Which Elite theme would you want for Necromancer next?

okay again^^,

Necromancer is still a class that was designed around condition Management and boonhate.

scourge is more boonhate/barrier support

imo next elite should have less Focus to AOE skills and more Focus to taking conditions from teammates to you and working with them (sending them to enemies/consuming them for heal/corrupting conditions to boons).you have a lot of skills on necro that are supposed to work in that way but didnt really used in that way because anet forgot About them. just remember degger 4, staff 4, consume conditions, plague signet. there are a lot of transfering and consuming skills from core class that would suit perfect to a e-spec mechanic that is build around collecting conditions. and this design would have less Problems with snowball effects like scourge because it would only work with conditions other classes are creating.

i just hope they bring back some shroud mechanic because i think necro without shroud(scourge) failed completely in design.

i would like a tanky necro with health "sacrificing" abilities

Some idea based on gameplay not on something as restricting as "condition" or "power".

Specs that keep the necromancer thematic but explore things like mobility, avoidance, the ability to stack lasting aoe (different from the scourge which have more the ability to extend it's aoe), ...etc. The important point being to open new possibility of gameplay because MM, power and condi dps, that's gameplay necro aren't unfamiliar with.

@"derd.6413" said:i would like a tanky necro with health "sacrificing" abilities

I really liked Blood Magic in GW1. It was built around health sacrificing. Necromancer is already pretty tanky though.

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Touch_of_Agony

Some touch skills were cool.

https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Generous_Was_Tsungrai

This was a Ritualist skill, but kind of fits what you mentioned about being tanky, and sacrificing health first.

@"Dadnir.5038" said:Some idea based on gameplay not on something as restricting as "condition" or "power".

Specs that keep the necromancer thematic but explore things like mobility, avoidance, the ability to stack lasting aoe (different from the scourge which have more the ability to extend it's aoe), ...etc. The important point being to open new possibility of gameplay because MM, power and condi dps, that's gameplay necro aren't unfamiliar with.

I still don’t feel like we have a true condition DPS Elite. Scourge was nerfed nonstop. Its support aspect cripples it. If we had a pure condition Elite, I’d like it.

I want to have viable pets please.Scourge can be made condi, but what about how underwhelming pets are?

@Kam.4092 said:

@"Dadnir.5038" said:Some idea based on gameplay not on something as restricting as "condition" or "power".

Specs that keep the necromancer thematic but explore things like mobility, avoidance, the ability to stack lasting aoe (different from the scourge which have more the ability to extend it's aoe), ...etc. The important point being to open new possibility of gameplay because MM, power and condi dps, that's gameplay necro aren't unfamiliar with.

You misunderstood me, a type of damage shouldn't be e-spec defining. If you look closely at both reaper and scourge they work well whether you use power or condition damage and that's fine. An e-spec that favour a specific kind of damage will just end up lacking build diversity and honnestly, condition build's gameplay all end up looking alike, there would be no point.

Reaper extend the necromancer's melee abilities but also developpe the idea of a slow hard hitting monster. The scourge extend the necromancer coverage and focus on tormenting foes and extending it's allies life. What we need is design that are different not something that will end up promoting an overused gameplay where you ended up flailing your scepter like what you do with c-scourge, c-reaper or even c-necro. It's obvious that it will be what will happen if we somehow end up with a "condi spec" and honnestly that's feel already boring. Same goes for power, we need something that allow us to do something else than what we do already.

That's why I say that power or condi shouldn't even begin to enter into account when someone ask for what we should or want to have as a next elite. What should be expressed should only be different kind of gameplay not what the gear we will end up using for maximum efficiency.

An elusive/uncatchable spec could be an option. Something revolving around the idea of rituals/sacrifices could also be an option (scourge is close to that but at the same time far from exploiting the idea of "sacrifice"). An e-spec with an heavy focus on combo that would grant mainly combo finishers. An e-spec that focus on "aura", exploiting the large health pool of the necromancer to rip benefit from these effects... etc. An e-spec should be defined by it's mechanism not by the kind of damage it's supposed to be best at.

@Dadnir.5038 said:

@Kam.4092 said:

@Dadnir.5038 said:Some idea based on gameplay not on something as restricting as "condition" or "power".

Specs that keep the necromancer thematic but explore things like mobility, avoidance, the ability to stack lasting aoe (different from the scourge which have more the ability to extend it's aoe), ...etc. The important point being to open new possibility of gameplay because MM, power and condi dps, that's gameplay necro aren't unfamiliar with.

I get what you mean, but when it comes to GW2, it’s either Power, Condition, or Support. If an elite doesn’t excel at one of these, then it won’t be useful. It’s important to have an overall focus for an elite. Reaper is mostly Power, with an option at Condition. Scourge is primarily Condition, but people found a way to make Power scourge ok in WvW.

Also an Elite based on combo finisher would be horrible. Until they add an option to prioritize your own combo field, things like that would never work.

@Axl.8924 said:I want to have viable pets please.Scourge can be made condi, but what about how underwhelming pets are?

Do you mean minions? Necromancers don’t have pets.

@Zero.3871 said:okay again^^,

Necromancer is still a class that was designed around condition Management and boonhate.

scourge is more boonhate/barrier support

imo next elite should have less Focus to AOE skills and more Focus to taking conditions from teammates to you and working with them (sending them to enemies/consuming them for heal/corrupting conditions to boons).you have a lot of skills on necro that are supposed to work in that way but didnt really used in that way because anet forgot About them. just remember degger 4, staff 4, consume conditions, plague signet. there are a lot of transfering and consuming skills from core class that would suit perfect to a e-spec mechanic that is build around collecting conditions. and this design would have less Problems with snowball effects like scourge because it would only work with conditions other classes are creating.

i just hope they bring back some shroud mechanic because i think necro without shroud(scourge) failed completely in design.

Would you accept a Shroud that isn’t another health bar, but is just damage oriented?

@Kam.4092 said:

@Axl.8924 said:I want to have viable pets please.Scourge can be made condi, but what about how underwhelming pets are?

Yeah minionmancer type build.More variety of minion types, and expansion on usefulness. Maybe for instance a no shroud spec that focuses instead on using minions to keep them alive and do most if not all their damage and buff the minions.

I want something quick with high dps and good mobility for once.

Elite specs are about providing new ways to play what about something with blinks, or super speed, perhaps even something with minimal stealth access not held back by life force if that is even the way it has to be.

Key points i look for in a elite spec that we dont see on any form of necro so far (not that it has to be all of the following listed)

• Super speed, we gotta go fast at some point if reaper got this i would be satisfied on this key point
• Blinks, we need the mobility to get in or get out
• Stealth, This is a questionable idea but its "DIFFERENT" and thats what elite specs are all about
• Evades, Be it on skills or utility and traits.... I cant speak on this one enough when will necro finally get its own vigor access or some form of utility or trait that grants endurance recovery.
• More traits that work with and without boons. Traits that can either steal boons (not corrupt or rip them) But also deal increased damage or apply bonus effects against targets that dont have boons. (So the traits are usable in pve just as much as a pvp setting)

Lastly what i don't want personally...

Is something that follows scourge format, that was a horrid idea to break down shroud skills and spread them out like that not to mention it lacks the proper feel of what draws me personally to necromancer. Not to mention it makes too many traits in core lines too clunky which leads to them needing their own set of rules when used with said e spec profession skills.

I also dont want anything support focused cause thats the hardest thing anet struggles to balance is "Support" In PoF release way too many elite specs were called out as "Supports" WE DONT NEED THIS MANY! at best we could do with 1 or 2 per xpack release not 3-4. (Even more so when the dps side of them turns out to be scaled super high and the support side is also scaled very high at the same time. )

Necro is not good anymore at converting conditions to boons and has never been good with boons, in general. Every other profession can get something out of the concentration stat but, for Necro and group members, it is a dps loss for no value.

Toughness, too, is a waste for team members in PvE.

Personally id realy welcome a more vampire/bloodmagic themed elite spec for necro like reaper is chill/death/fear or scourge with sand/barrier, focusing more on power damage, tons of life steal, and maybe target based mobility. i am not shure what weapon he should get, maybe a 1hand sword, still could provide many opportunities for character developement, like either you can make him a damage dealer with tones of life steal effects or something like "the more bleeding the enemy has the more damage/chritical dmg/hitchance you get (max cap 25 bleeds)", or a tanking spec with not that much damage moddifications but with life speal amplifications that let you facetank a lot of damage, or a healer who can extend his healing from lifesteal to affect your allies. his shroud mechanic could go into something like "blood rage" where he goes full rambo mode and goes on a full rampage, dieing to drink the blood of his enemys.

I'm very interested in a couple of different mechanics.

First I would like to see a mechanic that converts or forgoes bonus critical damage in favor of condition damage. There are several ways to do that. It could directly convert the extra damage with a multiplier to make up for the loss of burst. This method would maintain the need for ferocity on your gear. Or I think a better method would be to have crits do no bonus damage but instead apply a stacking condition that scales off of condition damage. The second method would favor existing fast weapons like dagger and axe. And it would finally put some use to gear like Rampager and Rabid.

Another mechanic I love is life steal. Now I understand that this is a VERY hard mechanic to balance because if you siphon enough to survive 5 enemies or bosses you are invulnerable to 1-3 people. I think a good theme for Necro life siphon would be a tanky front line healer. It could spend Life Force to regain it's own health OR provide life stealing effects for the group. This wouldn't maintain the Necro focus on enemies (all attacks and conditions, no boons or friendly targeted stuff). Make the siphoning effects scale with # of targets so that it's survivability goes up in swarms but isn't over the top in skirmishes. And make it better at healing others than self so that it doesn't become the solo raid bosses build. Or maybe even better make it's self healing somewhat dependent of having allies making use of your shared siphons. Low personal damage but stronger group damage support and strong maintenance style heals.

Everything. But no pet spec please, as pet specs will be useless for PvP and endgame pve.

And for normal pve we already got a pet build

Minion master. The ability to create and control a massive army through command skills that cost life force. Sacrifice abilities that buff your minions and provide specific effects based on how much you sacrifice.

some high mobility single target focused elitespec would be nice to see next. maybe shortbow or some shizzle

Anything, but a minion master elite. Which would be horrible in pvp modes and probably in raids too. I could just see it, summon minions, dead in first aoe burst. There goes my dps. Oh, but wait, we can summon them again and how cool now it can do some mediocre damage every 10-30 secs IF it can find the target. The AI in this game is mediocre at best. No thank you.A high mobility spec would be cool though.

I have a lot of ideas that I've been playing with trying to put together an elite spec concept. So far the one I like most involves something inspired by Daredevil.

Daredevil's Major Grandmaster traits allow them to change what type of dodge they'll have. I was thinking for Necromancer it might be interesting to do the same but instead for Shroud.

Say one of those traits is Condition focused, one is Power focused and one is Mobility focused with each of the lower tier traits complimenting the Major Grandmaster.

I haven't figured out what to do with the Major Grandmaster traits yet but one of the ideas I had for the condition Shroud involved "condition alchemy", a mechanic that allows conditions to be combined to create new ones. I was also thinking for the mobility Shroud it wouldn't be a Shroud at all but rather Life Force that replaces your Dodge, though with some obvious restrictions like ICD. But maybe entering Shroud instead gives you the ability to shadow step or absorb attacks similar to Distortion by expending Life Force which also drains your Endurance. I dunno, just some ideas I had that I'm still messing with.

@Crazy.6029 said:Anything, but a minion master elite. Which would be horrible in pvp modes and probably in raids too. I could just see it, summon minions, dead in first aoe burst. There goes my dps. Oh, but wait, we can summon them again and how cool now it can do some mediocre damage every 10-30 secs IF it can find the target. The AI in this game is mediocre at best. No thank you.A high mobility spec would be cool though.

Minions only die from aoe in PvP, in PvE they tend to be pretty resilient. But all in all, I agree, a minion spec, despite being highly thought by necromancer's roleplayers, wouldn't help the necromancer to perform well in the game.

@Ovalkvadratcylinder.9365 said:some high mobility single target focused elitespec would be nice to see next. maybe shortbow or some kitten

wow, that sounds exactly like thief ^^

@Zero.3871 said:

@Ovalkvadratcylinder.9365 said:some high mobility single target focused elitespec would be nice to see next. maybe shortbow or some kitten

u gotta think necroooOOooOOooOO

I really can’t see a minon spec being useful for any forum end game there’s a reason minon master is an open world build only ai sucks for any other content. I’d rather see a spec that changes or adjusts what the necro is lacking in the idea of high mobility spec would change necro game play an fix what the necro is lacking.