LucKreck.8724

True, but I'd say that the scaling would be split between PvP/PvE right? I don't know just exactly how big of an impact the healing cut has in PvE

But isn't that fixable by adjusting the amount and duration of the poison application, should it be changed from torment?

Would it perhaps be an idea to move the 'life force consumption to regain health' mechanic to shroud instead of out of shroud? If you were to make it so that your life force pool doesn't decrease while you suffer from blight, shroud would be your main source of sustain and make you less shy towards inflicting more blight on yourself

Something I forgot to add that has also been said by others like @Galmac.4680 is that it's hard to build up blight outside of shroud, and that life force is hard to build up due to the the passive consumption. They'll need to find a way to build up both blight and lifeforce more effectively for Harbringer, otherwise builds for this spec will be hardstuck to the soul reaping tree and going full shroud or elixirs to keep up their blight

Quick note beforehand - I'm very excited about the Harbringer, I want to give as much feedback as I can, so... this is going to be a long post. First of all, I'm very pleased with the concept of the Harbringer. There are a lot of things I already like about the spec and it feels fresh. I like the concept of a vitality focused spec that sacrifices health for power, and I'm mostly positive about the way Harbringer Shroud feels in play. There are just a lot things that still need to be improved, tweaked etc. in order to make this spec reach its full potential. From what I've heard/seen other people say about it, there are some things that I don't need to say anymore as it's already been said before. (like the bland elixirs and lack of blight management) However, there are some things I'd like to ask and give some input on. Theme & Flavour The first thing that struck me as weird when the Harbringer was fully revealed on stream was how much it's revolved around torment. Scourge already seems like the spec that focuses on inflicting torment and burning, and has the increased torment damage trait as well. There's also the following line from the Harbringer preview: "A harbinger makes no clean kills, wielding a pistol to devastate their enemies with noxious, corrosive bullets. These skilled alchemists have developed elixirs to inflict Blight on themselves, converting their own pain into power. In Harbinger Shroud, they gain devastating abilities while suffering from Blight." Noxious is literally a synonym for poisonous. As others in this thread have said, I think the Harbringer shoud focus more around poison rather than torment. The preview gave me the impression that the Harbringer was to be a poison and vulnerability based spec. Necromancer already has a trait to improve outgoing poison damage and it would've also fit the alchemist archetype better. I was also looking forward to a poison spec seeing as, with the current lineup of professions and elite specs, there's very little options available if you want to make a poison build. Blight There have been multiple posts addressing the Blight mechanic. It's a good concept and it fits the archetype, but there's no way to properly manage the mechanic, and the rewards you get doesn't yet feel like it's entirely worth the risk of sacrificing half your max health for 25 seconds. This is mainly due to the fact that hardly any of the core Harbringer skills synergize with Blight. There's only two traits that actually synergize with blight and they're pretty much the same thing (I'll get more into this in the traits section). The thing that I've talked about with other and have already seen others mention is that is would be nice if the blight mechanic would function a bit like the heat mechanic from Holosmith. Right now a very popular way to use Harbringer's mechanics is to ignore Blight and only make use of Dark Disciple's passive healing mechanic. Constantly regenarating somewhere between 4 and 5% of your max health is pretty neat to compensate for the lack of a second health bar, but it makes Blight a less appealing mechanic to utilize, since you'll be giving up half your health bar and thus also half your passive healing. Perhaps an idea to give players more control over Blight might be to give the Harbringer an F2 skill that consumes blight without restoring their negative health to create an aoe effect, which gives you a choice between getting rid of blight and healing back the lost health yourself, or waiting for the blight to wear off to get the negative health back in an instant. Harbringer Shroud Like mentioned before, Harbinger Shroud feels great in play. The mobility it offers paired with the shotgun skill 2 makes it engaging and a nice switch between the pistol gameplay, especially in PvP. First off, there's one issue however that shows itself more in PvE gameplay, which is that most of the damage is tied to skill 1 and 2. I believe if the damage output was to be more spread out over the 5 skills, the rotation of shroud in PvE would be more engaging that simply spamming 1 and 2, and 3 on occasion to close the gap between targets. And, like mentioned before, I dont get why all the condition output equals torment. Secondly, there's one big issue, that has been posted by others already, which is the lack of fear in shroud. Fear is such a key condition on Necromancer, and not having it feels wrong. Many of the traits synergizing with fear become somewhat useless on Harbringer because of this. I'd suggest looking for a way to implement fear into Harbringer Shroud, perhaps by changing Voracious Arc's daze to a fear. Traits The main issue with the traits is that they're too... basic, they try to give you three very distinct build paths which in turn gives you no choices when making a build. With the exception of the elixir traits, they basically boil down to 'get a stat increase, and give yourself a pulsing effect'. I'm not saying it's bad, I like the idea that harbringer can focus on more that one role, but there's very little diversity between these builds. The fact that you get a copy paste version for each 'build route' makes them feel very much the same. This means that the traits themselves aren't bad, but they feel like maybe five selectable traits scattered over nine. I'd say it's best to find a way to merge some of the existing traits and make new ones to get a new trait lineup that offers multiple options for each 'build route'. Examples of these changes could be (and please take in mind that these are just ideas and speculations); Adept Traits Wicked & Septic Corruption - Instead of having two separate traits that increase either increase condition or strike damage, maybe one trait that increases crit chance based on blight, since both builds thend to profit from this. It also struck me as weird that Septic Corruption additionally adds poison to shroud 2, but Wicked Corruption just increases damage. Vile Vials - The problem I see with this trait is that it's the only adept trait that doesn't synergize with Blight. I'd say it would make more sense if Blight affected the cooldown rate of elixirs. Third Adept - This would be the place we can put another trait in. It would have to be one that synergizes with Blight of course. Perhaps a trait that decreases the amount of health reduced by blight, or increases it and lets you heal a percentage of damage dealt based on blight. Master Traits I'm actually quite allright with the Master traits. The one issue that I can see in them is once again that they offer little choice between builds. The idea behind vitality increasing certain stats is very thematic though. Grandmaster Traits This feels like one trait. All three do the same thing in a different way and more importantly, it's not engaging. To be honest, looking at the name of these traits they sound more like traits that would affect Devouring Cut (shroud skill 3). Some ideas/suggestions I would have for Grandmaster traits: Vile Corrosion - Vulnerability deals damage. This would go nice in hand with other necromancer traits like Terror and Deathly Chill, and it would suit the idea of the Harbringer attacking with corrosive attacks. Cascading Corruption - This could be a trait that synergizes with the potential F2 skill mentioned before, making it pulse damage and poison for instance. Deathly Haste - If fear were to be attached to shroud 4, this could be a trait that applies swiftness and quickness on shroud 3, it fits the name of the trait and would make the rotation of a boon-focused Harbringer more engaging. Death's Embrace - Increase maximum Blight (like 30-33 maybe), you heal for a portion of all damage dealt based on blight. This bonus increases while in Harbringer Shroud Pistol A lot of comments I've read and heard is that the pistol feels a lot like a copy paste from the Engineer's pistol skills, and I can definitly see where this is coming from. It would be nice to see the pistol have some form of interaction with blight, like perhaps another version of skill 1 while at max Blight. The pistol also suffers from the problem that the skills feel like they boil down to just doing pew pew until your target dies. A lot of this has to do with the fact that the skills have no unique audio or enough visual feedback that indicate you're using a different skill. The audio is also a bit of problem due to the fact that the pistol shots don't really sound like a necromancer weapon, but more like... another pistol. There's also once again the question why this applies all that torment. Here's some feedback I'd like to give on the pistol skills: Vicious Shot - The auto attack skill is fine, seeing as most ranged weapons don't really have an attack chain. I would say that an AoE effect would make more sense than a bouncing projectile in light of the alchemist archetype. The reason it feels a bit bland is probably due to skill 2 and 3 feeling a little similar. Weeping Shots - This is where most people draw the comparison between the Engineer's pistol. Weeping Shots feels like a piercing, different version of Poison dart volley. I think this is mostly due to the way the skill is executed. Something I've seen someone mention is that the concept of the Harbringer being a ranged dps that switches between close(r) combat in shroud with skills more centered around engage mechanics is a great concept, but that the one issue with that is that the Harbringer has no disengage skills. Perhaps this could be a skill that made you do a small step/dash backwards to get you out of melee range. Maybe to balance it out the skill could be toned down in damage slightly or the cooldown could be slight increased, but it would already make the skill feel different. The application of vulnerability falls nicely in line with the supposed corrosive nature of the harbringer's bullets. Vile Blast - The concept of this skill is great, though it is a bit weird that it applies a 1 second stun if it's simply supposed to be an interrupt skill. All I'd have to say about this skill is, like mentioned above, to give the skill a more unique and recognizable visual feedback and audio. Elixirs Finally the Elixirs. This one is probably the most universally agreed upon issue, due to the simple fact that they're too bland. The icons look practically identical, and their effect basically all boil down to 'chug potion, get boons'. Especially because this is an elite specialization, these skills deserve to be better executed. They should feel more fun to use and have more of a visible effect beyond giving you yellow icons on top of your skill bar. A good start might be to have at least one of the elixirs be a throwable, have elixirs that give a beneficial effect other than boons, or have one that gives a special effect like a transform. They should also have more synergy with Blight. Here are some suggestions of what these elixir changes might be based on the names and effects that the current elixirs have: Elixir of Promise - This elixir might give you a bonus for a couple seconds that gives you increased healing from your passive life force drain based on Blight, to allow for some upkeep of your survivability while suffering from Blight. Elixir of Risk - Inflict Blight on yourself. Grant yourself might based on Blight stacks. Temporarily increase the effectiveness of Blight (-2.5/-3% health per stack of blight) and gain pulsing quickness for the duration. Elixir of Anguish - Inflict Blight on yourself. Throw an elixir that detonates in the target area, applying fear and torment/vulnerablity (or other fitting condition). The duration of the inflicted conditions is increased based on Blight Elixir of Bliss - Inflict Blight on yourself. Gain resolution and convert your conditions into life force. Life force gained is based on Blight. Elixir of Ignorance - Inflict Blight on yourself. Gain resistance and break stuns. Gain increased movement speed based on Blight for a short duration. Elixir of Ambition - Inflict significant Blight on yourself. Gain all boons. The effectiveness of blight is temporarily decreased. (-1.5/-1% health per stack of blight) Once again, all of these are suggestions and meant to give ideas rather than make demands. With changes like this the cooldowns would probably have to be increased to make up for the extra effect. A thank you to those who read through the entire thing and I would love to hear your own feedback on these ideas and suggestions.