, again, I am left with 8% drained from my life force. (The testing part of this has been tried in number of fashions by both me and other individuals to come to similar conclusions).

With the above info I hope I have shed some light on the subject. In the current set up I have calculated different amounts of total hp for DS which change only based on how I decide to incur damage to myself while in that form. Because of that I really cant tell how much actual hp we get.

However, I am now starting to think it is all % based and the actual amount is not important as how much each 1% is equating to. I say this because in the thread I am normally posting about this topic in, I make mention of the analogy to our DS being like a computer hard drive. Hard drives take data in small chunks ( like percents ) and store files based on those chunks not the actual size.

ie – you store a 200 byte file in a hard drive that uses the standard 4096 segments… that means you lose all that extra data space because the file is so small. However, with a larger file its not as penalizing because you match or come close to it.

• analogy relates to topic in the manner that most people want to know how much hp is in there DS for judging the amount of damage it negates… if a person uses tons of tiny hits your wasting hp because the 1% chunks of life force might be 4096 points worth of damage even though your getting hit for “500 points at a time.” Although if you get for 15k you only use 4% life force because of the size of 1% chunks…. These numbers are all totally exagerrated to make the example easier to follow, remember that. But you get the idea.

The above statement may not be true, and I hope it is not, but it seems given my tests that it is in fact working like that. I personally have heard some other mentions as to how the mechanic works and am starting to agree. It was mentioned that perhaps the mechanic is totally based around percentages, even if there is an actual number behind it all. Given that idea, then if one person was to take damage it would be accomodating a percent as the remainder, and not a exact number. If we were to think of it as rounding off by chunks of hp then it could be why we are seeing the same results. This would mean that we need to use a larger base of damage to judge if we are actually getting 30% from traiting or if we have any kind of actual hp gain via stacking vitality.

More directly it would be easier to think of your DS bar much like your hard drive on a computer. When you format it, most people use the 4096 option, it is made to record data in chunks. So if for example you had a file for 383 bytes, it would still use up 4096 because it is the lowest chunk it can use. However if you made a file that was closer to that number it would be better. Now if you think of damage like the files, you could essentially run down space rapidly by using low space files, cause each would use the full 4096. However if a file was 23409, it would be better management of the space, and use it more appropriately.

If you can follow, that example could iron out any discrepancies you may have thinking about if the pool is so low then why can we take chunks of damage from other players and not have it totally disappear (a large file). It would also indicate why when you have multiple foes, who you might be aware do crap damage can burn a hole in your DS so fast (lots of small files). This is all assuming that each % of life force is exactly working like the 4096 slots on a hard drive in relation to damage acting as files being saved. I really hope that this is not how the form actually computes damage and handles variables… but it was suggested in another thread and could make sense if you look at it from this analogy or perspective.

Yeah, thats just some extra food for thought as to how deathshroud could possibly work. I still have no definite way of knowing how much hp the form actually holds. I would assume its a lot seeing as how Lich and Plague offer up a higher hp pool and such. I was thinking of testing the ratio between those two and if they are the same i would like to think that Deathshroud would somewhat match it. Although they are elites so they could possibly be more due to that factor, but DS not falling too far behind.

Let me know what you guys think or if you need more clarification on what my previous posts were about. Like I said I am no math genius, so I can be wrong or off. Im open to any other testing methods or ideas behind what this mechanic and trait line is offering, or rather not offering…

It is nice to see that others are following up from what I last posted.

For clarification again, my initial hp was 24812 (thats refering to outside of DS not the actual DS hp itself). I was trying to find what my hp scales to as most of the time I have been told that is higher, if not just slighty higher, then what your actual hp is.

The calculation I did for how much hp my DS has was based off of the damage I would take. 1200 points of damage would equal 8% of life force in my last test. With that number I would divide 100 by 8, the amount of times the percent goes into the full 100, giving me 12.5 and then multiply that answer against 1200, the damage. 1200 × 12.5 being 15000. This of course is where I found a problem. I know that my life force can not be only 15000 hp. Much for the same reasons of the above poster who mentioned changing amulets and dividing against there starting and ending health pool. (this is initially what made me want to find out how much we get considering if I upgrade my vitality the green bar goes down, thus indicating my need to refill “because” I have extended the DS health points).

I would use a 10 count as my base of measuring the damage because i found that if I did not I could often miscalculate how much life force I lost just for being in it (4%/second). It made more sense to start the BiP and DS at the same time. The DoT is 10s so either way I would get a full count regardless. The only problem would be if that last second took an extra 4% or not. I try to be as exact as I can, but I am not some amazing mathematician or perfectionist gamer.

After summing all that up and now knowing all these things it seems that the deathshroud hp does not accrue damage like normal circumstances. It seems obvious at this point that regardless of damage or stats, if you take a given amount of damage with 30 points or without…. you still end up with the same effects and percent based remainders. Thus indicating even if Deathshroud somehow managed to have 50k hp in that form we would still have the same % taken away in any given circumstance.

ok… im a little weary to report this feedback.

I did a quick test as I am short on time and wanted to just try something that I thought would be easier then playing with the fire. (which by the way ticks 2x one being the first initial number followed by the 342, then repeats—> ergo completely destroying that test method due to possible % based damage from your amount of hp)

I decided to fill my life bar and use the self bleed we apply through Blood is Power instead. I have no added condition damage aside from the +350 for using the skill and the damage ticks for 60 with the tooltip claiming to give 850 damage total. This means that for the 10s duration of the bleed and while i am in DS i get 1200 damage from the bleed (accounting for the increase in condition damage via the skill). 1200 damage no matter what value hp I have to be more to the point.

For a 10 second duration in DS as with my initial test the % value was the same as before. With 30 points or without 30 points in Soul Reaping I exited DS with a total of 52% life force availabe to me (as my initial tests would give me 48% I am thinking I may have missed my exit exactly allowing an extra 4% decrease due to trying to move my character to see the damage ticks while using a stop watch as well as hitting the F1 key). Keep in mind 1200 damage is substantially less then the 3318 I was getting testing the fire. However, by doing the math (assuming that 8% is 1200 hp) my total DS hp pool would be about 15000. Just a reminder that the 3318 damage I was using for a previous fire test took 12% life force away bring my total DS hp pool estimate at about 27650. My actual total hp is at 24812. That doesnt make much sense in the idea that in one situation your DS hp is more then your actual hp, and then in another it is less.

With this quick test not only am I not seeing a difference in 30% increase. It seems that actual hp values are not being used, and if so they run on a completely different system of calculation. The only hard evidence I have found in my testing thus far is that the more toughness you stack the better DS mitigates damage. (Testing auto attack from a friend and switching between rabid and carrion jewel). The actual % of increase I can not really give exactly although I know it is minimal.

I would like to say good luck to anyone trying to figure out the ratio of hp gain DS achieves through stacking vitality… and as for the 30% increase, at this point im going to say it is not there. Unless someone can show me a difference in lifeforce value of 30% taking the exact same amount of damage between traited and untraited, then this trait line is severely broken for its soul purpose. It is a hard test to accomplish, but again I am open to anyone who would like to try and prove me wrong. I dont require pictures or videos, I am an adult with a brain and if you show me your test methods I will gladly retest them to find the same success or failure for verification.

If anyone else has anything to add, feel free. I would still like to hear more opinions/theory crafting on the idea of how to interpret our lifeforce bar for hp value and how it is effected by damage and such.

Some clarification for the certain above posters regarding the fire. From my calculations my hp pool is less then the lifeforce hp pool. However, if it was % based it does not change initial damage being bare or in DS form. Unless, the fires initial burn is solely based off my actual hp ( which at this point I am pretty sure it is ).

One other thing as some have noted the actual continuous burn (DoT) is 342 regardless of hp value or defense value. I plan on testing the DoT portion only as per taking the initial hit naked and then popping DS and doing a 10 second count after taking between 1 and 3 hits of damage. I am not sure whether I should use the regular 342 and calculate or if it would be easier having a larger base damage amount to do the math with.

Either way I agree with certain posters stating that if the trait bonus line did in fact work, it should definitely state my life force bar as 130%, given that regardless of points or not it drains in the same time. Some will argue that you are supposed to lose 4% a second but I feel that if I am spending 30 points… well the tooltip should be based off 130% and not the same 100%… otherwise whats the point? Either that or like the above posters have mentioned, you “have” to take trait II to feel the approximated 30% longer duration it gives on a flat drain with no damage. As for those stating that its 100% of a increased hp value… the whole point of my research at first was to find out how much vitality effects your total DS hp (scaling/%increase per vitality point)… which in my initial testing was still showing no difference for the extra 30 points i spent.

I will be back shortly with some more results though, I will try to give some more numbers as well. I think that most people here are arriving at the same answers though. As i said before, my results were similar even before the fire testing method. I had a mob just flat out attack me and I tried to use that as a measure but the crit and non crit hits made too much of a variable for a solid answer. Even with a guildie smacking with auto attack the numbers were never exactly the same, not too mention some crits here and there (even with the base 4% crit chance). Everything would be an average which is not as exact as I would want it to be. That could indicate that the gains from these talents are minimal if not non existant, but again… for 30 points there should be some notability in using all those points.

Yeah, Idk if this has been posted in this section before but I read a thread about the amount of hp you get from DS and did some testing. As I could not find the original thread again I made my own to share some info. I think we have a bug with a soul reaping trait line (or I should say another). It seems that by placing points in the line we only get half of the benifits… being the 30% increase to critical damage. The extra 30% to lifeforce bar seems non existant.

here is a link to my original thread:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/30-points-in-Deathshroud-does-not-give-extra-30-increase/first#post533042

If anyone can confirm my findings please follow up here or in that thread, I will be checking it later on again here and there. But in regards to what seems to be an apparent bug, I think someone should get on this right away as I dont seem to be aware of any other classes that suffer from only half benefits by putting points in a trait line. It is bad enough Gluttony does nothing, but if in fact we also do not get a bigger bar by using that trait line then what is the point of it dedicating a line for our main class mechanic. I may have a little over reaction to the severity regarding this, but im sure everyone knows what i am trying to imply here.

If you devs are out there reading this, a post would be nice but I recognize that you probably have your hands full either way. I just feel that this is a pretty important bug to fix, regardless of what class I play.

^^^ This.

Yeah, so after reading the suggestion to stand in the bonfire I decided I should test my theory again. It is true what the above poster is saying that there is no difference.

With a base health of 24812 and no points in Soul Reaping I took a hit from the bonfire for 2976+342. 2 ticks that gave 3318 in damage in total. I would take that damage and remain in DS for the duration of 10 seconds which with out traits should put me at 60% Lifeforce due to 4% drain a second, then take the difference of what actually remained to find out how much life force was taken by damage.

Now, after testing both with 30 points and without 30 points in Soul Reaping I consistantly would end up with Life Force being at 48%. That is 12% lifeforce lost regardless of 30 points or not. With the baseline hp I had by my calculations I had a total of 27650hp in DS either way I traited.

Just for the sake of double checking. I then removed all vitality gains I had. So with a base health of 18372 I would get 2 ticks from the bonfire with 2204+342 giving me a damage of 2546. Yet again, after 10 seconds and a hit from the fire I was put at 48%… with or without Soul Reaping. By this calculation I should have a total of 21220hp for DS.

However, in reality it seems there is no real hp pool that we can distinguish. We have 2 different damages still putting us at 12% loss. Granted the health pools start at different levels, but for that fact alone I would think there should be some kind of difference in the amount of damage I see absorbed by DS. In both scenarios the result was the same despite the difference of health and fire damage. Ultimately, what matters is if the traits add any benefit per point… answer seems a definite no.

Just a note for those questioning the fire damage. It seems the more hp you have the higher the initial value you get hit for by the bonfire. I think that is kind of weird, but that is how it worked when trying different hp values, although the following ticks all hit for 342 regardless. *

Edit: if anyone would like to verify using the same test, or one of their own I would be very appreciative. Thanks

Doesnt sound jaded. I just feel that as a class defining ability that so many people argue about and so many classes point fingers at, it should at least function properly and be effected by its trait line in the same respect. That 5% boost to life force gains would do wonders for all the people complaining about generating life force. Getting an extra 30% tacted on to the bar would also be amazing damage absorbtion. A lot of players ive talked to feel that DS isnt as tanky as it should be when investing so much into that trait line.

Idk, just another broken feature i guess to add to the other bugs. Im just wondering if other classes have broken features regarding their main class mechanic.

yeah, 13 pages of stuff is a lot to skim through in the bugs section, but i was wondering if anyone had seen or reported anything about the soul reaping line. Im pretty sure everyone is aware of the Gluttony trait not adding anything to our life force gain methods, but I have just spent an about an hour testing out if that +30% life force is actually there or not.

I have noticed that the life force bar changes % went you add or take away vitality and I notice that damage does get reduced slighty more while in Deathshroud the more toughness you have. However, when i tested how fast my bar depleted while being beat on by a trash mob with the full trait line i noticed no difference then when I had no points invested in the trait line at all. Is this just me? I am having a hard time testing it exactly because i cant pick and choose a damage source that hits me with steady numbers. The type of damage between crits or a regular hit is random so its pretty hard. But I do notice that I get a few more seconds out of deathshroud with the 25% reduction (trait II), its just that its the same whether I have the regular 100% bar or if i get the extra 30%. (** I do know trait II is working, 10 seconds of DS brings me to 60%, with the trait it brings me down to 70% -tested several times-)

It’s bad enough that I can not fill my lifeforce bar rapidly with that extra 5% applied through Gluttony, but if I also am not getting the extra 30% increase to the actual bar as well, thats just dirty. That really feels like the our main class defining mechanic is broken…. badly broken. That would mean that along with certain broken traits we also have a modifier that is not working when we add points to it. That should be a priority fix as no other class I am aware of gets nothing for using a trait point.

If anyone can test, or find a better way to test this, and confirm… please post something back. And if it’s broken add it to the bug list.

I am really curious to find out if this true. I originally just wanted to see how much extra hp I gained from the DS mechanic and if it was adjustable by stacking high vitality. It seems to add more to the bar by stacking vitality, but I really can’t tell. I do know by looking at the numbers the damage does go down a bit more when i have higher toughness and jump into DS. There was another post talking about this, which is why I started playing with it, but I cant find what thread it was in. So sorry if i missed that place to put this.

TL:DR -

Looking for some people to test out 30 points in Soul Reaping to see if you actually get that extra 30% or not as it seems its just bogus. If you can confirm add your findings to the bugs thread, thanks … really curious about this will check back later.

much thanks

I actually run a similar build most times. I just started using a Minion based spec and the survivability is pretty insane. I do crap dps but I last just as long as the bunker/wells spec. I get good spike/burst from my pets should they focus an enemy. Rather touch AI as everyone knows.

The only real difference between my normal spec and yours is I tend to run a scepter/dagger for my off. I try to stay off to the side lines. Dagger requires a litte in your face action. My asura is small so I hide in a niche and drop wells and giant marks from afar and swich to S/D for kiting away from enemies when I am discovered. Not the best again at dps but I do decent if the sPvP team is decently balanced and my guys arent completely out of it.

Thanks for the post, awesome info. As a extra I’ll mention incase you didn’t know (though im sure you do) that if you rock spectral wall it combos confusion with projectiles as well as pop choas armor when you use blast. Really nice if you happen to roll around with the little bone minion guys (dark combo blindness, light combo retaliation, spectral combos choas armor on blast… for those that missed it )

@OP

this may get a little off topic, but definitely has to do with minion appreciation.

…yeah, i didnt read all the following posts after yours, more like skimmed…

but i did notice that a lot of people mentioned they werent too into the minion thing. I too am not into it. However, i just spent my second night of theory crafting for sPvP. I have changed my mind, only to the extent of making pvp doable. I was pretty much using a Knights Amulet and went for a spite, death magic, and blood build … yeah all traits were for pets, aside from one in spite that i used for DS as retaliation for a litte protection and the one in blood for #4 in DS to heal surrounding allies ( this includes pets and minions ).

That being said… I had about three guys on me mesmer/engineer/theif …. could be wrong on the last one… but definitely the first two. I pretty much just held a point all by myself and even downed one of them… this is before the mesmer realized Moa destroys all my pets. But that didn’t last long. Between the regen from weapon smacks, my staff #2 healing both me and pets, the regen from all my pets dropping health on me from each attack and stacking mostly vitality (sitting at 29k hp ) I was near industructible, not to mention I barely touched DS… only for Life Transfer and to use choice moments of fear and retaliation.

A little more testing with that led me to believe that its not only why the hp regen is so tiny on weapon hits but also why some people might think that DS can make a necro Overpowered. It really wasnt hard, and although my dps was absolutely terrible (even with 20 in spite) my pets absolutely cut down on any foe near me…. the extra % for hp/damage really did help them out. If their AI was more on par, it would be even better….

all that has made me redifine my like and dislike for pets/minions… honestly id rather be the dark caster with curses/vampiric life drain, but I guess thats how arenanet wants it done. And for the record, this build is better then my previous bunker/wells build i would use. Best part is if my group is smart i can still switch to traits that provide support using wells with this set up.

kinda shocked… ArenaNet Necromancer portrayal…

Not one mention of DeathEater….

They look exactly like DeathEaters from Harry Potter…. that kinda sounds really sad when I put that out there, but I liked the movies so it doesnt really bother me. Almost identical when you use plague form or go deathshroud…. just think of the scenes when they are all flying around fighting, all the DeathEaters are shrouded in black smoke and mist… On my asura I can really see the whole wand play aspect when he is flailing around that scepter back and forth.

But yeah, when I look at the screen I dont really think Necromancer… but I think that’s more asthetically then what the class actually does. They do have summons and the whole locusts thing really gives off that whole “death and decay” mantra, so technically it is there. But im more of a curse guy then summons… so I primarily see DS, Plague Form, and scepter spam.

whats up people.

This post will be probably really long, so I apologize in advance. I have been following the necro forum for a couple of weeks now looking for insight and any and all advice to better my abilities with this class…. however, im left feeling like I have to work insanely hard to come up short in every aspect. A lot of people are saying that there is nothing really wrong with this class aside from the mechanics of certain traits/abilites being broken. I can completely agree with that, except when I pvp. Maybe im totally trash or maybe im doing something wrong. That brings me here….

I know a lot of different playstyles and for the most part a lot of them dont seem to work. A direct power build with daggers or a axe just seems to close for me. Wells build I do decent with as long as I run around in a group and strictly avoid walking off by myself to back cap or something… kinda feels this ruins the idea of being strategic, but yeah… Conditions… yeah, conditionmancer feels extremely situational. The damage output also seems slow and rather risky for being so squishy. Ill admit I am more of a defensive player, but a lot of people mentioned the necro as being the “tanky” caster… I feel squishy… DS or not. And the whole notion of DS is key to being OP still sounds like complete lies to me. I have even read a post from someone stating they have mastered it ( as well as not making any mention of how ) and can 1v1 with ease, 1v2 no problem, and make it out of 1v3… all this in a conditionmancer spec, which again feels way to squishy for that to be true.

If someone can pull that kind of skills off, I really think I am doing something wrong. He could be full of it, or maybe im just trash. Either way I see a lot of posts stating that they manage just fine in pvp. Half me wants to believe this due to being 72 and just facerolling all the content pve wise so far. But then when I go to sPvP I get steam rolled by mesmers/theives 1v1 and god forbid there are more then one person I get either blinded the whole time, knocked around like a ping pong ball, or my combat log says I just got hit with 790324932049 damage… seriously?

so yeah, please… anyone… a little help or advice. I really like the look and feel of a necro and Id hate to put all this effort into learning combo fields, rotations, and builds (not to mention all the pve stuff I worked up) in the trash. Been playing this guy since release jumping around from place to place, kinda sad that when I walk over to the mists I feel the glaring eye of other classes whispering “free kill”.

TL:DR – sPvP/tPvP help:

builds – playstyle – favorite traits – solo pvp experience – group pvp strategy – rotations – best combo’s – class that gives you the most problems – easiest class to face – advice on better damage out put – burst damage countering – strategy strategy strategy…. looking for insight on stuff like that.

Thanks in advance

I was going to write out this long drawn out response of points and such for response to the above said post, but its too late for that and in most cases i think people will just want the TL:DR response anyhow.

Basically… everyone can stack bleeds really fast, and if not bleeds they can burst out a bunch of conditions (not everyone, but a lot if they are specced for it). This being said… in sPvP time is the underlying factor. Most fights are burst fights… the only time a condition based necro will shine is when he has lots of uptime to do his thing. Between really long cast times and horrible stacking speed… a theif or ranger can come by and just burst you down way before you can put out that insane bleed damage.

I could just be a crappy sPvP player, but imo I been in the mists all night and from all the specs I have run, the conditions was fun… but only effective when I was left to do my thing. It was really support dependant, but if you are solo… well you can get steam rolled real easy (and not by multiple players). I had a knack for running into these guardian/theif/engineer/ranger guys who would use multiple knock around moves in succession virtually making it near impossible to use scepter or cast something. The thief more in the lines of dissappearing and going in and out of combat a lot. Either way, in the end being able to do serious damage with a bleed is useless if you cant get them on an opponent fast enough, much less be able to apply them in the first place.

Like I said it could just be me, or maybe perhaps people see necro and think “free kill” all focus now… dead.

oh yeah, I almost forgot. To the OP, as for dps in any other regards for our necro class vs others… PvE is faceroll for me… I have solo’d mostly everything on my way up to 80. I been playing since release and I am only at 72, but not in a rush to hit 80. Just been enjoying the ride and anywhere I go stuff dies… WvW is awesome in a group… and well I just had a small rant of some of my sPvP experience. Other specs I do better in for sPvP but trying to spec for damage is a joke. I last longer and do better with a bunker support spec.

…yeah.

I have not seen any difference in stacking vulnerability to up your condition damage… or at least as far as bleeds or poison is concerned. I have been working on a combo mix of power and condition build myself and with all the different variations I never noticed any of my ticks going up in damage.

… And just for the records sake. I am currently in front of a dummy in the mists getting a solid 58 ticking… only difference is if i stack intensity and its still a 58, just flashing faster. That is with 10 stacks of vulnerability. Hard to stack both on a target, but i think 10 would be enough to notice a change.

I like your build though, kudos to you. Staff FTW

@Mayama

I can understand the whole cast time thing… but thank god i can run, or move in general while i do that. If it were like other games where you move and your break casting… that would be really bad. … seriously bad. lol

@Lumines

very true. I also have noticed in this game that there is no right or wrong rotation, or rather a real rotation in the elitist gaming sense for maximum damage. It all really depends on what your traited to do and the current situation at hand, like you said. I personally just have a priority list of what i should be dropping first if the situation is right. Too many years of hardcore raiders max min charts i guess.

yeah… I too, like the staff. With my builds it tends to feel really bursty when you just drop #2,3,4 real quick at a mobs feet… its always my off hand weapon set, just for the utility of it.

thanks for posting. hopefully more people chime in with how they roll their necro.

@marianitten

sounds cool.

i avoid the minions as of yet due to them having really bad AI. they tend to do what they want some times.

as for me my build is similar.

15 spiteful spirit
20 weakening shroud / master of corruption
0
15 vampiric precision
20 path of midnight/unyeilding blast

thats more for survival then actual damage… i could tweak it more in curses and soul reaping for better damage output… but i like a little more safety nets, besides it lets you pile on a few more conditions at a time with that set up, not just specifically worrying on bleeds. I use that in conjunction with #3 on the scepter. 8% to 10% is a nice refill on my LF bar. Although i tend to notice the rate things die is good enough where i dont worry about filling it. Either way my off hand is a staff which will insta fill my LF if i really need it. Also with the set up gives a nice burst of solid damage as opposed to swapping conditions around. One trickyness about the build is that i constantly am debuffing myself as well as my opponents so i have to watch my #4 is off CD or not so i can stack those buffs back at the enemy to increase durations/stacks/intensity.

:(

i tell ya… i see all these links to builds. they always come up empty when ever i look at them… hence why i just list the 0/0/0/0/0 type of set up and name my needed traits for my build

but i hope my info helps. maybe more people will chime in with other builds. thanks for your contribution.

@Marianitten

Decent tip for you. (nice vid btw) If you take the trait “weakening shroud” in the first tier of curses ( i am assuming using scepter you are slightly in the curse line up) you can combo “Enfeebling Blood” … basically sustaing a constant state of weakness debuff to anyone near you. So if they are trying to jump you you can drop Enfeebling Blood(25s CD) and start stacking some bleeds ( i use blood is power and #4 right after) after about 5 to 7s just hit DS real quick and renew that Enfeebling Blood.

If Im right the internal CD on the DS skill is is about 15s and the DS itself is about 10s… and the actual #5 skill is 25s… if you can time these things right your opponent will have glancing blows as well as slow down his evasion mechanic by 50% keeping him from dodging your attacks… it also puts out a rather nice bleed to keep that bleed stack rolling and not dropping off… even better should you worry that your gonna miss your restack of weakness pop epidemic and switch targets… boom its right there again so you can get a lil more time to reapply it….

just something to play with if you wanted to try a different approach

@Mackster

the LF regen isnt bad on the scepter if you can stack tons of debuffs on your opposition… remember you get 2% per condition… if you had 4 conditions on a guy and hit #3 you instantly get 8% which is good… on a boss fight where there are tons of conditions… well you get the idea

Later peeps. Please leave some good stuff so we can have a decent list of combos and set ups that actually are more then just conditionmancer. I know there are people out there who are actually putting the sting on the enemy, help out and share… even if it’s just a hint of what would make a necro better. Sorry if this post is way out of control overboard in length.

TL:DR – yeah … you should really read it in depth, but its basically donate some suggestions to build a nice compendium of Necro builds/tips/tricks… and DeathShroud is more then a tempory health bar —--see above for one example of how I use my DS —--

I posted in segments because the forum told me I was over character limit … i know… i talk too much.

Thanks guys.

anyways, I think you guys get the idea. I am in no way a awesome player. Nor am I saying anything negative. I just wanted to see what other players are bringing to the table and how they have tried their class. I know their was a dev who posted about DS being used more to be more effectful. I went over this build in particular to advertise that idea as well as show that I think a power build can be useful and do some decent damage. Most of the posts ive seen over the last week have just been flat out saying that anything other then conditionmancer spec is total garbage. Again i have not tried this particular build for pvp as I am more used to wells and being a bunker/debuffer for my team. Maybe later I will do a few matches and see how I fair. The npc’s in the mist are rather easy for me when I face off against them aside from the thief…. party due to jumping in and out of sight so I cant super stack my vulnerability on him.

Please, anyone who reads let me know what your doing. Maybe we could actually use these forums to help each other instead of bugging and raging about our class being broken. From my point of view all i see are a bunch of bugs in my class and a slight slight slight lack of synergy between the traits as other profession trait lines have. Keep in mind my set up is part of the Minion Master set up… and that whole over view was damage from me not using pets… if they worked properly im sure my damage would be even better…

so yeah. I will be checking this post here and there. I have a few other builds that have really worked well for me both offensively and defensively and support wise… I dont mind sharing if you share. I really just want to avoid the whole “must reroll” “fix my guys, hes broke” stuff. We all are aware that he needs some love. But lets try to look at what works so when they fix it… he will be that much more fun to play.

by the way ill be in the mists testing more builds if anyone is curious to see more and happens to be on Ferguson’s Crossing.

Here is a more complete example of what I am looking to see in this thread. I have been toying with this build for pve. I am using basically an axe/focus set up and a staff off hand. My traits are 20/0/25/0/25. My exclusive traits I use are “reapers might” “death shiver” and “unyeilding blast” … “spiteful talisman” also is a good one to keep the combo’s rolling but not exactly necessary.

Basically using that set up i gear with lots of power and some decent crit here and there and toughness. Mostly looking for toughness and crit due to getting more power just from using toughness. Also i use the signet that grants extra might.

if your curious and want to try it out go to the mists and get a axe and focus… no sigils required… and grab the beserkers amulet. Now start once you get to nice spot to try out this set up start this rotation.

hit #4 for spreading vulnerability

lay on some #1 for more vulnerability

DS and hit #1 for yet again more vulnerability and also stacking some might on you…you also have an aoe pulsing vulnerability when you pop DS if you were unaware in this set up… so it stacks decently to jump up to about 17-20 stack quickly.

by this time you should potentially see some nice 2-3k crits from your #1 in DS then pop right back out….

finish the guy off with #2 and again if your lucky you will also see the total value climb to about 4K damage…. if hes still standing…

i havent quite worked out a nice rythm as to how or when i should pop in and out of DS but i have seen good damage pve wise. I’m still working on some utility for for pvp. the spectral wall is nice cause when you shoot through it with your staff not only am i getting about 600 or 1k crits… i combo confusion on the enemies. #3 on the axe is also nice as i get retaliation. Im trying to work in a extra skill using weakness as thats my core combo in scepter build as with no toughness i stay alive due to my enemy constantly having nothing but glancing blows at me. I could try and combo back and forth with retaliation on my #3 and using the trait for retaliation when i pop DS so im going in and out of that buff. Not too sure…

Hey guys,

I been playing the necro since a couple of days after release. I have to say that I really like him. Hes a pretty difficult class to master, and in my honest opinion maybe the toughest. I know a lot of people have been raging about the dps value of a necro or that they might flat out just be borderline semi ok for any set up… I dont see that to be exactly true. I am really wondering exactly how some of you are playing the class. Not saying L2P or anything remotely close to that… im just wondering what your rotation is or how you are going about your traits. Kind of like mentioning something along the lines of using scepter/dagger and popping “blood is power” and immediately hitting #4 to get the extra bleed off you and on to your enemies… many necros told me they avoid the corruption skills due to them hurting not only the enemy but you as well. (also “blood is power” is a great skill for piling bleeds as it is a 30s bleed and allows a little give to manuever or switch up your skills and not have to constantly spam #1 to achieve a high bleed stack. )