SPEED OF SHADOWS CHANGE WAS USELESS

[Stand The Wall.6987]

> @"Morde.3158" said:

> Entering the form is maybe the biggest problem I always have the life force when you have slow and chill on you 10sec shroud feels like 13sec

 

theres a lot going on here and I'm not sure what to make of it. I agree that when being kited and you get out of reap shroud the cd seems long. that pales in comparison when trying to build up lf tho. against quite a few classes I don't have any problem staying close to since necro has a ton of snares, a lot more then its lf generation skills.

[kybraga.7103]

Okay, lemme lay out the change for Speed of Shadows.

 

# Pros:

* It allows snare removal upon entering shroud. This is used primarily as a Reaper for charging. (~~Though you could easily just attack the vines that immobilize you.~~)

* Swiftness aside from Spectral Walk and Locust Swarm.

* As previously mentioned, it offers swiftness but also procs Blighter's Boon.

 

# Cons:

* It kinda killed some Shroud consistency.

* The movement boost wears off now and isn't just permanent.

 

Now, let's go through how much this changes the shroud-mechanic and makes Speed of Shadows just *horrible*.

* The change to snare now allows for Reaper and baseline shroud to break snares- this can benefit baseline shroud better as vines can only be hit by melee attacks and AoEs.

* Swiftness change isn't that big, but it's another source of a boon- which also synergizes with Blighter's Boon; that means you can heal even more health by just entering Reaper's Shroud.

* The hit to the lack of a shroud CD reduction can be pretty annoying due to the fact Elementalists, Guardians, Mesmers, Engineers, Thieves, Rangers, and Warriors can get CD reductions to their major mechanics. That just means they'll have to amp-up shroud somehow! ~~What a dream.~~

* The fact that we now gain Swiftness in shroud now also means we have another boon that can be corrupted in a fight versus another Necromancer.

 

To summarize, the changes can benefit Necromancer more than it can hurt. Not to say they shouldn't do more to it, but they shouldn't revert it.

[Stand The Wall.6987]

would be sweet if instead of swiftness it was superspeed.

you will not run away from my nec!

[DeceiverX.8361]

> @"kybraga.7103" said:

> Okay, lemme lay out the change for Speed of Shadows.

>

> # Pros:

> * It allows snare removal upon entering shroud. This is used primarily as a Reaper for charging. (~~Though you could easily just attack the vines that immobilize you.~~)

> * Swiftness aside from Spectral Walk and Locust Swarm.

> * As previously mentioned, it offers swiftness but also procs Blighter's Boon.

>

> # Cons:

> * It kinda killed some Shroud consistency.

> * The movement boost wears off now and isn't just permanent.

>

> Now, let's go through how much this changes the shroud-mechanic and makes Speed of Shadows just *horrible*.

> * The change to snare now allows for Reaper and baseline shroud to break snares- this can benefit baseline shroud better as vines can only be hit by melee attacks and AoEs.

> * Swiftness change isn't that big, but it's another source of a boon- which also synergizes with Blighter's Boon; that means you can heal even more health by just entering Reaper's Shroud.

> * The hit to the lack of a shroud CD reduction can be pretty annoying due to the fact Elementalists, Guardians, Mesmers, Engineers, Thieves, Rangers, and Warriors can get CD reductions to their major mechanics. That just means they'll have to amp-up shroud somehow! ~~What a dream.~~

> * The fact that we now gain Swiftness in shroud now also means we have another boon that can be corrupted in a fight versus another Necromancer.

>

> To summarize, the changes can benefit Necromancer more than it can hurt. Not to say they shouldn't do more to it, but they shouldn't revert it.

 

Thing is, the changes just made the necromancer weaker into the matchups it was already weak into.

 

Old SoS made the necromancer - especially the reaper - way more consistent and capable of dealing with a wider breadth of enemies. And gave you been in the PvP formats lately? It's literally down to who has more boons and who can corrupt faster. Swiftness is going to get immediately stripped/corrupted/stolen into almost anything.

 

I don't really care if it *can* be theoretically better. I want my class to be consistent, and right now it's anything but, while the SoS changes severely impacted its already-weak matchups for the worse.

[Lahmia.2193]

I don't see why the old version couldn't effect scourge's desert shroud recharge. I mean that was why they changed it to begin with.

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

> @"Lahmia.2193" said:

> I don't see why the old version couldn't effect scourge's desert shroud recharge. I mean that was why they changed it to begin with.

 

Honestly, I'm fine with Desert Shroud not having a 10 second cooldown.

[DeceiverX.8361]

> @"Lahmia.2193" said:

> I don't see why the old version couldn't effect scourge's desert shroud recharge. I mean that was why they changed it to begin with.

 

Probably because if you increase it, you end up removing the illusion of choice half of the time because it just makes Sand Shroud have a huge disparity between trait lines.

 

This was kind of an issue with such reaper builds - an artificial dependence on this trait with a lot of strength of the class lying here (for self-carry play) - but it wasn't as pronounced because the degen rate wasn't completely over the top like it is now; shroud uptime was still good.

 

They either need to massively buff shroud uptime or cut RS's cooldown by a ton and give the bonus movespeed as a core feature or part of Relentless Pursuit (though one may argue this makes it overloaded as a trait). Either way, RShroud uptime as a percentage of time spent playing reaper needs to be way higher in order for the reaper to stay strong at doing what it was supposed to/could previously do by design.

 

The effects of the old SR line with SoS and VP in some fashion need to be integrated into RShroud to make this spec whole again. It'll just stay a combo-spin-to-win OTP dependent on external support, otherwise, which completely fails the design goal of the reaper.

 

 

[Nimon.7840]

> @"Drarnor Kunoram.5180" said:

> > @"Morde.3158" said:

> > > @"ZeftheWicked.3076" said:

> > > > @"Morde.3158" said:

> > > > > @"ZeftheWicked.3076" said:

> > > > > **that** change? It's ages old!

> > > > >

> > > > > If that's the case author has no idea what he's talking about. Current speed of shadows is awesome. Here are but few reasons why it is so:

> > > > >

> > > > > * easy counter to druid's ancient seeds - the bane of necro

> > > > > * accessible for all specializations - not everyone plays reaper only

> > > > > * huge synergy with unholy martyr - SoS takes off specific non-damaging condies, letting martyr focus more on damaging ones

> > > > > * swiftness without being arm twisted into warhorn or spectral walk is sweet

> > > > > * not every necro build uses staff (marks), while every has access to shroud

> > > > >

> > > > > Now if it's the 7s shroud cooldown that i understand and agree upon. But that can also be placed elsewhere. No need to bring back inferior trait for one good component of it, that can literally be slapped elsewhere.

> > > >

> > > > wrong that trait does not break any entangle you have to kill the root first

> > >

> > > Entangle "roots" you by means of immobilize. You pop shroud and you walk outta it, because immob got insta-cleansed and you got swiftness to get outta there faster.

> > > But to be fair i am saying that as Foot in the Grave user, so the moment i shroud i'm immediately broken free from druid's cc he applied on me and can get outta there in an instant. If i was to remain pinned down by cc then going shroud wouldn't do much, because the immob cleansed gets reapplied while i still can't move and then i would indeed be in a pickle.

> >

> > wrong you have to kill the entagle and any skills like it it removes a normal immob just fine. Even then losing 25% perma movementspeed in shroud was a huge nerf and if you was getting kited before imagine losing the swiftness to a thief or something.

>

> Once you cleanse the Immobilize, you have until the next pulse from the roots to just walk out of it. Time it correctly and you have zero difficulty just walking out with a cleanse.

 

No. Thats not how it works. You need to destroy the roots in order tonget free

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

> @"Nimon.7840" said:

> > @"Drarnor Kunoram.5180" said:

> > > @"Morde.3158" said:

> > > > @"ZeftheWicked.3076" said:

> > > > > @"Morde.3158" said:

> > > > > > @"ZeftheWicked.3076" said:

> > > > > > **that** change? It's ages old!

> > > > > >

> > > > > > If that's the case author has no idea what he's talking about. Current speed of shadows is awesome. Here are but few reasons why it is so:

> > > > > >

> > > > > > * easy counter to druid's ancient seeds - the bane of necro

> > > > > > * accessible for all specializations - not everyone plays reaper only

> > > > > > * huge synergy with unholy martyr - SoS takes off specific non-damaging condies, letting martyr focus more on damaging ones

> > > > > > * swiftness without being arm twisted into warhorn or spectral walk is sweet

> > > > > > * not every necro build uses staff (marks), while every has access to shroud

> > > > > >

> > > > > > Now if it's the 7s shroud cooldown that i understand and agree upon. But that can also be placed elsewhere. No need to bring back inferior trait for one good component of it, that can literally be slapped elsewhere.

> > > > >

> > > > > wrong that trait does not break any entangle you have to kill the root first

> > > >

> > > > Entangle "roots" you by means of immobilize. You pop shroud and you walk outta it, because immob got insta-cleansed and you got swiftness to get outta there faster.

> > > > But to be fair i am saying that as Foot in the Grave user, so the moment i shroud i'm immediately broken free from druid's cc he applied on me and can get outta there in an instant. If i was to remain pinned down by cc then going shroud wouldn't do much, because the immob cleansed gets reapplied while i still can't move and then i would indeed be in a pickle.

> > >

> > > wrong you have to kill the entagle and any skills like it it removes a normal immob just fine. Even then losing 25% perma movementspeed in shroud was a huge nerf and if you was getting kited before imagine losing the swiftness to a thief or something.

> >

> > Once you cleanse the Immobilize, you have until the next pulse from the roots to just walk out of it. Time it correctly and you have zero difficulty just walking out with a cleanse.

>

> No. Thats not how it works. You need to destroy the roots in order tonget free

 

That is exactly how it works. The roots do not have collision. Instead they are a location that pulses Immobilize as long as they exist.

 

I've lost count of how often I leave those roots without bothering to destroy them because I just cleanse the immobilize and walk out.

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

To all non believers - just grab a warrior (or rev) and pop resistance when rooted. if roots are terrain you won't be able to move out without destroying them. If they aren't, and are based solely on immobilize you can walk in and out of them as you please as long as resistance is on.

 

 

[NekoNoKoi.9137]

Honestly, I'm a bit torn because I kind of like this 'new' trait. Crippling conditions, especially immob, are such a pain in the ass for necros, so this makes it easier to ~~attempt to~~ disengage, or get rid of druid immob. I'd much rather anet combine the old trait with the new one, so you get both things. Considering the amount of bs other classes have, I don't think it's such a tall order.

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

Tbh i think the problem with shroud recharge reduction lies in the fact that it's just too powerful for it's own good. Put it in any trait tier - other two traits are dead meat. Put it in a given spec line - other lines get shafted. Tbh i think this should be resolved by means of profession mechanic, that specialization lines may alter, but not define.

 

For example have shroud recharge last 7 seconds, but only after 10s you "stabilize" and can safely pop it.

If you decide to pop it sooner (between 7-10s) you pay a penalty in form of having less lifeforce then you normally would unpon entering it.

 

Then you can put some traits in different lines that can alter that mechanic, for example:

* **Curses:** Instead of losing lifeforce, you self inflict certain conditions for premature shroud activation

* **Blood Magic:** You store up energy and receive a heal on entering shroud if you don't re-enter it before 10s mark

* **Soul Reaping:** Penalty is not applied if you stayed in shroud shorter then x amount of time during previous activation (for shroud flashers)

* **Spite:** Instead of losing lifeforce, you lose ability to receive any boons for x amount of time after entering shroud early

* **Death Magic:** Instead of losing lifeforce, your minions are stunned for 2s (condition: you must have an active minion on the field)

[hash.8462]

What if Vital Persistence also reduce the Shroud CD? (-20%)

...and maybe Strength of Undeath also reduce Shroud Degeneration? (-15%)

 

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

Then spectral mastery will be far less picked and master of terror at all.

 

And both would make Soul Reaping a must-have line, something that should be avoided to not kill build variety (look at warrior and his two traitline builds, cause the last one will always be Defense).

[hash.8462]

> @"ZeftheWicked.3076" said:

> Then spectral mastery will be far less picked and master of terror at all.

This is true, but at the moment is the only trait that reduce Shroud skills CD...

To balance it I would be happy to remove the vitality boost and get a -20% on Shroud (F1) CD but I suppose Scrouges would not be so happy.

 

> And both would make Soul Reaping a must-have line, something that should be avoided to not kill build variety (look at warrior and his two traitline builds, cause the last one will always be Defense).

It was so before, Speed of Shadow was in that line and so it was for Vital Persistence that reduced the degeneration;

by the way Soul Reaping is the necro speciality tree (from wiki: Soul Reaping - focuses on Death Shroud and life force. Enhances shroud and spectral skills).

[Morde.3158]

> @"Dadnir.5038" said:

> Nope,

> The number one thing we asked before HoT was melee cleave. Take note that dagger used to hit only one target.

>

> The number 2 thing we were asking before HoT was power based damage because at that time conditions were a pale shadow of the current one and PvE end game was a power feast.

>

> The number 3 thing we were asking before HoT was more mobility and anet chose to make us reduce the mobility of our oponent to match our request while in PvE they just designed content so that mobility became less important.

>

> Also we asked to be usefull in sPvP and since HoT they started to gave us boon corruption and even more boon corruption, without missing some boon corruption on top of boon corruption.

>

> Since HoT, however, we ask for different things, I agree with that. We've asked for some support and with PoF we were gifted with scourge which is, in their mind, an heavy support spec.

>

> At this point I'm scared to see what they would give us if we ask them something, but maybe, it's just me...

 

maybe for you pvers

[Morde.3158]

> @"DeceiverX.8361" said:

> > @"kybraga.7103" said:

> > Okay, lemme lay out the change for Speed of Shadows.

> >

> > # Pros:

> > * It allows snare removal upon entering shroud. This is used primarily as a Reaper for charging. (~~Though you could easily just attack the vines that immobilize you.~~)

> > * Swiftness aside from Spectral Walk and Locust Swarm.

> > * As previously mentioned, it offers swiftness but also procs Blighter's Boon.

> >

> > # Cons:

> > * It kinda killed some Shroud consistency.

> > * The movement boost wears off now and isn't just permanent.

> >

> > Now, let's go through how much this changes the shroud-mechanic and makes Speed of Shadows just *horrible*.

> > * The change to snare now allows for Reaper and baseline shroud to break snares- this can benefit baseline shroud better as vines can only be hit by melee attacks and AoEs.

> > * Swiftness change isn't that big, but it's another source of a boon- which also synergizes with Blighter's Boon; that means you can heal even more health by just entering Reaper's Shroud.

> > * The hit to the lack of a shroud CD reduction can be pretty annoying due to the fact Elementalists, Guardians, Mesmers, Engineers, Thieves, Rangers, and Warriors can get CD reductions to their major mechanics. That just means they'll have to amp-up shroud somehow! ~~What a dream.~~

> > * The fact that we now gain Swiftness in shroud now also means we have another boon that can be corrupted in a fight versus another Necromancer.

> >

> > To summarize, the changes can benefit Necromancer more than it can hurt. Not to say they shouldn't do more to it, but they shouldn't revert it.

>

> Thing is, the changes just made the necromancer weaker into the matchups it was already weak into.

>

> Old SoS made the necromancer - especially the reaper - way more consistent and capable of dealing with a wider breadth of enemies. And gave you been in the PvP formats lately? It's literally down to who has more boons and who can corrupt faster. Swiftness is going to get immediately stripped/corrupted/stolen into almost anything.

>

> I don't really care if it *can* be theoretically better. I want my class to be consistent, and right now it's anything but, while the SoS changes severely impacted its already-weak matchups for the worse.

 

Facts my guy well said

[cobracommander.5861]

> @"DeceiverX.8361" said:

> > @"Crinn.7864" said:

> > > @"Morde.3158" said:

> > > > @"Crinn.7864" said:

> > > > Replacing relentless pursuit with speed of shadows just screws reaper harder as it would mean that speed of shadows would be competing with Augury (vital for shout builds) and also with Chilling Nova (important for burst)

> > >

> > > that has nothing to do with what I said try reading it again

> >

> > Fair enough I misread. However I completely disagree about Speed of Shadows never being taken. Speed of Shadows is always taken on any build that doesn't run staff, which for the record, is a lot of builds.

>

> I ran A/D + GS with SoS, VP, and DP in SR and RP, CV, and RO in Reaper before the nerfs and buffs to axe and I can genuinely say right now that build went from being one of the best/strongest builds I've ever played which totally dumpstered about 90% of daredevils as well, to absolute garbage to the point it has no favorable matchups.

>

> The meta traits used in PvE like Decimate Defenses and even Blighter's Boon were massively overrated and outside PvP and blobbing WvW I think staff is total junk.

>

> Aggressive power reaper was extremely strong in the right hands and mentality towards playing it in such a way (which is why I frequently won 1v2/3/4), especially for LF builds with shroud flickering, and the movespeed bonus from SoS single-handedly carried a lot of reaper's viability in duels because it couldn't get stolen or corrupted unlike swiftness, and the 7s shroud timer gave it just the right flow to rotate out-of-shroud damage and LF gain/CC-locking/boon denial while being able to flicker back into its real power and dominate a fight.

>

> This build went from being a mean contender to basically useless. When I see reapers, even on my core D/D thief I know they're free kills because any semblance of aggression and follow-through they used to he able to play with has been stripped away in favor of a playstyle which basically suggest to faceroll the keyboard and burn everything and either kill or be killed or try and kite while huge cooldowns tick.

 

This this this this this. I hope you’re listening anet.

[cobracommander.5861]

Honestly reaper shroud should be on a 5 second baseline CD with a 3% degeneration rate. If they’re worried about making a trait like this too OP not to take, it needs to be baseline. Leave the traits as they currently are. Except SOS should revert to plus25% speed in shroud cause convertible swiftness is dumb and defeats the purpose of the ethos of an unstoppable reaper.

 

Anet proved how little they actually test these changes last year when they took away our -50% shroud degen then changed base degen rate 24 hour later to -25 after everyone complained. They just need to trust the community on these issues if they don’t take the time to study the issue themselves.

[Nimon.7840]

> @"hash.8462" said:

> What if Vital Persistence also reduce the Shroud CD? (-20%)

> ...and maybe Strength of Undeath also reduce Shroud Degeneration? (-15%)

>

 

That would be too much ine one trait. Vital persistance is already the most picked trait. Giving it shroud cd as well would make the others completely useless

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

> @"Nimon.7840" said:

> > @"hash.8462" said:

> > What if Vital Persistence also reduce the Shroud CD? (-20%)

> > ...and maybe Strength of Undeath also reduce Shroud Degeneration? (-15%)

> >

>

> That would be too much ine one trait. Vital persistance is already the most picked trait. Giving it shroud cd as well would make the others completely useless

 

Fear of Death isn't completely useless? News to me.

[Jinn Galen.2468]

For the love of Grenth, why can't Anet just make the 7 second shroud CD baseline? Will it make the class so broken OP? Bloody hell... the class only has the goddamn shroud as defence...

[Morde.3158]

> @"Jinn Galen.2468" said:

> For the love of Grenth, why can't Anet just make the 7 second shroud CD baseline? Will it make the class so broken OP? Bloody hell... the class only has the kitten shroud as defence...

 

Because anet wants to make scourge fan boys happy but like I said before we waited 3 years for a new play style and now they hit us with the same old kick old content to the side and lets make the skill clickers happy! NEWS FLASH anet I want to have my profession mechanics untouched like the others, PLEASE and THANK YOU.

[aDemoNnDisguisE.8576]

Agree with OP.

 

Of all the nerfs to ever have been done to Necro. This was the worst by far for any power builds.

This change alone has made core necro and reaper fucking unplayable.

 

Set shroud CD back to the reduced time that it was anet.

[cobracommander.5861]

I just imagine the uproar if warriors got a 10s cd on weapon swap. Same thing anet.