Feedback on Theme and Aesthetic with Harbinger
Hi there,
I love the Necromancer and have played necro since the original guild wars (gw1). From the begining in GW1 there was something satisfying about floating off the ground while stealing the blood out of an enemy to heal you or bleeding yourself to heal others. I loved the dark theme, I loved the blood magic vampire build, minion master, curses and the like. GW2 has built on that base and it is great. I especially love Reaper specialization and the wonderful Necro themed animations with it to boot.
Now for the Harbinger,
This specialization with the gun and elixirs is not bad idea per se, but the Harbinger feels like a dark engineer, not a Necro with a new specialization. I know the traits are named after Necro sounding themes, but it does not come across in play. Rather the Necromancer profession gets diluted and muddled with the Engineer here. If this is supposed to be a dark arts of alchemy for the Necromancer theme it missed the mark. It looks like someone gave up, ran out of ideas or time while working on the Harbinger and defaulted to Engineer skills.
Terminology
The name elixir alone screams Engineer rather than dark potions of a plague doctor or alchemist. Terms used for the Harbinger skills could have been more descriptive or thematic. Better names for the new necro Harbinger mechanic elixir/skills might have been words like:
Tincture
Serum
Toxin
Injection
Just not elixer! Something ...you know dark and sinister.
Skills and Pistol Art
In addition, the elixir skill art was very bland, each bottle looked so similar and the same goes for the pistol skill art. It was hard to keep track visually what skill was what, especially while fighting.
Animation
I think more unique animations with each elixir would help Harbinger as well. This might help with the feeling of not being an Engineer too.
Overall, I was disappointed with Harbinger during the beta after the Reaper and Scourge were so good.
I hope there are some major improvements coming to Harbinger before it is released in End of Dragons.