Hey guys, something different here.

Video:

Chat with me about it, agree or disagree, let me know if you enjoyed and would like to see more, and have a wonderful day.

Generally, I agree except I disagree strongly about the minion traits being marginal benefit in PVE; sure they aren't all the useful on trash mob, but then again, who plays a minion build to fight trash mobs anyways? It's just not what they excel at, that's not why anyone should make and use it.

If you build and play a full out Minion build, it should be for soloing harder content, then ALL those traits are actually really good. The fun part is that stacking the minion skills and playing a minion build at the highest level removes the need for more 'useful' stunbreaks and CC.

@Obtena.7952 said:Generally, I agree except I disagree strongly about the minion traits being marginal benefit in PVE; sure they aren't all the useful on trash mob, but then again, who plays a minion build to fight trash mobs anyways? It's just not what they excel at, that's not why anyone should make and use it.

If you build and play a full out Minion build, it should be for soloing harder content, then ALL those traits are actually really good. The fun part is that stacking the minion skills and playing a minion build at the highest level removes the need for more 'useful' stunbreaks and CC.

Stun breaks are definitely optional for a most PvE content, but I still don't necessarily agree that all of the traits are exceptional. If Minions already have a hard time dying against most PvE mobs (high or low level), then where is the value from Death Nova? If you want them to be dying for Death Nova, then why bother running Flesh of the Master? The Toughness is negligible due to the minions eating the aggro, and the health is a bit counter-intuitive.

When I first played through the game, minions were The Way for getting through the open world, but that was a very long time ago before many of the trait changes we know now. Blood Minion is still fantastic in PvE, but I really don't know about the necessity of all of the other traits and utility anymore. If nothing else I would really like to see some better space management in the traitline so that Minion-exclusive traits don't take up so much real estate.

Hey, not bad. I certainly would welcome more in-depth studies of how the Necromancer Traits/Skills work, and your analysis of Death Magic is a good start. As to the video, could you try next time using comparisons; One video of PVE or PvP/WvW with Death Magic traits/skills, then another without -- Nothing sophisticated, just a few minutes of game play to really see the difference in cause and effect. Different scenarios would be good, too; Perhaps a few rounds against a Champion followed by some tough mob configurations in higher end content.

Nice job.

@The Bassist.5410 said:Hey, not bad. I certainly would welcome more in-depth studies of how the Necromancer Traits/Skills work, and your analysis of Death Magic is a good start. As to the video, could you try next time using comparisons; One video of PVE or PvP/WvW with Death Magic traits/skills, then another without -- Nothing sophisticated, just a few minutes of game play to really see the difference in cause and effect. Different scenarios would be good, too; Perhaps a few rounds against a Champion followed by some tough mob configurations in higher end content.

Nice job.

Certainly seems reasonable, thanks for the input!

Really like the video! You hit the nail on the head with certain aspects on the Death Magic trait line being lackluster or flat out bad. I really wish minions would have an entire trait line dedicated to them (since they take up so many utility spell slots). That could free-up Death Magic for more death magic stuff like, "the closer you are to death, the greater your ability effects are".

@Zero Solstice.9754 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:Generally, I agree except I disagree strongly about the minion traits being marginal benefit in PVE; sure they aren't all the useful on trash mob, but then again, who plays a minion build to fight trash mobs anyways? It's just not what they excel at, that's not why anyone should make and use it.

If you build and play a full out Minion build, it should be for soloing harder content, then ALL those traits are actually really good. The fun part is that stacking the minion skills and playing a minion build at the highest level removes the need for more 'useful' stunbreaks and CC.

I wouldn't say that Minions are exactly having a hard time dying ... I can recall soloing certain HP mobs where they certainly did die against them. I'm not saying Death Nova couldn't have a better effect but I do find it useful in large mob situations. Lesser Cloud is like you pointed out ... rather underwhelming.

I think you and me will just differ on the idea of space managing Minion-exclusive traits; I love the idea they are all packed in there. I think the 'minion' build is something so specialized, I wouldn't WANT those traits plaguing my other traitlines in non-minion build situations.

I did like the suggestion of comparing non-death to death traited minions on a champ ... because I've tested it; not good results. I needed those death minion traits for the concept to work, so I could only conclude they were very valuable for that specific build.

@Obtena.7952 said:

@Zero Solstice.9754 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:Generally, I agree except I disagree strongly about the minion traits being marginal benefit in PVE; sure they aren't all the useful on trash mob, but then again, who plays a minion build to fight trash mobs anyways? It's just not what they excel at, that's not why anyone should make and use it.

If you build and play a full out Minion build, it should be for soloing harder content, then ALL those traits are actually really good. The fun part is that stacking the minion skills and playing a minion build at the highest level removes the need for more 'useful' stunbreaks and CC.

That's fair, can't fault you for any of that. I haven't wholesomely tested minion stuff recently for things such as high-level PvE DPS trials, so I'll defer to you on the necessity of the DM traits in that regard

@Zero Solstice.9754 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:Generally, I agree except I disagree strongly about the minion traits being marginal benefit in PVE; sure they aren't all the useful on trash mob, but then again, who plays a minion build to fight trash mobs anyways? It's just not what they excel at, that's not why anyone should make and use it.

If you build and play a full out Minion build, it should be for soloing harder content, then ALL those traits are actually really good. The fun part is that stacking the minion skills and playing a minion build at the highest level removes the need for more 'useful' stunbreaks and CC.

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Zero Solstice.9754 said:

@"Obtena.7952" said:Generally, I agree except I disagree strongly about the minion traits being marginal benefit in PVE; sure they aren't all the useful on trash mob, but then again, who plays a minion build to fight trash mobs anyways? It's just not what they excel at, that's not why anyone should make and use it.

If you build and play a full out Minion build, it should be for soloing harder content, then ALL those traits are actually really good. The fun part is that stacking the minion skills and playing a minion build at the highest level removes the need for more 'useful' stunbreaks and CC.

To clarify, a finisher will only trigger once, so detonating a Bone Minion inside multiple fields will only trigger one of the fields.

Of course there is an amount of synergy that exists, but the control you have over it, and how much actual power it generates, is the issue. Sure "Rise!" is great with Death Nova, but that's a 40 second cooldown for a maximum potential benefit of 6 stacks of Poison for 5 seconds and a Poison field for 4, that you don't even have direct control over the timing of. Compare that to, say, Pulmonary Impact from Daredevil: It hits harder, has 100% uptime and access, requires less effort to pull off, and is placed in the Master Tier. Do I like PI? No, I think the design of it promotes unfun gameplay and the payoff is too high for how low the required skillfloor to use it is, but the concept that I'm trying to get across is there. I would rather have more direct access to functionality, like being able to sacrifice a Bone Minion in order to use the Poison Cloud to block projectiles, or detonating it on a Warrior that's Shield Blocking ir order to unblockably apply Weakness to him. Things that reward you for thinking ahead in the moment.

@Zero Solstice.9754 said:

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Zero Solstice.9754 said:

@"Obtena.7952" said:Generally, I agree except I disagree strongly about the minion traits being marginal benefit in PVE; sure they aren't all the useful on trash mob, but then again, who plays a minion build to fight trash mobs anyways? It's just not what they excel at, that's not why anyone should make and use it.

If you build and play a full out Minion build, it should be for soloing harder content, then ALL those traits are actually really good. The fun part is that stacking the minion skills and playing a minion build at the highest level removes the need for more 'useful' stunbreaks and CC.

I don't disagree with you in all honesty, there is definitely a lot of room for improvement with the Necromancer, specially considering the high payoff, low skillfloor you mentioned for some other classes.

I don't think the minion traits are overall that bad though.. I really enjoy minion play in Gw2 and have made some fun builds using them, but aside from minion traits yeah I would say the Death magic traits are pretty bad.. specially the others you pointed out in the video, or at least not things i'd ever consider when compaired to the other traitlines.

Going throught your video, I'd add:

• Minion traits: You often squizz out more benefit for your minion skills by only taking BM for it's minor trait vampiric than taking the whole lot of DM minion traits. Personnally I never take DM when I want to play a minion build, it's mostly a waste.
• Death nova: You could have added that the traitline is "supposed" to be a defensive traitline which make the fact that they removed weakness pretty much "anticlimatic". It would have made more sense if they had removed poison instead (except maybe if they expected us to take putrid defense which would have made sense if the trait was a minor, yet isn't)
• Unholy sanctuary: still have a chance to save the necromancer's ass in dire situation, please don't only focus on the regen aspect.
• I'm surprised you didn't talked about the minor traits, deadly strength and corruptor fervor. After all the minor ain't great, deadly strenght is an isolated power trait in a poor traitline that don't really give a s*** about power and corruptor fervor low effect that you need to build is difficult to justify in front of some other powerful option that other professions can have.

@Teratus.2859 said:

@Zero Solstice.9754 said:

@Obtena.7952 said:Generally, I agree except I disagree strongly about the minion traits being marginal benefit in PVE; sure they aren't all the useful on trash mob, but then again, who plays a minion build to fight trash mobs anyways? It's just not what they excel at, that's not why anyone should make and use it.

If you build and play a full out Minion build, it should be for soloing harder content, then ALL those traits are actually really good. The fun part is that stacking the minion skills and playing a minion build at the highest level removes the need for more 'useful' stunbreaks and CC.

Not exactly true. Minions can also die on their way towards the enemy. It's not like mesmer using F1 so that minions chase target and then explode.

Would be really nice though. If they reach a certain amount of health, they chase enemies ,you have in target, then explode in their face.

Synergy is there it just requires more effort to make use of it.. that 8 second weakness might come in handy too for staying in shroud longer since you'll have a 50% chance to take reduced dmg and kill an enemy's crits per hit.

And this little bit of weakness. I don't know. In pve you won't need it and in PvP modes minions are utter trash.

Also I don't know if @Zero Solstice.9754 talked about it, because I didn't see the whole video yet (watching on smartphone in break at work with bad internet connection). Gonna watch it as soon as I get home.

So why doesn't deadly strength synergise with corrupters fevor? (Same goes for armored shroud if I remember correctly)

That would only result in 21 additional power out of shroud while having full stacks. Not that big of a deal. It's not even equal to one stack of might.

Youre forgetting necros have a 2nd health bar.

If youd watch a duel on keep between a clicking anet dev with a mystic build vs another clicking anet dev with mystic build.... youd see how strong necro actually is.At least you admit to not having a game design degree.

You must be talking solo pve with that "2nd health bar" thingie. The 2nd health bar is completely useless in wvw and pvp because it doesn't have a useful damage modifier component. That means you have some additional health that melts in two or three hits while it already is decaying with the spell use from the necro.

@"Flumek.9043" said:Youre forgetting necros have a 2nd health bar.

If youd watch a duel on keep between a clicking anet dev with a mystic build vs another clicking anet dev with mystic build.... youd see how strong necro actually is.At least you admit to not having a game design degree.

Why do people call it a hp barFun fact about something with Health points. A true Hp pool does not degenerate over time.

If anything shroud is a the first form basic concept of barrier that just happens to provide you with new skills in the process of activating it.People need to stop using the excuse of "2nd hp bar" to justify things to their own consciences.

Most of the points are very valid here in this video actually.

To be honest though i think unholy is a good concept but presented poorly only because its numbers are bad, its scaled very very very VERY POORLYThe fact that its meant to be selfish, conditioned to being in shroud to activate, and has worse scaling than plain old regen its very mind blowing. Not to mention even if it was scaled properly the rest of the death magic line is still so bad that it wouldn't be worth taking.

I think a number adjustment on that trait could make it ok and give death magic in itself a identity of being the selfish sustain traitline Simply beef up the base by a ton and leave the scaling fair ish and it would be prefect.

Shrouded Removal should probably target damaging conditions only as we have traits like speed of shadows and Relentless Pursuit to take care of movement impairing conditions.

Reapers protection can die and get replaced by any ideaSoul comp can die and get replaced by any ideaArmored shroud can die and get replaced by any idea (i say grant retaliation personally)

Putrid defense should just change to reducing damage for each unique condition on a foe as all necro builds apply a decent amount of damage and non damaging conditions.

I also agree that minion traits can be reduced to 1 grand master trait and free up the other 2 slots for more creative options and ideas.

Its also funny how the video points out how watered down some necromancer stuff is and how they are still cutting things down like recently with "Lesser spinal shivers and Spiteful spirit"

Poison could was a bad example though I can understand why the minion one does not stop projectiles (it shows that this person either stopped playing, or that this video is super old, or has not been playing long. )

The projectile block was added to posion cloud as a later thing but of course that no excuse for the fact that the lesser version did not get it or the fact that you cant directly use the trait to make the most of its reward because you cant chose to kill your own minions (except 1 type) to activate the trait. (also lets not for get the trait does not do its intended strike damage either)

Mean while as a prime example Ranger runs around with "Not really a Lesser Muddy Terrain" (still waiting for that nerf anet)

@"Dadnir.5038" said:Going throught your video, I'd add:

• Minion traits: You often squizz out more benefit for your minion skills by only taking BM for it's minor trait vampiric than taking the whole lot of DM minion traits. Personnally I never take DM when I want to play a minion build, it's mostly a waste.
• Death nova: You could have added that the traitline is "supposed" to be a defensive traitline which make the fact that they removed weakness pretty much "anticlimatic". It would have made more sense if they had removed poison instead (except maybe if they expected us to take putrid defense which would have made sense if the trait was a minor, yet isn't)
• Unholy sanctuary: still have a chance to save the necromancer's kitten in dire situation, please don't only focus on the regen aspect.
• I'm surprised you didn't talked about the minor traits, deadly strength and corruptor fervor. After all the minor ain't great, deadly strenght is an isolated power trait in a poor traitline that don't really give a s*** about power and corruptor fervor low effect that you need to build is difficult to justify in front of some other powerful option that other professions can have.

I did mention that about Death Nova, by saying it belongs in the trait line because it casts the defensive corruption skill Corrosive Poison Cloud, except for the fact that it doesn't because it's just an entirely worse version without any of the defensive benefits.

Unholy Sanctuary I didn't only focus on the regen, I also mentioned the fact that I hate how it provides passive protection. I don't want a "Save me from myself" mechanic, I want something that actively enables me to help myself, such as reducing the cooldown for entering Shroud or something similar. Plus entering Shroud automatically is temperamental at times since you yourself might try going in at just the wrong second.

I didn't want to talk about literally everything in the line for the sake of viewership and keeping the runtime down. Deadly Strength is an okay trait, since it rewards you for specific build decisions i.e. rewarding you with Power for building tankier, although the trait is obviously not very flashy. Corrupter's Fervor is sort of the same concept, rewarding you in some way for making specific build choices, such as running Boon Corruption or a Condition-based build in order to turn offensive strength into defensive prowess.

Uhh. I love theorycrafting.

I think you make some valid points. But regardless how the current traits perform, I feel that Death Magic simply got only 'left-overs' and is way too much focussed on Minions. If you really want to flesh it out, other traitlines might have to suffer some blows to make the lines distinguishable.

I'm certainly not a Necro-expert. So don't nail me on LF-math. But just some ideas... And no... not a fan of current MMs, if anyone is wondering. :#

Themes

• Poison - Well... Poison and stuff... ;)
• Death - Traits related to Fear and Death - Should synergize well with Reaper :3
• Unholy herp-derp - Shroud-related, defensive with some support sprinkled in.

Traits

Adept

Reaper's Protection - New Minor. Protection gains x% increased damage reduction.

• Putrid Defense - As is. Just need to keep that icon! <3
• Fear of Death - Moved here from Soul Reaping. No longer inflicts Fear on downed. Instead doubles the bonus when in Shroud.
• Deadly Strength - Moved here from Master. Nerfed to +5% and +10%.

Master

Soul Comprehension - You rally/respawn with +x% LF. Killing a foe regenerates x% LF (ICD).

• Necrotic Sacrifice - Transfer 2 conditions to your Minions upon creation. Their attacks cause Poision. Sacrifices (Minion-Active) create lesser Death Novas. (I'd also decrease the cast time of Minions to make them less tedious to recast in combat and incentivise people not to have them out all the time)
• Banshees Wail - Moved here from Blood Magic. No changes to the trait, but WH#4 becomes an unblockable Fear.
• Unholy Sanctury - Moved here from GM. No longer heals, instead grants +250 Toughness in Shroud.

Grandmaster

Beyond the Veil - No change.

• Corrupters Fervor - No change.
• Terror - Moved here from Curses. Now scales based on Power. Double bonus in Shroud. Downed targets got x% less remaining health.
• Unholy Martyr - Moved here from Blood Magic.

Replacements for other Traitlines

Blood Magic

• Banshees Wail - Replaced by Empowering Marks - Marks heal up to 5 allies for x when placed.
• Unholy Martyr - Replaced by Blood Rush - Your Life Siphons deal x% more damage and heal y% more health when hitting a bleeding foe.

Curses

• Terror - Can't really come up with a name... Maybe Gloom? Entering Shroud blinds nearby foes.

Soul Reaping

• Ghastly Gaze When disabled, fear your target instead.

Death Nova: When you sacrifice minions, lesser CPC is cast. Only blood fiend, bone minions and flesh wurm 2nd activation will cast a cpc with projectile block. If someone kills your minions, nothing happens.

The idea of death nova casting cpc/blocking projectiles on all minions seems OP but then the discussion got me thinking of engineer turrets reflecting on summon which doesn't require a ICD because the turret CD are the "ICD". Also reminds me of the old clone death traits on mesmer which were deleted with good reason. Having it cast on all minion deaths seems too random/often that it can't be balanced well. Giving the lesser CPC more poison stacks won't be as hard to balance since Rise won't hypothetically proc 6xCPC at the same time on a 28 second CD. Seems GM worthy to me and requires skillful "execution". Works for PvE/PvP. I don't think it would be OP.

Especially with speed of shadows and also relentless pursuit reducing chill, cripple and immob by 66% in shroud, I 100% agree with the idea of shrouded removal targeting only damaging conditions.

Only thing I don't really like about the video is your focus on the "regen" on unholy sanctuary. Like if you delete the "regen" on unholy sanctuary, there is still the major portion of that trait that saves you from a lethal blow but fundamentally is problematic. Eternal bond on soulbeast (90 sec icd in pvp) or dead or alive (60 sec icd in pvp) on berserker which also save you from lethal blows, heal a decent chunk 4-5k on long CD while removing you from the the elite spec mode. They have no passive affect. Even rune of rebirth follows a similar pattern with a 90 sec ICD. US should be balanced more similarly to those. Any regen strong enough to save a necro from a lethal blow would be OP as a passive that is always active in shroud. Any regen that is balanced to always be active in shroud will never be enough to save necro from a lethal blow as soon as shroud runs out. So it's not that the regen is bad but that it exists at all on the trait. You only take lethal damage when not in shroud, so the trait can't kick you out of shroud. I suspect this is especially problematic to balance with a 30 second ICD but 10% life force requirement. Maybe the should just go the opposite direction. If you take lethal damage, heal for 5k and lose up to 20% life force. 90 sec ICD.

@Dadnir.5038 said:

• I'm surprised you didn't talked about the minor traits, deadly strength and corruptor fervor. After all the minor ain't great, deadly strenght is an isolated power trait in a poor traitline that don't really give a s*** about power and corruptor fervor low effect that you need to build is difficult to justify in front of some other powerful option that other professions can have.

Armored shroud and corrupter's fervor giving toughness while deadly strength gives you more power based off of toughness is ok synergy. Mix in SR/Reaper for crit in shroud and use cavalier/crusader gear to have a tanky bruiser build in wvw. If you have about 1k toughness from gear, 1k base, 480 from 2 traits, DS gives you ~350 power in shroud. Boring but it's basically 10% more dmg. Given how much defense you also get, it's not a bad choice compared to spite/SR/Reaper builds that pick close to death. Rise + flesh of the master is also a nice combo that can give up to 120 more toughness while giving 50% more health on minions that absorb 33% of the damage you take.

@Xaylin.1860 said:

• Terror - Can't really come up with a name... Maybe Gloom? Entering Shroud blinds nearby foes.

Darkening Shroud/Darkness Shroud/Veil of Darkness

I really like your ideas here. Just wondering though, since the only minion you sacrifice is the blood fiend and the bone twins, wouldn't that make 1/2 of necrotic sacrifice only work with those 2 minions?

@"Zero Solstice.9754" said:Hey guys, something different here.

Video:

Chat with me about it, agree or disagree, let me know if you enjoyed and would like to see more, and have a wonderful day.

It's worse than you think. I'll go into it later, but there are some things I will need to mention that I can't while on my phone.

200% agree with you. Meme traitline. Blood magic Is much better even fór personal sustain. I woukd like to see change for the minions traits zoo especialy death nova, or rework bone minions So if you detonate them you can choose location where he leaps And detonate.

But I like Unholy Sanctuary =(I use it as a passive form of extra life in a zerg fight where range revenant bombs can KO in a single hit.I also use it to bait enemies into over-committing on a smaller roaming group level lol...

Two groups of opposing roamers face off with both probing from range and neither willing to get in close first.Pirate ship meta on a smaller scale.I take some range hits and get my HP low.Enemy roamers see me low and dives deep into the group to get me down.US triggers and suddenly they realize they need longer to down me.But the group is on them now and they scramble to get back out into safety but usually dies.

These are my own comments for each trait and some general observations. There are many aspects of DM that are troublesome, imo.

Minor Adept: Armored Shroud - Gain bonus toughness while in shroud.The toughness theme is fine on paper but toughness does not win fights and Necro does not have blocks or much stability to function as a tank (aggro control) in PvE

Adept 1: Flesh of the Master - Minions have increased health. Gain bonus toughness for each minion you control. Your minions are destroyed when this trait is reassigned.Minions no longer need increased health aside from using them to solo elite and champion mobs in PvE. In fact, this trait is counter-productive for using grandmaster 1, which I will get to in a moment. Minion improvement traits consume three slots where other utility improvement slots use only one.

Adept 2: Shrouded Removal - Lose a condition when you enter shroud and every few seconds while you remain in shroud.This skill is too weak for a couple of reasons. First, it is not competitive with other condi-control traits in Necro, much less those in other professions. The Necro has to be in shroud for any benefit and 1 per 3 seconds without any player control over what happens to that condition or anything useful for waiting that long like LF or a boon is very weak. Second, this trait could provide some group utility like consuming conditions from allies but it does not and that is a missed opportunity.

Adept 3: Putrid Defense - Take less damage from poisoned foes.Not one of the Adept tier triats provides additional damage potential. Here, I would like to see damage improvement options that work with either power or condition damage builds. Opposing players to not keep conditions very long so this trait practically requires scepter auto-attack for everything but boss battles where people do not actually need that kind of damage reduction... and it is not a shareable reduction, either.

Minor Master: Soul Comprehension - Your passive life-force generation from nearby deaths is increased.This is a stupid, open-world PvE trait. It requires deaths to get any benefit so competitive play is out and it does not give that much LF even when it proc's. Open world PvE is where this becomes both powerful and utterly useless: If there a number of mobs dying around you, this trait fills up LF that much faster so you can camp shroud longer or spam more shade skills but doing that rarely useful. I, personally, would like this trait change to provide some actual benefit. For example, improving precision or concentration or something to make up for giving up another trait line that would actually improve dps, group utility, or even defense.

Major 1: Necromantic Corruption - Minions deal more damage and take conditions from you. Whenever a minion attacks, it transfers conditions to its target. (10 second cooldown per minion.)This is the only minion skill I like. I would give up both the other minion skills right now for something useful. With this, I can build a MM without taking staff, OH dagger, or traits in other lines.

Major 2: Reaper's Protection - When stunned, dazed, knocked back, pulled, knocked down, sunk, floated, inflicted with fear, taunted, or launched, inflict fear on nearby foes.Please take away this uncontrollable, useless trait. If Arenanet likes it so much they should roll it into Fear of Death. Use this slot for something with real offense, defense, or utility.

Major 3: Deadly Strength - Gain power based on your toughness. Power gain doubles while in shroud.Ooooh, I see what the developers are trying to do here and I like the concept... except toughness does not win fights and is the game's aggro mechanic. Also, it scales horribly. For giving up an offensive stat and trying to build around this defensive stat, the player gets a tiny fraction of the toughness investment back in power. A toughness-based build does not enable some new, amazing role for Necro in raids or PvP but it may help, marginally, in WvW zerging.

Minor Grandmaster: Beyond the Veil - Whenever you leave shroud, you and your minions gain protection.Why do only minions and the Necromancer get protection? Why do minions need protection? Why is it so short and tied to shroud cool-down and LF supply? How can selfishly claiming a single defensive boon impress anyone but a Necromancer?

Grandmaster 1: Death Nova - When you or one of your minions is downed, create a Lesser Poison Cloud. Summon a jagged horror when you kill a foe.Lesser Poison Cloud (very lesser) when a minion dies without you commanding it to and summons a jagged horror without you commanding it to. That horror will die in 30 seconds without you commanding it to after trying to lope after your target. I cannot command minions other than blood fiend, bone minions and flesh wurm where and when to die. Fix that! Make this trait force a minion's death by using their minion skill while it is on cooldown. Also, give them full CPCs and take away the jagged horrors.

Grandmaster 2: Corrupter's Fervor - Inflicting a condition on a foe grants stacking toughness and reduced incoming condition damage.Again with the toughness; orz. What if I wanted improved defense without drawing aggro in PvE? This trait could be good for PvP except that it is paired against the next trait instead of being major trait somewhere like, oh, I don't know, maybe the slot consumed by Reaper's Protection?

Grandmaster 3: Unholy Sanctuary - Regenerate health while in shroud. If your life force is above the threshold, your shroud will activate if you would take a lethal blow.Unholy Sanctuary is an interesting defensive trait that gives roughly one free action or moment when near death or a bit of health every second while camping it. Why can this trait not simply be, "While in shroud, incoming heals directly heal health," or is that too much to ask? It could also be something like, "Copy all boons in a 240 radius onto yourself upon entering shroud."

Final comments I have on Death Magic are as follows:

• Arenanet appears to be standardizing trait lines to offer one offensive, one utility, and one defensive trait per tier. I rather like that idea as it makes the trait lines, and the builds using them, more flexible. Right now, DM looks like this: Up: (Minion unwanted defense, minion good utility, minion bad offense), Mid: (bad utility (condi), bad utility (control effect), meh PvP offense improvement), Low: (unnecessary raid defense, bad PvP offense, almost-downed free action)
• Death Magic used to be Necromancer's boon duration line. Now, there are no good boon duration builds. All condi duration builds work from chill on power builds to bleed on condi builds. With poor built-in damage or defense scaling for boons, a large portion of the variety of equipment stat's are useless. Other professions have boon and condi builds that actually work but not Necro.
• Death Magic does not offer group utility unless your group loves a room full of minions doing whatever they like. Blood Magic is the opposite. Blood Magic can make personal dps loss acceptable for the group's benefit. Death Magic has no group/team benefit unless you are a minion.
• Toughness is fine in competitive game modes but, in PvE, toughness is the aggro mechanic and Necromancer does not have blocks and very little stability access. Death Magic could provide those tools. All of the aggro-claiming ability is there but is not useful to a team when Necro is susceptible to control effects and has no way to block.

Here are a few "out there" suggestions regarding a DM rework

1. One radical change might be for DM to replace shroud F1 with a block and have F2 be stability. That would enable a true aggro-control build and Necro could play as a functional tank. Players could take toughness and make it work in PvE groups to control mob/boss position. The dps loss of building for toughness might be compensated by the new capability.
2. Increase the damage compensation for toughness builds in PvP / WvW and replace the traits that proc automatically when the house is on fire.
3. Consolidate and rework the minion and fear traits. There is one Spectral Mastery, one Master of Corruption, one Signets of Suffering, one Vampiric Rituals, one Augury of Death, and one Sadistic Searing. Necro can certainly get away with having one Minion Mastery and one Terror Mastery.
4. Last, the defensive capability of Death Magic feels only half-baked. There is potential but the pieces do not fit together well. Necromancer has enough defense to show well in PvP without using Death Magic. Fix DM so trading out another specialization is worth the exchange; e.g., trade something for more stability, mobility, or enemy action impairment.