I want to bump this again, because I don’t think I can stress how cool I find these runes. They can really push a team fight your way, help keep you alive, and add instant pressure to people on a point.
They’re REALLY good for dealing with Diamond Skin (assuming the ele can’t get away from you and/or heal back up to >90% quickly) especially if there are multiple eles on the point!
[I… couldn’t find a more recent thread about this rune set, but I wanted to talk about it; this was the only thread to pop up on Google.]
I’ve been running a BM build lately in spvp, and stumbled onto these Mad King runes. What’s interesting is that they proc Vampiric and Vampiric Presence both for each of the 16 hits… on each of the 3 targets hit. This can be ~1300 damage to and ~1200 healing from each target hit by the attack. (Barbed Precision can also add ~1100 from the bleeds).
I’m not sure I like it more than Traveler’s yet, but it does make a CttB or Golem charge cause quite a bit of damage, and become a quasi-heal of ~3600.
Having Blood Bond require bleed procs that aren’t easily accessible without using sigils / expertise / a non-power weapon is bad enough. I really wouldn’t want the selfish Grandmaster trait to be condi-dmg-centric. The only way I’d be happy with Parasitic Contagion coming over to BM would be if it was increased to also include direct, power damage or have a more generic application mechanic (blighter’s boon for condis applied).
I’d also accept something like X stacks of any other condition become bleeds instead (since they don’t appear to be buffing bleed damage any time soon). If you reach X stacks, Y number of stacks are transferred/consumed/turned into Z seconds of Protection or Regeneration (and Regeneration heals you through Shroud). This would give healing or condi transfer, reduce condi damage taken, and help with the aforementioned Blood Bond universality issue. It also might be OP or not generic enough.
At this point, I’d take anything selfish that doesn’t require me to run a well; I’m running out of ridiculous ways to abuse Transfusion.
The lifesteal is pathetic. It was pathetic in beta and now it’s worse.
However, the Recharge reduction is good & technically this trait is best in slot for DPS.
The lifesteal on every hit of the GS was actually not awful with Death Spiral, just… everything else And that was when the CDR was still tied to Gravedigger, which was the worse side of the trait.
Just have the trait make gravedigger heal you for whatever damage it does, then it’ll actually be viable to cleave downed bodies or jump directly in the center of a fight.
Did I mention I don’t give a kitten about balance?
I figured. I was wondering if there was some sort of timing bug wherein you can get at least one tick out of Transfusion, and if it’s more present in DS builds (as I haven’t seen anything like that).
My kingdom for a selfish BM grandmaster trait for when I’m not running wells.
Just for the record – transfusion does nothing for you yourself. It’s your altruistic trait that with healing power can heal for obscene amounts, but you yourself are not healed by it.
Actually you’re wrong, if you are using regular death shroud, and you time transfusion before you leave death shroud, you will heal yourself.
I’m not seeing Transfusion work at all to heal me as I leave DS. Are you getting just one tick, or what?
2 Boons is fine as it is, but the vulnerability conversion seems pointless as Reapers are already the masters of inflicting it. The Instant Cast is a must though. It stays off my bar because of the Cast time.
The vuln works well for making the shout more bursty, helps with decimate defenses, etc. I actually prefer it to the random table, for what this shout is supposed to do (cast, cut someone’s head off through its shield).
I’ve been bouncing around between this and Well of Suffering. While I love NCSY for its countering nature, the cast time is rough, it doesn’t seem to last long enough to actually kill off things like heralds/mesmers who have access to something else they can use to then counter your NCSY, and it isn’t as strong as WoS in general use. Plus, the well is already unblockable and synergizes with Blood Magic grandmasters better.
What are you looking to do with the build? PvE? PvP? Alone? With a group? Out in the world? Dungeon? Raid? SPvP? WvW? All of those are important to take into account for what you want the build to be best at.
I was playing something similar to #2 a couple of days ago, and just got splattered by a couple of daredevils and a herald all night : ( Granted, I’m bad, but I just wasn’t sure how to survive through the burst.
It’s really the aftercast that shoots UB in the foot. If that were cleaned up so the cast time could start again more quickly, the ability would feel far better than if the cast time itself were reduced.
This beyond anything else. If my main attack in death shroud actually felt anywhere near as good as any of the skills in reaper shroud, I wouldn’t detest it so much. Path of Corruption is also just flat out gross compared to death’s charge.
You also hit the head when bringing up the combo system. Death’s Shroud brings in so, so many options to actually play off the system that base necro just doesn’t. And that’s with only a long whirl and a charge… :|
Giving up being able to actually stomp/revive with reliability through Infusing Terror makes my enjoyment of spvp take a huge, huge step back.
Playing with base necro makes me just want to play another profession entirely; it’s so full of holes.
You’re definitely not seeing it in top form unless you’re running healing power. It scales very well. Toss in Speed of Shadows and you can see a decent amount of self healing from flashing shroud.
Been spoiled with Reaper and can no longer function playing a core necromancer. Condi or power, Reaper just feels more superior.
This a million times over.
I’d still like a lot of things fixed so the class doesn’t feel so odd… (try explaining all the mechanics of any other profession to someone brand new, compared to Necro, see how that goes), but I’m really enjoying the feel of Reaper for the most part.
Pardon my ignorance – does this mean you’re wanting the build to revolve around dropping minions into a group of people/mobs and blowing them up / making death novas?
What really puts Reaper over the top, IMO, are the changes to Death Shroud.
This, so hard. RS is so much better designed than DS and actually supports both damage types (if not ranged play). Plus is just more fun… I traited Reaper as soon as I got Reaper Shroud and haven’t looked back.
Also, Chill to the Bone is a really good ult. I don’t find myself using Shouts very much as a Condi Reaper, but Chill to the Bone is a lot of damage, perfect when I don’t need the Flesh Golem to distract people.
Any time I feel like I’m going to just get hammered, I put on a Soldier’s amulet, Trooper/Soldier runes, all shouts -YSIM, axe + X, greatsword, and run around like a chicken with my head cut off while people beat on me. If you can hold onto the retaliation boon, and your teammates are at least pressing buttons while targeting your opponents, it can be a pretty fun experience! I feel really, really hard to bring down while also feeling like I contribute to the fight.
What’s unfortunate is that you never know when someone will actually ignore you, or you actively have to consistently take a tough-to-kill build or just avoid teamfights. : /
Spiteful Spirit has a 12s cooldown (though this should be 9 to account for shroud cd). The damage is definitely a bit lower (~170 with the zerker amulet I’m wearing right now) than Unholy Feast, but it’s also instant instead of having a cast time.
Weakening Shroud also does less damage than Enfeebling Blood (it’s also named something different, but is again – instant.
I think the most glaring difference is that Weakening Shroud has a whole ’nother effect attached to it – weakness on crit. Imagine if Spiteful Spirit corrupted a boon on crit?
All that being said, the damage coming out of the retaliation from Spiteful Spirit is actually quite a bit.
As for Focus becoming a condi – Sadly nope, because with chilling darkness you’re better off with the condi xfer AND the chill.
I haven’t been running curses, but I bet if someone is, that’s true! The duration of the chill on Spinal Shivers is so much that the damage from Deathly Chill makes it look like a lot! It’s just irrelevant if you have other sources of chill, and it’s not AoE : (
Fun stuff! Do you also have screencaps of the score screens after your matches? I’m definitely curious to see what builds and playstyles are putting up for metrics.
Hmm, there appears to be something up with this, actually. I’ll post some screenshots, but it looks like when I have 0 healing power, BB is giving more healing than the tooltip. When I have 1500, the tooltip is actually right on the money.
Also, you are correct – it doesn’t scale very well at all. It goes from 192 – 215 (0 – 1525 healing power, respectively).
I threw Sigil of Battle on Axe/Focus, but I don’t really like it. I thought I’d be cool and get 2% LF on swapping to that weapon, but that just isn’t much, and I’m really not that cool for doing it. I’ll need to look around at what else I might want with that weapon set.
If you’re running GS, you owe it to yourself to try the new Superior Sigil of Swiftness/Agility + that Sigil of Intelligence. It’s pretty amazing for helping to land Gravediggers.
Some condi Thief played me like a fiddle last night and it was infuriating because I was being an idiot in the 1v1, but I’ll be keeping an eye on how it performs under pressure.
The DDaredevil build is what made me start running Runes of the Trooper/Soldier with my shouts. Bleeding out before I could even affect that twirling sumkitten was
With DC finally being extra decent…. it pains to notice that terror and its supplement traits have completely seized being used
Even if I ever wanted to use it I could never justify picking it up instead of the other much more versatile traits it competes with
Yeeeeeeah, Death’s Charge’s cooldown makes Path of Corruption even better than it was before. Even Master of Corruption is quasi decent now with Corrosive Poison Cloud being as potentially powerful as it is.
I never really thought Terror did a lot of damage outside of putting a Spectral Wall up against someone trapped in a corner, and that’s even more glaring now.
One thing that’s helped quite a bit for getting off heals after RS is watching for the Infusing Terror stab pulse, seeing it pulse, casting Terrify, then dropping shroud and immediately healing. If I’ve got a chrono on me, I’ve found my best bet is to hope for an ooLoS spot.
And that was when the CDR was still tied to Gravedigger, which was the worse side of the trait.
