What if we could copy Blight?

[Rym.1469]

So...

 

Reverse barrier was something we spoke of years ago, but there was also another thing tied to it that could potentially come with HB.

 

What if we could copy our Blight onto the chosen target? Via grandmaster trait or Elite? Or Grandmaster trait that unlocks a longer cooldown ability in Shroud in place of the utilities? HB could also simply get F2 and grandmasters would modify it's functionality (with the Blight stacks copy being one of the options).

 

This could open up another avenue for Harbinger. While quite possibly requiring some limiting in PvE, this could create a proper desire to reach high Blight levels in PvP and to play Harbinger in PvP in general as a unique, possible roamer role. Furthermore, this could make Elixirs more welcome in PvP build to quickly build up Blight before copy and a spike. GW1 had target max health reduction in form of Deep Wound condition, so this would be similar.

 

There's also another option for this - in Guild Wars 1 there was an Elite called Grenth's Balance. Repurposing it to fit Harbinger, it could be a defensive or offensive effect depending on the situation. For HB, it could equalize both health and Blight between you and the chosen target.

 

There's a lot that can be done with Blight and I'd love to see it interact in more ways, such as above.

 

 

Edited August 14, 2021 by Rym.1469

[Drarnor Kunoram.5180]

It would be excellent to have more trait interaction with Blight, and I love the idea of transferring/spreading it to enemies, albeit in controlled amounts.  The Grenth's Balance idea is awesome.  Maybe like "when you leave Shroud, your next attack transfers half of your blight stacks to the target?"

[Rym.1469]

14 minutes ago, Drarnor Kunoram.5180 said:

It would be excellent to have more trait interaction with Blight, and I love the idea of transferring/spreading it to enemies, albeit in controlled amounts.  The Grenth's Balance idea is awesome.  Maybe like "when you leave Shroud, your next attack transfers half of your blight stacks to the target?"

I think copying Blight should never be a proc. Ideally it would be a distinguishable cast player could avoid. That's why I like the idea of this being Elite (maybe unlikely now because we already have one and it's high Blight would actually synergize) or a F2 skill you'd have to spec into. Wouldn't want it to be accessible to every Harbinger build not to run into the same problems as Scourge.

 

Could possibly replace the "power" Grandmaster and be split so specifically in PvE copying Blight would increase damage done to the target with it.

 

Second Grandmaster could turn F2 into Quickness to fit the existing archetype.

 

Third Grandmaster could do something with condition. My quick idea here would be that F2 either creates a miasma field itself or the next few Shroud mobility abilities leave a miasma field/trail and enemies standing in miasma receive extra conditions when hit with Shroud 1 or something. Or the trails doing X depending on your Blight levels.

Edited August 14, 2021 by Rym.1469

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

What they need to do is add a F2 to cash in your blight somehow, on a CD of course.

 

Something like:

 

Channel your blight into a powerful attack. Steals 100 life from nearby targets per stack of blight. Gain 1% lifeforce per blight stack consumed. 25s CD, 1/2s cast.

 

That way if you get in a hairy situation, you can dump the blight, get some healing/damage, and some lifeforce back.

[Rym.1469]

7 minutes ago, Lan Deathrider.5910 said:

What they need to do is add a F2 to cash in your blight somehow, on a CD of course.

 

Something like:

 

Channel your blight into a powerful attack. Steals 100 life from nearby targets per stack of blight. Gain 1% lifeforce per blight stack consumed. 25s CD, 1/2s cast.

 

That way if you get in a hairy situation, you can dump the blight, get some healing/damage, and some lifeforce back.

I think the ArenaNet's intent and the high risk/high reward of this spec is that Blight is not treated as a resource and can't be easily spent/got rid of. I believe that Blight should always be a punishment, but you should have ways to capitalize on it in different ways and Shroud/damage should be powerful to compensate too, as Cmc said on stream. You should have incentive in all game modes to have as high Blight as you can spare - currently it mostly applies to PvE and the carrot might not be there for PvP and WvW.

 

That's why I suggested a copy instead of a transfer.

 

Your idea specifically is good because it interacts with Blight, but while it should scale with Blight, it shouldn't probably remove it.

Edited August 14, 2021 by Rym.1469

[ZDragon.3046]

This wouldnt work well in pve for a few reasons. Blight is a effect that edits vitality. In other words its a percentage of max hp... in other words on targets in pve with extremely high hp it would possibly effectively be doing very very stupid amounts of damage when it was applied because their max hp values are so high.

 

Secondly this is not the blight interaction harbinger really needs. 

The heal elixir.. Why this does not remove some current blight stacks or heal based on current stacks is beyond me.

The break stun elixir... same thing honestly.....

The other elixirs???? Shoulnt they be empowered when you have blight stacks over a certain threshold.....

 

It feels like blight was thought of to only be a negative effect and honestly it being balanced out by a single dps modifier is not enough to warrant its current effects. At a base level it IS only a negative handicap and i hope the dps numbers make up for that... otherwise the system should have been designed closer to holo's heat system.

Where you can collect blight without any immediate effect but reaching a certain cap of blight nukes your health 

From there you could have easily made traits that causes the blight to radiate out of you and damage nearby foes or something.

 

Transferring blight in pvp would work but i fear in pve it would cause a lot of problems. There is only one other skill in the game that works similarly to blight and ive not done enough testing with it in pve to see how it effects AI targets in the long term. 

 

Feel free to go out and test lich Grim spector on things if you are interested to seeing how basically xfering blight would work.

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

1 hour ago, Rym.1469 said:

I think the ArenaNet's intent and the high risk/high reward of this spec is that Blight is not treated as a resource and can't be easily spent/got rid of. I believe that Blight should always be a punishment, but you should have ways to capitalize on it in different ways and Shroud/damage should be powerful to compensate too, as Cmc said on stream. You should have incentive in all game modes to have as high Blight as you can spare - currently it mostly applies to PvE and the carrot might not be there for PvP and WvW.

 

That's why I suggested a copy instead of a transfer.

 

Your idea specifically is good because it interacts with Blight, but while it should scale with Blight, it shouldn't probably remove it.

All fair points, but that is also why I suggested a 25s CD, which is roughly how long Blight lasts anyway. It would be an out if you need it, but would sacrifice the damage boost.
 

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

Regardless, in PvE or WvW you would run something like Sentinel's/Wanderer's with this. Roll Spite/Soul Reaping with Death Perception and Thief Runes. No need to worry about 50% HP when you can rock 40k base hp.

[Rym.1469]

55 minutes ago, ZDragon.3046 said:

This wouldnt work well in pve for a few reasons. Blight is a effect that edits vitality. In other words its a percentage of max hp... in other words on targets in pve with extremely high hp it would possibly effectively be doing very very stupid amounts of damage when it was applied because their max hp values are so high.

 

Secondly this is not the blight interaction harbinger really needs. 

The heal elixir.. Why this does not remove some current blight stacks or heal based on current stacks is beyond me.

The break stun elixir... same thing honestly.....

The other elixirs???? Shoulnt they be empowered when you have blight stacks over a certain threshold.....

 

It feels like blight was thought of to only be a negative effect and honestly it being balanced out by a single dps modifier is not enough to warrant its current effects. At a base level it IS only a negative handicap and i hope the dps numbers make up for that... otherwise the system should have been designed closer to holo's heat system.

Where you can collect blight without any immediate effect but reaching a certain cap of blight nukes your health 

From there you could have easily made traits that causes the blight to radiate out of you and damage nearby foes or something.

 

Transferring blight in pvp would work but i fear in pve it would cause a lot of problems. There is only one other skill in the game that works similarly to blight and ive not done enough testing with it in pve to see how it effects AI targets in the long term. 

 

Feel free to go out and test lich Grim spector on things if you are interested to seeing how basically xfering blight would work.

 

For copied Blight in PvE there's a simple limit = Blight in PvE equals to the amount of Blight took away from your original health pool.

 

Partially inspired by it, I decided to solve it and just remake Grandmasters. Each Grandmaster would simply unlock access to a different F2 ability described below:

 

https://imgur.com/a/sXt9viA

 

They all interact with Blight in different ways and are usable in both PvE and PvP. There's one for each archetype, but they all have some utility that could potentially be used by any in different situations. All 3 are unique and locked behind different traits so you have to choose and serve as big payoffs for keeping Blight on yourself.

Edited August 14, 2021 by Rym.1469

[ZDragon.3046]

32 minutes ago, Rym.1469 said:

 

For copied Blight in PvE there's a simple limit = Blight in PvE equals to the amount of Blight took away from your original health pool.

 

Partially inspired by it, I decided to solve it and just remake Grandmasters. Each Grandmaster would simply unlock access to a different F2 ability described below:

 

https://imgur.com/a/sXt9viA

 

They all interact with Blight in different ways and are usable in both PvE and PvP. There's one for each archetype, but they all have some utility that could potentially be used by any in different situations. All 3 are unique and locked behind different traits so you have to choose and serve as big payoffs for keeping Blight on yourself.

Sounds simple does not mean its simple in application we dont know the inner workings of how anet has things coded and how easily they can adjust that code to work as you say.

Even if we did it in this case that might sound horribly weak in practical use 11k raw hp in damage is not much as a one off ability. They would be better off creating a new skill that just deals strike damage that gets an increased modifier per stack of blight consumed on use.

 

The f2 idea could be a way to work around blight but i would rathersee it work with what they have already built so far. Just make it work with the shroud skills 2-5 or make it work with elixirs.

You shouldnt need a grandmaster trait to make make use of it imo.. it should just have a positive at base just like its a negative effect at base. 

 

Holo heat is a negative and limited resource on how long you can use photon forge... Blight is trying to in a way be the same thing however there is no pay off for stacking blight without traits. Vs holos getting benefits for building high levels of heat without the use of traits through enhanced utility effects and weapon skill effects.

 

The risk / reward values are grossly out of proportion here but i still think maybe lets wait till tuesday and see what the raw dps numbers look like. Several times did cmc claim this to be more glass selfish dps than reaper. IF the numbers say otherwise with these handicaps then he will know it needs changes pretty quick. 

Edited August 14, 2021 by ZDragon.3046

[felincyriac.5981]

just add any interaction with blight, currently it's so boring. It just stacks up and sits there.

[Rym.1469]

20 hours ago, felincyriac.5981 said:

just add any interaction with blight, currently it's so boring. It just stacks up and sits there.

I think the interaction for pve is there to some degree, but it's not present for competitive game modes yet, especially with pre-emptive nerf to modifiers Cmc mentioned. 

 

My bet is the developers will start looking more into this type of feedback once beta concludes me people get the hands on experience. 

 

It'd truly be a shame not to build a bit more around Blight as the mechanic stands out a lot. Wouldn't want it to be just eventually progressively nullified or be reduced just to a pve thing.