Here's how I would nerf scourge:

[Sigmoid.7082]

> @"Sarrs.4831" said:

> Cast time on Desert Shroud.

 

 

No shroud enter has a cast time nor should it.

 

 

[Nimon.7840]

> @"Sarrs.4831" said:

> Cast time on Desert Shroud.

> Maybe change the width buff Sand Savant gives you to only affect your shade, not you.

>

> From a WvW perspective the issue is that Trailblazer's is so good. To counter that add runes and sigils that cleanse or send condis.

 

> @"Sarrs.4831" said:

> Cast time on Desert Shroud.

> Maybe change the width buff Sand Savant gives you to only affect your shade, not you.

>

> From a WvW perspective the issue is that Trailblazer's is so good. To counter that add runes and sigils that cleanse or send condis.

 

No. Trailblaizer is the only option to not die like a scrub in every first inc of the enemy. I would have no problems playing full vipers if we had at least more: 1. Mobility 2. Survivability (such as sustain, blocks, invis, invuln)

 

But we lack all of this. So no wonders that we play trailblaizer.

 

If you can give us the most of what we lack i had no problem with changing the power scalings and nerving condis of scourge a bit, so we need to play more offensive stats to do dmg

[Toll Booth Willie.6723]

The glancing blows gotta go.

[ToPNoP.2493]

> @"Zero.3871" said:

> > @"ToPNoP.2493" said:

> > Maybe it is just the thief build I play, but scourge seems very strong. If it is in roaming gear (*vipers), I can not fight it no matter the pilot. 8 condi's when I can only clear 3, and exhaustion shuts me down so dodge/kite becomes impossible. So I run, such is the life of thief. If a zerg has 2 fb (alternating f2 and f3), 2 scourge, and one rev/chrono in every team of 5, it will be unbeatable.

>

> i am wondering because all people everytime argument with condi cleanse. there are way more options to counter condis. thief have nearly endless amount of dodges so for necros its really hard to hit a thief. you can negate 90% of scourge attacks by dodging. and if you get hitted by him ( happened rarely) than you can use your condi cleanse.

>

> also with p/p thief you will delete every necro (scourge, too) from game. just spam unload or pistol 4 and you will automatically win...

 

Last November thief was nerfed by if it clears condi with a dodge it receives "exhaustion" for 4 seconds, energy does not regenerate. Though this is not a show stopper, it does make it impossible to fight some builds, at least for me it does... But, it boils down to build and intention. I could probably change my build to counter scourge, then there will be another issue elsewhere, maybe power burst ele, or something as such.

I didn't intend to get off topic, but scourge is pretty strong. If I was on thief it would play out like this. I see a scourge and attack, the scourge immediately reacts with conditions, if I see it I can dodge and kite a sec, if it hits I clear with signet of agility (clearing 3) but with dodging away from scourge I receive exhaustion because scourge initial burst applies 4 conditions and I clear the last condition with dodge. If the second burst of 4 hits, and the necro is in dire or trailblazers, I will die. So I run... Survivability is ok, but fighting some builds can be very tricky. In a zerg, I think scourge are the most needed besides firebrand... Scourge sucks to fight 1v1, but it is in an ok spot I think. I am not complaining, just know that if the class does not fit my niche, then it fits another and I need not try to bridge the gap...

[Crinn.7864]

> @"ToPNoP.2493" said:

> > @"Zero.3871" said:

> > > @"ToPNoP.2493" said:

> > > Maybe it is just the thief build I play, but scourge seems very strong. If it is in roaming gear (*vipers), I can not fight it no matter the pilot. 8 condi's when I can only clear 3, and exhaustion shuts me down so dodge/kite becomes impossible. So I run, such is the life of thief. If a zerg has 2 fb (alternating f2 and f3), 2 scourge, and one rev/chrono in every team of 5, it will be unbeatable.

> >

> > i am wondering because all people everytime argument with condi cleanse. there are way more options to counter condis. thief have nearly endless amount of dodges so for necros its really hard to hit a thief. you can negate 90% of scourge attacks by dodging. and if you get hitted by him ( happened rarely) than you can use your condi cleanse.

> >

> > also with p/p thief you will delete every necro (scourge, too) from game. just spam unload or pistol 4 and you will automatically win...

>

> Last November thief was nerfed by if it clears condi with a dodge it receives "exhaustion" for 4 seconds, energy does not regenerate. Though this is not a show stopper, it does make it impossible to fight some builds, at least for me it does...

 

The trick is to use those dodges to avoid the attacks before they apply conditions, not to facetank the attacks then try and cleanse them.

[Zero.3871]

> @"ToPNoP.2493" said:

> > @"Zero.3871" said:

> > > @"ToPNoP.2493" said:

> > > Maybe it is just the thief build I play, but scourge seems very strong. If it is in roaming gear (*vipers), I can not fight it no matter the pilot. 8 condi's when I can only clear 3, and exhaustion shuts me down so dodge/kite becomes impossible. So I run, such is the life of thief. If a zerg has 2 fb (alternating f2 and f3), 2 scourge, and one rev/chrono in every team of 5, it will be unbeatable.

> >

> > i am wondering because all people everytime argument with condi cleanse. there are way more options to counter condis. thief have nearly endless amount of dodges so for necros its really hard to hit a thief. you can negate 90% of scourge attacks by dodging. and if you get hitted by him ( happened rarely) than you can use your condi cleanse.

> >

> > also with p/p thief you will delete every necro (scourge, too) from game. just spam unload or pistol 4 and you will automatically win...

>

> Last November thief was nerfed by if it clears condi with a dodge it receives "exhaustion" for 4 seconds, energy does not regenerate. Though this is not a show stopper, it does make it impossible to fight some builds, at least for me it does... But, it boils down to build and intention. I could probably change my build to counter scourge, then there will be another issue elsewhere, maybe power burst ele, or something as such.

 

but that is exactly the game. do you think a scourge, a warrior an ele or something else is playing all the time the same skills and traits against every enemy? no. there is no existing build that can Counter ALL classes at the same time. you have to adjust to the enemies. if there are more than 1 its everytime a hard fight, but you cant expect that anet give you a class where you can ez beat 2 or more enemies. for me as scourge. if i fight condi Mirage and power daredevil in a 1 vs 2 its the same Problem. i cant prepare to both.

[DeadlySynz.3471]

> @"Sinid.7460" said:

> The wave idea is actually a pretty good idea to be honest. But they also need to give cast time to shade skills to make it feel more balanced and allow counterplay.

> The other way of balancing scourge is to nerf its dps but giving it more utility or survival, or even both. Firebrand carries the class hard in that regard.

 

The counter play to a scourge is a ranged class; i'm not sure how many times this needs to be said. Scourge are at the mercy of classes like rangers and deadeyes. Players unwillingness to play these classes is a player problem, not Anet's

 

Regardless the idea OP's idea still didn't work because people are forgetting the fundamental way conditions work. Their overall damage has to equate to that of physical damage except over time. Anything that slows damage down whether it be an increase in tick time or a wave to slow down the ramp up time of applied conditions will have to be met with an increase in overall damage. In other words, for example, this wave idea, may turn a torment tick from 300 damage up to 600-800 damage. Burn might turn from 500 up to 900-1000. Players really need to think this through as they already shot themselves in the foot with the previous nerf. If a player fails to cleanse torment, the length of time it ticks now is laughable.

 

In this case, a player who is not using their head will say "well reduce the tick time of torment", but the trade off is (due to how conditions work), torment now has it's damage increased to be more bursty. There won't be any further changes, you can't just nerf a damage type of one particular class but leave others un-touched. You can't turn a scourges burn tick down to 100, while a guardian per say with the same stats ticks for 400; that simply isn't going to work.

 

The players solution to scourge, swallow your pride, get off melee, and jump on a ranged class.

 

Edit - Did players also think to maybe.... just not use boons? Can't corrupt what isn't there.

[Nimon.7840]

So: thief easlily kills scourge. No matter what build

Ele just outsustains, and then outdmgs necro

Power rev can easy kill necro, if you know how to play.

Warrior. Easy life for warriors to kill necros

Guardian. Firebrand can condiclear, use your spells wisely.

Ranger. No problems with killing necros

Mesmer: almost no chance to win against a power mesmer as a necro. Condi mesmer highly depends on the dodges and blurrs. But its possible to win against them.

Other necros. Most of them faceroll and then loose

[Galaa.8475]

no reason to nerf anything ever. we need all the power we can get in pve.

[Dadnir.5038]

Oh but I'm pretty sure most players here would gladly nerf every single bit of mechanisms that destroy everything in PvP/WvW for a tiny bit of mechanisms that may be usefull in PvE and give the necromancer this much needed power that he lack in this game mode. Sadly this is not the path that anet chose for the necromancer, it's just always more and more boon corruption (granted that initially the necromancer had as much boon corruption effects than he had boon ripping effects and now it's boon corruption everywhere...), more and more condition management (which is not that great in PvE) and more and more dark field whose combos are just bad.

 

Personnally I'd be more than ready to lose 80% of the boon corruption the necromancer (scourge included) have in favor of some boon ripping and a bit of PvE love.

[UnDeadFun.5824]

Every time I see a nerf Necromancer thread I cringe. Scourge might need an adjustment in sPvP and WvW but every time Anet does PvE gets hammered. If Scourge was truly meant to be support then Anet needs to make it support, period. However that also means going back and reworking Core and Reaper Necromancer.

[Sarrs.4831]

> @"Sigmoid.7082" said:

> No shroud enter has a cast time nor should it.

 

AFAIC it's only a shroud in name and trait interactions. For what Desert Shroud does it's way too valuable to have no cast time.

 

I honestly prefer opening the option of Shrouds with cast times.

[Sigmoid.7082]

> @"Sarrs.4831" said:

> > @"Sigmoid.7082" said:

> > No shroud enter has a cast time nor should it.

>

> AFAIC it's only a shroud in name and trait interactions. For what Desert Shroud does it's way too valuable to have no cast time.

 

It has the same premise and does almost the exact same thing as other shroud enters.

 

[Galaa.8475]

i just found necro, and lovin the hell out of it. great survivability and dps, with mediocre gear. all pve of course. have been very disappointed in the classes in this game till necro. of the other classess i've played they had good dps but survival was crap. i just dont want it or any other class to be nerfed for the sake of a few pvpers.

[Sarrs.4831]

> @"Sigmoid.7082" said:

> It has the same premise and does almost the exact same thing as other shroud enters.

 

Death Shroud:

Assume a spectral form and gain new skills, turning your life force into health.

 

Reaper Shroud:

Assume the form of a reaper and gain new skills, turning your life force into health.

 

Desert Shroud:

Enter the desert shroud, gaining a powerful barrier and pulsing necrotic energy around you and your sand shades.

 

No not really. You don't gain new skills and you don't turn your life force into health.

[Orpheal.8263]

Heres how i would nerf the most overpowered crap in this whole game:

 

## Base Mechanics

* Manifest Sand Shade: This Skill has now an internal Cooldown of 3 Seconds, Sand Shades can attack now only every 3 Seconds with you foes if you used a Shade Ability. Torment has been removed. and Maximum Count is now only 2 in regard of Ammo

* Nefasrious Favor: Converts now instead of 2 only 1 Condition of nearby Allies into boons and recharge Time gets increased from 5 to 8 seconds

* Sand Cascade: recharge Time increaded from 8 to 15 seconds, Barrier increased by 20% to around 2500 points

* Garish Pillar: Recharge Time increased to 20s, Fear Duration increased to 2s, Causes now 2s of Torment

* Desert Shroud: Torment removed, Duration reduced to 5 seconds, Pulses reduced to 5, 1 per second. Number of Hits reduced to 5 with the Damage being reduced by 20%

 

## Weapon Skills

* Harrowing Wave: Torment removed and replaced with Weakness. The Skill is with its Burning already strong enough under a Condi Scourge!

* Oppressive Collapse: Knockdown Removed, replaced with Daze for 1s

 

## Healing Skill

* Sand Flare: Torment Duration nefed down to 5 seondss, but increased to 2 Stacks. Can now be useed also underwater, named there as Mud Flare.

 

## Utility Skills

* Trail of Anguish: Remove Boon Corrupt and Torment. Replace Cripple with Vulnerability. Burn Duration reduced from 4 to 2 seconds. recharge Time reduced from 25 to 15s. Swiftness and Stability Durations reduced from 6 to 4s. Duration reduced to 4s. Can now be used underwater too with leavign a trail of mud instead of sand.

* Dessicate: Reduce Might from 5 Stacks to 3 Stacks and increase Duration from 8 to 10s. Can now be used underwater as well

* Sand Swell: Replace Torment and Cripple here with Bleeding and Blindness. Barrier reduced to 1000 points, recharge Tiem decreased to 30s Can now be used underwater named there as Mud Swell. Duration increased to 10s. Range increased to 1200

* Serpent Siphon: Recharge Reduced to 25. Now useable underwater as Mud Serpents. Torment and Cripple Remoded. Poison duration reduced to 8s. Instead of the Boon Corruption you steal with this Skill now 2 Boons only and for each stolen Boon iwll suffe the foe on a Stack of Poison. Range increased to 1200.

 

## Elite Skill

* Ghastly Breach: Recharge Time increased from 75 seconds to 90 Seconds!! Slow removed. Damage decreased by 20% Torment Duration decreased to 8s

 

# Traits:

 

* Abrasive Grit: internal Cooldown of 5 seconds now added and an Ally Target Limit of 3 added, so that you get get now only every 5 seconds maximum 6 Stacks of Might from giving Allies Barrier. Might Duration decreased from 6 to 4 seconds.

* Fell Beacon: Percentage reduced from 7 to 5% and the Trigger is not anymore Condition Damage, but now Precision. Reduces for you now the Duration of Burn and Blindess you suffer on by 20%

* Norishing Rot: internal Cooldown increased from 3 to 5s

* Sand Soul: The Stat Boosts decreased per Sand Shade from +75 to +50.

* Sadistic Searing: Duration of the Burning decreased to 2s. Burning foes grant you therefore per second now 1% Life Force per Second

* Unending Corruption: This Trait has been Removed and replaced

* Sand Armor: Ending Barriers grant your Allies now for 2 seconds Protection and Resistance. Replaces Unending Corruption

* Demonic Lore: This Trait has been removed and replaced

* Habringer of Plagues: Replaces Demonic Lore: Torment you deal, spreads now out like a Disease to nearby foes and deals 25% more Damage. When Torment spreads over to nearby foes, those foes will suffer then also onto Cripple and Bleedings.

* Feed from Corruption: This Trait has been removred

* Wailing Laments: Replaces Feed from Corruption. Whenever somebody uses in your near a Shout or Stance Skill, the user of this Shout or Stance Skill will get its Boons corrupted and you gain the Boons.

 

These Changes would cut down the masive powercreep of this Spec back to a normal and sane level, while still beign very strong, if played out well by the person in control, while the insane amount of condis and boon corrupts gets reduced to not so massively overwhelm enemies within the first 3 seconds of combat instantly, due to added and increased cooldown times, lowered damage for getting the bursts down to a more sane level and overwhelmign the enemy not instantly with way too much Torment and Cripple which Anet literally placed everywhere into this spec..ridiculous while removing Conditions that the Scourge should absolutely not have, like Slow and too strong Burns

 

[Dadnir.5038]

@"Orpheal.8263"

It's all kind and dandy but... I'm affraid you only manage to put the scourge in an even worse spot in PvE while, at the same time, not really affecting the scourge might in PvP/WvW. You are targeting the wrong things with all those "changes", the scourge is mean't to be a support spec and barely qualify as one already so nerfing it's support output which isn't even great as they are is a waste of time. As for the dps which isn't great either, you manage to properly reduce it to a joke.

 

Scourge sure need tone down but what you propose is beyond that. The necromancer's community is tired to be left behind in PvE and what you propose just remove every single possibility of a scourge in PvE, be it as a support, as a dps or as an hybrid support/dps. It's already difficult as it is for a necromancer to be accepted by a raid party, with your proposed changes it would be simply impossible.

[NekoNoKoi.9137]

> @"Sarrs.4831" said:

> >

> Death Shroud:

> Assume a spectral form and gain new skills, turning your life force into health.

>

> Reaper Shroud:

> Assume the form of a reaper and gain new skills, turning your life force into health.

>

> Desert Shroud:

> Enter the desert shroud, gaining a powerful barrier and pulsing necrotic energy around you and your sand shades.

>

> No not really. You don't gain new skills and you don't turn your life force into health.

 

Not really. It's not the exact same thing because your death shroud skills are now always there in the form of F skills, so to speak, but for the purposes of traits, F5 counts as entering death (in this case, sand) shroud. Also, you don't get life force because having barrier **and** life force on top would be way too much sustain for how much damage scourge can do, so instead you turn a bit of your life force into barrier when entering it. There is no cast time on entering death or reaper shroud, so it therefore stands to reason that there should be no cast time on entering sand shroud. It's not even like you can't tell the necro is in sand shroud, they get a big, pulsing aoe field around them.

[sylvnfox.7086]

oh ffs people scourge is not nearly OP as you think it is. here are the 2 rules for fighting scourge...

rule 1: don't get close, keep distance and range them.

rule 2: don't stop moving. all their damage comes from the shades, shades don't move.

if your not standing in the shade or near the scourge you take no damage.

follow those 2 simple rules and you will slaughter all scourges you face.

thank you and good night

[mazut.4296]

This is what I suggest:

Half its damage.

2sec cast time on shades, channel F skills rooting in place.

Overall 33% less LF gain from all skills.

Remove cripple from Punishments, reduce damage and increase CD.

Swap burning with 1xbleed on all traits except Dhuumfire.

Torch skill 4 is now single target and skill 5 does not kd, but apply vulnerability

[Anchoku.8142]

Orpheal, why such a massive suite of nerfs and what is your basis for each change?

 

Personally, my suggestion would be to trim the boon generation rate on all professions and do the same with boon corruption and boon ripping. Then see how the balance shakes out.

 

[bravan.3876]

> @"reikken.4961" said:

> Instead of making shade skills explode the entire area with instant unreactable damage, the shade skills do a wave of damage that starts in the center and expands outward. And the speed the wave moves is the same regardless of shade size, so it takes a lot longer for it to reach the edge of a big Sand Savant shade. How fast it is is up for debate, but slow enough to be reactable on the outer area of Sand Savant. Delayed AoEs in MOBAs tend to be about 0.6-0.7s, so I was thinking 0.7-1.0 sec to reach the edge of the big shade.

>

> I like this because the main issue with scourge isn't the amount of damage (see: PvE) so much as how easy it is for the damage to land. This way is a nerf in a way that makes the class less faceroll. Comboing damage with disables or saving bursts for when your opponent is out of dodges or out of position is now more important, just like it is for every other class. And this way it's also a lot less dangerous to stand at the edge of the massive point-covering shade than it is to stand in the middle of it.

>

> As an added bonus, it's _much_ less of a nerf for the smaller shades, bringing some balance there, and it's not really a nerf at all for PvE (where scourge needs _buffs_ if anything)

>

> Oh also, I'd make the subsequent pulses of Desert Shroud beyond the first, visually _much_ smaller. because they are a lot less dangerous than anything else coming from the shades, and you don't want important stuff hidden by constant desert shroud pulses. And the AoE barrier and condi clear on skills 2 and 3 should probably still be instant.

 

Not sure that will solve the issues in pvp, scourge still can occupy the point with all the aoe but outside of on point fights he will not hit anything with the shroud skills anymore. The skills should get an animation and a casttime (except the fear) i agree in that but how to deal with the high point pressure i don't know. Maybe a nerf to fb support will already deal with that.

[Kaiser.9873]

The very fact that if I cast my sandshade and then barely top a small rise in WvW and everything is "obstructed" is enough of a nerf.

 

The fact that if I try to wallbomb with a sandshade that everything only hits the outside of the wall with everything on top being "obstructed" is enough of a nerf.

 

The fact that a TREE can cause "obstructed", blades of grass and bushes in certain situations can cause "obstructed", and that all the while every other AoE class can essentially fire and forget much of their AoE, is enough of a nerf.

 

So much Scourge hate, but yeah any 1200 ranged class can crush a Scourge. Seriously this game has been rock-paper-scissors the entire life of the game, and some of you want Scourge to become marshmallow.

[Patrick.2987]

Shade skills should not apply any conditions. They have a good supportive usage and maybe need a buff in barrier scaling with healingpower and f5 barrier beeing an aoe. Weapons and utilities have enough condition damage already.

[Faffin.6741]

Scourge is pretty fun to play in PvP, but all the time I've played it, I've never been hard to kill, and often get focused. The condi nerf has actually made things harder, we depend on killing stuff fast. Any more nerfs and I'll go back to my ranger, because the RvR just won't be worth it anymore. I'm picking that Anet devs must have actually played Scourge in pvp quite a bit, and realised that it's not OP, because they haven't caved to all the pressure so far.