Guild Wars 2

Khalic.3561:

So it’s a question of risk vs reward, and it’s a question of limiting min-maxing.

It’s worth noting that trinkets also provide significantly higher non-percent stats than most pieces of armour. And though I don’t want to get into a debate about it, it is still worth mentioning the existence dire.

The point remains that they should have preserved the potential. The maximum amount of burst damage from a crit build was not at all unreasonable assuming that the player was actually glass. Or that they sacrificed some measure of their damage to gain some measure of survivability. Because of the distribution and ratio of ferocity the ceiling for all power builds is lowered.

There are a couple of parameters they had that you are forgetting.

1. Crit damage is a secondary stat, therefore any formula they use must work off of the secondary value on all gear.

2. Crit damage on trinkets was over-budget, so the amount provided by said trinkets had to be reduced.

3. Crit damage on armor/weapons was in the desired place already.

So, between #2 and #3, we have an issue. You can’t just shift some of the crit damage from the trinkets to the armor, because now the armor is over budget, even if the trinkets are now in the right spot. In addition, the armor/weapon crit damage stats had to line up pretty closely with Precision values on Zerker gear.

There is simply no way to satisfy all three issues without nerfing the maximum crit damage potential. As such, the overall damage nerf had to happen. Yes, this upsets players, but any change upsets players.

One thing you also likely missed is that, in the same Ready Up, they stated that Ferocity as a primary stat on gear is now a possibility. The time may come when your crits are even bigger than they are now, at the cost of smaller non-crits.

@Andar: Pretty sure the “Vast majority” doesn’t run Zerker gear. Yes, it is by far the best, and yes, the issue is due to enemy design. However, this change needed to be made regardless. Best to get it (the simplest of the likely changes) done and out of the way to see what kind of an impact it has while they work on the rest of their plan.

Ahh, I see the issue. You didn’t see the Ready Up when they announced that it was specifically those “hybrids” that they were aiming at, especially for WvW. People have been taking the Zerker trinkets and going pure Soldier for everything else because they got obscene crit damage for their tiny investment and still get to be tanky. The reduction on Zerker builds was also desirable as they aim toward making other gear types more relevant for PvE (this is the first step, not the only step).

Khalic.3561:

Black Box.9312:

Khalic.3561:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

The primary reason of the Ferocity change was bringing these in line. These weird imbalances between slots don’t exist in PvP, so nothing has to change there.

If that was the case then they would allow you to reach the same maximum amount of crit damage as before, but the amount per piece would be more uniform.

It was done to normalize critical damage and bring it in line with other stats. Being able to directly scale a percentage modifier made the game too vulnerable to power creep.

Such as boon duration or condi duration?

Boon and condi duration are very difficult to get on gear. Crit damage is not.

There is something you aren’t considering, though: Zerker and Assassin’s gear have three stats that multiply each other. A seemingly small increase in one can be significantly stronger than you would expect. Bunkers do not multiply in that way.

And only the amulet/rings/backpiece/trinkets are actually getting significantly nerfed. Other pieces of gear will result in nearly the same or even slightly higher crit damage (due to extra stats above the cutoff adding together) than before.

Breakdown of Ascended gear:
1-handed weapon
Pre-Ferocity: 5% crit damage
Post Ferocity: 67 Ferocity (4% crit damage, 7 points toward the next percentage)

2-handed weapon:
Pre-Ferocity: 10% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 134 Ferocity (8% crit damage, 14 points toward next percentage)

Helm:
Pre-Ferocity: 2% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 34 Ferocity (2% crit damage, 4 points toward next percentage)

Shoulders:
Pre-Ferocity: 2% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 25 Ferocity (1% crit damage, 10 points toward next percentage)

Chest:
Pre-Ferocity: 5% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 76 Ferocity (5% crit damage, 1 point toward next percentage)

Gloves:
Pre-Ferocity: 2% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 25 Ferocity (1% crit damage, 10 points toward next percentage)

Pants:
Pre-Ferocity: 4% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 50 Ferocity (3% crit damage, 5 points toward next percentage)

Boots:
Pre-Ferocity: 2% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 25 Ferocity (1% crit damage, 10 points toward next percentage)

Amulet:
Pre-Ferocity: 9% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 85 Ferocity (5% crit damage, 10 points toward next percentage)

Ring:
Pre-Ferocity: 8% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 68 Ferocity (4% crit damage, 8 points toward next percentage)

Trinket:
Pre-Ferocity: 7% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 60 Ferocity (4% crit damage, 0 points toward next percentage)

Backpiece:
Pre-Ferocity: 5% crit damage
Post-Ferocity: 35 Ferocity (2% crit damage, 5 points toward next percentage)

Extra points add up to 85 Ferocity, which is another 5% crit damage with 10 points toward next percentage (from food, runes, or other buffs)

hooma.9642:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

hooma.9642:

yes auto on scepter is maybe less effective without dhuumfire but still hits like a truck over the time with condidmg and application of bleed. or u wanna tell me we should dodge grasping dead cause the 2 bleeds or feast of corrumption on a condimancer?

i also throw incendinary powder into the mix

i hope u realize unless some good skills there isnt much to dodge on condi-builds. but all the spammy thinks apply condis that kill u rapidly.

What you should dodge is dependant on the situation and your own build. Signet of Spite is always worth dodging/blocking, but perhaps you have an advantage and want to deny the necro life force. So, dodge Feast of Corruption. Are you getting kited around? Grasping Dead should be avoided, then. Afraid of a condition transfer? Better dodge that Deathly Swarm. Need your damage to stay up? avoid the Enfeebling Blood.

Yes, you can’t usually avoid all of it. You aren’t supposed to. That is where the player’s skill comes in: making decisions rapidly, and responding to what your opponent decides. If you could avoid everything, you just would. You aren’t making decisions then. This is true on power builds as well. Do you dodge the Arcing Shot, Pin Down, Backbreaker, Earthshaker? Do you block the Rapid Fire, Hunter’s Shot, or Barrage?

I am not commenting on Incindiary Powder because I feel it also needs a rework similar to Dhuumfire.

how i mentioned, some skills are worth to be dodged. but your little explanation should show u that u arent dodging any of the dmg-ones. it also shows besides these “big” skills the dmg portion comes in too small pieces to complete avoid it and sums up quickly. that the difference between condi-builds and power builds atm. its a race where the favour lies in condis.

What “damage ones” are you not dodging? Grasping Dead and Enfeebling Blood are the heavy-hitting skills. There are just other reasons to dodge each one than just avoiding the damage.

And please, in the future, use correct capatalization, grammer, punctuation, and spelling when trying to make a convincing argument. Otherwise you look like a high-school dropout posting on their phone.

Because necros had predicted the effect of Dhuumfire well before it was released. And we were right.

What BlackBeard is saying is that he did some research. It doesn’t take much to find out what he said. The rest is just logical extrapolation.

Khalic.3561:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

I said the primary reason, not the only reason. Because those particular pieces were so horrendously over-budget, it meant that the only way to bring it in line was to nerf the overall amount.

There are other reasons for the change to Ferocity as well.

By giving ferocity to crit damage a better ratio than 15->1% they could have allowed for a higher maximum.

They could have, but as I already said, those pieces were over-budget and horrendously so. This means the total crit damage was too high. Ergo, the total needed to get nerfed as well.

Sube Dai.8496:

Speaking from a power ranger’s perspective, I can easily deal with conditions. In a single build I run:

18k HP
EB
SoR
Healing Spring
Melandru Runes
Lemongrass

As you have alluded to however, the problem with this is that I don’t have enough damage to kill all other classes. In my case it is Guardians and Warriors. Every other class is fine but I don’t have the raw damage to beat the heavies. Obviously condition classes don’t have this problem.

I don’t see this as a problem with conditions necessarily, its a problem with power builds.

I see this actually as evidence of balance. You specced a bit more into dealing with conditions, so you have to lose out somewhere. In your case, it was damage that suffered. You still do all right against everyone else, but high armor targets are a weakness for you.

Every build has, and should have, weaknesses (though some have more than others).

Khalic.3561:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

The primary reason of the Ferocity change was bringing these in line. These weird imbalances between slots don’t exist in PvP, so nothing has to change there.

If that was the case then they would allow you to reach the same maximum amount of crit damage as before, but the amount per piece would be more uniform.

I said the primary reason, not the only reason. Because those particular pieces were so horrendously over-budget, it meant that the only way to bring it in line was to nerf the overall amount.

There are other reasons for the change to Ferocity as well.

Crit damage was over the top in WvW because of Ascended trinkets/amulets/rings/backpieces. The current stats have a very strong amount of crit damage for each slot.

For example, an Ascended Berserker amulet has the same crit damage as the ascended helm, shoulders, and chest armor combined. However, it only has 67% of the Power of those same three pieces, and Power is the primary stat!. An Ascended ring has the same crit damage as the legs and any two armor pieces (chest excluded) combined, again, despite having at most 73% of the Power stat of those same pieces.

The primary reason of the Ferocity change was bringing these in line. These weird imbalances between slots don’t exist in PvP, so nothing has to change there.

My advice for playing against condition builds is a bit strange. Unless you have a lot of vitality, play as though you were a Zerker build. Knights, Clerics, Berserkers, Rabid, Rampagers, etc. all go down equally fast to condition damage, but all of them (save Cleric, which stands the best chance of those I mentioned) can pump out damage faster than condition builds. Time is not your friend when facing condition damage, so you need to get in, do your thing, and get out, avoiding as much as you can in the process. In other words, typical Zerker playstyle.

hooma.9642:

yes auto on scepter is maybe less effective without dhuumfire but still hits like a truck over the time with condidmg and application of bleed. or u wanna tell me we should dodge grasping dead cause the 2 bleeds or feast of corrumption on a condimancer?

i also throw incendinary powder into the mix

i hope u realize unless some good skills there isnt much to dodge on condi-builds. but all the spammy thinks apply condis that kill u rapidly.

What you should dodge is dependant on the situation and your own build. Signet of Spite is always worth dodging/blocking, but perhaps you have an advantage and want to deny the necro life force. So, dodge Feast of Corruption. Are you getting kited around? Grasping Dead should be avoided, then. Afraid of a condition transfer? Better dodge that Deathly Swarm. Need your damage to stay up? avoid the Enfeebling Blood.

Yes, you can’t usually avoid all of it. You aren’t supposed to. That is where the player’s skill comes in: making decisions rapidly, and responding to what your opponent decides. If you could avoid everything, you just would. You aren’t making decisions then. This is true on power builds as well. Do you dodge the Arcing Shot, Pin Down, Backbreaker, Earthshaker? Do you block the Rapid Fire, Hunter’s Shot, or Barrage?

I am not commenting on Incindiary Powder because I feel it also needs a rework similar to Dhuumfire.

Still Rabid, Dire, or a Rabid/Dire mix. Barbed Precision still adds a lot of damage that isn’t immedietly obvious. Carrion is an option if you’re worried about DS eles or aren’t so confident about Berserker Stance Warriors.

Now, Sigils and Runes may be very much up in the air until we have more info.

They also need to edit bosses to have significantly fewer, if any, one-shot attacks that render all defensive gear worthless. When any hit kills you, regardless of what you build, you might as well go pure damage.

Brando.1374:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

hooma.9642:

oZii.2864:

hooma.9642:

funny how any one can argue for conditions, when just 1 normal spvp game can prove the opposite. funny how a condi-burst build can easily kill a bunker and dps class as soon the cleanses are on cooldown or some cc prevents them from using it.

Uhh not sure you know this but my guild has the top tPvP in NA and has for a while. They only run 1-2 condition classes usually engi (Five Guage) Ranger (Genyen).

uhh not sure you know this but my mind tells me u have none or you would stop posting the same stuff over and over.

Looking up the But of Corpse (all necro guild) on the leaderboards, I see that Brando.1374 is in the 90th percentile for TPvP. Brando and oZii are in the same guild.

So he knows exactly what he is talking about, as they are competing at the top 10% in team arenas. You, however, clearly do not.

I dont really spvp/tpvp. I play wvw which is where GF was created.

Strange that the leaderboards have you ranked so high in tPvP, then.
https://leaderboards.guildwars2.com/en/na/pvp/guild/But%20Of%20Corpse

hooma.9642:

oZii.2864:

hooma.9642:

funny how any one can argue for conditions, when just 1 normal spvp game can prove the opposite. funny how a condi-burst build can easily kill a bunker and dps class as soon the cleanses are on cooldown or some cc prevents them from using it.

Uhh not sure you know this but my guild has the top tPvP in NA and has for a while. They only run 1-2 condition classes usually engi (Five Guage) Ranger (Genyen).

uhh not sure you know this but my mind tells me u have none or you would stop posting the same stuff over and over.

Looking up the But of Corpse (all necro guild) on the leaderboards, I see that Brando.1374 is in the 90th percentile for TPvP. Brando and oZii are in the same guild.

So he knows exactly what he is talking about, as they are competing at the top 10% in team arenas. You, however, clearly do not.

hooma.9642:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

hooma.9642:

well it was all warriors.

1 video u bursted your condis in his shield stance or zerkerstance. and he was using anti condi-duration food and cleansing ire.

2 video was not using cleansing ire

3 video the poor guy eat all your fears and did the error not switching to longbow to cleanse

honestly u cant justify your broken application of conditions with a atm op build/trait and call that l2p. esp the 3 video shows you how broken conditions are. so damage OVER TIME should kill clearly so fast?

Wait, so you’re saying that in the one video, he got gasp out-played? And he lost pretty badly, even? Oh my gosh, who would have thought that you could beat someone by out-playing them?

And in the second and third videos, he also managed to out-play his opponents (pretty kitten the third one, even). He shouldn’t have been able to win those!

i dont call it outplayed bursting all the stuff in a blocking enemy or a warrior using zerkerstance. its more bad play on necroside.

You mean using the unblockable marks and Dark Path on a blocking enemy? The blocking barely even came into play, though it did stop a nicely predicted Doom.

As for using Zerker stance, it was being activated after Tainted Shackles to prevent the Torment and Immobilize, as well as more or less turn off any incoming attacks.

TLDR: The Warrior countered and out-played the supposedly OP condition Necro and, as a result, won at full health.

hooma.9642:

well it was all warriors.

1 video u bursted your condis in his shield stance or zerkerstance. and he was using anti condi-duration food and cleansing ire.

2 video was not using cleansing ire

3 video the poor guy eat all your fears and did the error not switching to longbow to cleanse

honestly u cant justify your broken application of conditions with a atm op build/trait and call that l2p. esp the 3 video shows you how broken conditions are. so damage OVER TIME should kill clearly so fast?

Wait, so you’re saying that in the one video, he got gasp out-played? And he lost pretty badly, even? Oh my gosh, who would have thought that you could beat someone by out-playing them?

And in the second and third videos, he also managed to out-play his opponents (pretty kitten the third one, even). He shouldn’t have been able to win those!

Vox Hollow.2736:

@Drarnor
Maybe I’m not reading you right, but, I’m not entirely sure where the disagreement is?

The way you presented it made it seem like you were saying “DoT’s are better because if someone runs behind cover, it’s still ticking and can kill” despite the fact a non-over time packet of damage would have already gotten the kill, so the target didn’t even have the option of diving behind cover. Both kinds of attacks still need to land, after all.

Maybe I’m just misinterpreting things, but far too many people in these debates seem to think that “if Direct damage attack deals X, then Condition damage attack deals X+Y over so many seconds” when the reality is “Condition damage attack deals Z+Z+Z+Z+Z which adds up to X.” Heavily simplified, as the condition damage attack still usually deals less damage than the direct damage attack, but you catch my drift.

Perhaps ANet isn’t doing anything about it because Condition builds already do have to make the same sacrifices for that durability as power builds? I understand you seem incapable of running the math and realizing how hard the various skills (both power and condition) actually hit with the different stat combos, but Soldier’s gear hits just as hard or harder as Dire.

Heck, even the Necro Scepter auto-attack, which has horrendous power scaling, deals more damage with Soldier’s gear than Dire on its auto attacks until you get at least +40% bleed duration and +25% poison duration (and that’s the break-even point).

Engies already have a necro’s ability to bleed stack.

I will say that while I feel Incindiary Powder needs to be changed to be more active and have counterplay, it should not be done like Dhuumfire where it is tied to just one skill. Perhaps make it something like “equipping a kit causes your next attack to cause burning” could work, since all condi spec engies use kits.

As Chaith said, burning on an engineer is very different from burning on a necro. Engineers have pretty good access to Burning while a necro’s sole access to the condition is through this trait (situationals like corrupting Aegis and a friendly VoJ aside).

I agree that the trait needs a change, much like Dhuumfire is getting. It needs to be more predictable for both parties and have counterplay associated with it.

Other than the “smaller tells,” I think you have it right, Tim.

Perhaps this should be the new advice to give to people struggling with condition builds: “Play like you’re a zerker spec, even if you aren’t.” Since very few folks build vitality, the defensive value of their gear is about equal, so they should use their active defenses as though they were glass cannons. At the same time, it pushes them to keeping engagements short, which is when condition builds are weakest.

I’m not sure I agree with you on your representation of DoT’s. They don’t hit people that run behind cover, they build up to the damage that they would have dealt if they were just a “damage” attack. Inherently, having a DoT tick on you after you run behind cover is no different than being hit with a normal attack before you duck behind cover. There are other factors that can play into this, such as the presence of healing ability (not all games that have DoT’s have easily accessible healing), or things like traps where their action is independent of the person who got hit. But, from a purely “getting hit causes your life to go down” perspective and cover? No difference at all.

Rampager is closer to Knights for condition builds than Zerker. The stat you want highest is not what the gear grants you and in both cases, it gives you a stat you could do without. A true “zerker” equivalent would be Condition Damage primary, Precision and Condition Duration secondary.

That said, anyone running such a set would die long before managing to kill anyone.

DeWolfe.2174:

You’re forgetting runes, sigils, and venoms. So it’s mash utilities, then 111111. Maybe tossing in a weapon swap at the start and including thieves guild for giggles. Which you can all macro together.

Ahhh, so what you’re saying is “if a thief uses most of their skills, they can use their auto-attack to do some work”. That’s a far cry from “1111111 and get kills”

Heimskarl Ashfiend.9582:

So guards, thieves and eles get less dodge and wars get 80% more than them?

Vitality is actually equal across all professions: everyone has a base of 916.

Health, however, is not. That Vitality only accounts for 9,160 health. The rest is base values.

DeWolfe.2174:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Conditions need to ignore armor and be able to be a primary damage source (for characters, not groups) in order to have a healthy competitive environment.

For example, a P/D thief can 1111111 and win most encounters already. How is that healthy or skillful? If power builds are getting toned down, then condition builds need to be toned down too.

I challenge you to find a P/D thief that spams 1 and wins a fight against a player. Video proof is required.

My guess? You won’t be able to find a single one.

DeWolfe.2174:

I would not like WvW to become a full condition meta. It’s already there in small groups.

Using conditions as group modifiers is one thing. Conditions as a main source of damage is completely different. If Conditions are going to become that strong, we need armor to reduce them.

If armor reduced condition damage, then pure Knights would be The Best Thing in WvW (or any form of PvP). Why? Because nothing would counter high armor. Conditions need to ignore armor and be able to be a primary damage source (for characters, not groups) in order to have a healthy competitive environment.

@naphack: try using a sword. That gives you condition cleanse (initiative-based, too!). Alternatively, Shadowstep in utilities. Or trait into Shadow arts. Or don’t get hit with the conditions in the first place.

Just as a head’s up, Renewing Blast (Life Blast heals allies) was announced to have a base value of ~800, scaling with healing power. If you thought it could be decent with half that base, now what do you think?

One thing that I personally find interesting is that, point for point, many condition-applying attacks actually scale better with power without additional condition duration.

For example, the necro scepter auto attack chain is .35, .35, .5 power coefficients. To get equal return from condition damage, the bleeds (scale at .05 condition damage/tick) would have to tick 7 times each and the poison (scales at .1 condition damage/tick) would have to tick five times per cycle. This requires +40% bleed duration and +25% poison duration (as it is 5 second base duration on bleeds, 4 seconds on poison), just to get equal scaling between condition damage and power on those attacks.

These values are based at 2600 armor (as are all tooltips).

Due to the rune and sigil changes…we really can’t be quite sure.

With the new grandmasters, do you see any new builds opening up for Necromancers? This can be in any area of play.

coglin.1867:

Signet of spite does not represent all condition damage across all professions. I can list you more skills with knockbacks, stuns, knock downs, blow outs, daze, and stun with as bad telegraphs. To sit here and claim only condition skills have specific attacks with poor telegraph is very poorly thought out and a display of extreme cherry picking.

Signet of Spite is also very well telegraphed. The signet image appears over the necro’s head during the entire cast.

I mean, I suppose that if you aren’t looking at the necro, you wouldn’t see it coming with time to dodge, but isn’t that true with every skill?

Shadowbane.7109:

The problem with that is that you have very diverse health pools in the game. 15k to 25k is a huge difference. By doing this condis would become even stronger because now one can spec into something else while retaining huge condi damage.
I belive the cap on health loss was 10 per second and the rest just blocked health regen.

20 health/second, and yes. Conditions in GW1 were little more than an annoyance, outside of Weakness, Blind, Daze, and Burning. I’d honestly hate going back to the days of static output on damaging conditions (though Foul Feast/Melandru’s Resiliance N/R were hilarios). Conditions there were not intended to be a damage source, just low pressure.

Guild Wars 2 changed two things that make this model no longer work: the addition of passive abilities (GW1 had none) and the removal of the Energy system. Low pressure worked in GW1 because people had to make a choice of not only when to use their condition removals, but also if removing them at all was worth the energy to do so. In GW2, that’s no longer a choice: you just use the condition removal. In addition, in GW1, there were no passive condition removals to worry about. Everything was active.

In addition, you did not have the issue of “glass cannon” or “bunker” specs. Everyone had equal amounts of health and your profession determined your armor. As such, “pressure” builds could use static values to work. In GW2, what’s “light perssuer” against a Warrior can be downright lethal to a thief or ele.

Why are you trying to dodge auto-attacks? They aren’t the bulk of the damage anyway. Dodge the Grasping Dead, Doom, Signet of Spite, Enfeebling Blood (definitely dodge the last two, or your dodging gets cut short), not the autos. Do you try and dodge Ranger Shortbow autos? What about Mesmer Greatsword? Thief Shortbow? Engineer Rifle? Warrior Axe? No? Then why are you blowing your dodges on necro/ele scepter autos and not on something that actually will hit hard.

So, lesson #1: you will be hit by attacks when facing a player. Pick the right ones to dodge.

I think the main point of the OP is that people time their reactions to conditions horridly. There are two times to react against a condition build: when the attack is actually being made (huh, just like power builds) and that sweet spot of when the condition removal will be most effective, yet still not leave you nearly dead.

I’ve actually taken to roaming as a power necro recently with my only condition removal being Consume Conditions (because let’s face it, it’s the only necro heal worth using as a roamer). I have only the base value of Vitality (all Knight’s gear), yet I never feel overwhelmed with conditions. In fact, the only fights I’ve lost to a condition build were extremely long and drawn out where I almost killed them in return. I do this with a single cleanse because I learned from my time playing as a condition necro exactly when that “sweet spot” is.

Mbelch.9028:

I’m sure my two favorite condition fans are in here, but I’m just popping in to say conditions, at least chill for eles, need some type of correction. In my opinion, reducing the duration would be fine.

Nah, Chill just needs to not affect attunement swapping, since that is an ele’s weapon swap.

Jayce.5632:

Any necro skill with a cast time requires you to set it up to have any hope at landing them on your target. Without stability you’ll, at best, probably have a 50% chance at successfully getting off a 1/4-1/2 sec cast skill. Signet of Spite has a 3/4 sec cast and must proceed a fear for the highest success rate. Usually after the enemy has burned their breaks, but mostly after they have burned their heal. There is however extremely rare cases in which Signet of Spite is used at the start of an encounter instead of being used as a finishing move.

Not many necro skills have a cast time less than 3/4 seconds. I think you meant 1 second to 1-1/4 seconds, as is the case for our heals, Spinal Shivers, and any elite but plague?

General deal remains, though. Doom is basically a prerequisite if we want a particular skill to land.

bobomb.5209:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

I’m not entirely sure I would classify Defiant Stance as a “high risk” heal (since you cannot take damage during it), but otherwise the person above me probably has it right.

It’s high risk because it has a 35 sec cooldown, 3 seconds of uptime, and big green numbers appear to the enemy telling them that they are healing you. If you just “use” it with no situational awareness you will have wasted a heal that doesn’t even last long to begin with and die in an instant.

Fair enough. Makes sense to me.

Renny.6571:

No one “ignores” condition removal in suggestion/complaint threads. In fact, condition removal is one of the most tried counter-arguments people make in those threads which are then replied to and so on. You just have to read past the opening post and the first reply to find such discussions. Second, I’d love to see a build that had the capacity to cleanse 2~4 bleeds+poison+burning (on crit), such is the case with necro scepter auto attack chain, consistently, on top of dealing with other skills and utilities like Signet of Spite.

Necro burning is being made a lot more predictable in the next patch, so there’s not much point in still using it in these arguments. Scepter auto still deals bleeds + poison, but that’s where the damage of the weapon comes from (to give you a hint, even with a zerker amulet in PvP, about half the total damage still comes from the 0 condition damage bleeds).

And I still have yet to figure out why people make such a huge deal out of Signet of Spite. It is by far the most telegraphed skill in the condition necro’s build, has a 1 minute cooldown, and usually adds one, maybe two conditions to cleanse (bleeds and poison are already on you, Blind gets removed with an auto attack, and you usually are crippled from Flesh Golem or Grasping Dead). You know it’s coming, so just save a dodge/block for it.

Flytrap.8075:

Anyone who thinks that conditions are in a bad spot has been playing too much PvE.

To be fair, PvE should also be a focus of balance. It is what the majority of players spend their time on, after all.

Rym.1469:

jportell.2197:

Ummm for those saying the critical damage nerf will kill pvp power builds it won’t. They aren’t changing crit damage there just pve/wvw

Next patch I lose 10% crit damage from trait stats (20% instead of 30%) and 5% from lose of jewel + some minor loss from runeset.
If you’re running full zerk amulet like Thieves, Mesmers etc. nowadays the feeocity change doesn’t affect you much since loss of stat is compensated in Zerk/crit dmg stat amulet. But if you’re running more balanced versions like mine, with Barb amulet+zerk jewel etc. you take a loss. In my case, about half of my crit damage

I believe all of the amulets (save Celestial) that have crit damage will have an amount of Feroicty to provide the same crit damage as before, plus 10% (to make up for the 10% lost from traits).

I’m not entirely sure I would classify Defiant Stance as a “high risk” heal (since you cannot take damage during it), but otherwise the person above me probably has it right.

Atherakhia.4086:

Put a cap on boon/condition duration (+40%).
Put a cap on boon/condition duration reduction (-40%).

1. Cap already exists (is +100%)
2. Suggestions kill support and control roles even more than they already are in PvE, which is where the concern is centralized for reducing Zerker DPS.

How the hell are you getting 567 damage/3 seconds? Each minion only attacks once in that time frame. Even accounting for double-hits of Bone Fiend and Bone Minions, that’s still all of 378 damage/3 seconds if someone was an idiot and stood there. Factoring in Blood Fiend pushes it up to 441 damage/3 seconds. Virtually any dodge will negate at least one minion’s round of attacks and just walking around negates Bone Minions (which truthfully only do one attack anyway, as they get blown up).

So yes, actual damage ouput of that trait only hits ~2k in the longest fights.

63 damage/hit is negligable Over the course of a long fight, that may add up to ~1k damage total, less if you’re kiting at all.

And yes, I did forget that Haunt and Rigor Mortis were made instant-cast. The change to Rigor Mortis was a significant buff (nobody uses Shadow Fiend because it means forgoing the Flesh Wurm stunbreak).

Still, the related traits are, in fact, getting nerfed soon. Training of the Master is getting a 5% nerf (to 25% increase instead of 30%) and Vampiric Master is getting a 10% reduction.

Correct. It only heals you if you run out of life force while channelling.

Rym.1469:

You can even outdamage Ranger’s pet rez if you poison the target with #2 DS without much issue.

Or Trident 3. I’ve seen that skill alone get 30 seconds of poison on targets with only base condition duration.