Guild Wars 2

Makes perfect sense.

Cerbeius.7129:

Spiteful Removal got changed to Spiteful Renewal, Spite (II)

Actually, Spiteful Renewal was the old adept minor trait (gain health on kill) and Spiteful Removal was an adept major trait (lose 3 conditions on kill).
Spiteful Removal was never meant to make it into the new specialization system because – like all on-death traits – it was terrible.
Spiteful Renewal on the other hand was at first previewed as the adept minor trait which removes 1 condi and heals on hit, but instead it was changed to consume a condition and switched places with Reaper’s Might.

Parasitic Contagion!

…jk, Weakening Shroud.

WhiteCrow.5310:

I’m running WoB with the Well trait. It’s insanely good right now, and does so many things for being only one skill.

- Stun break? Check.
- Pulsing heal? Check.
- Combo light field? Check.
- Protection? Check.
- Life siphon? Check.
- Condition removal? Check.

When placed at the correct time (Condition burst), you end up coming out of the fight looking like a D/D Ele with all the buffs on you.

Interesting. Apparently there’s a way to combine Well of Blood and Well of Power into one healing skill.

Zero Solstice.9754:

flow.6043:

Zero Solstice.9754:

Krait with appropriate foods/oils and traits can get upwards of 180-200% duration.

The 100% cap still exists, so with Krait + Barbed Precision + pizza you’re already exceeding the maximum.

Lingering Curse adds 100% condition duration to your baseline, so you can effectively stack an upwards of 200% duration on your bleeds, cripples, and poisons via scepter skills.

1. If you double something twice you multiply by 4, so that would be +300%.

2. Lingering Curse only affects scepter skills.

3. A trait that modifies base durations isn’t really a duration increase but something that changes a skill entirely, and that new skill is again subject to the 100% cap rule.
So turning your scepter bleeds from 5 seconds into 20 seconds doesn’t mean +300%, but that you have a trait that gives you different scepter skills and in addition to that you also have +100% bleeding duration.

MethaneGas.8357:

If I’m being honest…. I felt no impact from Consume Conditions nerf…

The 10 stacks of vuln are less of an issue than I expected.
However, the extra 5 seconds cooldown are very noticable to me. It kinda throws off your inner stopwatch in Death Shroud, like when you have a lot of chilled on you. Sometimes I drop out of DS thinking Consume is ready to use, but nope, couple seconds left, and a few times that mistake killed me.

Zero Solstice.9754:

Krait with appropriate foods/oils and traits can get upwards of 180-200% duration.

The 100% cap still exists, so with Krait + Barbed Precision + pizza you’re already exceeding the maximum.

Zero Solstice.9754:

2 Krait/2 Mad King/2 Lyssa combo well for overall condi duration increase, plus other minimal bonuses.

They all give 5% with their 2nd bonus, why wouldn’t you just take 6 nightmare instead?

I just looked through your post history and found this:

Amityel.5324:

And its simple you have your DS woooohah but what if 3 pple focus you? you enter DS and boom you are dead. Dead class cant help its team ;-) Trust me i rolled mesmer and engie and I never come back to necro unless they fix the class because right now its joke.

sorudo.9054:

ether have it as a choice/trait or completely remove it, this pretty much ruins my character, a character i had fun with for so long.

I would very much like to watch you play. Your level of e-sport must be off the charts if a single extra click for long cd utility skills is the deciding factor between “fun” and “ruined”.

Balekai.6083:

Rym.1469:

He better advise that only competent Necros with good positioning should be using Transfusion.

Today I escaped a zerg in dowstate because of some random Gaurd’s Banish. While being revived, I got pulled into the zerg stampede with Transfusion.

Transfusion is okay, but you have to know how to use it.

Don’t tell me how to use Transfusion!!!

aarrg!

Balekai getting ganked by zerg, panic uses transfusion and teleports all his allies that were being ressed on top of him for the slaughter

Using downed bodies as human shields. That’s smart, I don’t see the problem.

Lily.1935:

The issue I have with allot of these changes, especially the changes to blood and Curses is that they seem to be balanced around the reaper and not the core necromancer.

I really don’t have a problem with some traits being underpowered until we see the Reaper.

A lot of people are mentioning Dhuumfire being bad (I actually quite like it with Unyielding Blast), but how many people are really taking it over Foot in the Grave and Deathly Perception right now?
The Reaper on the other hand already has a source of stability in Shroud, and there will be Decimate Defenses so it’s not necessary to have Deathly Perception.
So I really don’t think Dhuumfire being almost exclusive to Reaper is a bad thing.
Core necros are taking Terror now, but Reaper will more likely take Path of Corruption. Reaper: Chilling Darkness, Core necro: Plague Sending.

To me this is just the same as some traits working better in power builds and others in condi builds. I simply wouldn’t expect all traits to work equally well in all builds.

Bhawb.7408:

I dislike the design of Plague Sending to be so passive and difficult to play around.

I get a similar feeling from a lot of our new traits.

If at all possible I tried to avoid traits like these before the patch – like Reaper’s Protection, even Last Gasp and Chill of Death even though they are very strong.
I simply didn’t use any of those traits, not even nightmare runes or crit sigils, nothing that had an icd I couldn’t see or control. And that was one of the things I loved about my old build, because I had 100% control over everything!

But the new necro feels a little more spammy and seems to be carried by a lot more passive effects.

Spite still has Chill of Death, Spiteful Spirit has an icd (no one knows why..), there’s an icd on Plague Sending, Weakening Shroud’s weakness proc, Unholy Sanctuary, Mark of Evasion (why does this need an icd? And why a different one than the original MoB?), Blood Bond and Last Gasp.
Basically, it’s impossible to avoid having some uncontrollable randomness in the new necro (which includes Barbed Precision’s lower proc chance), and to me this feels rather weird. Everything seems a little less skill based now.

I know that some of those traits absolutely need an icd, but for transparency’s sake perhaps we could get an icon or something to show us if a signet proc is ready? Something like the sigil of leeching charge that is visible for everyone?

The Gates Assassin.9827:

1. No, but I’ve heard of some other people trying bunker builds with it.

2. I have not tried this exact build, but I already know it will not be meta.
Signets might be strong in 1v1s now but they aren’t doing a lot in team fights (except Locust because it’s aoe). But you don’t need to have a lot (or any) signets on your bar with Signets of Suffering anyway because the synergy with Plague Sending and Blood Bond alone makes it worth having.
Also, zombify doesn’t use Blood Magic in that build, big mistake!
And my personal opinion: scepter/dagger is generally too slow for PvP, but that isn’t really a trait-related issue.

3. Have not tried it yet.

4. I actually started using Master of Corruption at first (in both PvP and PvE) but the cd reduction just isn’t worth giving up Terror and getting additional self applied conditions. Blindness on Consume… horrible.

The Gates Assassin.9827:

just talk about what you feel is important to mention for Necromancer.

Overall I feel our traits are in a pretty good place after the patch.
However, there are still some issues left:

Spiteful Renewal does not work in Shroud.

Parasitic Contagion does not work in Shroud.

I kind of understand Anet’s position from a balance perspective, not wanting to open the flood gates and allow all sources of healing at once, but traits not working half the time simply excludes them as a viable choice over their alternatives. If the values are too high, make them lower, but the first priority should be that they aren’t rendered useless when combined with our class mechanic.

Unholy Fervor

One week before the patch this trait was previewed to give 10% more damage to all skills against vulnerable foes.
They changed it again and now it’s basically a weaker version of our old Axe Training. (like the axe was that strong it needed a nerf…)

Spiteful Spirit should not have an icd (like Weakening Shroud).

It just doesn’t make sense for a trait that is already gated by life force and the cd of Shroud to additionally have an icd of its own.

Barbed Precision

This trait was changed from 66% to 33% proc chance.
After the past week’s uproar on the forum about this (completely unwarranted) nerf they apparently decided to increase the base duration of the trait from 2 seconds to 2.5 seconds, so it would total 3 seconds with the merged 20% bleeding duration, but that doesn’t fix anything.
The best part about this trait was that you could actually see an increase of bleed stacks if you were under the effect of fury or changed your gear to something with more precision.
But now Barbed Precision is purely based on getting lucky with rng, even with full sinister gear + Deathly Perception + Target the Weak + fury + Spotter + Banner of Discipline.
They basically increased the damage potential with the duration buff, but the actual usability of Barbed Precision in terms of buffing skill rotations with a slight bleed stack increase just doesn’t work anymore. It can’t be controlled with a proc chance this low and is really just pure luck now.

I don’t understand why they nerfed Barbed Precision in the first place, but for all I care the duration of it could be 1 second, just bring back the 66% proc chance. Please!

Soul Comprehension

Weak. Armored Shroud and Beyond the Veil are superb traits, how does Soul Comprehension still exist after the rework?
Even MM necros who have minions dying around them all the time can’t make proper use of this trait. (in part because you don’t get the life force of nearby deaths when in Shroud)

Mark of Evasion

Triggers out of combat. Clearly this is a big issue in PvE, but also a slight annoyance in PvP.
The only other damaging on-dodge trait in the game is Uncatchable (Caltrops) but this one is a major trait, and also, thieves have a lot of other ways to avoid combat without dodging.

Blood Bond

Unlike the real Vamp Signet, the lesser version doesn’t work in Shroud.
Also, this trait should be changed to not require facing your target. It’s less of an issue with the real signet, but with this trait you can hardly control when and on which target Blood Bond is going to trigger.
For example: marks can be cast backwards, so do some boon corruptions like Corrupt Boon, Well of Corruption, Unholy Feast (Spiteful Spirit), then there’s Mark of Evasion, Weakening Shroud, Epidemic… the point is, we have a lot of aoe skills that can inflict bleeding on targets that are standing behind us, in which case the lesser signet will trigger but miss and the trait will go on cooldown.

You’re right, it does require facing your opponent like the original Vamp Signet skill.

Whether or not the real Vamp Signet shoul require facing your target is debatable, but in case of the lesser version it should absolutely not because you rarely every get to control when and on which target it triggers.

You don’t see the icd of the trait (maybe there should be an icon when it’s ready, same for plague sending etc), and when the trait is off cd you have a lot of random aoe bleeds flying around that are rather likely to hit targets that are standing behind you, like from Epidemic, Barbed Precision, corrupting vigor, Weakening Shroud…

So yeah, this should definitely be changed to not require facing.

Zalavaaris.5329:

the nerf of the 100% condition duration trait was because of fear in pvp.

It’s not just fear. You simply can’t have proper balacing for any condition if you have to factor in a trait that doubles everything.

Zalavaaris.5329:

100% longer duration would fix our ramp up time and condi burst in pve.

That’s not what would happen. Longer durations might help you maintain higher stacks after the ramp up, but they don’t make you stack faster.

NeXeD.3042:

if that trait somehow made our burns that we were transferring 100% duration….

Transfers don’t interact with durations at all, they just copy whatever time is left.

spoj.9672:

Jimorie.5293:

SpellOfIniquity.1780:

If I’m not mistaken… It’s the only on-dodge trait that triggers while out of combat. Things like Engi’s dropping bombs, Rangers getting protection or Warrior’s damaging foes only happens when they’re in combat. Seems weird that ours happens both in and out of it.

The Thief trait Uncatchable also triggers out of combat, so Mark of Evasion is not the only one. (The wiki entry on Uncatchable even states that is the only one to trigger out of combat! :P)

I too would very much like to see both changed to in combat only.

Fortunately for thieves uncatchable is a major trait. So they dont have to pick it.

And even if they did, they have stealth and teleports for skipping.

Liege Tai.8249:

Could try swapping the runes to “Mad kings”. Swap one malice sigil for earth (66% chance of bleed on hit) this synergies with barbed precision (a further 33% chance of bleed on hit)

Use epic minion, summoning the minion will trigger the rune (also work’s on charge 40 sec CD 45 sec rune cool-down) to activate a 13 hit attack with a bird flock, they all bleed on hit (13 stacks and have a further 2 chances to inflict bleed with the above stated sigil and trait, making a possible bleed stack of 39 from this attack alone… This is also AoE 5 targets, meaning a maximum possible condition application of 195 across all targets.)

Mad King triggers the ranger’s Hunter’s Call when activating your elite, which does 16 hits but only on up to 3 targets and it doesn’t inflict bleeding on its own.

Also, since Barbed Precision was nerfed to 33% chance on crit you can’t stack of lot of bleeding with it anymore, even with full sinister and multi hit channeled skills.

Siva Mira.3546:

Tim.6450:

Probably some dev reasoning: " With this they can dodge to set up a mark of blood before the battle starts."

You actually got it right, it is the reason for this behavior and it works great in PvP but not in PvE side. They just have to make it not work in PvE like it did in PvP.

I’m sure there’s no other reason than MoE has always worked like this and now they forgot to change it to work like any damaging on-dodge trait is supposed to: only in combat.

Also, what would you do in WvW? It’s a PvP environment, but there are lots of guards and stuff you just want to run by without getting slowed down.

Siva Mira.3546:

If it starts at the beginning of the dodge then you would have to walk to your enemy and then dodge away from him. Wouldn’t that be a counter product?

It would be counterproductive to use dodges as gap closers.

Neandramathal.9536:

With Cleric it lists 2547 heal (1200 heal power) – so that’s a 1.5x modifier for healing power!

That’s pretty nice actually.
It makes sense too, considering that if any build is going rezzomancer it would be someone using a tanky amulet like cleric.

MAN.9046:

never been a fan of wells but might try them for some extra siphoning

Of course the biggest issue of wells remains: people can just walk out. Which directly translates to how much you can actually siphon with them.
But the cd reduction of defensive wells like Well of Power and the protection you get with Vampiric Wells is nice either way. Also, dark fields are nice, and combos extend beyond the range of the well itself.

As for numbers: with the basic Vampiric values in addition to Vamp Rituals, one hit does about ~160 healing and dmg (varies a little with your gear of course).
So with up to 5 targets and 6 pulses over 5 seconds, one well actually has a really nice healing potential.

MAN.9046:

Thoughts?

Looks good, although I’d still go with Consume Conditions over any other heal, especially since your only cleanse seems to be Shrouded Removal.
Also, since you’re not using a staff you’re not really doing a lot of condition damage, so I’d definitely test this with a marauder, valk or soldier amulet as well.

Neandramathal.9536:

Transfusion seems to not heal yourself (that I’ve noticed?)

It will if your life force depletes during the channel.

Neandramathal.9536:

Not quite sure I’d call Vampiric Presence as amazing support just yet, especially in WvW those numbers are just so small – Life From Death is much more noticeable if not camping DS.

I’m not sure about “amazing” either, but it’s definitely better than Life from Death.
LfD just heals for too little. VP can rather easily catch up with it while also buffing your damage.
Also, Vampiric Aura pulses, so your allies don’t really have to stand near you at the right moment to get the benefit of the trait. But instead, once they have the buff they can move as far away from you as they want and still get the extra healing and dmg.

PlatinumMember.5274:

I casually use my necro to farm world bosses what suggestions do have for such a build?

Any build will do fine with Blood Magic, I think.
Spite is too good to pass up for any PvE content, so with the remaining choice I’d take Curses for a condi build and Soul Reaping for power.

CratZ.6270:

I take both, foot in grave for stomps, foot in grave for stun break, foot in grave for getting those life transfer channel for 3,2k + heals in shroud.

Sounds good.
The lack of reliable safe stomps was among the reasons why necros weren’t part of the old PvP meta.
For my build, unblockable marks and Foot in the Grave are the only reasons I would take Soul Reaping. So overall I really get more out of Spite and Curses.

Tommyknocker.6089:

but I fear just posting this will get us nerfed (AGAIN).

Nah, I think we’re good. The siphon values seem spot on, the extra healing and damage you end up with is not too much and not too little.

gavyne.6847:

It’s a very good support build with sustain in mind, and other classes have been giving compliments based on the buffs they’re getting from Boss Magic build.

I’m still on the fence about Banshee’s Wail vs Vampiric Presence.
I really like the traited warhorn, so I’ll probably stick with that unless people specifically ask me to trait for VP.

For those who have not played with Blood Magic yet:
This specialization is pure awesome-sauce now!
Which is why it shall henceforth be aka-ed BOSS MAGIC.

There are some minor issues like Mark of Evasion working out of combat or Life from Death being worthless when you compare it to Vampiric Presence.

But I’m telling you, Blood Magic is the complete package, there’s support, there’s damage and most importantly: there’s healing which actually scales with opponents AND heals through Shroud.
Blood Magic is the sutain buff we’ve been dreaming of for the past 3 years.
With Blood Magic you’re no longer the easy first target necros used to be.
And even if you do get focused first, it actually let’s you recover from damage… during a big team brawl… as necro! Wat?! Yes.

Consume Conditions was nerfed? Don’t care anymore, got Boss Magic now.

But in your build there isn’t a lot of synergy with Blood Magic?
Then change your build, just make it work!

But you want to go with Soul Reaping instead for the stunbreaks and life force? Just pick up a warhorn and go Boss Magic!

What’s that? You want to use the new signet build so you can troll engis 1v1?
Yeah you can pick up Signets of Suffering… but just so your Boss Magic’s Blood Bond gets a little more sexy. Now fill the rest of your slots with some wells and take Vampiric Rituals, your welcome!

Boss Magic is love, Boss Magic is life.

Seriously though, take Blood Magic.

Shiki.7148:

But shouldn’t it have the Enfeebling blood cooldown? Otherwise that would mean “Plague Sending” also has 0 CD as opposed to 30 and 24 with signet mastery, and that sounds incredibly strong as kitten…

Note how all other traits (like Plague Sending) say “This trait benefits from the recharge bonus of…”.

Also, it only makes sense for a trait that is already gated by life force and the cd of Shroud to not have an additional cooldown of its own.
Then again, Spiteful Spirit didn’t get the same treatment, which is weird.

Siva Mira.3546:

flow.6043:

spoj.9672:

I feel like it should trigger at the start of the dodge.

So do I.
Having it trigger at the beggining would make the trait a lot more responsive.
And placing the mark would feel a lot more controlled than having to estimate where you and your opponents are going to end up after the dodge.

No, I like it when I dodge in and nuke people while gaining Regen.

2 stacks of bleeding…“nuke”

Also, when you use your dodges properly – to evade attacks – you’re more likely to get regen when your attacker immediately triggers the mark, instead of maybe not even triggering it at all if you place it away from them.

spoj.9672:

I feel like it should trigger at the start of the dodge.

So do I.
Having it trigger at the beggining would make the trait a lot more responsive.
And placing the mark would feel a lot more controlled than having to estimate where you and your opponents are going to end up after the dodge.

manveruppd.7601:

Cue 6 months down the line, a developer replies to your Bug Forum thread to say “Corrupt Boon does not work on stability because it’s one of the strongest skills in the game”

Don’t jinx it :P

Also, it’s all corrupting skills, not just CB, so it should be “necro can’t corrupt stability because it’s one of the strongest classes in the game!”

I really think we’re safe this time.

Our main source of condi dmg is bleeding for which they’ve already nerfed the dmg formula.
They’ve also kept Mark of Blood at 2 stacks.
And even though they’ve slightly raised the base duration of Barbed Precision to 2.5 seconds (3s with the inherent duration increase), the 33% proc chance remains and has basically reduced this trait to something barely noticable compared to what is was before.

So in terms of our own condi pressure, I really don’t think there’s a lot more left to nerf.

What kills other people are our transfers, but that’s really not an issue with necros but the incredibly high stacks of burning, poison and confusion that other classes can produce.

Oh right, sorry. It works the same way as Vamp Presence.

The only dark field combo they showed in the Reaper stream was with the Greatsword.

Once you enter combat Vampiric Aura will pulse every 3 seconds on up to 5 allies.
That means, once your allies have that buff they can move away from you and siphon health for 9 seconds. If they stay within range Vampiric Aura will refresh to 9 seconds with the next pulse.

Last Rites works permanantly.

So far the only healing traits/skills that work through Shroud are:

• Unholy Sanctuary
• Vampiric
• Vampiric Rituals
• Vampiric Presence
• the active of Signet of Vampirism and Lesser Signet of Vampirism

Other siphons from sigils, runes, food or dark field combos are excluded on purpose.
There is no logic to this of course, they just decided to draw the line there for balance reasons (for now).

spoj.9672:

Another big glaring issue. Mark of Evasion procs even when you are out of combat. Was trolling and annoying the feck out of me in arah.

Unbelievable.
That makes Mark of Evasion the only damaging on-dodge trait in the game that works out of combat.
It didn’t really matter before because no one took Blood Magic anyway, or Mark of Evasion as a major trait for that matter.
But how on earth does Anet overlook something like this when they are doing a rework of the entire specialization and in the process put MoE into a minor slot?

Bleeding, torment and confusion were lowered.

Maybe we can get our original Barbed Precision and Mark of Blood back!
Jk, never gonna happen…

Well, at least other classes get to keep their damage formula for burning, it’s not like those can be stacked for 8k/tick now.

lol

Plague so tanky!

TheLastNobody.8319:

Rising Dusk.2408:

I have failed you all. ;-;

I’ll try very hard to get a lot of visibility on this for the next set of fixes.

no dusk, anet failed you…

Indeed.

I’d really like to know who looked at the previewed version and said: yeah.. no! sneaky-ninja-nerf!!! trololo

Like Chill of Death won’t be more popular in PvP anyway…

Confirmed.
And I’ve just tested the damage, it really just buffs the axe.
What the hell?!

Strategist.6132:

… he is only vulnarable against CC so far.

I wouldn’t be so sure. With Curses and Soul Reaping you can get Plague Sending, Last Gasp and Foot in the Grave. That’s 3 stunbreaks and some stability just from traits.

Goldenrevolver.4371:

its pretty obvious that full signet necros sadly is the best build.

I doubt it.
Signet’s of Suffering will definitely be popular, but more so for the synnergy with Plague Sending and Blood Bond.
Slotting your entire utility bar with signets is probably overkill in 1v1s against boon-heavy classes that you could’ve beaten without signets anyway, and in actual pvp matches with team fights you’ll probably do better with other skills instead.

Goldenrevolver.4371:

people were even thinking the necros bug using cause hes just playing full tank and then spamming signets. this is why corruptions got nerfed.

Full tank + signet spam means corruption skills needed a nerf?

Interesting observation.

Also, in regards to condition damage, since cele builds usually stack a lot of might they’ll get more than 700 condi dmg anyway.

Sigmoid.7082:

he isnt running blood magic either.

Oh right, I didn’t really look at his signet bar because I assumed no one would ever use Vamp Signet unless it’s the lesser version in Blood.
(then again, dat Consume nerf though)

Captain Unusual.9163:

I’m just saying that, from a design perspective, it would be all sorts of stupid to make the axe training trait better for literally every other weapon.

Which is why it’s no longer called “Axe Training”.
It was previewed as a trait that increases damage against vulnerable foes. As a side effect the axe’s cd reduction was added, simply because there is some synergy with the auto attack.

Also, I just don’t buy it before I can test it myself.
If it was true, are they going to change Spiteful Talisman to only be a 5% damage buff to focus skills?

Not impressed, that engi build can be beaten by any pre-patch necro. With Signets of suffering and Blood Magic it’s just… he doesn’t even need to try.

Mmmkay… so with Chilling Darkness and Bitter Chill your healing skill applies 13 stacks of vuln, chilled and blindness to yourself. lol
They really want to make the Reaper use shouts I guess.

Edit: oh, never mind, those traits say “on a foe”

Dadnir.5038:

For example : if you knock a door in WvW with some AR raining on you and your teammate, you’d most likely better use the weak burst heal trait.

Only because leeching doesn’t work on doors.
Also, if Vampiric Presence can’t help your zerg in that situation, neither will an aoe 500 hp on 5 allies.

Bhawb.7408:

MM builds won’t take the Vampiric, since it almost guaranteed won’t work on minions, while Life from Death will.

Are you sure?
Do you mean it won’t work in general or just prioritize players over npcs if there’s an aoe limit?

Dadnir.5038:

Personnaly, I’ll rather take the WarHorn trait than these 2 traits.

Vampiric presence is rather weak…

I think you’re underestimating Vampiric Presence.
Also, of course Banshee’s Wail will still be a popular trait, but that’s not the point.
Traiting for a better warhorn simply means that you choose to buff yourself rather than your allies. But when you compare Life from Death to Vampiric Presence: they are both support traits, but VP is better in everything way.

Wondrouswall.7169:

I agree with option #2 and everything that was stated.

If Life from Death isn’t buffed to be a viable alternative to the other master traits, it would seem rather conventient to have it merged with a trait that does the very same thing (heal and rez) only in a much more potent way.

Come to think of it though, in regards to switching Vampiric Presense with Rituals, I think it might be more valuable to have both of them in the same tier. So maybe it would be better to have Banshee’s Wail switch with Vampiric Rituals, for this setup:

• master: Vampiric Rituals – Vampiric Presense – X
• gm: Transfusion+LfD – Banshee’s Wail – Unholy Martyr

This way you could take Rituals if you are already using wells or want to be a stronger rezzer. Or instead, Vampiric Presence for a form of support that is less dependent on wells.

Even with Speed of Shadows, no one is going to give up their entire class mechanic for 2-3k healing every 7 sec.
Besides, Speed of Shadows is never taken to trigger on-DS traits more often, but in builds that are very Shroud centered and want to have their real hp exposed for a shorter time.
So my 20 sec estimate is actually rather optimistic.

Life from Death: When you exit shroud you heal and partially revive allies around you.

As revealed in the latest Ready Up, this trait will revive allies for about 5-7%.
We can also assume (since they didn’t mention anything specific about its healing) that the amount it heals for is the same as seen in the first core spec preview: 522 hp

My question: what build would take this trait over Vampiric Presense?

If you want to go full-on rezzomancer you’ll definitely take Ritual of Life.
You could pair that with Transfusion, which I’m sure will be a very popular PvP trait regardless.
Or maybe you take Ritual of Life with Vampiric Rituals instead of Transfusion so you can rez people with protection and getting healed not just by Well of Blood itself but also by its siphons.

Anyway, with either of those combos, Vampiric Presense seems to be a better choice than Life from Death!

We know Vampiric Presense will have the values of the current vampiric trait, so somewhere around 35 hp/hit.
When you look at an average fight a necro will spend his time 50/50 in and out of Shroud, so Life from Death will trigger about every 20 seconds. That means you only need to deal 15 hits in those 20 seconds to get more healing with Vampiric Presense than Life from Death. And that is nothing! 3 aoe skills in a team fight, done. Or a single well could do more hits against three targets.
So not only will VP provide more healing for you and your allies, but it will also buff everyone’s damage. Additionally, one part of LfD only works when your allies are in downed state. But this isn’t really an upside exclusive to LfD because VP affects downed allies as well, in fact it actually makes it possible for allies to heal themselves when down, especially in range of Last Rites.

SOLUTION:

Either

1. buff the healing of Life from Death by a massive amount, like 2-3k.

Or

2. merge it with Transfusion and switch Vampiric Presense with Vampiric Rituals.

This way your three rez-options would be:
Ritual of Life – Vampiric Rituals – Transfusion.
So even if you don’t have a well on your bar there will still be synergy between all three traits when reviving allies.

Also, as has been pointed out here there is currently no real “solo” trait in the grandmaster tier, but if Vamp Rituals and Presense were switched you could trait
Blood Bond – Banshee’s Wail – Vampiric Presense.
And as a new master trait there could be something that synergizes with Unholy Martyr, which so far would only ever be taken with Shrouded Removal and Vital Persistance, both traits in differnt specializations.

Thoughts?