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Open Letter to ANet Regarding Latest Patch


Saracen.2691

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@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:every single necro meta build has been nerfed to the ground. every single kitten one. so it doesn't come as a surprise to me, altho still a disappointment. reaper is in a decent spot now tho so at least that is something.

that is only a power build that a warrior with 1 hand and a decent build can out damage

Yeah, Just spam f1 and axe 5 one warrior = more dmg than necro

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@Nimon.7840 said:

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:every single necro meta build has been nerfed to the ground. every single kitten one. so it doesn't come as a surprise to me, altho still a disappointment. reaper is in a decent spot now tho so at least that is something.

that is only a power build that a warrior with 1 hand and a decent build can out damage

Yeah, Just spam f1 and axe 5 one warrior = more dmg than necro

maybe in pve but reaper auto can out damage most things

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@Stand The Wall.6987 said:reaper is in a decent spot now tho so at least that is something.No, it is not: it is literally the worst power DPS pick in the PvE endgame: there is no other class that does lower damage than the power reaper. It's even outdamaged by ALL other classes with a condi DPS build as well.Only the Scourge benchmarks lower than the Reaper ....

I know the solution to this .... Give the Necro Toughness ... surely that's what they need!

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@Agrippa Oculus.3726 said:

@"Stand The Wall.6987" said:reaper is in a decent spot now tho so at least that is something.No, it is not: it is literally the worst power DPS pick in the PvE endgame: there is no other class that does lower damage than the power reaper. It's even outdamaged by ALL other classes with a condi DPS build as well.Only the Scourge benchmarks lower than the Reaper ....

I know the solution to this .... Give the Necro Toughness ... surely that's what they need!

ANet's issue is that they made the necromancer self sufficient in might generation and quickness. They also made it so the necromancer have huge gain of raw stats from few traits. This was made to make the necromancer's dps competitive against other profession's dps. However, by doing this they forgot why other profession weren't self sufficient in might stacking and quickness, making the necromancer overperforming in PvP/WvW.

Obviously, now, a majority of profession can self sustain their might generation, yet the necromancer still do it faster (usually) with relatively low risks, low complexity involved.

The vocal majority being the one having an accute conscience of how effective thing are against their own character, the necromancer is viewed as having more than enough dps. The fact that it's lackluster in PvE don't really affect this vocal majority, while the necromancer having more dps would affect them and they would be pretty angry.

The necromancer is a bit to unique in it's concept, in the context of GW2 he stand out like a sore point. It's gameplay and tools pretty much sum up most the things that the vocal majority want to see removed from the game. A seemingly passive gameplay, low reliance on active defense, heavy spam of conditions, high number of area denial skills... etc. Every single point of the necromancer's design is an eyesore for the players that seek what they label as "skillfull gameplay". Which is, all in all PvP/WvW concern.

What ANet did since launch is basically enforcing patch after patch their design of the necromancer.

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@Dadnir.5038 said:

@"Stand The Wall.6987" said:reaper is in a decent spot now tho so at least that is something.No, it is not: it is literally the worst power DPS pick in the PvE endgame: there is no other class that does lower damage than the power reaper. It's even outdamaged by ALL other classes with a condi DPS build as well.Only the Scourge benchmarks lower than the Reaper ....

I know the solution to this .... Give the Necro Toughness ... surely that's what they need!

ANet's issue is that they made the necromancer self sufficient in might generation and quickness. They also made it so the necromancer have huge gain of raw stats from few traits. This was made to make the necromancer's dps competitive against other profession's dps. However, by doing this they forgot why other profession weren't self sufficient in might stacking and quickness, making the necromancer overperforming in PvP/WvW.

Obviously, now, a majority of profession can self sustain their might generation, yet the necromancer still do it faster (usually) with relatively low risks, low complexity involved.

The vocal majority being the one having an accute conscience of how effective thing are against their own character, the necromancer is viewed as having more than enough dps. The fact that it's lackluster in PvE don't really affect this vocal majority, while the necromancer having more dps would affect them and they would be pretty angry.

The necromancer is a bit to unique in it's concept, in the context of GW2 he stand out like a sore point. It's gameplay and tools pretty much sum up most the things that the vocal majority want to see removed from the game. A seemingly passive gameplay, low reliance on active defense, heavy spam of conditions, high number of area denial skills... etc. Every single point of the necromancer's design is an eyesore for the players that seek what they label as "skillfull gameplay". Which is, all in all PvP/WvW concern.

What ANet did since launch is basically enforcing patch after patch their design of the necromancer.

Why hasn't anet give necros more active defenses then?

I agree with you about necros passive but i heard some call toughness a passive defense, so why did ANET give us more toughness through a trait instead of a active defense we can activate to protect ourselves? why didn't Anet for instance nerf the radius like everyone has been asking for of scourge instead of buffing it in WVW?

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@Agrippa Oculus.3726 said:

@Stand The Wall.6987 said:reaper is in a decent spot now tho so at least that is something.No, it is not: it is literally the worst power DPS pick in the PvE endgame: there is no other class that does lower damage than the power reaper. It's even outdamaged by ALL other classes with a condi DPS build as well.Only the Scourge benchmarks lower than the Reaper ....

I know the solution to this .... Give the Necro Toughness ... surely that's what they need!

I wasn't referencing pve.

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@Dadnir.5038 said:

@"Stand The Wall.6987" said:reaper is in a decent spot now tho so at least that is something.No, it is not: it is literally the worst power DPS pick in the PvE endgame: there is no other class that does lower damage than the power reaper. It's even outdamaged by ALL other classes with a condi DPS build as well.Only the Scourge benchmarks lower than the Reaper ....

I know the solution to this .... Give the Necro Toughness ... surely that's what they need!

ANet's issue is that they made the necromancer self sufficient in might generation and quickness. They also made it so the necromancer have huge gain of raw stats from few traits. This was made to make the necromancer's dps competitive against other profession's dps. However, by doing this they forgot why other profession weren't self sufficient in might stacking and quickness, making the necromancer overperforming in PvP/WvW.

Obviously, now, a majority of profession can self sustain their might generation, yet the necromancer still do it faster (usually) with relatively low risks, low complexity involved.

The vocal majority being the one having an accute conscience of how effective thing are against their own character, the necromancer is viewed as having more than enough dps. The fact that it's lackluster in PvE don't really affect this vocal majority, while the necromancer having more dps would affect them and they would be pretty angry.

The necromancer is a bit to unique in it's concept, in the context of GW2 he stand out like a sore point. It's gameplay and tools pretty much sum up most the things that the vocal majority want to see removed from the game. A seemingly passive gameplay, low reliance on active defense, heavy spam of conditions, high number of area denial skills... etc. Every single point of the necromancer's design is an eyesore for the players that seek what they label as "skillfull gameplay". Which is, all in all PvP/WvW concern.

What ANet did since launch is basically enforcing patch after patch their design of the necromancer.

But that's the real issue, they're not really! You can't stay true to one part and dare I say it, the most negative part of their design (passive play/defences etc.), but completely forget about the other part of it: because it's also supposed to be a Condi King to be reckoned with (like you said yourself: "heavy spam of conditions")! In PvE, it already was the worst Condi class you could choose, benchmarking lower than any other class out there. And after the latest patch, it's probably even worse now (definitely if it comes to moving targets).It's just unfair to the Necro community!

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@"Axl.8924" said:Why hasn't anet give necros more active defenses then?

I agree with you about necros passive but i heard some call toughness a passive defense, so why did ANET give us more toughness through a trait instead of a active defense we can activate to protect ourselves? why didn't Anet for instance nerf the radius like everyone has been asking for of scourge instead of buffing it in WVW?

Because, unfortunately, ANet want their design of the necromancer to work. They believe in this design, they believe that it's viable and through load of powercreep they manage to barely make it "work" at the cost of other part of the game. From my point of view, it's just extrem case of studborness on their part.

@"Agrippa Oculus.3726" said:But that's the real issue, they're not really! You can't stay true to one part and dare I say it, the most negative part of their design (passive play/defences etc.), but completely forget about the other part of it: because it's also supposed to be a Condi King to be reckoned with (like you said yourself: "heavy spam of conditions")! In PvE, it already was the worst Condi class you could choose, benchmarking lower than any other class out there. And after the latest patch, it's probably even worse now (definitely if it comes to moving targets).It's just unfair to the Necro community!

The point is that the necromancer is a "condi king", it's designed to be one afterall. The issue there is not the necromancer, it's PvE. The necromancer's condi potential require 2 things to be achieved:

  • boons to corrupt
  • slow ramping incoming condition

This is, unfortunately, something that you don't find in any encounter in PvE. You sure encounter a few boons from time to time or some heavy condi burst, but you never face an environment where the necromancer can play with conditions and boons as freely as in PvP/WvW. This is why the necromancer's condi dps suck in PvE, otherwise, the potential is there. I'll say it again, but giving mobs with a breakbar perma vigor would be enough to make scourge's punishments worth taking in PvE. As for condition damage, a lot of boss encounters come with tic of power damage from the arena, replace these power damage with a damaging condition applied for 10s with each tic and the necromancer become top condi dps (Hell, with necromantic corruption you'd even make a minion master worth taling for these bosses).

If ANet wanted to fix necromancer in PvE, I believe these 2 very easy changes would be more than enough. And the best part is that these changes have absolutely 0 impact on other professions and PvP/WvW.

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@Dadnir.5038 said:

ANet's issue is that they made the necromancer self sufficient in might generation and quickness.

Scourge generates might mostly from Oppressive Collapse, an easily evaded ability with a long cooldown. Siphoned Power is a minor contribution. How does Scourge generate quickness outside of boon cleansing? That's hardly 'self-sufficient.' Scourge doesn't benefit from Reaper's traits and the issue of this thread is how heavily Scourge has suffered from a change made without any consideration for its consequences, not something Reaper can do that can be done better anyway by other classes. You mention it later but yes, most every other class can self-generate might now so your point is somewhat moot.

@Dadnir.5038 said:They also made it so the necromancer have huge gain of raw stats from few traits. This was made to make the necromancer's dps competitive against other profession's dps. However, by doing this they forgot why other profession weren't self sufficient in might stacking and quickness, making the necromancer overperforming in PvP/WvW.

A 'huge gain of raw stats' by what metric? Extra expertise when using a torch? Any other stat increase from the Scourge trait line relies on having shades out which you are now punished for attempting to upkeep. Spite grants additional condition damage when using a Sceptre, still not enough to put it on par with anything else. Death Magic's changes are the opposite of active defence. Soul Reaping gives some vitality. Meanwhile, let's compare that to a class you don't have to look far to see: Warrior. Forceful Greatsword, Great Fortitude, Pinnacle of Strength all give easy stat bonuses. Berserker's Power does too with a requirement you'd be fulfilling anyway. Wounding Precision, Deep Strikes and Blademaster all give stat bonuses. Thick Skin, Armoured Attack and Rousing Resilience give stat bonuses. Roaring Reveille, Empowered, Empower Allies and Vigorous Shouts increase stats. Axe Mastery is a stat boost. Blood Reaction and Heat The Soul are stat bonuses. For Guardian, Zealous Blade, Kindled Zeal, Right-Hand Strength, Stalwart Defender, Honourable Staff, Force of Will and Power of the Virtuous will give you additional stats. Ranger gets Farsighted, Spotter, Taste for Danger, Ambidexterity, Instinctive Reaction, Lingering Magic, Pack Alpha and Honed Axes. Most of these also have a swath of benefits easily triggered by what you'd be doing anyway and it just goes on and on for every class. So, really, Necromancer doesn't actually have a huge gain of raw stats from a few traits - if anything, it has less than average when compared to other classes.

I cannot understand why problems in PvP, which Scourge definitely isn't contributing to anymore, should dictate the balance in PvE so heavily as to make the class useless. Same goes for WvW. The only problem with Necromancer in PvE is it's gutted and useless. How can the answer ever be, then, more nerfs because of issues in a different game mode when ANet has demonstrated they are capable of splitting changes?

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@Saracen.2691 said:

ANet's issue is that they made the necromancer self sufficient in might generation and quickness.

Scourge generates might mostly from Oppressive Collapse, an easily evaded ability with a long cooldown. Siphoned Power is a minor contribution. How does Scourge generate quickness outside of boon cleansing? That's hardly 'self-sufficient.' Scourge doesn't benefit from Reaper's traits and the issue of this thread is how heavily Scourge has suffered from a change made without any consideration for its consequences, not something Reaper can do that can be done better anyway by other classes. You mention it later but yes, most every other class can self-generate might now so your point is somewhat moot.

@Dadnir.5038 said:They also made it so the necromancer have huge gain of raw stats from few traits. This was made to make the necromancer's dps competitive against other profession's dps. However, by doing this they forgot why other profession weren't self sufficient in might stacking and quickness, making the necromancer overperforming in PvP/WvW.

A 'huge gain of raw stats' by what metric? Extra expertise when using a torch? Any other stat increase from the Scourge trait line relies on having shades out which you are now punished for attempting to upkeep. Spite grants additional condition damage when using a Sceptre, still not enough to put it on par with anything else. Death Magic's changes are the opposite of active defence. Soul Reaping gives some vitality. Meanwhile, let's compare that to a class you don't have to look far to see: Warrior. Forceful Greatsword, Great Fortitude, Pinnacle of Strength all give easy stat bonuses. Berserker's Power does too with a requirement you'd be fulfilling anyway. Wounding Precision, Deep Strikes and Blademaster all give stat bonuses. Thick Skin, Armoured Attack and Rousing Resilience give stat bonuses. Roaring Reveille, Empowered, Empower Allies and Vigorous Shouts increase stats. Axe Mastery is a stat boost. Blood Reaction and Heat The Soul are stat bonuses. For Guardian, Zealous Blade, Kindled Zeal, Right-Hand Strength, Stalwart Defender, Honourable Staff, Force of Will and Power of the Virtuous will give you additional stats. Ranger gets Farsighted, Spotter, Taste for Danger, Ambidexterity, Instinctive Reaction, Lingering Magic, Pack Alpha and Honed Axes. Most of these also have a swath of benefits easily triggered by what you'd be doing anyway and it just goes on and on for every class. So, really, Necromancer doesn't actually have a huge gain of raw stats from a few traits - if anything, it has less than average when compared to other classes.

I cannot understand why problems in PvP, which Scourge definitely isn't contributing to anymore, should dictate the balance in PvE so heavily as to make the class useless. Same goes for WvW. The only problem with Necromancer in PvE is it's gutted and useless. How can the answer ever be, then, more nerfs because of issues in a different game mode when ANet has demonstrated they are capable of splitting changes?

If you want to comment on my post, first read "necromancer" as "necromancer", not "scourge". Then read the whole post. Building might is very easy thanks to core necromancer to which the scourge have access. And yes, DM giving you 900 stat is huge and death perception giving you the equivalent of more than 600 stat point is just as huge.

The reason why the PvP issue dictate the state of PvE is because:

  • PvP/WvW offer the ideal environment for the necromancer's tools while PvE's environment starve the necromancer potential.
  • ANet do not make mechanic split between gamemode.

The balance simply balance based on where the tools of the profession have the strongest impact. One thing that you have to keep in mind is that ANet can only balance the necromancer in PvE by either make mechanic split (which they won't) or adapt PvE to the necromancer (which they seem to lazy to do).

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@"Agrippa Oculus.3726" said:But that's the real issue, they're not really! You can't stay true to one part and dare I say it, the most negative part of their design (passive play/defences etc.), but completely forget about the other part of it: because it's also supposed to be a Condi King to be reckoned with (like you said yourself: "heavy spam of conditions")! In PvE, it already
was
the worst Condi class you could choose, benchmarking lower than
any
other class out there. And after the latest patch, it's probably even worse now (definitely if it comes to moving targets).It's just unfair to the Necro community!

The point is that the necromancer is a "condi king", it's designed to be one afterall. The issue there is not the necromancer, it's PvE.And again, that's the issue! They can balance gamemodes separately, but they just don't. At least not for the Necromancer (or not enough). I really don't care that much if they nerf the Necro in PvP and/or WvW as long as they really deserve it. I don't consider myself a veteran WvW or PvP player but considering my previous experience, I'm also not a casual, and according to my own experience, they are (were) in the top tier if it comes to usefulness, so it's fine they receive nerfs there, it's only
fair
.But again, in PvE, it's all
but
fair! They're not in a good spot at all, and ANet should fix that. Sure you can make it incredibly complex: i.e. by doing an advanced makeover in encounter design, or by changing the whole design of the Necromancer itself, or adding an elite spec that solves all of the before-mentioned issues of the Necro, or changing the way how conditions behave in PvE, etc., etc. And IMO that would actually be the
right
things to do, but after so many years and also considering the announcements lately AND don't forget the latest patch (I mean: the Death Magic redesign was absolutely laughable), I've got a feeling they will
never
do that!So please ANet: and throw us a bone here and just give us some simple buffs the Necromancer so much needs
in PvE only
. Merely tweaking some numbers as you always do with split changes: i.e. some higher condi stacks and/or durations
in PvE only
; some power DPS enhancements
in PvE only
; augmenting some shareable buffs (like
)
in PvE only
; etc.If we can't have the real deal, at least give us that!

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@Dadnir.5038 said:If you want to comment on my post, first read "necromancer" as "necromancer", not "scourge". Then read the whole post.

Precisely what I did. This thread is primarily in relation to the Scourge change, ergo I am going to address everything through a Scourge lens foremost as the subject matter intends. Even so, I then continued immediately afterwards towards Necromancer as a whole specifically to satisfy your points. Don't pretend like I ignored the meat of your post because I didn't summarily engage it within the first sentence.

@Dadnir.5038 said:Building might is very easy thanks to core necromancer to which the scourge have access. And yes, DM giving you 900 stat is huge and death perception giving you the equivalent of more than 600 stat point is just as huge.

Necromancer's might stacking is hardly leaps and bounds better than the capabilities of any other class. The fundamental problem with your point is these stat bonuses might look impressive on paper but practicality tears them apart. What use is turning Necromancer into a tank when your mobility is the worst in the game and your baseline damage is so bad you require inflated stat boosts to have your damage even register on a consequential scale? So you can die the same death more slowly? Death Perception, by the way, isn't strictly a raw increase. It only functions when in Shroud which if we keep on topic with Scourge means you're never going to take it over Dhuumfire, or rather you can't because it's outright worse than Dhuumfire.

@Dadnir.5038 said:The reason why the PvP issue dictate the state of PvE is because:

  • PvP/WvW offer the ideal environment for the necromancer's tools while PvE's environment starve the necromancer potential.
  • ANet do not make mechanic split between gamemode.

That's not true, though. Everything Necromancer should be able to do is useful in, say, Fractals, which in my opinion is what should define PvE balance. Boon corruption has a use there, condition cleansing/management has a massive and only increasingly gigantic use with Fractal reworks, DPS is useful in every gamemode and even the Barrier mechanic pre-patch could mitigate some worst case scenarios that can crush you and then your entire party otherwise. It's ridiculous to suggest balancing for one gamemode should have free rein to destroy a class or even just a singular spec in another.

@Dadnir.5038 said:The balance simply balance based on where the tools of the profession have the strongest impact. One thing that you have to keep in mind is that ANet can only balance the necromancer in PvE by either make mechanic split (which they won't) or adapt PvE to the necromancer (which they seem to lazy to do).

Then the 'balance' change is utterly indefensible. Scourge's greatest impact is in WvW. This mechanic change just worsened Scourge's WvW problem and did nothing to fix the actual issues people complained about. Anything Necromancer can theoretically do in PvP is a waste of time, another class and spec will always do it better by one means or another.

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@Saracen.2691 said:

@"Dadnir.5038" said:If you want to comment on my post, first read "necromancer" as "necromancer", not "scourge". Then read the whole post.

Precisely what I did. This thread is primarily in relation to the Scourge change, ergo I am going to address everything through a Scourge lens foremost as the subject matter intends. Even so, I then continued immediately afterwards towards Necromancer as a whole specifically to satisfy your points. Don't pretend like I ignored the meat of your post because I didn't summarily engage it within the first sentence.

If you fail to address the class in its entirety, strictly speaking, you're making decisions based on the same flawed principles that are being criticized, just as how buffing boon corruption and Area control, which works fine for the necro in the narrow lens of PvE damage, is completely and totally game-breaking-overpowered in the PvP modes (notably WvW). It doesn't matter if the scourge sucks. If buffing it breaks something or it was nerfed for good reason, then you need to get more creative with what to improve upon, or agree with the real problem at hand, which is necro's place in PvE encounters/encounter design.

By ignoring other aspects of a class, poor ideas are made. The original Deadeye is proof of this concept with them ignoring necessary areas of weakness within the thief's kit already and failing to recognize areas of concern brought up by its respective original proposers and discussion on the topic.

Fact is, necromancer is only weak in PvE and/or massively overpowered in the PvP modes because the concept of boon/condition control is too strong to relegate to once class, particularly when boon and condition control is how most group PvP play is built around and won, with no extra possible wiggle room.

I still really struggle to understand why people care so much about PvE optimization, either. Class balance has next to nothing to do with success rate in the PvE areas of this game when things like raids can be done with literally anything if the players don't suck.

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@DeceiverX.8361 said:If you fail to address the class in its entirety, strictly speaking, you're making decisions based on the same flawed principles that are being criticized

Shades are Scourge-specific. The present issue is the Shade mechanic and Shade trait interactions. Why Scourge then is the focus should be perfectly clear, I would hope.

@DeceiverX.8361 said:just as how buffing boon corruption and Area control, which works fine for the necro in the narrow lens of PvE damage, is completely and totally game-breaking-overpowered in the PvP modes (notably WvW). It doesn't matter if the scourge sucks. If buffing it breaks something or it was nerfed for good reason, then you need to get more creative with what to improve upon, or agree with the real problem at hand, which is necro's place in PvE encounters/encounter design.

So by all logic you should be completely against this mechanic change too. You're saying boon corruption and area control are too good in WvW and PvP (which are the only things Necromancer can do at all anymore) so what did this patch do? It certainly didn't make boon corruption worse. It made area control in the context of WvW as strong as on launch with how many targets Shades can affect now. So all the problems you have with the class are emphasised with this change, and everyone who wants a bare minimum of viability in PvE doesn't get what they want either.

@DeceiverX.8361 said:Fact is, necromancer is only weak in PvE and/or massively overpowered in the PvP modes because the concept of boon/condition control is too strong to relegate to once class, particularly when boon and condition control is how most group PvP play is built around and won, with no extra possible wiggle room.

I have a suspicion a large number of people would disagree with this, all evidence I've observed certainly lends to that presumption, but I again don't interact enough with the PvP elements of the game to say more than this: Then make changes there. The solution was never in any case doing what they did to Shades with this patch. Again, Shades contribute next to nothing to either of these two things you've highlighted.

@DeceiverX.8361 said:I still really struggle to understand why people care so much about PvE optimization, either. Class balance has next to nothing to do with success rate in the PvE areas of this game when things like raids can be done with literally anything if the players don't suck.

Because this isn't strictly a matter of success rate. It concerns two other key factors; viability when contrasted to playing anything else and class efficiency. Yeah, you can do anything with just about anything providing everyone is good enough, but is it reasonable to expend disproportionate amounts of time and effort at the expense of everyone else you're forcing yourself upon? Should you selfishly take up a slot someone more useful could fill? Is it decent to make everyone else suffer unnecessarily because you made the terrible mistake of enjoying playing a certain class? Necromancer has nothing in PvE anymore. Even Chrono can boonstrip while providing unreservedly better boon support. Every other class can output better DPS, every other class with support-aimed utilities can perform that role better. PvE is where the vast majority of their development goes, to pretend like it's incomprehensible why there is a concern for PvE balance is preposterous no matter how dedicated to PvP and WvW you are.

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The problem with evaluating PvE balance of a class is that there is no algorithmic matchmaking.

The necromancer's PvE problem is something like this:

In PvE Bronze tier Necromancer is god.In PvE Silver tier Necromancer is outstanding.In PvE Gold tier Necromancer is great.In PvE Platinum tier Necromancer is mediocre.In PvE Legendary tier Necromancer is bad.

If there were algorithmic matchmaking and skill ratings in PvE Necromancer would be rightly understood as being an overpowered class you can stack to win by a vast majority of the playerbase.

However there is no matchmaking. So the game everyone is really playing is "let's pretend everyone is legendary tier", and that means kicking necros and talking about how terrible they are. Wanting to bring a necro to a raid is a clear signal that you are not a legendary tier player, so gtfo we are all pros here.

If you ever drop out of top tier statics and go slumming in a Thursday night PUG with 3 healers it becomes very obvious very quickly just how hard Necros carry. They absolutely stomp when teaching new players a raid encounter for the first time.

You might not care about that personally. I totally get you can't run a necromancer in your raid because it does like 10% less damage than a good class in a pure dps role, and that is frustrating. But the class needs to be balanced across use cases, not just your corner case. While it is unfortunate everything doesn't have its peak performance in your corner, that is the nature of needing to balance across skill levels and use cases.

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@"Ensign.2189" said:The problem with evaluating PvE balance of a class is that there is no algorithmic matchmaking.

The necromancer's PvE problem is something like this:

In PvE Bronze tier Necromancer is god.In PvE Silver tier Necromancer is outstanding.In PvE Gold tier Necromancer is great.In PvE Platinum tier Necromancer is mediocre.In PvE Legendary tier Necromancer is bad.

If there were algorithmic matchmaking and skill ratings in PvE Necromancer would be rightly understood as being an overpowered class you can stack to win by a vast majority of the playerbase.

However there is no matchmaking. So the game everyone is really playing is "let's pretend everyone is legendary tier", and that means kicking necros and talking about how terrible they are. Wanting to bring a necro to a raid is a clear signal that you are not a legendary tier player, so gtfo we are all pros here.

If you ever drop out of top tier statics and go slumming in a Thursday night PUG with 3 healers it becomes very obvious very quickly just how hard Necros carry. They absolutely stomp when teaching new players a raid encounter for the first time.

You might not care about that personally. I totally get you can't run a necromancer in your raid because it does like 10% less damage than a good class in a pure dps role, and that is frustrating. But the class needs to be balanced across use cases, not just your corner case. While it is unfortunate everything doesn't have its peak performance in your corner, that is the nature of needing to balance across skill levels and use cases.

The issue with your arbitrary categorisation is there are raw values you can use to contrast classes. In a PvE DPS role everything dedicated to DPS outclasses Necro and especially now Scourge in comparisons using optimal statlines and identical quality gear. Your example of three healers and raids makes little sense. Necromancer is meta for only a single raid boss and in the vast majority it's suboptimal. Obviously in a party of three healers Necromancer is going to appear to be overperforming in a DPS role, after all with three babysitters allowing you to keep chipping away indefinitely it would be hard for anything to not find success. The reality is a player would be better off learning any other class over Necromancer where their usefulness is on par and not capped because of fundamental issues irrelevant to personal execution. Maybe I'm just mental but I wouldn't describe aspiring towards getting close to average DPS for a dedicated DPS role using one of the best DPS builds available to your class in the most significant part of the entire game as a 'corner case.' Worst part is - I'm not even arguing for that, though it seems to be the impression you have. I just want Scourge's mechanic to not be completely invalid and more of an encumbrance than anything else. I could tolerate lower DPS - and I did - if we at least still had that. Instead, we're now trailing in every aspect with nothing redeeming in sight.

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@Saracen.2691 said:

@"Ensign.2189" said:The problem with evaluating PvE balance of a class is that there is no algorithmic matchmaking.

The necromancer's PvE problem is something like this:

In PvE Bronze tier Necromancer is god.In PvE Silver tier Necromancer is outstanding.In PvE Gold tier Necromancer is great.In PvE Platinum tier Necromancer is mediocre.In PvE Legendary tier Necromancer is bad.

If there were algorithmic matchmaking and skill ratings in PvE Necromancer would be rightly understood as being an overpowered class you can stack to win by a vast majority of the playerbase.

However there is no matchmaking. So the game everyone is really playing is "let's pretend everyone is legendary tier", and that means kicking necros and talking about how terrible they are. Wanting to bring a necro to a raid is a clear signal that you are not a legendary tier player, so gtfo we are all pros here.

If you ever drop out of top tier statics and go slumming in a Thursday night PUG with 3 healers it becomes very obvious very quickly just how hard Necros carry. They absolutely stomp when teaching new players a raid encounter for the first time.

You might not care about that personally. I totally get you can't run a necromancer in your raid because it does like 10% less damage than a good class in a pure dps role, and that is frustrating. But the class needs to be balanced across use cases, not just your corner case. While it is unfortunate everything doesn't have its peak performance in your corner, that is the nature of needing to balance across skill levels and use cases.

The issue with your arbitrary categorisation is there are raw values you can use to contrast classes. In a PvE DPS role everything dedicated to DPS outclasses Necro and especially now Scourge in comparisons using optimal statlines and identical quality gear. Your example of three healers and raids makes little sense. Necromancer is meta for only a single raid boss and in the vast majority it's suboptimal. Obviously in a party of three healers Necromancer is going to appear to be overperforming in a DPS role, after all with three babysitters allowing you to keep chipping away indefinitely it would be hard for anything to not find success. The reality is a player would be better off learning any other class over Necromancer where their usefulness is on par and not capped because of fundamental issues irrelevant to personal execution. Maybe I'm just mental but I wouldn't describe aspiring towards getting close to average DPS for a dedicated DPS role using one of the best DPS builds available to your class in the most significant part of the entire game as a 'corner case.' Worst part is - I'm not even arguing for that, though it seems to be the impression you have. I just want Scourge's mechanic to not be completely invalid and more of an encumbrance than anything else. I could tolerate lower DPS - and I did - if we at least still had that. Instead, we're now trailing in every aspect with nothing redeeming in sight.

I disagree I think it would only make sense to me IF we could be on par with other support classes while sacrificing DPS, then yeah who cares because you are viable support

I heard scourge barriers were kinda weak, so not sure why they nerfed support scourges in pve.

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@Dadnir.5038 said:

@Saracen.2691 said:I cannot understand why problems in PvP, which Scourge definitely isn't contributing to anymore, should dictate the balance in PvE so heavily as to make the class useless. Same goes for WvW. The only problem with Necromancer in PvE is it's gutted and useless. How can the answer ever be, then, more nerfs because of issues in a different game mode when ANet has demonstrated they are capable of splitting changes?The reason why the PvP issue dictate the state of PvE is because:
  • PvP/WvW offer the ideal environment for the necromancer's tools while PvE's environment starve the necromancer potential.
  • ANet do not make mechanic split between gamemode.Wait a sec. This change was done because of scourge stacking in large-scale WvW fights and how barriers and condis add up.sPvP has nothing to do with it. There you have mostly just one scourge per team and scourge was doing pretty okay before the patch, not OP, but still viable. This patch hurt sPvP scourges at least as bad as PvE scourges. In open world PvE it's just a noticable nerf, but now I don't even want to try PvP anymore.

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@Fenella.2634 said:

@"Saracen.2691" said:I cannot understand why problems in PvP, which Scourge definitely isn't contributing to anymore, should dictate the balance in PvE so heavily as to make the class useless. Same goes for WvW. The only problem with Necromancer in PvE is it's gutted and useless. How can the answer ever be, then, more nerfs because of issues in a different game mode when ANet has demonstrated they are capable of splitting changes?The reason why the PvP issue dictate the state of PvE is because:
  • PvP/WvW offer the ideal environment for the necromancer's tools while PvE's environment starve the necromancer potential.
  • ANet do not make mechanic split between gamemode.Wait a sec. This change was done because of scourge stacking in large-scale WvW fights and how barriers and condis add up.sPvP has nothing to do with it. There you have mostly just one scourge per team and scourge was doing pretty okay before the patch, not OP, but still viable. This patch hurt sPvP scourges at least as bad as PvE scourges. In open world PvE it's just a noticable nerf, but now I don't even want to try PvP anymore.

sPvP suffered from the fact that scourge could deny access to two 360 radius circle. In a lot of way the change to shades was made with sPvP in mind a lot more than WvW.

Honnestly, I wouldn't be surprised if they had this idea when scourge were a plague in sPvP, but put it aside in favor of a safer solution. And then dusted it off in a hurry when their WvW centric note didn't hit the mark in the players' mind. From my point of view, there is 90% chance that they did the change without taking into account the consequences of what they were doing. The issue with old idea is that a lot of change have been done in between and the analysis of it's impact have to take into account those change. With how they landed the change, do you think they even took the time to try to weight the pro and cons? I don't. They probably just focused on the "pro" in the context of WvW and forgot to look at the cons that led this idea to be put aside.

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@Ensign.2189 said:The problem with evaluating PvE balance of a class is that there is no algorithmic matchmaking.

The necromancer's PvE problem is something like this:

In PvE Bronze tier Necromancer is god.In PvE Silver tier Necromancer is outstanding.In PvE Gold tier Necromancer is great.In PvE Platinum tier Necromancer is mediocre.In PvE Legendary tier Necromancer is bad.

I kinda agree with your situational sketch here, and I'm sure absolutely everyone agrees with your last two tiers. But you forgot to compare it to other classes: like the Warrior which is pretty much a god in all your tiers! But forget about the Warrior (imo the most OP class in whole of PvE atm), everyone seems to also forget you don't HAVE to run full Berserker/Assassin or Viper gear. I mean, I can tell by own experience that even Ele is absolutely god tier in the hands of every beginner if you give it full Celestial, but no-one does that! Or slap on Harriers in combination with Magi's and It also carries much better in raids than any Necro can! Everyone tends to forget these kind of builds which pretty much any other class has examples of. But that's understandable, cause all these other classes also have several META (read: in your PvE Legendary and Platinum tiers) builds at their disposal. So it's completely understandable that even lower tier players are mostly focussing on these META builds (btw, also because of sites like snowcrows, etc.), and I would even recommend it as well, cause it's the best way to simply get good and stay useful once you get in these higher tiers.

The only reason why these beginner tier builds are widely known for Necro only, is simply because they don't have real higher tier builds (like you also acknowledged yourself).

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@Dadnir.5038 said:

@"Stand The Wall.6987" said:reaper is in a decent spot now tho so at least that is something.No, it is not: it is literally the worst power DPS pick in the PvE endgame: there is no other class that does lower damage than the power reaper. It's even outdamaged by ALL other classes with a condi DPS build as well.Only the Scourge benchmarks lower than the Reaper ....

I know the solution to this .... Give the Necro Toughness ... surely that's what they need!

ANet's issue is that they made the necromancer self sufficient in might generation and quickness. They also made it so the necromancer have huge gain of raw stats from few traits. This was made to make the necromancer's dps competitive against other profession's dps. However, by doing this they forgot why other profession weren't self sufficient in might stacking and quickness, making the necromancer overperforming in PvP/WvW.

Obviously, now, a majority of profession can self sustain their might generation, yet the necromancer still do it faster (usually) with relatively low risks, low complexity involved.

The vocal majority being the one having an accute conscience of how effective thing are against their own character, the necromancer is viewed as having more than enough dps. The fact that it's lackluster in PvE don't really affect this vocal majority, while the necromancer having more dps would affect them and they would be pretty angry.

The necromancer is a bit to unique in it's concept, in the context of GW2 he stand out like a sore point. It's gameplay and tools pretty much sum up most the things that the vocal majority want to see removed from the game. A seemingly passive gameplay, low reliance on active defense, heavy spam of conditions, high number of area denial skills... etc. Every single point of the necromancer's design is an eyesore for the players that seek what they label as "skillfull gameplay". Which is, all in all PvP/WvW concern.

What ANet did since launch is basically enforcing patch after patch their design of the necromancer.

The thing is Necro is just badly designed.Plenty other professions can easily maintain perma quickness, and pretty much all of them can maintain perma 25 Might, Fury etc. really easily.

The difference is, those other specs can spec in and out of selfishness, as well as usually sharing that boon support with other's around them, making those functionalities still valuable in group content, providing choices.

Reaper has no choice but to provide some self quickness with Reaper's Onslaught, which you still need anyway in PvE endgame to do decent DPS, even if Quickness is already covered by the supports.You can't opt out of Reaper's Might for Might generation, even if 25 Might is already covered, etc.

Meanwhile, a Guardian for example can just pick up Zealous Scepter to easily generate 25 Might in solo play, but then opt into Fiery Wrath for a damage modifier in group play where Might is already covered instead, which increases it's damage capabilities.A simple choice like that makes it both better in solo play as well as group play.

Following that Guardian example, it's much the same situation for Quickness, where Guardian can choose to give themselves AND their group permanent Quickness, or forgo that option for higher personal DPS, making it valuable in many more roles, types of content and situations.Reaper always has to give themselves some quickness, and it's always lacklustre in terms of personal DPS cap, making it neither a viable support/hybrid sharing boons to the group, nor a good DPS.

People keep pushing how Reaper, or Necro in general, is at least insane in Open World (for what that matters), but it's really not even great there, IF you know how to build craft. Then you realise quickly, that when running bad builds, sure, Reaper performs still great in solo play, because you can't opt out of what makes a character excel there, but once you realise what those factors are (Self might, capping crit chance, potentially with self perma Fury, applying Vuln etc.), you can look for those as optional tools in pretty much any other spec and easily outperform Reaper in solo play as well.

It doesn't matter if it's Firebrand, Renegade, Chrono or what have you, they all are much superior in selfish solo gameplay, having a much easier time self buffing themselves in Solo play, while at the same time excelling in Group play, generally both as top meta DPS specs as well as hybrid boon supports/DPS's or even full supports.They are robust enough designed professions to have options for how you chose to play.

Not that Necro doesn't have any advantages whatseoever, like superior cleave for example, but that also generally doesn't matter in group content, as trash is pulled together and bosses are single targets.

And yes, I totally agree, Anet just keeps piling on the wrong design onto Necro, making it overperform in small niches like WvW Zerg gameplay, while being completely lacklustre in everything else, and when ever they try to address that issue, they somehow make Necro even stronger for that small niche, while nerfing it further for everything else.Until eventually like now with Scourge, they end up essentially breaking the entire profession and it's design, while still somehow managing to perpetuate that issue further.

The incompetence displayed by the designers responsible for Necro, with it still suffering all the same issues after 7 years of patches(!) is actually almost impressive, if it wasn't this frustrating.

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@Asum.4960 said:The thing is Necro is just badly designed.Plenty other professions can easily maintain perma quickness, and pretty much all of them can maintain perma 25 Might, Fury etc. really easily.

The difference is, those other specs can spec in and out of selfishness, as well as usually sharing that boon support with other's around them, making those functionalities still valuable in group content, providing choices.

Reaper has no choice but to provide some self quickness with Reaper's Onslaught, which you still need anyway in PvE endgame to do decent DPS, even if Quickness is already covered by the supports.You can't opt out of Reaper's Might for Might generation, even if 25 Might is already covered, etc.

Meanwhile, a Guardian for example can just pick up Zealous Scepter to easily generate 25 Might in solo play, but then opt into Fiery Wrath for a damage modifier in group play where Might is already covered instead, which increases it's damage capabilities.A simple choice like that makes it both better in solo play as well as group play.

Following that Guardian example, it's much the same situation for Quickness, where Guardian can choose to give themselves AND their group permanent Quickness, or forgo that option for higher personal DPS, making it valuable in many more roles, types of content and situations.Reaper always has to give themselves some quickness, and it's always lacklustre in terms of personal DPS cap, making it neither a viable support/hybrid sharing boons to the group, nor a good DPS.

People keep pushing how Reaper, or Necro in general, is at least insane in Open World (for what that matters), but it's really not even great there, IF you know how to build craft. Then you realise quickly, that when running bad builds, sure, Reaper performs still great in solo play, because you can't opt out of what makes a character excel there, but once you realise what those factors are (Self might, capping crit chance, potentially with self perma Fury, applying Vuln etc.), you can look for those as optional tools in pretty much any other spec and easily outperform Reaper in solo play as well.

It doesn't matter if it's Firebrand, Renegade, Chrono or what have you, they all are much superior in selfish solo gameplay, having a much easier time self buffing themselves in Solo play, while at the same time excelling in Group play, generally both as top meta DPS specs as well as hybrid boon supports/DPS's or even full supports.They are robust enough designed professions to have options for how you chose to play.

Not that Necro doesn't have any advantages whatseoever, like superior cleave for example, but that also generally doesn't matter in group content, as trash is pulled together and bosses are single targets.

And yes, I totally agree, Anet just keeps piling on the wrong design onto Necro, making it overperform in small niches like WvW Zerg gameplay, while being completely lacklustre in everything else, and when ever they try to address that issue, they somehow make Necro even stronger for that small niche, while nerfing it further for everything else.Until eventually like now with Scourge, they end up essentially breaking the entire profession and it's design, while still somehow managing to perpetuate that issue further.

The incompetence displayed by the designers responsible for Necro, with it still suffering all the same issues after 7 years of patches(!) is actually almost impressive, if it wasn't this frustrating.

Dead on post. Wish I could pin it.

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@Agrippa Oculus.3726 said:The only reason why these beginner tier builds are widely known for Necro only, is simply because they don't have real higher tier builds (like you also acknowledged yourself).

The main 'problem' with necro is that they have so much baked in easily accessible power and utility. It's a general problem with how inflexible builds are in this game, but comes up in particular for necro. They just don't have design levers to make them narrow enough to justify the kinds of DPS output players desire.

To that extent the scourge change is a good thing- their class mechanic being a lot weaker, especially with respect to massive AoE utility, gives some real room to dial it up a bit.

I agree there is more that could be done to weaken the class in ways that would fit in more DPS, on the margins, but you really need big changes like the Scourge shade nerf to create some meaningful room.

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The class mechanic isn't any weaker; it's just relocated. Sand Savant makes your shade hit 10 ppl and maxes your expertise and concentration from the minor trait whilst still performing area-denial. Whatever the design intention of the shade nerf was, it has backfired quite badly if scourge performs 'as before' or better in wvw, whilst effectively deleting the spec from pvp and pve; unless that was the intent.

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@Ensign.2189 said:The main 'problem' with necro is that they have so much baked in easily accessible power and utility. It's a general problem with how inflexible builds are in this game, but comes up in particular for necro.

Not more so than other classes on the average. Being good in an arbitrary category where the concept of viability doesn't enter the equation isn't an argument for anything, you could extrapolate absolutely everything in the game is fantastic if you have such a low qualifier for value. What was the only thing Scourge could do with a measure of superiority before the patch? Piling on AoE damage in WvW zergs so much so it's the driving factor of why anyone thinks Necromancer is a strong class. All this patch accomplished is making that use case stronger and Scourge incomprehensibly bad in every other regard. I think any Scourge player who wasn't dedicated purely to WvW would much, much prefer the lower DPS we already cope with if we got to keep what should be a bare minimum quality of life standard that lets us exist as something more substantial than the player equivalent of an Engineer's rocket turret.

@Ensign.2189 said:To that extent the scourge change is a good thing- their class mechanic being a lot weaker, especially with respect to massive AoE utility, gives some real room to dial it up a bit.

I agree there is more that could be done to weaken the class in ways that would fit in more DPS, on the margins, but you really need big changes like the Scourge shade nerf to create some meaningful room.

It's not just 'a lot weaker' though. It's downright punishing to use and discordant with both Scourge's best traits, one of which you have zero choice in taking, and synergies with core specialisations that kept Scourge barely afloat. We don't need big changes like this unless the intent is to make it clear people should stop playing Scourge completely outside of a gamemode that every non-Scourge hates us for and single-handedly garners a reputation of needing nerfs direly despite how painfully untrue that is in gigantic chunks of the game. Do you think that makes anyone happy and should be considered healthy balancing? I don't, and I am in full confidence that no number tweaking with this mistake will ever allow Scourge to recover from this - that isn't even taking into consideration your optimism that ANet will make good on their supposed interest in caring about Necromancer whatsoever. At this point, believing they will is frankly naive.

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