Guild Wars 2

I came up with a concept for an elite well a few years ago I think. Or one year. It was around a Christmas I think.

I remember the concept being something like this

• Well of Devouring
  Suck your foes in and and deal damage and heal based on the amount of boons removed

And the first pulse of the well would Pull foes within 900 radius to its centre and remove all boons and deal increasing amounts of damage based on the amount of boons consumed with a base modifier of 1.0 and +0.10 per boon devoured on target. Then it would pulse 3 more times doing damage with a 0.70 base modifier and inflicting 3 Bleeds and 2 Torment while Pulling foes within back to its centre every pulse with the 5th pulse Launching foes away the same distance as the first Pull and healing you for 100 base with a 0.10 healing power modifier based on the amount of boons that were removed by the initial pulse.

I did of course realize it was overpowered as kitten and pretty stupid, but it sounded cool in my head at the time. I did feel a minor amount of saltiness when I first saw Gravity Well announced for Mesmer since it was sort of similar to what I had envisioned.

gavyne.6847:

Surely someone tested this during BWE 3? We have quite a few dedicated community individuals here that test numbers and time kills. Hopefully someone did test this over the BWE’s.

Fastest kill times I got against golem was doing standard dagger rotations until 50% after which you could spam Gravedigger. RS felt pretty weak against static enemies. Only time it felt beneficial to damage was as an opener for getting 100% crit Focus 4 > Executioner’s Scythe before you got into dagger range.

If you read the thread you would have seen that the resource cost of stacking might outside of combat with RS. It would take about 22.5 seconds, though someone said 20. Close enough. Assuming you have Vital Persistance that is the equivalent of 45% of your life force spent doing nothing but pressing 1. I should point out though, 17.5 is not the base value of the might stack from the trait either. It’s 15 seconds. Where did you get that 17% might duration increase from? Well lets ignore that for now.

Do you think 45% life force is worth less than a handful of cooldowns on Ele or Warrior? Is it worth less than the energy upkeep on Heralds Facets? Feel free to tell us.

hackks.3687:

what don’t you understand about the term “meta”. seriously. look it up. you don’t even make sense.

and regardless, 5 sec of Might on crit, aoe or otherwise, does not stack up to 17.5s for swinging at nothing, or cleaving at everything and collecting 2 stacks of Might for 12 sec for every target below 50% HP.

seriously. make more sense.

I am well aware of the textbook definition of meta. You however seem oblivious to what it entails within a gaming sense. Might want to look that up yourself. And yes. Reaper’s ability to stack might on its own is more sufficient than Warrior’s. No doubt there. But we also can’t share our might generation, so it’s definitely not better. If we could share it then yes, I would be all for nerfing it appropriately.

hackks.3687:

Perhaps you should look up the definition of “meta”. One person in one tournament does not = meta. The build is primarily for fun in solo PvP play.

I find it highly doubtful that oRNG would run a build just for fun in the de facto biggest GW2 tournament when there was money on the line. You’re quite daft if you believe so.

I also find it hard to take anything you say even remotely serious when you were unaware of the existence of one of the most defining Warrior traits next to Fast Hands and CI.

hackks.3687:

Warrior GS has not been meta since they changed how Haste works. Post the build.

You’re not even making an effort lad. GS/Ham Warr was meta for a long time and was used in the last WTS. For the sake of everyone, educate yourself before you make any manner of statement on things relating to balance in PvP.

Additionally, a proper PS Warr in PvE will keep an entire party at 25 stacks of might permanently on top of bringing banners. Necros can’t even dream of being that useful in PvE.

Syviren.7086:

Its not too bad, but atleast those boxes die

You can hit any set of boxes on Kyhlo for LF. Even the indestructible ones.

Malediktus.9250:

Aktium.9506:

Reaper will get Champion Beyblade for sure.

Really? I hope you are trolling

Of course. I also happen to know that the Dare Devil title will be Champion Shoe.

Reaper will get Champion Beyblade for sure.

Bhawb.7408:

Lightsbane.9012:

the dulfy notes say 900 radius. I’m assuming this is a typo, but clarification would be marvelous.

On what?

The skill balance changes on Dulfy are phrased like this

Axe skills (Rending Claws/Ghastly Claws) going up to 900 radius.

I don’t mind 900 radius Axe 2 tbh. Not at all. I quite like the idea of being able to hit everything on the map.

striker.3704:

So, what is it? It has an asuran gate, and what appears to be some capture points, but i’ve never gotten over there or seen anyone over there.

There used to be a deep lake there with 3 golems in it for testing underwater combat skills. It was removed when they removed the Raid on the Capricorn map from PvP and announced that they would stop supporting underwater content.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Lily.1935:

Norjena.5172:

Blackmoa.3186:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Lily.1935:

But base necromancer I feel so lacking. Like I’m missing something major.

Like damage?

The damage isnt THAT bad, in a group with warrior you get up to ~8k bleed ticks at times and rarely drop below 6k while also havign your poison and torment. im not saying it is incredible damage but it is far better than most people seem to think.

8k is bad rly bad. Even 9 or 10 k are bad.

High dps classes are doing more then 15k sustain dps. Burst 20k upwards.

No they are not.

High DPS are doing more like 9-10k sustained. Still better than the 8k bleed ticks, but bleed is still not the only source of damage in a condi Necro’s kit. Granted, Torment is negligable, but poison is a thing.

Conds need that ramp up time too. Often it’s just not worth it, like that one sinister Ranger build that had higher dps than the standard zerker build for Ranger, but the ramp up time makes it worse because you’re doing less dps than the zerker one for half the fights with bosses on top of being useless against trash.

Roquen.5406:

By your logic:
Legendaries should not be usable as their particle effects in some cases block the player’s view and cause an unfair advantage.
The wing backpieces should not be usable as they are very large and skew the player’s view.
Players should all have to be the same style/race/gender as that would cause an unfair advantage.

You realize there’s an option for this right? Standard enemy models option makes everyone humans with a class specific set of armor and weapon set.

Whenever the subject of the old PvP exclusive armors have come up and a dev has replied they’ve always talked about them as if they were intended. Of course they might very well be sets that were originally made for PvE but were shoehorned into PvP before launch because they either forgot to make PvP exclusive skins or didn’t have time to do it. Either way they have always been accepted as PvP exclusive items. And I do not blame Anet for any mistakes involving the old PvP wardrobe, because lets face it, it was a kittening mess at best. The majority of everything in it had different names and icons than their PvE counterparts.

Either way, exclusivity is a good thing and should be cherished. I will use the example of the Greatsaw and the Ghastly Grinning Shield as I always do. I really want that thing, but I have absolutely no right to have it. It’s the same with all old skins are that either unobtainable or incredibly expensive to attain. Their rarity shouldn’t be destroyed. If anything we need more items and skins like this that are only available a limited time and never again. It increases the uniqueness of players. And that’s a good thing.

Gaebriel.3754:

Nope. There is a heavy armour set, I believe it’s called Heavy Scale, that also was mistakenly exclusive to the PvP wardrobe. But you don’t hear anyone about that one, since it looks fairly similar to the low level PvE sets so there’s probably no ‘prestige’ attached to it.

I’ll give you this one, I had forgotten about this one until you mentioned it. I mainly only played my main Necro back then and I sort of just got all the skins by no-lifing PvP and the heavy one was just one of many heavy armor skins I unlocked for classes I didn’t play at the time.

Gaebriel.3754:

The fact that those random old sets didn’t transfer correctly with the merging of the locker into the wardrobe, doesn’t make them intended PvP exclusives. They have zero coherent theme to them, weren’t marked as PvP exclusives anywhere. Some of the ‘exclusive’ sets have random bits scattered around the Personal Story rewards. It’s clearly a bug.

You know devs stated that they were exclusive on numerous occasions right? If anything parts of stalwart armor being obtainable in the PS is the real unintended bug.

Gaebriel.3754:

Aktium.9506:

Gaebriel.3754:

You couldn’t use their appearance in PvP back in the days.

You could use Tribal skins in PvP back then. Just the name and icons were wrong. The skins were still there.

I think you misread. My sentence referred to the actual Masquerade armour (the ball masque style armour), it wasn’t in the old PvP wardrobe but is usable now.

Due to the misnamed icons, its unavailability in the PvP wardrobe was clearly a mistake, just like the Tribal armour being unavailable in PvE back in the days. The Masquerade set is kinda the ‘counterpart’ to the Tribal armour in my argument for free availability. :P

There was always supposed to be PvP exclusive armors. Of course they mucked it up pretty royally by having there be 2 exclusive light ones and 1 medium with no exclusive heavy armor. But the idea was always there as intended. I would also like to add that a third or so of all the skins/icons in the old PvP wardrobe were broken in some way and that Tribal was in no way special in that regard. Underwater weapon names and icons were the worst. You’d have all those tridents with icons of harpoon guns and names of spears and similar things. Good times.

Bhawb.7408:

AoE is definitely one of the strongest counters, but heavily overestimated on how easy it is to just cleave the minions. Burst AoE on long CDs, which is what Necros have, isn’t what counters MM, you have too much healing/defense, too many ways to counter their AoE. Bone Minions are just blown up before they die, Flesh Golem can be charged out of the AoE and won’t return until it’s done pulsing, and your other two minions are ranged.

Well cooldowns aren’t that much longer than Wurm and Bone Fiend. Minions also have the the downside of taking eons to summon.

Bhawb.7408:

Reaper is certainly stronger because of Greatsword, and the ability to use Gravedigger and general AoE. But wells are a really weak setup against MM, because of how easily you can avoid their effects and have maybe 1 ability forced onto CD (Flesh Golem, or a ranged minion), while they have 2+ forced, and now they have no burst to kill you.

The builds that would deal with MM really well are engis with kits, elementalist, Shout Reaper, and other builds that bring a ton of incidental AoE on really short CDs, not Wells necro with a massive CD burst that can be avoided really easily and then lack the kind of pressure needed to down the MM before their CDs are back.

I would argue that minionless MM with Cleric/Sent/Soldier Ammie also does no damage without minions while power Reaper still does consistently high damage in RS while also having much better LF regen capabilities than MM. Getting your minions off CD won’t win you the fight when you’ve been losing the DPS race after all the utilities are spent if everything blows up in the initial engagement.

I’d put Reaper above Ele for dealing with MM. At least with Ele if you’re MM you can get them burns transfers.

I also have to add that I don’t see how shout reaper would do any better against MM than wells. Only YAAW is good there. NCSY and Suffer won’t do diddly.

Captain Unusual.9163:

Aktium.9506:

I don’t think anyone appreciated the change to Target the Weak. Should have been left as it was or had its effect moved to another minor.

People who used the Curses line for stronger Conditions did. The bonus damage did nothing for condi builds, whereas the bonus crit is quite nice for them.

Filthy condition peasants are irrelevant.

Bhawb.7408:

I’d argue that most MMs are complete garbage, which tends to be true. I’ve done a lot of 1v1s against heavy damage builds, and the reality is that you can put out around 10k healing in a normal MM build, on top of minion base 15k HP. So unless you guys know of some build that can deal 25k AoE damage to both ranged and melee minions at the same time, I’d be really interested to know how everything dies in seconds.

You won’t see me disputing the fact that the majority of MM’s I’ve encountered are bad. Besides. 25k AoE damage against targets that don’t move out of AoE or dodge isn’t all that outlandish. Wells + Soul Spiral + Grave Digger will put out about 40k ez if you don’t get interrupted. Protection on Minions definitely doesn’t stick around for long due to WoC. If it ain’t dead after all that you can just press 1 a few more times to finish the job. If it takes more than a couple of seconds you dun goofed.

Bhawb.7408:

Also, MM only has, at most, 3 traits invested only for minions, with a few others being kind of useful to minions but also generally useful. Flesh of the Master, which makes it harder to kill them and so is fully used when minions are being killed, Death Nova, which is fully used when they die, and Necromantic Corruption which is the only one you actually deactivate. Transfusion and Life from Death are also heavily minion focused, at least in 1v1s, and both of those should also be taken advantage of. So by the time you kill the minions, the MM build doesn’t actually have any traits left that need minions, the traits have already done their job.

3 utility traits is still more than the 1 trait affecting your utilities you’d see on a well build. When the MM is without his minions he’s in a lot more trouble than a power build with wells on cd.

Bhawb.7408:

I just find a lot of confirmation bias with MM, people who think it is OP will always find it OP because all they see is losing to a build with AI and go “oh well the Necromancer did nothing and I lost to the AI”, and people who see it as too weak are just like “well I beat this MM and they did nothing so MM is bad”. MM is a hard to play and really specific setup build, and people don’t understand the interplay. They treat it like a fire and forget build, which it isn’t. Just look at the person OP was playing against to see an example.

I understand the build quite well. Played it a bunch for fun, it’s probably my second favourite type of build after wells and spectral. I don’t think it’s op or anything and I know it’s quite a lot more active than most think. And it’s hard to deal with as non-Reaper Necro, I should know, having lost to an MM in the ESL Necro 1v1 thingy in the semi or quarter finals or whatever. Though in my defence I wasn’t sober back then and I forgot to switch to piercing LBs before the fight started. But yeah. But MM has some very clear weaknesses, and strong aoe/cleave is one of them. I don’t see how you can argue against this. You’re experienced enough to know this as well as I do.

I don’t think anyone appreciated the change to Target the Weak. Should have been left as it was or had its effect moved to another minor.

Hyper Cutter.9376:

They did. Aside from one or two items that are inexplicably absent, and a few that are still buyable on the TP, almost all the old living story rewards are available from laurel vendors.

I am talking about rare items like the old Halloween ones that have only been available in a raffle since the original event. They make Tribal available again I want those items to be just as available. No less.

Gaebriel.3754:

You couldn’t use their appearance in PvP back in the days.

You could use Tribal skins in PvP back then. Just the name and icons were wrong. The skins were still there.

Bhawb.7408:

nearlight.3064:

Yeah If I run cleric MM and I’m dueling a power well necro and he puts all of his wells on my minions, they will instantly die unless I’m already pulsing transfusion.

All their utilities for all your utilities isn’t that bad of a trade, especially since the CDs are pretty close and Death Nova is going to destroy their HP. Plus they’d have to deal about 18k damage, through protection, to kill them. And that’s without Transfusion.

I had no trouble at all tearing through MMs when I played Reaper. It was easier than on GS/Ham Warr even imo. I mean, the MM still takes ages to get down, but minions die in seconds even without Wells. And it barely feels like you lose any DS to Death Nova due to LF generation. I’d argue that a MM losing all his utilities suffers more from it than a Power build. Definitely isn’t an even trade. MM has a lot more traits invested in his utilities.

Renkencen.6127:

Also there is nothing “prestigious” about the tribal armor nor was it ever part of an reward in the first place. The only way to had gotten it back then was using the PVP forge using certain ranked materials.

Getting to the rank where you could craft Tribal armor back when it was possible to get it was way way harder than you think. It was a time when all the rank points you got were basically just your personal score on match finish. If they bring back old PvP exclusive armor then they need to bring back all the old PvE exclusive items they’ve removed that are exceedingly rare as well and make them just as easy to get your hands on.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• What build was being run here?

MM with Cele Ammie and Dhhumfire by the looks of it. Looks like DM/SR/R spread.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• What would you have done differently?

Gone with a much glassier setup with at least 2 stunbreaks and a condi removal. Played more aggressively. Defensive play against a Mesmer doesn’t go very well. Ever.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• What is your mentality in a matchup vs Chrono?

Same as against a normal shatter mes.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

• What should you look out for when vs Reaper?

Reaper Shroud mainly. Clones and Phants are ideal for generating Might for BB. I haven’t tested but I’m reasonably sure RS2 destroys the Mirror Blade projectile. So that too. Otherwise it’s an unfavourable matchup, you should be able to stay away to just continually do damage from range. The Reaper won’t do much if he can’t reach you.

abc.5790:

sincerely,
an engie main on queue

On a scale of 1 to 10 how much do you miss Gear Shield, Elixir S, AMR and Self Regulating Defenses when you play Necro?

Burjis.3087:

I don’t know if focus really needs this much improvement, but if #4 really doesn’t bounce at max range, then it’s a problem that has to be fixed. I hardly ever use #4 if the enemy is too far. I just cast #5 to slow them down and close the gap, then #4 works perfectly, so I haven’t really noticed the bug.

It’s not something that’s unique to Focus 4 on Necro, GS2 on Mes is the same. All bounces only bounce back 600 range even if the skill range is higher.

Every class has them, but would could be done to make skills like Well of Blood, Corrosive Poison Cloud, Signet of Undeath and Spectral Grasp more useful?

They all have some niche use for which you might slot them temporarily but still fall short of being worth a slot on your bar as an actual useful skill.

Post some ideas on how these skills could be changed for the better.

apharma.3741:

Aktium.9506:

apharma.3741:

Mesmer: Outside of the mantra of distraction mirror blade mind wrack build you generally were outplayed through kiting.

You forgot one of the most hated builds for Mesmer and probably the whole game as well.

You mean the condi PU build that you can beat with 0 cleanses by dodging the only 2 threatening attacks?

I am way more fearful of all burst builds than PU condi Mesmer.

PU allows bad players to be more of a threat than they should be. On top of being able to reset a fight when they feel like it they’re just unfun to fight. The times where I’ve nailed bursts on a PU Mes just to have them go poof and reappear as a speck on the horizon are numerous. Sure, it’s technically a win if they flee, but it’s infuriating nonetheless. And regardless of whether you win or not the fight will take ages unless the player is a mentally challenged drunk. PU is definitely one of the most hated builds and for good reason. Encountering one is like waking up in the morning and remembering that you have a 10h work shift that day.

apharma.3741:

Mesmer: Outside of the mantra of distraction mirror blade mind wrack build you generally were outplayed through kiting.

You forgot one of the most hated builds for Mesmer and probably the whole game as well.

Nova Stiker.8396:

Aktium.9506:

Nova Stiker.8396:

It’s strength is it counters EVERYTHING. There is no build that is a threat to Signet Necro’s.

Cele Signets is beaten soundly by pretty much any other Necro build in 1v1.

What? The only Necro build I think of that could beat a cele signet necromancer is minion master. They have condition transfer so going condi necro isn’t an option and a constant pumping of weakness so going power necro isn’t the answer.

As I said, they have high defense, counters to power and conditions plus get a massive damage spike if they knock you below 50% health and can keep up that massive damage spike making it nearly impossible to recover.

They have a counter for nearly everything, except team fights which is where they are at their weakest.

Nah, Cele Sigs loses to Power too. Cele Sigs doesn’t have the damage to outdamage nor sustain to keep up with Power in a straight 1v1. SoS/PoC/Plague Sending don’t really do much against Power Necro so they’re basically wasted traits in that matchup. Only danger is Weakening Shroud.

Nova Stiker.8396:

It’s strength is it counters EVERYTHING. There is no build that is a threat to Signet Necro’s.

Cele Signets is beaten soundly by pretty much any other Necro build in 1v1.

I would like to see single and double stat combinations.

Said it before, saying it again. If they make the old stuff like Tribal and Apostle armors obtainable again I demand that they make Greatsaw/Scythe/Ghastly Grinning Shield skins easily available as well. I fractured my hand punching a wall due to Clocktower shenanigans during 1st Halloween so I couldn’t grind for them back then. So I’m by all means entitled to those skins.

I really didn’t like this skill on the greatsword. Using it felt like a waste of time even when you could hit several opponents.
It’s slow to activate, feels wonky when it activates and the payoff is insignificant. 12% Life Force and 12 Vuln and like 2k~ damage at best. I feel like it should do something more, like inflict an additional condition or have some boonhate on it. It’s easily the skill on the GS that I liked the least anyway.

The iframes on the skill needs to be removed. It’s already doing a lot of damage on top of being unavoidable without blowing defensive cooldowns.

Bhawb.7408:

CttB which is meant to immediately and heavily swing a fight in your favor by stunning enemies for a long duration and then keeping them weak for quite a while after.

I’m not feeling it. In any large fight you will end up getting hit with CCs or Blinds before you can get it off.

This elite just ain’t good. It just keeps letting me down.

I see no reason to ever take it over Golem/Plague.

meow one twenty.4376:

You guys are going to make me play everything.

Nothing is stopping you from doing that.

I did get 80k once but that screenshot didn’t get saved apparently

Krysard.1364:

Aktium.9506:

Krysard.1364:

I dont think this bug is exploitable, I prefer a full DS than a 3s free cast immunity :p

It wouldn’t be a problem if it put you back in DS after it ends though.

Or if it worked as intended :p

Woah lad, that’s asking a bit much there.

Krysard.1364:

I dont think this bug is exploitable, I prefer a full DS than a 3s free cast immunity :p

It wouldn’t be a problem if it put you back in DS after it ends though.

Congrats to Axelwarrior for winning.

ronpierce.2760:

They dealt with turret engines (once they admitted there was a problem) fairly quickly without removing Soldier and Sentinel amulets. Because that would have been silly. Same thing here. The answers are there, it’s not this big unexplainable anomaly.

I have very little faith in fast fixes. I’d rather assume the worst instead of hoping for the best.

ronpierce.2760:

Aktium.9506:

ronpierce.2760:

You’d just be deleting Ele out of the game and hurting diversity.

Somehow I’m completely alright with that prospect. Besides, they’ll still be crucial for WvW and PvE.

I should note though, for all your championing for diversity I’d say that since the recent ESL, the existance of Ele is more detrimental to diversity than the removal of Celestial Amulet would be. At least on EU servers.

Well that’s why I want the right thing nerfed. I’m not okay with leaving them alone, I just want it to be handled the right way the first time.

But proper changes take time, and a temporary removal of Celestial Amulet is a fast and easy solution until they can handle it right as you say. Rather than having us suffer through weeks of 3+ D/D Ele teams.

ronpierce.2760:

You’d just be deleting Ele out of the game and hurting diversity.

Somehow I’m completely alright with that prospect. Besides, they’ll still be crucial for WvW and PvE.

I should note though, for all your championing for diversity I’d say that since the recent ESL, the existance of Ele is more detrimental to diversity than the removal of Celestial Amulet would be. At least on EU servers.

ronpierce.2760:

Aktium.9506:

Speaking as a Necro main I am 100% for the removal of Celestial Amulet.

Losing our Cele Sig build is a small price to pay if the end goal is to tone down D/D Ele.

That’s just silly… The game doesn’t need to be fixed by creating more issues. Stat diversity is one of the biggest issues PVP has, it doesn’t need less. Just fix the kitten issues with D/D ele, it isn’t hard…

Fixing the core problems with D/D is a lot more complicated than just removing Cele Amulet. I’d settle for temporarily disabling Cele Amulet for a few months until HoT comes out and they can bundle the needed changes to Ele with the xpac.

Speaking as a Necro main I am 100% for the removal of Celestial Amulet.

Losing our Cele Sig build is a small price to pay if the end goal is to tone down D/D Ele.

Drop Lich for Plague m8.

Lich is pretty easy to deal with in teamfights and even 1v1s. A single Ele will make Lich pretty useless due to blinds. Add Thieves and Mesmer or multiple Eles and Lich often does very little. Oh and Engis Elexir X f5 too, though that is equally awful for Plague. You will get a a lot more mileage out of Plague.

Tao.1234:

Aktium.9506:

That’s a horrible way to see if someone is macroing. I can dodgejump indefinitely without fail with no macro usage.

Well, that depends no?
If you put a hard pressure on someone, I doubt he’ll have a time to [/b]focus[/b] on dodge jumping every single time.

But it requires little to no focus at all. Literally doesn’t matter whether you’re being attacked by a single guy running a bunker build or if you’re being jumped by a mes/thief stealth gank. It sure as hell doesn’t make it harder than jumping normally anyway.

Tao.1234:

GrandHaven.1052:

Out of curiosity. How do you determine if someone is macroing? I mean I know its a thing, but how do you know this? Or do you just suspect?

Pretty much if a guy is doing dodge jump all the time which in combat is impossible to do it every single time.

So let’s say, you 1v1 someone and he’s using dodge jump often(have energy sigil+vigor) then he’s using a macro with 90% chance – there can be someone to do 5 in a row luckily, but doing 8~12 is pretty much impossible and repeating it in every combat.

Hence, anet should fix that dodge jump thing.

That’s a horrible way to see if someone is macroing. I can dodgejump indefinitely without fail with no macro usage.