Boehm
Dalayan Elder
I am Velleity Darkbloom, the necromancer class leader. Though I mostly make irrelevant posts on the forums, most of you have no clue who I am because Necros are by nature closed about our class. I hope my points will be treated with respect as coming from a serious student of the class who has no intention of playing another class, nor wants to appropriate any aspect of another class. I have been meaning to make this post for over a year, but the general view of other class members is so hostile that I held my piece. I would like to thank Kiseble for his support.
No class should be balanced around one AA. Festering Curse is broken, and I will lay out why the below. I will lay out why Festering Curse is currently necessary, and how it can be made unnecessary in the future.
This is not a post to have it modified, but to have it removed and replaced by another ability if possible. I make this post with some trepidation as being a volunteer server, it is possible that a change may be made and halted half way breaking us all to pieces.
Festering Curse is;
1. The most powerful spell in the game, and irresistible. More powerful then Boss spells, Nylastra' Zara, you “... channel a spell of tremendous power.”? You can't touch this.
2. Too cheap at 9 AAs in a game about incremental increases in power. I received my biggest DPS buff at around 90 AAs. This is a terrible precedence, which I believe has encouraged balancing decisions about other classes. So that rather then being balanced in and of themselves, the class is balanced around some big thing in their development. I'm looking at you druids, mages and beastlords.
3. Far too good at lower levels, when a necromancer can make significant contributions to a long fight, afk and in zone. No class should be able to kill a named because they present.
4. A third of our DPS, but only available on every other engage. We are a break-in, “Big Moment” class, but our ability to meet that “Big Moment” only occurs every other engage. Preventing us from being “good” all the time.
5. Prevents necromancers from being balanced along the tiers.
6. Necromancers will never get anything special, because we have festering curse and what we got with Ikisith is probably accidental.
7. Devs deliberately break fights for Festering Curse, by various mechanics, because it is so powerful.
Necromancer DPS at the high end is currently comprised of three elements; the Big Three (Archaic, Caress, and Marlows) and Scitterpox, Festering Curse, and Hierophant's Breath. Without each of these elements, necromancers are not competitive. ( Should you view my dps, you should note that I use ToT ear, DoTO gloves, and Vah Back on every engage these are available. Casters should not be balanced around things they farmed either. )
Necromancer DPS at the low end comprises two elements, three fire spells, Scitterpox (if it lands.) and festering curse. Currently, the low tier necromancer is essentially dependent on the existence of festering curse to do any significant sustained dps, the cost and duration of the spells preclude it.
The issue is that Necromancers currently have the worst sustained DPS of the DPS caster classes based on our innate spells, which is why Festering Curse and also Heirophant's Breath are necessary casts. Because while their damage makes us plausible in groups, our primary spells, the Big Three, are fundamentally unsustainable because of their duration. It is simply too much mana for us to be able to do competitive DPS. Their duration is, also, too short to allow us to stack other spells to fill their lack of base DPS. We do not have a crit mechanic which makes our spells conditionally, insanely efficient, nor a pet to fill the holes. Nor do we want either.
We are not wizards, nor are we mages. Being the slowest to max dps class in the game, we do not want ultimates or a big friendly pet. Our pet is a reeking conjuration of misdirection, attracting mob attention away from the real threat, us. We want to be the best sustained dps casters in the game and considering our mechanics, deserve it. Doing this based on our ability to weave spells depending on the circumstance, not an AA crutch. We accept that there will be circumstances where our stack mechanic may make us the not an optimal class for an engage, but wish that we should be designed that what we are capable of as players should determine our outcome.
My belief is that Festering Curse can currently be removed, allowing a more rational and incremental increase of necromancer DPS through the tiers. I believe this could be achieved by the introduction of a number of changes to the game. Among these changes, the replacement of the AA itself and a few spells;
1. The change of funeral pyre of malath into an 8 tick dot at the same mana cost and same damage, This would allow it to do significant duration dps at lower leves with scitterpox if the necromancer has done the murk spell quest, and in combination with Marlow's Cremation.
2. The change of the Archaic Claws of the Chill and Caress of Sivyana to 5 dot ticks by the either a replacement AA for 15 minutes or on their own, with a 15 minute cooldown. Because of cleric mana, it is unlikely any fight will last more then 15 minutes.
3. Stop conditionally nerfing Heirophant's Breath on a zonal basis. If the dev desire is not to do so then give us more long duration dots we can use instead of festering curse, at least such that we have to choose being safe and having runic 2 on our bar or doing max dps.
4. Replacement of Festering Curse with an over-lich which requires the dedicated healing of a priest for us to be able to perform duration dps. Necromancer dps is massively linear, if you can't make the boss regen reflect it, (like rujik), I don't know what to say.
Tldr: read the whole thing. ( and the boards have completely eaten my careful nesting :/)
No class should be balanced around one AA. Festering Curse is broken, and I will lay out why the below. I will lay out why Festering Curse is currently necessary, and how it can be made unnecessary in the future.
This is not a post to have it modified, but to have it removed and replaced by another ability if possible. I make this post with some trepidation as being a volunteer server, it is possible that a change may be made and halted half way breaking us all to pieces.
Festering Curse is;
1. The most powerful spell in the game, and irresistible. More powerful then Boss spells, Nylastra' Zara, you “... channel a spell of tremendous power.”? You can't touch this.
2. Too cheap at 9 AAs in a game about incremental increases in power. I received my biggest DPS buff at around 90 AAs. This is a terrible precedence, which I believe has encouraged balancing decisions about other classes. So that rather then being balanced in and of themselves, the class is balanced around some big thing in their development. I'm looking at you druids, mages and beastlords.
3. Far too good at lower levels, when a necromancer can make significant contributions to a long fight, afk and in zone. No class should be able to kill a named because they present.
4. A third of our DPS, but only available on every other engage. We are a break-in, “Big Moment” class, but our ability to meet that “Big Moment” only occurs every other engage. Preventing us from being “good” all the time.
5. Prevents necromancers from being balanced along the tiers.
6. Necromancers will never get anything special, because we have festering curse and what we got with Ikisith is probably accidental.
7. Devs deliberately break fights for Festering Curse, by various mechanics, because it is so powerful.
Necromancer DPS at the high end is currently comprised of three elements; the Big Three (Archaic, Caress, and Marlows) and Scitterpox, Festering Curse, and Hierophant's Breath. Without each of these elements, necromancers are not competitive. ( Should you view my dps, you should note that I use ToT ear, DoTO gloves, and Vah Back on every engage these are available. Casters should not be balanced around things they farmed either. )
Necromancer DPS at the low end comprises two elements, three fire spells, Scitterpox (if it lands.) and festering curse. Currently, the low tier necromancer is essentially dependent on the existence of festering curse to do any significant sustained dps, the cost and duration of the spells preclude it.
The issue is that Necromancers currently have the worst sustained DPS of the DPS caster classes based on our innate spells, which is why Festering Curse and also Heirophant's Breath are necessary casts. Because while their damage makes us plausible in groups, our primary spells, the Big Three, are fundamentally unsustainable because of their duration. It is simply too much mana for us to be able to do competitive DPS. Their duration is, also, too short to allow us to stack other spells to fill their lack of base DPS. We do not have a crit mechanic which makes our spells conditionally, insanely efficient, nor a pet to fill the holes. Nor do we want either.
We are not wizards, nor are we mages. Being the slowest to max dps class in the game, we do not want ultimates or a big friendly pet. Our pet is a reeking conjuration of misdirection, attracting mob attention away from the real threat, us. We want to be the best sustained dps casters in the game and considering our mechanics, deserve it. Doing this based on our ability to weave spells depending on the circumstance, not an AA crutch. We accept that there will be circumstances where our stack mechanic may make us the not an optimal class for an engage, but wish that we should be designed that what we are capable of as players should determine our outcome.
My belief is that Festering Curse can currently be removed, allowing a more rational and incremental increase of necromancer DPS through the tiers. I believe this could be achieved by the introduction of a number of changes to the game. Among these changes, the replacement of the AA itself and a few spells;
1. The change of funeral pyre of malath into an 8 tick dot at the same mana cost and same damage, This would allow it to do significant duration dps at lower leves with scitterpox if the necromancer has done the murk spell quest, and in combination with Marlow's Cremation.
2. The change of the Archaic Claws of the Chill and Caress of Sivyana to 5 dot ticks by the either a replacement AA for 15 minutes or on their own, with a 15 minute cooldown. Because of cleric mana, it is unlikely any fight will last more then 15 minutes.
3. Stop conditionally nerfing Heirophant's Breath on a zonal basis. If the dev desire is not to do so then give us more long duration dots we can use instead of festering curse, at least such that we have to choose being safe and having runic 2 on our bar or doing max dps.
4. Replacement of Festering Curse with an over-lich which requires the dedicated healing of a priest for us to be able to perform duration dps. Necromancer dps is massively linear, if you can't make the boss regen reflect it, (like rujik), I don't know what to say.
Tldr: read the whole thing. ( and the boards have completely eaten my careful nesting :/)
