Current State of Reaper

[stormemperor.3745]

Anet: Talks about elite spec tradeoffs by mentioning reaper's shroud.

 

Also Anet: Proceeds to remove tradeoffs from every other class.

 

RIP Necromancer

[Artificer.3468]

they were pretty forthcoming about what they consider tradeoffs tbh and reaper shroud doesnt really fit that definition

[Methuselah.4376]

16 minutes ago, stormemperor.3745 said:

Anet: Talks about elite spec tradeoffs by mentioning reaper's shroud.

 

Also Anet: Proceeds to remove tradeoffs from every other class.

 

RIP Necromancer

Reaper's Shroud IS the main mechanic of the Reaper specialization, how would you suggest to keep Death Shroud and Reaper's Shroud? 

[Seuchenherbst.2746]

55 minutes ago, Methuselah.4376 said:

Reaper's Shroud IS the main mechanic of the Reaper specialization, how would you suggest to keep Death Shroud and Reaper's Shroud? 

I don't think he means "keep the F1 core shroud and gain F2 reaper shroud". I think he means the rate of shroud decay, which is 3% per second for Core Necro, but 5% per second for Reaper Shroud. Decay of reaper shroud used to be equal to that of Core Shroud, but it was changed to add a trade-off to the Reaper Shroud. Since the other specs all seem to lose their specific drawbacks/trade-offs, it wouldn't be too far a stretch, IMO, to change the Reaper Shroud decay rate back to 3%.

[Dr Meta.3158]

Core and reaper shroud decay at the same rate in pvp at 5% while core is 3% and reaper is 5% in pve.

Reaper has a larger shroud degeneration while also taking more damage due to being melee only. Both loss damage reduction to their shroud without any damage increase making them even worse than the poor state they were in to begin with. 

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

On 10/4/2022 at 11:14 AM, Methuselah.4376 said:

Reaper's Shroud IS the main mechanic of the Reaper specialization, how would you suggest to keep Death Shroud and Reaper's Shroud? 

Serious answer: The same way they did Berserker, with two F# keys and shared cooldowns.

[Methuselah.4376]

4 hours ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

Serious answer: The same way they did Berserker, with two F# keys and shared cooldowns.

But why would you ever use Death Shroud over Reaper's Shroud? If you're running Reaper then the aim is to always be in melee, and while Life Blast is a decent damaging attack it's too slow. 

[SoftFootpaws.9134]

6 hours ago, Methuselah.4376 said:

But why would you ever use Death Shroud over Reaper's Shroud? If you're running Reaper then the aim is to always be in melee, and while Life Blast is a decent damaging attack it's too slow. 

Reaper Shroud can be a liability, if you take damage in it you also lose damage. This is one of the main reasons it currently doesn't have a place in the top benchmarks. By comparison the main reason a class like Machinist does so well is freedom of positioning while still maintaining their DPS uptime.

Edited October 14, 2022 by Mariyuuna.6508

[Dr Meta.3158]

Being able to pick the shroud you want while also having access to the reaper traits would be pretty sick as far as versatility in matchups and probably far too difficult to balance.

Edited October 14, 2022 by Dr Meta.3158
Spelling

[Obtena.7952]

11 hours ago, Mariyuuna.6508 said:

Reaper Shroud can be a liability, if you take damage in it you also lose damage. This is one of the main reasons it currently doesn't have a place in the top benchmarks. By comparison the main reason a class like Machinist does so well is freedom of positioning while still maintaining their DPS uptime.

OK but if you take damage in Death Shroud, you also lose what Death Shroud has to offer as well, so the liability of shortened Shroud due to taking damage is the same. 

Therefore, the question still stands. Why as a Reaper would people use Death Shroud? I think more fundamentally, the question is what problem is being fixed by giving Reaper access to both Death and Reaper Shroud? If anything, this creates more problems than it solves ... for example, doesn't anyone think of the consequences of giving Reaper access to all those Fears? You should, because IIRC, it was a point that caused it to be nerfed a long time ago. It's simply not a tenable situation to have such broad access to all these capabilities and it still doesn't address the main problem everyone has on there mind here. 

 

Edited October 15, 2022 by Obtena.7952

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

Literally the only time I can think of where having core shroud as an option on Reaper would be nice is during Cardinal Adina as I'm pillar kiting.  I lose so much DPS by having to leave melee range that even Death Shroud's suboptimal DPS would be an improvement.

Would probably also be too much for PvP/WvW.

Edited October 15, 2022 by Drarnor Kunoram.5180

[Dr Meta.3158]

On 10/14/2022 at 9:22 PM, Obtena.7952 said:

OK but if you take damage in Death Shroud, you also lose what Death Shroud has to offer as well, so the liability of shortened Shroud due to taking damage is the same. 

Therefore, the question still stands. Why as a Reaper would people use Death Shroud? I think more fundamentally, the question is what problem is being fixed by giving Reaper access to both Death and Reaper Shroud? If anything, this creates more problems than it solves ... for example, doesn't anyone think of the consequences of giving Reaper access to all those Fears? You should, because IIRC, it was a point that caused it to be nerfed a long time ago. It's simply not a tenable situation to have such broad access to all these capabilities and it still doesn't address the main problem everyone has on there mind here. 

 

Death shroud in pvp gives reapers an option to deal with ranged classes as their gap closing abilities are terrible since they're tied to the necromancer class as a base, chill no longer reduces the distance non teleport mobility skills cover, and as such are pretty screwed against rangers and their variants, deadeyes, good dragonhunters, and even the sort of fast rotational classes that rely on kiting like power heralds.

 

But again thats definitely overkill and makes core necromancer kind of pointless.

[Obtena.7952]

26 minutes ago, Dr Meta.3158 said:

Death shroud in pvp gives reapers an option to deal with ranged classes as their gap closing abilities are terrible since they're tied to the necromancer class as a base, chill no longer reduces the distance non teleport mobility skills cover, and as such are pretty screwed against rangers and their variants, deadeyes, good dragonhunters, and even the sort of fast rotational classes that rely on kiting like power heralds.

 

But again thats definitely overkill and makes core necromancer kind of pointless.

Right .. that's a good example of the broad access to toolsets that would be a problem if Reaper were to have both Death and Reaper Shroud. 

[Dr Meta.3158]

9 hours ago, Obtena.7952 said:

Right .. that's a good example of the broad access to toolsets that would be a problem if Reaper were to have both Death and Reaper Shroud. 

On that front I'd suggest what many others have suggested quite a lot before on these forums. Make greatsword 3 a 600 range leap finisher. 

[Methuselah.4376]

On 10/15/2022 at 8:16 PM, Drarnor Kunoram.5180 said:

Literally the only time I can think of where having core shroud as an option on Reaper would be nice is during Cardinal Adina as I'm pillar kiting.  I lose so much DPS by having to leave melee range that even Death Shroud's suboptimal DPS would be an improvement.

Would probably also be too much for PvP/WvW.

Er, why are you pillar kiting with a Power Reaper? Or any melee class? 

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

13 hours ago, Methuselah.4376 said:

Er, why are you pillar kiting with a Power Reaper? Or any melee class? 

It's more to do with my static group and my lack of gearing on non-Necro professions than anything else.  I'm in the lower half of power DPS anyway, so me moving off stack is less of a loss.  Personally, I'd be happy playing condi scourge in that fight instead, but they insist I go power.

As an aside, don't try using RS2 in that fight to get back to melee.  You get stuck on the ground everywhere.

Edited October 17, 2022 by Drarnor Kunoram.5180

[Radina.6057]

Com: "Why is everyone dead? WHY DOES THE BOSS HAVE 9 STACKS!"

Kite: " Uhh. Sorry. Some slubblings walked through. My Scythe wasnt long enough. Wouldnt have had that problem with Scourge."

----

Kite: "kitten. Iam dead."

Com: "What? Why?"

Kite: "I sliped and pressed Shroud 2. Charged right of the platform. Wouldnt have happend with Scourge."

-----

Com: "Why is the Boss locking on the group?"

Kite: "Sorry. I went into the shroud and got distracted by the Reaper filter. Kind of ran of the platform on accident. Wouldnt have happened with Scourge btw."

-----

Kite: "F*ck me sideways."

Com: "Whats now?"

Kite: "Nothing. I just remembered how bad Reaper is and tossed him off the platform. Mercykill. Wouldnt have happened with Scourge!"

 

Wouldnt take to long to make them understand.

Edited October 17, 2022 by Radina.6057

[stormemperor.3745]

17 hours ago, Drarnor Kunoram.5180 said:

It's more to do with my static group and my lack of gearing on non-Necro professions than anything else.  I'm in the lower half of power DPS anyway, so me moving off stack is less of a loss.  Personally, I'd be happy playing condi scourge in that fight instead, but they insist I go power.

As an aside, don't try using RS2 in that fight to get back to melee.  You get stuck on the ground everywhere.

You could go power harbinger