Guild Wars 2

I would actually preffer a fully geared lvl 80 doing less damage on a level 10 map then lvl 10 player.

Reason being the lvl 80 already has full aceess to all his traits and potentially runesets giving him that much more power and options already.

So with the endless boon span being present in our meta (least the spvp one) i got an idea that might help balance things a bit. Idea is simple: When a given boon is stripped or corrupted by enemy skill, it cannot be applied again for a certain duration (kinda like stealth and revealed)

Proposed valued would be 5s by default, with some professions being granted ability to make it more (necros should!), while in other areas getting a cut or not being applicable at all (mesmer sword auto, since it’s a spammable boon strip)

Reasons for this change:
1. Overabundance of quickly refreshable boons.
2. Limited amount of boon strip/corruption counters compared to the above.
3. Bigger skill required for the latter – boon strips and corruptions need to acually land on an enemy. Blinds, LoS, evading, blocks – all these can make your boon counter go down the drain.

Leave your feedback on the idea and +1 if you like it!

And who said i run meta power necro or that ele run aurashare tempest?

Actually that is my feedback from battle between my base power necro vs bunker tempest. Not reaper nor condi. Tempest still owned me despite best efforts.

Condi or for that matter power reaper would have even lesser chances in this fight. because in RS the ele can easily kite me with it’s perma swiftness, leaps and teleport. At least in death shroud life blast doesn’t care if he’s within 170 range of me.

Also i guess you do have a point with condies, though i must say as a necro i don’t see that very much, cause while on my condi reaper build i can overload enemies with conditions, it takes a long time. I win these fights because of sustain, not because of burst.

A huge problem i have with some professions and boons is how swiftly they can be reapplied. I say that as a necro – guy specializing in corrupting boons.

I corrupt 5 boons on ele via corrupt boon (pat on the back for getting it below 90% hp and past it’s diamond skin) and what reward do i get? I get to see it apply tons of new ones 2s later including the dreaded protection.

Sure i can and do use my signets, but that extends the battle for 5s more or so. Then i’m outta corrupts, while the happy boon spammage continues.

So how about giving the protects longer cooldowns, or making it that corrupting a boon also prevents receiving that boon for a set duration, much like interrupting a skill prevents it’s use for a certain duration?

1v1’d scrapper in pvp. After corrupting roughly 9 boons over few secs, he still keps spamming boons on himself. Didn’t stop me from seding him back to his base the fast way, but it shows just how the relation of boon application to boon removal looks like currently…

and then enemy sets the “standard character models” option in menu and your whole plan goes down the crapper. Seriously – L2P and face your opponent like a man rather then this “asura chameleon” cheese…

1. chrono
2. tempest
3. reaper – more then nerf, he needs some of the good things moved to base necro, which is pretty horrid without the reaper spec.

taunt is the same as fear for all i know – both cc and a condition. So both stunbreaks and insta condi cleanses works.

the very point of that rule is for wars over who kills the beasts. Let’s say team red deals 60% damage to svanir before team blue’s member/s get around to stealing the beast…only now they can’t do it unless they kill all red members and let beast reset.

With the things they way they are now there is an incentive to have blue participate and bringing more ppl in for bigger chance of being the ones to deliver the final blow. It’s hectic, maybe not too fair, but it does ensure more action and some additional beast wars instead of short “check & skip” cause other team already booked he beast and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Warriors aren’t useless. When i kill one i get 5 points just fine, often easier then with other professions. That’s certainly useful.

It’s about looking for a scapegoat and whining like a baby instead of fixing the problem by taking matters into your own hands and organizing a team. If you don’t build it, they won’t come, simple as that.

We all know the story – ruby is where it gets hard and everyone’s on the edge. But when i get blamed by my teammate for playing non-meta class (necro) that’s when line gets crossed.

So to all “meta whiners” (and those who don’t like it that their teammates “suck”):

If you didn’t go through effort of making your own premade team that has the professions you want manned by ppl you like, don’t go whining about what you get in solo queque.

The End.

The reaper is by far the most balanced tank. To survive as a reaper you actually have to use your defenses at a right time, manage your life force pool and ds cooldown, try to cc your enemies when it actually matters, help your minions protect your kitten and so on.

The only problem is “balanced” is not what wins the game. The “meta” is, and that is swamped with invulni/immune/ spammage, and ofc the legendary tempests that even a power necro can’t touch if they know their stuff.

Save yourselves was never an elite, just regular shout. Tome of Courage didn’t have any skill like save yourselves…

Let’s be honest – there may be a group that prefers base necro over reaper, sure. But certainly not because of DS. More likely because the needed a base necro traitline in place of the reaper, or just don’t have HoT.

rager.4963:

Just wondering has anyone stayed Necromancer because they like Death Shroud?

cricket noises….tumbleweed rolls past….crows cawing

L2P. Well corrupts 1 boon a sec. Unless you’re extremely unlucky you have time to spot it and move/dodge out of it. With the crazy amount of stab these days a good countermeasure is needed and luckily that’s one of the few roles a necro can acually take without getting outbested by half of the roster.

I don’t know if it’s protection or other culprits, but i can easily say this – if i go on full power reaper vs a diamond skin ele (so in short i crit every hit) and still can’t make a decent dent, then something’s indeed wrong here.

200k $ for tourney rewards, apparently insufficient $ for properly staffed pvp balance team – anet logic, go figure..

as i said – it’s not the damage, it’s the ability to hold enemies in melee, which was widely advertised as reaper’s core gameplay style.

So i main a reaper and hell yeah it’s fun, even in pvp. And albeit he may as well be the best balanced profession of them all, he still is a good study case for “what went wrong”.

And by that i mean reaper’s lacking ability to trap targets in melee range, especially in shroud which is his trademark. And what is said bad decision?

Leaps being immune to cripple or chilling. It was pointed out before and now it comes back with a vengeance. Reaper on your kitten No problem! Just use your leap skill to escape, chill won’t hinder it one bit!.

The reaper can give chase? Well yeah, and guard can be full condi. Possible, but that’s not what the design was about! The reaper’s job is to hold and reel in anyone foolish enough to think they can leap around him like a frog and kite him ez-pzy without taking some serious risk! But that’s not what’s happening.

So where are the cripples and immobilizes for the reaper? Where is the ability to hinder their leap skills to make escape that much harder if they haven’t condi-cleansed?
Edit Oh and where is my pull for rs? Not everyone uses gs in pvp, hell most reaper’s don’t. Not to mention the horrible cooldown and tracking for that thing…
While everyone who traits reaper does use reaper shroud and it’s always melee, so how about some tools for being effective in melee there?

Answer to that and more in next balance patch…

Reaper as a profession is pretty well done save one MAJOR flaw. It fails to perform it’s trademark feature which is holding enemy at close range and not letting them get off the hook till you’re done.

Unfortunately there are 8 other professions and “well done” is hardly the word to describe most of them. Usually it’s either “ridicilously OP” (bunker tempests/mesmers/sustain druids), or “horribly weak” (berserker and daredevil).

There’s also the poor dragon hunter who does have very good burst and more blocks then lego, is pigenholed to 2 working builds – mediguard or trapmedi.

Bottom line here is that all the professions need a look at them and some of them a serioius trait rehaul, because they’re down to one or two builds that can perform reasonably well in pvp, rest being plain suicide.

“Krytan Butcher” – my necro’s a racist and an ex-convict for serial charr murders after the peace treaty, to which he never agreed.

Now released due to lack of hands to fight the mordrem he earns his freedom doing what he does best, only this time to cabba…erm “corrupted sylvari”. Never trust a salad! Or a catcow for that matter!

Down huh? Well then here’s your survivalist version, in text form

Weapons: Staff, Scepter/Focus

Sigils: Ice/Chilling (Staff), Bursting/Agony (Scepter) – you can choose different ones, they aren’t critical to gameplay, like for example sigil of torment instead of bursting for more condies to feed scepter #3, or sigil of battle for staff for stronger terror.

Runeset: Rune of the Traveller (passive run speed, condi and boon duration).
Amulet: Wanderer’s (best condi damage of all, but low power. You can also try Rabid’s, Carrion’s and Viper’s. Bottom line: condi damage).

Specs:

Curses – 2 – 3 – 1 or 3 (extra condi removal, terror and either enfleebling blood on shroud or extra condi durations for scepter)

Soul Reaping – 2-3-1 (unblockable marks are HUGE in block spammy spvp), then extra duration for your fears and fear on downed, finally foot in the grave for some badly needed stun breaks and stomp stab.

Reaper: 1-2-2 – no brainer here. Shout support trait cause you use shouts, and two chill support traits cause you’ll be doing a lot of that too and chilling victory is a nice might source without going into spite.

utils:

1. - consume conditions – obvious.
2. - optional. I usually slot spectral armor for extra survival vs bursts (armor then shroud) or well of corruption/corrupt boon – for being extra evil vs boon spammers.
   Flesh wurm is not too shabby too since generally with this build (unless with spectral armor) you’ll want to avoid the biggest brawls and just condi enemies down at certain range. Having your wurm escape option is good too.

1. - Rise! 50% damage reduction talks. But in order to get it yapping your enemies need to get hit by your minions. Luckily with all the chills on board and scepter #2 you have tools to help the little buggers land their blows.

1. - Nothing can Save you! Does exactly what it says, especially vs those pesky dragon hunters. Convert 2 of thier boons into vulnerability stacks (5 per boon) then tear through their blocks, because this shout just made all your attacks unblockables! Be sure to not waste it for staff marks, as they are already unblockable 24/7 thanks to traits.

elite - chilled to the bone! or plague – chilled to the bone is your practical choice that synergizes with the build – chil damage, 2s stun aoe, nasty stability for you if it hits.

plague is the 3mins cooldown panic button. Not as sweet as chilled but when you’re swarmed on point and you pop it fast (before losing much hp) you can but yourself some precious time for help to arrive before all is lost. In practice even without master of corruption, plague can make a a difference.

And that’s about it;) Lotsa unblockables, nasty fear/terror uptime, generally pure condi build;)

PvP Murphy Law #2:

Remember, out of 5 ppl on your team 0 goes to close to hold it. In short – unless you move your kitten there expect fast and easy decaps of close. Once in a blue moon you might get someone who actually bothers to care about capping and staying at close so enemies don’t get easy points.

In this build it’s not absolutely necessary, though it is a hit. With rune of traveller and wanderer’s amulet you get 47.33%(if i recall right) condi duration. Fear included. So nearly 150% fear duration instead of nearly 200%, if Fear of Death is traited.

The real loss is the Fear on down which is nice damage to down your would be stomper before he gets the chance to stomp you.

However recenlty i got into ruby and my terror reaper was suffering from sustain issues. Slotting spectral armor and going spectral mastery over fear of death does a lot for his survival, though he’s still not absolute tank. But in 1v1 the survival did go way up, especially since ressing teammates was not viable at all, even with well of corruption fearing stompers off them. The stream of damage to downed guy and myself kept me from finishing the job on time, often killing me, sadly.

As i compare guardian to my necro – guardian’s design fails miserably.

The two are a good comparison because they’re both extreme classes. They’re not jacks of all trades, masters of none. Both are extremely lacking in one area while being supposed masters in another…except the guard is not.

Necro keeps his promise – no one can match his condition manipulation abilities, he even has two sources of additional condi damage if he so chooses – damage from chilling and terror. All the while many of his other aspects also work and synergize well. It is not impossible to have a necro that has reasonable damage along with not too shabby sustain and solid condi cleansing and cc countermesures.

The guard however fails miserably. Not only does it lack something truly unique in terms of team support (no unique boon here, like let’s say mesmer’s alacrity) but is easily matched if not bested by both ele and engi in that departament.

The trait layout and syngergies are horrible, getting decent condi cleanse usuallly means seriously gutting something else like damage mitigation or offense. If that wasn’t enough guard’s sustain is very bad – without constant healing he’ll be feet forward before you know it, so another thing that cannot be passed up in your build no matter what, reducing build diversity.
And then there’s the condi play or rather lack of sides burning…

At the end of the day necro stays unique, with his mastery over conditions unmatched by others, and a solid set of utilities and traits allowing for build diversity without being forced to always pick a specific trait or skill for ensured survival, and only then build on top of that.

As for the guard – just ask yourself what is it that guard can do that engi can’t, only better, with more versatility and without crippling condi play? And those traits..

I liked my bomb hobosack…

Spartacus.3192:

Build diversity disappeared when ANET forced you to NOT be able to choose an adept to put in the master slot or a master trait into the GM slot. And of course by locking you into only 3 trait lines.

QFT. R.I.P. my zombieneer build:/

Why don’t you just spec it my way and give it try to judge for yourself?;)
In a question of more sustain vs faster kill there rarely are easy answers. This one you should decide on your own.

So, after emerald ruby’s the second death trap?

I don’t even understand how the argument “they can’t code it” even appeared in the first place. I’m here giving an idea. Wheather a-net can or cannot code it, shouldn’t that be a-net’s concern and no one else’s?

I disagree, necro is not selfish anymore. He is the best kitten reviver ingame (transfusion + last rites), has might for party (blood is power) and now even a projectile blocking field (corrosive poison cloud)

Reaper does not need buffs. Core necro does. Cause majority of fixes to necro issues are in reaper spec. Base necro still suffers from multiple issues:

1. horrible ds (compared to reaper shroud)
2. cc ragdoll
3. lacking good melee cleave
4. slow casting and/or horrid cooldown on too much stuff
5. Weak combo play (again reaper brings that up by a lot, but not base necro).
6. Weaker condi play (no damage on chill, dhummfire useless).

So i was playing a match y-day with my friend we got owned hard by the other team, happens. However what does not happen ever, least to me was the way lord was killed.

Let’s put it plain and simple “your lord is under attacked” started popping AFTER he was already dead. Nor did i see them on mini map right before the deed, though that could’ve been me not paying proper attention (though i was expecting them to go for the lord).

Is is possible it was some stealth+real high burst at play, or was it some form of cheating?

There is a semi-invulni panic button for the reaper – spectral armor. A smart reaper will pop that right before shroud to gethimself some solid survivability uptime. If his overall defense is strong and enemy’s burst comes in multiple hits rather then one big one it may ineed seem reaper pushed 0 damage button. Well except he didn’t and it won’t work well against condi spam.

Reaper is by default to be durable and not that easy to kill. In good hands that’s what it is, but it’s by no means a cheapshot like let’s say diamond skin bunker tempest or mesmer with blur and distortion spam.

As for the warrior he’s more likely referring to rampage, the elite vs necros, unless the necro has plague as his (blind spam). And yeah, rampage eats necro even the reaper, unless he’s properly geared and very coolheaded (corrupt his stability at it’s start, then chain fears before next one kicks in).

As i recall difference between shadowstep and a teleport is that one is moving fast to destination, but actually moving, so obstacles matter, while other is just plain dissapear and appear.

With that in mind I expect obstacles, especially player created ones like line of warding, spectral walls, etc cc zones to block shadostepping from going through them. Obviously that’s not the case. Now remind me – if i run faster against a wall do I;

a) pass through it
b) make myself a piece of modern art all over the wall and surroundings?

Ok, my first character on gw2 was a guardian. It was fun…except it wasn’t. The character (look and lore) was fun, the world was fun, but the profession, i never ever got along with. I tried hard, really i did, but i could never muster real performance from it, real individuality, real unique role i’d enjoy. Something just didn’t click between me and the guardian, period.

Few years and professions later i come back to guardian…and not a kitten thing changed. When i want to make a build for my necro it’s a textbook case of hard love. It’s difficult, it’s demanding, it can bite you in the kitten , but it is possible and results are worth of the pains.

When i wanna do something with my ranger – breeze. I slab what i need i go in and rock (or die;). With all the pets and some cool trait combinations a lot is possible.

But whenever i feel like making a build for guard…i just feel it’s impossible by design. No matter which turn i take always a wall that cannot be smashed or jumped over.
Like it’s either “run traps or meditations or go home son”.

So, is it just me having an anti-guard gene in my DNA, or is guard really a nightmare when it comes to diverse builds?

Elvirais – but ofc. Beating dragonhunter is all about 3 things:

1. not getting pulled in/surviving if you do.

Firstly you can harass him at range as mentioned. You can use Rise! when near him. It’ll spawn a minion where he stands, usually setting off all the traps. You lose a minion, he loses half of his traps (cause he probs has them off cooldown and can set new wave of them).

If he spears of justice you (you’ll be on a glowing chain) use death shroud. You’ll get 3s of stability just for popping it, and you can follow up with #3 to get some long kitten stab after. That way you won’t let him forcibly pull you into the traps. Watch out for his true shot – he’ll charge it up a sec – doging is advised.

If kitten hit the fan and you got pulled in, popping shroud is higly advised. Not only it will soak up some damage, it will grant you insta stab to get out of there. especially if you got caught by dragon’s maw. other then that don’t be a Gohan and DOOOOOOODGEEEEEEE!
Getting out if they immobilized you might be bit trickier. You will need to cleanse it or transfer it with staff #4. Also insta popping your Rise! before ds is also a live saving idea.

2. Or just do what i do – cc his kitten Good news! This build is stuffed with unblockables, and good cc, specifically for dealing with dragon hunters. All your marks are unblockable, well of corruption is unbockable, your shouts are unblockable. And you got Nothing can Save you to literally make everything unblockable for few secs.

Pop marks under his rear, watch the condi damage flow. But be careful with reaper’s mark. 95% of time it goes in, but when dealing with a good dragon hunter you need to to check if stab is up. If it is, rip it/corrupt it (focus #5, “Nothing can save you!”,Well of Corruption) or wait it out, if not enjoy watching him eat terror and chill damage.

Chillblains is also crucial. Asides sweet sweet chill damage it poisons them – guardian are all about healing and blocking. Kill these two avenues of sustain and you got yousrself a dead dragon hunter.

3. Finish the job! Scepter will make quick work of what’s left (as long as poison is up). I highly recommend using Nothing can Save you! right after you’re done with staff. Your scepter does not have unblockables on it’s own and getting that poison off auto and torment off #3 is crucial.

Or you can make a turn here and go to RS, again after “NCSY” and (if you’re sure you can handle the traps/already dealt with them), and mow him down with #4, throw in #5 for good chilling measure and in between maybe you’ll get away with lucky fear from #3.

Usually by this point further discussion is void as the dragonhunter is just waiting to be offed:)

Also remember about chilled to the bone! as a move to use when you’re in “unblockable time frame” after NCSY. It is “bit” visible to enemy, so they might dodge it, but used bit later in the fight there’s a fair chance their dodges already got used up. So chill them to the bone! if you’re not in RS.

I don’t get the opener’s post at all. This is pvp, it’s only natural you reach a point where you stop, because ppl above you are simply better while people below you are weaker. That’s when you hit 50/50.

Only way to fix that is to improve your team’s play, yourself inculded, else you’re not gonna move forward much.

Xillllix.3485:

They need to nerf condi and passive play, not Diamond Skin.

Bolded the crucial parts out…

Meow – let’s not exaggerate here. Guardian’s line of warding (their knockback wall) is it’s own center of knockback, separate entity etc and it works just fine.

And what about every well or better yet corrosive poison cloud? They too don’t follow us around are separate entities, have condi damage beased off us and what not and worked with proper traits.

Wall would be much the same, not minion as you might think, just a field that applied condi and has enemy fear direction calculations based on it’s position and not ours. Not a terribly hard thing to do considered they already did half of the job with line of warding, and other half (condi calculations) with corrosive poison cloud.

Just for the record – transfusion does nothing for you yourself. It’s your altruistic trait that with healing power can heal for obscene amounts, but you yourself are not healed by it.

The point of MoC asides awesome recharge reduction that really brings them way up in value is to arm you with extra condies on yourself for your use. Problem is you don’t follow up on it. Here are but few things you do with them:

Cast consume conditions after a corruption – due to extra condies on yourself heal will be that much stronger. Corrosive Poison Cloud is especially good for this – a projectile block that will boost your CC heal.

Cast a corruption to passively transfer condies to your enemy. If you got curses you got passive signet of plauge cast on crit if you go over 3 condies on yourself. Now imagine you got some serious burning on you. Just that. It’s not 3 condies, it’s not triggering. Use corrutpion and with next crit they burn, not you.

If you use well of power (which imho would be awesome if not for the atrocious cooldown), you can arm yourself with boons of your choosing thanks to it’s condition to boon corversion and corruptions always applying same condies on you.

And then there’s always the traditional condi transfer via dagger #4 or staff #4, or the normal plague signet in utility bar.

1st rule of pvp balance:

“You don’t let Chuck Norris face off against normal ppl.”.
Sorry Chuck.

“Playing base necro” is one such scenario.

Tell me about it.
Call me crazy (i like it, muahahaha) but i believe “competitive” means two players (or teams) enter a host’s (a-net is this case) prepared “arena” where everything is already nicely set, without any room for their own intervention and tweks that could skew the chances.

In GW2 however it looks more like this:
1. go to options and change almost every setting there is to actually get a responsive control over your character.
2. get team or get recked.
3. get teamspeak or any other not included in base game VOIP app.
4. get used to quirks of the UI such as that mini-map issue.
5. Be sure to follow meta builds, cause you know – thinking for yourself seems to be a criminal offense!
6. Hope the league deems you worthy to get a pipe (don’t worry wins or losses are not mandatorly tied to the pips you get!).
7. enjoy your ranked pvp experience!:)

Oooops almost forgot!!
8. Download additional software to make your mouse coursor actually visible when in bigger fights!

So, as usual in my case when i hear of meta my fist tends to clench save one finger which stubbornly stays straight. With that in mind i give to you my very own Krytan Butcher’s terror reaper build!

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNAW7dnc0A10gdbCWbC0bilgBLeIuEjiUXhpQTIKpFAaAA-TpRAABAcEA+4BAsfZgC3fwiLAQ3HEAA

This is a condi-terror build for the reaper boasting strong condi, cc, anti-block and anti-boon gameplay. It also has a bit of survivability crammed into it, and strong anti-cc game as well. Forget about being a necro rag-doll, not with this one they don’t!

In short it wrecks dragon hunters like no tommorow, handles most opposition 1v1 very well, provides great ways to be a real pest in larger fights and keep your allies alive by making their would be stompers life a living hell!

If you need more precise instructions, ask cause i don’t feel like writing a wall of text in vain….this time that is;)

Oh and #7 utility is the optional slot. I like well of corruption there, but many other skills make a great pick for it as well depending on your needs!

Notable mentions include: Spectral Wall, Plague signet, spectral armor, “Suffer!” and “You are all weakings!”

Interesting theory indeed!
In PvE blueish ress icon may be consistent because in PvE we’re all on the same team – the Pact.

But in PvP we’re not all on the same team and each needs it’s own color scheme followed or it leads to mistakes. For example i’m red and i see blue icon near point held by our defender.

Normally i think – enemy down, he’ll stomp it, nothing to see move along.
Unless i remember that map’s doing this weird kitten it does and then realize “Oh crap that’s our man that’s down!!” Gotta save his kitten or we’ll lose the point!

Also the color theory is another reason this should be aborted. One color for your team, always the same one, and another for enemy, also always the same. Like green/red or white/black…whatever. As long as each team is under the same conditions and non subject to misleading information or emotional influence from the UI itself.