Have reapers received any buffs?

I'm interested in playing again and was looking through the forums and other sources to see if Reapers have received any buffs since last I played I remember that they were underperforming in just about ever area other then solo pve.

I keep reading up that Reapers (even experienced ones) STILL tend to underperform on fractals, pvp, and WvW since I've last played.For example, in fractals, they don't offer that much support for the party and their dps is underwhelming compared to other classes, I don't really want to be dead weight to others. (Maybe undead weight but... yea..)

Has Reaper/necro received any significant buffs since I last played? (2 years ago)The last thing I can find is back in December.

Well of Darkness: Reduced power coefficient per strike from 0.8 to 0.45 in WvW only.Well of Corruption: Reduced power coefficient per strike from 0.45 to 0.35 in WvW only.

yes, reaper recieved some minor buffs.

if you know how to play your reaper, its not bad. in pug groups (fractals/raids) you will often find yourself in the first two spots dps wise.

but, in premade groups, in which players are actually able to play their classes, it still gets outperformed (dps wise) by pretty much every other build.

Buffs that affected the dps of power reaper have been the rework of well of darkness to a damaging well, that also generates chill and the reduction of the well cooldowns in PvE (because the wells trait in blood magic was deleted and the reduction it granted became baseline).

This brought the dps to 34k at the golem, which would be awesome, if we had the year 2016. In 2021 this is the bottom of the barrel and close to inacceptable.

you could say that the overall 30% damage nerf in PvP/WvW was a buff for the necromancer since it's designed to strive on longer fights.

@Dadnir.5038 said:you could say that the overall 30% damage nerf in PvP/WvW was a buff for the necromancer since it's designed to strive on longer fights.It isn't as significant as many people think. A soldier geared reaper can make a better frontliner than before if you just look at the initial sustain. But on the other hand critical sustain skills received cooldown increases, which increases your recovery times. Additionally necro and reaper still can not be healed in shroud, which is a big disadvantage. When you miss the healing burst because you are in shroud, then you die and 30% more or less damage don't make a difference. When you leave shroud, then you have to eat all the damage for the next 10 seconds, while other classes have blocks or invulnerabilities. So leaving shroud to receive a heal might kill you 5 seconds later.

The things above are the reasons I never join the pug zerg. Even on soldier gear you have misplaced sustain windows.

Marauder is still not viable when you are focussed by more than one player. You will melt in the blink of an eye.

As a solo roaming player I can say, that while marauder was and still is trash, soldier gear was better before the patch because the non-crit damage was high enough to be able to kill almost everything in a 1v1 while necro has been very tanky. After the patch there are a lot of unkillable encounters and encounters that can peel you with hit and run until shroud is eliminated and which you can never pressure to mentionable extends. So the situation actually got worse with the damage nerf.

The by far easiest encounters for me are other necros. They are so easy to counter. Run when barrier or shroud is up. Burst when it's down. Wurm has a huge cast time and so never comes surprisingly and spectral walk does also show you where the necro will end. The whole class has huge tells for everything it does.

@KrHome.1920 said:

@Dadnir.5038 said:you could say that the overall 30% damage nerf in PvP/WvW was a buff for the necromancer since it's designed to strive on longer fights.It isn't as significant as many people think. A soldier geared reaper can make a better frontliner than before if you just look at the initial sustain. But on the other hand critical sustain skills received cooldown increases, which increases your recovery times. Additionally necro and reaper still can not be healed in shroud, which is a big disadvantage. When you miss the healing burst because you are in shroud, then you die and 30% more or less damage don't make a difference. When you leave shroud, then you have to eat all the damage for the next 10 seconds, while other classes have blocks or invulnerabilities. So leaving shroud to receive a heal might kill you 5 seconds later.

If we think thats bad wait until we get nerfed into the ground because folks are crying about reaper and the damage of lich form attack 1.

I just wish for once Anet investigates on their own before nerfing.

imo scourge is trash in wvw now. reaper is fine in pvp.

@"KrHome.1920" said:

This brought the dps to 34k at the golem, which would be awesome, if we had the year 2016. In 2021 this is the bottom of the barrel and close to inacceptable.

Hyperbolic much? Reaper is the lowest power (pure) dps sure, but it's not at a "close to unacceptable level". A build doesn't need to pull of 42k damage to be great. As of writing this:dps over 38K: Amazingdps over 36K: Greatdps over 34K: Good.dps over 32K: Decent.dps over 30k: Bad.Then there's Scourge.

It's tiring to always see people bashing builds/classes because they don't speed clear end game content. Not everything needs to have speed clearing ability to complete end game content. And if it doesn't have speed clearing ability, it is not automatically trash.

So to the OP: If you enjoy Reaper, and become good at it, play it because it does very well. Yes you will meet people who will out dps you on certain classes if they are good at them, but from my considerable experience in T4 fracs (which I do on Reaper) and raids (which I switched to pSlb only because it's got such an easy rotation for high reward), that will not happen as often as you think. And if it does, it doesn't matter, because Reaper is no longer in a state where it drags the group behind....it used to be mind you, but not anymore.

Reaper is always going to underperform because of how much of a safety buffer they have compared to other classes. The only way Reaper could have equal DPS would be if Shroud was removed entirely.

I wouldn't expect this to ever change. Defense is built into the class mechanic, so DPS will always be lower.

@Methuselah.4376 said:

@"KrHome.1920" said:

This brought the dps to 34k at the golem, which would be awesome, if we had the year 2016. In 2021 this is the bottom of the barrel and close to inacceptable.

Reaper did even work that way when it was released. People just camped greatsword and spammed wells. Then ANet thought, that avoiding the class mechanic to deal max damage is not how the class should be played and they flipped it around. Now you have to be in shroud to deal max dps.

This tells us two things:

• Shroud isn't that significant as a defense mechanic as people think - necro worked fine and did not die, when people just camped greatsword.
• ANet shot itself in the foot, with that damage switch - they could have shifted necro even more towards: deadly but squishy outside of shroud, less pressure but tanky in shroud.

@"KrHome.1920" said:

That's all subjective. Objective are the snowcrows benchmarks, that reach from 42k to 34k for dps builds and you can find each class in that range. Below 34k are the support builds, which makes 34k dps necro (that has 0 support!) look even worse as support builds reach almost its dps numbers.

But this is the issue. People look at benchmarks, which happen in a vacuum. Not saying that Reaper is going to perform better in an actual fight, but it relies less heavily on situational condis like Slow for power Chrono or a very fast paced rotation like Weaver.

Why are you changing the subject here? The OP asked whether necro is still underperforming and it clearly is. It is the bottom of the barrel in dps. Each other class has a dps build that is stronger and some have also better support builds. This has absolutely nothing to do with the question whether is can just "complete" content. Of course it can - that's trivial.

Fair enough. I like to think of it more as other professions overperforming but that's splitting hairs I guess (looking at you, Guardian, with your nice burst damage and sexy tomes).

I wouldn't expect this to ever change. Defense is built into the class mechanic, so DPS will always be lower.

Except Shroud in end game content, or in general as a Reaper, isn't really used for defense since it is a DPS boost and any damage taken in shroud will reduce your dps as you are spending less time in it. I get what you're getting at, but as far as end game PvE is concerned, boosting necro's damage is not gonna be game breaking because you still need to have life force management as well as avoiding taking damage while in shroud. And since PvP/WvW and now split from PvE, it's no longer ridiculous to expect a dps boost.

Again, I agree Reaper's the bottom of the dps chart. But it is still a powerful profession and it brings with it a lot of natural tools most other professions would need to sacrifice some dps for. This is the balance that comes with the class imo. We all remember a time when power Reaper felt like you're hitting with a wet noodle. That is no longer the case.

if you wanna do dmg play some other classes. 

reaper dmg is pathetic even with full gear and 100%crit and all buffs you wont pull of more then 23k dps in a realistic fighting scenario (where bosses move and get immune and stuff) 

just play power bladesworn 35-40k (without much effort)

or this 1 button 30k dps classes  (with no effort)that was extra designt 4 anet workers.

fazit Anet spit reaperplayer in the face when it comes to dmg

Have you been living under a rock?

Reapers (and all power necro variants, really) received a huge buff in the form of a -20% crit chance in shroud, which somehow amounts to an overall DPS buff, during the June 28th update.

Praise ANet!

10 minutes ago, Devas.8104 said:

Have you been living under a rock?

 

Reapers (and all power necro variants, really) received a huge buff in the form of a -20% crit chance in shroud, which somehow amounts to an overall DPS buff, during the June 28th update.

 

Praise ANet!

That update was to bring Harbinger down a bit.

Reaper damage has nothing to do with crit chance anyway, since you get 50% from Vulnerability by default. You can run full Dragon's+Scholar and still crit cap extremely easily, but even with 3k of power, 100% crit and 250% crit damage, you will always still feel weak compared to everyone else in the group because you lose DPS every time you get attacked. (the only class that has this problem).

Reaper base damage needs to come up by about 15-20% to be competitive.

6 hours ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

That update was to bring Harbinger down a bit.

 

Reaper damage has nothing to do with crit chance anyway, since you get 50% from Vulnerability by default. You can run full Dragon's+Scholar and still crit cap extremely easily, but even with 3k of power, 100% crit and 250% crit damage, you will always still feel weak compared to everyone else in the group because you lose DPS every time you get attacked. (the only class that has this problem).

 

Reaper base damage needs to come up by about 15-20% to be competitive.

Bring harbinger down in terms of power damage?

Lol that already was a meme build.

And Boone used the crit trait on condi/hybrid harbinger in pvp modes.

You would run curses death magic.

And on reaper running decimate defenses is dps loss

The thread is 1.5 years old guys... Let it rest in peace please.

1 hour ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

The thread is 1.5 years old guys... Let it rest in peace please.

You forget this is the necromancer forums?

3 hours ago, Bookah pls.9352 said:

You forget this is the necromancer forums?

Should we treat all mesmer's thread as illusion or all guardian's thread as evangelic words?

18 minutes ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

Should we treat all mesmer's thread as illusion or all guardian's thread as evangelic words?

Does that mean all warrior threads are fighting words?

And that all ranger threads are unicorns and rainbows?

All thief threads are just smoke and mirrors?

That the engineer threads are all landmines?

That the elementalist threads are vapor?

That the revenant forums are all spooks and kooks?

On 8/24/2022 at 12:09 PM, Dadnir.5038 said:

or all guardian's thread as evangelic words?

Nah, i don't work at Anet.

On 8/24/2022 at 1:30 PM, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

Does that mean all warrior threads are fighting words?

And that all ranger threads are unicorns and rainbows?

All thief threads are just smoke and mirrors?

That the engineer threads are all landmines?

That the elementalist threads are vapor?

That the revenant forums are all spooks and kooks?

I mean isn't warriors bout fighting? so makes sense they would take physically and verbally especially with shouts and banners.

3 hours ago, Axl.8924 said:

 

I mean isn't warriors bout fighting? so makes sense they would take physically and verbally especially with shouts and banners.

Thems fighting words.

3 hours ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

Thems fighting words.

This would make the next e-spec promising, maybe the next spec will allow us to see a hammer warrior yelling "Hammer!" like a degenrate each time he use the hammer burst. They could even add some lightning special effects...

21 minutes ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

This would make the next e-spec promising, maybe the next spec will allow us to see a hammer warrior yelling "Hammer!" like a degenrate each time he use the hammer burst. They could even add some lightning special effects...

 

Hammer Time.

1 hour ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

Hammer Time.

Nope, Thor (2011). 😉

Edit: The film where he can't use it because Odin punished him.