Guild Wars 2

Gnat.9405:

I just commented on this in my post

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Cashing-Out/first#post2494451

It’s ridiculous and makes me want to qui

It is ridiculous. I’d like to give him the benefit of the doubt and the fact that he wrote it at 1:30am after a long day, but the underlying logic implied (PvP balanced = GW2 balanced) just seems bizarre.

Maybe he is thinking is that PvP amplifies imbalances; therefore, PvP acts as a early warning system for imbalance in other modes? I dunno.

From: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/pvp/pvp/Like-that-the-devs-are-now-in-the-forums/2493665

(emphasis added)

JonathanSharp.7094:

1:30 am…long day at the show.

THe reason I quickly jump into the sPvP forums is because that’s usually the best place to talk overall game balance.

It’s honestly just easier for me to look at that 1 forum, and then the WvW base forum, and get a sense for those 2 game types. For PvE, there are many layers of balance, from story steps, to dungeons, to fractals, to events, to new content for the living world, etc.

For the class forums, it’s just looking at 8 individual forums, which, when you’re on trips like this with a slow wi-fi connect, is just much harder and slower.

It’s not that we don’t love PvE, or balance for PvE, it’s literally just easier for me (personally) to check 1 sub forum, rather than 8, when I have limited time and a “meh” wi-fi.

Don’t read too much into that.

Also, if I post in 1 class sub forum, then I feel like I need to be fair and post in the other 7…which adds up fast at 1:30 am. Heh.

Just being honest! Thanks for all the constructive posts and honest questions guys!!!

-Chap from China

I know he says “Don’t read too much into that”, but geez…

But we already have the powerful trait Deathly Invigoration!

Bhawb.7408:

I think more to the point is that they were suddenly overwhelmed by a rush of people saying a single thing, and it took the other side a while to even realize there was a problem (I don’t think anybody was thinking these changes were going to be considered OP) and respond in kind. The latest quote from Allie Murdock shows that they are hearing the other sides now, and frankly I think they will realize that the idea that Necros are too strong defensively is ridiculous.

And…now its 17 hours after Allie asked for post-patch video proof of necros being OP, there have been four more pages of comments with no real video evidence.

So a necro AoE mechanic which has been in the game since release and was a non-issue is now suddenly a problem?

I guess the whiner’s will wait until next week to cry about how AoE wells are OP because they are…AoE.

Kraag Deadsoul.2789:

I like your suggestion of:

Overkillengine.6084:

Capping the amount of life-force you can lose to a set max rate per second no matter how many people are attacking you while in Death Shroud. That would give a closer approximation of the invulnerability/avoidance mechanics that other classes get.

Attacking a Necromancer would still cause them to have to exit Death Shroud sooner than they would unattended, but would help them greatly to survive the current behavior of mass focus firing a Necromancer the moment they are identified as such.

A hopefully simple way of doing this might include just two different degen rates while making the Necromancer technically invulnerable while in Death Shroud, one for not being attacked during the degen tick period, and one for being attacked during the degen tick period.

PROVIDED that the following addition is made:

The amount of overflow damage from deathshroud to the necro’s regular health will not exceed the max “under attack” degen rate that you are proposing.

To illustrate:

Assume a necro with 20,000 health and no points in Soul Reaping. Their deathshroud will also have 20,000 “health” if I’m correct in assuming that the recent fixes to deathshroud now make it equal 100% of the necro’s regular health.

For the purposes of this example, let’s further assume that the base degen rate of deathshroud is 5% of max per second and 10% of max per second when taking damage (but only for attacks which exceed 10% of the maximum potential life force).

Now picture a necromancer in deathshroud with only 5% life force remaining. They are hit for 10,000 damage. However, per the OP’s suggestion that the necro will have a capped life-force-loss-per-second when under attack and my suggestion that this be set to 10% of maximum life force, the necro will only take 2,000 damage:

Necro takes a 10,000 point hit.

10,000 points exceeds 10% of the necro’s max potential life force pool.

20,000 life force pool x 10% max loss per second from attacks = 2,000.

The original 10,000 damage attack now becomes a 2,000 damage attack.

20,000 × 5% life force remaining = 1,000 points of deathshroud “health”.

The first 1,000 points of this damage will be applied to the life force pool since the necro only had 1,000 points left. This knocks the necro out of deathshroud. The remaining 1,000 points of damage are then applied as “overflow” to the necro’s normal health.

It will NOT be the case that the necro absorbs 1,000 points of that 10,000 damage with their life force and the remaining 9,000 points spills over to damage the necromancer directly.

This is a compromise I’d be willing to live with. The whole “damage taken while in death shroud will now overflow to the necromancer’s health pool if the damage taken is greater than the remaining life force.” without any modifications has got to go, though.

TL;DR: Simply make deathshroud function similar to Protective Spirit from GW1; cap life force degen at 10% of max per second when damage taken exceeds this amount. The new damage overflow nerf for deathshroud remains in effect, but the amount of overflow damage taken is only that amount left over after having decreased it to 10% of max life force and subtracted whatever life force was still remaining in the necro’s deathshroud.

This makes alot of sense to me. It entirely mitigates being bursted but it is still a limited resource that the necro has to manage. I wonder if it might be OP in situations where the necro is gaining alot of LF passively from dying foes, such that the LF gains keep exceeding the max degen so that wearing down the necro is a very long process. But then again, isn’t that the whole point of us being an attrition class?

rager.4963:

How bad are pets? I mean I see people saying they are bugged, but they got to be useful for something right? I don’t see them leaving them worthless for this long.

Depends where you are talking about: open-world PVE, dungeon PVE, PVP, or WVW.

For open-world PVE they are generally quite good and an easy way to level. Yes, a minion might bug out on occasion, but it rarely happens to me.

JonathanSharp.7094:

We want to shift more focus to death shroud through main hand skills,…

Can you then also buff the LF generation from scepter, please, please.

So far, I’m mostly liking the patch changes.

All the changes seem pretty reasonable to me (although no longer being able to jump from high places in DS is sad).

I recall numerous proposals on this forum to increase marks by 50% by default as a way to avoid having to consider 10 pts in DM as mandatory. And…now that 10pts can go to Staff Mastery instead, if you want.

LF buffs from spectrals, minions and weapons are good. (Wish they had buffed LF from scepter Feast of Corruption!!)

Damage in DS fix is good.

Terror damage reduction was kind of a poor fix to the Dhuumfire/Terror synergy (if that was the intent). But 17% probably won’t be too noticeable.

These changes really seem to help power (& minion) builds, but in doing so it does move us away from the attrition concept…unless they are considering the DS & LF changes as boosting our attrition capacity.

I leveled a Charr necro to 80 and then decided I wanted an Asura necro for the racial skills.

But I never found any light armor that made the Charr looked good – its almost all just stretched human gear. Its not quite as bad with the Asura. Here is my current outfit (T2 helm, acolyte shoulders, cabalist coat, winged leggings; colors are midnight fire, oxblood and winter ice):

EDIT: Two big aesthetic drawbacks to the Asura:
1) all the weapons are so small its hard to see them
2) the exception to #1 is that when the staff is stowed, most of them are too long and/or rigged too high on the back so that they clip through your big Asuran ears and it looks really lame.

It would probably help if you change the build editor from PvP mode to WvW mode (upper right corner) and then fill in your armor/trinket slots. Then post the new link.

Another alternative fix is to leverage the Axe Training trait as a way to uncouple vuln stacking from Axe1.

In this case, we alter the Axe1 weapon skill to remove vuln application and make it hit harder and reduce cast time to 1/2 sec.

Rending Claws (revised):

• Damage Damage (2x): 260
• Vulnerability: 7 s
• Range: 600
• Activation (casting) time: 1/2 sec (same as scepter1)

And then alter Axe Training by adding the vuln ability there.

Axe Training (revised):

• Axe damage is increased, axe applies 1 vulnerability stack per cast and axe skills recharge 20% faster.

This gives a decent autoattack, and only players who spec into Axe Training will gain the vuln stacking.

From the wiki:

Rending Claws:

• Slash your foe twice with ghostly claws to make them vulnerable.
• Damage Damage (2x): 236
• Vulnerability: 7 s
• Range: 600
• Activation (casting) time: 3/4 sec

I think the problem with Axe1 is that ANet kind of screwed themselves by coupling vulnerability and direct damage and granting it 100% chance of 2x vulnerability.

In doing so, any change such as adding cleave or increasing speed results in too much total vuln stacking. Likewise, increasing the damage per hit results in too much total effectiveness of vuln+damage.

As a result, we have mediocre vuln stacking, very weak damage, and a slow speed (i.e., slow casting time) attack. The slow speed of the attack is especially unhelpful with the limited 600 range to maneuver. Also, the 600 range makes it hard to justify Axe1 as a “support” ability.

My proposal is to:

• Make the vuln application crit-chance%-based
• Decrease the casting time
• Increase the direct damage per hit

The result would be something like:

Rending Claws (revised):

• 50% chance on crit to slash your foe twice with ghostly claws to make them vulnerable.
• Damage Damage (2x): 120
• Vulnerability: 7 s
• Range: 600
• Activation (casting) time: 1/4 sec (same as dagger1 or casting a well)

Over 3 sec @ 3/4 sec cast time, there are 4 casts. Results in:

• 4 × 2 = 8 vulns
• 4 × 236 = 944 dmg

Over 3 sec @ 1/4 sec cast time, there are 12 casts. Results in:

• 12 × 2 × .5 x .5 = 6 vulns (assuming player has 50% crit chance)
• 12 × 120 = 1440

This gives us a cast time suitable for 600 range and 50% more direct damage, at the cost of slightly lower vuln stacks and a dependence on being a build with crit chance (which most axe builds will have).

From: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/info/news/Game-Update-Notes-December-14-2012/999247

Necro
The necro boasts the highest natural health of all the caster classes, and also has death shroud to extend that life total even higher. While they don’t have some of the escape or damage reduction capabilities that other classes boast, they do have a lot of ways to win attrition fights. They have access to poison on multiple weapons, they are able to combine condition damage with raw damage, and they have multiple disables to interrupt enemy skills. Necromancers also have multiple movement disabling abilities, while allows them to chase down enemies who are low on health.

From the main website:
https://www.guildwars2.com/en/the-game/professions/necromancer/

Practitioners of the dark arts, necromancers summon the dead, wield the power of lost souls, and literally suck the life force from the enemy. Necromancers feed on life force, which they can use to bring allies back from the brink or cheat death itself.

From my perspective, all of this is correct. It makes us perhaps the most flexible profession, but it also makes us the least specialized professions. We can have wildly different kinds of viable builds with wildly different kind of mechanics and abilities – power builds, condition builds, MM builds, DS builds, hybrid builds, etc.

But the tradeoff seems to be that our abilities in any one specific area can’t be too strong lest a synergistic confluence of abilities make us OP (e.g., the recent concern over whether Terror+Dhuumfire is possibly OP).

For open world PVE I am liking this build at the moment:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQQQNArYWjMap7tbKbMcKEpCPzUhvB6x7pLgYkCkJYA-jgxAIMBxUYR0YLtFRjVzgpUJiqdIFRrWIgFbBA-e

30/20/10/10/0 Terror and Dhuumfire. Good survivability with regen from Staff2 and Mark of Evasion. certainly not the most OP build, but I like to get myself in trouble alot, so I like the sturdiness. Crit chance is a bit low but enough that Dhuumfire procs often enough. So its mostly a condition build but I have enough power to kill a weapons rack.

Bhawb.7408:

Terror isn’t the problem at all. Terror was not only fine balance wise, but we were still underpowered even with it. They introduced burning, and now a single build is OP, one that uses both. Hybrid builds do not, nor have they ever needed that trait, they just ran CtD before it existed. Burning is the culprit, and changing Terror is going to kill condition builds. Just make burning less ridiculous (reduce its duration a bit) and we’ll be back to being strong offensively but way too weak defensively.

I agree – Terror was never the problem.

Reducing the Dhuumfire burn from 4 sec to 3.125 (3 1/8) sec results in an effective reduction from 5.2 sec (4 * 1.3) to 4.063 sec (3.125 * 1.3), due to the 30% cond dur from Spite. This would be a 22% decrease in the damage from Dhuumfire.

This seems like a simple and effective way to lessen the effect of Dhuumfire+Terror without altering either feature significantly.

Poplolita.2638:

Engineer doesn’t have access to the OP dhuumfire+terror combo.

This. Dhuumfire synergizes with Terror very well, possibly too well. Terror by itself was never an issue prior to Dhuumfire, and Dhuumfire without Terror is not an issue.

Same thing here.

vicious.5683:

here is another idea.

Change Dhumfire to:
100% chance to inflict burning for 5 seconds when a channeled skill is used. This effect can only trigger once every 10 seconds.

This would benefit to axe and dagger, weapons used in hybrid builds and terror builds will only proc it each 40 secs on DS#4.

This would reduce the bursting on terror without nerfing any other build.

Any thoughts?

That’s an interesting idea, but a couple of thoughts:
1) Staff/scepter, used for condition builds, would lose out entirely on the burning condition
2) Dagger and axe2 are the “burstiest” damage we have now, so would this only make us “burstier”?

Blaine Tog.8304:

TheAgedGnome.7520:

I’m not quite sure what you mean by "nerfing Dhuumfire and dropping it to a lower point is that you make Burning + Terror builds potentially tankier than they are now. ". What does “lower point” mean?

Making it a Major trait instead of a Grandmaster.

Ah, ok. But I did not make such a proposal. My alternate proposal was to move it from a Spite GM trait to a Blood GM trait. The idea being that such a Terror+Dhuumfire build would now be 0/20/0/30/20, which would cause a reduction of 300 power, loss of traits like AxeTraining and loss of 30% cond duration, which could be a big impact on Terror ticks. As I stated, I consider this a radical proposal.

Blaine Tog.8304:

TheAgedGnome.7520:

As to the idea of reducing the length of the Dhuumfire burning from 4 to 3 sec, well yes, it wouldn’t “feel as good”. I agree. In addition, reducing the duration unfortunately nerfs all Dhuumfire builds, not just Dhuumfire + Terror builds. But it seems like the least radical kind of change which Anet could try, if indeed Dhuumfire needs to be changed at all.

There are always a lot of ways to nerf builds if they need to come down, but as I said in the first post, if Dhuumfire builds are fine, Terror builds are fine, and only Dhuumfire + Terror builds are not fine, then Anet should endeavor to fix Dhuumfire + Terror in a way that has as little collateral damage to the other builds as possible.

“then Anet should endeavor to fix Dhuumfire + Terror in a way that has as little collateral damage to the other builds as possible”.

Agree wholeheartedly.

I’m just not sure that changing Dhuumfire from one condition type to another really addresses this specific situation (Dhuumfire + Terror) without creating other collateral damage.

Your proposal “Dhuumfire. 33% chance to apply a 5-second stack of Torment on hit. No internal cooldown” would really alter builds due to no required crit chance. As you say, that might be a good thing. But also, since Torment doubles (ticks twice per sec) when the target moves, doesn’t this change actually improve Terror builds, since a Feared target will be moving?

To be clear, I don’t really have a dog in this fight as long as we don’t get nerf-batted back to pre-Dhuumfire; in fact, I’m fine of they leave Dhuumfire as it is now.

flow.6043:

TheAgedGnome.7520:

3) probably a much shorter range

Why?

Is it reasonable to have such a CC ability as Torment out to 1200 range? Again, I pose it as a potential issue, not a showstopper.

flow.6043:

…@ balancing torment’s damage for such a trait: Since PvP is the problem you’d have to assume that your target is always moving. No player stands still because he has torment on him.
So in a pure condi build torment on a moving target is about 25% of burning. If the trait would stay the same expect for the condition, then either 2 or 3 stacks would be appropriate….

Well, darnit, that makes some sense. But maybe 4-5 stacks would be preferable rather than 2-3, since the target can instantly drop the damage in half by standing still? Then again, if Terror+Dhuumfire synergy is the issue, then maybe 3 would make more sense (since a Feared target will be moving).

Blaine Tog.8304:

TheAgedGnome.7520:

But replacing burning with Torment would probably be even worse due to:
1) the much lower damage multiplier for torment
2) loss of a condition type
3) probably a much shorter range
4) significant change in dynamics.

1) Your calculations don’t take into account that Torment deals damage twice per second when the target is moving. …..

2) We barely have Torment as it stands (10 second duration on a 40-second cooldown). Near-100% Torment uptime across potentially multiple targets is arguably more difficult to cleanse off than 52% Burning uptime for one target. It also makes condition cleansing more of a soft counter than a hard counter to our damage, and soft counters are better game design. It both means that more builds can play against you, and you also don’t get shut down as hard when playing against builds which counter you.

3) Considering 1200 is outside the range at which the Necro is a major kill-threat, I don’t see a huge problem in allowing us to apply a few stacks of torment at that range. It’s SUPPOSED to be hard to kite Necros, harder than where it currently is. Re-tuning us to be more difficult to escape from is where Anet should be taking the profession.

4) On-proc CC is not unprecedented. Elementalists with Glyph of Elemental Power can have cripple or chill on-hit basically all the time. I know Eles don’t really run that skill, but it’s still an example of something Anet is ok with. That said, Torment isn’t even true Crowd Control; it’s more “Crowd Suggestion.”

The danger, I think, with nerfing Dhuumfire and dropping it to a lower point is that you make Burning + Terror builds potentially tankier than they are now. So we’d still have high burst, but then we’d be even more difficult to kill. A 2- or 3-second Burn also wouldn’t feel as good to apply, I think.

1) On the contrary, I did specifically address that situation.

2) I agree the duplication of Torment stacks from Tainted Shackles and a Torment-based Dhuumfire is a minor issue. I mention it for completeness.

3) Again, I mention it for completeness. I’m just pondering possible unintended consequences.

4) The “on-proc” of Dhuumfire is not an issue, it is whether it result sin unintended consequences if the proc is Torment. As I stated in a counterpoint to my own question: On the other hand, has anyone seriously complained about the synergy of Dhuumfire burning and Epidemic?

The danger, I think, with nerfing Dhuumfire and dropping it to a lower point is that you make Burning + Terror builds potentially tankier than they are now. So we’d still have high burst, but then we’d be even more difficult to kill. A 2- or 3-second Burn also wouldn’t feel as good to apply, I think.

I’m not quite sure what you mean by "nerfing Dhuumfire and dropping it to a lower point is that you make Burning + Terror builds potentially tankier than they are now. ". What does “lower point” mean?

As to the idea of reducing the length of the Dhuumfire burning from 4 to 3 sec, well yes, it wouldn’t “feel as good”. I agree. In addition, reducing the duration unfortunately nerfs all Dhuumfire builds, not just Dhuumfire + Terror builds. But it seems like the least radical kind of change which Anet could try, if indeed Dhuumfire needs to be changed at all.

Copy of my recent post from this thread:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Quit-crying-and-read/2410967

=========

TL;DR: Although replacing Dhuumfire burning with Torment is possible, it creates its own set of prickly issues to deal with. My suggestion is to either 1) reduce Dhuumfire proc from 4 sec to 3 sec, or 2) Move Dhuumfire from a Spite GM to a Blood GM slot.

flow.6043:

vicious.5683:

You can replace burning with some more bleeds and it’ll be the same.

…would actually overnerf the necro (damage wise). Part of the problem is the extra cleansing spot that burning is covering. So replacing it with bleeding would absolutley not be the same.
It has been suggested many times already, but here it is again: burning ->torment.

Agree that replacing burning with bleeds would be bad.

But replacing burning with Torment would probably be even worse due to:
1) the much lower damage multiplier for torment
2) loss of a condition type
3) probably a much shorter range
4) significant change in dynamics.

1) The formula for burning damage is:
(0.25 * Condition Damage) + (4 * Level) + 8 damage per second

The formula for Torment damage is:
(0.0375 * Condition Damage + 31.875) per stack per second

At 1000 condition damage:
- Burning does 578 per sec
- Torment does 69.4 per sec

That is, Torment does only 12% the damage of burning per sec.

So, replacing Dhuumfire (4 sec burn) with Torment would require roughly 8 stacks of Torment to be equivalent to burning. Thus, to decrease that damage would require less stacks. For example, 5 stacks would do 347 per sec, or 60% of the current burning damage per sec, which might be reasonable.

However, if the target is moving, then Torment is applied twice per sec, so now the damage would be 347*2=694 per sec, which is higher than burning. So, tuning the number of stacks would be very tricky to balance.

2) Removing burning removes another condition type, and cleansing Torment from DS’s Tainted Shackles would now also cleanse the Torment from this GM trait.

3) Burning via Dhuumfire has the range of the weapon being used. On the other hand, Tainted Shackles has a limited range of only 600. Would it be reasonable to allow Torment to apply all the way to 1200 (especially when multiplied with Epidemic)? What would that do to a zerg? It would also greatly reduce the effectiveness of kiting a necro, but I don’t know if ANet would want necros to have that kind of control at that range.

4) Having that kind of nearly constant CC on targets via a proc (rather than via a weapon’s skill, such as mesmer Illusionary Counter) is probably not the intent of ANet. Coupled with Epidemic it probably would be too much pressure. (On the other hand, has anyone seriously complained about the synergy of Dhuumfire burning and Epidemic?)

My suggestion is to instead either:
1) Reduce Dhuumfire proc from 4 sec to 3 sec, or
2) Move Dhuumfire from a Spite GM to a Blood GM slot.

1) Since Dhuumfire is 30pts into spite, its duration is always a minimum of 4*1.3=5.2 sec. Therefore, (again using 1000 cond dmg), total burning damage would be 578*5=2890.

Reducing from 4 sec to 3 sec results in an 3*1.3=3.9 sec of burning, or 3*578=1734 or 4*578=2312 damage. So, roughly a 30% reduction in damage over the length of the proc.

2) Moving Dhuumfire to a Blood GM (call it “Boiling Blood”!) removes the automatic 30% cond duration from Spite. It also rewards tankier builds rather than adding more reward to glass cannons, as it does now. This is clearly a far more radical change, but ANet can’t have it both ways: they can’t want us to be an attrition class and yet position traits which create a lopsided bonus to glass cannons.

TL;DR: Although replacing Dhuumfire burning with Torment is possible, it creates its own set of prickly issues to deal with. My suggestion is to either 1) reduce Dhuumfire proc from 4 sec to 3 sec, or 2) Move Dhuumfire from a Spite GM to a Blood GM slot.

flow.6043:

vicious.5683:

You can replace burning with some more bleeds and it’ll be the same.

…would actually overnerf the necro (damage wise). Part of the problem is the extra cleansing spot that burning is covering. So replacing it with bleeding would absolutley not be the same.
It has been suggested many times already, but here it is again: burning ->torment.

Agree that replacing burning with bleeds would be bad.

But replacing burning with Torment would probably be even worse due to:
1) the much lower damage multiplier for torment
2) loss of a condition type
3) probably a much shorter range
4) significant change in dynamics.

1) The formula for burning damage is:
(0.25 * Condition Damage) + (4 * Level) + 8 damage per second

The formula for Torment damage is:
(0.0375 * Condition Damage + 31.875) per stack per second

At 1000 condition damage:
- Burning does 578 per sec
- Torment does 69.4 per sec

That is, Torment does only 12% the damage of burning per sec.

So, replacing Dhuumfire (4 sec burn) with Torment would require roughly 8 stacks of Torment to be equivalent to burning. Thus, to decrease that damage would require less stacks. For example, 5 stacks would do 347 per sec, or 60% of the current burning damage per sec, which might be reasonable.

However, if the target is moving, then Torment is applied twice per sec, so now the damage would be 347*2=694 per sec, which is higher than burning. So, tuning the number of stacks would be very tricky to balance.

2) Removing burning removes another condition type, and cleansing Torment from DS’s Tainted Shackles would now also cleanse the Torment from this GM trait.

3) Burning via Dhuumfire has the range of the weapon being used. On the other hand, Tainted Shackles has a limited range of only 600. Would it be reasonable to allow Torment to apply all the way to 1200 (especially when multiplied with Epidemic)? What would that do to a zerg? It would also greatly reduce the effectiveness of kiting a necro, but I don’t know if ANet would want necros to have that kind of control at that range.

4) Having that kind of nearly constant CC on targets via a proc (rather than via a weapon’s skill, such as mesmer Illusionary Counter) is probably not the intent of ANet. Coupled with Epidemic it probably would be too much pressure. (On the other hand, has anyone seriously complained about the synergy of Dhuumfire burning and Epidemic?)

My suggestion is to instead either:
1) Reduce Dhuumfire proc from 4 sec to 3 sec, or
2) Move Dhuumfire from a Spite GM to a Blood GM slot.

1) Since Dhuumfire is 30pts into spite, its duration is always a minimum of 4*1.3=5.2 sec. Therefore, (again using 1000 cond dmg), total burning damage would be 578*5=2890.

Reducing from 4 sec to 3 sec results in an 3*1.3=3.9 sec of burning, or 3*578=1734 or 4*578=2312 damage. So, roughly a 30% reduction in damage over the length of the proc.

2) Moving Dhuumfire to a Blood GM (call it “Boiling Blood”!) removes the automatic 30% cond duration from Spite. It also rewards tankier builds rather than adding more reward to glass cannons, as it does now. This is clearly a far more radical change, but ANet can’t have it both ways: they can’t want us to be an attrition class and yet position traits which create a lopsided bonus to glass cannons.

Zerroth.2401:

First question, I heard that conditionmancers have two drawbacks,
1: You can only have 1600 condi dmg, and 2: a mob can only have 25 stacks of bleed. So does that mean you can only have 1600 worth of DoTs on a mob at a time? or you can only have 1600 condi dmg on your character (like what it says in the hero tab)? Cause from what I gather even with full spec in curses and full rampager gear my condi dmg will be at like 835? Did I just do the math wrong or what?

^^ That is important to my understanding of condi dmg vs. condi durration.

Your amount of condition damage modifies the conditions you apply, thereby increasing damage per each tick of the condition. See, for example, the wiki page for Bleeding:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Bleeding

The damage formula is:
(0.05 * Condition Damage) + 42.5 per stack per second at level 80

So, at 835 cond dmg, each bleed will tick for 84.25 damage. If you have 10 stacks of bleed on the enemy, then you are doing 842.5 damage per sec.

Note that each condition type (bleed, poison, etc.) has its own formula. See the wiki.

If you are using Rampagers armor & trinkets, I’m not suprised your condition damage is at 835. Usually for a condition-based build you would use Rabid or Carrion (or a mix).

For the various stat combinations of level 80 gear, see:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Item_nomenclature#Triple_attribute

Edit: Also note that total damage from conditions is affected by your condition duration. So, if you have a 5 sec bleed which does 84.25 per tick, then that bleed will do 421.25 dmg over the 5 seconds. If you add condition duration (from food, Spite traits points, Givers weapons, sigils, runes), you will increase the total damage. If you have 60% condition duration, your 5 sec bleed will run for 5 * 1.6 = 8 seconds. Now your total dmg from the bleed will be 84.25*8=674 dmg. So, going for a mix of cond duration and cond damage that fits your goals and playstyle is usually better than going for just increasing cond dmg – at least in PvE. In PvP or WvW, conditions tend to get cleared by enemies, so condition duration is less valuable there.

Ryn.6459:

@TheAgedGnome:

From staff and DS.

The above build has 100% cond duration. Question is if I need that or I can drop it to 75%. Maybe I can drop it for chill, fear, burning, weakness and vulnabirty and keep -via traits- for bleeding.

Ah, I was looking for other chills from traits/sigils.

Whether or not more duration is worth it to you, only you can say. Depends on your preferences and playstyle.

Ryn.6459:

@You all: My main question is how much condition duration do I need. i.e.: With 75% condition duration will I have perma freezing? Will be enough to get a second tick of fear? Will I have burning 80% of the time?

With 75% cond duration, your burning will be 4 * 1.75 = 7 sec long. With 47% crit chance its pretty likely you’ll crit within 1-3 sec of Dhuumfire being off of its 10 sec CD. So that would be roughly 5 procs per minute, which would be 5 * 7 = 35 sec of burning per minute. So, that would be 35/60 = 58% of the time that burning would be applied.

I’m not sure where your freezing would be coming from, I don’t see it in your build.

LOL…I had this happen to me yesterday. Usually it happens with my Lich form, but yesterday it happened with my normal body. I took some screenshots to post on the bugs forum in case it didn’t clear itself (which it did in a few minutes).

spoj.9672:

sorrow.2364:

I’m getting tired of repeating the same things over and over.

I’m not up for a straight nerf to CC. I think Necromancer healing should be buffed on all the line. But if ANet doesn’t want to do that, I proposed another solution to the REAL problem I’ve tried to point out in this topic the lack of variety among healing skills.

Don’t kittening get mad every time you see something which barely resembles a nerf proposal.

But your solution is a nerf. Thats not an option!

Agreed. A nerf is a nerf is a nerf.

sorrow.2364:

TheAgedGnome.7520:

Absolutely not.

Any explanation?
It doesn’t help the topic if you don’t explain why you think it is a bad change.

Sorry for spaz-replying.

I disagree with the premise of your argument “this skill is that strong to the point it overshadows both the other heals.” To me, Consume Conditions, is as it should be, for self-healing. As such, I do not see a need for CC to be nerfed and therefore none of the other changes are needed. (Ok…Deathly Invigoration could use a boost.)

sorrow.2364:

What do you think?

Absolutely not.

Anchoku.8142:

Necromancer needs an alternative to Close to Death that plays differently rather than a condition like Dhuumfire; something like where the player gains some Toughness or Vitality on timers depending upon incoming dps along with gaining Vigor. If Necromancer is going to be a profession that cannot escape and can barely dodge when not exhausted, then it needs a trait that rewards damage taken.

It needs a trait skill that rewards Masochism!

Just a thought…

Masochism – Grandmaster Spite trait
Gain 1 stack of retaliation for 2.5 seconds every condition (i.e., not every stack) received and gain 2 stacks of retaliation for 2.5 sec for each critical hit received. Cooldown: 10 sec

(2.5 sec sec @ 30% cond dur = 3.25 sec)

Speaking for open-world PVE….

Full cleric is amazing for the regen (see build in my sig) and really boosts your survivability. But you do “kitten ” yourself in the sense that you aren’t the primary damage dealer – your minions are. You’d likely be better off trading out your daggers for axe/focus….just to apply weakness and vulnerability to the enemies; i.e, to be better support to your minions.

If you were going to mix in anything, it’d probably be rampager. Your crit chance is low and rampager armor brings it up some (4% to 19%), without sacrificing the entire concept.

They shouldn’t touch Terror since it was demonstrably not OP pre-patch.

If they absolutely must tinker, then they ought to reduce Dhuumfire from a 5.2 sec effective burn (yes, 4 sec + 30% dur. = 5.2) to, say, a 3.5 sec effective burn (2.75 + 30% dur. = 3.5). That would make burning damage 67% of what it is now. It would also diminish the effect of cond. dur. runes.

No.

If anything, either torch or mace.

Here’s what I posted yesterday in another PVE condition thread. It’s similar to Balekai, but with less CondDmg/more Power and a bit squishier:

TheAgedGnome.7520:

This is what roughly I’ve been playing with today in Cursed Shore:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAW7YjMap7tbKbM8JEpCPD0jbRXAxoHETwkMA-jAyAYLBZaBEVAIHWEN2SbR0Y1MYaTioaPSR0qFCYxWA-e

Pretty much just load up targets with conditions, Epidemic, and Fear/Torment them while they burn and melt. I don’t know if its really any better/worse than my previous power-focused zerker/knight axe/focus/staff (which shines for single-target), but it allows for more kiting without loss of DPS. One downside is low LF generation.

It seems to do pretty well, although I usually like more Toughness (e.g., swap some/all Rampager trinkets for Carrion or Rabid). I might use Carrion weapons instead, but this just happens to be the equipment I currently have.

Also, I’m liking the Adventurer runes. Usually when I need to heal I’ve also been dodging and am out of endurance, so getting free endurance with a heal is quite nice.

I don’t know if I’ll stick with this, but it seems quite nice for open-world PVE.

Check out the video tutorials by Nemesis stickied at the top of the forum:
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Necromancer-tutorials/first

They are outdated since they are prior to this most recent big patch, but there is still alot of good information in there.

This is what roughly I’ve been playing with today in Cursed Shore:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAW7YjMap7tbKbM8JEpCPD0jbRXAxoHETwkMA-jAyAYLBZaBEVAIHWEN2SbR0Y1MYaTioaPSR0qFCYxWA-e

Pretty much just load up targets with conditions, Epidemic, and Fear/Torment them while they burn and melt. I don’t know if its really any better/worse than my previous power-focused zerker/knight axe/focus/staff (which shines for single-target), but it allows for more kiting without loss of DPS. One downside is low LF generation.

It seems to do pretty well, although I usually like more Toughness (e.g., swap some/all Rampager trinkets for Carrion or Rabid). I might use Carrion weapons instead, but this just happens to be the equipment I currently have.

Also, I’m liking the Adventurer runes. Usually when I need to heal I’ve also been dodging and am out of endurance, so getting free endurance with a heal is quite nice.

I don’t know if I’ll stick with this, but it seems quite nice for open-world PVE.

Asura male beats all the other bookah races, hands down.

Just trying to understand this as a carebear PVEer where I don’t see Dhuumfire as very useful….

With 1000 condition damage (just to pick a number), burning would cause 578/sec * 4 sec = 2312 total…on a single target. But since Dhuumfire requires 30pts in Spite, thats +30% duration, so 5.2 sec, 578 × 5 = 2890 total.

That’s about 3 times the damage BiP would do in the same 5 sec (also @ 1000 cnd dmg).

On the other hand, 2890 isn’t much more than what I typically do instantly with Putrid Mark in PvE in a moderate Power build, and its about half of what Axe2 typically does with some vulns. However, Dhuumfire can’t be dodged.

But then again, Dhuumfire is, in a convoluted sense, a “free” skill with a 10 sec CD, insofar as it doesn’t require taking up a skill slot. However, its truly only a 10 sec CD with 100% crit chance, otherwise it depends on your crit chance, so in practice it might be more like a 15-25 sec effective CD, somewhat similar to Putrid Mark.

In short, Dhuumfire seems to add up to roughly 6-12K or so additional dmg per minute (if one gets 2-4 procs off while off CD per min.), without cleansing, with typical crit%.

But if one could indeed get a proc every 10 sec (i.e., a very high crit chance), then it would be 2890*6=17.3K dmg, with no cleansing.

So I guess I can see where if in PvP one ran a high-crit chance build and could CC a foe for most of a minute, then they could pretty much wipe them out with Dhuumfire damage alone. Combined with other conditions (and Terror, etc.), it’d be less than a minute.

However, this also assumes such an extended CC, and that the foe is entirely ineffective at breaking stuns, cleansing, heals and CCing the necro.

All in all, Dhuumfire damage might vary wildly in effectiveness, from a few K/min to nearly 100% foes health/min.

It seems like this wide range is a big part of the issue. Whether the high end of that range gets knocked down by counter-builds or not isn’t yet known. If not, then maybe Anet would have to do something, like increasing its CD from 10-15 or 17 sec, which would knock them max dmg/min down to 8.7-11.5K (again, assuming 1000 cond dmg). Or conversely, lowering burning duration per proc. The question is whether it would still merit being a Grandmaster trait at that point. Probably yes.

Here’s my necro at Incendio Templum. Two pics have the default named exotic armor look, the other has Asura racial headgear, cabalist coat, and winged shoulders/legs.

Surprised that they didn’t merge Greater Marks with Staff Mastery or make it the default mark size.

Also:

• All elite player transforms (racial and profession) now have a 1-second cooldown on leaving them. This was done to prevent unintentionally leaving through double-clicking.

So glad! Too often I would spaz-click F1 and just flash in/out of DS unintentionally.

It doesn’t seem like dagger+dagger/axe+focus is going to supply much regen, aside from Focus4. Regen should be over 300/sec with cleric, and so would provide roughly 3.1-3.5k of healing every 10 sec….if one can keep the regen up.

No.

Here are the available combinations:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Item_nomenclature#Triple_attribute

In It To Win It.2315:

In its current form it just removes 1 condition on entering DS and what I would like to see is feedback on it removing 1 condition on entering DS and 1 condition every 5s after that. Would this be overpowered?

I doubt it would be OP, although we might quibble about whether the timer should be 5s, or 8s, etc. I rarely spends more than about 7 sec or so in DS at a time, so I’d rarely get a chance for a second removal tick if it were 8s, for example.

Also, considering that there are no cond removal skills while in DS, this would be helpful. Even if taken alongside the Spiteful Removal trait, it doesn’t seem OP.

Full agreement on this. Having four separate traits in three trait lines for one weapon is beyond silly.

I’d like to put a plug in for trying 5 x Infiltration runes + Close to Death (instead of Axe Training). That’s 30% dmg increase (35% with Sigil of Force). Once the target is below 50% health they tend to just crumble.

I’m currently using Berzerker weapons, Berzerker armor w/Infiltration runes + Knight trinkets (with rubys). So, similar to you, just reversed armor/trinkets.

Weapons are Staff & Axe/Focus, so my trait distribution is different than yours. Staff & Axe have Sigil of Force, Focus has Sigil of Accuracy.

Edit: i think you’d probably want Consume Conditions instead of Well of Blood.

Myrmidian Eudoros.4671:

Blaine Tog.8304:

I like the idea of Axe #1 cleaving, maybe in a cone. It would suck as a 1v1 weapon compared to the mainhand Dagger, but in a teamfight or skirmish, it would provide awesome direct-damage pressure.

Naw. With the slow attack speed and terrible DPS even the cleave wouldn’t salvage it into useful. …..

This.

If they won’t speed up Axe1, then maybe they could add, say, 2-5 sec of Weakness to the attack? It won’t help our DPS, but it would help our survival, so it fits with the whole “attrition” concept.

I have to admit that Axe2 is pretty good with a decent Power build. Mine is nothing extreme, and I get (in PVE) 5-6K (with Clsoe to Death) pretty reliably with some vulns on the target.

As others have said, though, Axe can’t really stand on its own as a weapon: it requires Focus4 (or vulns from a party member) to make Axe2 effective, and a Grandmaster trait which still fails to add any notable effectiveness in comparison to Close to Death.

Edit: Also, I have to say that the Asura male axe animations are pretty good.

At the very least there should be no loss of damage done based on how much LF there is left. Its absurd that necros have to deal with a class mechanic that both 1) auto-degenerates AND 2) becomes less effective as it degenerates. Its a joke.