Reaper needs a buff!

[Axl.8924]

10 minutes ago, KrHome.1920 said:

MightyTeapot posted a video where he did all raidbosses with a support scourge (plaguedoctor or sth.) composition, that is unkillable even when controlled by complete idiots. This comp was 10% slower than the speedrun world record. So much about golem dps.

 

A general question:

Is there any class where any spec is usful in any content? And shouldn't we ask about core necro dps buffs in the first place because core has not even aoe like reaper. Reaper is great in pvp, wvw, open world and in general at cleaving. Core is trash everywhere besides at sustaining melee 1v1 in pvp.

 

If they do that, they will have to also go towards helping core ele core engi and even core ranger.

Seems at this point necro isn't the only one needing some attention.

Edited July 23, 2021 by Axl.8924

[mortrialus.3062]

The filthy dirt and garbage eating bottom dwellers, Warriors, Revenants, Guardians, Rangers, Engineers, Thieves, Mesmers, and Elementalists, are working together to cry to ArenaNet that necro is overpowered.  The truth is necro is unchanged and balanced.  Necro players have simply caught up to the game itself through clever build craft after spending almost a decade being the unambiguous worst profession.   If necro was truly over powered, you wouldn't see people asking for nerfs.  You'd see people en masse bandwagoning onto the class which you simply do not. 

[Dadnir.5038]

3 hours ago, KrHome.1920 said:

MightyTeapot posted a video where he did all raidbosses with a support scourge (plaguedoctor or sth.) composition, that is unkillable even when controlled by complete idiots.

To be fair, the video is more about epidemic and barrier abuses than anything. 2 mechanisms that are poorly designed but very great if you stack scourges.

[Redpawa.4108]

On 7/23/2021 at 10:22 PM, KrHome.1920 said:

A general question:

Is there any class where any spec is usful in any content?

guardian

It would be nice if the new E-Spec is single target so reaper can finally shift back to being a bruiser.

[Rym.1469]

I find it really odd that Reaper's Onslaught gives Quickness.

 

I mean, I see the reasoning because Reaper tends to be played a lot by the more casual players and it certainly makes it a solo PvE power, being self-sufficient.

 

On the other hand, Reaper's thing is making hits count and not being that quick on it's own. Personal nitpick, it doesn't mesh well with the class fantasy.

 

On the topic, I digged out the suggestion I had many years ago regarding Reaper, specifically leaning a bit more towards PvE. I don't know if I posted it, but here it is. More or less giving Reaper niche around execute phases. A lot like Legion's Fury Warrior trait Juggernaut. Trait replacement for Soul Eater and a tweak to Gravedigger. Creates a loop of keeping chill up, recharging GD with vulnerability generation in Shroud, on GS itself and with second weapon set and then spending GDs on getting more stacks. Adds weight to proper cleave, especially with RS#5, in order to boost stack generation.

 

https://i.imgur.com/2Ya0BDm.png

https://i.imgur.com/NOgaV7v.png

Edited August 8, 2021 by Rym.1469

[KrHome.1920]

Reaper does not work without the increased shroud casting speed in the competitive modes.

 

Reasons are

- the chill nerf for leap distances,

- the mobility creep in PoF

- and the 30% damage nerf last year.

 

The pacing has become too fast and reaper's burst and stickyness to a target too low for the unbuffed reaper shroud to apply any pressure. Everyone is picking onslaught for a reason. It carries the overnerfed reaper design (see the 3 reasons above). You would have to rework the whole spec to compensate a quickness removal in onslaught.

 

I don't know whether your suggestions would improve reaper in PvE, but for the competitive modes they would kill the spec.

 

Edited August 9, 2021 by KrHome.1920

[Dadnir.5038]

2 hours ago, KrHome.1920 said:

I don't know whether your suggestions would improve reaper in PvE, but for the competitive modes they would kill the spec.

 

It wouldn't, such suggestion would likely send reaper back below 30K dps.

 

There is a good reason why ANet's devs graduated from their focus on making gravedigger the main skill of the reaper. What he suggest is stepping back in this "gravedigger era", giving up sustain and damage on all melee hit for potentials overbuffed critical hits on a 12s CD gravedigger after more than a minute within the fight.

 

If you don't have 100% chill uptime, high vuln output and 100% cit chance, you're useless. Worse, the trait even compete with decimate defense so good luck for the crit chance out of shroud.

[Infusion.7149]

This is meta reaper: http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?PSwEE6MssgC2VH7Ikp01Gb0R6qsZD-zRIYRUzXG1mCVUB2eSEjxwT2AYJizI-e

Can you tell me why you think 100% chill uptime is necessary when Chilling Nova is on 8s ICD and doesn't count for a damage modifier? Not to mention you essentially have 100% uptime if you attack on greatsword out of shroud. To top it all off , the latest Snowcrows log has chilling nova constituting only 1.168% of the DPS (~400DPS) and the same holds true on Luckynoobs' log where it is 1.108% (~350DPS).
Better yet why do you think high vulnerability output is necessary given that the stacks don't count and merely the presence of it?

Holosmiths and chronomancers both rely on stacks of vulnerability, not the mere existence of the condition on the target (see Shaped Charge, and Fragility). The same goes for revenants' Targeted Destruction in Devastation traitline.

I think any change to reaper would need to be weighed very closely versus competing options that may not have as much CC or innate boon rip (see any elementalists, full DPS thieves, or engineers without mine kit ... also to a lesser extent soulbeasts and power DH) as well as less sustain and self boon application. The overarching problem right now as far as class diversity is you have supports doing higher damage and more boon output than they were a year or two ago , which is something that was not an issue when we had chrono+druid meta because both of those were not high DPS.

 

Class by class:

• Guardian - condi FB is overperforming for the utility it innately has even after nerfs (~40K full DPS with 8 pages, just under 38K official on snowcrows, ~32K DPS as CQB with group)
• Revenant - condi RR is overperforming and condi ren has a lot of utility regardless (~40K full DPS , ~37K DPS as condi RR)
• Warrior - if it's overperforming it is not by a lot (37K full DPS and 34K banner) considering 100% swiftness uptime is needed to not drop the benchmark by 10% due to Warrior's Sprint, this has mainly strong CC
• Ranger - power variants of soulbeast are okay given spotter buff although OWP nerf was heavy handed, condi soulbeast is not as strong as hybrid soulbeast but 33K shortbow soulbeast is a relatively easy build
• Thief - power DPS is mediocre (deadeye has low cleave and staff daredevil is ~35K) but CC can be strong if running a weapon swap from staff , I've seen some 41K condi daredevils lately ingame which is promising
• Engineer - scrapper has a quickness role now but is not on par with CQB or StM chrono ; heal scrapper is in a decent position if you have external might and fury sources (quite effective at SH , Slothasor, and Matthias) ; holo is decent DPS but reliant on others for fury uptime
• Mesmer - power chrono is not great in fractals due to the ramp of clones but the damage is mediocre without DT (so slow stacking from multiple chronos) so it's mainly strong CC , focus pulls and boon rip on auto that save it; condi mirage is busted in a few situations but relatively low damage when confusion isn't abused (as it should be since it's spitting out alacrity and a bunch of might) : the main place you run chrono over cQB is KC because there's a +35% damage for power builds due to the low toughness on Keep Construct
• Elementalist - weaver has innate problems with boon reliance and the rotation is not that forgiving (also the swiftness and weakness reliance makes it not attractive to play) while rotating attunements to CC can very well make your damage horrible,  tempest could have far less RNG when there is single small target to hit and then the benchmark DPS would be workable

I think the real answer is a slight reduction on damage output from condition firebrands and renegades instead of buffing mediocre DPS classes that have utility / boon rip (for example, the main occassions a chrono is massively more useful vs reaper is when you need to personally block a instakill attack, boon rip is needed on a less than 10 second interval, or there is arena damage that robs you of shroud). Scourge is perfectly serviceable as well and arguably even overpowered on some fights and given that scourge is a necromancer I really don't think reaper need a lot of help other than shroud uptime in areas where tick damage is existent (see Whisper of Jormag or Boneskinner when stubborn necromancers run reaper over scourge despite the movement and tick damage respectively ; even something as rudimentary as the Gorseval stomping attack consuming life force or arena damage at Vale Guardian that causes experienced players to run scourge there exclusively).

A huge QoL update would be to implement the same change that happened for minions/clones to when reaper shroud is up: if you aren't directly targeted by an attack or AoE perhaps the life force penalty could be lower as it drains itself already. The only issue I could see arising there is if people abuse minions and damage mitigation from death's carapace and other sources such as protection to ignore damage. Before the torment change I stated that scourge would be the main way for necromancer to gain viability across all instanced content and it seems I was right.

Edited August 9, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Obtena.7952]

^^ None of that is the answer ... because what other classes do has nothing to do with whether Reaper needs a buff or not. 

[Dadnir.5038]

@Infusion.7149

I think you're misunderstanding something there if you answer my post. My post specifically answer KrHome's post who specifically answer to Rym's post.

 

I'll sum it up for you. Rym suggest changes to gravedigger and soul eater.

- Gravedigger would reset while striking a foe below 50% health point but, instead, have 2 charges with a 12s CD that can be reduced by 1 second each time you apply vulnerability.

- Soul eater would no longer do the current thing it does but instead allow gravedigger and executionner's scythe to build stack of critical damage increase while stricking a chilled foe for gravedigger alone.

 

Within this context, I hope you understand why I said that to be effective with those kind of change, the reaper would need 100% chill uptime, high vuln output, 100% crit chance and a long build up for him to stack those critical damage increase.

 

Keep in mind, that I think that reaper is fine as it is in PvE, It has never been in a better spot than it is right now and don't need to be.

 

The PvE metagame is currently shacking because Woodenpotatoes proved that you can reach similar raid time with team comps that are less glassy than what the speedrun guilds suggest. We might very well be at the edge of a new era where dps and offensive support aren't necessarily the most important thing you have to care about and many players have a hard time accepting that.

[Rym.1469]

19 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

 

It wouldn't, such suggestion would likely send reaper back below 30K dps.

 

There is a good reason why ANet's devs graduated from their focus on making gravedigger the main skill of the reaper. What he suggest is stepping back in this "gravedigger era", giving up sustain and damage on all melee hit for potentials overbuffed critical hits on a 12s CD gravedigger after more than a minute within the fight.

 

If you don't have 100% chill uptime, high vuln output and 100% cit chance, you're useless. Worse, the trait even compete with decimate defense so good luck for the crit chance out of shroud.

 

Fair, I should've probably mentioned it's more a proof of a concept and suggestion on gameplay loop rather than an exact and an immediate solution. You are right in that if applied tomorrow it would've been a net negative on the meta build.

 

If the game goes forward though, I imagine multiple elite specializations are going to step on each others toes more and more, even within the same class. That's what I'm mostly aiming at - creating a satisfying loop and niche that will last for the Elite to find a place for itself among ever expanding competition.

 

As far as Onslaught goes - I can't really see the mobility creep in PoF Kr speaks about, apart from Engineer perhaps? I'm not asking for removal of the quickness and giving nothing in return, mind you. There are other avenues of compensating for Quickness as well, including simply rising the damage back up. I just expressed my opinion that Quickness on Reaper specifically contradicts what you would expect from it and it's class fantasy.

Edited August 10, 2021 by Rym.1469

[Dadnir.5038]

1 hour ago, Rym.1469 said:

As far as Onslaught goes - I can't really see the mobility creep in PoF Kr speaks about, apart from Engineer perhaps?

 

DH discovered trapper runes.

Runes of speed.

Mirage's utilities allow you to slot 4 teleports where you could only have 2 before (not talking about the weapon skills).

Soulbeast movement skills via beast mode.

... etc.

[anbujackson.9564]

Reaper doenst need buffs. We dont need the same fiesta as we do now with scourges, firebrands and renegades. You cant just give a spec with huge utility and survivability endless dps. 

 

You know, I would gladly take reapers tools over my berserker warrior. It can do the same but better. Higher dps be dammed, which is too reliant on others.

> self generating boons (especially quickness and even situational stability, very good if you have bad support players) while also not being reliant on alac

> high crit chance in shroud

> high amounts of vulnerability (good for your crits)

> CC (golem and spectral grasp, which is the best pull in the game with big soft cc on top. Just doing as much as the golem takes you at 2 or more like 3 skills depending on the hitbox as a warrior)

> Cleave (spin2win, huge AA range) with blinds and another pull on GS

 

Give me all this and i give you my 2-3k dps.

Edited August 10, 2021 by anbujackson.9564

[Infusion.7149]

9 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

@Infusion.7149

I think you're misunderstanding something there if you answer my post. My post specifically answer KrHome's post who specifically answer to Rym's post.

 

I'll sum it up for you. Rym suggest changes to gravedigger and soul eater.

- Gravedigger would reset while striking a foe below 50% health point but, instead, have 2 charges with a 12s CD that can be reduced by 1 second each time you apply vulnerability.

- Soul eater would no longer do the current thing it does but instead allow gravedigger and executionner's scythe to build stack of critical damage increase while stricking a chilled foe for gravedigger alone.

 

Within this context, I hope you understand why I said that to be effective with those kind of change, the reaper would need 100% chill uptime, high vuln output, 100% crit chance and a long build up for him to stack those critical damage increase.

 

Keep in mind, that I think that reaper is fine as it is in PvE, It has never been in a better spot than it is right now and don't need to be.

 

The PvE metagame is currently shacking because Woodenpotatoes proved that you can reach similar raid time with team comps that are less glassy than what the speedrun guilds suggest. We might very well be at the edge of a new era where dps and offensive support aren't necessarily the most important thing you have to care about and many players have a hard time accepting that.

Thanks for clarifying

[Martzi.7341]

Reading all these comments about pros/cons of buffing Reaper, place of Reaper on the palette of professions,  searching through multiple  threads about this topic, here are my toughts, insights and (at the end) ideas.

So, what merits Reaper has from PvE perspective and what relevancy these have.
- 35K dps (sustained, not peak) -> reliable in any scenario, big room for errors, easy to keep it up (+).
- selfreliance -> good, but irrelevant in raid scenario (0)
- low to no mobility -> definitely downside (-)
- selfishness (nothing to give to the group over the beaf if has on its own) (-)
- LF reliance -> works perfectly in target-rich environment, on  single target, it falters (-)

- countless chill application (without any effort) -> good occasion to get something out of it (+)

ANet stated that Reaper should be a slow but deadly monster. Moreover, Reaper traitline is a power focused one, except Deathly Chill.
As Teapot also stated, the important thing is to make the encounter easier (and I tend to think the same).
Someone pointed out, that the peak dps professions play a "high risk high reward" play style with a potencial of 40K dps, but the average players does not get so high, and those numbers are tested on golem (mainly).

Concluding fron the above, these are the relevant perspectives:
- the 35K dps is a fine mid-tier, considering how sustainable it is (no need for buff on this part).
- more mobility would breat the style of the spec, so that's a no again.
- LF reliance again is part of the specs uniqueness (again a no).

 

The remaining aspects are the chill application and selfishness.
And there is the only non-power oriented trait that bugs me since it lost it's uniqueness, when they changed it to its current state. It feels so alien (to me) in this spec.

On bringing something to the table, everyone gives something to its gourp mates, like a gift. Spirits, Empower Allies, Alac, Quickness etc... So, why could not be Reaper a bit different? Instead giving a gift to the team, we could give opportunity.

Here's my idea for a viable rework that would make the trait more spec coherent and the spec itself more welcomed in group content. There is 2 variant that came in my mind.

 

1)
Deathly Chill:
-  Striking a chilled foe gives the Reaper 1 icicle, stack up 3 times (5 sec cd). At 3 stacks the next strike of the Reaper againts a chilled foe detonates them, causing (a unique debuff)) Deep Freeze to that and adjacent foes (up to 5 targets at once). 
Deep Freeze:
- Target with this debuff takes 15% (5% in PvP/WvW) more damage. (20 sec duration)

2)
Same but on Chilling Nova proc, instead of striking a chilled foe. (40 sec Deep Freeze duration)

This would cause the loss of Reaper's Onslaught,  meaning trading personal dps for group utility (group dmg) in a unique way. Wont cause problem in solo content (open world) or small scale content with fast phased encounters (fractal), where Deathly Chill would be suppar to RO (wich is the current best option) hence the encounters are too short for staching (takes up 15 sec on case 1, 32 sec on case 2).
On the other hand, this mechanism would provide team utility  coming from active participation, planed rotation like alac/quick, not like spirits and Empower Allies passivity by existing.

Maybe something like this could give an aspect to Reaper in group content without making it broken on any part.


 

[Dadnir.5038]

@Elbritil.3817

You're just wrong on 1 point, 35k is the peak of dps potential that the reaper can achieve. As much as other professions won't achieve their peak dps potential, reaper won't achive his own. Reaper will only be able to reach his peak dps potential where other professions will be able to achieve their own.

 

In practice, it usually put every professions on an average that's situated in between 10k and 20k. The reaper probably being able to stand at 16-17k. An important point to take into account because it mean that using easier rotations with other professions don't necessarily mean that they will end up with less dps in practice as, anyway, a big chunk of dps is always lost to cope with mechanisms, breaking those optimal rotations.

[AXLIB.8425]

On 7/23/2021 at 5:38 AM, mortrialus.3062 said:

The filthy dirt and garbage eating bottom dwellers, Warriors, Revenants, Guardians, Rangers, Engineers, Thieves, Mesmers, and Elementalists, are working together to cry to ArenaNet that necro is overpowered.  The truth is necro is unchanged and balanced.  Necro players have simply caught up to the game itself through clever build craft after spending almost a decade being the unambiguous worst profession.   If necro was truly over powered, you wouldn't see people asking for nerfs.  You'd see people en masse bandwagoning onto the class which you simply do not. 

If that is the case then just be glad anet didn't actually listen and gut your entire class like they did with mesmer even if the situation is the same.

[Infusion.7149]

 

4 hours ago, Dadnir.5038 said:

@Elbritil.3817

You're just wrong on 1 point, 35k is the peak of dps potential that the reaper can achieve. As much as other professions won't achieve their peak dps potential, reaper won't achive his own. Reaper will only be able to reach his peak dps potential where other professions will be able to achieve their own.

 

In practice, it usually put every professions on an average that's situated in between 10k and 20k. The reaper probably being able to stand at 16-17k. An important point to take into account because it mean that using easier rotations with other professions don't necessarily mean that they will end up with less dps in practice as, anyway, a big chunk of dps is always lost to cope with mechanisms, breaking those optimal rotations.

Ignoring Matt / Trio / SH/TL which are condi fights or things people don't care what you are on for DPS:

https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/vg   ----13K , on par with other classes, this is with the arena damage as well so scourge is stronger even if same DPS
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/gors --- 12K , about average but behind scourge and this is with Gorseval stomp attacks ; scourge is stronger here
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/sab --- ~10K , below average even though there are adds probably due to the random damage but scourge is a top spec here and can flak kite too

https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/sloth   --- ~13K roughly on par with other DPS specs
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/kc --- ~19K Reaper basically a top DPS spec
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/xera --- ~10K on par with power Soulbeast , pBS , and DH
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/cairn ---isolating for normal mode (greens in CM screw you over on power reaper), Reaper ~16K which is on par with DH / FB
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/mo --- ~19K for reaper on par with DH and power soulbeast more or less; scourge is a top spec here too
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/sam ---just under 10K on par with FB/weaver, power soulbeast, herald, etc
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/dei --- just under 17K on par with other DPS classes ; scourge is a top spec here
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/dhuum --- ~12K which is better than DH and on par with soulbeast but scourge is a top spec here due to mechanics
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/ca --- ~22K across normal/CM which isn't terrible (it's ahead of BS + core guard or power soulbeast)
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/q1   Qadim it fulfills lamp duty and scourge is a top spec
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/adina ---~9K which isn't great but scourge works here even though being a minorly power biased fight
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/sabir --- ~9K damage incoming is problematic as well as movement ; scourge isn't terrible here though
https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/raid/q2  --- ~15K which is not great but on par with DH, scourge fulfills pylon here

Reaper is not as bad as people make it out to be. In fractals if people don't break the breakbar which results in scourges being busted, it's perfectly servicable when there are added mobs to fuel life force.

An example of an extremely lopsided scenario is Boneskinner where scourge is more or less top DPS and top support whereas reaper is life force deprived and mediocre (see https://gw2wingman.nevermindcreations.de/strike/bone).
 

Edited August 12, 2021 by Infusion.7149

[Obtena.7952]

As usual, the point devolves to 'DPS' ... people forgetting how the game works. 

Edited August 13, 2021 by Obtena.7952