Guild Wars 2

Lightsbane.9012:

now that mesmer has more torment, maybe it’s time for necromancer to get some more? you know, the class it was originally meant for? tainted shackles just doesn’t cut it.

It wasn’t “meant” for Necromancer, it was first introduced on, and created using inspiration from, Necromancer. While I think torment could solve some issues, because right now Necromancers lack sustained pressure (and need nerfs to our random burst pressure), and if we want torment it should be addressed via that, not whining because someone else gets torment.

Yeah, PvE isn’t suddenly going to be taken over by condi-Mesmers, hate to burst that bubble but relying on condis for damage isn’t a good plan unless you are soloing.

LF itself doesn’t scale into teamfights, but any of our defensive mechanics which give us more benefits per player hit does. For example, Locust Swarm gives LF per hit, the more people you hit, the more it gives you, so in a way it scales into teamfights better than dagger auto, which will never give you more regardless of how many people are around. Same with healing via siphons, which currently scale into teamfights as well (exception being MM which really doesn’t get much scaling), and AoE conditions, which indirectly affect your defenses and are AoE.

So to answer your question, they should buff our defenses in these situations by buffing our AoE lifesteal, AoE defensive conditions, and AoE life force generation, and even potentially things like protection, all of which can scale into fights. I imagine they will do this by buffing our various sources of these things which currently underperform, which is essentially what they’ve been doing for everyone.

I’m confused I guess. It is simply impossible to play Necromancer efficiently without using DS. So, are you asking for a build that focuses on Death Shroud? Because in a generic sense, literally every build will use DS, at least to some extent.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Your concerns about Mesmer PU are laughable. /ignore thread and move on.

If Helseth has concerns about Mesmers being buffed, I will pretty much blindly believe him.

Nah, Necromancers have always been the gods of conditions. We have plenty of other issues that make us on the line between viable/unviable, but condi necro just flat out destroys condi builds in fights. Its similar to how S/D thief drives so many power builds out of the meta because of how easily they can counter them, condi necro pretty single handily drives out other condi builds.

Idk, I don’t mind the changes to mesmer. More torment coming out of mesmers means more conditions to throw back on them.

Uh… everyone seems to have made up stories as to what torment is.

It was going to be first introduced on Necromancers, with Necromancer community getting to pitch ideas, on a skill that was built around keeping people close. It was never promised to be Necromancer exclusive, it was never promised to be a mainly Necromancer condition, it was simply given to us first. The condition itself is just the confusion of movement; instead of punishing you for using skills it punishes you for moving.

And yeah, this is why feedback exists. I personally don’t think Mesmer is suddenly going to be gods of conditions (especially not if condi necro still exists to load them with so many conditions they won’t respawn until GW3), although whether the changes are healthy or not for everyone remains to be seen.

I doubt SWs will be buffed to matter, they don’t have very good build paths to do much, and the lack of an elite SW is massive. Minions are unlikely to be truly buffed as well, plus literally every MM I’ve ever run into even in the highest tiers of soloQ was absolute garbage and ran Blood Fiend, so I don’t think you have to worry about good MMs in PvP unless I decide to play more. At most MM will be indirectly buffed via weapon/trait changes, but even then the unreliability of the skills themselves and their clunkiness make them undesirable except for fun.

So, wouldn’t worry about those.

They have no more control over their summons than you have over your Spirit actives.

Its not like they’ve been having these previews for feedback for a long time. They’ve only done it 1-2 times before this, so yes having 2 examples is actually quite nice.

Drarnor is correct, I quoted the dev somewhere around here, but its confirmed.

Rym.1469:

With a slight exception of Confusion, though Of course if we don’t count Perplexity runes or Corruption.

That’s why he said those minions. They have projectile finishers (100% per attack) through the Wall = confusion.

There is absolutely no reason that we “need” mobility. Guardian has craptons of defense just fine without any mobility in their defensive sets, their mobility is all in their offensive setups, which have absolute garbage defense.

Or simply add new elites. New skills is the way to go, not introducing new weird mechanics that could be confusing to new players or reducing our already limited utility pool.

Staff needs to be reworked, really. Not have secondary effects like this added, but some kind of (even minor) rework, because it frankly lacks counterplay right now, and that not only is problematic for a healthy game, but means that the strength of marks have to be restricted.

Other than that these ideas just get incredibly strange. Why would staff have a bunch of transforms on its set? It makes no sense, it is a utility weapon.

Poplolita.2638:

Do you think anet will add torment to scepter?

They are adding torment to the mesmer scepter, but if they add it to ours it has to be on the 2 skill to make any sense.

Lich is NOT used because its autos hit for more per shot, although yes that helps. It is used because it boosts your crit chance and power by a massive amount, gives an otherwise fairly single target build a very strong piercing/cleaving auto, and to add range. This means everything power based is boosted significantly, and nearly everything crits. Chill of Death is now a massive burst tool, easily capable of allowing you to down nearly anyone from 50%, also Lich autos very easily hit multiple targets.

You use Lich for these few things:

1. Massive power/crit spike to boost procs (sigil/chill of death) and abilities you’ve already put out (wells/focus 4/etc.)
2. To allow a power build to truly deal “cleave” damage for teamfights, this is why a well used Lich will easily destroy an entire teamfight if allowed to
3. In PvE for when you need to ranged an encounter

Yes, just do the track a few times like Roe said and you will be just fine. As a side note, it is probably much faster if you do CoF 1+2 daily (120 tokens in maybe 30-45 minutes max) and then do the track for the rest of your play time, but if you don’t want to touch PvE you don’t have to.

Awesome, great to hear.

Wyrden.4713:

i think all 4 proffessions should be previewed tomorrow for the sake of fairness

They aren’t able to do that because it takes time for them to record and edit the previews, and they just didn’t have that time. I think this is a perfectly reasonable solution.

Josh Davis.6015:

The next Ready Up after tomorrow’s will actually be next week – we’re going two weeks back to back. This will give you ample time to sign-up ahead of time and request a roster change if you feel that it is necessary.

Josh Davis.6015:

The next Ready Up after tomorrow’s will actually be next week – we’re going two weeks back to back. This will give you ample time to sign-up ahead of time and request a roster change if you feel that it is necessary.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Because, as they stated, they want some feedback about the changes they’re making. Sometimes a change they’re making turns out to not be so good and the forums can come up with a better one that accomplishes the same goal. Letting us know what’s on the way, both builds up anticipation and helps them determine what makes for a better game.

This is why. Especially with such long downtimes between patches, its important that they get a chance for people to go WHOA WHOA WHOA, NO before a patch hits. Its worked in our favor before (Weakening Shroud), its worked in all player favor already with this pack (commander tags) so I think its reasonable to say. That isn’t to say they’ll suddenly hear a bit of feedback and by the time we hit patch day everything is different, but a simple number tweak here or there is perfectly reasonable, and something they could accomplish as a result of feedback, that will help us all.

The reality is they do listen to us. They’ve listened to us a whole lot. That doesn’t mean we ended up with better content (dhumbfire) but at the very least they read over the forums and other sources of communication, and consider things.

Stephapanda.5804:

Is this sarcasm? Because the necro downed state is a joke.

If he’s talking a pure 1v1 against a Necro, I could maybe see it happening. Necro can drop Fetid Ground when the ranger goes to res, and Necro heals while dealing damage. I still find it unlikely, because Necro downed is pretty garbage.

Josh Davis.6015:

I’m willing to entertain ideas/suggestions for the sign-ups and timing, but we can’t delay the first qualifier.

Would it be possible to release a text-based overview of what you would have done in the Necro/Guard previews on friday alongside the Ele/Mes changes? This would allow you guys to basically keep the same schedule for everything that is already going on, but also allow teams to have equal information for every profession.

Raven.9603:

they absolutely dont care about public forum feedback to proposed changes. the changes are set and the feedback for them is internal. they come to the forums to gauge long term balance issues and for future suggestions, not for last minute “did you guys want fries with that?” changes or requests.

They already changed the WvW commander tag part of the patch based on community feedback. While that isn’t balance, it shows they care. They’ve also done this before with Necromancers, on Weakening Shroud.

It also isn’t all about feedback. There are players that want to play in ToG. There is no way Necromancers are going to get on teams with the profession being how it is right now, without knowing what the changes are going to be. Its a huge liability.

Other classes do get that removal… they are transformations, and every single transformation works in the same way, it removes your skills and replaces them. Now, we happen to have 3 transformations, which I believe is the highest of anyone, but its not like we are uniquely harmed by it.

Its a balance thing. Lich Form simply could not be as insanely powerful if it also had access to heals/utility skills, because it would be able to cover its own counterplay. Plague couldn’t be the crazy defensive CD it is if you could also be using offensive abilities while using it.

I’d say this needs to at least be after the last preview. You’re essentially asking teams to figure out their roster when there is a known large patch coming, only they don’t even know what all the patch will change, and also there are the ToL teams who might want to mix up their roster, but can’t possibly do that right now.

Personally, I would say put it on the friday after the patch goes live (September 12th), this allows teams to see all of the changes, not just the previewed ones, it gives ToL teams a bit of time to change rosters, and it gives everyone a few days to play on the patch so they have some idea of the tournament environment they are going to play in.

They listen before and after, its not an either-or thing.

Dhuumfire was a player-requested change. Weakening Shroud, Terror, Reanimator/PotH, there are actually a lot of cases of them listening.

Black Scoutsman.5830:

LOL at the wishful thinking that makes you believe that they care about your feedback. These changes have been tested by them and they believe they are best, and nothing any general forum user has to say about it will matter.

The very reason I want them to have time for feedback is because they actually listen. There have been a lot of Necromancer changes that started off because of forum feedback, for better and worse. The reality is they do listen, and have listened before, which is why I’m so peeved about this.

I appreciate the public statement, and I’m happy to see that you split. Regardless of what other “eSports” deem appropriate, CoI is a massive issue, and just because some other people get away with it doesn’t mean its okay.

Neko.9021:

-________-

So let me get this straight, you guys had a set way the brackets would be seeded – some math magic about average top leaderboard rankings or whatever – and then based on the results of the ESL Weekly Cups, you decided to go ahead and just deviate from your original established system… just because?

Yeah… this lead to this issue really. This is why Riot was recently put under heavy pressure to make their seeding selection (for Worlds) public; not because people don’t trust Riot, but because it squashes all possible accusations and issues. I honestly am not sure why there was secrecy about this, we constantly criticize ANet for not being open with us… and then a player made organization does something very similar. The brackets should have been entirely random, or the process should have been 100% public, but surprises like this lead to issues.

Anyway, best of luck to Mistpedia, and I hope there are no issues going forward.

Eurantien.4632:

There is no way of telling that right now besides what weapons they are using… Isn’t that enough?

Except most players don’t coordinate their looks, so even if the first time you are slightly unsure, from that point on you can fairly easily visually tell which one is which build. Not that its a huge deal with weapons almost always being different, but it is something to consider.

Kain Francois.4328:

It’s a pretty tough decision to decide order.

Elementalits: This is an IMPORTANT thing. ANET wants to assure us Ele still has tricks even though FGS and Meteornado is being nerfed. They want to show it early so that guilds can prepare, both tactically and mentally.

Mesmers: Currently lower tier in PvE. Mesmers are hungry for changes.

Necros: Lowest tier in PvE. Hungry for changes, and more team support.

See, the obvious decision would be: why does anyone have to have no time for feedback. Why not have two weeks, or one, between the very last previews and the patch. That way no one has to worry about it. Also don’t plan a tournament in the middle of a big change preview.

Lily.1935:

Sure most of this wasn’t exactly what we were thinking, but it is what the devs thought would be the right move to move forward. So they do listen, just aren’t always the best at getting it right.

This is a good point. Anet does listen, sometimes too much. Which is part of why this is annoying, because with the timing they can’t listen, they have no time to.

Clip.6845:

Wait… what’s the advantage, doesn’t the audience want the best 2 teams to meet in finals?

A tournament organizer should not have a team of their own in the tournament. They should also not change seeding for no apparent reason other than to give their own team a free ride into the finals.

coglin.1867:

Your making a lot of claims here, such as claiming the necromancer is “one of the worst professions atm and in need of some of the largest changes” which is only an unsubstantiated opinion, but your are continuing to push it as your agenda, as if it will convince them to push the day of the updates back just you please you specifically.

Because we’ve seen so many Necromancers in the PvE tournaments right? Bunch of Necromancers were in that All-Star voting weren’t they? ToL completely being dominated by Necromancers comps?

Reality is the only place Necromancer is well off in is WvW zerging. This is an objective fact that can be seen by the desire to bring Necromancers into content, how much they are played, at what level, etc.

I’m not asking for them to buff us to insane levels, I’m only asking that we get the reasonable consideration that they said was the point of these previews. This was supposed to be about feedback, they have given no room for feedback.

Mark Katzbach.9084:

Guys, there’s no conspiracy regarding the order that these were done in. Karl and I both agreed that doing them alphabetically every time wasn’t really fair and settled on a somewhat random order. Every couple weeks, I ask Karl, “What 2 professions do you want to talk about this time?” he tells me and we record them.

There isn’t anything more behind the decision other than sometimes considering how long each profession might go on for so we don’t end up putting two together that are either very long or very short.

That’s fine, someone has to go last and that’s understandable. However, last place didn’t have to result in having no meaningful time for discussion. Last place didn’t have to occur weeks after the signups for the largest prize pool to ever grace GW2 play (at least as far as I’m aware). Last place could have just meant a slightly longer wait, but now it means no feedback at all, and an entire profession being fully screwed over because no one will want to take them with such a high risk of them still completely underperforming after changes that we known basically nothing about.

Lucentfir.7430:

Does it really matter what info is released first? One thing about these forums is it will never be pleased. If Anet decided to throw out necro changes this week people will still whine and cry how something wasn’t buffed or they deserve more than that, or changes aren’t going to do nothing GG, Or all the changes are useless to individual belief. So does it really matter at all when changes are going to be previewed? You’ll get the preview eventually so please be patient necro players instead of preaching and spewing out comments like “How can you live with yourself Anet?” “Anet doesn’t care about necros and only care about X class more.”

Would it matter if this wasn’t according to ANet themselves all about feedback? No. But the ENTIRE POINT of this balance thing, according to ANet, was to break it down so they could get feedback. You’re telling me 4 days is long enough for players to voice opinion, discuss, ANet to internally discuss as well, and then implement changes? Because it isn’t. So either they stop acting like this is at all about feedback, or they acknowledge they made a huge mistake by forcing two professions to have no chance of feedback.

Engineer was first, actually. Guardian will be last with us.

Lucentfir.7430:

ITT: Necromancer players sounding like impatient whiny children. TBH I’d rather have Guardian and Necro last, so Anet can actually listen to some possible suggestions on the class sub-forums before they even record what they’re going to do with the class. Aside from the short readable preview on the front page. As much as feedback goes, when was the last time you’ve seen the one thing not wanted on the class taken back and not being released, based on feedback?

Because months upon months upon months of feedback wasn’t enough? There are threads on a nearly daily basis that give feedback on what to change, I host a near-weekly podcast with an hour of content on what to change, reddit has info on what to change. At some point they need to tell us their plans so we can give them feedback.

Rym.1469:

I don’t think that if you provided some feedback on Ranger even month ago, it would change anything in upcoming patch.

They have everything set by now I think.

The entire point of splitting it into 4 shows was to give feedback. That’s also why they only preview some of the changes and not all of them. Now, if they don’t want feedback, just don’t ask for it and pretend like that’s what the goal is and then pull this.

Mark Katzbach.9084:

We’ll be covering mesmer and elementalist this week.

Basically, Necromancer is on the very last preview. Meaning, there is a whopping 4 days for us to give them feedback in change. Or, in more realistic terms, we are absolutely stuck with the changes they make for the next 6 months with no chance to give them feedback on how those changes might affect us. All this, despite the fact that we were voted highly in need of changes, and their track record of making highly questionable changes to the profession (or do we need to bring up Dumbfire again?).

Anet, you need to make better choices about stuff like this. I don’t care about being last, someone has to be, but you can’t give absolutely no time for feedback in addition to that.

So, Necromancer, one of the worst professions atm and in need of some of the largest changes… is being pushed off till the last possible week with absolutely no time to realistically give feedback on the changes. I just don’t see the logic in this, there is no way you can respond to any feedback given on the last two professions with this, and while I doubt its being done on purpose, it really gets the feel of “hope you like the changes because you’re stuck with them for 6 months”.

I understand if its too late, but this really needs to be done better next time. If you are going to do something like this, then why would you push a profession that was voted as one of the most in-need of changes till the very last second? In the future, give yourself more time.

And we have Flesh Wurm, SWalk, and gap closers ourselves. Not to mention bunker builds for Guardians which are good enough to tank aggro in a 5v5 teamfight have absolutely 0 mobility past some swiftness on staff. Mobility isn’t key to living through damage, and it makes no sense with our profession design.

You don’t need mobility to have survivability, see: guardians, who are our slow-as-molasses-in-the arctic-winter brothers and sisters. Literally all we need are slight improvements to our already existing mechanics, and more mechanics that scale into multiple player focus.

To put this in perspective, if they don’t clump them together, the last two professions to be covered will be done on September 5th, giving us just 4 days to give feedback and for them to respond. That just isn’t enough time.

If Lich was OP it would be seen in the highest tiers of PvP, which is where you see every single OP spec. Is it very strong? Yes, but its strength is balanced by the fact that it is so easy to counter. You can strafe side to side which makes the attacks miss, you can blind, you can remove boons + CC, you can burst it down, you can simply pop defensive CDs (a lot of professions can stall for most of lich’s duration), you can disengage and come back. There are a ton of ways to deal with it, it actually plays by the rules of risk vs reward that seem to have been forgotten by many other skills.

Could they potentially tone it down? I guess. But I think it is very reasonable as is. I would much rather see other elites actually feel like elites, like this skill does.

Thief didn’t, I highly doubt necro will.