To put it simply, each character would only able to maintain one stack of burning by themselves, but multiple sources would still stack.
I think that could work to make burning different to other damage conditions while keeping multiple players working together.
I wonder if that’s even possible with the current code.
I would personally make fire start with relatively little damage, and factor the time you’ve been under burning to increase the damage, so it increases over time the longer it’s on you, making it a condition you REALLY want to remove, as a counter for high vitality characters who can or may even want to keep lots of conditions on themselves.
Effectively this would make any build relying on burning for damage unviable right now since they would never stand a chance against the insane burst potential when they are only being able to uphold one stack indivudually.
That being said, they really NEED to tone down both condi damage and burst damage. The game simply cannot be properly balanced when there is a multitude of one-shot builds.
IMO they should simply adjust the damage formula for less dps and longer duration, keeping the total damage the same.
I don’t think it was a good idea to make burning stack with intensity, however that change is now here and will certainly not be reverted. So it has to be balanced as an intensity stacking condition now.
Warhorn is not good for condi, certainly not meta. Also for speed you should take signet of the locust (redundant if you take both sol and warhorn). Krait runes should now IMO be run with blood magic to guarantee frequent procs of the signet from the adept trait (in which case you could also take the cooldown reduction trait for warhorn if you really want to use it).
Not sure though yet whether you can actually take blood magic instead of soul reaping for condi. The master and grandmaster traits in blood are not that good. However, the bleeds from the mark on dodge and the sigil proc for corruption and sustain are really nice.
PS rending shroud could actually be better now for condi than chill of death. If you have enough boon corruptions, then there is little reason to actually remove boons. Meanwhile, vulnerability is now a really good buff to condi damage.
(edited by Tissitra.4153)
Mesmer right now are mostly just carried by the new pu. Condi mesmer is really bad compared to power, the advantage of power shatter is now probably much higher than it was before the patch due to how much essentially unavoidable burst you can have.
Now all those players that you are perceiving as weak can one-shot you by pressing 3 buttons.
Having really high burst in a game only promotes skillfull play when there are sufficiently many drawbacks. And builds being able to one-shot almost anyone is not good balance.
Pvp is complete chaos right now because of the way they are approaching things: come up with some ideas for each profession, then balance from live.
Expect the next months to only bring nerfs to all professions.
This was to be expected at least with the staff trait. The recharge was ridiculous. Expect pu next, as it is even more over the top.
I main a mesmer and obviously, these traits are very strong and desirable. However, most professions now have rather stupidly strong staff. If there is not to be complete chaos, various things everywhere need to be adjusted.
I imagine there might now not be an over the board reduction of damage, but they will rather try to balance every particular instance individually – this already started with power block in the last patch. Unfortunately, this probably means that pvp will be complete chaos in the coming couple of months. And of course the hot release will break any balancing achieved once again.
As much as I like what you can do on mesmer now with the incredible burst coupled with the insane stealth duration, both condi and direct damage are completely out of hand.
Marauder is mostly pointless right now since you get insane burst with zerker and survivability from stealth/blocks/invulnerability. Other forms of defense,including higher health pool, are just rather pointless right now.
The burst is definitely far too high. When everyone can be one-shot if the opponent initiates first you don’t have ‘fast-paced combat’, but rather no combat at all. Just one-shot ting.
Locust is better than both spite and corrupt boon imo: the passive is very useful and the active is AOE boon corruption on a very low cooldwon.
OK so incendiary powder on engis who have been dominating pvp forever to a large extent due to all the passive burning is OK but if the profession that is at the very bottom of the food chain starts getting halfway viable then it’s ‘nerf the passive gameplay’…
Btw the signet build has just this one passive trait, all the rest is used actively.
I can confirm that. Trying to view someone else’s build in pvp immidiately crashes the game.
Let us not forget that without signets of suffering necros still don’t have anything halfway competitive and that whether the signets will actually be enough to pull necros out of the gutter yet remains to be seen.
The way I see it they basically gave up trying to balance the current changes before they are being introduced. It will now be much like when the game first came out, with a multitude of broken builds possible.
Thing is, the same will happen AGAIN in 2-3 months, when HOT comes out. But what will actually happen in between? Since any kind of balance achieved now would be destroyed soon anyway, they might to some extent just lay low for now and let the chaos reign.
Well having a full signet bar will give you more active gameplay than equipping say only spectral skills, since the cooldown on signets is now much lower.
Yes, signets are now by far the best utilities necros have, probably even without their passives. They do however give you very active gameplay.
Well most thieves used to have at least two signets in their utility bar when playing SD and this was not perceived as passive game play (and it in fact was not, since they were used actively). Don’t see much of a difference to what is happening with necro now.
Signets have a bad rep because they normally mean passive game play carried by stats. I don’t think this is the case with the new necros signet builds since the signets are almost exclusively used for their active here. Now it would have been much better to give the buff they gave to signets to corruptions instead, but the effect would have been mostly the same.
So I would not call this gimmicky.
I’d take MoC if the skills would inflict more condition stacks on me. Yeah, i am not crazy. If i got inflicted for something around 5~8 torment stacks over 2 stacks i’d send them to foe right away. 8 torment stacks burst is STRONG!
Don’t think I would want that. I don’t like the idea that unless you use a corruption skill together with a condi transfer, you are gimping yourself. This makes you very predictable. With the right timing, your opponent will dodge the transfer and you are out of luck.
I am still advocating that corruption skills should apply their negative effect not just to yourself. Ideally, make MoC corrupt a boon on everyone around you (yourself included) when using a corruption skill. Would make much more sense than self-inflicted condi. These are CORRUPTION skills after all.
I always thought that the only way condi necros can be competitive is through more boon corruptions and Cindy transfer, while almost everyone was crying for survivability buffs. THIS is how it should be: no insane condi application per se, but rather strong condition manipulation.
We will se how things play out. Right now condi burst with burning seems just generally far to strong. Saying that the 8k burning ticks cannot be pulled off in pvp is not true: firstly, it should be consistently doable combined with slick shoes. Secondly, it can be done easily to anyone who is downed.
The fact that necros might now find a place as the saviour against all the burning insanity is very nice. However, hopefully they will still tone down the insanity.
Start to prepare your builds for another classes, because i got some news, necros will get deleted tomorrow along with patch release.
That would be totally nonsensical. Do you really expect the engis that everyone will be playing are supposed to kill EACH OTHER???
The real death of conditions necros occurred slowly over the last years when they made sure that there is so much condi removal that manipulation of conditions is essentially pointless.
Burning stacking in intensity is merely the gravestone.
if you get 14 stacks of burn on you you deserve to die.
Except that any engi with slick shoes can now put 14 stacks of burning on you with basically no counterplay.
Though at some point I guess you could say that anyone still rolling necro does indeed need to be realised from their misery as quickly as possible…
Finally necromancers can fully partake in the universal quest to bring every necromancer back to their natural state: the downed state.
But seriously how can the devs possibly not realize how hilariously broken this is? Anyone with a basic knowledge of the mechanics or the will to JUST TEST THE TRAIT ONCE will tell you how silly this is.
Here is what would make a lot more sense for master of corruptions instead of self-inflicted conditions: corrupt a boon on all foes and allies around you (yourseld included) when using a corruption skill. Would certainly be interesting gameplay :-)
LOL I wrote in another thread that you could actually end up with blinf on heal, but I did not expect that they would actually do that. I mean really? They expect that people will actually trait into that ???
The devs find themselves between the hammer and the nail, they can’t really overnerf or overbuff the cele amulet, the concept itself is part of gw2 gameplay, removing cele amulet would not remove hybrid professions from gw2 and as such hybrid builds ( capable of doing a bit of everything ) would still be present; personally I don’t think cele build will dominate pvp more than now ( if everything they will be less present ), we have now enough amulets to make things more interesting for everybody
Well I find the current state of balance (just prior to the changes) not good at all. I understand that every class is supposed to be viable in many roles, hower thanks to celestial there are currently JUST TWO roles that are fully viable: celestial hybrid and pure power. Yes, I agree that a profession should be able to fulfill different roles, but once the same BUILD can be effective at anything, you end up with no build diversity at all.
IMO they should have really nerfed it strongly. People played something else before it was buffed and would switch to something else now. It would still be better for the game in the long term than being eternally stuck with what we have now.
Well his numbers do seem to be correct. If you make the calculation based on the total value of all the attributes after equipping the amulet and allocating all the traits (which is the relevant number, since this what you will actually be playing with), it would seem like a relative buff for celestial amulet compared to the three-stat ones.
Two points why this might not be quite as decisive now (hopefully it is not, since I personally despise celestial).
Firstly, the ‘pure’ amulets and the fact that you don’t have to spec into attributes you don’t need through traits will now allow builds to be more focused. One can expect that burst damage of power builds, condi damage of condi builds and tankiness of bunker builds can all be somewhat higher now.
Secondly, so many traits are being introduced that seem broken (as in op) that there are much greater problems right now for balance.
As someone mentioned in another thread, minion masters (and probably to a large extent all transforms including Lich) are right now hardcountered by engis running the aoe moa toolbelt skill. If they take the trait where they recharge a toolbelt skill on evade, then they can actually SPAM AOE MOA ON A 20 SEC COOLDOWN.
Cannot imagining that master of corruption will be picked up. Giving yourself two conditions every time you heal (they mentioned that there will be torment, bleed AND BLIND in the mix for condis that you get, so you might actually end up blinded whenever you heal)?This just to shave off a third of the cooldwon of consume conditions? Compare to engis, who can now take the medkit heal from 16 seconds cooldown to 8-10 seconds with a single trait without any drawbacks (they have a trait where they recharge the next toolbelt skill after evading).
Am I correct to think that parasitic contagion still does not work in death shroud? In that case it is far inferior to both other options in the tier.
Also, I find blood and death magis are still both really subpar. Teleporting downed allies to you using an easily interruptable skill? I am not sure you even WANT to be able do that: you are kind of drawing a huge arrow showing your opponents where they should now concentrate all their burst and cc (with you and the downed people now conveniently in one spot). Thieves OTH will now stealth themselves and their downed allie whenever reviving (something that I think makes much more sense) from A MINOR in shadow arts.
For condi necro, I think it will be curses, spite and soul reaping. The new weakening shroud is actually really strong (I think by far the best option in its tier), as are signets of suffering,
engis being able to reduce the duration of their heal by half when using medkit (there is a trait that resets cooldown on the next toolbelt skill after you evade)
That trait has 20s of cd, you won’t be able to use it efficiently on Bandage Self (16s cd), you are better off using it on your f5 (double moa ? double bandage drop ? quadruple orbital strike ?).
It also contends its spot with gadgeteer and gadgeteer basically gives you 50% cd reduction on slick shoes + an overcharge (no idea what the overcharge does but it’s probably going to be op like double duration or smthing)
Hmmm? What do you mean it would not be efficient? You could use your main heal on 8-10 seconds cooldown… But granted, double AOE moa or half the cooldown on slick shoes + overcharged might be even more problematic.
As for adrenal implant: not sure how it compares to the other staff, just finding the fact thar engis would, if I understand the way endurance and vigor work now correctly, be now the profession with access to more dodges than anyone else (sd thieves included) problematic. Adrenal implant is now actually better than having perma vigor.
Edit: Sorry you meant overcharge, not overcharged shot. Still, halfthe cooldown on slikshoes (even better actually, since sliskshoes now have lower cooldown than before by default) would seem really unreasonable.
(edited by Tissitra.4153)
I mostly agree with the above. Mesmer would be somewhere on top now, however I have the strong suspicion that several of their new traits will be quickly nerfed back again.
I would certainly place engis at least 2nd (maybe first) already because of the huge number of additional mechanics they are getting. Also placing of eles should be somewhat lower.
For the o no chill converts to resistance things ive been seeing. yes it converts to it and its sucks but its only 2sec of resistance and not many classes have actual boon conversions so it shouldnt be coming up that often.(i only see engi being main threat for this because of their convert on incoming conditions, but this can be baited/burned out by using other skills first). Also classes that do have it arent able to spam it, so use another cripple/chill on them and when their resistance falls off they are affected by them(its not like resistance prevents you from adding new condi to ur target, they just dont take affect while its on)
You are forgetting guardians who can transform conditions into boons on demand and also Lyssa runes which any profession can equip. Lyssa could now see a lot of use by engis: they now have a kit as an elite skill, so could use the elite effect off the cooldown on Lyssa.
Well right now the cast time on it is the most roblematic single thing, it should be maybe half of what it is.The cooldown would actually seem fine, given what it does and how you can trait it with signets of suffering. The LF generation is currently far too low compared to similar signets on other professions.
If the above things are addressed, I think it would be fine as an elite. As far as what it should be replaced with: necros already have plenty enough signets. I would rather prefer a mobility/survivability utility.
And other professions?
Besides, who runs Axe or Locust Signet in PvP?
Actually, with signet of the locust now on a 24 second cooldown traited and being able to corrupt 2 boons in an aoe in addition to the lifesteal, I think it will be one of the most popular necro utilities both for condi and for power builds. And the axe trait as mentioned you can now trigger even without using axe, every time you go to Shroud.
As far as other professions go: you will probably agree they don’t need as much help as necros do.
And how would you actually rip or corrupt that stealth, hm? Throwing random null field or Well of Suffering and hope for the best? And then watch Thief hit you, remove a single condition and get stealth again?
Not happening, son.
Signet of the locust now corrupts two boons in an aoe when traited. Axe three now corrupts one boon in an aoe by default and you can have this trigger every time you enter Shroud. If you hit the thief in stealth while you have condis, you can proc plague sending, which will also corrupt two boons on them. Also of course if you trigger chill of death on them when they are in stealth, you could remove the boon.
So it would actually be doable in several simple ways with the new traits necros have.
Edit: I forgot the trait in blood magic which triggers a Signet with bleeds. This would also corrupt boons in stealth together with signers of suffering.
For mesmer it would obviously be possible to pull it off (though harder to do) just by sword autoattack, greatsword 3 or traited shatter skills.
(edited by Tissitra.4153)
After the patch:
engis being able to reduce the duration of their heal by half when using medkit (there is a trait that resets cooldown on the next toolbelt skill after you evade) and the fact that they can now have more dodges than sd thieves (adrenal implant is now the same as permanent vigor AND you have vigor on top of that. So up to 200% endurance Regen, whereas for sd it is now 175% at most. Hope that I got these numbers right).
Mesmer stealth and protection uptime from the chaos line (HUGE uptime on both just from the traits in this one line).
Eles now having dhumfire (just joking – even though eles do have essentially what used to be the GM dhumfire trait on necros as a minor, noone will care cause on eles the trait being minor is actually justified, given how strong everything else is).
I am sure there will be a lot more broken stuff now, these would be just obvious ones.
Lol love the thread title.
I think the change was mostly random and if the devs just spend a minute thinking about it they will probably agree that it makes no sense balanced wise. Unfortunately however, since this is about necro, the last mentioned eventuality will probably not occur in a couple of months.
Edit: I mean of course the change to consume condition.
Mind Stab dem Refuges mwahahaahaahaaa. Still not a good idea.
Would still not be a hard counter: removing stealth would not apply revealed per se, so the thief would go to stealth agaib with the next pulse from the refuge.
I still think this idea might be very nice for the game play. Boon duration increases are now actually very limited in spvp, so I don’t think this alone would lead to broken stealth durations here. More than anything, it would be a buff to necros: axe 3 would now have an additional purpose as a counter-stealth weapon, for condition builds there is the traited sinet of the locust.
Don’t know much about wvw, but I believe all kinds of halfway broken builds are possible here anyway.
I kind of could not find it: does this also mean that endurance regeneration is capped at 150% of base, or will it still be up to 200% base?
If I am correct engis still have a trait that gives 50% more endurance regeneration by default. This is now not only equivalent to perma vigor, if the cap is still 100% it would actually also STACK with vigor (I think engis are now the only ones with such a trait, or am I missing something?).
In any case, traits granting 50% endurance regen by default cannot possibly allowed to exist after this change.
How about the following corruption trait:
‘Sorry guys, I need to use my skills’
Reduces recharge on corruption skills by 33%. Corrupt a boon on ALL nearby foes and allies when using a corruption skill.
Seriously though, this could actually be sort of interesting…
Basically, if you want to solo stuff in pve, you can mostly just put on tanky gear and go to town. This however you can do on any class and it is not an actual indicator of anything.
In group play, necro is not a viable tanking option because outside of soaking up damage (which basically any class can do if specced for it) it does not actually provide anything to your group: no (or really marginaly) healing, no boons, no utility. As for other options: power necros have high dps (which others also have), but again no support. Condi necros actually apply lower condi pressure than most other condi builds and, as you might have guessed already, again bring very little else to the group.
Unfortunately, the few things that necros are actually vastly better at than others: corrupting boons, transferring conditions and applying chill are currently hardly useful in pve and not powerful enough in pvp.
Some things that will I think have to be addressed quickly:
engi tools 7 ‘after evading a strike the next toolbelt skill you use is recharged instantly’ this will DOUBLE your heal if you use med kit
mesmer chaos line: illusionary membrane, the new chaotic dampening and the new prismatic understanding will together most likely give near 100% protection uptime just from the traits (as much as I like mesmer, which is my main, this will almost certainly be over the top)
Still hoping that they will revert the change to consume conditions. It is not only completely irrational, it is also a huge nerf to a profession which is already at the very bottom of the food chain.
So now that quickness is a boon and we have slow and resistance, what about stealth and revealed?
With mesmer now having access to the huge stealth uptime from the new pu and with thieves being able to tap into shadow arts more, how about allowing for some counterplay? Necros can certainly use the help. Would also make more sense than giving access to revealed to engis, who already do very well against thieves.
It also would not be a one-way street and potentially allow for very interesting gameplay: guardians would actually be able to apply stealth in some situations by transforming revealed (to some extent also engis with transmute-rng or anyone using lyssa). This would be limited enough though, since you have to be revealed in the first place.
Here is a simple suggestion to make soft cc on necro a lot better: make stealth a boon and revealed a condition.
Instead, they are giving to engis a trait that reveals on hit. Why? Because engi, I guess.
I don’t want to be presumptuous but I think there might be a general issue with the way the balancing process is set up.
It seems that the way it works right now is this: each dev is tasked with doing 1-2 professions, then there is a meeting where the changes are discussed from the balancing perspective. This seems deeply problematic for two reasons:
1. Noone is actually responsible for balancing as such. Everyone just brokers there specific ideas.
2. Since different devs are to a different extent vocal/enthusiastic and are also in different positions, in the long term balance is skewed depending on who does which profession.
There is actually a simple way to avoid most of these issues: firstly, there should be a rotation so that a single dev does not do the same profession for longer than say half a year without swapping. Secondly, there should be someone who is tasked with overall balance exclusively and does not do a specific profession.
Maybe I am wrong in some of my thinking here. Still, since many of the last changes seem so random from the point of view of balance, maybe there is reason enough to question the overall current balancing approach.
Well hopefully they will make some changes to reaper before the expansion comes out. Especially given the recent changes, any build that has to rely on chill to do things is doomed: every class now has traits reducing chill duration, elementalists can now remove chill in an AOE by dodging in any attunement and so on. It is quite hopeless as it is now.
It is like if you were playing a game where you can do a lot more damage than others, however the others are actually invulnerable all the time.
The best case scenario is there will be some halfway random change to a reaper trait that will actually make it playable. But looking at the core mechanics as of now, I cannot see it working.
BTW I noticed that someone just started a thread on the engi forums raising the valid point mentioned above: the dev activity on the engi forum is staggering if you compare to say necros or rangers.
That thread was quickly locked with no explanation that I can see.
I said it before and will say it again. From the point of view of balancing, there was ZERO reason to spend all this effort on engi changes.
Cooldown reductions across the board, a whole new kit where literally every single skill is a field or a finisher and engis are the only ones who got a whole completely new slot (toolbar 5 skill). Looking at the state of the balance, it is VERY hard to explain it by anything else than bias.