Necromancer Patch Notes (June 28th)

[Zero.3871]

4 minutes ago, KrHome.1920 said:

This is the bigger picture I can not say much about. I have no overview over the synergies with others classes. But I guess the community will develop meta comps that cap crit chance or the alternative: no dps build is able to cap crit chance anymore.

/edit: fixed wrong quote

Maybe ... but like I said, they could just have lowered ferocity to 225 to achieve this. This 15% solution implies they changed the math.

hmm,l i would say there are effects like food/utility that gives extra stats in relation to existing stats. so having flat 15% is less valuable then having 225 ferocity. could be the idea here

[KrHome.1920]

10 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Actually, I can see why people care ALOT about the WH change since daze interacts with NOTHING as a Necro and Fear interacts with LOTS of things as a Necro. #besalty

Nice, someone who understands! 🙂

Fear of Death @ warhorn 4 @ 5 targets = 75% life force

For Reaper: warhorn 4 now also chills (now add all the chill related traits for reaper to each warhorn 4 usage)

I already mentioned dread, so warhorn 4 becomes a quickness and fury source.

Bye offhand focus!

Edited June 24, 2022 by KrHome.1920

[Esorono.1039]

7 minutes ago, KrHome.1920 said:

Nice, someone who understands! 🙂

Fear of Death @ warhorn 4 @ 5 targets = 75% life force

For Reaper: warhorn 4 now also chills (now add all the chill related traits for reaper to each warhorn 4 usage)

I already mentioned dread, so warhorn 4 becomes a quickness and fury source.

Bye offhand focus!

Yeah, I will be honest, I got rather excited when I found out that WH was given fear, daze is alright, but necro works so well with fear that even though it is a one second fear compared to a two second daze, I would take the updated one over the old WH4.

[Eddy.7051]

I like the QoL with the Death Perception update. I hated not being recommended to use wells while shroud was on CD. But can we all agree that the trait no longer has anything to do with Soul Reaping - which is all about shroud and life force? RIP to rp flavor.

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

I don't understand why people are thinking the crit damage bonus on Death perception will function outside of Shroud when it's clearly replacing the Ferocity bonus.  I'm also not aware of any existing crit damage bonuses being multiplicative with Ferocity.

 

I do have my concerns on the Warhorn changes as well. 

 

If the bonus defiance damage on Wail of Doom is less than 100, it's a nerf against breakbars.  There are a couple raid bosses where it will be a nerf regardless if it's less than 200 damage.  As it is, the skill does get negated by Resistance after this change happens.

 

Then there's my concerns with the Banshee's Wail trait.  Right now, it gives Wail of Doom +50% Daze duration, not increase the base duration like Lingering Curse does.  If this carries over to the Fear version, it means that Fear of Death plus Banshee's Wail will cap the duration on their own, no expertise will factor in.

[KrHome.1920]

6 minutes ago, Drarnor Kunoram.5180 said:

I don't understand why people are thinking the crit damage bonus on Death perception will function outside of Shroud when it's clearly replacing the Ferocity bonus.  I'm also not aware of any existing crit damage bonuses being multiplicative with Ferocity.

I bet the trait will just add 15% damage on each critical hit in shroud (this is literally what the patch note says). And if it does this, then this is a big damage buff to before.

Quote

As it is, the skill does get negated by Resistance after this change happens.

This does not matter, as the fear related traits will still trigger as the fear is applied (even though it does not have an effect due to resistance). I mean now warhorn4 bis negated by stability and does not trigger any traits, so this will be a definitive improvement.

Edited June 24, 2022 by KrHome.1920

[Bale.3851]

44 minutes ago, KrHome.1920 said:

Fear of Death @ warhorn 4 @ 5 targets = 75% life force

 

Isnt fear of death on a 4 or 5 sec idc? Just curious.

Edited June 24, 2022 by Bale.3851

[KrHome.1920]

Just now, Bale.3851 said:

 

Isnt fear of death on a 4 or 5 sec idc? Just curious.

If you hit multiple targets at once, then this will count as one trigger for the ICD. That's how all the other ICD traits work too.

[Bale.3851]

Just now, KrHome.1920 said:

If you hit multiple targets at once, then this will count as one trigger for the ICD. That's how all the other ICD traits work too.

 

Nice to know. Thanks.

[lovemghool.7613]

1 hour ago, Devas.8104 said:

The death perception rework is a -23% critical chance reduction while in shroud, and a 5% critical damage nerf.

lol

 

 

a very sneaky and nasty nerf indeed

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

10 minutes ago, KrHome.1920 said:

I bet the trait will just add 15% damage on each critical hit in shroud (this is literally what the patch note says). And if it does this, then this is a big damage buff to before.

This does not matter, as the fear related traits will still trigger as the fear is applied (even though it does not have an effect due to resistance). I mean now warhorn4 bis negated by stability and does not trigger any traits, so this will be a definitive improvement.

The Resistance bit is more for the fact it's far less reliable as an interrupt in PvP/WvW.

Looking on the wiki, I see that most of the traits boosting critical damage do have notes saying they're multiplicitive, however, so I do feel better about that.

[Devas.8104]

1 hour ago, KrHome.1920 said:

 

Maybe ... but like I said, they could just have lowered ferocity to 225 to achieve this. This 15% solution implies they changed the math.

 

It isn't beyond them at this point to change the wording just to hide the fact it's a nerf.

[Boh.4568]

So, if I'm a WvW player without a fury slave in party, and using speed runes for roaming so I can't afford precision runes, and I have to keep my energy/cleansing/absorption sigils instead of the accuracy one...I get -23% crit chance and -5% crit damage in exchange for........? 10% crit chance off-shroud where half of my might, damage, ferocity and quickness traits are disabled? Am I missing something? Is this update only for PvE party content?

At least the buff to the shouts is nice, especially the heal and CTTB.

[Asum.4960]

54 minutes ago, KrHome.1920 said:

If you hit multiple targets at once, then this will count as one trigger for the ICD. That's how all the other ICD traits work too.

No it's not, those are very specifically noted exceptions, such as Chilling Victory's "Single attacks can activate this trait more than once before recharging." 

Fear of Death procs once for 7/15% LF regardless of amount of targets hit, something very easily tested ingame.

 

Edited June 24, 2022 by Asum.4960

[Zoser.7245]

I wonder if the radius of the Locust Swarm still remains at 180?  It is really small. Unless your allies are glued to your @ss... most of the time it's not going to be very useful except in raid unless you're running after them instead of keeping an eye on what you owe. I would have loved an increase in radius in the skill itself or when traited with Banshee's Wail instead add the 10% increase in outgoing healing to that trait.

 

Edited June 24, 2022 by Zoser.7245

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

Honestly, Locust Swarm needs to be buffed to 240 radius anyway.  The group healing is going to be...what, 400 healing on a 30 second cooldown?  Equivalent to 3 ticks of 0 healing power Regeneration?  Pretty laughable.  Traiting it increases that to 5 ticks of Regeneration.  Ooooooooh.  So strong.

Edited June 24, 2022 by Drarnor Kunoram.5180

[Devas.8104]

19 minutes ago, Zoser.7245 said:

I wonder if the radius of the Locust Swarm still remains at 180?  It is really small. Unless your allies are glued to your @ss... most of the time it's not going to be very useful except in raid unless you're running after them instead of keeping an eye on what you owe. I would have loved an increase in radius in the skill itself or when traited with Banshee's Wail instead add the 10% increase in outgoing healing to that trait.

 

 

How is that even remotely relevant considering the vast amount of nerfs necros have been getting in every single patch?

 

Wurm CD increase "to bring it more in line with spectral walk" (aka no reason), lich form -33% damage because people can't reflect/dodge/LoS,  harbinger shroud power damage divided by 2 which only impacted zerker builds (that already had 0% survivability), and even a PvP "Rise!" nerf out of all things.

 

Please wake up.

 

Even mesmers had a set of nerfs. Kek.

 

Notice how guards actually got buffs, and they don't even have a thread dedicated to the patch notes.

 

 

[Zoser.7245]

2 hours ago, Devas.8104 said:

 

How is that even remotely relevant considering the vast amount of nerfs necros have been getting in every single patch?

 

Wurm CD increase "to bring it more in line with spectral walk" (aka no reason), lich form -33% damage because people can't reflect/dodge/LoS,  harbinger shroud power damage divided by 2 which only impacted zerker builds (that already had 0% survivability), and even a PvP "Rise!" nerf out of all things.

 

Please wake up.

 

Even mesmers had a set of nerfs. Kek.

 

Notice how guards actually got buffs, and they don't even have a thread dedicated to the patch notes.

 

 

Because what is done is done and now is time to take profit of the changes in the best way possible. Wasting time raging  does not worth.  My time as a key-warrior ended a long time ago. I will be retesting all the professions and specializations that I think will be the best for me this time, updating their builds and playing around with them. 

For get angry and be raging, it's better quit and do something more pleasant and fun.

Anyways,  when they ask for ideas, like before the expansion, i still try to help. How the Mirage's axe work came from my ideas with the flying axes like boomerangs, the Harbinger's elixirs, Devouring cut and Vital Draw skills too (my posts are still available to read in the feedback thread), the Chronomancer AoE capability with wells too (i was a the key-warriors at that time asking for add AoE capabilities to the mesmer profession as we lacked effective ones for PvE/WvW). We got it! And more things that i can't remember as i have being playing since the beta.  So i'm proud that i was able to help again and i have been having fun with the Harbinger too.

This is a game to have fun and it's what i do.

Edited June 25, 2022 by Zoser.7245

[Obtena.7952]

Wording is messy on that. But it does read as 10% always, with 15% increase in shroud. That's a 10/25 split

For me the big question is why are there so many changes converting ferocity buffs to crit? Does Anet simply anticipate more crit cap so they want to put a lid on the DPS before it's out of control?

40 minutes ago, Zoser.7245 said:

Because what is done is done and now is time to take profit of the changes in the best way possible. Wasting time raging  does not worth.  My time as a key-warrior ended a long time ago. I will be retesting all the professions and specializations that I think will be the best for me this time, updating their builds and playing around with them. 

For get angry and be raging, it's better quit and do something more pleasant and fun.

Anyways,  when they ask for ideas, like before the expansion, i still try to help. How the Mirage's axe work came from my ideas with the flying axes like boomerangs, the Harbinger's elixirs, Devouring cut and Vital Draw skills too (my posts are still available to read in the feedback thread), the Chronomancer AoE capability with wells too (i was a the key-warriors at that time asking for add AoE capabilities to the mesmer profession as we lacked effective ones for PvE/WvW). We got it! And more things that i can't remember as i have being playing since the beta.  So i'm proud that i was able to help again and i have being having fun with the Harbinger too.

This is a game to have fun and it's what i do.

Love this. it's true. Why continually build and harbour negative feelings over something that is a leisure activity? People REALLY need to know when to break off. Someone described this as 'demonstrating passion'. Really? Ranting and taking the kitten out of the devs and the game on the forums is about passion? More like, it's about mental health. 

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

39 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Wording is messy on that. But it does read as 10% always, with 15% increase in shroud. That's a 10/25 split

For me the big question is why are there so many changes converting ferocity buffs to crit? Does Anet simply anticipate more crit cap so they want to put a lid on the DPS before it's out of control?

10% and 15% are crit chance and crit damage respectively, so you're reading it wrong.

 

As for Ferocity to crit damage? Not really sure, but if they wanted to cap it, they would keep it as Ferocity and not a separate multiplier.

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

4 hours ago, Zero.3871 said:

hmm,l i would say there are effects like food/utility that gives extra stats in relation to existing stats. so having flat 15% is less valuable then having 225 ferocity. could be the idea here

Not much that converts Ferocity to other stats on Necro. For the actual crit damage, a 15% separate multiplier out-does 300 Ferocity always.  Even with 0 Ferocity otherwise, you end up at 172.5% crit damage instead of 170% crit damage (300 Ferocity), and the more Ferocity you build, the greater the separate multiplier's impact will be.

[PseudoNewb.5468]

Wait this is so confusing they should not say increased critical damage by x%, if that is not what they mean.

 

Critical Chance Increase: x% means they add x% to the stat (that is a percentage).

So

Increase Critical Damage by x% should mean something similar. The stat is called Critical Damage

 

But there are several skill entries in the wiki stating that this is could have a different meaning and is confusing. 

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Critical_Damage

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Pure_Strike_(trait)

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Twin_Fangs

https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Ferocious_Strikes_(thief)

Other skills don't have this note but all tooltips say Critical Damage Increase: x%.

If the wiki is correct. the tooltip should simply be 

Damage Increase on critical: x%

Damage increase is not a attribute or derived attribute so it is straight forwards what this means.

But I guess, does this damage increase stack additively or multiplicatively with other Damage increase effects?

So this is just a mess.

Edited June 25, 2022 by PseudoNewb.5468

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

Assuming Death Perception ends up in line with other traits that increase crit damage and not via Ferocity, then our crits will do more damage post-patch than now.  Whether this increase plus the extra out-of-shroud crit chance are enough to make up for losing 23% crit chance in shroud needs someone better at math than I to figure out.  It's still possible for us to crit-cap with some gear changes at the cost of Power.

Edited June 25, 2022 by Drarnor Kunoram.5180

[Obtena.7952]

2 hours ago, Drarnor Kunoram.5180 said:

10% and 15% are crit chance and crit damage respectively, so you're reading it wrong.

 

As for Ferocity to crit damage? Not really sure, but if they wanted to cap it, they would keep it as Ferocity and not a separate multiplier.

Call me optimistic but that's either something REALLY new we never seen before ... or an error in the notes. AFAIK, there are no effects that just flat buff crit damage (or almost none?). 

If that language is accurate ... then it's a pretty big downgrade.  

[Asum.4960]

The Death Perception change is weird. Over the years I got the impression that Anet wanted to move away from most of the multiplicative modifiers and even derived stats, as they turned more and more of those (especially weapon related) Traits into granting main stats instead. 

 

A lot of times it really feels like one hand doesn't know what the other is doing and a significant portion of "balance changes" is just shuffling things back and forth between different competing design ideas. 

 

Meanwhile I really wish, rather than bouncing around passive stats gains, multipliers and modifiers, they'd just look at upping base skill modifiers while using the Trait system to provide compelling and build defining, gameplay altering, actual options.

15 minutes ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Call me optimistic but that's either something REALLY new we never seen before ... or an error in the notes. AFAIK, there are no effects that just flat buff crit damage (or almost none?). 

If that language is accurate ... then it's a pretty big downgrade.  

As @PseudoNewb.5468 posted, here is the short list of Traits on the Wiki that do indeed still seem to provide multiplicative Critical Damage buffs. 

If that's the case for the new Death Perception, it's an upgrade Critical Damage wise. If it's additive to the actual derived Critical Damage stat (which yea, I think would be unprecedented), a downgrade.

Edited June 25, 2022 by Asum.4960