Guild Wars 2

raahk.2786:

People are thinking that thief underwater is weak. Are you kidding me? We’ve got one of the best underwater sets in the game, especially with spear. In between the endless block or evades with 3 or 5, or the constant vulnerability and yet another evade with two, or even a pull with four…Well, I’m sort of confused at how one could be complaining about what is practically the best underwater class in the game, especially when you factor the various utilities that thieves have access to.

If you’ve ever tried to kill something with Spear…

The #2 + #5 may give evades, but they do bugger all damage (#2 especially hates moving targets) doing less than just auto-attacking in the time it takes for the animations to finish.

The #3 requires enemies to attack you, and be in melee range (Not that common, especially since people shy away from melee underwater due to positioning and mobility issues)

The #4 has a very short range, meaning it’s practically melee (It also pulls you, knocking you down whilst doing nothing to the enemy whom has ~1 second of free time to either attack you or move away so you need to use it again)

Utilities a Thief can use underwater:

Signets
Venoms
Tricks

Signets being pretty terrible most of the time (I run 3 underwater though due to the lack of anything else worth while)

Venoms are only good in a venom orientated build, which is great if you play one but if you don’t you’re out of luck

Tricks have effects that are either unhelpful (Haste, considering how bad a lot of the attacks are underwater… The lack of dodges is also a hindrance) or on really high cooldowns (Roll for Initiative, Shadowstep, Haste)

Compared to other classes such as Necro:

1. Does high damage and provides vulnerability in an area
2. gives life siphoning in an area around you as well as swiftness
3. area pull enemies close (Synergises extremely well with #3 + #2)
4. similar pull that Thief gets just provides Bleeding instead of Cripple

Utilities a necro can use underwater
Minions (With 1 second shorter cast time)
Signets (Still not very good, but 1 second shorter cast time)
All but 1 Spectral skill
All but 1 Corruption skill (With lowered cast times)

I could go on about Elementalits masses of control underwater, Mesmers and their huge damage through mass confusion, Engineers with high burst damage, or even Warrior and Guardian’s high damage output with their weapons.

All other classes can still keep their survivability intact underwater (Necro’s still have DS, Mesmers have mass clones + Shatters, Ele’s have all their boons etc whilst Thieves lack any stealth underwater that isn’t Hide in Shadows which can be a big part of their defences)

Misery.9825:

Also, Taril, your ticks would end up doing more like 202+ with bleed at that condition damage as I’ve gotten 198 per tick from 3004 condition damage.

Bleed =
2.5 + (0.5 * Level) + (0.05 * Condition Damage)

42.5 + (0.05 * 3109)

42.5 + 155.45 = 197.95 (Rounded to 198)

3004 Condition damage should be 192.7 (Rounded to 193)

Spazza.6024:

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/necromancer/?5.0|b.1b.0.8.1b.0|0.0.0.0.0.0|1b.719.1b.719.1b.719.1b.719.1b.719.1b.719|2w.d18.2w.d12.3w.d18.2w.d12.3w.d18.2w.d12|0.u000.0.0.0|2w.d|0.0.0.0.0|e

from that website with best gear possible. 1904 condition damage with Consumables. Then add another +250 from stacks and 875 from might. Gives you a max of 3029

With another 30 into Death Magic and 10 into Blood Magic + Rabid Crests in weapons you’d get the highest possible of 1984 + 250 (Sigil of Corruption) + 875 (25 Might) = 3109 maximum condition damage.

This amount of Condition Damage would make Bleeds hit for 198 Damage per tick per stack and Poison would hit for 395 damage per tick. If Asura then access to confusion it would do 596 damage per stack per tick.

Unfortunately the downside to this is that you sacrifice Runes, Food and Traits and so have 0 Condition Duration to stack up lots of bleeds…

Dasorine.1964:

For a duration stacking condition its damage is just so minor to the point where if it wasn’t something that gets applied as a matter of course im sure most people would never use it, the only few real saving graces for it is how common it is, that it can be combo’d with stuff like lotus poison to gateway to something more useful or for those times where reducing the targets healing comes in handy or to buffer any other more damaging condition.

First off, I’m using 1500 as an “Average” amount of condition damage, as it’s about average for condition builds (Yes, full exotics. People actually use them when considering average DPS at level 80) 1800 being the high end of Condition damage requiring Ascended items (Over 2k is possible with Runes/Gear/Sigils combined with food + Tuning crystal).

Sure as a primarily D/D thief poison just looks to be a barely noticeable ticks of damage, but when it’s as strong as ~2 stacks of Bleeding and easy for various classes to keep high uptime on it does become strong.

In the case of Shortbow, you’re not going to be getting super high stacks of bleeds (Even with point blank CB spam) without heavy investment into bleed/condition duration. Yet with no condition duration a single Choking Gas shot can apply 20 seconds of poison onto 5 targets. Meaning you miss out on a cluster bomb (Direct damage won’t be too high if on a condition build) and get guaranteed high/perma poison on a target(s) which will roughly even out – About 1410 Bleed damage from 1 detonated Cluster Bomb compared to 4680 Poison damage from 1 Choking Gas.

Sebrent.3625:

There you go :-) I can get behind different symbols.
I’m not quite sure on the yellow swords vs red swords though. I’m confident I could tell the difference in at least 1/2 the cases, but I know others who could not.

Green Paw = Safe
Yellow Paw with a single sword in the middle = Combat
Red Paw with crossed swords = Danger

Possibly with the red paw also being 50% larger than other symbols.

misterdevious.6482:

Do we need a Paw Icon over our own pets to help see them in giant dynamic events, crazy dungeon fights, and zerg warfare? It seems to work with Commanders.

There could be a toggle button on the pet management window if you wanted to turn it off.

What could be interesting is if there was a Paw icon above pets that changed colour if they were in range for various attacks sort of a Green = Safe, Yellow = In range of Auto-Attacks and Red = In range of a big wind up 1-hit-kill type attack.

This would allow a platform for Pet dodging (Also easier use of Companion’s Defence) to be viable even in more chaotic scenarios as it would be clear to see when pets are in danger.

Another way to fall any height and not die:

1) Jump off a cliff
2) Enter Death Shroud
3) Land and walk away

Brassnautilus.2941:

You are using the setup (P/D) wrong Taril. This setup was based on the stealth producing concept, which you don’t take advantage of.

" times when you either need the stealth now and not after BP>HS or times when you don’t have enough initiative for BP>HS."
Why are you using init if you weren’t stealthing? HS spam?
You get the init return from producing stealth dude.

I do take advantage of the stealth. But only when it’s the right time for it, I don’t just mindlessly spam BP>HS>BS and hope to win using 3 buttons.

That playstyle is terrible, and won’t beat anyone whom can actually play the game at all (For example the other day I was 1v1 with a Ranger who wasn’t very good and yet would still dodge every backstab attempt I tried due to the predictability of the combo)

Initiative can be used up on:
Heartseeker on low health targets, to either apply pressure or to get to a target (Or finish someone off if they’re really low)
Shadow Shot (Does pretty decent damage now + Blind + Shadow Step)
Headshot to interrupt big attacks/heals so I won’t get smashed in the face
Black Powder > Heartseeker combo (Yes going stealth gives back init, but only 2 when the combo costs 9. That’s a net loss of 7 initiative)

To be honest, one could make the argument that 15 into Wilderness is highly beneficial.

The ability to give Protection to your pet on demand is pretty strong (Gives a way to keep your pet alive against the big hits as long as you have the energy to dodge and can see the attack coming)

When I level characters I usually just buy gear every 10-15 levels.

It usually doesn’t cost much (Maybe 1s per piece of gear at level 60+) and it’s not too vital to replace (A couple of my characters used level 30 gear up until levels 55-65)

As long as you can keep leveling in places that are suited to your ability (At level is generally fine, can go to lower level zones and still get decent exp. I personally take things at 5-8 levels above me (Yes even my level 65 character that was wearing level 30 gear)) you should be fine with armour you get from personal stories/drops/occasional bit bought from TP.

Well… Choking Gas + Lotus Poison (Deadly Arts 15) = Amazing.

As far as traits that would benefit it? A trait increasing the flight speed of Cluster Bomb would be amazing. Not only would it make CB effective at range, it’d increase the skill required to get maximum benefit from it (Less time for it to get from best time to detonate to hitting the ground)

Dasorine.1964:

And poison clouds only real redeeming feature is synergy with cluster for a aoe weakness combo, it deals no real damage even on condition builds and theres lots of sources of poison that actually deal initial damage also.

People really underestimate the damage that poison deals… With an average amount of condition damage it will do ~234 DPS. Combined with the fact that Choking Gas can apply it to multiple targets within an area that can be 1170+ DPS (The poison lasts for a decent amount of time and if targets move into/out of the field it can allow more than 5 targets to get poison applied to them)

Sure it’s not the 25 Bleed 2950 DPS (14750 DPS if on 5 targets) , but the 25 Bleeds can only really be done by D/D and in melee range (Even with the evade during the animation there’s time where you’re vulnerable to being insta-gibbed)

Brassnautilus.2941:

btw, shadow refuge at the expanse of infiltrator’s signet is a bad trade imo
using signet of shadow in wvw instead of ambush traps i can understand
we are d/p, we don’t need those lousy 1 click stealths. Stuns create the only dangerous situation for us, use every breakstun you’ve got.

I roll with Infiltrator’s Signet (Signet of Shadows in WvW), Blinding Powder and Shadow Refuge.

Infiltrator’s Signet is a stun break.
Blinding Powder can be used while crowd controlled (Stun, Knockdown, Daze) and causes a Blind + Stealth (Allows you to reposition unnoticed after the effect wears off)
Shadow Refuge is too invaluable and will never leave my utility bar.

I’ve never been chain CC’d to death, even by GC Hammer Warriors purely due to Blinding Powder.

Blinding Powder can also be used to extend Stealth as it doesn’t need to attack and can be used for instant stealth for times when you either need the stealth now and not after BP>HS or times when you don’t have enough initiative for BP>HS.

Brassnautilus.2941:

you are looking at shadow arts and acrobatics as pure defensive specs, but they really not.

I’m looking at Shadow Arts and Acrobatics as purely for initiative. The +2 init on stealth and the +2 init per 10 seconds really adds a lot to an encounter (More Shadow Shots, more BP>HS>BS combos)

The additional Toughness, Vitality and Dodges (Through Feline Grace) is just a side effect)

Brassnautilus.2941:

shadow’s rejuvenation and assasin’s reward don’t do well bringing you all the way up from bottom, but they are extremely consistent fillers. 1k here and there, before you knew it you’d be back to full pool, which gives you 5% crit chance from keen observer, a much more consistent bonus than fury or quickness from crit line.

Shadow’s Rejuvenation in my gear and build = 313 health per second (I stealth for about 2 seconds at most = 939 Health when I BP>HS>BS which isn’t that often as it’s a predictable and easily counterable way of attacking)

Assassin’s Reward = 76 Health per initiative spent = 228 for Heartseeker, 304 for Shadow Strike and 456 for Black Powder. Whilst it would add up over time I’d have to give up either 100 Power + Mug, 100 Precision + 10% crit damage + Initiative Proc chance on crit + 5% of Precision as Vitality (Valuable in Zerker gear) or my 2 Init per 10 seconds which doesn’t seem like a decent trade as with the amount of blinds and dodges I have I can avoid most damage and the burst can put someone on the defensive.

I don’t get Fury nor Quickness from the critical strikes line (I don’t know why everyone keeps assuming I do, even when I’ve listed which traits I’ve taken, I have the 7% crit chance when Flanking and the Precision/Vitality conversion) as it’s too unreliable to be of any use in my playstyle.

Brassnautilus.2941:

the 2 traits together also increase efficiency of your double/tripple/quad crossing bp tremendously. Without these traits, doing so only remove conditions, now you not only filling up at double speed, you’d be getting 12-14 stacks of might from that 4-5s of safety, which then goes directly to your backstab….

I don’t play perma-stealth Backstab or nothing build. I don’t sit in stealth for long periods of time, I don’t spam stealth and therefore don’t take the “X bonus in stealth” traits (Especially since they proc every 3 seconds and BP>HS lasts at most 3 seconds meaning to get the bonus you have to not Backstab and wait for stealth to wear off)

Brassnautilus.2941:

adding 10% dmg bonus from fluid strikes, it’s almost a net gain of heals when you max out shadow and acrobatics instead of traiting directly into critical strikes or deadly arts, and these damage bonuses are far more consistent than fury and quickness.

Offensive benefits from going an extra 10 points into SA and Acro = Occasional Might stack when stealthing (35 Power and condition damage per Might stack) + 10% damage when endurance is not full.

Offensive benefits from traiting into DA and Critical Strikes = 11 Seconds of Poison on Steal (Damage + Heal reduction), Steal does damage with a 1.5 coefficient (For comparison, Backstab from behind has a 1.6 coefficient), 200 Precision, 20% Critical Damage, 7% critical chance when flanking, 5% critical chance when above 90% health, chance on crit to gain initiative.

Most of these are static and controlled, the only ones that aren’t are the critical chance ones but with 56% base critical chance it’s not such a big deal.

Brassnautilus.2941:

Lastly, when you only have 10 pts to spend between deadly arts, critical strikes and trickery lines, getting critical strike 3 is the best option mathematically.

I don’t know, I kinda prefer the 100 Power, Poison and Damage on Steal as far as controlled burst rather than the 100 Precision, 10% critical damage and 20% damage on a target that’s below 50% health (You know, the point where HS already hits like a truck and a nice Backstab/Mug crit could finish a lot of people off)

If I was going to be doing mainly PvE then 30 into Critical Strikes would be far superior (20% more damage when below 50% health is much better when a target is below 50% for a lot longer rather than a few more hits) but for PvP and WvW the extra burst and control (Via -33% healing due to poison) tends to be better.

evilapprentice.6379:

So, either MwS doesn’t work correctly with BP->HS, or the wiki is incorrect.

Tested BP>HS in the Mists with a 0/0/0/0/0 build and the stealth lasts 3 seconds.

Meaning MwS doesn’t affect it (Also the wiki is correct).

evilapprentice.6379:

Is it possible that Leap Finisher->Smoke field stealth is only 2s base?
I’ve never run D/P without at least 15 points in SA, so I’m not sure.

According to http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Combo it’s 3 second base.

evilapprentice.6379:

you’ll see you get 4 ticks of healing from Shadow Rejuv (meaning 4s of stealth)

4 ticks would imply a 3 second stealth as you get a tick upon entering stealth.

Also looking at the stealth buff, the BP>HS gives me only 3 seconds with MwS (So it’s not my timing being thrown off by the immediate stealthing rather than the stealth upon hitting with CnD)

Brassnautilus.2941:

^^ you missing half the heals, that for mug and bit of fury isn’t necessarily a good bargain.

Where abouts am I missing heals?

Shadow Rejuvination? I’m not in stealth enough for it to tick very much (Especially since the main stealth I use is BP > HS so it doesn’t last very long (Doesn’t seem to benefit from Meld with Shadows) and I typically use Backstab shortly after)

Assassin’s Reward? Whilst it could be effective (BP > HS is very initiative heavy and with all the initiative regen I can spam off a lot of initiative nigh constantly) I’d lose out on something important (Quick Recovery if staying 20 into it, Mug/Opportunist + Practiced Tolerance if going 30 into Acro)

Pain Response? Very low uptime and situational clense… Not something that’d be hugely important.

Instead I roll with Sigil of Blood and use Dodges and Blind (Maybe even Rune of Vampirism procs if I decide that way) to negate and heal damage. I can also do a combination of Backstab + Mug to burst into people (Full zerker gear) to either outright kill them (GC’s and upleveled players) or put them on the defensive (Thus reducing damage inflicted on me)

I’ve just swapped to a 10/20/20/20/0 D/P build.

Mug/Side Strikes/Practiced Tolerance/Master of Deception/Infusion of Shadow/Fleet Shadow/Quick Recovery

Trying to maximise Initiative gain (Infusion of Shadow, Opportunist, Quick Recovery + Infiltrator’s Signet) whilst still having some on demand burst (Mug, Backstab, 20% crit damage from Critical Strikes traits) and some defence (Practiced Tolerance + Master of Deception)

Whilst Deception skills can be unecessary a lot of the time, I roll with Shadow Refuge and Blinding Powder. Shadow Refuge with lower cooldown can be used as a heal in combat and also an escape mechanism, Blinding Powder can be used while stunned and is amazing for survivability (Blind the next attack that comes after stun/knockdown and be in stealth after getting up to move away from a target)

Not decided whether to roll with Hide in Shadows + Ruby Orbs (For damaging condi removal + extra crit damage) or Withdraw + Vampirism runes (Withdraw being instant, short cooldown and working well with the ~950 damage + healing from Vampirism runes especially with the ease of access to stealth (Don’t need to hit a target with BP > HS)

Combat should be a mix of offensive abilities such as Shadow Shot + Auto’s with the ability to get some repeated Backstabs off if necessary (Along with Smoke field for blinds)

Mister Mustard.7203:

Also, I just want to make sure you understand that DPS and damage are not the same thing. I realize it may be splitting hairs, but when discussing relative power of weapons it is an important distinction to keep imo.

Precisely.

Although Necro’s dagger does pretty high Damage per hit, it’s rather slow in it’s attack speed. I’ll run some numbers for full zerker gear with 30 in power/crit damage (Ignoring the extra crit chance a Ranger would have due to Precision and Crit damage in the same tree) and also some Crit damage food + Sharpening stone:

Damage calculation = (Average weapon damage * Power * (Skill coefficient * (Crit coefficient * crit chance)) / Armor) / Attack Speed

Stats = 2400 Power, 50% crit chance, 118% critical damage.

Necro dagger #1:
953 * 2400 * (0.6 * 1.34) / 1800 = 1021
953 * 2400 * (0.4 * 1.34) / 1800 = 681
953 * 2400 * (0.8 * 1.34) / 1800 = 1362

That’s a total of 3064 damage in a chain, but it takes 2 seconds to complete the chain so 1532 DPS

Ranger Greatsword #1:
1048 * 2400 * (0.34 * 1.34) / 1800 = 636
1048 * 2400 * (0.34 * 1.34) / 1800 = 636
1048 * 2400 * (0.39 * 1.34) / 1800 = 730

That’s a total of 2002 but it takes 0.8 seconds to complete a chain so that’s 2502 DPS

Ranger Sword #1:
953 * 2400 * (0.4 * 1.34) / 1800 = 681
953 * 2400 * (0.4 * 1.34) / 1800 = 681
953 * 2400 * (0.47 * 1.34) / 1800 = 800

That’s a total of 2162 but it takes 0.6 seconds to complete a chain so that’s 3603 DPS

So while Necro’s hit pretty hard with their hits, they hit so slowly that it hampers their DPS (Not to mention the extra 200% DPS the Ranger weapons would get if they cleaved onto extra targets)

AirWick.1769:

If you seriously want melee then dagger auto attack chain is the strongest auto attack combo out of all the professions.

It’s actually not….

Does less DPS than even Rangers Greatsword (Which is known for it’s lack of damage, their Sword does 50% more DPS than it) and doesn’t even cleave. The only benefit is that it’s stronger than any other Necro weapon (Also DS, unless hitting multiples with piercing DS)

shimmerless.4560:

A good third of a Ranger’s damage (or more in some cases) is pocketed up in her pet. A petless Ranger would be horrendously kitten and if you buffed him to compensate you’d be terribly strong (because your pet would still be adding his damage).

Now you might say, “Well just give me some buffs for when the pet’s stowed to make up the difference”. At this point there’s no reason to ever take the pet out, and what’s worse is that you’re now playing a class that has nothing to set it apart from any other. Bows are not Ranger-exclusive (Warrior, Thief), nor are Traps (Thief), nor are pretty light clothing. Basically you can’t expect to be roleplaying as Link or Linkette from Hyrule because the class ambiguities in GW2 demand sharper focus.

1) I don’t think I mentioned giving 100% of your damage back from stowing the pet.

2) You’ll miss out on utility provided by pets, burst provided by pets, defence provided by pets and all the traits that affect pets and pet swapping by choosing to stow the pet.

3) I mentioned having thematic boosts based off pets to counter the “You’ll have no class mechanic with no pet” argument. Which could be stuff like Power/Precision boosts with Felines/Birds, Power/Vitality with Bears/Spiders etc. With unique F2 skills corresponding with pets you choose so you at least keep some relevance to pets and pet skills.

Arganthium.5638:

Meh. It’s nice on a ranger or a mes. From my experience w/ a thief, you can do a lot of damage with the harpoon gun. Either way, most combat takes place on land anyways so.

I actually like underwater combat on my Necromancer, it’s fluid and rather powerful (Weapon skills for Necro are pretty amazing and also every utility has it’s cast time reduced by ~1 second)

My thief though? Nope.
Cannot stand underwater on my thief…. “Oh you’re entire class’s survivability is based around stealth? Lets give you access to only one stealth while underwater!”… Ugh…

In WvWvW, if anyone jumps into the water (Even if they’re at like 5% health) I just leave them… Not worth it to try and put up with the awful underwater combat a thief has access to (Doesn’t help that I’m a condition + stealth build, meaning there’s no synergy with anything underwater)

Bas.7406:

@targuil, The problem with sigil of battle is it requires weapon swapping every ten seconds to be effective since I am in Death shroud that’s not possible. Plus over a period of time sigil of superior strength can surpass sigil of battle.

Since last patch there have been reports of leaving Death Shroud proccing “On Swap” sigils. I’ve not personally tested, but if true could make Sigil of Battle more usable (Depending on how long you’re in DS for)

Bas.7406:

@haley For sake of argument the Life blast has a ver short CD.

The delay between Life Blasts is enough to make a Life Blast cast once every 1.15 seconds. Not quite every one second, but the delay adds up when trying to stack Might and/or Vulnerability.

I don’t get the argument “I like pets” as a point against having optionally to not use one. Given the option, people who like pets can still use them whilst those that don’t (Or don’t want to put up with it for a specific event) could opt out of having their DPS dragged down by having a dead pet by their side due to AoE’s.

Ideally they’d improve pets to the point where it’s possible to keep them alive and it’s fun to play a ranger with a pet whilst also having the option to get rid of the pet and get a boost to damage (At the cost of “On pet swap” traits and utility/burst damage provided by a pet)

Thus keeping Rangers unique mechanic as pets without having to constantly use a pet (Petless boosts could be based off various pet families, giving unique F2 abilities along the same lines as some of the pet F2’s)

I’ve not had much problem with Abominations on any of my characters.

After figuring out what their version of Frenzy did (Other risen have a Frenzy with similar icon but different effects) I learned to focus them down as quickly as possible before they get stupid high stacks.

The fact that they can’t hit you if you kite them with some Cripple/Chill makes them still killable when at 25 stacks, provided you have enough room and a weapon set that can provide some ranged damage and some way of crippling (Most classes do)

I kind of wish that the Frenzy would dissipate if they’re not attacking for a while though, can be quite annoying to walk up to an event and face an abomination with 25 stacks (Through hitting NPC’s)

Have been thinking about various suggestions as well as how I’ve been finding pets and have came up with the following thoughts:

• Pet Dodge – While it sounds good at first, giving pets the same mechanic to avoid the big hits as players, in practice it wouldn’t have the intended effect due to needing to pay attention to positioning of the pet, every possible ability going their way, the dodge button and resource pets would use, causing it to be very difficult for the majority to do anything with.

• Passive pet boosts – These work in other games, giving pets bonus damage resistance and such but in this game which is designed around fast paced reflexive action it would just make the pets OP with the amount of damage they do and the fact they are AI controlled.

• Aegis/Protection for pets – These would work, but have the issue of being tied to your own dodging (Thus meaning your survival goes down to keep your pet up, no other class has to put themselves at similar risk to keep 40-50% of their damage)

• Alternatives solutions – Heavy reduction in the cooldown of pet-swaps (Especially the dead pet swaps) or ways to heal pets (Pet heal on evade/your crits/applying boons to allies etc) to bring them to life again (Or keep them from dying in the first place).
  – Rebalance of the pet/player DPS ratio to make the pet not as required (Possible petless builds?) or maybe even make the number rebalancing less OP

• Non directly pet survivability related thoughts
  – More synergy between pet and master, boons from various attacks, Thief style “Dual strike” abilities (Changing with pets/weapon sets)
  - Viable choice between single and multi-pet usage, allow single pets to be utilized through “Master’s Bond” type abilities at the expense of “On swap” abilities
  – Equipment for pets (Armour and such) either as cosmetic only (Gem store) or as a stat boost that can help mould pets to the players playstyle (Say if someone wanted to get some extra Vitality/Toughness onto their pet for dungeons or some Power/Precision in PvP for making the most out of what time their pets are on targets)
  - More control over pet skills, allow players to toggle auto-attacks of pet abilities or use them on demand. Also increase the fluidity of using them by making them instant-cast and usable whilst the pet is moving (Possibly will need to add leaps to some abilities so animations wouldn’t be broken with them)

Out of all the times I can remember, it’s saved my life once and that was because I was being chain CC’d by an engineer and couldn’t manually pop a stealth.

99.9999% of the time, it has killed me (Popped mid-CnD so I get revealed rather than stealth or popped while I’m still on the offensive and get revealed and can’t stealth when I wanted)

I really don’t like that trait, it’s so early into the tree and can be so detrimental…

So, the Cultural Tier 2 legs have some calf warmers from the ankles to just below the knees that clip through various boots (Including the Cultural Tier 3 ones)

Would be nice if the calf warmers could be hidden when wearing boots (Rather than shoes) since you won’t see them when wearing most boots (The boots cover up the calf warmers in most cases)

This particular aspect of the leggings makes little sense since the Tier 2 Boots cover the calf warmers up completely…

Anyhow, would be nice for at least the T3 boots interaction would be fixed as I wanting a mix of them, but the clipping is off putting…

ForAce.1943:

http://imageshack.us/a/img88/4185/gw220s.jpg
Somebody know what chestpiece is that?

Tactical Armor.

I think a bunch of ideas have been mentioned in this thread (Not read all of it, but most)

A good way of getting some platform ideas going would be to look at how other games implement the pet classes and how they work in both PvP and PvE content:

World of Warcraft:

• 90% Damage reduction from AoE
• High survivability for all pets
• Dedicated heal for pets
• On demand swap to 1 of 5 pets
• Pets do only about 20% of a Hunter/Warlocks DPS unless they are specced for Pet based combat (Where it becomes 50-60% of their DPS and pets get massive boosts)
• Pets scale from owners stats.
• Pet talents allow for insta-res when it dies, increase of armour, healing etc
• Pets have their own action bar that incorporates “Attack”, “Heel”, “Go Here” “Agressive (Attack anything hostile nearby)” “Defensive (Attack only when master is attacked” “Assist (Attack when master attacks/is attacked)” and “Passive (Don’t attack)” along with activated abilities used by pets (Can also macro them to place them on normal action bar)

Warhammer online

• Act closer to Necro minions (For Squig Herder at least) being able to explode/eat them for benefits
• Multiple pets to swap out to at will (For White Lions, their summon skill had a short cooldown)
• Had either “Tanky” pets or a stance that made pets tanky
• Pets had their own action bars that had their AI type on (Agressive, Defensive, Passive) and their activated abilities.
• Pets only did a portion of the overall DPS, only doing a large amount if specced into it (Only doing a large portion if specced into pets as a White Lion) and had the option of getting a flat 15% damage increase instead of the pet (Cost one Tactic slot)

While a lot of these wouldn’t work here, it’s something to start thinking about, such as the fact that in other games the pets do about 20-30% of the overall DPS unless specifically built around their damage whilst they also have more control over the pets in terms of positioning, how they behave and even what skills they use and if they auto-attack with them or use them only when activated.

Robert Hrouda.1327:

We tried giving them reduced damage from AOE/attacks, and it opened up other problems – mainly that a team of 2 rangers could take on almost any boss in a dungeon by smart swapping of pets and letting the pet take aggro. It’s unfortunate, but we can’t just increase and decrease numbers until pets are perfect – we’ve tried really hard, but numbers are not going to fix pets without letting them break everything. We have to look deeper into mechanics, AI, player actions, and skills.

Also, they don’t want to interfere with open world PvE (If pets tried to get behind targets, they’d cause huge issues in open world if they ever got aggro)

I’ve found that Guardians tend to give me the most trouble, as a P/D thief, I centre around a core premiss of “Whittle them down with bleeds” which kinda falls short when Guardians remove conditions so often and have continual regen.

That said, I’ve not really lost a fight against a guardian (I came close once, then he threw himself off a cliff. I guess he thought I had more left than I actually did)

There was this one Mesmer I couldn’t deal with though, a GS phantasm build that was focused around getting iZerkers out and staying in stealth through Decoy and Prestige as long as possible (The iZerkers took about 30-50% of my health off per attack due to high crit damage)

Everything else is fair game (I’d assume a decent Bunker Ele would resist my attempts at killing, I haven’t faced one yet) especially Thieves, I mostly kill Thieves when I’m roaming (They tend to be more kitteny and don’t try to flee when spotting me and then I shut them down pretty hard no matter what spec – D/D D/P S/P S/D P/D P/P)

Firgof Umbra.4851:

Is there a limit to increased condition duration?
Right now with rare veggie pizza my scepter bleeds has 128% duration increase.
Is the limit 100%?

The cap for condition duration is 100% or 133% with the increased sceptre durations.

Firgof Umbra.4851:

Also I use Scepter/dagger and Staff.
Will I need to invest more into Vitality or Toughness? With a condition/well build
I use Well of Suffering & Corruption but I use them in Range.
I keep my power around 1600.

Either one is good, Toughness reduces the amount of damage you take making it easier to heal up while Vitality increases your health and maximum Life Force allowing you to take more damage both in and out of Death Shroud.

Toughness has the downside of not affecting Conditions while Vitality has the downside of not reducing damage (Makes it a lot harder to heal up)

Ideally, going for a mix of both would be best, increasing your health and reducing damage you take.

That said, if you’re choosing between Rabid and Carrion gear, your set up would benefit more from Carrion (As the Power would boost the damage from Wells) than from the precision on Rabid (Crits + Barbed Precision minor trait = More bleeds)

Phira.3970:

Am I missing any?

“Sick ’Em” – 40% increased pet damage for 10 seconds would probably be beneficial for high pet damage.

OMNIBUS.2913:

just stating my opinion, scepter scales bad with power cause its a condition based weapon. you might as well take out 1 target at a time than use baby aoe scepter hits with zerker gear :P

Though what I’m saying is that even though Sceptre is a primarily condition weapon, it still does decent damage in full zerker gear. Considering other alternatives for AoE situations (Staff, Axe retaliation tanking and single targeting things down) I found it to be the superior way of dealing with multiple targets (3+)

Because while you may think “Oh it’s a condition weapon, it scales poorly with power” it actually packs quite a bit of punch, combine that with the fact that bleed has horrible scaling (5% of your condition damage stat…) and you get a fairly decent AoE weapon that can put out huge burst on a single target (Feast of Corruption + Zerker Gear + a bunch of conditions = large crits) and even the “Weak” #1 chain crits for about 1k without very good zerker gear (Dagger #1 will out do it but has no AoE and no bleeds to take into account)

Heck, power builds often run with Staff for AoE and that’s not a great power weapon either (Though it’s #1 is better with power, you lose out on a second sigil and shorter cooldown abilites as you’re probably not going to pick up staff traits in a zerker build)

OMNIBUS.2913:

If your going powermancer your best aoe comes from well skill utilities and not weapon skills, you could use staff but i find it a lot more effective in condition builds. Same with scepter.

Again, I’m aware of that.

But I was looking for a WEAPON SET that will provide me with some AoE DAMAGE that I was lacking from my DAGGER/FOCUS set I mainly use.

This is because instead of bringing WELLS for burst AoE damage in a power spec, I opted for MINION UTILITIES for more consistent DPS and HPS (Through Vampiric Master Trait – 79+ Health per minion hit + up to 6 minions attacking = huge healing compared to Wells 42 per target per well (Up to 210 per well = up to 840 HPS) for 5 seconds every 36+ seconds.

OMNIBUS.2913:

If your going zerker gear scepter isnt a good idea. Its more condition based. Go with dagger/warhorn or dagger/dagger with alt axe/focus

I’m aware of that, I just wanted an off-set that provided some AoE, which Axe/X and Dagger/X don’t provide.

That said, sceptre doesn’t do too badly in zerker gear (#1 crits for about 800-1k and #3 I’ve seen crit for up to 2k)

My current build:

30 III, IX, XII
0
10 III
30 II, V, VII
0

Full zerker gear, D/F and S/D (Scepter does okay damage in zerker gear and also provides decent AoE damage. Dagger offhand for Condition transfer and AoE weakness)

Utilities: Signet of Focus (Sometimes swap to Flesh Wurm or Shadow Fiend) / Bone Minions / Bone Fiend.

Heal skill: Blood Fiend is pretty good, Consume Conditions is great for WvW/PvP/Solo PvE and Well of Blood for dungeons (Though Blood Fiend can be okay there)

Sigil of Blood + Sigil of Accuracy (I use dual Sigil of Bloodlust on S/D because I’m too cheap to buy a second set of weapons for it)

Runes of Vampirism x6 (The 6 set skill does wonders for survival, it can also proc while in DS without disabling DS skills and the 4 set bonus increases the effectiveness of heal skills by a decent amount (~970 damage + heal after using a heal skill, most effective with Consume Conditions)

Huge damage, lots of potential healing (If all minions are alive and attacking) with good use of DS can keep you alive pretty well.

It does become a lot less painful eventually.

At low levels using Minions + Staff (#2 Mark of Blood can provide regen to minions to heal them) is extremely effective. After level ~30 I found picking up Well of Suffering and Well of Corruption along with Greater Marks ended up being fun and rather effective (Find 5 things, gather them up whack down both wells and a 2-3-4-2 Staff combo and then loot everything – Bonus points for summoning and exploding Bone Minions for nice AoE damage + Blast finishers)

Key Traits I used were:
Death Magic 10 (Greater Marks/Staff Mastery)
Death Magic 20 (Greater Marks/Staff Mastery)
Blood Magic 20 (Ritual Mastery – I didn’t actually use this, but it would help)

Using Power gear to begin with, then Power/Vitality (Power/Precision also works Staff Mastery allows for very easy perma-regen) eventually getting P/V/T stuff (Or zerker gear if going more towards Dagger/Axe Well burst and away from the staff traits)

Warhorn is amazing in a DS focused build.

Vital Persistance (25% slower LF drain in DS) + Locust Swarm = Life Force won’t naturally decay in DS which allows for a lot of blasting away with a fairly damaging attack which can also pierce and give Might.

I kinda wish that the cooldown untraited wasn’t so horrible (Heck even when traited it still is kinda bad) and that the trait wasn’t in a trait line that seems inappropriate for (Curses is about Conditions. Warhorn provides no conditions… Would make sense for it to be in something like Soul Reaping (Though that is kind of cramped due to how many traits are required to make DS a reliable focus of a build))

I’d say something like – 25 Second base cooldown on the skills, trait providing 25% cooldown reduction + the 50% Stun and 20% swiftness duration (So traited would be 20 second cooldown, 3 second daze and 12 second swiftness rather than the current 25 second cooldown)

Technically you could say that crowd control already breaks stealth due to the fact a corpse cannot stealth.

Hitting with crowd control assures where a stealthed character is allowing for most skills to still accurately hit the stealthed target (A few of them require a target, but not all)

Chained CC will usually prevent a stealthed target from re-stealthing unless they’re carrying a stun break (Which if going for a perma-stealth build is less likely) even then, knockdowns aren’t affected by stun breakers and will leave anyone at the mercy of the CCer for a short while (With the burst that comes out of some classes, it can be all that is needed either to kill or set up for a second CC effect)

Broccoli Surprise.3584:

Kuper.2641:

The other great thing is that even if you are conditionmancer, you will want these traits as the use of epidemic is a insta heal. Each condition spread to enemies is considered a ‘hit’ couple with the AoE condition abilities on Staff/Scepter/Dagger off hand makes for a ton of hits.

Please elaborate on how you achieve this. I was under the impression Vampiric only triggered on “white” damage, not conditions.

The application of conditions counts as a hit.

So stuff like Staff Marks, Grasping Dead and Enfeebling Blood will proc a life siphon per target hit (So up to 5 siphons per cast)

I haven’t tested it myself but it sounds as if when using Epidemic, every condition spread counts as a hit meaning that it could do 6 conditions (Poison, Bleeding, Chill, Vulnerability, Weakness, Burning) on up to 5 targets (30 procs of life siphon) or at least 5 conditions x 5 targets if solo (25 procs = 625 health/950 health with Bloodthirst)

I’m not too sure about D/D counters to D/P, I’ve been mostly roaming as P/D, but essentially I keep moving, stay out of BP and CnD when they Backstab and DD when they’re about to HS to keep damage up all the time popping into stealth as much as possible for Healing (Shadow Rejuvenation)

I also run with Basalisk Venom and use that to get a couple of free hits on them (Usually after they backstab so they’re not in the middle of a BP)

A tactic I should try at some point is using Shortbow, Choking Gas and Cluster Bomb on their BP when they’re trying to stealth and also on their Shadow Refuge to at least deter them from attacking.

Bhawb.7408:

Its not like you need to exploit a bunch of things to get them to attack, or enter some secret code, you just need to attack the target twice. It is that simple.

Yet, I can still go about hitting targets 10-30 times with purely single target attacks and minions still won’t attack

I’ve seen this happening with:

Blood Fiend (In my experience, the most reliable minion)
Bone Fiend (Not very often, but still happens occasionally)
Shadow Fiend (This guy is hopeless, whenever I use him I always find him attacking a target I’ve not done anything to, even seen him go after undamaged inanimate objects I’ve done nothing to, can even use his active and he teleports and then runs back off to what he was hitting before…)
Flesh Wurm (Not entirely often do I see him hitting the wrong thing, though I don’t use it very often either)
Bone Minions (Happens to both of them more than 50% of the time, it’s to the point where I only summon them to explode them immediately)
Flesh Golem (Happens around 30-40% of the time, the most reliable melee minion in my experience)

Avigrus.2871:

Anyone tried a similar build before and if so, how much +healing did you put on with your gear? I’m trying to strike a balance between DPS & healing.

In all of my Life Siphon builds I used 0 +healing. It doesn’t affect Life Siphoning so I usually go for extra toughness (Except my current build where I’ve gone full zerker and am using the extra life siphon from minions and clever use of DS to keep me up)

Using average power and armour and coefficients I’ve calculated my self along with attack speeds I’ve timed myself:

Dagger #1:
953 * 2400 * 0.6 / 1800 = 762
953 * 2400 * 0.4 / 1800 = 508
953 * 2400 * 0.8 / 1800 = 1016
This chain takes 2 seconds to complete so it ends up being 2286 / 2 = 1143 DPS

Staff #1:
1048 * 2400 * 0.45 / 1800 = 628
This attacks approximately every 1.15 seconds so it ends up being 628 /1.15 = 546 DPS

Death Shroud #1:
1000 * 2400 * 0.9 / 1800 = 1200
This attacks approximately every 1.6 seconds so it ends up being 1200/1.6 = 750 DPS

Staff would require at least 3 targets for it’s #1 to out damage Dagger #1 (Though Putrid Mark may mean 2 targets is all that’s needed, I’d have to calculate the DPS it brings)

While DS #1 would need at least 2 targets to do more DPS than Dagger #1 even including the Might and Vulnerability.

Bhawb.7408:

If you want your minions to attack, auto attack your target, never use staff (its aggro is obviously far too complicated for you), and you’ll be fine.

You keep saying this and it’s flat out wrong.

I kill things using ONLY Dagger #1, you know, the dagger auto attack that is entirely single target and still pets often just stand around (They don’t follow me, they just stand there a few feet behind me doing nothing)

I’ve killed things using only Sceptre #1, yet another single target auto-attack that according to you should make them attack and yet often causes minions to again stand around doing nothing.

Oh what about Axe #1? Yeah, tried that same results.

You keep saying that single target attacks (Not Staff auto + Marks) means they will attack and they’re fine, but it’s not the case. I’ve seen all the minions wait around when I’m attacking doing nothing besides standing around or occasionally being attacked until they die.

You say there’s a pattern that you can exploit to make them attack? We shouldn’t have to do that in order to get use out of utilities that we have limited control over and that can be killed instantly in any content that’s actually worth doing (Anything that isn’t solo world PvE, even then 2-4 hits of normal mobs will kill even the Flesh Golem)

You say that it’d be too strong if you could make pets actually do things?

Well isn’t that the point? They’re still weak to AoE (Unless what everyone keeps suggesting is put in and they get like 90% resistance to AoE or only take a % of their health maximum) they still cannot avoid things (Unless my suggested change to be able to make them dodge, though tied to your own dodging so makes you more vulnerable) they have no condition clearing (Can’t remove Cripple/Immobilise/Chilling/Burning/Poison/Bleeds/Confusion meaning they can be controlled and killed off quickly with some conditions) and they don’t have scaling Vitality and Toughness so they won’t ever be more tanky then they currently are.

When selecting a bunch of minions, you’re giving up other utilities such as Wells (Suffering + Zerker gear = Tonnes of damage on up to 5 targets, in a chilling build you can keep multiple targets inside it for a good portion of its duration) or corruption skills (Epidemic = Amazing, Blood is Power is very good as well) which all scale of gear and work to make builds that are strong. Minions don’t scale off gear and currently have little control over them, making builds that use them potentially strong (I.e. When the AI works and they attack regularly) or potentially completely useless (I.e. When the AI doesn’t work and up to 5 out of 7 of your traits do literally nothing)

Is it bad that none of these changes would do anything beneficial for any of the 5+ builds I play?

That said, the %health things proccing from Life Force in DS would be nice, though maybe a bit too nice (With the speed at which Life Force can be generated, it’d mean stuff like Decaying Swarm could proc a lot (Locust Swarm + Vital Persistance = Life Force essentially doesn’t decay over time))

Bas.7406:

That would force you into one build for minions. Sorry I run berzerker with Minions and i prefer them to tank a brunt of the damage. You are walking a fine line if you increase their vitality. If you overscale it they will be the only pvp style since it would essentially give you 5 people to kill for everyone.

I also run Berserker with Minions, note I didn’t say “REMOVE ALL TOUGHNESS AND GIVE THEM -1000000% THREAT AND 100000000 HEALTH” no, just a decrease in toughness that makes them “Less likely” to be targeted (If they could still pull threat based off their toughness when I was 30 into Death Magic + full PVT gear….) and a proportionate gain in vitality so that they wouldn’t be insta-gibbed by any attack

Bas.7406:

We have been through this a dozen times. They are not pets, they are supposed to die. They are not perma pets designed to make your life easier, they are tools to be used and then expunged. If you find your minions are on low health a lot trait for poison on death.

Yes they’re not perma pets, I’m not asking them to be able to regen their entire health bar in a couple of seconds, just a bit of health regen so that they can actually live long enough to fire off a couple of hits and get into a position in which their death would mean something as dying and placing a poison patch 1000 range away from anything is not very helpful.

Bas.7406:

The code to do this would be enormous and be subject to an incredible amount of bugs and frustration. You can already specify who you want them to attack by simply attacking that target with single target abilities. Bhawb is finalizing some tests to test which abilities and the timing of them.

1) Wouldn’t the code essentially be similar to the code for Auto-Attacks and the toggle-able function for auto-targeting but relating to minions auto-attacking?

2) Whilst you can specify attack targets, it’s not reliable. I know that you say that they attack 100% and are really reliable especially if you’re using single target abilities, but in my experience they are not. They aren’t even close, the amount of times I’ve attacked using only Sceptre #1 and Dagger #1 and my minons have stood around doing nothing until I’ve killed multiple enemies on my own is pretty awful.

Bas.7406:

This would make them extremely OP in spvp and wvwvw situations. Someone targets my minion. I dodge they wasted a hit, I keep killing them. You have to think through how this will affect not just how you play.

You mean someone could waste a hit? Almost like if they tried attacking you and you dodged? Wow that feature would make Necros unstoppable killing machines who can keep dodging forever and keep attacking whilst doing infinite dodging.

There are limitations on this suggestion – They’re tied to your dodging which means you would lose out on DPS and also survivability if you’re dodging to keep your minions alive (Which according to you is counter productive because you’re supposed to be letting your minions die because they’re minions and minions shouldn’t be used to attack things)

Bas.7406:

My best idea for improvement is simple – Stop thinking of them as pets, but as tools. Once your mindset changes they are no longer as flawed as you think.

You’re implying I think of them as pets. I do not. They are minions, they’re there to do some DPS and when the situation arises, to be killed off to cause more damage or healing (Though only 3 of 6 Minions can be killed off at will, the other 3 don’t have active abilities that cause death)

If I did think of them as pets I’d be passing off suggestions on making them more like the pets of Masterminds from the MMO City of Heroes – Making them tankier, do more sustained damage, scale off gear, more options for keeping them alive, self healing for minions etc

Bas.7406:

The only really improvement is casting time after summons. I hate that I have a 1.25 second cast that can be interrupted easily.

This is a very annoying thing… I’d be happy if they’d use the underwater cast time for minions which is 0.25. Heck, I’d settle with just the Bone Minions to have that.