Necromancer Skill Balance Suggestions - Blood Magic Focused

Ok, we all know that the blood magic line of necros is really lacking. It's damage is nearly useless in pve and rarely will you find decent builds for pvp. The only skills from blood magic that are really being used in pve are, orders, br, and bip. One of the problems is that it's all armor ignoring damage or life steal which could make unbalanced spikes and the sacrifice of some skills is too much. So here's a few suggestion for the blood magic line along with a few other skills.

[awaken the blood] This skill is like a terrible necro version of glyph of elemental power as it has a long recharge time and increase's sac by 50%. Functionally change to, (10e, 1c, 20r) "For 1...15 sec, you sacrifice 50% LESS (EDIT) health and have a +5 health regeneration. No effect while under another necromancer enchantment."

[barbed signet] Terrible casting time and recharge as it also sacrifices health. Reduce cast to 1 second and recharge to 15 seconds.

[blood drinker] Bad casting and a bad alternative to signet of agony to combine with angorodon's gaze. Reduce casting time to 1 sec or functionally change to (5e, 1c, 8r). "If target touched foe is bleeding, you steal 29...65 health."

[blood of the aggressor] Weak damage compared to its health sacrifice. Increase damage to 7...46 and if target foe was attacking, you sacrifice 2% hp instead.

[cultist's fervor] Way too much hp sac to gain back, damage from spamming skills isn't worth it. A vampiric spirit, agorodon's gaze, vampiric gaze, signet of agony spam is way more effective for damage with also plenty of heals. Fuctionally change to (5e, 1/4c, 20r) "Sacrifice 25% health. For 1...16 seconds, whenever you are wielding a vampiric weapon, your attacks steal 5...20 more health, but deals 20...5 less damage." Thought this could be a little interesting :P

[dark pact] Needs a superior blood magic rune to deal more damage that what hp is sacrificed. Increase damage 15-45, if target foe has more health than you, you sacrifice 5% hp instead.

[jaundiced gaze] Health sacrifice is too high to gain health. Change to sacrifice 5% hp if target foe has more hp.

[mark of subversion] Can be a great finisher on monks, but casting time and recharge are too long. Change to (15e, 1c, 20r)

[vampiric touch] [vampiric bite] Terrible skill for necros, good for rangers, makes no sense. Sacrifice 5% health (to combine with masochism and dark aura). Increase recharge to 8, increase stolen health to 29...80.

Ok I don't feel like going into a bunch of other skills but here are 3.

[enfeebling touch] Bad skill, bad damage, touch range, get my point? Functionally change to (10e, 3/4c, 8r). "Target touched foe suffers from weakness for 5...12 seconds. If target foe was already suffering from weakness, that foe is knocked down.

[weaken knees] Don't need to say anything here. Functionally change to (5e, 1c, 5r) "While target foe is suffering from weakness, that foe moves 50% slower and is knocked down when struck by an attack. Hex ends when foe is knocked down and weakness is cured."

Order of the Undeath. Ok ya it seems this skill is kinda pointless in pve now. For pve (not a big supporter of split but...) functionally change to (5e, 1c, 15r). All but 3 non-elite minions die. For 20 seconds, those minions deal +5...30 damage and attack 33% faster, but they are weakened and crippled when this skill is activated. (Please make verata's sacrifice useful again)

These are the only 2 skills that I can agree with you on. The others is meanless imo.

Kill life stealing and then we can talk.

barbed signet needs to do bleeding >_>

If you want to make blood work in pve as well, you'll to give it some more aoe effects. Life transfer was a step in the right direction, but offensively it is a mockery compared to ether phantom.

example:

Oppressive Gaze: (15e 2c 7r) "Steal 5...41 health from target foe. If that foe is suffering from weakness, that foe and all nearby foes take 18...52."

I also like the idea of some more blood magic skills inflicting bleeding, deep wound, and maybe cripple. That way each Necro line would sort of have its own set of conditions.

I dont know if i agree with your buffs but I do agree that blood magic needs a boost.

one of my main bitches is that alot of the skills that require sacrifice deal more damage to you than the enemy.

~the rat~

Weird, i've been seeing more necros running blood in ra than in the past. If it is that weak of a line, why am I seeing more people running it?

Because the average person in RA thinKs 1+1=3

i like [awaken the blood] tho
good for sum [spoil victor] action against bosses 'n stuff
and with the recent buff of [life transfer] and [vampiric spirit]
i think it's okay

In RA, there are lots and lots of bad players.

The amount of people playing X build shouldn't influence how good a certain skill line or individual skill is.

the answer is simple, Unless you team up with friends the chances of getting heals are very low.

Blood line at least offers "some" self survivability and it does it in the form of damage. Unfortunately it kinda sucks at both....but hey.

[blood renewal] already exists. There are enough cloned skills out there (Factions cloned many of Prohpecies skills). I see no need for a repeat.

Well the point of that skill would be at least to reduce the sac while br heals much more. Maybe anet needs to balance blood magic to steal more health, but to sacrifice more to balance out the healing, but they also have to do it so we don't have a problem with blood spike. Honestly, I don't really see blood spike working in at least gvg because they won't be able to effectively split, but I dont really gvg. 6 Man HA teams ftw... >.<

Edit - What if they increase the health stolen by a bit, but you can only steal health up to your maximum health. So if you have 490/500 hp, you cast vamp gaze you can only be healed for 10hp, which you can get down by using hp sac skills.

blood magic will never be worth specing into as long as 1) low damage output from skills (irony is that blood is suppose to be the necro's damage line) because of the life stealing mechanic. 2) current sacrifice mechanic, particularly with those skills meant for defense.

there is no need to balance blood skills as long those two issues are on the table.



Jayce Of Underworld

a lot has been covered here (and in other threads)...

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...php?t=10316715

then why is this thread still open?

/close

eep!, i actually have a very good blood/curse magic build that i use to defeat glint in Tomb (normal mode) but did not think anyone would be interested , think Angorodon build and bring Atrophy (curse)

i think its blood/curse/soul reaping N/Mo and actually could use to spread diseases fastly.

tested briefly, vanquished one sparkly swamp in HM. I'll post the build when i can.

Atrophy (could save you from irritating elementalist boss that otherwise won't die like Joffs the Mitigator in HM) and Masochism so you could spam mwahahaha , those two skills are a must in the blood necro build. bleh, can't get build now. :|

work along those, if i remember correctly.

Are you retarded? I stopped reading your "suggestions" after your horrible proposal to Awaken The Blood. The point of that skill is to boost your attributes. Blood Renewal already does EXACTLY WHAT YOU PROPOSE.

I don't even think you've ever played Necromancer.

You're an idiot.

Agreed.

OP,Even if you have played necro, Anet wouldn't change the skill this late in the game, waste your breath somewhere else.

And where is the benefit of the attributes? Your suggestion makes it litterally worthless.

Too limited. You have to make it bleed in order to steal health. How about "Inflicts bleeding on target touched foe. If target is already bleeding, steal 29...65 health."

uhm. The last part makes no sense. If target foe was attacking, you lose 2% hp INSTEAD?!? So if your fighting a warrior... this skill is literally useless. How about, "Steal 7...46 health from target foe. If target foe was attacking, you also sacrifice 2% health."

what the HELL? Necromancers don't even have a vampiric weapon mod. This is basically stripping it from the Necromancer use and putting it right into the hands of attackers. Most likely going to be Assassins or just not used.

I think it should be (15e, 1c, 15r) to be balanced personally.

Compared to the other enfeebling skills, this is well balanced. To compensate for the touch range, you add damage. [enfeeble] only gives weakness, [enfeebling blood] spreads that weakness, but you sac life. All three, compared to each other, are relitively balanced.

just change the and to an or, and I got no problem.

They put the skill back for PvE and PvP today, no need for this big of a change. (They should have kept the single minion way for PvP, imo).

If I didn't mention it (which I think was only one or two skills) I don't mind the proposition.

Oh, and btw, Blood is really useful all all around. I use it in PvE and PvP and I do fairly good. I only AB for PvP mind you, and I only die when I get dazed or mobbed. In PvE, I don't even know if I died while paying attention with a blood build.