Guild Wars 2

Not at all, I think most of the changes you suggest are absolutely fine.

League has over 2,000 Challenger players Worldwide, nearly 4,000 Master, and 211,000 Diamond, and those represent just the top 2.14% of League players. However, the reason ANet is supporting the pro scene is because there was a pro scene before they got involved. It doesn’t meaningfully slow down their balance, except in rare cases where a patch might be pushed back a week or two, and if anything allows them to get better data on what balance is.

Now, sure the game will never be one of the big eSports unless they fix the many issues with PvP, but that doesn’t mean they should just leave the pro scene alone until then. If people are wanting to play, why not support it.

As long as mass condi removal remains condi-anything won’t see play. I do think Condi Reaper has some interesting play, especially with the really nice Terror-Deathly Chill(?) synergy, but it won’t be enough when you have 1-2 builds in every team that spam AOE removal.

Lily.1935:

And quite frankly there really isn’t a way it could.

There absolutely is, scaling LF generation. Hypothetical situation: if all of our LF generation abilities gained X% per target hit, they would scale linearly with how large the fight was, and accordingly how “dangerous” the situation was. This means you might gain 1% LF per hit 1v1, but Xv5, you gain 5% LF per hit, scaling up evenly with the number of enemies that can hurt you. This works with ICDs so long as they are per-attacker instead of global, and works on all multi-hit abilities, and even could work on traits like Soul Marks. This isn’t the entire picture, as we’d still need better counter-CC options in order to reliably keep up our offensive-defense, and we’d still need at least a few abilities that reflect/block/invuln in order to work in PvE and give us those chances to apply our “defense” even while being trained down.

There is nothing that actually stops our current mechanics from scaling except ANet’s fetish with ICDs and non-scaling LF generation, and lack of a few “necro” styled more traditional defensive options.

Few notes.

1: Blood Fiend is garbage, not worth taking, ever. Maybe after the spec changes, but not before, take Consume Conditions instead.

2: You are going “full” damage, but you have staff and axe. You will do basically no damage unless you are in DS with this setup. You need dagger, either drop staff and go D/WH A/D, or probably the better option and go D/WH and Staff, so you don’t lose the poison. All you lose by dropping axe is the 3 skill, which isn’t good enough to warrant not having Dagger’s immobilize chaining and damage/LF building

3: Shadow Fiend is kitten. I want to like the guy, but a 3 second activation time is awful. Flesh Wurm deals slightly higher DPS until Vampiric Master is involved, while being far more reliable at dealing it, and has a vastly superior active. Or, if you want the true yolo experience, bring Well of Corruption. I did this waaaaaaay back in the SOAC profession tournaments and kitten on a lot of people 1v1 and 2v1 with it, the damage is absolutely disgusting, and with dagger/bone fiend/tainted shackles you have like 11 seconds of chain immobilize.

4: For Runes go Pack. Boosts yours and the minions DPS, and probably go blood or leeching sigils.

Axe 2 is flat out bad, objectively, compared to every other similar skill.
Ghastly Claws takes 2.25 seconds to deliver 2.88 coefficients of damage, with the utility of 12% LF.
Whirling Wrath does the same damage on up to 5 targets, while also being a whirl finisher
Volley deals more damage at double the range and while being a projectile finisher
Rapid Fire deals significantly more damage, almost a full 1.0 coefficient more, at again double the range, while stacking vuln, and being a projectile finisher
Blurred Frenzy while being the only one to deal less damage, it gives Blur for the full effect
Hundred Blades good ol’ 100b of course roots you for the effect, while dealing almost double the damage of Ghastly Claws cleaving.

Every similar ability except for Blurred Frenzy deals more damage, most of them at similar or higher ranges, with better utility. And these aren’t necessarily on weapons that are considered good either, a lot of these weapons have problems of their own, and are still stronger than Axe. Ghastly Claws is absolutely in need of help, it just flat out doesn’t do enough.

Axe needs a bit better of an identity. It doesn’t know exactly what it wants to be, and besides the 3 skill does nothing well.

SoU + VP still has you losing 4% LF every 3 seconds. And still, never leaving DS isn’t exactly meaningful, the only build that would want to do that is glass zerker necro, which wouldn’t want to take SoU, and would be easy to burst out.

They regenerate health out of combat, and if you desummon/resummon them they’ll be resummoned at full HP. You can also heal them just like players using Regeneration (boon), Transfusion (trait), Well of Blood, or anything else like that.

And if you don’t need that, there’s axe.

Yeah, well I might as well do the changes lol. At least get it in order before specializations come up.

I have an account, and already posted on the discussion for that build a while ago, managing to fix it up from its previously mediocre state. The current build was changed from (I assume) the one that included my contributions, and frankly I don’t feel like arguing with whoever made that current abomination just to make sure my guide notes stay up.

Don’t use that build. I didn’t realize metabattle had kittened up their minion build that much, but that is just sad. This is what happens when you allow random people to “fix” builds.

spoj.9672:

What I find most surprising was that this many people used and cared about axe in the first place lol.

Axe might be a kitten weapon, but we also have staff, an equally kitten weapon in power builds. So when it comes down to battle of the least awful yeah Axe wins sometimes.

Reaper won’t backline as well due to melee vs ranged DS, plus I don’t see anything useful that Reaper would bring for them, while Spite/Blood Magic/Soul Reaping are pretty important lines for a backline Necro. I do think Reaper has the potential to be a frontliner, if shouts work out to be strong enough. The boon spam will make for some crazy sustain and tankiness, and the super short CD shouts or massive snare reduction can make for a good frontline, even if they don’t necessarily have the CC of the hammers.

No. Blinds really aren’t that big of an issue to me, normally, though they aren’t fun.

A longer duration with LC isn’t an issue on its own. A longer CC duration that also piles damage on top of other condis and forces you to stun break or die is a problem. LC really only has issues in combination with Terror, but that only matters as they are now. Changes to either could assuage that.

This is a bad idea.

1) Minions don’t bug out because of their actives, more actives just allows for more chances to try to “fix” their bugs by resetting aggro. They’ll still bug out.

2) Power creep.

3) This isn’t the kind of changes we need to minions. Its basically wasting time to indirectly only sort-of fix one problem while bringing up others.

Yeah the minion ideas were awful I just didn’t read through them on the first go-through.

Self-sacrifice would be a great elite specialization theme, but it doesn’t fit well as a core mechanic.

GW1 was a different game, there were a lot of ways to counter-act the self-sacrifice: dedicated healers, body-blocking, much more effective spacing mechanics, and some specific other things. A BiP Necro could easily stand as far back as possible, throw out a bunch of really strong buffs, and then be supported by a healer, while being far away from danger. It also worked because dedicated supports were something you could afford to run, and so one build doing nothing but sitting in the back buffing was fine, which we won’t see here.

And the only thing that can directly counter that kind of stability use is boon corruption that instantly turns the stability into an interrupt, hint hint wink wink.

I wouldn’t be getting too in depth on specifics (except as a point of discussion for balance) for HoT, it is a long ways and at least one big balance patch away.

In WvW the entire point of bringing a Necro is wells, without them we’re essentially crappy Rangers and Plague-bots. If you are talking roaming, I’d say bring spectral skills, probably Corrupt Boon, but it is much more open what you bring for roaming, pretty much anything that isn’t fully condi is fine.

The Necromancer will help the team by carrying it

The devs almost never directly interact, with anyone. You are more likely to hear a direct answer to prayer than get a forum conversation with a dev about balance.

I don’t think there is a good way to standardize boon removals. For example, Unholy Feast I’d actually really like for Swiftness to be high on the list because it has a doubling up effect, Aegis needs to be either first or last on the list depending on the skill, since some of them just flat out remove Aegis in addition to all the normal removals.

If anything, I’d separate it between flat out removals and corruptions, since they act differently. But still, certain skills want to remove different boons due to how they work, I don’t think making a single set for a whole profession will make everyone happy.

Rym.1469:

On the other hand, we have a lot of traits that are pretty mandatory to take. Terror. Last Gasp. Vital Persistence.

None of these should be baseline. Of them, only Terror is strictly speaking necessary, and that probably won’t be true after we have more ways to get condition damage, like Reaper, Dhuumfire’s change, and LC.

People seem to be confusing “mandatory” with “needed for X playstyle”. ANet was making traits like Blasting Staff, which are needed on a mechanical level to make staff worth using, baseling. This doesn’t include things like Terror, which are needed because of bad current balance.

Self-harm made sense in GW1 because it essentially gave you overpowered abilities in every other way, except that they hurt you. In GW2 we get mediocre to slightly strong abilities, that have a variety of meaningless to crippling effects on you.

Corruptions could work just fine, if they were strong and had strong but not overly debilitating self-harm.

Plague being a 20 second stationary effect is a massive nerf to its usefulness; if you want to make Plague worthless its a great way to do it though.

spoj.9672:

Lets not even suggest adding a self inflicting condition to plague please. Would rather not see another pointless nerf. CPC is already ruined because of that poor aspect of corruption skills.

5s of Slow, technically a corruption, actually does nothing.

All I can say is thank god we’re not in charge of balance. I agree with flow here, we don’t have much that needs to be made baseline except a slightly changed Soul Marks, but some minors need fixing with certain traits added there.

I’ll be going D/WH + GS most likely. Staff is still a garbage weapon even if it now has chill on the 5 skill, though with how awful Axe is now its really hard to compare how bad these two weapons are. It might actually be worth taking staff w/ Greater Marks to make up for the on-demand poison that I’ll be losing.

MrDreadful.7014:

To the point: for PvE is it still considered less effective to main an axe? I like the feel of it, but what I want foremost is to do the best for my group.

If you wanted to do the best for your group you wouldn’t be playing Necro, so the real question is if the difference from dagger (the better DPS Necro weapon) to axe is big enough to bother you, and the answer is probably yes since Axe is a garbage weapon pretty much universally until you compare it to staff.

Well skills are all ground targeted stationary effects. It is much easier to throw a condition on Plague though.

Increase how long it takes to get the reward track if it isn’t fair that you can avoid RNG, but have the right number of geodes at least.

striker.3704:

The reason I find Rise! to be looking so good, is that your other options as a minion master for that same slot (assuming all minion utilities) are bone minions and flesh wurm. Bone minions tend to be better for group fights when it comes to their burst damage, so (as far as the necromantic corruption build goes) Rise! competes directly for the same slot as a team fight utility. Bone minions also lose potency for this build as you lose death nova.

Wurm is absolutely necessary for all MM builds unless your plan is to never move from a single point. It not only provides reliable and good DPS and a projectile finisher (and at least used to ignore stealth), but allows you to quickly reposition both infight if you are getting trained down or between fights when someone tries to rotate.

Rise! will be worthless without DN, without that you get 5 minions with extremely pathetic AA damage. The extra little bit of condition removal in a NC build won’t make up for your loss of the burst damage of Bone Minions, and in a DN build you won’t want to lose the blast finish and on-demand poison potential. Rise! will only be used on condi MM builds using DN, otherwise it provides nothing special.

striker.3704:

CC pinballing is rather prevalent in any situation involving a guardian or 2+ opponents. I will agree that FitG helps with the same issue, however the rest of the traits don’t help the minion master keep an opponent locked down, which is very important for the build to function. This is why I believe reaper wins out in this situation.

It really isn’t a big deal, even when it happens. The only time CC chains are really an issue is when your minions are already dead, you’re in a 2v1 or 3v1, and are low on LF or other CDs. Otherwise it isn’t that big of a deal, all minion actives are instant cast, Flesh Wurm can not only bring me out of a stun but also prevent any incoming ones and reposition me far enough that no one bringing high CC can follow, and in small fights they’ll run out of CC eventually. Plus I can very easily save my dodges for CC, since you can absorb damage readily, even more so once we get better damage reduction and healing from the core specialization changes. The key to avoiding CC chains is to reply with your own, which base Necromancer will do much better at with Doom and Tainted Shackles, an instant cast or delayed-effect CC that will break enemy chains.

Reaper doesn’t bring any special CC. Anything it brings you will take only by giving up CC from core.

striker.3704:

To say that you ONLY fight 1 v 1 or 1 v 2 is silly to me, as the movement for maintaining that type of play typically calls for lots of swiftness and blinks for persistent rotation of points. Even then, your power houses for 1 v 1 fights are the shadow fiend, bone fiend, and flesh golem. The last utility slot doesn’t require a 1 on 1 minion, letting you cover your weaknesses with the last remaining utility slot.

Shadow Fiend isn’t used in standard MM builds, his active is so garbage its not worth taking him over Flesh Wurm who provides similar DPS but more reliably, with a projectile finisher, and a better active. And yes, you do need swiftness and blinks, which you easily pick up with Flesh Wurm and Locust Swarm. Swarm gets you the speed, Flesh Wurm gets you far enough away to use it. Even when I was really highly ranked in sPvP I was able to force enemies to 1v1/2v2 me by running to the third point, or allowing their 1v1er to come to me.

striker.3704:

immobilize (along with chill and cripple) aren’t gonna be a big issue to the necro himself with necromantic corruption, but they will slow down his minions tremendously. allowing them to get into range to hit the enemy player is rather important to a necromantic corruption build, so the reaper helps mitigate the only weakness necromantic corruption can give you.

Sure, its nice. But only 1 minion that stays around long in your standard MM build really cares about movement slowing. Otherwise, you are looking at Bone Fiend, ranged, Flesh Wurm, immune to all of those CC effects, and maybe Blood Fiend, also ranged. Bone Minions don’t stay around long enough to bother, and Shadow Fiend will only be used if Haunt is fixed, at which point a bit of CC isn’t that big of a deal. Also they just need to hit to get rid of their CC, and your big melee minions (Shadow/Golem) hit every 1.5 and 1.2s, more than capable of stripping CC effects if you set them up for it.

Reaper will be nice, absolutely, but not even remotely mandatory.

If SoV actually decreased all damage taken by 342 it would be incredibly strong.

Guessing Lich→Spectral, Plague→Corruption, also hoping they change how they work to not be transforms anymore but we’ll see on that.

You’re not going to find people who will agree on removal.

They never have before, I wouldn’t expect them to now.

November would be really late. Q3 (so July/August/September) is a much more likely release date set, unless stuff goes really badly. I’d expect the core specialization changes to come in June, maybe early July.

The effect persists into DS, and in fact can nearly nullify bursts, as it reduces direct damage you take to 33%, plus gives you 8% LF per hit (1s ICD), so you have to be getting hit for more than 24% of your LF per second to actually lose LF to damage.

striker.3704:

Well for minion master builds, it gives you access to two things that are very important:
-Rise! (condi removal for new necromantic corruption, mass jagged horrors for death nova, ect)
-A persistent stability that also AOE fears

The stability is most of all what’s important to minion master builds. Minion masters have no answer to CC pinballing. The flesh wurm is only a stun break and the vast majority of classes can simply leap to you as soon as you do it with whatever gap closer+stun they have. With the “shrouded in fear” ability, not only is it a REALLY STRONG way of preventing CC pinballing, but it also lets you force enemies off you if they all pile onto you. Both of these are things the current form of minion master sorely lacks without compromising his build.

On top of that, the relentless pursuit trait helps deal with immobilize spam, which is something else that greatly hinders the minion master.

In all honesty, I do believe reaper is strictly better for a minion master build. The rest, I guess, could be argued preference.

Rise!, unless heavily changed, will not be used in normal MM builds. It is a skill that gives very little effect compared to other MM skills unless you can hit 4-5 targets. Yet, MM is a build that desperately wants to avoid dealing with 4-5 targets, your entire build and playstyle tries to push you away from the very thing that will make the skill work.

CC pinballing isn’t an issue as MM. You are only fighting 1v1/1v2, and it is extremely rare you find someone who is able to CC you that much, and either way MM is now able to go FitG so that still isn’t a thing to force Reaper. Immobilize shouldn’t be a big deal either with the almost excessive condi removal Necromantic Corruption gives.

Pretty much all combinations of Spite, BM, SR, and Reaper will work, the only real requirement is that you have DM, outside of that they all offer something unique for the MM.

Or they are internally determining what to do, and won’t mention anything until they’ve figured it out and know what to do.

Balance healing and DS after our mechanics are made to work logically. Mechanics should always take priority, with balance coming in after the mechanics of a profession and build feel good.

Its not like Reaper has -33% movement speed, they walk just as fast as anyone else, and its not like base Necro has a bunch of extra movement effects.

If you need to learn how to fight with 100% LF then you need to learn how to play Necro. There is no reason to start a duel with 100% LF, if those are the kinds of “duels” you want you might as well roam and kill underlevels.

The point of a duel is to test your 1v1 ability, and get better as a player. If you just want to trash scrubs then roaming is for you, not dueling.

striker.3704:

-Minion masters (all types)
-power builds (all types)
-well builds
-blood magic builds

None of these are strictly true.

Let’s go with this. You have 167 HP giving you 100 LF, a 60% HP→LF conversion just like live. Now, with the base Soul Reaping changes, you now have 15% increased LF, for 115 LF, which means 167 HP gives you 115 LF, 115/167 = 69% of your HP is your LF pool. However, while you see 115 while in DS, whenever you get hit by direct damage you’ll take half the damage you “should”, so a hit for 100 will only take 50 LF away, making your effective LF against direct damage 230 since you’d have to take a hit of 230 to fully deplete your LF pool, which doubles your actual HP→LF scaling to 138%.

Aktium.9506:

What? But that’s almost double the current scaling. Why? When was this announced?

I mean I’m not complaining since it means you’ll be able to have 33k HP + 45k DS for kittens and giggles if that’s the case. But I fail to see the reasoning behind it.

Because the current scaling is basically a lie, you take half damage while in DS, meaning vitality is effectively double what it says. You would get technically 9% more vitality scaling according to the numbers, but 18% due to half damage taken.

Sigmoid.7082:

Thought the base was up by 15% then traits is another 15%. Compound effect would happen but you would only get an extra few % compared to now

9% by the numbers, 18% with how the LF actually works.