Guild Wars 2

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Dhuumfire does not give a burn for every pulse of Desert Shroud. Please stop spreading this misinformation.

It only gives one burn stack at the initial cast.

Make sure to set a PVP build. You can consistently get 6-7 burns with a viper setup and hitting F5 after F1, nothing else.

This is with Sand Savant.

adding it to current maps is an absolute no go, because it requires developer resources, which would be wasted on a feature nobody needs.

People that want duels already have multiple ways to do so. IF they cannot get duels these ways, they are obviously socially maladjusted, because any normal person can easily get a duel running if they aren’t stupid about it.

Acewako.6421:

yep but what traits should we use on necro?
old traits buff only shroud… they dont buff scourge
Scourge is buffed only by added elite traits

This is completely false. All shroud traits work for the sand shade skills.

Transfusion in Blood works with Garish Pillar. It causes multiple pulses of healing and reviving from the scourge (not the shades). It’s surprisingly strong, much better than using it with Reaper Shroud 4.

Also keep in mind that if traited, the Pillar is also a heal (try it out at lower HP to see how much it actually does) that also revives people. That, together with the fear AND the shade attacks does make it worth its cost.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Scourge will melt trash mobs like there’s no tomorrow. The problem is that its damage output is limited by life force so if things aren’t dying, the damage drops off quick.

Scourge has high burst, but I don’t think its long-term DPS will actually be that high.

This may actually be the key to DPS as scourge. We do not actually HAVE to use scepter on both weapon sets. What if we use Daggers? Shade damage seems vastly superior to scepter damage, and this could ensure we can keep doing so.

Well, Zefiris don’t seem to get why the scourge will suck in PvE raids.

Oh, I sure get the spec. The issue is that you do not seem to be able to – you keep whining about Barrier (while using it wrong), and keep failing to notice the rest of the spec. It’s almost cute.

The suggestion is so there is an actual alternative condi mainhand weapon. We currently have scepter, which is meh, and staff, which is complete garbage. And don’t even mention Axe.
Our lack of reasonable weapon choice for condi is quite sad.

Power being fixed is independent of this, but a condition power wouldn’t care for being on dagger wouldn’t be a balance problem once power is fixed.

ceejay.2517:

Zefiris.8297:

I don’t think so – the equivalent of the shroud autoattack is the shade attack on ability use. You get less of those than you get autoattacks in shroud, but can activate them at all times, balancing things out.

We already have another trait that causes burn on shade spawn too, that overlap would be strange.

I just cant get my head round the design. It was always going to be too strong.

I think it’ll be fine. They might have to tone down the pulsing burn from F5, though.

Giving them health would make them useless. Scourge is not only a minion spec, and should not suffer when not specced for minion traits.

Might be worth to ask for a TRAIT that changes your shades that way.

I don’t think so – the equivalent of the shroud autoattack is the shade attack on ability use. You get less of those than you get autoattacks in shroud, but can activate them at all times, balancing things out.

We already have another trait that causes burn on shade spawn too, that overlap would be strange.

Annoying. It’d all be more conclusive with instanced golems

Flumek.9043:

Scourge T1 Adepts – torch trait is trash,

It’s not. It ensures application of a ton of might (in fact, with alacrity you can keep up permanent 25 might), and also gives you 8% condi duration unbuffed.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Just one problem: Scourge mightstacking sucks. Torch 5 doesn’t count the conditions on your target when calculating how much Might to grant. It counts how many conditions are on your allies. If one ally has three conditions, they get 6 Might. If another ally on the same cast has no conditions, they get no Might.

Dessicate only gives 5 Might period. Never any more (though also never less.)

I tested it on golems earlier, and consistently gave my allies 16 might, when 8 conditions are on the golem, and said ally had 0 conditions.

Are you sure it works the way you think it does? Did you test it, or are you basing this from how you read the skill?

Testing on golems is trouble – no instance, so it is certainly POSSIBLE that the might came from others – so I cannot be 100% conclusive, but it sure looked that way.

Dessicate is 5, BiP is 10, both of which would be great parts to keep up 25 when you lack alacrity.

Okay, did it again. Brought out my bone minions, attacked a golem, got some condis on it, and then used torch 5. The bone minions got 14+ stacks of might.

These CANNOT have come from conditions on the minions. The real issue is that I don’t get the might XP

ceejay.2517:

Really, didn’t know this. I guess its a bug fix rather than a balance issue then.

How is Dhuumfire working a bug? o.O

Obtena.7952:

Zefiris.8297:

Not to mention that power is weak right now – giving it a bit more damage that way wouldn’t exactly hurt the game.

If power is weak … how would adding conditions to dagger fix that.

The suggestion is not to improve power builds. I was talking about its possible side effects. Check the topic.

ceejay.2517:

Also i think it is “Demonic Lore”, burn on agony, that procs on the F skills. Dhummfire only procs on the summon i think.

This is false. Demonic Lore has a 3s internal cooldown, and you still get these stacks if you use Sand Savant.

Not to mention that power is weak right now – giving it a bit more damage that way wouldn’t exactly hurt the game.

Looks pretty good, Danny, if a bit edgy grimdark :P

Leinhart really is stylish, too. Nice

Axl.8924:

The barrier is kitteningly weak.its so horrid i am free kill to anyone.Either Make the barrier not decay and give us at least 15k barrier, or give us a barrier of 30 k that degrades after 10 seconds maybe.

once again we necros are free kills guess i’m rerolling to thief cause i’m not gonna stand around and instantly die cause no ccs and no barrier and warriors blow you up instantly.

You people do want to be unkillable gods, don’t you.

Your “suggestion” is so ridiculously overpowered it’s not even funny…

Dadnir.5038:

For PvE, the scourge will be as fine as anything else for open world or story. However for anything else the scourge is still in favor of condition damage and still lacking a meanigfull mean of support.

Might stacking is definitely a meaningfull mean of support alongside barrier, epidemic, and dps.

I do hope for a power reaper buff for sure.

Iridi.8473:

Ramoth.9064:

F2 is so ridiculously powerful as a condi clear. If you have troubles with condi as scourge its a l2p issue. The real challenge is lack of stability.

You’re joking, right? 2 condis converted? That’ll do…. oh yea, absolutely nothing in wvw.

That every 4 seconds for 10 people around you/shade (Which doubles as an attack!), or more if you use several seconds.
While also having multiple ways to transfer conditions(such as dagger 4), or eat conditions outright (consume conditions).

If you do not understand how ridiculously strong this is, I can’t help you. Who even comes close?

Iridi.8473:

No, because of condi damage. Rofl, its so funny how so completely wrong you are. I’ll sit back and laugh while you predict how much condi damage you take before you die since your barriers are gone.

You don’t even understand how barrier works. It’s not gone the instant you take any amount of damage.

Taking Condi damage into account makes barrier even better.

My god, the scrubs in this forum…

Iridi.8473:

Zefiris.8297:

Iridi.8473:

ceejay.2517:

I don’t agree. Considering how much access to barrier we have, and their cooldowns, its not in a terrible place.

I think we should see how it plays out over a few weeks before deciding its too fast.

Wrong. Its “access” is crap. 2k, 5k, 4.3k, 1.4k are the barrier numbers from the skills that grant barriers.

*Baseline, without Healing Power
*Which still are respectable and useful numbers

Keep telling yourself that. Im sure your mediocre barrier healing power support burn torment corrupt boon scourge will have massive impact in WvW and PvP.

Keep telling yourself that. I’m sure it is a good excuse.

Iridi.8473:

ceejay.2517:

I don’t agree. Considering how much access to barrier we have, and their cooldowns, its not in a terrible place.

I think we should see how it plays out over a few weeks before deciding its too fast.

Wrong. Its “access” is crap. 2k, 5k, 4.3k, 1.4k are the barrier numbers from the skills that grant barriers.

*Baseline, without Healing Power
*Which still are respectable and useful numbers

It doesn’t feel like it’s half a second…

…but perhaps that’s due to me just having beaten Bloodborne’s DLC. Good old Orphan required so much faster reflexes than mitigating damage with barrier does!

i fear the same, scourge is great in its current state, but whining may get us nerfed hard =/

Sand Savant DOES add power, if you’re in a 10 people group, and if your enemies move.

The rest I agree with. Sand Savant makes Sand Shade placement feel fun, without having to worry about the minor traits. It should be so baseline!

Zoltreez.6435:

we have a MAX CAP on barrier… there is 0 and i mean 0 reason to have that super fast decay…..

that decay alone nerfs our shield againts dmg a good 50%….

Did you consider that you are perhaps playing it wrong?

The point is not to spam it mindlessly and hope it works out. You can instead predict incoming damage(to your group), and use it beforehand.

You have a huge two second window where no decay can even happen! The design is clearly intended for predicive, skillful usage of barrier.

Haha. Yeah, true enough. Barrier is a bonus, definitely not the main course. Being that AOE beast is.

I mean, I want to play a scourge in a supportive way, and every build I am tinkering with still keeps the AoE condition beast aspect. Would be silly not to.

Sublimatio.6981:

how about continue developing shrouds for each elite spec and never again commit the same mistake that was done with scourge?

What mistake?

Actually making a powerful AND fun class?

Losing shroud and letting me use the five shroud skills next to my normal kit is the best thing the scourge did! I hope future elite specs continue doing this.

" It’s clear. This profession is going to suck ass in PvE."

Do us a favor and sit down, part time PvEers might not enjoy it but for the rest of us, it’s great.

Superb, competitive damage coupled with good support, exactly what necro needed.

Scourge is okay in PvP, where it shines is PvE.

It’s a support once you keep might up for your party.
WHILE being a Condi AOE beast <3

I love the scourge, too.

Barrier degen is fine, damage is great, the only thing I don’t like is Sand Savant feeling kitten near mandatory.

Feels like it should be baseline, with a grand master trait in its place that lets barrier degen start 4 seconds later.

My only negative feedback is this:

-Sand Savant feels absolutely mandatory for PvE, not just for what it does (3 shade uptime for 15% damage reduction/boon duration/expertise/Always a shade up for condi spam), but also for what it avoids, namely clunkiness. A 15 second cooldown for the shades is just too long, especially because the ammo mechanic means that only one charge recharges at a time.

Cutting the recharge down with Sand Savant makes it feel pleasant to play.

I feel Sand Savant should be baseline, with a major trait allowing you to split it into three.

I genuinely do not understand half this feedback.

- The damage we get is huge. It isn’t bad at ALL, it’s easily superior to reaper. Once we can test PvE, I am actually wondering if Dagger/Dagger will turn out to be the mainstay weapon we are in at least half the time, because the amount of conditions you can apply with its life force generation is sickening.
- Unlike reaper and necro, we finally have group utility, and what group utility it is! Not only can we keep up 25 might with ONE SKILL (if we have alacrity) or several skills (if we don’t), we also provide other utility, in form of a big health buffer that we can activate just before big damage comes in.
- We still keep the things that make necro useful right now (Utility that is often not appreciated much, such as Epidemic or boon hate), we do not lose it

“even our new elite spec is a nerf”

How is a straight up buff across the board a nerf? Like the only thing scourge loses is stability, and that’s mostly for PvP.

Transfusion works like this:

You use F4. You then pulse 9 healing pulses around and including you.

It is actually BETTER than it was before, because you do not need to go into shroud to use it, but instead can use it as a spot heal at any time you choose.

Unholy Martyr works like this:
You hit F5, and it starts working.

“Support? A barrier that degenerates fast is equal to a low ticking regen boon.”

No, it’s vastly superior to an extent that having to actually explain it to you is baffling.

You use it when you predict incoming damage. If you have any amount of skill, this means that it is VASTLY better than regen ever could be, because it will always have its utmost impact, and massively increase EHP.

I wonder if OP tried the class at all.

There is huge synergy with existing traits – all shroud traits work, especially traits like Dhuumfire, and some of the synergy is so strong to make certain trait line feel almost mandatory (Dhuumfire, hint hint)

Weapon choice is limited on the surface, but actually, the obvious choice may be a trap. Dagger may be better since it allows massive usage of F2-5, for great effect.

And no, for me, Torment is not the main damage condition, burn and bleed are.

And if you think barrier is ineffective, you haven’t used it. It’s actually better than shroud.

“This is sad and disheartening.”

Sad and disheartening is people not even understanding how our trait lines work.

Good work, Flubbernaut.

It’s unfortunately not really addressing the issue of Shroud-focused specs, because the even more heavy handed Speed of Shadows nerf wasn’t addressed in the slightest.

But it’s something, and you helped give us at least a little. Not enough to even make us viable, but it’s something.

No issues whatsoever with zerker+jungle. Why would there be any?

I see rangers and necros get kicked all the time, usually before they even get to say a word, even when the group just said “zerk only”.

Doesn’t affect me personally, as I play a Guardian, but it does happen frequently, I see it a couple times a week I’d guess.

My advice: Never click on the “leave instance” button before the bonus chest spawns.

We just had a clown like this in a run. Two other people click yes, I click no.

We get warped out. No chest, no skin, entire run completely and utterly wasted.

Do not be someone like that.

Nah. Been with GW2 since the beta, and I don’t feel betrayed, but then I’m not a child that starts crying when other people get gifts.

Instead, I’m happy for them. You should try that, it’s kinda the mature thing to do.

Venture out in the real world a bit. You’ll soon notice all the “first buyer/signup gets X!” stuff. it’s actually entirely normal and not scummy at all.
The complainers really don’t seem to get out much.

Gorani.7205:

paranoid mode on

You guys really fall for this smoke screen to cloud the whole controversy about the pre-purchase price policy?

This is a quality of life update to be able to change a current ascended armour into another stat via the MF. As it destroys all upgrades, a complete re-mod would cost e.g. ~120 gold (Zerker/Hoelbrak runes) + Laurels and soul shards.

I appreciate the update, but all the concerns and valid arguments about the HoT xpack have not been addressed.

paranoid mode off

I have yet to hear any “valid argument” or even half-valid concern there. Lots of petulent complaints, though – as your post so well demonstrates.

ColinJohanson.2394:

Masteries is being added to PvE to help provide this system as our form of progression for PvE moving forward, and the WvW ability system exists for WvW and will be what we use to expand WvW in the future.

To more directly answer some of your point….We are adding a system that lets you change the stats for your ascended gear (weapons and armor) next Tuesday – which will cost a combination of 10 spirit shards, piece you don’t want anymore, 5 ectos, and an exotic insignia of the stats you want to convert to. Legendary Gear will remain the gear that can freely change stats any time.

-CJ
(Edited to clarify weapons and armor)

With this, you have not only reassured me that all my fears were unfounded, but also provided me with actual exciting usages for spirit shards.

Thank you.

Don’t worry, a week of progress is nothing. You’ll be much faster next week, if you are still in the mood for the game.

Get a refund from Amazon, and make a new account.

Amazon will probably aid you, they usually have really nice customer support.

Preordering and prepurchasing is silly indeed. Nobody should do either. I sure won’t – I’ll only buy HoT if it does what I want [No additional geargrind, no raid-like content].

That aside, I think the pricing is 100% fine, as is including the base game. Common videogame practice and has been for 20+ years.

Stuff gets ridiculously cheap after a couple years. These days, it’s after a couple months. Do you folks feel betrayed when people get some block buster game for nearly free? Nah, of course not.

Because that’d be silly, just like this storm in a teacup is silly.

" are any indication, that’s a bare-minimum loss of $78k,"

Just like the massive steal community boycotting a certain game were PROVING that the company would lose hundreds of thousands in sales!

On day one, all of them were playing that game. Over steam. In other words, they buy it.

People complaining often actually buy it anyway.

Ascended Gear and the gear gap is rearing its ugly head again. A lot of people are unhappy, for various reasons.

But this thread isn’t about this. This thread is about an alternative.

Arenanet wants ascended gear to be truly useful, something people want to work for. The problem is, in its current form, ascended gear harms the very idea of horizontal progression. It punishes switching builds, being affected by meta changes, having alts, and simply preferring WvWvW.

The reason is that Arenanet made Stats the marker that made ascended gear special.

This does not need to be the case. The solution already is in the game!
With the change, give rare gear the stats exotic gear would have gotten, and exotic gear the stats of ascended gear. Ascended gear keeps the planned stats. On top of that, ascended gear gets the mechanic that we currently see with Legendaries:

The ability to swap stats via a drop-down menu

Bam. Now we have horizontal progression in its purest form. Ascended gear now is a massive convenience upgrade, giving you highly flexible gear that is not bound to a character.

It shouldn’t take much time to roll the mechanic out – it already exists. Adjusting the stats is also a simple matter.

And if you want users of Legendaries to feel special, fear not. There’s a solution here, too. Make legendaries get a function that places their upgrades into your inventory. Now legendaries are truly flexible. Simply announce this function, and implement it a few patches afterwards, so no schedule is affected.

Users of ascended gear that truly want an advantage would have it. Bag space, flexibility, the ability to adjust to any meta shift on the fly.
Those that don’t could make do with exotics, different sets, which could be obtained from various sources.

[Yes, my personal opinion is removing gear stats entirely, but I know this would be a pipe dream. So why not an alternative?]