Guild Wars 2

T raw.4658:

I will be starting a new campaign on ever class in this game.

Necro LF will be treated like adrenaline. It rapidly depletes when oocyte

Engi now have 20 second cd on all kits and elixir s skill and passive have to be used 45 secs a part or fail.

Mesmers PU now only gives 1 sec extra stealth and zero protection and lose all access to blind

Warriors can no longer stack stances and have to wait 20 secs between stances.

Rangers lose all burning and taunt.

Ele loses blinding ashes and ALL blast finishers on daggers

Here’s a good reason to take you seriously when you complain. /s

I want:
1.) An updated beautiful scythe. Black and normal metal (keep it neutral so everyone can enjoy it!) staff skin.
2.) A new updated wizard hat. What game without wizards has only 1 exclusive wizard hat…? >_>
3.) Need more long “full-robe” legging armor skins, similar to Arah or Nightmare ones, for light armor wearers.

Mm, maybe not ticks, because that opens all kinds of clunky issues. I do agree that applying Conditions should reveal though. There’s only a few scenarios where this doesn’t happen right now, however.

Seriously. Need more scythe, need wizard hat, asap…

What kind of game with Mage-like casters has 100 versions of face stickers and only 1 exclusive wizard hat?!

Zero Day.2594:

ronpierce.2760:

Zero Day.2594:

ronpierce.2760:

Well. I will say one thing on the weapon swap situation for thief. Because of how initiative works and no actual “cooldowns” -

You missed my point, so good job. It is, but it’s shared, thus swapping to a different offensive set provides no real incentive, where as swapping weapons on a class with ACTUAL “cooldowns” does. Don’t jump in here to post ignorant memes, please.

Sorry, can’t stand when someone says no cool downs. It’s almost like an automatic reaction.

Well, I meant what I said, given the proper context. I’m not suggesting thieves are endless spammers, I’m saying that the lack of cooldowns on a given weapon provides no direct incentive to require more than one offensive weapon set. For this reason, unless weapons started providing VASTLY unique perks, given trait restraints, you’ll probably see most people only ever need one weapon set that’s traited to be fully effective, and the shortbow for utility.

cakeonroof.7385:

All I can tell you is that you’d want to limit the amount of PU condi mesmers in your team to 1 or none. It’s a powerful build but a huge nightmare for capping. Direct damage shatter is a better option for a Mesmer build on your team.

That’s because they fill the same role as Thief. The silent decapper/+1 burster. Little do people realize, just because it’s not intended to be stacked, it doesn’t make it not incredibly powerful. It’s just a role that any given team only really needs 1 of.

Zero Day.2594:

ronpierce.2760:

Well. I will say one thing on the weapon swap situation for thief. Because of how initiative works and no actual “cooldowns” -

You missed my point, so good job. It is, but it’s shared, thus swapping to a different offensive set provides no real incentive, where as swapping weapons on a class with ACTUAL “cooldowns” does. Don’t jump in here to post ignorant memes, please.

Well. I will say one thing on the weapon swap situation for thief. Because of how initiative works and no actual “cooldowns”, there is much less incentive for needing two combat weapon sets compared to basically any other class. You might have less combat buttons, but you’re able to utilize one more, making two (more or less) redundant. Especially since they share a resource pool, swapping means fairly little.

Example, D/P → S/D means a change in play style, but your goal is still to avoid damage and deal as much as you can. You can get a similar outcome by just camping one.

Say another class… Warrior, for example. They might Blow their cooldowns but their auto attack doesn’t justify not swapping to a different weapon not on cooldown, so swapping means something more than just play style, it’s opportunity.

Some may see this as a weakness, but in reality, it’s a good part of thief. They don’t need to force a change in play style and fill up a second weapon slot to fill (essentially) the same role, like a GS+Axe warrior might. Instead you get to focus around making one set work to your advantage, and using a second set for utility. Necromancer’s are similar to Thief in this regard because much of their use for Dagger is in the auto attack and it lets them stay in melee or shroud longer, reserving Staff for utility. It’s more of a perk than a draw-back to not feel obligated to swap weapons to do a very similar thing.

As for Pistol, you’ve heard just as much as Necromancer has for Axe/Scepter. We’ve heard Gee is looking into it and that they’re weak. Karl said Pistols were weak and they were going to try to buff them. At this point, it is just a waiting game, but, back to the whole reason I ended up in this thread, more salt and more frustration onto the fire with sarcastic posts isn’t helping anything at this point. You can be frustrated, but you’re only making yourself (and others) more frustrated by spreading the negativity.

Azure The Heartless.3261:

ronpierce.2760:

In regards to the nerf-to-buff. You have to look at non-numerical things (at least in case of thief), such as Shortbow 5.

Thief are in such a rough state right now because they have perks that they do so well that if you give them too much, they would become irreplaceable.

yknow, thats another thing.

Vertical mobility at the cost of half of a thief’s initiative?

I dont think that mobility is worth nerfing the rest of their core.

Remember, on land, Warriors outpace us.

I don’t really feel like getting into this debate because it never ends well, but there’s a reason why Magic Toker can carry a WTS on decaps. No other class can navigate in the same way. Part of it has to do with it being vertical, the other part about the “burst-of-mobility”, but either way you look at it, it’s already what basically solidifies a thief’s position in a team as part of the highest-level meta-game.

It just is what it is, and you could argue its potency, but the proof is in that no other class does what a thief can do, and I personally believe the thief’s core suffers for it.

Sagat.3285:

ronpierce.2760:

Sure, but being sarcastic still isn’t helping anything towards making sure that “one shot” counts. You’d think knowing there is this big of a gap would increase peoples’ willingness to get involved constructively.

Also, nothing about sarcastic attacks at the developer makes Karl want to reach out to you more. The more hostile you are to your developer the more you’re shooting yourself in the foot.

Do what Bhawb, Spoj and I do. Take time, write a big objective and well organized set of feedback and directly message Karl about it and just be like “here’s a list of directions we feel thief should be taken in.” Include benefits AND areas you’re willing to take a hit for the greater good, etc.

I will point out one big different between Necromancer and Thief. Necromancers are almost always willing to agree if something they are doing feels too strong or if a suggestion is clearly too outrageous. Thief on the other hand are so combative and I’m not sure I’ve seen… Really any posts saying “we need this tuned down for us to get better elsewhere”.

Why is this important? Because a shift in power is always necessary. It’s bound to happen. But if you only take charge of the buffs you want and never the nerfs, that’s how you end up in situations where you get a nerf from left field that totally breaks you.

Balance is a two way street, and you have to help with both sides, and do so constructively or you will just end up with whatever the developer was able to think up alone,

I’ve(and others) given my feedback already on the new condi traits and SA not acro but others did, dig deeper. The nerfs have already happened on thief ×/d sets have been put to p/p level not sure what needed to be nerfed on them while d/ p barely go scratched and I don’t remember anything on necro to nerf to buff unless those “nerf dagger will buff GS” threads count.

Robert did a get a rough entry after trait revamp but look he didn’t stealth, he talked to his level and reacted with positive changes not perfect but positive he even broke the “balancing around perfect scenarios” rule I applied to necro. I know it’s a team effort but he claims us so the negativity of the forums goes to him nothing against him personally it’s criticism as a dev you embrace that and respond with changes or reasons not stealth. Someone give me a counter to his stealth.

In regards to the nerf-to-buff. You have to look at non-numerical things (at least in case of thief), such as Shortbow 5. The thing that comes to mind as consideration, and remember, I’m on your side, thieves need help, but there is literally only so much they can do to make a class better in teams or even 1v1s while leaving mobility at the levels they are. A direct buff to, say, a mesmers level (though, I’d rather them go down) while maintaining other thief perks, you’d simply become the next OP class, and that’s why trade offs are important. Thief are in such a rough state right now because they have perks that they do so well that if you give them too much, they would become irreplaceable.

As for Necromancer give/take. Many necromancers want better LF generation (on weapons that lack it obviously), and VP to be baseline for diversity reasons. That said, we realize Spectral mastery and maybe even Spectral Armor would need to be shaved down to allow for that to happen. Many even agree we’d take a 15 or so % nerf to our total life force pool, just to use it more reliably, and to increase diversity. Providing areas for nerfs doesn’t mean forcing a nerf for buffs. It means logically seeing what needs to be done to allow for net-positive growth, without leading to more issues.

Back to thief, and why that is relevant, you can’t boost an agile attacker to making them too much bulkier (for sake of team fights) or too much better at deleting a target while still being able to zip around a map at will because it creates further issues.

These are things that need to have solid solutions to ensure you don’t just end up getting nerfed again the next patch, and without proper input on how to handle it.

Another good example: Turret Engineer. Got buffed into a very powerful spot, but needed to be snapped back into reality, and the result was a completely unusable set of utilities because their strong points got demolished.

I’m not trying to be a jerk here, I’m just being honest. If you want to be a “balanced” class, you have to really consider the aftermath, much more than just getting boosts because balance isn’t just the next patch.

Shogun.7401:

ronpierce.2760:

Thanks for your input! I’ll send this information to a few of the developers personally so I can make sure it gets the proper review it deserves. I’d say if they use your constructive feedback as a guideline for fixing thief, we’d see thief emerge from the darkness and find themselves in a great spot!

Keep up the good work!

Wow !!! Really???

How about we stop giving anymore constructive feedbacks? We are done giving constructive feedbacks. Let them read all the constructive feedbacks we have been giving for past years.

I have not seen any results yet. How much more time do they need to fix the class?

The same as any other? Balance patches don’t happen at the snap of any one classes fingers. If it did, the d/d Ele issue would be handled by now. I’ve already explained this.

No amount of unconstructive posts leads to quicker balance updates. It just makes you look bad. It’s as simple as that.

Sure, but being sarcastic still isn’t helping anything towards making sure that “one shot” counts. You’d think knowing there is this big of a gap would increase peoples’ willingness to get involved constructively.

Also, nothing about sarcastic attacks at the developer makes Karl want to reach out to you more. The more hostile you are to your developer the more you’re shooting yourself in the foot.

Do what Bhawb, Spoj and I do. Take time, write a big objective and well organized set of feedback and directly message Karl about it and just be like “here’s a list of directions we feel thief should be taken in.” Include benefits AND areas you’re willing to take a hit for the greater good, etc.

I will point out one big different between Necromancer and Thief. Necromancers are almost always willing to agree if something they are doing feels too strong or if a suggestion is clearly too outrageous. Thief on the other hand are so combative and I’m not sure I’ve seen… Really any posts saying “we need this tuned down for us to get better elsewhere”.

Why is this important? Because a shift in power is always necessary. It’s bound to happen. But if you only take charge of the buffs you want and never the nerfs, that’s how you end up in situations where you get a nerf from left field that totally breaks you.

Balance is a two way street, and you have to help with both sides, and do so constructively or you will just end up with whatever the developer was able to think up alone,

Sagat.3285:

tetrodoxin.2134:

ronpierce.2760:

People clearly have issues with how they are doing it. How about giving better feedback rather than creating a million "the sky is falling threads that do absolutely nothing.

Also, by the sounds of things, it’s you who is feeling a bit salty.

This so much. Thief forums are currently drowing in salty tears of self-pity.
Kinda hilarious. I’m sure the devs will react to that!

Feedback was given since trait preview and 1st day post patch even money was given there was no reaction on thief except for selling DD and purity of pistols 2.0 sooo yeah.

To be fair, very little has changed since then… For anyone. There is a larger balance patch on its way, repeating sarcastic nonsense on the forums isn’t solving anyone’s issue. They don’t produce balance patches at a rate based on pointless threads in the thief section per day.

We still have to deal with Ele in its current state, that alone says there is work to be done and it just hasn’t come yet.

However, as living proof, being reasonable and doing lots of collaboration and write ups, it’s much more beneficial to the class in the long run (as we’re starting to see Necromancers inch out of that terrible spot it was in for 3 years).

Be a part of the solution and you might get the results you desire. (As a whole, not directed at you specifically.)

Vieux P.1238:

ronpierce.2760:

While this is a thing and incredibly cheesy, luckily it doesn’t have too much of an effect on sPvP. That said PU is still much over the top.

Remove Aegis from the pool, reduce to 50% increased stealth = perfect.

Basically removed any kind of sustain abilities so mesmers can go back to the bottom of the food chain like it use to be… ! ……………Right?

Yeah, totally man. That’s what I said. Stop being so dramatic.

I agree. I think you might curve behavior better if they removed the skirmished point bonus and added “Contester” bonus for fighting on neutral points.

I feel like it would help people in the long run if their points better reflected good playing habits.

Brawl.5178:

It wouldn’t be a power creep at all, 10 endurance on weapon swap fits with the rest of the minors in the trait line and would prove quite useful and rewarding to player actively engaging in the combat.

I mean it could even be like 3 seconds of fury or something.

I don’t think you understand what power creep means. You’d be gaining power for nothing, that is a power creep. What Choppy said is perfectly fine. Discipline does not need buffs, other lines just need access to FH without it (at best, which can still be debatable). Base lining it and giving discipline more power is the very definition of a Power creep.

Trancid.8514:

Fat Disgrace.4275:

Tbh, there’s kinda threads doesn’t help us at all. When a net see’s threads like this I wounder why they even do anything any more

Balancing is never fun. It’s their job, they get payed for it.

People clearly have issues with how they are doing it. How about giving better feedback rather than creating a million "the sky is falling threads that do absolutely nothing.

Also, by the sounds of things, it’s you who is feeling a bit salty.

I think it’d be a better design to allow them to work, but at a much reduced potency. It’s not like special rules haven’t existed before. Having boons works at full capacity while half the rebuffs in the game do nothing just looks lazy to me, and can be a real downer for playing a debuffer. Doesn’t even have to be much.
- Weakness reduces boss damage by 10%.
- Chill, slower by 20% and slightly increases time between some harder hitting skills (less of an issue since we rely on animations and not UI timers usually in this game).
- Cripple, slower by 10%.
- Slow, bosses attack 10% slower.
- Blind 10% chance to miss with a basic attack, doesn’t affect mechanic or powerful attacks.

Essentially the same things but less potent on bosses, but at least the skills are still useful. There is absolutely no reason, even if you argue boons are weaker, that all boons should be fair game but practically none of the conditions do.

That said. I personally still feel like Quickness is still too potent as a boon. (And by extension, Slow). I think both would be better off at 25% (access could be adjusted considering new values).

~ Just opinions.

While this is a thing and incredibly cheesy, luckily it doesn’t have too much of an effect on sPvP. That said PU is still much over the top.

Remove Aegis from the pool, reduce to 50% increased stealth = perfect.

Thanks for your input! I’ll send this information to a few of the developers personally so I can make sure it gets the proper review it deserves. I’d say if they use your constructive feedback as a guideline for fixing thief, we’d see thief emerge from the darkness and find themselves in a great spot!

Keep up the good work!

IMO Quickness needs toned down.

Eye of the beholder stuff.

Some people really hunger for that more basic (less magical/flashy) martial arts combat theme. Others really don’t… Design wise, you might not enjoy it, but there are certainly some aspects of uniqueness to Daredevil, such as entirely reworking how you evade. It is cooler than people let on, which seemed to get a bad rep due to clunkiness. If the first impressions weren’t “clunky”, I have a feeling the general mood would have been much brighter overall.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

ronpierce.2760:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

ronpierce.2760:

Pimsley.3681:

Another reason why the necro forum thrives is because the mature, helpful tone is influenced by the leadership of folks like Bhawb, Ronpierce and a handful of veteran usual suspects.

These guys know necro inside out. Other class subforums lack that kind of presence so threads are sometimes teeming with misinformation and a hostile tone.

<3 I love you for your kind words. This made my day. I hope that doesn’t make me egotistical. x.X

We’ll be there to knock you down a few notches if it does

Get out of here, I’m am GRENTH!

No you’re not. I met the guy.

((Actually, in my Necro’s RP backstory, he would have been the eighth Reaper, but he died in the battle against Dhuum. Dhuum cursed him to never know the afterlife, so he’s been reincarnated for over a millennia. Yes, same character as I had in GW1, despite being a charr now))

Or… Yeah, well…

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

ronpierce.2760:

Pimsley.3681:

Another reason why the necro forum thrives is because the mature, helpful tone is influenced by the leadership of folks like Bhawb, Ronpierce and a handful of veteran usual suspects.

These guys know necro inside out. Other class subforums lack that kind of presence so threads are sometimes teeming with misinformation and a hostile tone.

<3 I love you for your kind words. This made my day. I hope that doesn’t make me egotistical. x.X

We’ll be there to knock you down a few notches if it does

Get out of here, I’m am GRENTH!

Pimsley.3681:

Another reason why the necro forum thrives is because the mature, helpful tone is influenced by the leadership of folks like Bhawb, Ronpierce and a handful of veteran usual suspects.

These guys know necro inside out. Other class subforums lack that kind of presence so threads are sometimes teeming with misinformation and a hostile tone.

<3 I love you for your kind words. This made my day. I hope that doesn’t make me egotistical. x.X

Kain Francois.4328:

RS gives might and applies vulnerability, so it may be better for smaller encounters.

Especially if you run the dhuumfire variant, I do agree. In dungeons/quick fights/solo, you’ll probably find yourself using RS more often than dagger mixed with a bit of GS. It has its place even right now. I just think 4/5 needs more damage (5 needs to only be two-tiered, this 3 tiered stuff is pointless), and 1 could maybe use a touch more damage, but it’s certainly not a make or break situation. At least we got .2 seconds shaved off the total rotation, so that should be like a 5-8% damage boost overall right there. :P

Steelstickfig.9146:

ronpierce.2760:

Yeah, I think many of us wanted to see more damage on RS 1, 4 and 5. It’s not looking good though at this point, I doubt we’ll see it get boosted at this point. But never lose hope, I guess. It would be nice, as I’ve always felt if you spent the time to build LF it should most certainly pay off at least a little bit over standard weapons.

The thing is, much like how I personally despise camping dagger / GS for highest damage, others might dislike the idea of having to be in RS. A single optional trait that directly boosted shroud skill strength (perhaps in the SR line, where it would best fit) would remedy this, though.

Dhuumfire is almost this exactly if it was just a smidge stronger and affected RS 4 (maybe even without, I haven’t bothered doing the math behind RS4 over a fire field), it does give some incentive to use RS, it’s just not enough atm. But even still, it should at least be on par or the Burst skills (4/5) should be worth using. I feel if you’re at a point where the class just neglects it’s mechanic all together it’s a pretty flawed design. I’d be more in support of boosting 4/5 than #1, and giving Dhuumfire a tiny nudge for other shroud skills, in which case you might actually achieve some differentiation between a ‘shroud-dps’ build and a standard weapon build that doesn’t differ too drastically.

Overall, it’s obviously a grey area. There’s only so much that can be done due to PvP as well, so it’s not hard to understand why it’s a hard balance to strike.

I will say, Dhuumfire Shroud builds would definitely be a thing if they added Power/Ferocity/Condition Damage armor stats.

Yeah, I think many of us wanted to see more damage on RS 1, 4 and 5. It’s not looking good though at this point, I doubt we’ll see it get boosted at this point. But never lose hope, I guess. It would be nice, as I’ve always felt if you spent the time to build LF it should most certainly pay off at least a little bit over standard weapons.

Brawl.5178:

Just out of curiosity, what would replace fast hands as a minor trait?

Ridiculous hands. Swapping also gives 5 seconds of quickness.

Zenith.7301:

Reaper Shroud is weak and a damage loss in PvE. You use it purely to absorb damage if you totally need to and can’t evade the damage any other way.

Otherwise you camp greatsword all day in a group setting.

I’m not so sure of that, honestly, with Onslaught+Dhuumfire, even on a zerker build. I believe Dhuumfire provides a means of boosting DPS above 50% iirc. It also ensures you are much less likely to misalign your cooldowns and wasting time not using Gravedigger below 50%.

With a SRS Reaper build I think it’s passable to run Flame Legion as a Rune set boosting Dhuumfire damage by 30% and giving a 7% damage boost instead of 5% from strength. Given a good team set up in raids, this would likely provide more overall DPS and is less subject to DPS drops that come with Runes of Scholar.

Jerus.4350:

ronpierce.2760:

Jerus.4350:

ronpierce.2760:

rivurivurivurivu.3041:

Sigmoid.7082:

Gravedigger can be very good but as the same problem of attack speed, the Dagger AA can deal exactly the same amount of damage, expecially if you use the vampiric aura (that’s sad).

• Dagger auto 2.1s total time cast time. 2.8 total coeff. 1.333s coeff a second.
• Gs auto 3s total cast time. 3.6 total coeff. 1.2 coeffs a second. ( this doesnt count putting grave digger whenever you can for a dps increase. )
• Grave Digger spam 1.8s cast time. 3 coeff. 1.66667 coeffs a second.

dagger auto cant make up for 0.3 coeff especially since thats 0.3 is effectively 0.69 because of crits, which siphons cant do.

TL;DR Gs is good.

so gs is better when spamming grave digger, is that what you mean ?
so the best dps will be dagger AA to 50% and then switch to gs and spam grave digger right?

I’m not sure spam is the best word, and it depends on traits. I think zerker dhuumfire autos > dagger. I suspect it will be something like Focus 4, dagger auto to build LF. Swap to GS and enter RS, RS to auto. Below 50% you will want to drop Nightfall (with its 1/4 cast and 3.5 damage) then spam grave digger between night falls.

May omit the RS phase/part in certain builds and under 3 targets.

Wouldn’t you want to faceroll…err I mean use your GS skills before jumping into RS?

Also what about Death’s Charge, worth it for DPS?

Ah yeah, I had thought that earlier, forgot to say it in the above detail. That’s correct, you’d likely drop Night fall -> GD -> RS.

And I don’t know atm about deaths charge. I kind of feel like it would be a dps loss…

Edit: Its hard to brain think the dps with Dhuumfire. It might be worth using. The animation fix on Death’s charge will also change things a bit.

And work in Death Spiral and Grasping Darkness if you want lifeforce at least, not sure how they work out damage wise.

Ideally, dagger+Focus would likely get you up to speed on Life Force. If you’re starting at 0 (Which you likely won’t often since much of fights will be spent out of Shroud spamming GS abilities), you might use a Death Spiral for early Vuln/LF, but I don’t think it would particularly boost your DPS. Neither skill hits very hard and both have sizable cast times. You would definitely want to take any easy opportunity to drop Night Fall and Gravedigger, though. Both of those would pretty much always be a DPS increase. Don’t drop shroud > 50% (target) though, as wasting a GD too soon will hurt your DPS, and you can’t re-enter shroud right away.

Jerus.4350:

ronpierce.2760:

rivurivurivurivu.3041:

Sigmoid.7082:

Gravedigger can be very good but as the same problem of attack speed, the Dagger AA can deal exactly the same amount of damage, expecially if you use the vampiric aura (that’s sad).

• Dagger auto 2.1s total time cast time. 2.8 total coeff. 1.333s coeff a second.
• Gs auto 3s total cast time. 3.6 total coeff. 1.2 coeffs a second. ( this doesnt count putting grave digger whenever you can for a dps increase. )
• Grave Digger spam 1.8s cast time. 3 coeff. 1.66667 coeffs a second.

dagger auto cant make up for 0.3 coeff especially since thats 0.3 is effectively 0.69 because of crits, which siphons cant do.

TL;DR Gs is good.

so gs is better when spamming grave digger, is that what you mean ?
so the best dps will be dagger AA to 50% and then switch to gs and spam grave digger right?

I’m not sure spam is the best word, and it depends on traits. I think zerker dhuumfire autos > dagger. I suspect it will be something like Focus 4, dagger auto to build LF. Swap to GS and enter RS, RS to auto. Below 50% you will want to drop Nightfall (with its 1/4 cast and 3.5 damage) then spam grave digger between night falls.

May omit the RS phase/part in certain builds and under 3 targets.

Wouldn’t you want to faceroll…err I mean use your GS skills before jumping into RS?

Also what about Death’s Charge, worth it for DPS?

Ah yeah, I had thought that earlier, forgot to say it in the above detail. That’s correct, you’d likely drop Night fall -> GD -> RS.

And I don’t know atm about deaths charge. I kind of feel like it would be a dps loss…

Edit: Its hard to brain think the dps with Dhuumfire. It might be worth using. The animation fix on Death’s charge will also change things a bit.

rivurivurivurivu.3041:

Sigmoid.7082:

Gravedigger can be very good but as the same problem of attack speed, the Dagger AA can deal exactly the same amount of damage, expecially if you use the vampiric aura (that’s sad).

• Dagger auto 2.1s total time cast time. 2.8 total coeff. 1.333s coeff a second.
• Gs auto 3s total cast time. 3.6 total coeff. 1.2 coeffs a second. ( this doesnt count putting grave digger whenever you can for a dps increase. )
• Grave Digger spam 1.8s cast time. 3 coeff. 1.66667 coeffs a second.

dagger auto cant make up for 0.3 coeff especially since thats 0.3 is effectively 0.69 because of crits, which siphons cant do.

TL;DR Gs is good.

so gs is better when spamming grave digger, is that what you mean ?
so the best dps will be dagger AA to 50% and then switch to gs and spam grave digger right?

I’m not sure spam is the best word, and it depends on traits. I think zerker dhuumfire autos > dagger. I suspect it will be something like Focus 4, dagger auto to build LF. Swap to GS and enter RS, RS to auto. Below 50% you will want to drop Nightfall (with its 1/4 cast and 3.5 damage) then spam grave digger between night falls.

May omit the RS phase/part in certain builds and under 3 targets.

Industry.9362:

Anastasis.7258:

7. Necromancer’s Spectral Armor while in Death Shroud Mode.

Unless I missed something and it is bugged in some way I am not aware, this is not and should not be possible. When entering shroud spectral armor is removed as per the tooltip. The trait that auto procs it does so off a health threshold so if you are already in shroud it shouldn’t be possible to set it off and you cannot manually use it since all utilities are locked in shroud.

Tooltips weren’t adjusted, but this was changed a long time ago.

I believe someone had already come to the conclusion that it was, something like… 1.35 coeff per sec versus 1.2? I could be off with these numbers but it was something like that.

Currently, the general thought is you will probably use Dagger > 50% mixed with some Reaper’s Shroud if you run a Zerker Dhuumfire build, and Gravedigger/Nightfall below 50%.

I think the best process, in the long run, is to handle class balance through proper feedback and self criticism on your class forums and putting forth enough information from the class “leads” for their individual developers (Karl, Gee, Roy, etc.) and forging a better means of communication and feedback.

At least, that’s the experience I’ve had so far. It works best and people who know their own classes are the best at nerfing themselves without breaking the class when put to the task of self identifying areas they may be too strong in.

Class finger pointing has rarely been constructive, though it has gotten results a few times (Turret engi, Ele a long time ago), but the result is often not good.

Nova Stiker.8396:

Add Rampage to that list.

It’s not overpowered, it just promotes bad play styles. I’ve met too many warriors that rely 100% on that elite for Victory, nothing else.

I don’t think that would be convenient for this person’s list. :P

The necro stuff seems a bit ignorant, and not just because I play Necro. (Some of the rest is on point, some of it isn’t, and the list certainly isn’t the best list that could be made.)

Signet of Vampirism HAD to be made in such a way it goes through defensive effects, because the debuff itself doesn’t DO anything (of course, I’d be in support of not boon ripping if they dodged. That’s a fair critique.) The actual heal portion, you can still technically block the damage/healing because while you’re blocking, people aren’t proccing it.

The Spectral Armor… If you actually do the math, it’s a 50 second cooldown stun break and 4-7k absorption… Like… C’mon now… Necros get focused enough, one extra sponge on a 50 second cooldown isn’t going to be the end of the world. Could it be a tad strong? Possibly, but it making your top 10 list is a bit silly if you ask me.

Burning damage may need a small adjustment downward, but mostly, Ele needs less stacks on certain skills, and actually, other conditions (Torment, Bleeding, Poison) need to get a decent boost. Currently, burning hits about 4-5 times as hard, and because of this is significantly more reliable at dealing damage. Other conditions need to be brought into meaningful use.

Runes of Vamp are a garbage crutch, wouldn’t mind seeing them go, honestly…

The thief stuff doesn’t seem that bad to me… Pretty standard to cleave kill anyways, thief will still probably get his kitten handed to him if he’s not careful.

Taunt needs a LOT of fixes. Funny how fixing the Taunt/Resistance bug wasn’t on the list. x.X

If I had a nickel… :P

Not really. That might be ideal if some sorts are under performing and others are over performing. End result is people try new things. In the case of Necromancer, though, our highest performing weapons are under performing by themselves, so I don’t see that as much of an option. Likely dagger and GS will resemble closely the Axe+GS warrior in the sense that dagger would be sustained damage, and GS would be the situational burst set, possibly with some dhuumfire shroud mixed in above 50%. I’d be very surprised to see dagger be negatively impacted for way of GS. Both have their niches as far as I’m concerned at this point.

Does anyone know if the Death’s Charge velocity change translates into a faster cast or further distance? I assume 3/4 cast instead of 1, and a shorter projectile protection frame? I assume this js the case but it’s nice to be sure.

For Initiative.

Right guys? Roll… For Initiative…?

striker.3704:

Dagger main hand is good, dagger off hand is fine for condition builds.
Staff has plenty of utility, best ranged option for a soul reaping build.
Axe and scepter are being looked into.
Focus offhand honestly isn’t bad for PvP, it will pair well with reaper.

Honestly, only scepter and axe are truly hurting and we already know they’re being looked into.

Yeah, I think I’m more in mind with Zap here. Dagger is only great because it has crazy auto damage and massive life force not tied to a cooldown. 2 is okay (kinda long) and 3 really isn’t great compared to just about any other immobilize skill in the game.

As for the rest, Staff is passable mostly because we have no other 1200 options and its the only way to get LF from afar, other than that its pretty “meh” after the years of nerfs.

Dagger offhand needs #4 to move faster and be unblockable so it’s at least ALMOST as reliable as putrid mark, and #5 needs to cast faster due to the animation delay, and needs some sort of Life Force generation.

Axe/Scepter needs large changes.

Focus would be fine if regeneration was basically ANY other boon on #4 and #5 was a faster cast (likely 3/4).

Warhorn is fine, at least. :P

TheLastNobody.8319:

ronpierce.2760:

Cat Has Ducks.1982:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Necros are only good against bad DD eles. No serious DD ele is going to put high burn stacks onto a signet necro. They can outheal our dagger damage, and blind us faster than DS AA. The only way a necro can win against a DD ele is if that ele is bad.

You need to watch Nos kitten on top tier Cele Eles all day. Necro has the tools to beat the beast.

Erm, Supposedly, Nos did tests against Phantaram. It went 50/50. That suggests it’s not a direct counter. It has all the tools to match up to it, which is a little sad if you ask me.

Why is that sad to you?

It’s sad to me because it’s so even when Necromancer had basically every tool you could imagine to counter Ele. :P
(high boon corruption, transfers burning back, poison and chill access, weakness)
Just saying, it’s almost perfectly designed to counter that type build and it’s still pretty close. Something about that seems off to me.

Cat Has Ducks.1982:

ZudetGambeous.9573:

Necros are only good against bad DD eles. No serious DD ele is going to put high burn stacks onto a signet necro. They can outheal our dagger damage, and blind us faster than DS AA. The only way a necro can win against a DD ele is if that ele is bad.

You need to watch Nos kitten on top tier Cele Eles all day. Necro has the tools to beat the beast.

Erm, Supposedly, Nos did tests against Phantaram. It went 50/50. That suggests it’s not a direct counter. It has all the tools to match up to it, which is a little sad if you ask me.

You can’t be seriously suggesting a block and a knockdown is equal to 3 Arden per target within just 180 radius.

Outrage is literally a “stun break” utility, the adrenaline is mostly for Rage skill flavor. Bandit’s Defense is more of a counter-attack and is by far stronger even with a 15 second cool down.

I know thieves have their issues, but Bandit’s Defense potency, even post nerf, is not one of them…

nearlight.3064:

ronpierce.2760:

Kain Francois.4328:

What happened to the Axe changes?

They’re coming with the upcoming balance notes for the core classes. They will likely all come at once. Beta/Elite spec changes are a separate topic from base class changes. I haven’t heard a more definite time-frame on the core changes though, all Gee told me a week ago was that it was delayed and would be some time after the Elite spec changes, which is now apparent.

Yeah, personally I don’t see this balance patch happening until right before the launch of HoT. It would be cool if it could come sooner, but they have so much to do, and some things like D/D ele balance honestly sound like crazy challenges to overcome.

Based on context clues of developers talking, namely Grouch, it sounds like there will be some sort of written “here’s what to expect” set of notes prior to the changes being actually made. Which does sort of point toward us having a bit of a wait (likely 2-3 weeks from now). Which would be fine, but the unfortunately part is, usually they don’t change much based on feedback from that point forward. The preview usually ends up being early patch notes.

I think the hold up might be some last minute Scrapper/Druid work, which obviously takes priority to posting changes for the core classes at this very moment for them, and they want to sync class update notes so no class feels left out. (All speculation, of course.)

All praise Geesus! He’s a great dev, and a great guy, too. Easy to talk to and seems to genuinely care. That’s the best part about GW2 in general, those select Developers who really go above and beyond with the community.

Sometimes it can feel like we get ‘ignored’, but if you play just about any other MMO, you’ll realize the relationships we have with our developers, even the more quiet ones is still very abnormal. We’re a lucky bunch to have Gee.

(Honorable mention: Roy! Fantastic dev as well.)

Sagat.3285:

Edit: Out of compassion please show mercy to rangers.

Ranger isn’t as bad as people say. At this point, they’re basically “borderline” in every way possible.
Great standing in PVP Meta (Basically all thanks to Taunt)
http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Ranger_-_Power_Survival

And even “meta” in PVE as a power spotter, and “great” with their condi build.
http://metabattle.com/wiki/Build:Ranger_-_S/A_LB_Spotter

The problem with Ranger, and I can say this as I play one (and my best friend mains one), isn’t so much directly their “power”. It’s just that pets are innately stupid and the ranger controls for them are janky and unreliable and the class is FILLED with bugs (which is what you get for spending too much time in nature, I guess). With the right changes, very easily a ranger could go from laughable to god-like, very similarly to what happened with the roller coaster that is D/D ele, when it went from god, to terrible to OP again.

Unlike Ele though, a good bit of that fine line for Ranger involve bugs. Power wise and such, only minor changes are totally necessary. (All of this, of course, post the offhand fixes and so on. Directly after June 23 was a very different sad story.)

Note: Not just trying to disagree with you here, but really, Rangers aren’t as bad off as many like to think, design wise. They just need to be fixed and their pet needs to not be terrible at life.

A bit of what both of them said. We’re not “op”, but we’re decent. Most of our decency comes from our niche to dampen boons which helps topple the giant right now. But more than anything, there are others that should come down to Necromancer level rather than always pushing forward. Overall, Necromancer isn’t bad. I’d like to say it’s in a good spot for the most part, but it still has a lot of issues that need to be looked at such as Life blast speed, VP being baseline, and weapons that aren’t our standard Dagger+Warhorn need to be looked at, but more often than not, that boils down to adding diversity than directly needing more power.