My Take on the Update (Necromancer, but mostly scourge)

[Lily.1935]

@LucianDK.8615 said:Perhaps its boonshare that is out of control, not boons themselves per say. If theres too many whom can constantly pulse boons onto each other, then you can never purge or corrupt them all.

Do you have a proposal to fix that? I am at a loss as to how to fix it. What would you suggest?

[Ragi.7291]

if each skill was impacted by the number of targets it affects.It would change everything, less boons, less corruption, less damage,...Example if you make an aoe that if it hits 1 target makes 10K and it can hit 5 targets max, if it hits 5 targets it will make 2K on each.Same for heal, buff and corrupt (with a minium by target)

it would allow us to have the same skills that adapt to the content we do, as you affect more or less target.Example for healerWhen we do raids 10peoples we are 2 healers + other's boons class. (same in Bus WvW)If we do fractal 5peoples we are solo heal so we have to more heal / barrierIn solo content it would give more survival (same in roaming WvW)

we already have damage in relation to the distance between us and the target so why not on the other hand it would be a huge rework.

[schokelmei.8271]

@"LucianDK.8615" said:Perhaps its boonshare that is out of control, not boons themselves per say. If theres too many whom can constantly pulse boons onto each other, then you can never purge or corrupt them all.

It's not boonshare alone it's the complete boon application. Just have a look at the professions and their access to boons. There is never a shortage of boons, especially not with Concentration in the game. Boons shouldn't be available all the time and not running for 60s and not all classes should have full access to it, like not all classes have boon corrupts or teleports or stealth.One of the issues:https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Boon_Duration

[LucianDK.8615]

Yeh, concentration was a terribly bad idea. And I remember when Leadership runes from Dragons Stand was all the rage. But one can hope Anet is doing something about it with the upcomming competitive update on the horizon. But Im sure there will be QQ from those whom gets de-booned.

Though I think dedicated boonbots such as Heralds or Chronomancers is probably those whom would suffer the most, and deservedly so to clean up this mess. But as usual, I expect anet wont skill split such a massive update between pve and competitive.

[Lily.1935]

@gebrechen.5643 said:

@"LucianDK.8615" said:Perhaps its boonshare that is out of control, not boons themselves per say. If theres too many whom can constantly pulse boons onto each other, then you can never purge or corrupt them all.

It's not boonshare alone it's the complete boon application. Just have a look at the professions and their access to boons. There is never a shortage of boons, especially not with Concentration in the game. Boons shouldn't be available all the time and not running for 60s and not all classes should have full access to it, like not all classes have boon corrupts or teleports or stealth.One of the issues:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Boon_Duration

Perhaps a new condition is in order that cuts Boon duration time or perhaps makes Boons inert. Something the reverse of Resistance. Maybe that last one shouldn't be the case. Because then how would it interact with resistance? Hmm. Just spit-balling ideas.

[LucianDK.8615]

@Lily.1935 said:

@gebrechen.5643 said:

@"LucianDK.8615" said:Perhaps its boonshare that is out of control, not boons themselves per say. If theres too many whom can constantly pulse boons onto each other, then you can never purge or corrupt them all.

It's not boonshare alone it's the complete boon application. Just have a look at the professions and their access to boons. There is never a shortage of boons, especially not with Concentration in the game. Boons shouldn't be available all the time and not running for 60s and not all classes should have full access to it, like not all classes have boon corrupts or teleports or stealth.One of the issues:

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Boon_Duration

Perhaps a new condition is in order that cuts Boon duration time or perhaps makes Boons inert. Something the reverse of Resistance. Maybe that last one shouldn't be the case. Because then how would it interact with resistance? Hmm. Just spit-balling ideas.

Sounds like you are aiming to make boon corrupts stronger. Why not go all out then? Taking a page from necro focus5, Boon corrupts deals significant damage as well IF you have boons on you.

[Dadnir.5038]

@"gebrechen.5643" said:It's not boonshare alone it's the complete boon application. Just have a look at the professions and their access to boons. There is never a shortage of boons, especially not with Concentration in the game. Boons shouldn't be available all the time and not running for 60s and not all classes should have full access to it, like not all classes have boon corrupts or teleports or stealth.One of the issues:https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Boon_Duration

It's not really the ideal thread to talk about that and I excuse myself in advance, but...

I would say that it's a bit more complicated than that.

In itself, introducing concentration in the game was a good idea. The real issue is that the base duration of all the boons in the game wasn't changed at the same time which led to a flat boon powercreep (Without taking into account the boon powercreep from new traits/skills that came around the same time and was further increased years after years).

At the same time, objectively, the boon have more or less the same issue as the condition: the ramp up. Just like it has become to easy to ramp up condition, it is to easy to ramp up boons (and especially might). A fast ramp up of might is a problem because it allow you to reach your maximum potential in second and nobody should be able to increase it's damage that quickly.

ANet need to try to find for boons a balance point between sustainability and intensity. The thing is that their balance philosophy of not spliting mechanism between gamemode prevent them from affecting the ramp up in the PvP/WvW modes. Thus they chose to forget about balancing the boon ramp up and just tried to balance things out as if being at full throttle is the "norm". This is but one of the many balance mistake done over the years.

In itself, if the one that provide the boons have to sacrifice something (most likely it's dps and preferably survivability on top of dps) in order to maintain these boons on it's teammates, it's not a problem, it's even good design. That's why concentration isn't a bad thing. However, when you don't need much sacrifices and you can basically self sustain boon to work at full strength, it ecome an issue and, unfortunately, this is the kind of issue that GW2 face.

On the topic of corruption, this is an interesting mechanism but ANet implemented it clumsily. Or, more accurately, they should have revised it when they introduced the specialization mechanism. For me their mistake is that they choose to make boon corruption dominant at the cost of boon riping in order to keep the variety of effects tied to boon corruption. They should have sacrificed the variety to the specialization, focusing on boon riping and adding effect based on the specialization. They did it for scourge, of course, but they did it in an incomplet way which led us to an almost total rejection of the mechanism by the community and thus a bunch of "nerfs".

There is much that can be done on the necromancer side to improve the balance of the game. However, from experience, ANet tend to avoid those things that can be done. They are deadset on keeping in game some very poorly designed mechanism (like barrier being stackable, the boon corruption table, transformations, the damages on shades skills... etc.) and try very hard to make them "work" despite years of constant setbacks and negative feedback from players.

[Methuselah.4376]

@KrHome.1920 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:Seems like they want to force out dps scourges from WvW, they being too over represented. It feels like they are trying to push scourges wholly into a support role, ie barrier bot.

Possibly. Last time we had nerfs this heavy handed (Condi reaper) the scourge was over the horizons. I'll choose my delusional and believe they're working on new elite specs.

cries in denial

But Im kind of wondering, if neither Reaper or Scourge is allowed to have viable condispecs, could a hypotetical third espec be condi oriented from the beginning?I think Reaper lost viable condi because it proved too difficult to balance together with a power spec. Also because of promoting the scourge as condi master.

And in scourge they crammed far too much into the package. Scourges was gods at the beginning of Pof. now only pale shadows of what they once were.Core is the condi spec.

Core is underpowered (almost trash) on power gear, good on carrion amulet in pvp and totally broken/overpowered on trailblazer gear in wvw.

In general lots of classes have broken trailblazer builds. After all these years anet is still not capable of balancing their condi mechanic. It scales too well with trailblazer.

I am having SO MUCH FUN in WvW with trailblazer core necro....and I usually HATE WvW ^_^ With Curses, Spite and Soul Reaping, Shroud lasts sooooo long, particularly with Signets of Suffering, Signet of Undeath, and Fear of Death. I am using Viper's trinkets for some power for my Life Blast.

[LucianDK.8615]

@Methuselah.4376 said:

@KrHome.1920 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:Seems like they want to force out dps scourges from WvW, they being too over represented. It feels like they are trying to push scourges wholly into a support role, ie barrier bot.

Possibly. Last time we had nerfs this heavy handed (Condi reaper) the scourge was over the horizons. I'll choose my delusional and believe they're working on new elite specs.

cries in denial

But Im kind of wondering, if neither Reaper or Scourge is allowed to have viable condispecs, could a hypotetical third espec be condi oriented from the beginning?I think Reaper lost viable condi because it proved too difficult to balance together with a power spec. Also because of promoting the scourge as condi master.

And in scourge they crammed far too much into the package. Scourges was gods at the beginning of Pof. now only pale shadows of what they once were.Core is the condi spec.

Core is underpowered (almost trash) on power gear, good on carrion amulet in pvp and totally broken/overpowered on trailblazer gear in wvw.

In general lots of classes have broken trailblazer builds. After all these years anet is still not capable of balancing their condi mechanic. It scales too well with trailblazer.

I am having SO MUCH FUN in WvW with trailblazer core necro....and I usually HATE WvW ^_^ With Curses, Spite and Soul Reaping, Shroud lasts sooooo long, particularly with Signets of Suffering, Signet of Undeath, and Fear of Death. I am using Viper's trinkets for some power for my Life Blast.

But are you actually able to kill anything?

[Methuselah.4376]

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Methuselah.4376 said:

@KrHome.1920 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@LucianDK.8615 said:Seems like they want to force out dps scourges from WvW, they being too over represented. It feels like they are trying to push scourges wholly into a support role, ie barrier bot.

Possibly. Last time we had nerfs this heavy handed (Condi reaper) the scourge was over the horizons. I'll choose my delusional and believe they're working on new elite specs.

cries in denial

But Im kind of wondering, if neither Reaper or Scourge is allowed to have viable condispecs, could a hypotetical third espec be condi oriented from the beginning?I think Reaper lost viable condi because it proved too difficult to balance together with a power spec. Also because of promoting the scourge as condi master.

And in scourge they crammed far too much into the package. Scourges was gods at the beginning of Pof. now only pale shadows of what they once were.Core is the condi spec.

Core is underpowered (almost trash) on power gear, good on carrion amulet in pvp and totally broken/overpowered on trailblazer gear in wvw.

In general lots of classes have broken trailblazer builds. After all these years anet is still not capable of balancing their condi mechanic. It scales too well with trailblazer.

I am having SO MUCH FUN in WvW with trailblazer core necro....and I usually HATE WvW ^_^ With Curses, Spite and Soul Reaping, Shroud lasts sooooo long, particularly with Signets of Suffering, Signet of Undeath, and Fear of Death. I am using Viper's trinkets for some power for my Life Blast.

But are you actually able to kill anything?

Actually, yes, with a surprising rate. Obviously there are some classes I can't win against, such as a good core warrior. But as a whole, I've been able to do well. I try not to solo much, but in 1 vs 1 I tend to win at least half the time. The good thing with the build I use is Death Shroud lasts so damn long, and once out of it, I can bring it back to full in a few seconds, in time to go back in. Now yes, contrary to Reaper, my biggest attacks are out of shroud (Plaguelands, Corrupt Boon, Scepter), but Death Shroud can do some decent condi damage as well with Dhuumfire, Path of Corruption and Tainted shackles. In essence, it's a battle of attrition.

On a side note, does anyone find that Life Transfer (Death Shroud 4) barely restores life force? To the point that by the time you're finished channeling the skill, you pretty much back at the same life force level before you began the channel? For me the biggest life force restorative while in shroud is Doom traited with Fear of Death (and boy does it feel good when you pop it as you're about to get your 6% life force from Signet of Undeath, for a total of 21% life force).