Guild Wars 2

While I do think phantasms need to be reworked and get their damage removed, I think this change is necessary anyway. Currently phantasms are our sustained damage. Do other classes have to wait 30s to get their sustained damage back when switching targets? So I think there is no balance problem with this suggestion. So phantasms should behave like minions/pets during combat, switching target whenever you switch target.

As for behaving like minions out of combat (i.e. staying alive and following you), that would possibly too strong because phantasms have high burst. So I would not go there first. This could still be possible if we wanted it, as long as we remove the damage as I suggested, or if we reduce the burst damage and increase the attack frequency, but that would have important balance implications.

• Most players stick with the “meta” builds, that is the ones played in pro league
• People complain that pro league is not a reference because they have different skill level and have coordination allowing babysitting
• Yet, only few come to the conclusions that in standard games you should simply NOT play the meta build.

The signet necro of pro league is glass cannon. It has no sustain, no active defense, nothing. On the other hand, it has great pressure and very strong boon corruption.

There are many ways to make a necro with a higher sustain, in particular through the use of shouts. Sure, you get lower pressure and utility, and that makes this build less interesting for pro league, but it is very self-reliant, and allows you to play with your favorite class without spending your time on respawn timer.

I know this opinion is controversial, but I think we should stop with the world linking and instead do a merge.

I am from AR, one of the smallest server around. Before the linking, WvW was pointless to me. There was not much people around at any time of day. WvW was really PvE, except when sometimes you meet a small enemy group and die.

The first linking was a huge transformation. We were now with YB, had always foes and friends around, and finally I could experience the real WvW, as it was meant. I started to follow great YB commanders and learned and enjoyed.

And then… it changed. We were linked again, and I had to start from scratch. I had to get to know the new servers, their guilds, the commanders, etc… Now we are back with YB, which is great, but for how long?

I want to be able to form a network with our ally server. I don’t want to be the small pion moved around to adjust numbers, I want to be part of a group, maybe even join guilds etc..

We need to merge servers, and let the communities form, else the small servers will keep losing members because we have no hope of getting anywhere. I understand that some people like their server and their communities and don’t want to lose their names, but this is all pointless. Soon you will have a larger community to feel part of, even if it is under a new name.

I hope my text made sense, and that arena net will consider merging the servers. Linking was a hot fix for population unbalance, not a long term solution.

My plan was to end tomorrow, but considering the very few votes so far, I will probably postpone.

Not a bad idea actually. We lose a bit of control (like not voting for self) but it may attract votes.
http://www.strawpoll.me/11519530

DuckDuckBOOM please recast your vote in this to keep updated.

We have all in all 1 vote so far. Please everyone give your opinion!

Ithilwen.1529:

You didn’t even mention the spec I put out in the voting :P

This is nothing personal, I focused on the elite spec suggestions that had a full concept (skills, traits, mechanics etc…). You had an overall idea but no details. I won’t prevent people from voting for you, but you do not appear on the list.

Ross Biddle.2367:

Silverkey.2078:

So, I can now close the contest. Here are the different contestants:

1. Zintrothen’s Siren
2. SaltAndLight’s Enchanter
3. thunderfall’s Prophet
4. Ghotistyx’s Magician
5. Keitaro Dragonheart’s Trickster
6. Menaka’s Nightmare
7. DuckDuckBOOM’s Wastrel’s Reaver
8. messiah’s deceptive mind
9. Xstein’s Dementalist
10. IonoI’s Twins
11. OriOri’s Mirage
12. Silverkey’s Enchanter

The votes are now open. You can either vote here or send me a message in-game if you prefer remaining anonymous

For those of you who submitted an elite spec, please do not vote for your own idea.

I don’t see Buton’s Butterfly Terminator in this list. It was the very first submission!

So easy to get overlooked with all the mindless spam in this thread…

I focused only on the detailed ideas. But you had a very solid concept, and I would not be surprised that a-net’s design will eventually reach something similar.

Forum bug…
/15char

Arkanthor.2307:

Oh kitten i got late; i wanted to post mine but seems I cannot anomre.
Can i post it even if I don t enter the competition or I better wait for other thread like this?

Well votes have started, so you are putting yourself at a (slight) disadvantage. But technically we are the 23rd, so, if you hurry, I can’t really refuse.

So, I can now close the contest. Here are the different contestants:

1. Zintrothen’s Siren
2. SaltAndLight’s Enchanter
3. thunderfall’s Prophet
4. Ghotistyx’s Magician
5. Keitaro Dragonheart’s Trickster
6. Menaka’s Nightmare
7. DuckDuckBOOM’s Wastrel’s Reaver
8. messiah’s deceptive mind
9. Xstein’s Dementalist
10. IonoI’s Twins
11. OriOri’s Mirage
12. Silverkey’s Enchanter
13. Arkanthor’s Virtuoso

The votes are now open. You can either vote here or send me a message in-game if you prefer remaining anonymous

For those of you who submitted an elite spec, please do not vote for your own idea.

I haven’t had time to work much on an idea, but I still wanted to present something, so here is the best I could do in the little time I had:

The enchanter
The enchanter uses the enemy strength against himself. It is a mobile support class, as opposed to mesmer/chronomancer who focuses on area support (wells/glamours). As opposed to the duelist that is mesmer/chronomancer, the enchanter excels when surrounded by multiple enemies. It is also a great healer.

The specialization is meant to work with my phantasm rework, meaning the mesmer has more damage but phantasms do not provide damage (but support).

Just a reminder: this is the last day to submit your ideas!

Sadly, in gw2, many elite skills don’t fill so elite… I think mesmer is a good example of what elite skills can be: a unique game changing skill.

Now, complaining about the elites is easy, but what suggestion do we have?

• Signet of Inspiration now copy the number of might stack currently on you instead of just one. I think that was what happened also with “we heal as one” for rangers when they added the boon copy functionality.
• Rune of chronomancer now give quickness to allies in the target area. The runes are dead with this patch, since the short personal stacks actually play against the new stacking limit and the new SoI design.

Any other suggestions?

Condi chronomancer killed mesmer for me… Still trying to like mesmers in other ways, but I just can’t PvP much with it right now.

I think mantras were initially designed to be charged BETWEEN fights. For example, mantra of pain is really meant as a burst, not a sustained damage.

Else, I’d like sword off-hand to be reworked to have more utilities (see my phantasm rework) like mobility and personal damage, staff and focus to have more support, torch to get the CC it lacks, etc…

You have to enter into the mind of a-net when it comes to necro balancing:

1. AA: life force + chill = utilities
2. whirl finisher
3. life force + vulnerability = utilities
4. blind = utility
5. CC = utility

To see how strong a-net thinks this weapon is, let us translate those utilities in “other classes language”:

• chill = gap closer
• life force = evades
• blind = block
• vulnerability = might

So if this translation was accurate, GS is as good in terms of utilities as the engineer hammer

1. might + vulnerability
2. whirl finisher + missile reflect
3. gap closer + evade
4. block + vuln
5. CC

Understand how a-net thinks to understand their surprising balance choices.

Levetty.1279:

Well looks like PvE Mesmers hopes now rest entirely on Mirage. A condi focused defensive based spec with a 1h weapon with no changes to phantasms or even a new phantasm skill…

kitten

PvE mesmer is still fine. Actually probably better since

• you can still share perma quickness
• you have more personal DPS.

I think the base HP difference is part of the reason why elementalist and thief are so hard to balance.

I am fine with having HP differences, the same way there is armor difference. But the armor difference is fairly small overall (about 15% between light and heavy armor), while the HP difference is huge (64% more HP for warrior compared to guardian). Balance would be much easier if this difference was reduced by half:

• Mesmer, Ranger, Engineer, Revenant: 15922
• Elementalist, Thief, Guardian: 13784 (instead of 11645)
• Necromancer, Warrior: 17567 (instead of 19212)

For the sake of consistency, you could also move engineer to the “high HP” category.

There would need some balances to make this work, but it is a healthier start imo.

PvE mesmer will still work. I’m just curious to know if WvW boonshare is still viable or if mesmers are back to being non-existing in WvW (outside of roaming).

Also, blurred frenzy buff in PvE, does it mean WvW too?

Yes, mesmer is not very flexible in its utilities overall in PvP. Blink is too good to pass, portal is required if you play in an organized group, so is Moa. so we have pretty much 1 free slot.

I feel that overall the problem of mesmer is that we have great utilities, but bad weapon skills. Many classes have utilities in their weapons, but we sort of don’t. We have one CC on each set, but

• no mobility (only sword 3 which is short-ranged, requires target, slow, unreliable)
• no healing
• very little support in general
• no condi cleanse

etc… So we have to put everything either on our traits or our utilities, and it just gets crowded fast.

In my rework I suggested:

• mobility on sword off-hand
• support and healing on focus/staff
• condi cleanse on staff, reliable cleansing bolts on focus
• some fire field/blast on torch.

Will these make blink less mandatory? Maybe not. But the sword off-hand would for example give a bit of the mobility/defense that blink currently provides, so maybe…

Crinn.7864:

Silverkey.2078:

I am still playing this build:

Sage shoutmancer
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBLhZ6kZTobTsdTwcTgeTs0NYTPgNWAIeBOB3gUfgRwhC-TpQWAB7WGAg9HAA

You have very low boon corruption overall, which is probably why it is not meta. But it is way more survivable than the meta build, which is great in soloq. Does enough damage to keep pressure and has some decent support. I typically run NCSY instead of Suffer if I don’t fear too much condi pressure but expect a lot of boons or blocks.

Because it does a bit of everything, I find it a decent carry build.

Yay, I’m not the only person that has looked at sage amulet.

I use a different variant.
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNArYWnMbC10glbCebC0biFvBjqDECKUTNgAQCIOBGBvgA-TpQWABAs/wulBAA

WoC is very useful and very underrated. Works extremely well for shutting down rezzes and getting people (especially DH) to GTFO the point.

I would love some added corruption, but you are doing it at the expense of a stunbreak! I just could not find any place in my utility bar for it…

Also, why do you use a healing power amulet but avoid the only traits which scale well with healing power (life from death and transfusion)?

I am still playing this build:

Sage shoutmancer
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBLhZ6kZTobTsdTwcTgeTs0NYTPgNWAIeBOB3gUfgRwhC-TpQWAB7WGAg9HAA

You have very low boon corruption overall, which is probably why it is not meta. But it is way more survivable than the meta build, which is great in soloq. Does enough damage to keep pressure and has some decent support. I typically run NCSY instead of Suffer if I don’t fear too much condi pressure but expect a lot of boons or blocks.

Because it does a bit of everything, I find it a decent carry build.

Less than 2 weeks left. Sadly I probably won’t have time to suggest my own
But please continue offering your suggestions!

stale.9785:

Folks, if we don’t fundamentally change Shroud, then power necro remains borked. Literally, our whole skillbar exists for no reason except to survive while we power up shroud.

That is a kitten poor design, right there.

I agree the shroud is the main source of our problems. But it is not completely awful, I don’t mind having it as a mechanics, but I would like to be able to choose to use the necro skills in a different context. That is why I think an elite specialization is a good way to address it. Give to this elite spec active defenses and remove the shroud HP bag. Easy! An example is the elite spec I suggested above.

While I sometimes think classes are doomed by design and need a major overhaul of their mechanics at the core level (for example mesmer and phantasms), I don’t think necro shroud is that bad.

OriOri.8724:

None of our mainhand only weapons produce a phantasm (though since we only have 2, I can see why you would think scepter was “unique” in that regard), so I really don’t see what you are trying to say here.

Maybe scepter feels unique because it actually has a burst damage skill which is not a phantasm. Sword’s damage is essentially the AA.

Zintrothen.1056:

I’d rather see concentration and expertise removed. They just make boon and condition builds unnecessarily strong, especially with conditions that are meant to be short lived, like confusion and especially torment. If you must keep those stats, you need to shorten the duration of the more powerful conditions. Confusion, torment, poison, and in some cases, bleeding and burning even have too much duration with expertise. And the only reason we don’t see the eternal boon builds we used to is because concentration only exists on two amulets that don’t have a single defensive stat. If they were on anything with either toughness, vitality or healing power, then boon builds would be better than ever, and their already strong. Same thing goes for condition builds that don’t use an expertise amulet. They’re already strong as is and adding to that strength is not going to help. Removing the option also doesn’t exactly help. So actually, don’t remove concentration and expertise. Just nerf conditions and boons…

For expertise, note that none of the amulets I suggest have both condition damage and expertise. The point is that conditions are really 2 different things:

• a source of damage
• a debuff, on par with boons

The amulets I suggest are the ones meant for builds using conditions as debuffs. Conditions can really be a form of support in a sense, and those amulets would allow that to happen. I suspect they won’t see too much use overall, but I can think of a few builds which could be interesting with them.

As for boons, I think we all agree boons got out of hand, but it is mainly because they evolved to something you don’t need to invest in. Allowing those amulets would also allow a general duration cut on most of the boon output. On the contrary, now having good boon output would be because you sacrificed something else (healing power, vitality, etc..).

• Simple fix: change phantasms to attack only once (being invulnerable during this time) before becoming “standard” clones and fix our personal damage accordingly.

• Less simple (but better?) fix: rework and remove damage from phantasms altogether like I suggest in my signature.

There are solutions, but a-net does not care too much.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

Those builds rely on the multiple hit attacks from critting more often where it wil beeat out berserker damage/burst, I know P/P and S/P thieves benefit the most from Assassins Amulet in pvp, especially since those builds run CS that allows for really big burst from Unload and Pistol Whip, and those builds have been seeing a rise in use lately.

Ok I think I get your point. Not really if you have multiple hits, since then you start to get statistics and berserker will beat assassin. But single big hits like backstab, yes, you would rather have reliable crits, even if they are slightly weaker. I guess that is why some thieves use rune of the daredevil.

BlaqueFyre.5678:

First thing Assassin fills a niche role that Beeserker doesn’t, it helps for builds that rely on multiple hit attacks I.e Unload, Pistol whip, hundred blades, Rapid fire and so on, these aren’t " meta"and don’t see much use but what you are suggesting kills what little diversity there is. Just because you find no use for it does not mean there is no use for it.

Yes they should introduce more amulets it will increase diversity

How does it help for those builds? Do you mean because on some on-crit effects? If you actually think the amulet is useful, then by all means keep it.

Josh Davis.6015:

Hi all,

I’d like to take a moment to address some of the concerns posted since last Friday regarding the possibility of solo/duo queue.

The poll we’ll be running this week will simply ask if we should trial a solo/duo queue system during season 5. Assuming the poll passes and Season 5 is solo/duo only, we’ll monitor feedback throughout the season and then run another poll at the end of S5 to ask folks if they’d like to see the change become permanent.

“But Josh, what about people that like to queue as premades, do guild missions, etc?” An overwhelming majority of players already play as solo/duo in leagues, but that doesn’t mean we’re not thinking about the groups and the guilds. That said, unranked arena will continue to accommodate roster sizes of up to 5. Guild missions will still be able to be completed in unranked arena. Assuming the post-season 5 permanence poll passes, we’ll evaluate the need for another environment where teams can compete (based on your feedback).

Hopefully that answers some of your questions!

Am I missing something or does this mean the guild challenger league will disappear?

I would like to discuss with you a list of amulets which you think should be added/removed to promote build diversity without making anything broken.

The rules of current balance seems to be that you cannot have both more than 2 non-offensive stats, always at least one offensive stat as a major, no toughness + healing power, etc..

First, a few obvious (I believe) changes about existing ones:

• Assassin is a worse version of berserker in all ways: it serves no purpose: remove it
• Barbarian, cavalier and knight would be decent if they had power as main.
• I don’t see the point of magi… but maybe someone can give me an example

Then, I would like a few more amulets with expertise and concentration:

• Commander: Power, Precision, Toughness, Concentration
• Diviner: Power, Concentration, Precision, Vitality (small change)
• Something: Power, Condition damage, Vitality, Concentration
• Something: Power, Precision, Ferocity, Expertise (similar to seeker)
• Something: Power, Precision, Toughness, Expertise (similar to commander)
• Vigilant: Power, Toughness, Concentration, Expertise (this one may not fit the rule which is why they removed it, but it is really far from OP)

Which other amulets would you like?

There are 2 problems. First, the 4-stats have more total stats. In the celestial times, net justified it because according to them, builds could not make use of all stats efficiently. But then the whole theory crafting was based around trying to find a build which uses all of the stats efficiently and you entered a celestial meta. Now it is the same again but even easier, because usually the extra stats added to the 4-stats amulets are toughness and/or vitality, which all builds can make use of.

The second problem is that stats do not all scale as well. You have the main stats:

• 1000 power is a 100% power damage increase
• 1000 condi is a 300% bleeding damage increase
• 1000 vitality is between about 50 and 100% vitality increase
• 1000 toughness is about 50% reduction from power

and then you have the secondary stats:

• 1000 precision is a 20% power damage increase if you have no ferocity.
• 1000 precision + 1000 ferocity is about 50% damage increase
• 1000 Healing power.. well it depends on too many things

So the key is that in general, the best amulets will be the ones combining as much as possible of the main stats. That is why Mercenary was broken, that is why marauder is better than berserker, that is why Paladin is so good. Even with a lesser total, those combine too good stats to pass. (this is arguably overly simplistic and neglects many things such as on-crit effects, power/condi ratio you can output, power/condi ratio of the enemy team, etc… but I think you get the point).

Silv.9207:

What’s the problem with powercreep?
I think that with that definition you mean “dps meta”, then what’s the problem?

No, I don’t mean DPS meta. Power creep is not only damage creeping, it is everything, the list being given above. You have an increasing amount of damage, only countered by a increasing amount of block/evades/heals. An increasing amount of CC is countered by a increasing amount of stability.

It is very much a “Red Queen’s race”: you have more of everything, so the balance is still respected. But the enjoyment has decreased because everything relies more and more on unfun mechanics.

The obvious proof to the power creep is the fact that the pre-HoT meta builds are now unviable. They didn’t receive a nerf, many even got buffed, but they were just absolutely outgunned by HoT stuff.

The people will always be unhappy about the game meta, but this one is the best we ever had.
7 classes totally viable plus a necro useful to boon corrupt and die and a elementalist able to be a really good bunker/supporter, still if everyone think it’s the worst class atm.
It’s seriously the best meta we ever had.

I said that before. The balance is the best it has been for a long time, maybe ever. That does not change the fact that pre-HoT meta was more fun by a large margin. In a sense, we now have a balance between 9 equally broken specs.

dustydawg.3105:

Silverkey.2078:

• CC spam + stability spam (engi, rev)

Yo when you say CC spam and only include Rev/Engi as the worst of your problems, than you might want to start paying attention to warriors (3 stuns), druid (2 cc’s or more depending), necro (2-3 fears depending on their rune), mesmer (chaos storm + 2 stuns from f3 given they are chrono condi), and thief (headshot spam, as well steal, as well as basalisk)

but yeah this game is trash, it has been since HoT, simple fix? remove HoT from pvp

xDDD

I referred to engi and rev for the stability spam. The CC spam is all over, and actually rev is almost a least offender (if you exclude staff #5)

I will try to bring my 2 cents here:

• boon spam + boon corruption spam (necro)
• CC spam + stability spam (engi, rev)
• evade spam, block spam, heal spam + condi2strong, power2strong
  this all is summarized by a simple concept: power creep. Yes, by adding spam of stability you counter CC spam and achieve “balance”, same for evade/block/heal countered by absurd power and condi damage. But this makes the game so much less enjoyable overall.

Class stacking is not a new problem, and I don’t think it is a problem on its own, the problem is that stacking classes using the exact same build should never been the optimal thing to win.

Yo-yo balance: technically gw2 PvP is well balanced, maybe more than it has ever been. Sure guardians currently wreck low and medium tiers, but high tier is at its best. The problem is again the power creep. This balance is just not an enjoyable one.

You forgot: abysmal build diversity. Here again, partly result of the power creep since you need HoT broken specs to work.

Finally, low and toxic population is in great part the result of all the above. So all the main gw2 problems can be summarized by “power creep”.

STOP AND REVERT THE POWERCREEP!

My overall understanding is that spirit watch is still not a favorite of the community. At the same time, many people are getting bored of all conquest maps ending up feeling similar. Finally, when it comes to watching especially, one of the big problem of gw2 conquest is the linearity, since the whole game is a never-ending fight for capture points.

So in general, I think it would be beneficial for the secondary mechanics to create different game phases.

Here is for example my suggestion for spirit watch (numbers can be changed):

• It starts as it currently does, with the conquest game
• At 12 min mark, all cap points are blanked and do not give points anymore. The points you own before the orb phase give you a bonus depending on the point (strength for wolf, defense for bear, speed for raven). After a few seconds, 2 orbs appear in the middle area but close to the respective spawn. Each of these orbs can only be taken by the respective team. They function very similarly to the current orbs (i.e. they disable your skills and offer new ones). Then it becomes a race to the mid point. If the orb is dropped, it can be taken again (by the same team only) after 3 seconds. The first team to score gets 50 points. The time limit is 1m30.
• Back to a conquest game, starting from the fully uncapped map.
• Orb phase again at 8 min and 4 min.

Overall, the benefit of this is to create clear game phases, with interesting strategical questions (split for the race between offense and defense). Plus the relay race it would create sounds fun to me.

In general, while this is just a suggestion I like the idea of the orb phase being separate from the conquest game (while still related) to create a unique dynamics. What do you think? What would be another way to make spirit watch more unique and enjoyable.

I feel like I keep advertising for my old posts, but using F1-F4 instead of a transformation was the key of my elite spec suggestion
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/New-ES-the-warlock-a-burst-and-DPS-spec/first#post6094838

If we keep the death shroud mechanics as it is, what I would suggest is:

1. Life blast changed to a channel beam (like staff AA of druid) with 3 hit on each auto every 1.5s or so. This allows DS to benefit from all the “shroud skill 1” traits as much as RS (RS is currently hitting faster and thus benefitting more). It also becomes more reliable than the stupid projectile we currently have, especially since we already have similar AA on staff and Lich Form.
2. skill 2 changed to a ground-targeted teleport and with shorter CD.
3. skill 3 could become a stunbreak (either by default or thanks to Foot in the Grave)
4. skill 4 slightly faster channel
5. skill 5 I don’t know about this one

Just a small note. This new mechanics does not work at all with all shroud traits. This is sadly one of the biggest difficulties in designing an elite spec

I did make another dark-themed ES some time ago:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/New-ES-the-warlock-a-burst-and-DPS-spec/first#post6094838

Oh, my bad. This shows my absolute lack of knowledge about fractals.

Fay.2357:

I’ll just quote myself from another thread on this exact topic that conveniently still happens to be on the front page of this forum.

Fay.2357:

You’re using the wrong aspect of the skill to avoid a stomp, and this is why the Mesmer downed state is more reliable than the thief downed state for avoiding stomps.

If you are stealthed when the stomp finishes, it will fail. Since the #2 skill stealths you, that is what you use to avoid the stomp. A simple teleport, like thief, can be countered with another chasing teleport mid-stomp. The only way to counter the Mesmer stealth is with reveal.

Therefor, the proper way to use the Mesmer downed state is to wait until the stomp has almost completed, then use the skill. You will stealth and the stomp will miss.

Well to be fair, this is very much a PvP advice. In PvE, the randomness of #2 makes it unreliable. So the situations is:

• it can be a way to get out of a bad AOE. But not reliably so.
• It can be a way to trick stupid AI by the clone generation and give you a bit of time.

Overall I would say this is not a skill you should necessarily use. In fractals, your hope is to get rezzed, and the teleport may put you in a worse situation (closer to the enemy or its AOE) and confuse your team more than the enemies. So use #2 only if you think it will help you which I think are mostly the 2 situations highlighted above.

If there is a condi focus, I see the axe as a melee cleave hybrid weapon, akin to Revenant mace. A ranged main-hand condi weapon makes no sense with Scepter and Staff already in our ar — senal.

messiah.1908:

i am doing nicely with powerblock condi mesmer if my group is okish

Well that is sort of the point. Having success in pug-PvP means you should be able to carry a team. I don’t feel like I can carry with power mesmer. As a matter of fact I was playing power shatter during the summer (though admittedly I didn’t play much during the summer) and had a lot of fun. But my team won if it was good and lost if it wasn’t. When I play other classes (even non meta builds like my support-condi shout reaper) I can lift a team on my own if I play well.

And the worst part… it is more than half a year of boring condi chrono meta. And thus more than half a year of me not playing mesmer.

It is a better trait when it comes to functionality (chill gives another condition instead of chill ticks damage on its own). The only thing is that the numbers may need adjustment.

I would argue though that condi reaper does not need buffs. Ideally, core necromancer, power necro/reaper should see a buff.

The game should be balanced for 1v1… and for 5v5. And for 3v3…

The idea is that every classes should be as good as any other in 1v1. And also every class as good as any others in 5v5. But not necessarily the same build/elite spec.

So the idea is that you should be able to build your toon for a more 1v1-centric fight or a more group fight build. Currently this is not really possible because of bad design. But I think it should be a balance goal.

Honestly, I am mostly curious about how broken this spec needs to be to keep with chronomancer.

I mean, in PvE, to have any chance to compete with chronomancer’s quickness/alacrity buffing (and considering it still has to work with 2 core specs and with the overall mesmer design), it will need to pack some serious punch!

In PvP, to make the shield unnecessary, it will need to give serious amount of defenses (blur?) or pretty good damage.

In WvW, the boonshare frontline also needs the shield for multiple reasons.

That is the problem with trying to fix all design problems at the elite spec level and saying elite specs are mutually exclusive: you have to fix the same problem with every new elite specs, over and over and over and over….

In my rework, I suggest merging well of darkness and well of power, since both are defensive… and underwhelming.
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/My-Necromancer-rework/first#post6348218

To some extent you could say “well those added mechanics come at the price of a minor trait” but let us be honest, they are usually much stronger than just that. And even DH and Reaper’s mechanics are in general straight upgrades to the core mechanics. Try to compare the amazing “1 aegis” of F3 for core guardian to the 5s block of DH. “oh but it’s not instant”… yeah huge tradeoff!

To expand on your suggestion, for example, for Mesmer/Chronomancer, I believe Continuum Split should have replaced distorsion since effectively it offers some sort of temporary immunity (weaker, but with the significant added benefit of resetting your cooldowns). Sadly this makes some trait/skill interaction messy (signet of illusion resetting Continuum Split? no thank you).