What?! Your Necromancer is evolving!

[Akirai Annuvil]

Currently, I'm not happy with the Necro's implementation. Sure the profession oozes that death obsessed gothic cool factor, but its gameplay is based around passivity - you're either mashing your animates so they can fight the fight for you, spamming your hexes hoping your enemy triggers them or pressing your lifesteal buttons as soon as the caller says 0. No thought, no finesse, mostly spam, and if there's one thing me, and most of the PvP community can't stand, it's spam skills. As long as they're the basis of the necro, the class will end up being broken and whined about or useless and left to rot. The archtype is so popular though that ANet is almost bound to revisit it - the question then becomes, in what way can the class be changed to make it both active and in keeping with its classic style?

Evolving the Minions
Minions are 'maintained' with energy upkeep.
Minions can be locked on to targets.
Forcibly stopping to maintain a minion causes the minion to blow up, triggering an AoE effect.
When not near a corpse, minions require a large health sacrifice instead.
Minions come in both the spectral and undead variety; the one having a defensive, the other an offensive effect.
Explanations
A small point by point explanation how this helps achieve the goal of making necro's more active. Minions are a principally permanent form of pressure, without any skill investment. Once they're out, they'll be attacking and causing damage until stopped. This is fine, but as long as they're causing pressure on the opposing team, they're also pressuring their owner. This limits the amount of minions he can have, as well as the amount of pressure he can inflict himself. Finding a balance is key for the necro to maximize usefulness.
Minions having specific targets reduces the impact AI has on their efficiency. The less AI is in control of minions, the more involved the player has to be.
Exploding minions is of course, awesome. I mean seriously, who does not like minions exploding on death? More importantly, it increases strategic depth - do you maintain your minion and have it deal damage continuously or do you send it in, sacrificing it to maybe spread some disease around or remove some hexes?
As long as minions require a corpse, they require building around. Having to build around them means they're silly and gimmicky, and won't see use. Having them require a sac is a different, risky, way to allow you to create a minion without allowing you to spam them.
More, different types of minions is awesome simply because there's some really cool spectre models and some really kickas s undead models to create and use. I'd also vary their strengths and weaknesses - for example undead minions having extra high defense versus physical attacks, but being weak to elemental attacks, spectres being the opposite. Minion effects should be so diverse as the rit's binding ritual effects.

Explaining it lorewise isn't too difficult either - an ancient, incredibly powerful, dragon has just risen to Lord over the Undead. It strengthens minions sure, but also tries to pull them in. It's up to the MM to prevent the pull, which explains the energy maintenance - it doesn't want to have any part of the minions remaining for the dragonlord to abuse, which explains the explosion.

Changing Curses
All Necromancer hexes have their recharge halved if their target is attacking or using a skill.
Efficient hexes (in PvP) need to have their recharge halved.
Necromancer Hexes focus on 'trigger damage', degen and passive defence.
Explanations
Fewer changes but hopefully with an equally big effect. The first two changes make the main difference. To be able to use the necro's skills at all effectively, you need to be aware of what is happening and what your target is doing. Though the effect they offer may be largely passive in nature, the requirement to know what people are doing would hopefully make up for it. Adding the 'halved recharge' clause to all necro hexes creates clarity for people getting into the class and assures all of them are balanced around the same rulesets.
The key to balancing the hexes properly is balancing their recharge vs. duration. In general I'd say recharge of passive hexes needs to be slightly higher than hex removal's recharge, where duration needs to be about equal to the hex's recharge.
This allows the necro to spread the love when triggering the halved recharge, but without allowing the necro to just continue spamming them.
Their proposed applications are similar to their current incarnation, with anti-block hexes removed.

The Last Remnant
For the 'other' skills, no infinite range buffs like [[order of pain].
Incorporate a fair amount of enchantment removal.
Lifesteal needs to be either affected by prot or removed.
Soul reaping's mechanic needs to be changed to something controllable, like reducing life sac.
Explanations
Infinite range skills are degenerate to the core - they actually promote you to not only ignore the battlefield but to stay away from it. Plus, as they affect the entire party they tend to only promote one playstyle.
Enchantment removal seems to be a necro thing nowadays and admittedly, it fits their overall style. I'd like to see them keep in charge of this role.
Lifesteal, when bypassing prot, needs to be done in terribly small packages to a point where it becomes useless to bring it at all. After all if it's done in big packages the spikeability becomes too great. If it's affected by prot though, the lifesteal can be increased to something more respectable, something maybe even useable as a selfheal/damage source. A secondary option is to double or even triple the healing received for a few key lifesteal skills while keeping the damage low, making it viable selfheals.
An attribute like Soul Reaping is impossible to balance around. In a normal match, you can't predict how many people will die so you can't balance the skills in accordance with the deaths; in a rigged match (a gimmick) so much stuff dies, it surpasses the energy gain estimated and balanced around. Ultimately, a primary like SR will be balanced around global estimations for the entire game, but the death toll varies way too much per arena, area, match and mission to make the balance in anyway balanced. Better to change SR's functionality to something you can't just predict but also roughly calculate, something outside of the realm of player control, but in keeping with the dark necro appearance. Manipulating life sac fits the bill, it's easy to balance around, provides a solid bonus to skills, and is suffiently depressing for out paleskinned friend.

I'm afraid those were the only ideas I could think off. Some of them are a bit general, others are a bit whack - hell some of them are so far unseen. All of them though seem like an improvement over the current version. Which is yay by me.

[Shinryu]

Good thread, GW quality material in there. It seems that your ideas will actually keep people from whining, unless they are the pompous-teenage-thinks-they-are-cool-because-they-think-everything-sucks type of person.

:D :D :D

[Simply Kedde]

Very much agreed on curses and the rest. Minions I don't really know much about. I've never been fond of the concept other than lorewise and for the cool looks it has.
Curses needs to be at at least half of their duration and generally be like all other active hexes. Short duration. Shortish recharge and an energy cost balanced about the power of the effects.

[sequel]

First off kepp your hands away from soul reaping, tweaking around with it has caused mayhem among pve players before and will do so again. It's a powerful primary but the entire profession is based on it. Skill changes are constructif improvements while primary changes are just plain murder.

About your comments on curses, don't confuse the way you play a mesmer and the way you play a necro. If your proposed changes were to be made, appart from aoe dmg the two professions would be identical twins. Mesmers bewitch their ennemies, necros curse em. Mesmers are pupeteers while necros are a disease, a plaque, an omen of bad luck.

About the minions, try playing a ritualist build around spirits. I'm pretty sure that it is what your looking for rather than a minion master.

And if you don't like necro's choose another profession for your character, where exacty is the problem ? There are several professions i don't particular like and never felt the need to play , but i'm not gonna ask that these should be changed towards my personnal preferences and disregard those that actually liked these professions.

And why is this in the Gw2 discussion forum ? Your comments concern the necro we know in Gw1 and asking for a change doesn't make it Gw2 material per se. Some of us still appreciate playing Gw1 despite the announced Gw2 which will be a totally diffrent game that has yet to earn credits. Sharing the same name doesn't make it an improved version of it's predecessor.

[Sir Jack]

And why is this in the Gw2 discussion forum ? Your comments concern the necro we know in Gw1 and asking for a change doesn't make it Gw2 material per se. Some of us still appreciate playing Gw1 despite the announced Gw2 which will be a totally diffrent game that has yet to earn credits. Sharing the same name doesn't make it an improved version of it's predecessor.

Likely to suggest changes to balance the profession should it return in GW2, unless ANet follow D3 and makes it a Witchdoctor...

On Akirai's suggestions:

- Minions:
While I like most the suggestions and agree with them, I have to say having the require energy-upkeep is a bit much. This is actually present by having to heal them every couple of seconds. This was of course implemented better with Verata's Saccrifice. So, instead of Energy Upkeep, how about a skill that heals them/counters degen that works as a hybrid between VS and BotM? An example for current GW would be:
15 EN, 1s cast time, 30s recharge
For 30 seconds, all your minions gain +15 regen. You saccrifice 3% HP for every minion affected.
Along with the 10 Minion Limit, this means that you lose 15 EN and 30% HP every 30s to keep a full army rolling.

Along with Minions that can be summoned from a high sacc cost if there's no corpse, the MM would have to be rather careful when tryin to conjure an army. I'd also say that if no corpse is around, the recharge of the summon is increased. We don't want MM having full armies before the match starts, do we?


- Soul Reaping
Fixing the current implementation of SR:
You gain X EN when a foe dies. If one of the minions under your control dies, you gain X EN.

No EN from allies or allied Minions, no EN from Spirits. With the Sacc cost on Minions, you could exchange HP for EN, but it'd be costly (EN and HP for summon, in return gain some EN), so it wouldn't be abusable. In PvE, no inelegant EN gain cap crap, you steamroll everything with or without it anyway.
In PvP, if the opposing team is dying so fast it'd be under the current cap, they're getting owned and will lose anyway.

[Uluwuluzulubulu]

I like the ideas. MM needs a change for GW2 and this one looks ok so far. The biggest problems with MMs are the limited on/off rampage control of minions in combat and the lagging behind on the rest through the need for upkeep spamming. Most people i know have left this mindnumbing task to a hero , who does a reasonable job at it. I also like the big health sac possibility when lacking a corpse. I was hoping that this ability would have come as a skill for a GW 1 expansion for quite some time but no luck there.
I agree with the need for a reworked SR for GW2 and the idea for blood (with some added sacrificial skill to pump that excess selfheal in).

[Akirai Annuvil]

Curses needs to be at at least half of their duration and generally be like all other active hexes. Short duration. Shortish recharge and an energy cost balanced about the power of the effects.
Active hexes does not just mean a shorter duration, recharge and balanced energy cost. Active hexes, like diversion, require you to be aware of your opponent and their actions and respond appropriately. Reckless haste used to have a longer duration and recharge - it got shortened so you have to press the button more often to activate it. It still hasn't become active, as it doesn't require your involvement in the action in anyway.

First off kepp your hands away from soul reaping,
My suggestion is even better. Keep SR away from my hands. Just remove it and if primaries still exist in GW2, replace it with something more controllable and less volatile (like my idea).

Skill changes are constructif improvements while primary changes are just plain murder.
Expertise begs to differ.

If your proposed changes were to be made, appart from aoe dmg the two professions would be identical twins. This is moderately funny as I haven't mentioned aoe anywhere. It becomes even more funny when you remember I never mentioned mesmers. To top off the hilarity, you manage to completely forget how Mesmers don't have any access to minions or lifesteal.

About the minions, try playing a ritualist build around spirits. I'm pretty sure that it is what your looking for rather than a minion master.
I'm pretty sure you're mentally handicapped. If you can't see the difference between the proposed minions and binding rituals (the target lock, mobility, explosions should all have been subtle hints) you pretty much have to be retarded.

And if you don't like necro's choose another profession for your character, where exacty is the problem ?
The problem is the necro's bad design. It rivals rits and paras in innate levels of broken. Of course ANet could do what you're asking for in which case you'll never see a necro in PvP again. As I like PvP and like the death manipulation archtype the necro represents, I'd actually like them to not be broken and actually be balanceable without causing ****loads of qq.


And why is this in the Gw2 discussion forum ?
Because I'm asking for a complete rewrite of the class in its practically inevitable GW2 incarnation, instead of its currently present GW1 incarnation.

Sequel, I get that you're a long standing Necro player; this may have given you the mistaken impression that randomly ramming your fist on the keyboard actually makes you a valuable contributor all over the internet. It does not. Please stop spouting epic walls of unrelated information, personal interpretation and barely veiled attempts at derailing. As much fun as your inability to read and understand causes me, the chances of me developing carpal tunnel actually responding are too much for my health insurance to bear.

- Minions:
While I like most the suggestions and agree with them, I have to say having the require energy-upkeep is a bit much. This is actually present by having to heal them every couple of seconds. This was of course implemented better with Verata's Saccrifice. So, instead of Energy Upkeep, how about a skill that heals them/counters degen that works as a hybrid between VS and BotM?
I considered this, but I disliked the idea of minions basically requiring you to bring a skill to manage them staying alive for more than 15 seconds. Having you bring a skill limits your skill bar greatly, and makes you far more vulnerable to disruption. It's also constantly in danger of becoming the quintessential unnerfable minion skill, as every minion, their decay, all get balanced around it.
As far as skills go, yours administers the same principle my version would. Exact numbers like recharge, cast time, energy cost, sac need to stay up in the air. If I were developing it, I'd probably make it more dependant on the number of minions, but that'd end up requiring alot of alpha and beta testing anyway.

I'd also say that if no corpse is around, the recharge of the summon is increased. We don't want MM having full armies before the match starts, do we?
An awesome little idea I had was having an Avatar of Balthazar come down from the heavens and smitekill all minions when the timer reaches 0. BOOM.

With the Sacc cost on Minions, you could exchange HP for EN, but it'd be costly (EN and HP for summon, in return gain some EN), so it wouldn't be abusable.
Preventing abuse from necros isn't that hard. The thing I was attempting was to allow for balancing around the skill. Currently, no skill can be balanced around SR so almost all skills are better on a mesmer, ele or even monk. The exception to this are wail of doom, foul feast, minions and (arguably) SS, which scale very favourably with necro's runes or bluntly require SR. Changing SR to directly effect most necro skills allows those necro skills to be balanced around it.

Most people i know have left this mindnumbing task to a hero , who does a reasonable job at it.
Yeah, which is a shame. GW minions are some of the best looking in the industry, I'd like to see them actually be used gladly because they're fun and interesting rather than forced on the player while boring and spammy.

I agree with the need for a reworked SR for GW2 and the idea for blood (with some added sacrificial skill to pump that excess selfheal in).
If it were up to me, 80% of all necro skills would have a sac associated to them. Easier balancing = ftw.

[Simply Kedde]

Of course cutting all stats on curses won't really make them active. I just don't see any way of making the skills a lot more active if they're gonna be anything like the ones we have currently. I just don't want the same mistake of having curses be some longlasting hexes with short recharges and debiliating effects only having the cost trying to balance it out. Those aren't exactly fun. I find your idea of halving recharge if the foe your hex is performing a specific task amusing. I wouldn't be anything but happy if something like it was implemented to gw. I just do not see how it would fit for anything else than balance.

[Uluwuluzulubulu]

If it were up to me, 80% of all necro skills would have a sac associated to them. Easier balancing = ftw.

Makes me wonder about your stance on skills like Masochism and Dark aura. Personally i think these skills are holding sac skills back. I remember dark pact got a buff a while back which was recalled due to a gimmick build with dark aura and the old vampiric spirit. Which makes that sac skills were balanced to the gimmick combo and not to their own potential (which is hurting yourself more then your opponent).

[sequel]

Some things to point out :

the reference to mesmers as stated involved the curse line and was a response to the fact that you want necros to anticipate the ennemies attack pattern, that's a mesmers role in my book

you want both defensif and offensif minions that explode with a high energy sack, that's pretty close to the way rit spirits work

you may consider necro a broken class in pvp but take into account that there is a pve part of the game

scince you obviously want a completly diffrent type of profession with the same bad goth looks than the necros, you should advertise to scrap the concept and ask anet to design a class just for you

as for calling me a retard, it's always refreshing to encounter the likes of you and remember how pathetic people can be

[raspberry jam]

Necromancer is imo one of the more difficult professions to look at from the standpoint of balance.


Evolving the Minions
Minions are 'maintained' with energy upkeep.
Minions can be locked on to targets.
Forcibly stopping to maintain a minion causes the minion to blow up, triggering an AoE effect.
When not near a corpse, minions require a large health sacrifice instead.
Minions come in both the spectral and undead variety; the one having a defensive, the other an offensive effect.While I like to see a merge of the necromancer and the ritualist, I disagree that the minion armies of today should be removed. More unique types of minions can still exist, like a [[Recuperation|Ghostly Mending Spirit] that gives the entire party health regen or an [[Animate Flesh Golem|Animated Zombie Warrior] that will attack the targets you want, maybe even use skills from some limited set - but I do think that the necromancer should still have access to [[Animate Bone Minions|Swarms of Braindead Undead]. Yes it's fire-and-forget, but it can be good to have things like that too.
The extreme version of your idea would be to have literal minion skills, sort of like rangers have pet skills.
The explode-on-stop idea I don't like. :undecided: It smells of gimmick to allow AoE damage which can be precisely controlled in time and location (even though the location is obvious to the other team), impossible to interrupt, free of cost (except losing a minion), as well as not requiring a skill slot sacrifice. Maybe, depending on how the rest of the game would work, it could be balanced. Very likely though it would be possible to build a gimmick around it.
I'm not sure what you mean when you say that minions shouldn't require corpses. While I do think that GW2 monking should be more about protting than healing, let's face it, there will probably be a [[Infuse Health|powerheal] spell available, and it's not a big thing to ask your monk to heal you when you create your minion, especially if said minion would be powerful enough to motivate energy upkeep and/or a large health sacrifice.


Changing Curses
All Necromancer hexes have their recharge halved if their target is attacking or using a skill.
Efficient hexes (in PvP) need to have their recharge halved.
Necromancer Hexes focus on 'trigger damage', degen and passive defence.Sounds a bit dangerous considering that some characters (frontline) will probably be attacking nearly all the time. Also, some anti-block hexes are good ([[Rigor Mortis|the ones that prevents blocking] are not, but [[Defile Defenses|the ones that punish it] are). Still, the idea to halve recharge when the hex is used in a certain way is a fresh and interesting idea! It does sound more like something for mesmers, but then again, hexes are hard to balance because they take no skill. As this would add the need of skilled usage, I see no major problems with it, and despite making hexes fully reactive when used efficiently, I like it.


The Last Remnant
For the 'other' skills, no infinite range buffs like [[order of pain].
Incorporate a fair amount of enchantment removal.
Lifesteal needs to be either affected by prot or removed.
Soul reaping's mechanic needs to be changed to something controllable, like reducing life sac.These are obviously good. Even though orders was (well, still [[Barrage|is]) [[I Will Avenge You|fun to abuse], it is an inherently really broken idea for a skill, and needs to go.
Soul Reaping is idiotic in nature which is why it needs artificial balance mechanics such as the 3 times/15 sec thing. Your version is better, but I have a suggestion that ties in with your minion suggestion. Apart from any other benefits that SR might have (the halved recharge on hexes should maybe not always be half - not always 50%, but maybe 2% for each rank in SR or something), I think that instead of energy upkeep for minions, the maximum energy for the necromancer should be reduced by a certain amount (different for each minion, the amount affected by your ranks of SR). This would place the MM under pressure - another kind of pressure - while he has minions active, as well as enabling him to reclaim energy when minions die, which is the primary use of SR for PvE necros.

[Simply Kedde]

Saying hexes take no skill is a bit much. Timing diversion, shame etc. can turn the tides of matches. Though I couldn't agree more if we're only looking at the curses attribute.

[Nemeon Lion]

Let's mix Akirai idea with Raspberry idea for hexes.

If an enemy is attacking/casting a skill, the recharge is reduced by 4% for each Soul Reaping level. This only affects hexes of the Curses atribute. This means that bringing a Necromancer primary is actually usefull, prevents abuse from other professions and gives a bit of active play for general hex use.

You could give another bonus besides the recharge for Soul Reaping though, like reduced sac cost.

[Sir Jack]

Let's mix Akirai idea with Raspberry idea for hexes.

If an enemy is attacking/casting a skill, the recharge is reduced by 4% for each Soul Reaping level. This only affects hexes of the Curses atribute. This means that bringing a Necromancer primary is actually usefull, prevents abuse from other professions and gives a bit of active play for general hex use.

You could give another bonus besides the recharge for Soul Reaping though, like reduced sac cost.

If there's anything Spawning Power shows us, it's that Primaries that only affect one part of the class are completely useless attributes. A 4% recharge reduction ONLY if the spell is used actively instead of passively is too niche to make good use of. You're better off running a Me/N with MoR in that case.

[Nemeon Lion]

If there's anything Spawning Power shows us, it's that Primaries that only affect one part of the class are completely useless attributes. A 4% recharge reduction ONLY if the spell is used actively instead of passively is too niche to make good use of. You're better off running a Me/N with MoR in that case.


The energy idea posted before is also a good one. Just tried to find a way to incorporate Soul Reaping in the necros skills.

[Akirai Annuvil]

you should advertise to scrap the concept
You may not have noticed this but I am advertising to scrap the concept of mindless spam - which unfortunately includes the basis of the necro profession.

Yes it's fire-and-forget, but it can be good to have things like that too.~
The extreme version of your idea would be to have literal minion skills, sort of like rangers have pet skills.~
The explode-on-stop idea I don't like. :undecided: It smells of gimmick to allow AoE damage which can be precisely controlled in time and location (even though the location is obvious to the other team),~
I'm not sure what you mean when you say that minions shouldn't require corpses. ~
Fire and forget isn't bad for one or two skills. Currently however, it's the idea behind the entire mechanic of animates. I want the idea behind them to shift from 'mash animate when corpses available - mash botm when minions present' to 'how can I effectively master my minions use?'. This would probably include some dumb brutes, but also necessitates more extensive utility, a bigger risk-reward factor and easier availability. I'd find minion specific skills to be a bit iffy. They attempted such a system with pets and I'm not exactly glad where that led to in PvP either.
I also wouldn't let them deal any (major) damage when exploding. Have the explosions have other cool effects instead, whether that be interupting in the area, stripping nearby enchantments, or spreading disease.

~On anti block
I'd give defile defenses and other 'single trigger' hexes like [[mark of subversion], [[diversion] and [[clumsiness] to mesmers instead. They're the more mesmer-ish thing, especially incomparison to degen and passive defence hexes.

~On SR

~On SR
I figured adding multiple effects to a primary makes it seem convoluted and bloated. For myself, I don't mind too much whether it's incorporated in SR or not. Like Jack said though, it's not enough for a stand-alone primary effect.

Makes me wonder about your stance on skills like Masochism and Dark aura.
Though this is going a bit deep in a divergent topic, suffice to say, their existence changes the dynamic of sac skills completely. This change does not have to be bad, but it does mean they have to be taken into account when balancing. Personally though, the main problem necro's have is that they simply require too little skill which means they shouldn't be buffed to viability :-/

[Undead Priest]

Just some ideas I got from reading some of the previous posts,


I think an Interesting Idea for Soul Reaping, would be that you change Necromancers to have an Innate ability to have a significately reduced energy cost to All Skills, (i.e. 50% off) but in return all skills also require a Life Sacrifice,
The amount of that sacrifice would be dependent on two things.

1. The original energy cost of the skill
(So a 25e skill would require a greater life sacrifice cost than a 5e skill)

2. The amount allocated to soul reaping.
(More into soul reaping means the less health sacrificed on a particular energy cost)

(i.e. a 25e skill would be only 12e for a necromancer, but they would also sacrifice 33% max health at 0 SR, but with a 16 level of SR, they may only sacrifice 5% max health.)

Thus Soul Reaping would reduce that innate life sacrifice cost to all skills.



I also like the OP's concept of making minions require a Health Sacrifice instead of a corpse, which I always thought made them extremely gimmicky to start with.

Plus if my above concept for Soul Reaping was implemented, they would just have a High Energy Cost, and that in turn makes them very expensive in both health and energy to create.

With minions, I think if you're going to add maintenence it would make sense to eliminate the minion health degen, and buff the minions so that a single minion is actually something an opponent needs to have at least some concern about.
Not to mention I agree that Minions should be controllable like a Beastmasters Pet.

Overall It would make for an interesting dynamic because a Necromancer would have to concern themselves with how effective the Minion is at the time being, versus the drain it is on their Energy/Health reserves, (I'm also assuming there would be a Minion Healing skill which of course would require additional Energy/Life through the Altered soul reaping).

Plus if you made the Necromancer able to summon multiple types of minions anything from the traditional variety of Minions, to Spirits, to Nightmares, to Asura Summons, each with their own special Strengths and Weaknesses, then it would make being a minon master much more about the skill involved in choosing the right minion or set of minions and balancing the costs of both switching and maintaing those minions, rather than simply spamming a couple of skills under the right circumstances.


As far as LifeStealing, I like the answer of simply classifying it as Damage, that way it is effected by all the things that limit damage, in return you just greatly Increase the Health Gain effects so that the skills are properly balanced.



The OP's curses suggestion for Curses interested me, However I'm wondering if it might not be better to alter the curses from what they are to be something that requires more active awareness of the battlefield than the current variety,
in fact, I wondering if they shouldn't become something that is maintained through health degen to the caster like the current Maintained Enchantment's Energy Degen.
In return these hexes would generate a life steal effect anytime the Hexed foe(s) commits a particular action (i.e. attacks, moves, casts a spell, uses a skill), the action of course would be different for each hex. But if these new "Hexes" were handled like maintained enchantments then the Necromancer would need to be aware of who was casting or who was attacking, When they were moving and when they stopped doing the said action.
Because then the Necromancer would need to cancel their Hex, or otherwise waste health.
This way Hexing for a Necromancer would require incredible situational awareness so as not to waste their health because they were maintaining useless hexes like a Backfire type Hex on a Warrior.

[sorudo]

mmm, not gonna play a necro not GW2 if the necro is this screwed, minions are minions, not summoned elementals.
also, if SR would be in a balance streek, then making it so that you gain X max% energy from the enemy it self.
that way, if an enemy is out of energy like 2 energy, you only gain 1 energy.
but if the enemy has 40 energy, you gain X% of it's max energy.

[Sir Jack]

How about this for Minions, obviously inspired by Diablo:

- Class 1: Standard Minions
Same type we have now. Degen, require corpse, trigger SR from it's Master.

- Class 2: Magic Golems
Properties:
- Do not degen
- Do not trigger SR
- Do not require a corpse
- Require a hefty sacc cost to raise
- Can only have 1..2 of each type at a time (scales by DM)
- Can not be healed by normal Healing skills, only by it's master Necro skills
- Killing the Master destroys the Golems under it's command

Magic Golems would come in different varieties. The basic melee type would be an Earth Golem, whose attacks deal Earth damage. Attack speed equal to Horrors, higher base damage, scaling armor and HP.
A Ranged type would also be a Fire Golem, which would be able to hurl fireballs at foes.
Aditionally, there'd be spells to redirect conditions, damage or sacc cost to those Golems to use other spells.

That way, you'd have:
- The current Minion Master, relying on bodies and raising large armies to attack foes.
- The Golemancer, rasing a small army that can be micromanaged to make better use of them.

An example Bar would be:
- Raise Earth Golem
- Raise Fire Golem
- Restore Golem (heal)
- Golem Buff (Enchanted Golem Armor, gives Golem + AL)
- Golem Buff (Cold Grasp of Grenth, Golem deals Cold damage and attacks deal +X Cold Damage)
- Skill relying on Golem/Minion (Dark Bond, redirects damage or the one that transfers conditions)
- Skill requiring Golem (Dark Assault, you and nearest Golem saccrifice Y% HP, target takes X Damage)
- Rez

[Bravo]

The OP's curses suggestion for Curses interested me, However I'm wondering if it might not be better to alter the curses from what they are to be something that requires more active awareness of the battlefield than the current variety,
in fact, I wondering if they shouldn't become something that is maintained through health degen to the caster like the current Maintained Enchantment's Energy Degen.
In return these hexes would generate a life steal effect anytime the Hexed foe(s) commits a particular action (i.e. attacks, moves, casts a spell, uses a skill), the action of course would be different for each hex. But if these new "Hexes" were handled like maintained enchantments then the Necromancer would need to be aware of who was casting or who was attacking, When they were moving and when they stopped doing the said action.
Because then the Necromancer would need to cancel their Hex, or otherwise waste health.
This way Hexing for a Necromancer would require incredible situational awareness so as not to waste their health because they were maintaining useless hexes like a Backfire type Hex on a Warrior.

And following the vain of maintained enchantments, make it so that you can only 'maintain' hexes until you have -10 health pips, any more and you will lose one hex when you cast another. Possibly also have the limit that they can only be maintained within ear shot - This way the target has the option to completely withdraw and you are then forced to either follow or reapply later...

[Skyy High]

Sharing the same name doesn't make it an improved version of it's predecessor.
I think that's the idea mate, to discuss things that would make GW2 an improved version of GW1. Many of these suggestions are quite clearly too radical to take place in the current incarnation of GW, which is why the thread is in the GW2 discussion forum. Getting all huffy about proposed soul reaping changes is exactly why it should be changed; it has caused way too much controversy in GW1 to stay as it is, should the necro return in GW2. Better to balance the game from the start with the necro having other, more balance-able energy management options.

[raspberry jam]

I'd find minion specific skills to be a bit iffy. They attempted such a system with pets and I'm not exactly glad where that led to in PvP either. I agree. Setting them to attack a certain target is one thing, controlling their minute actions is another.


I'd give defile defenses and other 'single trigger' hexes like [[mark of subversion], [[diversion] and [[clumsiness] to mesmers instead. They're the more mesmer-ish thing, especially incomparison to degen and passive defence hexes. I agree with this as well... Apart from the name I have no idea why Defile Defenses is a necromancer hex.

[Alaris]

its gameplay is based around passivity

-Minions are 'maintained' with energy upkeep.
-Necromancer Hexes focus on 'trigger damage', degen and passive defence
-Lifesteal needs to be either affected by prot or removed.
-Soul reaping's mechanic needs to be changed to something controllable, like reducing life sac.

If you had started the thread saying "this is an idea for a new summoning class in GW2", I would have been thrilled. Sounds fun, different, exciting. But I would not want the necro to change that way. It's not an improvement, it's a totally different playstyle.

Some other comments: lifesac is too restricted to be of any interest. I'd never play that as a primary profession, no point.

Energy upkeep needs to be well implemented. I'd sooner think that you'd want a "permanent exhaustion" instead, which stays as long as the minion is alive. If it dies or you kill it, then an empty space on your energy bar appears, and your energy can regen. This means that you have to choose between more minions, or keeping the ability to cast spells. By your method, you'd soon end up with a very passive play much like the bonder.

Lifesteal's only positive side is that it is unaffected by prot & armor. Otherwise it's ineffective. It's also an effective counter to armor & prot, which is needed in the game.

Like I said, it's not that I think these are bad ideas. I like the necro how it is, and your ideas should be channeled into a new profession.

[Simply Kedde]

Akirai did mention lifestealing should have it's numbers raised if it would be affected by prot.

[Akirai Annuvil]

~
Maintained hexes are ok, but their maintenance cost needs to be both standardized (the same for all the necro hexes) and well balanced for each hex, making it dangerous and wasteful to maintan hexes not in full effect yet not so much that maintaining them is not worthwhile. I'd think it harder to balance than just having something like recharge reduced by a certain conditional.

~
Like I said, I don't mind the current style minions to be implemented. As long as those stay completely inviable in PvP, being bad for the game.
The golem skills seem a bit too dependant on the, well, golems. I'd prefer the skills to (heavily or lightly) interact with them but have a small independant effect as well.

It's not an improvement, it's a totally different playstyle.
Yeah, this seems to come up semi-regularly; just to point out the two aren't mutually exclusive. Necro requiring more skill isn't a bad thing.

I'd sooner think that you'd want a "permanent exhaustion" instead, which stays as long as the minion is alive.
Jack or raspberry mentioned it as well. I'm starting to like the idea better than my original.

It's also an effective counter to armor & prot, which is needed in the game.
It isn't - not until the damage becomes high enough to spike, which is when it needs to be nerfed. As far as effective counters to armor and prot, an effective counter to armor is damage and deep wound, an effective counter to prot is enchantment removal and shutdown. The game doesn't need lifesteal in its current incarnation. It serves no purpose but to spike; being unprottable and ranged, you don't want it to be spiking material.

[Bravo]

The thing to consider with 'permanent exhaustion' is that an elementalist could then (if energy alone dictates maximum number of minions) raise more minions than the necromancer (albeit without runes/headpieces to boost things such as level), which then opens the way to making it better than the primary (if combined with things such as winnowing/barbs/mark of pain...).

[Alaris]

Maintained hexes are ok

Just to point out the two aren't mutually exclusive. Necro requiring more skill isn't a bad thing.

Jack or raspberry mentioned it as well. I'm starting to like the idea better than my original.

It isn't - not until the damage becomes high enough to spike, which is when it needs to be nerfed.

Maintained anything unfortunately lead to passive play. You cast it, then mostly forget about it (unless it's removed).

I like summoner classes. I also like that Necros and Ritualists are very different in their summoning. Sometimes I enjoy more passive play, more relaxing... and sometimes I prefer more active. I also tend to prefer more active on characters that I have more experience with, because I know better when and how to use the skills. Active play means a steeper learning curve for new players, which can turn some of them away from the game. I'd sooner argue for a continuum, some skills are more active, thus give slightly better benefits if used well. But you can still be fairly effective with more passive skills.


The thing to consider with 'permanent exhaustion' is that an elementalist could then (if energy alone dictates maximum number of minions) raise more minions than the necromancer

Depends on implementation.

If exhaustion caused by this is %-based, then there's not much of an advantage being warrior or elementalist (there is still some to cover costs).

The primary could lower that cost sufficiently that you'd be better off being a summoner than an elementalist or ...

[Skyy High]

If you had started the thread saying "this is an idea for a new summoning class in GW2", I would have been thrilled. Sounds fun, different, exciting. But I would not want the necro to change that way. It's not an improvement, it's a totally different playstyle.
Hate to break it to you, but GW2 is going to be a completely different game. If it's just the same core 6 classes with new skills and prettier classes, we should all feel jipped.


Energy upkeep needs to be well implemented. I'd sooner think that you'd want a "permanent exhaustion" instead, which stays as long as the minion is alive. If it dies or you kill it, then an empty space on your energy bar appears, and your energy can regen. This means that you have to choose between more minions, or keeping the ability to cast spells. By your method, you'd soon end up with a very passive play much like the bonder.
I'd like the "minions take a piece of your energy while alive" mechanic better as well.


Lifesteal's only positive side is that it is unaffected by prot & armor. Otherwise it's ineffective. It's also an effective counter to armor & prot, which is needed in the game.
It's not a "counter" to armor and prot (given that they are the only two mechanisms of defense against spells in the game, saying that something is a counter to them doesn't make sense at all), it simply doesn't have a counter at all, which results in the situation we have now: lifestealing sucks unless it's part of an OP-ed spike.


Like I said, it's not that I think these are bad ideas. I like the necro how it is, and your ideas should be channeled into a new profession.
The necro is not going to remain "as it is." Full stop. Either we're getting completely new classes, or they're at least going to take the opportunity to completely revamp (heh, "vamp") the classes that we have now. Necros have issues, and to wave them off because you don't want any changes to your class in a brand new game is just relegating the necro to their basically-useless-but-always-one-step-from-being-OPed state that they've been in for the past 3 years.

[Alaris]

Hate to break it to you, but GW2 is going to be a completely different game.

I'd like the "minions take a piece of your energy while alive" mechanic better as well.

it simply doesn't have a counter at all, which results in the situation we have now: lifestealing sucks unless it's part of an OP-ed spike.

Yes, I know. GW2 is a new game. Why should that prevent me from discussing my opinions, ideas, and preferences?

I'm not telling ANet how to make it, they've probably decided that already. Just pointing out that there are pros and cons to active vs passive play. Not everyone likes the very active play of mesmers and the like. Also pointing out that there are different implementations of a summoner, like necro, rit, or the energy % exhaustion idea above. Each has its pros and cons.

As for blood magic skills, you're repeating yourself, and I really don't feel about arguing semantics. We can agree on this, blood is not particularly viable except for rare team builds based on spiking.

Personally, I would rather see blood being a form of healing - you steal blood from a target, and then send it to allies. It would perhaps be more fun that way. It's a completely different game afterall!

[Simply Kedde]

Hexes being maintained does in no way make them passive. When you need to maintain them thus the maintainence having a cost makes you want to only keep them up when they have the optimum effect not to waste energy or what they might cost. That leads to active play in choosing who to hex and when to do so and also when to stop hexing a certain target. Additionally it makes you think about the amount of energy you'll have further in the game rather than just spam them on the needed targets.

[raspberry jam]

The thing to consider with 'permanent exhaustion' is that an elementalist could then (if energy alone dictates maximum number of minions) raise more minions than the necromancer (albeit without runes/headpieces to boost things such as level), which then opens the way to making it better than the primary (if combined with things such as winnowing/barbs/mark of pain...).That's why the "exhaustion" should be affected by SR.

[The Boz]

I really dislike the changes in te OP and subsequent posts. It seems like most of them are listed not because they would be a good idea and a good gameplay mechanic, but just for the sake of changing something.

[Simply Kedde]

More like a lot of the mechanics for the necro in their current incarnation will be either overpowered or bad (at least in the fun factor, see lots of hex crap and the like).

[The Boz]

I may agree with some changes to the hexes if the two hexing playstyles still remain viable. The first is the dude who occasionally/on recharge spreads his hexes around and continues with conventional spells and effects, the second is the dude who is only spreading lots of hexes around, disrupting the enemy tactics. Currently, both of these are overshadowed by the dude who just spams Spiteful Spirit around....

And how do you know necro mechanics would be overpowered or bad? You have some insight into GW2 gameplay that I don't? Cause if you're just basing this on GW1, I see no OPedness in the necro at all...

[Skyy High]

And how do you know necro mechanics would be overpowered or bad? You have some insight into GW2 gameplay that I don't? Cause if you're just basing this on GW1, I see no OPedness in the necro at all...
And that's why you should have read the OP better. It described in detail why exactly the necro has always either been OP-ed or useless in PvP, as well as why the necro has always just been OP-ed in PvE. They've never been balanced, which is what these changes are meant to correct.

[Simply Kedde]

Of course I'm basing this on the current gw. That's the building ground for a new and improved proffession. We don't know if Anet will re-use any of it, but chances are they will. This is a suggestion as to how to re-use the original concepts of the necromancer and take them further to make them balanced in a way they won't end up like now, useless for anything serious (no, not in pve) or overpowered in more than one way.

[Bravo]

That's why the "exhaustion" should be affected by SR.

All exhaustion or just this 'summoning sickness' (to paraphrase some cartoon or other).

Just so that if ANet do choose to go for this that the wording can be all sorted well in advance (unlike for instance the original wording on expertise which was very cumbersome, and not even accurate).

[the forests wisper]

Let me go down the list.

the minion suggestion was plain stupid. Basically minions are ****tier pets. How many minions do you think you will be allowed to keep afloat before they all blow up? Current guild wars mechanic, specifically regarding regen rates for energy, no more than 3. Did you magically forget why bonds sucked? Or is it because bonds never became useful, so your brain instinctively looked for the one mechanic in guild wars that was too pathetic to get the nerf bat?

your curse suggestions show just as much foresight. You little *** *** suckers pretty much ruined the only reason to play a necro. And what for? So we can stack aegis chains and bring ineptitude mesmers. Only to get both those skills nerfed anyway? A hex is suppose to disable a target for a period of time, that is what the necro was designed around and that is what worked until most of ya'll forgot how to play the **** game? You want "active" hex'ing? Remove autoattack from warriors.

And now finally the bloodline, the bastard line of all casters. Your idea? ZOMG PROTABLE LIFE STEAL GO GO GO. Geez I wish I lost interest in Guild Wars much quicker before I have to read some half baked suggestion like that. However I have to applaud you for understanding the need for a buff on the healing side of blood magic, if the damage isn't going up. But then you ruined all good favor when you mentioned soul reaping.

Oh that brings back memories, I should send flowers to the guy who figured putting soul reaping on a timer, then removing corpse from pets, then removing spirits from soul reaping, then keeping soul reaping on a timer, was all a good idea that truely helped this game out for the better. I should congratulate you, by running you over with a bus.


Bozes: Oh and for those that were wondering why this is even a thread, well with large scale RA battles becoming more likely the only other pvp besides gvg, the OP is probably foreseeing large Minion Master battles dominating much of that arena.

<3 trolls

if your not a troll then read the thread, not just the first post.

also all that pointless swearing does make your penis bigger so please continue.

back to topic.

if people think that SR/necros in general are fine as they are they are in denial.

SR has always been incredibly over powered even after the nerfs. name me another passive way to earn (up to) 48 energy every 15 seconds? lets just say for simplicity u run 10 SR, its a nice easy figure to reach attribute wise and it still gives u 30 energy every 15 seconds if it playes out well for u with deaths. in pve thats easy, just slap on some minions and away you go. in pvp its usless unless its a silly blood spike/IV spike.

the problm lies in that the PvP players want it fixed but the PvE players will thorw a fit because they cant kill monsters with some pretty fail AI (entire other subect) the solution is sod GW1 and fix it off th bat for GW2, which is the point of this thread. if players dont like it that way then please post why, but dont try and deny it needs a change.

as for curses, i kinda agree that they need to be more active but they do need to have more diffrence to mesmers. i liked the idea of health degen on you because it stops the spam.

and life steal shouls be like ether feast is for energy. you deal X damage (protable) and gain 1-3 times the damage they take in health. that way if it gets protted you wont be healed, thus making it more active and usefull.

[the forests wisper]

You want to see the sum total of the soul reaping change. What it actually did? Nothing, the same roll your face on the keyboard "LOL I BUTTON MASH FASTER THEN YOU!!!!!!!" builds are still being played in HA,
ha is dead and shouldnt really beclssedd as something to compair with consideing just how gimmicky it is . HA=/=balance



with the same N/rt backlines. What did the old soul reaping allow them to do? Spam mend body and soul? I'm sorry, I can't help but laugh at the irony of the situation. There are less builds people can play in HA, but somehow after all these years you can say with a straight face the soul reaping changes were more then knee jerk "ZOMG BIG NUMBERS" nerfs.

the n/rt might still be around but its nowere near as effective as it was. back when it first came around it ws incredibly imbalanced.



Do you know how many teams are losing to N/rt who cast recuperation regularly? do you know how retarded HA has become years after "yeah soul reaping got nuked one overpowered primary line down"? Of course you don't most of you don't, those that do well they don't play HA or even better don't read the Guild Wars forums unless its about how to get pve gear.


i pay all forms of PvP and pve often and can say i do know how crap HA has become, hence the above comment about it being the full of gimmicks to farm fame.




Keep your head in the sand, there is more.


but it tastes bad :rolleyes:



So you want to make the curse line the redheaded stepchild of the illusion line. That great. First remove auto-attack from warriors. Age of Conan did it, I heard they balanced.

i also heard were not suggesting make it like illusion magic, were just saying make it so it takes more thought than a 3 year old. if u want to mash keys go play street fighter.



Well after reading this wall of text, your heads fried, unable to comprehend why I would bash such brilliant ideas, all I have to say is, the facts speaks for itself. In that matter of fact way, My game, the Guild Wars I know is broken, with no one left to care.

i didnt say they were brilliant i said they needed to change and this is a discussion on what we think is best.

you have presented no facts other than your own warped views which account to very little here.

yes its broken, hence why we are discussing ways to make sure we dont have the same problems in GW2.

granted u might disagree but your hardley contributing. it sounds to me you want a direct transfer of all the skills over to GW2 which will leave it in exactly the same mess as this game and would make the idea of starting fresh seem a joke.

/end :soapbox:

i also had a thought earlyer that SR could be changed to you gain energy when u sac, 1 energy every 3 ranks + HP or dependent on amount sacked per attribute lvl. that puts it more like dervs and paragons primarys.

[Ringsgold]

Fine I say it more politely, the ideas are retarded.
Might wanna look up what words mean before using them. (http://www.onelook.com/?w=polite&ls=b&sourceid=Mozilla-search)


First remove auto-attack from warriors. Age of Conan did it, I heard they balanced.

We really need Age of Conan balance in GW2 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SG6LHMfEdmE&feature=related)


with the same N/rt backlines. What did the old soul reaping allow them to do? Spam mend body and soul? I'm sorry, I can't help but laugh at the irony of the situation. There are less builds people can play in HA, but somehow after all these years you can say with a straight face the soul reaping changes were more then knee jerk "ZOMG BIG NUMBERS" nerfs.It's still better than when the mid and front lines were N/Rt too.

So far the only viable use for necro's has been in gimmicks. When they're not part of some gimmick hardly anyone uses them. That's what the OP and many others would like to see changed, by increasing the skill it takes to play an effective necro, necro's can be actually made effective.

And fyi, nobody cared about HA before the soulreaping nerf either.

[Ryuujinx]

Warning: Lots of Text. And possibly many typos because I'm on a laptop. (God I hate these keyboards)

This thread caught my eye, I think it might be the word necromancer in it...

Anyway, first the OP then the silly comments.



Evolving the Minions
Minions are 'maintained' with energy upkeep.
Minions can be locked on to targets.
Forcibly stopping to maintain a minion causes the minion to blow up, triggering an AoE effect.
When not near a corpse, minions require a large health sacrifice instead.
Minions come in both the spectral and undead variety; the one having a defensive, the other an offensive effect.


PVE Standpoint:
Brainless retarded walls of minions should stay, lets facce it, it's PvE and it's fun to be broken there. Watching the mobs run into armies of 30 minions is made of lulz. We already did it in GW1, so why not some PvE only skills there?

Current Bone Fiend,Horror etc could stay as PvE only skilsl with att tied to the normal line (For the love of god no ****ing PvE title track to make them halfway decent.) When I would NOT be mindless and actually play the game, this could be interesting to play with.

The current incarnations (PvE skills or not) should still require a corpse, don't want to make it too easy.

PVP Standpoint: Active play is gud. However, no damage from the explosions. Poison, Enchant removal, Interrupts(though this seems more mesmerish then necroish), I don't know how energy regen is going to be, but 1:1 is a bit overkill for energy regen; however if the minions get buffed to the point it's actually some kind of threat on it's own then 1:1 would be fine.

I like all agreements.





Changing Curses
All Necromancer hexes have their recharge halved if their target is attacking or using a skill.
Efficient hexes (in PvP) need to have their recharge halved.
Necromancer Hexes focus on 'trigger damage', degen and passive defence.


PVE Standpoint: Once again, things like SS should stay (but not SS in it's current form as it kind of overshadows every other part of the curse line) in PvE, once again make use of the PvE skills to keep PvP balanced.

PVP Standpoint: Some skills just need to die. Period. (parasitic bond I'm looking at you) Covering should not exist, deep hex removal should be needed on hex heavy teams, not against one necro. I like the active ideas.



The Last Remnant
For the 'other' skills, no infinite range buffs like [[order of pain].
Incorporate a fair amount of enchantment removal.
Lifesteal needs to be either affected by prot or removed.
Soul reaping's mechanic needs to be changed to something controllable, like reducing life sac.

Agreed on all. For lifesteal I like the Make it effected by prot, increase damage some, Enchant removal is gud.

For soul reaping, make skills require sac for the most part (not -every- skill, but the large majority) as such, buff their power above normal so it's worth the sac and make SR reduce the sac some. Skills like Masochism and Dark aura need to go though, on sac skills would be bad if you constantly sac regardless the build.


First off kepp your hands away from soul reaping, tweaking around with it has caused mayhem among pve players before and will do so again. It's a powerful primary but the entire profession is based on it. Skill changes are constructif improvements while primary changes are just plain murder.

Because SR is so easy to balance around right?




About your comments on curses, don't confuse the way you play a mesmer and the way you play a necro. If your proposed changes were to be made, appart from aoe dmg the two professions would be identical twins. Mesmers bewitch their ennemies, necros curse em. Mesmers are pupeteers while necros are a disease, a plaque, an omen of bad luck.
Active is gud. Wail of doom for instance, is awesome. Short duration miss% would make it aweosme.

As an example (assuming The 50% Recharge if attacking is implmeneted)

Price o Failure
Cost 10 Health 5% Cast 1 Recast 18
Hex Target Foe for 6 seconds. Foe has a 50% Chance to miss attacks. On Miss: Foe takes 20..50 Damage. If Foe Was attacking on cast this skill recharges 50% faster, hex ends on attack skill.

So this you could use as short term pressure relief or as spike prevention. And I wouldn't call it mesmerish. Active, yet necro...ey




About the minions, try playing a ritualist build around spirits. I'm pretty sure that it is what your looking for rather than a minion master.
Rits spirits are about as passive as you can get. Drop the spirit and forget it for 30-45 seconds.



And if you don't like necro's choose another profession for your character, where exacty is the problem ? There are several professions i don't particular like and never felt the need to play , but i'm not gonna ask that these should be changed towards my personnal preferences and disregard those that actually liked these professions.
Hi, my name is necro. I never get to play PvP outside of gimmicks. Please help me :(


mmm, not gonna play a necro not GW2 if the necro is this screwed, minions are minions, not summoned elementals.
also, if SR would be in a balance streek, then making it so that you gain X max% energy from the enemy it self.
that way, if an enemy is out of energy like 2 energy, you only gain 1 energy.
but if the enemy has 40 energy, you gain X% of it's max energy.

After it's been hit this many times shouldn't it be obvious? PASSIVE ENERGY GAIN IS BAD! The necro NEEDs a new primary attribute as it never sees (serious)PvP use right now. yes, there should be some of the old mindless skills for PvE (or I guess world PvP...) But for the love of god can we get it to see some serious play in high end PvP?


I may agree with some changes to the hexes if the two hexing playstyles still remain viable. The first is the dude who occasionally/on recharge spreads his hexes around and continues with conventional spells and effects, the second is the dude who is only spreading lots of hexes around, disrupting the enemy tactics. Currently, both of these are overshadowed by the dude who just spams Spiteful Spirit around....

And how do you know necro mechanics would be overpowered or bad? You have some insight into GW2 gameplay that I don't? Cause if you're just basing this on GW1, I see no OPedness in the necro at all...

And in response to the other post too. The necro right now is useless. It gets SOME use in TA with wail of doom, never seen it in GvG used seriously at high levels. In lolHA it's used as a gimmick. (and who really cares about RA or AB when discussing balance). Right now, if we go by the definition of "If it's not overpowered it's balanced" then yes, the necro IS balanced. However if we go by a real definition, of "If it's too strong or too weak" then no, it's not. It's in a patehtic state because it CAN'T be buffed without a drastic overhaul of it's core mechanics (Soul Reaping, Passive Hexes, Passive Minions) and as such; is a suggestion for GW2. I personally think there should be some of the mindless spam skills (Horrors,Fiends,Long curses) made as PvE only skills so if you're wanting to use them you can. But I'd actually like to use my necro in serious PvP in GW2.


Also; wuzzman if you're not going to bother with actually posting something relevant to the topic, why bother posting at all?

[sorudo]

After it's been hit this many times shouldn't it be obvious? PASSIVE ENERGY GAIN IS BAD! The necro NEEDs a new primary attribute as it never sees (serious)PvP use right now. yes, there should be some of the old mindless skills for PvE (or I guess world PvP...) But for the love of god can we get it to see some serious play in high end PvP?
then you're out of luck, a necro is suppose to get passive energy, no mater how you play it around.
reducing sacr is useless, since only around 5% is life sacr, the rest is all normal.
also, as i see it(and you clarify it) SR then needs some old mechanism back, like removing the timer.
you said it your self, it's useless in PVP, and PVE has a low use for it as it is now in high-end PVE.:undecided:

[Ryuujinx]

then you're out of luck, a necro is suppose to get passive energy, no mater how you play it around.
reducing sacr is useless, since only around 5% is life sacr, the rest is all normal.
also, as i see it(and you clarify it) SR then needs some old mechanism back, like removing the timer.
you said it your self, it's useless in PVP, and PVE has a low use for it as it is now in high-end PVE.:undecided:

No, it doesn't need the ways of old. That's like burning the building with the broken window.

It needs to be scrapped and redone. That simply will not hppen for GW1 and as such, these are suggestions and discussion for GW2

Necros getting free energy is bad and prohibits it's skills and versatility due to not being able to make it better. Soulreaping needs to be scrapped and redone if it is to see any kind of serious use.

[Ryuujinx]

i'm sorry but any real change tends to involve the exact opposite of what you guys are proposing. but who cares pvp is in great shape.:rolleyes:

Then enlighten us on your all-solving ideas all mighty wuzzman!

Seriously, SR needs to be sacced and redone, curses needs to be redone, minions need to be redone..and this is the best thought out and best balanced idea said so far.

Or are you going to be one of the "lulz passive play is good!" people?

[the forests wisper]

Arrghh, you don't get it do you ...

This thread is the classic version of "NECROS MADE ME LOOSE IN PVP AND SHOULD BE NERFED TO HELL" against "OMG, PVP FANATICS WANT TO RUIN PVE YET AGAIN" and as such won't produce any useful or even relevant comments.

are u that retarded that u cant read the thread? were trying to find ways to make the necro suck LESS in GW2! wake up and take that "only my opinion matters" stick out your ***.



It has been done over and over before with the only result of disagreement and mutual hatred. In all honesty i hope that pvp and pve get seperated for good in GW2 so that i'm rid of foul pvp language and constant pvp whining.

first of all, find a thread thats discussing ways to discuss how to make necros better in GW2, then say its been done over and over.

and i agree they need to be seperated so the litttle pve cry babys wont QQ when a skill gets changed. is it so hard to kill a few monsters that a skill change makes u crawl into the fetal position and sob your emo sorrows away?

and before u shout "omg i lack pvp experiance, thier for u suck" at me please note i do PvE, but i deal with skill changes and work around them. no *****ing, no whineing.

[Simply Kedde]

If you'd actually bother reading the thread you'd find that minions in this suggestion would be fewer, but stronger in all ways making up for it.

Completely chaning the curses line into skills that are active and require timing and skillful use would make necros viable even if SR is reworked. Curses shouldn't be spammable in the first place. Having skills give a good effect if you're good at using them will be able to put them in the midline of gvg teams as opposed to now, where they're either rubbish or used because if some overpowered skill.

Blood will obviously have higher numbers when affected by prot. Thus giving spikeability and it'll also provide some selfhealing should you send it off on a split or countersplit. Blood magic won't have to fill up the entire bar. The rest could be midline utility as in new and improved curses or lots of enchant removal and possible degen.

Those are only possible scenarios. Noone knows how they'd fit into some metagame as all the proposed changes are ideas for the attributes themselves and not for every single skill.

[Wuzzman]

If you'd actually bother reading the thread you'd find that minions in this suggestion would be fewer, but stronger in all ways making up for it.

Completely chaning the curses line into skills that are active and require timing and skillful use would make necros viable even if SR is reworked. Curses shouldn't be spammable in the first place. Having skills give a good effect if you're good at using them will be able to put them in the midline of gvg teams as opposed to now, where they're either rubbish or used because if some overpowered skill.

Blood will obviously have higher numbers when affected by prot. Thus giving spikeability and it'll also provide some selfhealing should you send it off on a split or countersplit. Blood magic won't have to fill up the entire bar. The rest could be midline utility as in new and improved curses or lots of enchant removal and possible degen.

Those are only possible scenarios. Noone knows how they'd fit into some metagame as all the proposed changes are ideas for the attributes themselves and not for every single skill.

So basically different flavors of clumsiness, but the "unspammable' versions for curse line..I wonder what warrior the new and improved curse line will shut down. But i be trolling if I debate that further so i'll move on.

Prottable blood magic meets ranger with dshot.

People have been trying to get pets removed from the game for a long time. You think people will want necros the possibility of raising more then one? But I'll be trolling if I debate this point any further so I'll leave this argument alone till the next response.

hey this is fun.

[Malhavoc Adhamar]

For some reason I'm leaving this thread open even after cleaning all that crap from it. Wussman take a day out for causing the majority of said crap. The rest of you have been warned. Any more and I will close this thread.

[Divinity Archer]

I've been thinking a bit about the SR issue, and the following came to mind..

I've always liked the idea about the necromancer being the "anti-monk." Instead of enchanting, the necro will find a way to disenchant you. Instead of giving you health, the necro will find a way to directly steal your health.

So I came up with the following concept:
For each rank of Soul Reaping, You steal 3.2 health from your target whenever you cast Necro spells on them.

The idea behind this concept is that in GW2, most of the necro spells will resolve around health sacrifice, making this primary most usefull as a sort of "energy management," like most other good primary profession attributes have included.

The only problem I might foresee is soul reaping spike.
However, the health steal could then be changed into a health gain (minor heal) to effectively reduce the health sacrifice.

This makes SR still sound necroish imho without relying on deaths and actively taking part in battle.

Any thoughts?

[Simply Kedde]

So called "clumsiness" for necros is just an assumption about how an improved curses line would be. And clumsiness didn't shut warriors down when Sineptude or dual clums were meta?

Prottable blood magic being interrupted? That's a counter for anything. It shuts down anyone, not just potential spike skills from a necro.

The reason pets are bad is because they're terribly implemented. A large difference between minions and pets is the fact that you can't use minion attack skills and don't have a weapon besides the pet to do damage.
Trying to make a viable minion mechanic is not a bad thing. Come up with better suggestions if you have any.

Besides these ideas are not what's wanted for the current gw, but visions for gw2. It'll be an entirely different game so while these things might not be very workable for this gw, they're pretty much the best ones we've seen yet.

[the forests wisper]

I've been thinking a bit about the SR issue, and the following came to mind..

I've always liked the idea about the necromancer being the "anti-monk." Instead of enchanting, the necro will find a way to disenchant you. Instead of giving you health, the necro will find a way to directly steal your health.

So I came up with the following concept:
For each rank of Soul Reaping, You steal 3.2 health from your target whenever you cast Necro spells on them.

The idea behind this concept is that in GW2, most of the necro spells will resolve around health sacrifice, making this primary most usefull as a sort of "energy management," like most other good primary profession attributes have included.

The only problem I might foresee is soul reaping spike.
However, the health steal could then be used as a health gain to effectively reduce the health sacrifice.

This makes SR still sound necroish imho without relying on deaths and actively taking part in battle.

Any thoughts?


now thats a good idea.

i really like that. at 16 SR it would work out at 51.2hp which would take the bite out of 10% sac on a 600 hp necro.

the only downside is 8 X 51 = 408 passive damage, which is a heft spike when u use 1/4 second cast time necro skills.

if this was implemented ide say maby 2 life steal per SR rank and make life steal protable.

but on that note the life steal from SR would have to be added into the base damage of skills or it will make skills like RoF (thats if its in GW 2) usless against necros. that also puts skills alot higher in damage and would make skills like spirit bond and PS be an effective counter.

[Смерть]

AN ANIMATION SUGGESTION:

When minions start to loose life. Could their color drain with that life. So the closer to death, they have a more "white-like" deathly color?

This will not only look cool, but it will make finding minions to rejuvenate a tad bit easier.
[Edit: Or make it a bit easier at least to know when you will need to raise the next minion]

And when you BoM, have the full color flush back into the minion (reference to your blood courses through them). This would look really wicked.

[Divinity Archer]

the only downside is 8 X 51 = 408 passive damage, which is a heft spike when u use 1/4 second cast time necro skills.

Yes, I was also worried about that, hence I think they could change the life stealing to a simple health gain, thus receiving a minor heal. (I admid that part was a bit vague, but I changed it in my original post)


but on that note the life steal from SR would have to be added into the base damage of skills or it will make skills like RoF (thats if its in GW 2) usless against necros. that also puts skills alot higher in damage and would make skills like spirit bond and PS be an effective counter.

That could be discussed, but it is pointless for now, since we don't know about those skill mechanics in GW2.

It is however a valid point that needs to be saved for later.

The big downside of my suggestion is also that it has little use with the current line of death magic, only curses and blood magic can benefit from this version of SR..

[sorudo]

No, it doesn't need the ways of old. That's like burning the building with the broken window.

It needs to be scrapped and redone. That simply will not hppen for GW1 and as such, these are suggestions and discussion for GW2

Necros getting free energy is bad and prohibits it's skills and versatility due to not being able to make it better. Soulreaping needs to be scrapped and redone if it is to see any kind of serious use.
then you ether just suck in using a necro or just have no sight of how to use SR at all.
it's crappy now because of the big nerf, still a bit usefull in easy places but GW:EN made sure that in some dungeon places, SR is utterly useless.
if the timer would be 5 seconds, it would scale it self out.
in PVP, it can't be abused since you can't get energy from spirits, the reason why SR was nerfed so much.
for a small thing to point out, it's just closed minded to say you can't fix it or make it better.
there are plenty of way's to make it better, just think.:wink:

[Ryuujinx]

then you ether just suck in using a necro or just have no sight of how to use SR at all.
it's crappy now because of the big nerf, still a bit usefull in easy places but GW:EN made sure that in some dungeon places, SR is utterly useless.
if the timer would be 5 seconds, it would scale it self out.
in PVP, it can't be abused since you can't get energy from spirits, the reason why SR was nerfed so much.
for a small thing to point out, it's just closed minded to say you can't fix it or make it better.
there are plenty of way's to make it better, just think.:wink:

Or we could make it so it's actually useful? let's see, in PvP it's only useful in spiking because of the energy you'll get back lets you spike that much faster. Necos have never been used seriously in PvP for ages, and no I don't "Suck with necros" , as it's very hard to suck when you can just make 30 minion walls and eat a sandwich and press BoTM over and over. PvE isn't the focus of balance, all the broken skills can be PvE only, but we're discussing how the necro will be in GW2, and hopefully by this pioint of nerfing SR so many times they've realized the entire concept is flawed and needs to be reworked.

Thus, if you would read some of the posts a bit better we're proposing adding sac into most skills, 5~10% probably. And then adding "reduce sac%" for SR so that necro skills are useful and also so that the necro primary is worth bringing. In TA they sometimes see use spamming foul feast and plague sending with wail of doom thrown in.

In GvG, very rarely do you see them. THeir long curses and passive animates that require someones death before even being useful makes them not viable outside of gimmicks focusing on those mechanics.

If you're going to disagree with me, fine. But back your argument up with something, because "QQ You want to change my necro" isn't a very good argument.

[the forests wisper]

Yes, I was also worried about that, hence I think they could change the life stealing to a simple health gain, thus receiving a minor heal. (I admid that part was a bit vague, but I changed it in my original post)


so u did, my bad :grin:



That could be discussed, but it is pointless for now, since we don't know about those skill mechanics in GW2.

It is however a valid point that needs to be saved for later.


i agree, now is not the time for that i was just thining the idea through based on current game mechanics.


The big downside of my suggestion is also that it has little use with the current line of death magic, only curses and blood magic can benefit from this version of SR..

hmmm i hadent thought of that. but then again, it does still help DM skills.

if you can spam say BoTM with minions u can counter the sac (to a degreen).

better yet hows this for an idea.

for every rank in SR u are healed for 3.2. if u have one or more minions they are healed for 3.2 per rank.

that stops the spike idea, incorperates the general idea of reduced sac and covers all 3 attributes if u play the necro in an active way while keeping it in line with other primarys.

[The Boz]

Healing is for monks, and lifesteal is for necros. While a flat +X lifesteal is imba, how about...
For each rank in Soul Reaping, your necromancer skills that target a foe deal 3.2 less damage and steal 3.2 health.

That would mean spells and hexes ALWAYS steal that health, while Dark Pact would actually become less sucky(it wouldn't become suckless, just less so). It would work on necro touch skills and signets, but not on other classes skills.

That wouldn't be Soul Reaping any more. And some really(really) good methods of necro e-management should be implemented to offset the obscene costs...

[Divinity Archer]

Healing is for monks, and lifesteal is for necros. While a flat +X lifesteal is imba, how about...
For each rank in Soul Reaping, your necromancer skills that target a foe deal 3.2 less damage and steal 3.2 health.

I like it, but what about pure life stealing spells like Vampiric Gaze? (If these kind of spells will be available in GW2 in the first place.)

[The Boz]

Since lifesteal isn't damage, it will be buffed by the attribute accordingly. It helps against other professions taking advantage of necro lifesteals...

[Bravo]

How about you gain 3.2 hp/rank when you cast a necromancer skill that targets an enemy, and for 3 seconds target foe suffers -0 (at 0) ..-8 (at 15 or gw2 equivalent) health degeneration.

This way it won't stack the damage (essentially the 'spirit burn' nerf)...

[the forests wisper]

How about you gain 3.2 hp/rank when you cast a necromancer skill that targets an enemy, and for 3 seconds target foe suffers -0 (at 0) ..-8 (at 15 or gw2 equivalent) health degeneration.

This way it won't stack the damage (essentially the 'spirit burn' nerf)...

personaly thats overpowered to me.

whats to stop me throwing 8 necros into a gvg and keeping the other side on perma -8 degen.

even on like -3 degen thats a ton of pressure for free.

[Bravo]

Its no more overpowered than the suggestion earlier in the thread that necromancers should life steal 3.2hp/rank when using a skill that targets an enemy, 15*3.2=48, 8*2*3=48 but degen in this form will not stack unlike the earlier suggestion stopping spikes.

Finally, this is all a moot point, seeing as we don't know what skills soul reaping will have, or even if attribute lines will work like they currently do. Soul reaping could end up with loads of useful skills and so have a poor passive mechanic (ala strength), a good passive mechanic and a poor/no selection of skills (ala prophecies soul reaping), niche passive mechanic and skills mainly linked with that same mechanic (ala old spawning power)

[the forests wisper]

Its no more overpowered than the suggestion earlier in the thread that necromancers should life steal 3.2hp/rank when using a skill that targets an enemy, 15*3.2=48, 8*2*3=48 but degen in this form will not stack unlike the earlier suggestion stopping spikes.

Finally, this is all a moot point, seeing as we don't know what skills soul reaping will have, or even if attribute lines will work like they currently do. Soul reaping could end up with loads of useful skills and so have a poor passive mechanic (ala strength), a good passive mechanic and a poor/no selection of skills (ala prophecies soul reaping), niche passive mechanic and skills mainly linked with that same mechanic (ala old spawning power)


yes the LS idea was imbance, thats already been said. but if its prottabledamage its like 1:1 on the damage per rank its possible.

im still pretty sure that having a thearetical -8 (-16hp a second) across 8 players means 16*8 = 128 health a second that i cant remove (its not a hex or condition) thats spread out across my party so its not as simple as fireing off WoH after a few seconds.

maby if it was made into:

every time u cast a hex spell on target foe they are also hexed with "blah blah"
for each rank in SR your foe is hexed with "blah blah" for .5 seconds. when "blah blah" ends u gain 1 energy for every 4 ranks in SR. you can only gain X energy every 5 seconds from this.


let me explain this.

with this it gives the necro a free cover hex and minor energy managment while makeing it so that it cant be abused to give a silly ammount of energy.

this keeps in line with the necro feel of hexs and such while still giving them some energy managment from the SR attribute that necros love.


thoughts?

[Bravo]

(Not a response to the quotes, just reiterating points raised in the quotes)


If there's anything Spawning Power shows us, it's that Primaries that only affect one part of the class are completely useless attributes. A 4% recharge reduction ONLY if the spell is used actively instead of passively is too niche to make good use of. You're better off running a Me/N with MoR in that case.


PVP Standpoint: Some skills just need to die. Period. (parasitic bond I'm looking at you) Covering should not exist, deep hex removal should be needed on hex heavy teams, not against one necro. I like the active ideas.

Instant cover hex is bad. Especially if there are skills like recurring insecurity (an elite that does half of what you are suggesting) and soul barbs (SB+RI spike...). It then forces the use of deep hex removal regardless of the reaction speeds of monks. Alternatively, it causes all necromancer hexes to suck since it is not feasible to remove them.

That aside.

Why have the 'only gain x energy every 5 seconds'? If attributes work the same as GW, that would mean a maximum of 4 energy at 16 soul reaping, since it is a hex, you can only get that 4 energy once per person, and 4 energy will not cover the cost of the hex.

Then you have to consider that all the necromancer hexes will then likely end up (at least at first) having a minimum cast of of 10 energy, in an attempt to 'balance'; soul reaping at the release of prophecies caused most necromancer skills to cost >=10 energy or have a life sacrifice component (or both).

[Ryuujinx]

I'm personally a fan of reducing all the costs, adding health sac to most skills, giving SR a "For every 2 ranks of reduce the amount of sac by 1%". So at the general 10/10/11 split you'll be able to nullify 5% sacs entirely, and put a dent in 10% sacs.

This idea does a few things:

-Provides a Primary that is useful outside of gimmicks
-Prevents Me/N being better then N/Any, the 5% Sac per spell will play a toll on people's healths without the SR.

In addidtion, to compensate we need more energy management. (less conditional, things like glowing gaze and glowing ice = good conditionals. Things like SoLS not as easy to meet.)

[the forests wisper]

ok so the cover hex idea was bad, meh, was just putting the idea out thier.
the LS (unprottable) is bad
the current energy system is imba.

quite frankly the only real thing is reduced sac, prottable LS that only works with damage skills (so i cant just spam 1/2 fail hexs), a self heal when u sac or some way to keep energy in but not at its current extra high level.

on a side note

will not cover the cost of the hex.


thats the point, its not just point and spam. players might have to think. :yikes:

thats kinda why the current SR is still not right, dont get me wrong i think the nerf was harsh but in the over all layout of the game it was needed, and its still not enough.

as for cover hex's, why are they bad? personaly i dont see why they dont just lower recharge by a 1/4-1/2 second (on some skills, not all) on hex removal. i see a good cover hex as balanced because if your against a good monk u shouldnt have time to get a cover on without help from your team. if thats interupts,thier own cover or generaly harrasing the crap out of the monks it doesnt matter.


but meh thats just how i see it.

[Wuzzman]

101 ways to gimp a class before it is released. Make the necro-pve only in guild wars 2, there problem solved :cool:

[Simply Kedde]

If it was to be exactly like it currently is, that would be a good idea. But this thread is suggesting changes to the class that would prevent the need to do so.

[the forests wisper]

101 ways to gimp a class before it is released. Make the necro-pve only in guild wars 2, there problem solved :cool:

did u learn nothing from your holiday?

[Kazuhiro Risuko]

My problem with this is that you make spam builds impossible. With such wildly different mechanics we would surely see the end of simplistic builds such as, for instance, SS or life-steal spam. People wouldn't like that and it would make Necro unnecessarily difficult to play. People don't play Necro expecting an intense metagame experience.

Monk, on the other hand, is an inherently quick-draw style of play, right up there with an interrupt mesmer.

[Wuzzman]

did u learn nothing from your holiday?

I learned that no matter what the playerbase sucks more.

[Wuzzman]

If it was to be exactly like it currently is, that would be a good idea. But this thread is suggesting changes to the class that would prevent the need to do so.

I think it is the quit the same. if these changes were implemented you might as well make the necro the pve class.

[the forests wisper]

rezzing a dead thread to troll more?

[Simply Kedde]

You again fail to read even 2 and a half sentences.
They are mere suggestions.