Necromancer shroud is insanely strong and Condition damage outperforms power by a lot

Necromancer shroud life bar seems to be insanely in pvp with the power nerfs. Now everyone seems to run Necromancer in competitive play. Not only is Necromancer tanky, but it has condition damage which makes it do so much damage and with the lack of condition clense in this game, I feels like Anet doesnt know how to balance a class or they are all Necromancers playing condition builds?

Yes, welcome to new meta.This has been discussed to death over the last two months with various threads talking about the same thing.

@Fantasylife.7981 said:Necromancer shroud life bar seems to be insanely in pvp with the power nerfs. Now everyone seems to run Necromancer in competitive play. Not only is Necromancer tanky, but it has condition damage which makes it do so much damage and with the lack of condition clense in this game, I feels like Anet doesnt know how to balance a class or they are all Necromancers playing condition builds?

Necromance Profession is the best thing that came out of the patch. Secondly, Necromancer is a condition base Profession. Thirdly, Necromancer alongside Ritualist are the only Professions who have the power over death. In other word, death should be a slower kill to them as its Masters.

Necromancer should be the last Profession standing....being alive. Simple as that!!

Thank You!

just stun it a few times. Necros always have next to no stability or stunbreaks. Also, focus actual squishy berserker targets instead of the bunker nec who's only doing like 1k dps?

I could suggest a few fixes. But since Necromancer gets nerfed into the ground so often I'll hold it off for now. Let necro shine in PvP for a bit.

As for PvE necromancer needs some serious buffs.

@Lily.1935 said:

As for PvE necromancer needs some serious buffs.

Ngl, Eternal Life's introduction could have single handedly solve like, almost all of PvE Necro's issues, foremost being the lack of Lifeforce in instances, but it directly competes with an insanely potent damage boost, Death Perception, which just feels bad man.

It would probably make Necro super strong if we swapped Eternal Life and Vital Persistance, but hell it would make PvE Necro, especially Reaper really really good.

@Yasai.3549 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

As for PvE necromancer needs some serious buffs.

Necromancer doesn't have issues with life force anymore. Even without eternal life. And on healer it's over kill.

Necromancer has some utility issues and trait issues. Scourge, reaper and Core are all lacking in damage and support. Scourge has the best support but they lack effective utility aside from signet of Undeath.

Now imagine if core necromancer could use their utility skills and weapon skills in shroud. Core necromancer honestly could be fairly good. The signet trait in combination with core condition necromancer could be superb IF necromancer basically had no shroud skills. Which is unfortunate.

For core necromancer in PvE it is a handicap. For Reaper their handicap is just that they're lacking a bit of damage. For scourge it's that the way their skills work split their focus between support and offense so neither is as good as they could be. But I'd still argue scourge is the best of the 3. Even condi scourge has incremental support which can aid less skilled groups that people don't notice.

@Yasai.3549 said:

@"Lily.1935" said:

As for PvE necromancer needs some serious buffs.

From the very beginning, necromancer never needed a trait like eternal life in PvE. It was something more or less needed in sPvP due to the lack of LF, but that's all.

The issue of the necromancer is and have always been that it's not adapted to the needs of PvE players. Condition management is not needed in PvE, your either flooded for a short time or don't receive any at all. Boon corruption is extremly weak in PvE due to mobs/boss generally being strong enough without them. A lot of condition have little to no impact against defiance. And shroud carrying both defense and offense prevent it to be great in any single aspect of it.

On another hand, the necromancer is well adapted to sPvP/WvW where boons and conditions are overflowing and where being able to deal damage while defending is a must. Which is the reason that, to ensure counterplay, the necromancer is extremly vulnerable to hard CC and isn't very mobile.

All in all, it's a problem of design, not a problem of numbers. But ANet mainly make numbers tweaks and proved to be terrible at fixing designs so...

The solution of the issue of the necromancer's survivability is to remove offense from the shroud and standardize the "defense" given from the shroud. In short, move offense to the out of shroud state all while keeping an interaction between offense and life force and increase the core shroud degen to reaper's level. It seem simple, yet it requiert work and to break out of a design that some players currently enjoy and asked for. Meaning that doing it will be time consuming and create just as much discontent than it's supposed to soothe.

They aren't tanky, they just feel tanky.

@Dadnir.5038 said:

@Yasai.3549 said:

@"Lily.1935" said:

As for PvE necromancer needs some serious buffs.

I strongly Disagree with your solution. Its neither simple in implementation nor would it work particularly well. It wouldn't just work poorly it would remove much of the draw to use shroud in the first place. Now, I do agree shroud is a problem. The whole mechanic is a issue.

I have real solutions to this Dillema but the It too takes a lot of changes to the profession, but not nearly as much as your supposedly "Simple" solution. What you're suggesting is a complete overhaul of almost all of the necromancer's traits. Not only that You're basically asking Arena net to remove the necromancer's unique mechanic. If its only defensive and no offense than the synergistic play with necromancer is greatly diminished. To put it simply, its an absolutely dreadful idea that would result in a hobbled profession with little to nothing to redeem itself with.

Aside from that, its not even true. Necromancer isn't the only profession that has defense and offense tied in with their unique mechanic. Mesmer, Elementalist, Engineer, Guardian and Revenant's defenses and offenses are all tied into their mechanic too. They aren't holey reliant on it, aside from Revenant, which necromancer is completely reliant on Shroud.

If I were to change core shroud and offer some solutions for the necromancer, they would likely be unpopular changes... AT FIRST! You have stated multiple times you HATE sacrificing anything at all to get anything. Everything needs to be laid out for you and perfectly in line and order. To the complete contrast of the necromancer's core philosophies and their very identity.

"Necromancers , calling on the spirits of the dead, and even death itself, to overpower enemies and assist allies. In sacrificing Health and taking curses and diseases upon themselves, they can deal large amounts of damage to those foolish enough to oppose them. Dead and dying enemies become unwilling allies in their hands. Necromancers have the singular ability to absorb Energy from an enemy’s death, and can raise a fighting force from the corpses of their foes. Curses, which often cost the Necromancer dearly, exact an even greater toll from enemies, who find that their Enchantments and healing skills are rendered useless. Due to the sacrificial nature of their methods, Necromancers must practice patience and self-discipline to survive."

THIS is a necromancer. This is their philosophy. This is who they are. This is what is needed to fix them. Their old identity. You want to solve the overwhelming power of necromancer and their high defense, you make them choose while in combat. You force the player to think and engage with their mechanics. You make the necromancer practice patience and use their resources wisely.

If it were Up to me, I'd remove Core shroud and replace it with an F1-F5 skills using most of the same skills. The big difference would be that they don't require to be in shroud to use and they require life force to be used. And F5 would be death shroud which would be eat at their life force just as those skills would. This forces a choice. Either you can use the power that life force offers for offense, or you can save it for defense. Or you can mix it, looking for that right balance. My solution would require far fewer Trait changes even if its a bit drastic in terms of play style. Another thing I'd do is I'd remove the Damage reduction that Shroud Gives the necromancer. Its honestly been a bit too much when its been good.

Necromancer Should be a Risky class to play. As it was in GW1. It is not a risky class to play. its Safe and it will NEVER break out of its shell if we offer safe or passive solutions like you're suggesting.

"should be a Risky class to play ".. hehe good one. you mean those nekro bomber builds that have no other use then to do a selfdestruct in order to secure a quarry.

@Lily.1935 said:

@"Dadnir.5038" said:From the very beginning, necromancer never needed a trait like

eternal life

in PvE. It was something more or less needed in sPvP due to the lack of LF, but that's all.

The issue of the necromancer is and have always been that it's not adapted to the needs of PvE players. Condition management is not needed in PvE, your either flooded for a short time or don't receive any at all. Boon corruption is extremly weak in PvE due to mobs/boss generally being strong enough without them. A lot of condition have little to no impact against defiance. And shroud carrying both defense and offense prevent it to be great in any single aspect of it.

On another hand, the necromancer is well adapted to sPvP/WvW where boons and conditions are overflowing and where being able to deal damage while defending is a must. Which is the reason that, to ensure counterplay, the necromancer is extremly vulnerable to hard CC and isn't very mobile.

All in all, it's a problem of design, not a problem of numbers. But ANet mainly make numbers tweaks and proved to be terrible at fixing designs so...

The solution of the issue of the necromancer's survivability is to remove offense from the shroud and standardize the "defense" given from the shroud. In short, move offense to the out of shroud state all while keeping an interaction between offense and life force and increase the core shroud degen to reaper's level. It seem simple, yet it requiert work and to break out of a design that some players currently enjoy and asked for. Meaning that doing it will be time consuming and create just as much discontent than it's supposed to soothe.

Well, you're attacking me with a lot of twisted argument. So let's be clear:

I dislike sacrificing health as a mechanic because I think it doesn't have it's place in this game. Nothing more, nothing less. This is the only "sacrifice" that I'm against. So I'd be grateful of you to avoid generalising with: "You have stated multiple times you HATE sacrificing anything at all to get anything." This was a totally wrong statement on your part. We only have different opinions on the "spirit" part of the quote that you throw at me.

The current necromancer in GW2 isn't a risky class because the shroud offer both offense and defense at the same time and that's what I suggested multiple time to change. (Which in itself mean that I m more than ready to sacrifice offense for defense and defense for offense!)

Now how did I suggest to change that? In a passive way? Nope! I suggested to:

• Reducing shroud (core and reaper) skills damage.
• Increasing death shroud LF cost per second to reaper's level.
• Change death perception into a trait that grant a flip skill to the shroud that eat all LF to grant it's benefit for a duration based on the %age of LF eaten. (This is far from being passive gameplay, at least it's less passive than the current one!)
• Change Reaper's onslaught into a trait that grant a flip skill to the reaper's shroud that eat all LF to grant a weapon kit (let's say Reaper's scythe), for a duration based on the %age of LF eaten, with the exact same skills than the reaper's shroud but without the health pool protected and with better coefficients than the reaper shroud. (current coefficient, the reaper shroud itself having it's coefficients nerfed in the first point.)
• Change desert shroud into a skill that do not deal damage but instead provide damage reduction/mitigation for it's duration.
• Transform Herald of sorrow in such a way that it make desert shroud lose it's damage mitigation in favor of an increase in damage in the form of a buff that would carry the death perception stat buff with it.

Far fewer trait change? I require 3 traits change altogether. Let's say 4 for entertainment, giving soul barb buff only on exiting shroud (Just to hammer the fact that shroud is the defensive stance).

What you suggest on your part? Reworking the necromancer's mechanism from the ground.Why it's not possible? Because devs already said that they can't change the core mechanism to this extent.Why I think that what I suggest is possible? Change like what I suggest aren't very different from what happened to the core thief when they gained an F2 for their stolen bundle.

@Yasai.3549 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

As for PvE necromancer needs some serious buffs.

sorry, but i dont think this Change would fix anything. what do you want to get out of it? more lifeforce for condi scourge? and then swapping out signet of undeath for someting else? thats at max a 1k dps increase as all Utility skills are super bad at dealing Damage.and for power reaper? nice dps loss trait you'd choose there, loosing soulbarbs

This isn't a problem .. .something is always meta. It makes no sense to request 'balance' in a game where the consequence of it's design are optimal setups.

@Dadnir.5038 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@Dadnir.5038 said:From the very beginning, necromancer never needed a trait like

eternal life

in PvE. It was something more or less needed in sPvP due to the lack of LF, but that's all.

The issue of the necromancer is and have always been that it's not adapted to the needs of PvE players. Condition management is not needed in PvE, your either flooded for a short time or don't receive any at all. Boon corruption is extremly weak in PvE due to mobs/boss generally being strong enough without them. A lot of condition have little to no impact against defiance. And shroud carrying both defense and offense prevent it to be great in any single aspect of it.

On another hand, the necromancer is well adapted to sPvP/WvW where boons and conditions are overflowing and where being able to deal damage while defending is a must. Which is the reason that, to ensure counterplay, the necromancer is extremly vulnerable to hard CC and isn't very mobile.

All in all, it's a problem of design, not a problem of numbers. But ANet mainly make numbers tweaks and proved to be terrible at fixing designs so...

The solution of the issue of the necromancer's survivability is to remove offense from the shroud and standardize the "defense" given from the shroud. In short, move offense to the out of shroud state all while keeping an interaction between offense and life force and increase the core shroud degen to reaper's level. It seem simple, yet it requiert work and to break out of a design that some players currently enjoy and asked for. Meaning that doing it will be time consuming and create just as much discontent than it's supposed to soothe.

• Reducing shroud (core and reaper) skills damage.
• Increasing death shroud LF cost per second to reaper's level.
• Change
  death perception
  into a trait that grant a flip skill to the shroud that eat all LF to grant it's benefit for a duration based on the %age of LF eaten. (This is far from being passive gameplay, at least it's less passive than the current one!)
• Change
  Reaper's onslaught
  into a trait that grant a flip skill to the reaper's shroud that eat all LF to grant a weapon kit (let's say
  Reaper's scythe
  ), for a duration based on the %age of LF eaten, with the exact same skills than the reaper's shroud but without the health pool protected and with better coefficients than the reaper shroud. (current coefficient, the reaper shroud itself having it's coefficients nerfed in the first point.)
• Change
  desert shroud
  into a skill that do not deal damage but instead provide damage reduction/mitigation for it's duration.
• Transform
  Herald of sorrow
  in such a way that it make
  desert shroud
  lose it's damage mitigation
  in favor of an increase in damage in the form of a buff that would carry the
  death perception
  stat buff with it.

Again, these changes have greater ramifications than you think. Do you remember the time before Death Perception was a thing? Do you remember before the Specialization system? Because that's what you'll get with some of these changes. Necromancer's use to just flash shroud and use it purely as a damage sponge because that's all it was good for. And players HATED IT! And Shroud used to degen faster like you suggested. You're asking for changes that would take us back to 2012. Which was the absolute worse time to play a necromancer. It was boring, uninterative, weak and was played basically for aesthetic and because the Necromancer players from GW1 really didn't have a home to settle in aside from that.

I've seen your posts and responses about sacrificing. You're not just against health sacrificing, and if that's all you're against, you've made yourself extremely unclear about your perspective. You've always sided on the least interesting and least innovative way to improve the class. I believe it was you who said they don't like corruption skills as well. Which are along the same lines as Sacrificing health. Which we should do. The idea its not a part of the game, and doesn't work is completely false. Necromancer has done it for years with corrupts and the engineer does it now with Holosmith. Just because YOU don't like it doesn't mean it isn't in GW2's design.

Scourge already has synergy issues with the core specs, especially with death magic, and what you're suggesting makes it worse. And, you say its just 3 traits but I see far more that would need to be changed to fit your vision. You think its simple, but its not. I admit, my change is drastic, but yours converts so many traits into uselessness its not even funny. From your Reaper's onslaught and death perception changes it removes synergy from multiple traits. including but not limited to Reaper's Might, Signets of Suffering, Path of Corruption, Shrouded Removal, Unholy Sanctuary, Life from Death, Vampiric Presence, Unholy Martyr, Transfusion, Unyielding Blast, Speed of Shadows, Soul Barbs, Eternal Life, Dhuumfire, Relentless Pursuit and Blighter's Boon. If that's not what you meant, than you worded your suggestion extremely poorly. My solution which we'll never get is far far less destructive to the overall design of the necromancer. Your suggestion is so anti synergistic that it should have never even crossed your mind as a possible solution.

I CAN actually explain my vision and give you in game Data for why it would work far better and I can show you how at least part of yours was already done and failed miserably.

Necro goes shroud, ignore and maintain distance... has always been this way...

@"yiksing.9432" said:Necro goes shroud, ignore and maintain distance... has always been this way...

+1

-2011- Anet PAX Prime 2011 Demo of Necromancer + Shroud

-2012- Necromancer PvP

i'm the only one here gettin hit by 11k crits with 3k armor ?also i get 5k burns wihile doing 80-300 with bleed and poison few times i did a decent damage:/

Necromancer is currently quite bad in PvP, compared to many overpowered builds that most of the other professions can use. Some people talk about how strong necromancers are right now, but it is pure fantasy.

Anyway, I’m surprised to see ArenaNet letting the work only half done. Condition damage “needs” to be reduced at least as much as power damage got reduced.We have less healing, some professions got their survivability nerfed, but conditions can hit harder than power damage pre 02-25-2020.

PvP is full of condition builds that can annihilate in few seconds even professions with very high cleansing potential in their builds.

Personally, something I don't understand is many power skills have reduced damage in PvP/WvW compared to PvE.

Meanwhile, Conditions, with exception of Torment (On a target standing still only) and Confusion (Which will actually proc in PvP/WvW) all conditions deal the same damage across all modes.

So, people dropping stacks of 5/10/20 Bleeding/Torment or 5-10 stacks of Burning are doing the same damage as they would in PvE. While power builds are taking hits across many (If not all) of their skills from their PvE potentials.

@Taril.8619 said:Personally, something I don't understand is many power skills have reduced damage in PvP/WvW compared to PvE.

Meanwhile, Conditions, with exception of Torment (On a target standing still only) and Confusion (Which will actually proc in PvP/WvW) all conditions deal the same damage across all modes.

So, people dropping stacks of 5/10/20 Bleeding/Torment or 5-10 stacks of Burning are doing the same damage as they would in PvE. While power builds are taking hits across many (If not all) of their skills from their PvE potentials.

The purpose of the power damage nerf in sPvP/WvW was to increase the time-to-kill, conditions naturally take time to grow strong enough to kill while power is more immediate. That's why ANet nerfed power but not condition. Nobody drop 20 bleed/torment in a single hit, and even if they did, it still would need a few seconds to kill it's foe. That's the gist of it, don't look to far in what ANet does, some players posted how they thought the issue was the TTK in PvP and ANet just increased the TTK to please them, they didn't touched what already had a high enough TTK.

At the end of the day isn't the biggest problem that players don't want to die but do want their enemy to die? Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way..true balance means that you can lose any fight.

Nerfing condis will make Bunker builds even stronger than they are now, because its literally the only way to bypass defenses like Protection and extremely high armor ratings, and Poison is the only viable counter to healing.

That's what people don't understand when they keep asking for nerfs. It won't help, it'll make things worse.

Shroud regen just didnt got hit as much as it should have. Its healing too. Same with their life rip

Having shroud capped in 33% of their max health would be almost enough. Then they could even keep their not-nerfed heals

My perspective:

Halve the damage reduction from shroud in competitive play, or reduce it to 33% damage reduction at least. Conditions as a whole need their condition damage coefficients reduced in competitive play.

Necro weapon skills all need a revamp at this point, particularly daggers, staff, and axe.

@Dadnir.5038 said:

@Taril.8619 said:Personally, something I don't understand is many power skills have reduced damage in PvP/WvW compared to PvE.

Meanwhile, Conditions, with exception of Torment (On a target standing still only) and Confusion (Which will actually proc in PvP/WvW) all conditions deal the same damage across all modes.

So, people dropping stacks of 5/10/20 Bleeding/Torment or 5-10 stacks of Burning are doing the same damage as they would in PvE. While power builds are taking hits across many (If not all) of their skills from their PvE potentials.

That’s far from the reality in Guild Wars 2, we have condition builds able to deal more than 20k damage within 3 seconds.Condition builds in Guild Wars 2 can be more effective than power builds at bursting down opponents.

Right now conditions are far more effective than power both as burst damage and sustained damage, the last one often comes with high defence too. The current situation is probably caused by an oversight from the developers, and should be addressed if the developers are still willing to nerf the burst damage potential (they failed when they nerfed power damage coefficients).

Dealing with conditions is also way more difficult than dealing with direct damage. They can also debilitate enemies. It is not surprising that many people hate them.