Guild Wars 2

How about making Shrouded Removal 5pt or 15pt minor? would it be too much?

I do what Altroll does.
If you dont have a friend to practice go at the NPC in the mists. Its not much of a challenge but at least you can get familiar with the skills.

Pay attention to what the mesmer does, dodge at the right times and use #5 as an extra dodge.
For example, if they try a shatter and BF combo, use #5 and evade it all of it, or almost all of it.

When i was leveling i really liked the Staff+Axe/Warhorn or Dagger/Warhorn with damaging wells and Power-Precision gear. As for traits i took Greater Marks in Death Magic as soon as i could. I dont really remember what i took after that. Maybe i added some points in to the Spite trait line to get more power.

Run around gathering mobs and 1 or 2 wells, staff marks, DS 4 and any other AoE u may have. Finish of single mobs with either Dagger 1 or Axe 1 and 2.
Since LF builds quickly in PvE you ll be pretty durable even with full dps gear.

Another good way to level are minion builds. You are safer since they provide a distraction for enemies but i think you kill things a bit more slowly because u dont have that much AoE. As far as traits go take almost anything with ‘minion’ in the description. Lower cooldown, more life (Death Magic trait line) and more dmg (20 into Spite trait line) are very important.

I leveled up to lvl 50-55 with events and open world exploration and then used crafting and some CoF (Citadel of Flame dungeon) path 1 runs to get to 80 fast. Each crafting proffesion gives around 10 levels and some are cheap so you can afford them even with your first character.

Dungeons are probably not a good way to level since they are pretty slow and often hard for new players. Also avoid farming mobs, doing quests and events and exploring the world gives you more exp than just farming mobs.

Finally dont be afraid to buy gear from the Trading Post. Fine (blue) quality items are very cheap. If u want u can take some masterwork (green) items but i dont think its really worth it. Try to replace armor, weapons every 5 levels or so. Trinkets with the stats u want might not be available every 5 levels so you ll have to keep them for a bit longer.

Tobbygnome.6793:

I would rather it remove 1 Condition entering DS and 1 Condition leaving DS, that way you can control when you remove your conditions […]

I really like this idea.
+1

+1 Archaon

Nothing more to say

Hammerheart.1426:

Someone needs to address that most of the biggest proponents of the downed state are the veteran GW2 players.

Why? Because they have put the time into discovering the nuances and ideal combinations in order to exploit the glaring flaws of it in order to make it work in their favor. The possibility of removing it disrupts the status quo of the meta and risks dislodging them from the top.

This by no means makes it a good mechanic. It has been terrible since beta and continues to be terrible.

First of all.. top players will still be top players no matter the changes in the game simply because they figure out how to adapt to any change.

Also being a top player means among other things that he has figured out all the nuances of every aspect of a fight and knows how to react to each situation effectively. He doesnt have to exploit any flaws to stay on top.

Now the fact that downed state is terrible is simply your opinion and i could respect it if u provided a reasonable argument, but u didnt.

I m not even close to being a top player but i like the idea of the downed state. It has its flaws ofc and so does everything that is created by man. But it also adds something new that is at least interesting and can be improved.

+1 Konrad

Kugkug.8795:

basically you want people to sit there an be farmed by you because you love doing it. .

Basically i want people to stay and fight, not give up and leave after the other team wins the first fight at the middle and gets a 50 point headstart.

I m not asking people to stay in a match so unbalanced that is going to end 500-0 anyway. I m talking about matches that even in 4vs5 end with a score of 500-300 or so. Matches that would at least be interesting if they were 5v5.

In a game a few weeks ago someone went to destroy the enemy treb, got his a * * kicked by the mesmer manning it, got mad, called us noobs in chat and left… We lost with a score at around 400-450.

Also i dont think anyone in tournaments cares about farming… if someone wants to farm for whatever reason he can hop in a hot join, u get more glory and rank points there in my opinion.

I was experimenting with a minion build that has fetid consumption (minions draw 1 condition every 10 secs) without using CC and along with putrid mark it seemed to work fine. If u have your minions u can clear up to 5-6 conditions every 10 secs with seems pretty nice to me. Just an alternative.

It leads to a more passive condition removal which i think is a more friendly playstyle for new players.

I m in no way say saying that minion builds are stronger than others overall, i just think they are easier to play up to a decent point.

Anyway this is the build i used:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNBmODbkQrUvVzXjePBIpIaqnewN4hDpYXpB-TsAA2CtIcS5kzJjTSnsON+YFyGBA

I often changed items or traits though.
For example sometimes i used dagger instead of axe. And i often changed the off hand too and used a stack-on-kill sigil with it (sigil of summoning was fun for hotjoins but i never tried in in tpvp). When i used focus a also took spiteful talisman in spite.

Sorry, my bad…
I though u just wanted a more direct, personal and convinient way to talk to someone that forums cant provide.
Therefore i though u might be able to help EU players too

I think a good place to start would a be a minion necro with either soldier’s or knight’s amulet. Much of your damage will come from minions allowing you to focus more on staying alive.

I think u can send Altroll the message no matter where u are since last i checked (a couple of months ago) communication between NA and EU servers is possible.

Blood Red Arachnid posted while i was preparing some numbers too.

One thing to point out though is that if u can spam LB indefinitely u dont get only 4 stacks of might but can go up to 10-15 without any +boon duration. This makes the dmg increase even greater with infinite LB spam than what Blood described.

Ofc in reality u wont just spam staff AA while out of DS but even then there is a big difference.
I was trying to use an old spreadsheet i have to calculate the dmg u can do with different staff rotations and compare it to LB spam but it is very difficult to do so i decided not to post it.
It is not very accurate but LB spam with no might and vulnerability can do about 10-15% more dmg than a full mark rotation in a berserker build. And ofc the average staff dmg is lower than the mark rotation, since u have to fill in with the weaker staff AA.

I think it clear how big the difference can be…

Its disappointing how people can post things without even bothering to take a look at the numbers and also post things like “It is as if nobody actually plays the game”…

sas.6483:

It is as if nobody actually plays the game, in which we get chain CCed, our DS gets blown through in a few shots even in a bunker build, we don’t get enough life force fast enough to make up for that fact by the time our 10 second timer is up, and sooner rather than later we are dropped. But that doesn’t happen, because we are the attrition class, amirite?

You are describing PvP and as said before u need to consider how a change affects all aspects of the game.
Noone argues that this change is fine for PvP where there are counters. Its PvE where the imbalance can appear.

We need to stop thinking based on one aspect of the game and look at the bigger picture.

For example no degeneration on DS wihtout any other change can make DS OP in PvE where u can avoid all dmg and are able to stay in DS all the time stacking boons and doing a lot of dmg with LB. In PvP though people can burst you out of DS and therefore things can be more balanced.

On the other hand no degeneration and internal cd on might/vulnerability stacking or reduction on dmg form LB is fine for the long fights we have PvE, but its not as usefull in PvP where u need to stack boons fast and burst someone.

This is why i think there needs to be some sort of limit for the time spent in DS. Right now this limit is degeneration and i think thats a bad way to do it.

With degeneration removed a time limit can be added. This limit can be a fixed amount of time or perhaps time based on the LF u have when u enter DS.

Another solution would be to have a maximun numbers of allowed casts while in DS, similar to how elementalists conjured weapons work.

Then all the traits regarding DS and LB dmg can remain the same as they are now without making DS OP in one aspect but UP in another.

Ostricheggs.3742:

If a person goes down on your team your first priority should be to rez that person or somehow make it so that person gets up. If a person goes down on the enemy team then your first priority should be to either cleave the body to prevent a rez or get a stomp. A very large majority of people who play PvP don’t seem to understand this and it’s depressing.

Mastering how the downed state functions is one of the most important things in this entire game.

+1

People really need to undestand this.

But this is also where i d like to point out that some classes when downed can help their teammates res them a lot more that others. And this is where i see the imbalance.

When i play an ele i know i can mist and go behing my allies to get to a place with less AoE so that they can res me. As a warrior i have to hope that the one who is trying to stomp me has no clue of what hes doing and has no block, no stability and no invulnerabilty and therefore will be interrupted by me or an ally.

Ostricheggs.3742:

Also certain classes get better condis in their downed states vs others making condition damage or power damage more or less favorable for the downed state.

This also something important. Some classes/specs can be a threat in a teamfight dmg wise (eg thief) and cant be ignored while others can just be left there to die by life degeneration since they can do almost nothing (eg condition necros).

One thing u can do is place a flesh wurn somewhere on the map when u enter WvW and hope that the enemy group is not coming from that direction or that there isnt a cliff or other obstruction in that direction.

This way when u see them u can use the teleport (which no matter where u are will try to port u to that direction) and with some luck and a speed boost (swiftness or signet of the locust) u can create some distance and hope that they dont want to chase you.

Its much inferior to what other classes but u have to make do with what u have i guess and i dont see it changing anytime soon.

Also dont forget that jumping of a high cliff is the best escape move necros have in WvW…

Its interesting that u built a lot around might… i have no idea how well works but i like it

+60% fear duration is nice enough since it gives a good chance that fear will tick twice. i feel more comfortable having +70-80% fear duration but thats mostly a personal preference really.

What i think is some sort of a problem though is the use of staff.
Staff alone is unable to put significant presure on an enemy in my opinion and this is why u ll have to swap weapons constantly which is mandatory for the might stacks too. Therefore i m not really comfortable with using 3 traits for the staff alone.

As Mammoth said :

“It’s hard to justify taking staff mastery over reaper’s protection, or soul marks over foot in the grave, but this might be the build for it.”
and
" taking the last ten points in curses and picking up lingering curse…. "

As far as soul marks go i rarely feel i need more LF after the initial fight in a tournamet. Since i mostly get in DS for 1-2 sec max to get fury and stability, perhaps use Dark Path and/or Doom, and then get out. If u are carefull with positioning and dodge at the right times u ll rarely need to use it to absorb dmg anyway.

The corruption cd trait is also a nice option as Hexxen suggested. I think i d take this over hemophilia. Terror is a great trait in my opinion and its hard for me to play without it.

I now use a 0/30/10/0/30 build which i feel works great.

I think that it works quite similarly to the build u posted if u take BiP and change the runes and sigils to make it more might oriented so u might want to give it a try too and see how it goes.

Most eles will run away from you if u manage to presure them a lot.
For this reason i found that the more CC u have the better.

And i think this is the key as to why flow can kill eles “easily”.

Sigil of Paralyzation, Terror trait with Doom, reaper’s mark, golem charge, WH daze and Corrupt Boon can put a lot of presure on the enemy in a short amount of time which can lead to victory with a little luck and if used at the right time.

I was able to kill bunker eles with 20/30/20/0/0 and 0/30/10/0/30 or similar builds as long as i had these CCs available, but i would never say i could do it easily. This happened mostly in tPvP though where they had to stay and fight to keep the point for their team. In WvW they usually managed to use a cantrip or RTL to get away before i could finish them off.

The difference with the other classes u mention are the traits that could make Life Blast too strong. Imagine for example how powerfull it would be to gain 1 stack of might for 15+ seconds with your “auto-attack”.

Dont get me wrong, i hate the degeneration and i d like to see it removed, but i m afraid its not that simple to do it.

Perhaps the degeneration could be removed completely but we get a time limit on how long we can stay in DS to keep things balanced. I think a 10 sec duration per use would be reasonable in this case.

As a first step i d definitely like to see Life Blast doing the same dmg regardless of LF and the rate of degeneration reduced.

Indeed the system with tournament tickets was better in that aspect.

With this system though I think something as simple as ‘if u leave/are reported afk’:
-‘you cant participate in any tournament game for the next 15-20 mins’
or
-‘you get no rewards from your next tournament win’
or
-‘you cannot gain glory/rank points for the next X mins’
could help a bit.

War Mourner.5168:

That implies that the less than 1 sec universal CD doesn’t matter because you can’t poop out clones fast enough.

This is what i meant. If this wasnt clear then i m sorry.
If somehow u can create clones faster than that then i dont know what to say.

Dagins.5163:

Lyssas.1586
Right now you win solo against 2 or more opponents because you are more skilled than they are, and you have some stomping tricks like stability, stealth, shadowsteps, blinds, haste, or invulnerability.

What is wrong with it?
Would you rather faceroll them instead with your eyes closed?

Using these tricks is what i like about downed state and the reason i dont want it removed.

The problem is though that those tricks dont help at against some classes.
For example if u try to stomp an ele he will use mist form and there is nothing u can do to stop this. Thats 3 secs that work in favor of the downed player and his teamates. On the other hand all u need against a warrior or necro for example to secure a stomp is to use stability and perhaps even a simple blind could do the trick.

So u are saying that the universal cooldown of shatters is actually slowing down the rate at which u can shatter?
I m not saying it takes long to get more clones to use shatters, i m just saying that the universal cd in this case is so short thats is barely noticable.

Its been quite some time but i definitely remember getting chaos armor from spectral wall and putrid mark inside the spawn area in WvW whithout ever triggering the mark. I ll have to check again when i m able to log in the game. Wiki also states that it triggers twice. Perhaps its a bug and only some combos trigger?

i m not in favor of removing the downed skills completely, but i sure as hell want our downed abilities to be more balanced.
I agree 100% with terrahero on everything he said.

I totaly agree, a penalty for people who leave tpvp matches is mandatory.
Also there should be a “report afk” option in tournaments and if someone is found to be afk he should get the same penatly as if he left the game.

Cool
Thank you for your answer

I havent ever tried any build similar to yours but i m afraid u are trying to do too many things at once.

Your 500 condtition dmg and hemophilia wont help u since u cant stack many bleeds on a target with this setup and even if u could they would be weak.
Since u use wells i d take the ground targeted wells trait instead of hemophilia.

Vital persistence is not that great in my opinion either. U need to get in DS to soak up the dmg. Reducing the natural degeneration wont really help u in terms of survivability in my opinion. I think its more usefull if u want to stay in DS longer to cast Life Blast.

You are also focuing a lot on defensive stats on your gear which could be a good thing but u have to expect that many people will just run away since your dmg will be very low. Personally i hate to spend time getting someone to about 15-20% health only to see them use their escape skills and get away from me.

Also i dont think its worth to take retaliation on healing. I feel there are better traits u can take.

Target the weak is a good trait but i dont think u should build around that. For example lets assume u have 5 conditions on a target. That is an extra 10% dmg. Since u have 1.8k power u can get the same result by getting an extra 180 power which is quite easy. I think that if u want to get 25 into curses u might as well go up to 30 to get weakness on criticals. It helps a lot with survivability in my opinion and if u take the trait u can afford to focus on more offensive gear.

Finally i think that a build a bit more focused on offence (using knights gear, or a mix of soldier and berserker for example) would be more effective. U can still be quite tough to beat, but u ll also be able to do respectable damge.
20 in blood magic for the siphoning traits with knights gear and dagger/WH can work pretty nice since with locust swarm and dagger autoattack u ll deal many hits in a short time increasing the amount healed through siphoning. And with the high toughness u ll be pretty durable. Burning and confsion though will be among your greatest enemies.

This is what i use lately and i like it:

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/necromancer/?5.0|8.1c.h1.g.1c.h2|6.1c.h2|1n.a7.1n.a7.1n.a7.1n.a7.1n.a7.1n.a7|1i.67.1i.67.1i.67.1i.67.1i.67.1i.67|u6ac.k49.0.k25.0|39.7|3r.48.4c.4d.4g|e

You have to know which fights to pick and which to avoid though…

What vince said… 100% agree on keeping the cd on DS.
I dont think we need any change to the cd of DS. We just need DS to do a more efficient job at what it was meant to do. For example be allowed to get healed while in DS.

The 2 sec cd on attunement swap Rennoko mentions is the universal cd triggered for all attuenements.
And shatters also have a universal cd if i m not mistaken, but who cares? u wont have any clones to use them back to back anyway.
Both of these are bad comparisons to DS in my opinion anyway.

Also just learn to keep track of your cooldowns… its hard and i dont say i can do it yet but everyone has to do it for weapons swaps, kits and attunements. It jsut seems fair to me that we have to do it for the 3 DS abilities too.

Merlin Dyfed Avalon.5046:

Here have a blast finisher on a mark.. that an enemy has to activate.. lol..

The blast finisher activates twice on putrid mark. First when u lay the mark donw and a second time when the mark is activated.
Just though i should clarify this.

Since its been bumped i though i d ask…
Khalifa any changes in your build over the last few months that you d like to share?

Also what do u think about WH instead of dagger? I might have missed it, but i dont think u ever commented on that.

Reaper of grenth is not that bad since its not a transform and u can still use all your skills while its active.

Personaly i dont use it, but u might want to give it a try if u dont mind spending the skill points to get it…
Stacking a lot of poison and chill could perhaps come in handy and u can maintain your dps.

I agree spoj

I just think that if u level solo dagger off hand has its uses if u want to have more defence when u need it (agaisnt veterans for example). I agree its not usefull in any group PvE content for a power necro.

And focus is great for vulnerability stacking, but i dont think its a must have while you level up solo. Amazing and a must have for veterans and above though.

I m just focusing a lot on “leveling solo” simply because i assume that skinnybb is still leveling up.
If this isnt the case, then u can forget all i said.

Mepheles.2087:

Im sad to hear daggers aren’t so hot. I am leveling a dagger/Focus necro because I wanted a class that could use a dagger, but is rarely used by the class. XD

Dont be discouraged. Daggers are fine in general in my opinion. There are weak points in every build and every weapon combination.

Against mesmers for example daggers are weak, thats all…

I m glad singet of spite works for you

I either use spectral walk or flesh wurm instead of signet of spite. i just like to have a stun breaker in all my builds. And flesh wurn is amazing in some maps for ninja escapes

Have u tried dagger/dagger with quickenig thurst? i believe that the effects stack and that u get 25% speed boost. Might be usefull…

I like to use WH with my dagger. Since u are up close anyway u might as well take advantage of the AoE dmg from WH 5.
I prefer this for open world activities (quests, events, WvW) mostly for the swiftness.

All off hands are good options though…

Dagger is more defensive with blind & condition transfer and weakness
and focus has nice vulnerability and regeneration on skill 4 and the attack will bounce on you since u ll be close to the target. Focus 5 has a very long cast time and i think it is very situational in most PvE content.

i agree with ronpierce about gear, traits and weapon choices. only difference is i went for wells for aoe dmg… i just like to kills 5 or more mobs at the same time.

marks, WoS or WoC (or both), DS 4 and usually all mobs are dead.. if not use your dagger.

also make sure u replace all your gear every 5 levels or so. exception are trinkets becuase u wont find the stats u need every 5 levels so u ll want to keep them longer.

If this is your first char and money are an issue buy only fine (blue) quality items… they are very cheap, but they help a lot.

I ve been using a similar build lately…
In curses i have weakening shroud… dagger has great LF regeneration and i rarely feel i need more from reapers precision. And since u are using berserker amulet inflicting weakness on your target might help a lot with survivability.

Also i d swap out signet of spite. The power it gives is great (equivalent to 5 stacks of might) but i d rather take a defensive skill since with berserker u are squishy and u might need some extra defense if things go south. Perhaps a stun breaker…

Does the blind for rune of the flock work with chilling darkness?

I always found tab targeting to work better than clicking when facing mesmers, only in 1v1 situations ofc.

i ve never noticed the icon above the downed mesmer.. what does it look like?

i was not talking about boons, i was talking about food and buffs from items like sharpening stone.

I m not sure but i think that buffs and food only appear on the real mesmer…
if this is the case then it might help a bit at identifying the real one.

Also Azraeel when u down a mesmer and he uses skill 2, the second one to appear is the real one. And if u hit him while he is down instead of trying to stomp him u ll notice that the real one will also have lower health than the clone.

Best way to know how to tell the real mesmer and eventually know how and if u can beat one is to try the most popular specs for some time and notice the details of how they work. Going into spvp will help with that

Why do u have 15 in spite? the extra 50 power doesnt seem like much and the healing u get doesnt really benefit you u since vampiric traits dont scale with Healing Power.

I might be missing something but why dont you go 10 in spite and 20 in Blood Magic and take vampric precision since u seem to like this trait?

Loyo.8526:

Never noticed it follows them in stealth though.

Just to clarify… it doesnt follow them in stealth. It comes back to you and then chases the mesmer again once he appears.
Its similar to how it goes for the real mesmer when u down them and they use Deception

I agree that double duration would be too powerfull…
Especially in pvp (spvp and WvW) the 10 sec area denial alone would be too much.

i d rather they pulsed faster or did more with each pulse

depending on the map i either use WH or OH dagger.

WH above the keep in forest for example is not usefull, but its great in spirit watch were fights are not as static.

In the end its a matter of personal preference, but WH definetly has some great uses.

WoP combined with WoC wont ever happen… the result will be a skill much stronger than Null Field and i think we all can imagine where this will lead…

Having them convert all boons or all conditions at the first pulse would be great, but it wont happen either… Null Field was somewhat like that and it got nerfed. Also what use would corrupt boon be then since we could get a well to do the same job on a larger area?

I think reducing their cooldown is the best option…
Especially WoP and WoD should be brought down to 45 secs like the rest in my opinion.

Or perhaps if they could convert 2 boons/conditions on each pulse.

I guess if all wells were ground targeted by default and we got another trait in its place it would also help a lot…

In 1v1 situations most wells seem too weak, but if u manage to get 2 or 3 allies or enemies in a well then their usefullness is much clearer… how u are going to do that is another story though..

I wouldnt say that but u used the work “rookie” in the title and i though that u might find it usefull…

All hard CCs (stun, daze, knockdown, knockback etc) are removed when u use a skill which “breaks stun” nad we have 4 of them if i m not mistaken but they all have quit long cooldowns.

There are also soft CCs (chill, immobilize, cripple etc) that are conditions and u can remove them with any skill that removes conditions and we have plenty for that purpose

Finally fear is both a condition and a hard CC meaning u can remove it with “break stun” skills and condition remoavl skills.

I have a very hard time dealing with any good mesmer regardless of build and i still have a lot to learn but here is what i think helps in addition to what others said ofc…

Having the remove condition on DS trait (if it fits your build) can help get rid of the immobilize since illusionary leap has a 12 sec cd and therefore u ll probably be able to jump into DS every time the mesmer casts it as long as u have enough LF. i m not sure but i believe condition removal works in a LIFO way and therefore u ll be able to get rid of it most of the time.

Also more often than not they try to shatter and use blurred frenzy at the same time. Since illusions need some time to run up to you and explode a mesmer usually has to use his shatter right before he jumps in for blurred frenzy. Therefore when u see illusions coming to you dodge, or use any kingd of CC (WH daze has a pretty big area of effect and should not be underestimated)

Using the golem as elite helps in my opinion, and not only for the charge.If u manage to target the real mesmer once the golem with follow him as long as u dont target any of his clones. Even if the mesmer sthealths the golem will pursue him as long as he re-appears which can be a big help if u are trying to identify him.

The problem is that shatter and non-shatter mesmers should be treated very differently and by the time u can identify what u are dealing with u are probably already in a very bad situation since they are all really strong…

In any way if u are alone and see a mesmer i d suggest u just run… hopefully u ll be able to get away…
Mesmers are in my opinion the best 1v1 class in the game and no matter how well u play they could always use moa (which if i m not mistaken can now be cast while moving) and ruin your day.

All condition specs are based on the same principles more or less, what affects the decision between carrion and rabid in my opinion is mostly whether u want to focus on pvp or pve.

To be honest if u focus on pvp i d suggest u forget all about numbers and try both and see which one feels better.

One of the reasons I prefer carrion is that it allows me to use plague signet to pull conditions from allies to myself thanks to the extra vitality.

Another reason is that burning, terror and confusion (which can stack very fast in the right builds) are all hard hitting conditions that can do a lot of dmg in a short duration and therefore you might not be able to get rid of them fast enough even with your numerous condtion removals. Again in this case the extra vitality helps.

You are right that effective power is effective power and it tends to average after long periods of time.

But my point was for when u use dagger for short periods of time and then move to axe.
Then having low crit change and high crit dmg is just “unreliable” since dagger might not provide the spike u want to get if u get unlucky with crits.

It matters very little in pve anyway since fights are long enough and things average out, i just often think in a more pvp oreinted way…

Sorry if there was any confusion