Necromancer's Depth

[Sarrs.4831]

Necromancers getting access to their utilities while in shroud could be a neato espec

Maybe also get Glyphs.

[pah.4931]

> @ugrakarma.9416 said:

> > @Jaya.2760 said:

> > 5 years ago i looked through the 8 classes wondering what should be my main. It was the condition managment - the ability to cleanse/corrupt/transfer condis and boons from enemys and allies - which let me take the necro. And since then i'm left with the feeling that it isn't the lack of ability on the necro side that this scenario doesn't work, it's the lack of content in which it could shine. (just from a pve point of view) Beside of some mistlock instabilitys and maybe sloth&matthias there is no real condipressure and way to less boons on pve-mobs to make use of this kind of playstyle. We don't know if this is also the case in PoF, but i'm afraight for the old content the scourge (like core necro) will not be able to pull of his full potential because of this.

> >

> > Sorry for my english - it isn't my native language

>

> These conditions management only/boon management only is a game fault in general. The boon strip traits/skills while 99% os pve mobs dont have boons or dont apply many conditions became useless. Their should do their homework on a more sophisticated split between pvp/pve or get ride of theses pvp only traits.

>

> The "useless" but mandatory trait is big broken mechanic.

 

OR ... they could give those strip/corrupt abilities a little additional: "If the target has no boons then ____________"

[Kaladel.1670]

> @pah.4931 said:

> > @ugrakarma.9416 said:

> > > @Jaya.2760 said:

> > > 5 years ago i looked through the 8 classes wondering what should be my main. It was the condition managment - the ability to cleanse/corrupt/transfer condis and boons from enemys and allies - which let me take the necro. And since then i'm left with the feeling that it isn't the lack of ability on the necro side that this scenario doesn't work, it's the lack of content in which it could shine. (just from a pve point of view) Beside of some mistlock instabilitys and maybe sloth&matthias there is no real condipressure and way to less boons on pve-mobs to make use of this kind of playstyle. We don't know if this is also the case in PoF, but i'm afraight for the old content the scourge (like core necro) will not be able to pull of his full potential because of this.

> > >

> > > Sorry for my english - it isn't my native language

> >

> > These conditions management only/boon management only is a game fault in general. The boon strip traits/skills while 99% os pve mobs dont have boons or dont apply many conditions became useless. Their should do their homework on a more sophisticated split between pvp/pve or get ride of theses pvp only traits.

> >

> > The "useless" but mandatory trait is big broken mechanic.

>

> OR ... they could give those strip/corrupt abilities a little additional: "If the target has no boons then ____________"

 

I see 3 possible solutions to this problem :

1) The simple one : yours.

2) The hard one : create a split between PvE and WvW and increase the split between PvE and PvP

3) The one that takes a lot of work : Make boons almost omnipresent in PvE (open word included) - I like this one best, 'cause it has potential in teaching new players the importance of boon stripping/corruption early in the game. (But I don't expect this one to happen)

[pah.4931]

> @Kaladel.1670 said:

> > @pah.4931 said:

> > > @ugrakarma.9416 said:

> > > > @Jaya.2760 said:

> > > > 5 years ago i looked through the 8 classes wondering what should be my main. It was the condition managment - the ability to cleanse/corrupt/transfer condis and boons from enemys and allies - which let me take the necro. And since then i'm left with the feeling that it isn't the lack of ability on the necro side that this scenario doesn't work, it's the lack of content in which it could shine. (just from a pve point of view) Beside of some mistlock instabilitys and maybe sloth&matthias there is no real condipressure and way to less boons on pve-mobs to make use of this kind of playstyle. We don't know if this is also the case in PoF, but i'm afraight for the old content the scourge (like core necro) will not be able to pull of his full potential because of this.

> > > >

> > > > Sorry for my english - it isn't my native language

> > >

> > > These conditions management only/boon management only is a game fault in general. The boon strip traits/skills while 99% os pve mobs dont have boons or dont apply many conditions became useless. Their should do their homework on a more sophisticated split between pvp/pve or get ride of theses pvp only traits.

> > >

> > > The "useless" but mandatory trait is big broken mechanic.

> >

> > OR ... they could give those strip/corrupt abilities a little additional: "If the target has no boons then ____________"

>

> I see 3 possible solutions to this problem :

> 1) The simple one : yours.

> 2) The hard one : create a split between PvE and WvW and increase the split between PvE and PvP

> 3) The one that takes a lot of work : Make boons almost omnipresent in PvE (open word included) - I like this one best, 'cause it has potential in teaching new players the importance of boon stripping/corruption early in the game. (But I don't expect this one to happen)

 

Agreed. #3 would be aces! But... also agreed. Not holding my breath.

[Dadnir.5038]

Reasons for #3 not happening:

 

- there is 8 other professions aside from the necromancer and some lack boon hate

- event scaling: anet chose to make the mobs stronger the more there is player around them, with boons on top it would quickly begin to be a mess

[Lucian.8235]

> @"Robert Gee.9246" said:

> This is a pretty cool discussion so far. I'm interested to see where it goes.

>

> > @Lily.1935 said:

> >One suggestion I've been pushing for years is to have your skills 6-0 always available to you, even when in shroud, but with a hefty cost. I've suggested that if Necromancer was to gain this utility it shouldn't be for free.

> Currently the "cost" for using these skills is that you need to drop out of shroud in order to use them. Rather than paying lifeforce, you are putting your defensive ability on recharge.

>

>

> > @kKagari.6804 said:

> > A majority of our GM traits are passive in effect, or doesn't have the two pronged effects that Cleansing Ire has. To increase skill ceiling, and depth for necro, changes should start from core specs; there are simply too many passive GM traits.

> I think it's okay to have some passive and simple GM traits. And some passive traits like Parasitic Contagion can act as keystone traits that players can build and play around. It would be informative to hear some specific examples of the traits you're worried about.

 

Why do our utilities need a cost to use, at all, beyond their base cooldowns? Shroud is certainly a potent class mechanic, when used properly, but it's no more potent than other active or passive defensive mechanics in the game. Indeed, there are plenty of defenses in the game that are significantly more powerful, but don't incur any such penalty.

 

For that matter, why do we need to take a trait to make our signets function, at all, when using our defensive mechanic when other defensive mechanics, many of which are no less, sometimes far more, potent, do not lock other classes out of their signets? It should be noted that even with signets getting extra effects and functioning within Shroud, that trait is terribly underwhelming to take.

 

Why was the spectral trait nerfed so hard when, in the same patch, it was mentioned how few people took that, or the fear trait, in the face of vital persistence? Spectral skills weren't made all that much more powerful, indeed, some spectral skills had their cooldowns dramatically increased in the same patch the spectral trait's cooldown reduction was also dramatically decreased.

 

Also, since we are constantly balanced as if we have second health bar . . . why don't we legitimately just have a second health bar? We're balanced like we do, but we don't. We have a mobile downed state with all the negatives that come with such a concept, and many more that have been tacked on for fear of that constantly degenerating mobile downed state being too powerful, while defenses with no, or far lesser, negatives continue to exist, be used, and prove, in action - in practice - how much better they are than a mobile downed state. I don't want those defenses, but if we're constantly going to be balanced as if we have a second health bar - why don't you just give us one?

[Erebus.7568]

hi op.

it would be cool if you could be more direct with what you are trying to say, as your text goes in circle's for me when i read it.

1. do you feel that necro is too UP compared to other classes overall?

2. do you feel that necro is too OP compared to other classes overall?

3. do you feel that necro is in a good spot compared to other classes BUT that necro's are too easy to play for to high reward (aka to easy to play, but as effective as other classes) ?

4. or is it the opposited of 3, that you feel they are to hard to play for to low reward (aka, their skill ceiling is to high for the same outcome as other classes) ?

5. or do you simply feel necro doesn't feel as you like it to feel but balance isn't considered at all in this statement?

 

i honestly can't really decipher where you are going with your original post, so if you could try to be vastly more precise in what you are trying to say it would be possible to chime in on it ^^

 

also do remember when comparing classes which classes you compare to and for what purpose as there is some clear T1,t2,t3 classes depending on the purpose they are used for. as well as different skill ceiling for different people's preferred playstyle, such as elementalist that from release has had a Vastly higher skill ceiling than any other class yet not more reward for perfecting this and the argument for this is that "some people prefer the higher skill ceiling of the class without any extra reward for it", which i always shake my head at (and obviously higher skill ceiling can't mean higher efficiency as it would be equal to breaking the balance of the classes at top play lvl).

[Kaladel.1670]

> @Dadnir.5038 said:

> Reasons for #3 not happening:

>

> - there is 8 other professions aside from the necromancer and some lack boon hate

> - event scaling: anet chose to make the mobs stronger the more there is player around them, with boons on top it would quickly begin to be a mess

 

Hm, I don't think boons should be added on top of mobs like they are right now. The idea is to tweak their stats so with their boons, they are at the same level as they are currently. Stripping or corrupting their boons would make them weaker and compensate our lack of DPS (and it has the side benefit of making the necro more desirable in group, since debuffed mobs are easier to kill for everyone).

[grave of hearts.7830]

Well a little bit to add here

In general the discomfort playing necromancer in wvw stems that while the dmg ammounts are mediocre and clunky and the dmging conditions are either negated by resistance spam or outright cleansed,it is the lack of meaningfull choices that hurts the class more.

I loved gw1 necromancer for its flexibility to bring utility in and play other classes with the trade off of more casts for less effect.

Gw2 necromancer got none of that utility,no orders skills and no dual class no hexes nothing.

And since launch been mostly a condition class that got hurt really bad from the nerfs to reduce its power,and the subsequent epidemic and signet changes.

In my own opinion necromancer needs more utility choices to build around and broaden the gameplay,and be rewarded for those choices.

Plague signet for example,there been several times i did build around it and i wished i could increase its range to 1500 with a trait to be able to be further back and use my curses gm to get 10% heals out of it hitting me as well.

This would open condition management for support.

Lore wise and thematicaly wise an inteligent and proactive class been playing like a brainless warrior because the class design is conflicting too much with the nature of the game.

Instead of giving more power stats or systain ,give to necro instead the ability to create stuff .

Traps or bone cannons or equip allies with bone sabers or load flesh golem into trebuchets and lob it into the enemy or lock people into cages that they have to break out of.

The necromancer should be fun and entertaining to play.

[pah.4931]

I agree with @"Lucian.8235"

 

This "second health bar" term is far too casually thrown about, when it isn't what Necros have. Shrouds, as is, are either an inferior third weapon swap (since we lose 6 - 0), which ideally would at least NOT be a dps loss, or it's an OH SH*T button when health is low and healing is on cd. Compare to elementalist that basically gets 4 basic weapon sets with no real downside and enough defensive tools (not to mention more damage and more mobility) to make up for not having that little extra health that shroud has.

 

The penalty for using shroud makes it nothing more than a chance to hit more buttons or to prevent yourself from dying, but when you start balancing around it as if it's some ungodly ability (reduced damage, defensive skills, and mobility) then it becomes a problem.

 

Not sure why our core prof mechanic has to come with a drawback at all, while most others are just on top of the prof base mechanics. What is the "drawback" for an engineer's kits and f skills? Or a warrior's adrenaline damage boosts? Or a ranger's pet? For some reason, the necro shroud is perceived as this super OP ability that has to have a drawback.

 

/shrug

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

I would at least like to be able to see my utility cooldowns when shrouded, so I can make informed decision when it's a good time to exit.

[finkle.9513]

> @Lily.1935 said:

> I figured this will be a great post to submit for the necromancer forums and with this new format it should be easier for me to make chances. This Discussion will be regarding to the necromancer's Depth and complexity. while Compare that to its GW1 counterpart. I'll also be discussing how the Scourge in this post but this is using that as a comparison to the GW2's necromancer history.

>

> **The Depth problem**

> To start this off, the necromancer is a fairly shallow profession. I know this sounds like a negative thing to say, but bare with me for the moment. When it comes to difficulty of execution and pay off the necromancer's abilities are fairly low risk and low reward. Although this isn't true all the time, Blood is power traited for Master of corruption is a high risk skill with low reward for its correct use. When comparing this to professions like thief, mesmer or even warrior it becomes clear that playing well on them or even mastering them is rewarding because a player can dive far deeper into that class and find powerful strategies that lets them go beyond what's expected of them or at least have the illusion that they go beyond. The necromancer hasn't had this sort of gameplay.

> As they stand now, Necromancer is a low risk low reward profession that rewards passive play on the lower levels of things like PvP and PvE, while at high end PvP this passive play that the necromancer has been taught to use becomes a liability but with the mechanics of the profession it doesn't offer much room for improvement on the player's part. What you see is what you get. While lets compare this to the mesmer. A profession with a high skill ceiling. Many players when the pick up mesmer assume its a fairly weak profession that's easily taken down. But as the skill of the player grows with it they eventually realize just how much control and sustain the profession actually has.

> Contrast that with the necromancer. Necromancers are fairly slow, straightforward and have very few defensive options. Because of this players quickly learn the gaps in the professions armor and its short comings. Its a very simple profession for people to just pick up and use but because of this it sacrifices so much of the depth that the GW1 necromancer was known for in favor of of this user friendly necromancer we see in GW2. Now I'm not saying this is inherently a bad thing. The passive game play and simplicity allows for the necromancer to be a menace in low end PvP and WvW which rewards this sort of profession.

> As that stands though, this sort of style philosophy pushes the player who decides to make the necromancer their main into a pretty bad position if they decide to get into the depth of the game. Its giving the player a profession with training wheels and expecting the player that they have to be aware that if they' want to advance in the game they'll have to give up their main and start focusing on a profession with a higher skill ceiling. But as it stands the 9 professions are so different and necromancer's defenses are so drastically different from the other professions that it can be like relearning the game all over again with far less to translate over from the necromancer.

>

> **The Scourge**

> The Scourge is a fairly interesting elite spec when we compare it to the core profession. As an Elite it is far deeper in terms of its gameplay than the necromancer. As it stands now, it has 3 active defensive abilities on its bar at all time, along with the Aoe fear which can be activated without the use of a Shade. This opens up the door to new options and new ways to seriously screw up. This is a good thing! Because of the depth problem that the necromancer has at its core it doesn't offer a reward for high skilled play. While the Scourge is far less passive in its execution and far more active in its gameplay. I've described it as "Necromancer's Crossing over with engineer" which I feel is an apt description of it. Engineer, being one of the most complex professions while necromancers being one of the simplest. Because of this you get a resource hungry monstrosity that has the unique flavor of the necromancer with a bit of that Engineer depth. The Scourge addresses the necromancer's problem with depth and provides players a means to grow and expand with the profession.

> Why I'm in love with the concept of the scourge is because it moves the player back to the days of the GW1 cursing necromancer. Although that spec in GW1 didn't have much field control, it was quite taxing on your opponent and rewarded you for being aware of your surroundings. GW1 necromancer was loved because of its depth in use and the scourge gives players a bit of this back. While it doesn't offer everything the necromancer desires it is a start.

>

> **Guild Wars 1 Necromancer**

> When we compare the guild wars 2 necromancer to its Guild wars 1 counterpart the Guild wars 2 necromancer up until this point was necromancer in name only. The GW1 necromancer was a very bursty, controling and damaging profession that ripped holes into its own defenses in order to expose weaknesses of its foes and unlock great power. Because of this the necromancer was a very difficult profession to play and master in the first game, rewarding player for very risky behavior that we haven't seen since. Holosmith seems to be closest to this style. And that isn't the first time I've compared engineer to GW1 necromancer and it likely wont be the last.

> When Guild Wars 1 necromancer mains were making the transition to Guild Wars 2 the necromancer was a shock to them. Where was the risk? Where was the reward? It just wasn't there. Arena net advertised the necromancer as a high skill profession, a statement we haven't heard in a long time and likely for good reason. Arena net seems to have gone with the GW2 necromancer as a user friendly profession while the GW1 necro players have been starved for that gameplay they left behind from GW1.

> Arena net still seems to have some of the core philosophy still buried into the GW2 necromancer. Corruptions being more in line with GW1 necromancer's theme and being fairly odd for the GW2 necromancer when you honestly think about what its trying to do. I'd like to see arena net push further down this path and give us the Power at any cost profession we fell in love with in GW1.

>

> **Suggestion for Core**

> I've harped on for a while about how the core profession is a low skill low reward profession. But I honestly believe that it doesn't have to be. It can still be user friendly while adding a bit of depth to it. One suggestion I've been pushing for years is to have your skills 6-0 always available to you, even when in shroud, but with a hefty cost. I've suggested that if Necromancer was to gain this utility it shouldn't be for free. That using these skills in shroud should cost you life force and that the healing skill shouldn't provide health but still maintain its secondary effect.

> The Advantage of this would be that the necromancer player needs to make a very interesting decision that GW1 necromancer had to make all the time. Do I sacrifice my defenses for this utility? Which is an extremely meaningful question. And although their defenses would still be quite different when compared to the other professions in the game, this would set up a means to teach new players about rewarding gameplay that involves sacrifice while still letting them play at the lower ends with that level of passivity.

> Depth promotes enjoyment of a profession. And Complexity is good to an extent, but what you want is depth. Although this is by no means a small change to the profession. It does open up some very interesting prospects to the core and reaper that could allow them to compete with the level of depth that the Scourge provides.

>

> With that said, I think this post is done. A bit of a long one, but tell me what you think. DO you have something to add? I'd be happy to hear from all of you.

 

Can i ask what build you play?

I actually dont think my vipers build necro is that simple, as im swapping dagger/mace/ great sword/staff and juggling when to use minions - This is all in PVE.

[Dadnir.5038]

> @finkle.9513 said:

> Can i ask what build you play?

> I actually dont think my vipers build necro is that simple, as im swapping dagger/mace/ great sword/staff and juggling when to use minions - This is all in PVE.

 

You're using mace???!!! As a necromancer??? Ain't you a revenant in disguise?

 

The build matter not, there is no build that need for you to play at high level to reach new height. Power build struggle to reach a below average dps with no hope in sight, support builds only shine in WvW and are not complicated to use nor do they need depth and condi builds can ask you for a specific rotation but are far from being difficult to play.

 

What Lily say is that the necromancer don't/can't act proactively like other profession to reach the same height as those professions. This is easily seen by the fact that the necromancer still have the worst combo finishers and fields out of all professions. There is also a strange lack of direct support that would increase a bit it's usefullness. You could say that reaper introduced combo whirl and you would be right, yet the specialization make the reaper compet with other profession because you would want to finish a whirl on an ice field which have no value for them and that they don't want to see.

 

There is no real synergy between a necromancer and other professions and this end up with an overall low dps, a selfish tankiness and very poor support abilities. The profession also take no advantage of it's strenght, it's built like this, a lot of things depend of the shroud yet can only be used for a short uptime while still underperforming.

[Sephylon.4938]

dagger/mace? with gs/staff? Your build looks far more interesting than hers. I'm also wondering what you mean by "juggling when to use minions". As far as I can remember, you just pop them and let them do their thing and never have to worry about them unless they die. Unless you're referring to rise maybe?

 

Anyway to the topic, I agree that necromancers need some more flavour to their play style. Something that does reward and encourages them from taking high risks. Shroud also needs to have an identity in and of itself. What if we had shroud gave us a different way to play the class instead of being an extension of it? What if, outside of shroud, our traits boost our offensive capabilities and encourage us to take risks, and become defensive options when we enter shroud. Something like: While out of shroud, deal more damage to foes in the range threshold. While in shroud, take less damage from foes in the range threshold. Or Deal more damage based on your missing hp while out of shroud. Take less damage based on your missing hp while you're in shroud. For reaper, we can have them be a speedy glass cannon type build out of shroud, and entering shroud makes us the slow moving, unstoppable Juggernaut that anet wants. Basically make shroud the defensive option, while being out of shroud is our offense.

[SunTzu.4513]

I think it would be awesome if shroud could get some more deeper gameplayoptions. Mostly i use it as ''oh shit'' second healthbar or camping in it if i'm on my power reaper trip. Maybe something like all skills get an other function inside shroud or some synergys wich you can build up to normal skills when you are inside the shroud so that you have to time more often when and how long you get into it.

[Arzurag.7506]

For the necromancer and all following elite-specs I wish getting more mobility. In the current state of the necromancer we lack mobility, abilities that gives us the possibility to jump, leap, to reach a target fast. I´ve played warrior alot recently and his mobility always brings back into my mind how clunky and slow necromancer is.

[Windler.4815]

Thanks, @"Lily.1935" for posting this and thank you @"Robert Gee.9246" for being open to this discussion.

[Brujeria.7536]

The problem with necro's gameplay depth is that we can't properly do one thing with the tools we have at hand.

 

1. Most of our weapon skills and base shroud are not in the same tune, we lack a dedicated power based meele weapon that's there for damage. We lack a dedicated power based long range weapon. We lack a real defensive offhand. We lack a second weapon for condi specs. Base shroud wants to provide a bit of everything, but fails in its functions. In addition to that most of our potent condi clears are actually tied to our weapon skills, we have a lot of boon corrupt that isn't much of a use sometimes and doens not really justify a "benefit" We cant go for a full bursty power kinda build as we lack the weapons and defenses. This strange pattern is engraved across almost all of our combat tools, severly limiting the ability to decide how we specialize into the chosen aspect.

 

2. We are a "if" class. IF the enemy has boons and IF we are a condition build and IF we luckily happen to have terror traited and IF we are lucky again we may get to corrupt stability for trait synergy, but we really can't controll it. A Lot of power is gated between corrupts and they only show their real benefit in the perfect scenario, with the perfect build. We actually could sustain good with blood magic, we have a lot of multi hit abilities to make use of the vampire procs IF we can maintain to hit our target. The thing here is as well, we don't controll that directly. We are a sitting duck for burst damage, focus fire and chain CC. Most of our defensive tools are tied to offensive actions - which is perfectly fine - but we dont get the tools to reliably keep up the offense.

 

3. We have good "intentions" in our kit, self harm, weapons with a rather unique theme, the potential to make use of corrupts and condition manipulation, but i feel the concepts fail at delivering and connecting these through traits.

 

 

We need more potent and interesting weapon abilities and choices.

 

We need adapting shroud skills that change based on the weapon wielded.

 

We need actual traits for defense and to influence corrupts. Corrupts should deal damage, or siphon life when traited. We need THEMATIC boon corrupts. If im wielding a scepter i want the corrupt to prefer the boons that turn into damaging conditions. If im using the axe corrupt i want this to corrupt the defensive boons like protection and turn them into vulnerability. If im using the corrupt boon utility i want that to prioritize Resistance and Stability first.

 

We need reliable means against burst damage and CC, reliable ways to "stick" to an opponent to keep up our playstyle.

 

We need better distributed condition clears and transfers, not exclusively tied to weapon skills.

 

We need real sacrifice skills, that are potent for its niche.

 

We need lifeforce gain on hitting enemies. There should be no dedicated skills for this, as this hurts build variety.

 

 

In the current form we are shoven into one build direction that we can't really escape : conditions and boon corrupt with a touch of condition controll. I think it would be much better to have the right tool for the job instead of overall tools in most places. If we can't spec to do one thing well like mesmer of thief can we will never get deep gameplay, as our job and the abilities to do so are fixed and the individual skill matters less than for the other classes.

[Kaladel.1670]

> @Brujeria.7536 said:

> We need lifeforce gain on hitting enemies. There should be no dedicated skills for this, as this hurts build variety.

 

I'm totaly supporting the rest of your post, but this part even more, it would be a good step to make the profession more enjoyable and build variety is always a good thing.

 

[Robert Gee.9246]

Wow this got really big really fast. Unfortunately I don't think I can reply to everyone individually but here are a few thoughts on some of the stuff that's come up multiple times:

* Health Sacrifice - This would be thematic to necromancers and it's something we've experimented with in the past, unfortunately it didn't end up playing very well. The main reason it doesn't work too well is because of the prevalence of healing currently in the game. With large parties and dedicated healing specs in the game it's very difficult to have health sacrifice values that are fair in all situations. Balancing lifesteal to offset a health sacrifice cost ends up blowing out sustain as soon as any outside healing gets involved. Scourge's life force cost on skills is one way we've found to have a pseudo-health cost since it can't be influenced by outside factors, although it doesn't have the same feel as true health cost would.

* More Retaliation - We're usually pretty careful about limiting this particular boon. I agree that it synergizes well with the necromancer's high health, but it's very unfun to play against a character with retaliation up all the time. Since not every class has good access to boon removal we have to make sure that certain types of boons have low uptime.

* Signets of Suffering - This trait update came along with some other signet updates (guardian and thief) and I agree that this one kinda missed the mark. (If we have time in a future update I'd like to revisit it.) However, I think the main problem here is that utility and weapon traits on the grandmaster tier generally feel lacking, due to how they lock you into a particular skillset rather than encouraging a more general method of playing. This would probably feel pretty good as an adept or master level trait, but as a grandmaster it lacks the punch to be build defining.

 

I hope this helps foster the discussion a little bit.

[Lucian.8235]

> @"Robert Gee.9246" said:

> Wow this got really big really fast. Unfortunately I don't think I can reply to everyone individually but here are a few thoughts on some of the stuff that's come up multiple times:

> * Health Sacrifice - This would be thematic to necromancers and it's something we've experimented with in the past, unfortunately it didn't end up playing very well. The main reason it doesn't work too well is because of the prevalence of healing currently in the game. With large parties and dedicated healing specs in the game it's very difficult to have health sacrifice values that are fair in all situations. Balancing lifesteal to offset a health sacrifice cost ends up blowing out sustain as soon as any outside healing gets involved. Scourge's life force cost on skills is one way we've found to have a pseudo-health cost since it can't be influenced by outside factors, although it doesn't have the same feel as true health cost would.

> * More Retaliation - We're usually pretty careful about limiting this particular boon. I agree that it synergizes well with the necromancer's high health, but it's very unfun to play against a character with retaliation up all the time. Since not every class has good access to boon removal we have to make sure that certain types of boons have low uptime.

> * Signets of Suffering - This trait update came along with some other signet updates (guardian and thief) and I agree that this one kinda missed the mark. (If we have time in a future update I'd like to revisit it.) However, I think the main problem here is that utility and weapon traits on the grandmaster tier generally feel lacking, due to how they lock you into a particular skillset rather than encouraging a more general method of playing. This would probably feel pretty good as an adept or master level trait, but as a grandmaster it lacks the punch to be build defining.

>

> I hope this helps foster the discussion a little bit.

 

Thank you for any response at all, especially in regard to your note on signets.

 

On the note about life steal, it's always been lackluster in comparison to the life steal implementations in GW1, which never felt particularly unbalanced. I realize they're two different systems, but, honestly, life steal values in GW2 on Necro have always felt . . . barely present? I know they're there, but I can't really count many times they've made a difference, where in early GW1 my necro ran into clutch moments where life steals/siphon/transfer turned the tide and made a noticeable impact. I think that's one of the main things I noticed the second I tried to build a blood magic focused Necro when GW2 first launched, and, while things have changed since then, I still can't say I've run into that, "this changed the tide of battle" moment. I get that may not be the point of life steals and blood magic in GW2, and I can respect that, but it's a feeling I've never been able to shake when playing GW2 Necro.

 

I understand the Health Sacrifice stance, which is why, prior to the Scourge, I think a lot of potential, "Sacrifice" suggestions talked about sacrificing Life Force.

 

If Retaliation is unfun to play against . . . I get. Why keep using it at all then? It sounds like something you're afraid to use, and, speaking as a long time Necro player, feeling balanced by, "things we're afraid to use" never feels fun, we've heard that a lot about Shroud itself, and the dev fears surrounding it. I get it, it's probably hard to do, I won't pretend balance is simple, but why not a different boon that plays off large health pools in a more fun way then? Probably too late for something like that I guess.

 

Thanks again for taking the time, best of luck with what must be a great deal of work, sounds like it anyways.

[Kaladel.1670]

> @"Robert Gee.9246" said:

> Wow this got really big really fast. Unfortunately I don't think I can reply to everyone individually but here are a few thoughts on some of the stuff that's come up multiple times:

Thanks for taking the time to come here. Lily's topics are pretty populars and we haven't seen a developper in our profession forum since.. a while, so that explains the enthousiasm.

> * Signets of Suffering - This trait update came along with some other signet updates (guardian and thief) and I agree that this one kinda missed the mark. (If we have time in a future update I'd like to revisit it.) However, I think the main problem here is that utility and weapon traits on the grandmaster tier generally feel lacking, due to how they lock you into a particular skillset rather than encouraging a more general method of playing. This would probably feel pretty good as an adept or master level trait, but as a grandmaster it lacks the punch to be build defining.

Hope you'll have the time to do it and that it will open new horizon for us or simply give us some (relevant) things to be good at. :)

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

Ty for feedback Robert. I'll try to be concise then and on topic of what you said:

 

* I don't think you missed with Signets of Suffering.

 

Free stats + passive working in shroud are very good. I love necro because of free stats that let me use unconvention gear (crusader, valkyrie, seraph for scourge etc)

I would like to ask you to consider changing spiteful removal to 3s icd, much lower heal, but triggering on healing skill *heal* when there's a condi, opposed to healing skill *use*. So that passives from vampiric precision and blood fiend get a fitting, passive condi removal. They need it to bring pasiive healing builds outta closet.

 

* A pity about that retal, but i understand.

 

* Speaking of granmaster tier unworthy traits - curses line has few entrants.

Lingering Curse is basicallly a scepter boost and that's it. It doesn't greatly change of define a playstyle.

Parasitic contagion is too weak in PvE, too unreliant in competitve. It needs and additional feature to help condi necro sustain himself, like maybe a slow or something.

 

In Death Magic Unholy Sanctuary needs some love. It's healing value is too low for grandmaster and it's fully passive - you don't have any crazy method to make it go overboard like bligher's boon (just pump more boons!) or parasitic contagion (epidemic + plaguelands).

[Lucian.8235]

> @ZeftheWicked.3076 said:

> In Death Magic Unholy Sanctuary needs some love. It's healing value is too low for grandmaster and it's fully passive - you don't have any crazy method to make it go overboard like bligher's boon (just pump more boons!) or parasitic contagion (epidemic + plaguelands).

 

I always forget about unholy sanctuary, mostly because I haven't had a reason to use it. Ever. Certain traits (not just on necro) too easily fall into this, "they may as well not exist," trap filled with stuff players just never use, and some stay that way for months. Months may be an understatement.

[Crinn.7864]

> @"Robert Gee.9246" said:

> * Signets of Suffering - This trait update came along with some other signet updates (guardian and thief) and I agree that this one kinda missed the mark. (If we have time in a future update I'd like to revisit it.) However, I think the main problem here is that utility and weapon traits on the grandmaster tier generally feel lacking, due to how they lock you into a particular skillset rather than encouraging a more general method of playing. This would probably feel pretty good as an adept or master level trait, but as a grandmaster it lacks the punch to be build defining.

>

 

As a sPvP enthusiast I would say that the old version of Signets of Suffering was a very "build defining" trait, while the new one brings nothing to the table. The patch notes for the change said the shift was to eliminate having two boonhate traits in the same tier, but at the same time there is a vast gulf in how signet corruption builds work and how spiteful spirit builds work. The former is more about precise single target corruption, while the latter is all about the AoE corrupts. The old Signets of Suffering also had interesting interactions with traits like Plague Sending, Blood Bond, and Blighter's Boon, while the new signets of suffering only interacts with the active bar signets. The change to Signets of Suffering essentially killed off signet builds in sPvP, and served to permanently glue [Corrupt Boon] to our utility bar.