[Dev Update] Skill Balances for Early April

Those poor necromancers get hit so hard at times. I do like the buffs to assassins as it will open up viable builds in time. Also the modifications to rangers seem very cool, especially with pet controls on the way, I wonder how this will affect the little guys. Mesmers are getting it again too which is funny because wasn't Anet going to make PvE viable for them and instead they reduce hex effectiveness (True I did hate those Shame Mesmers when I Monked but still...)? Lastely, I feel sorry for paragons because I felt they could at least change it to non-spirit allies so that npc's in quest and allies could still receive the help (for example in AB).

I'm liking the ele changes... The new GoLE is gonna be better than ever for primaries ^^ And the buff to Mind Blast... Cute.

Crippling Slash... GJ there (seriously) It means that C. Slash warrs don't have to lug around that godsforsaken Sever just to nail a DW on someone... Now what do I do with my free skill slot? Mending?
Now... about Hundred Blades?

Brutal Weapon looks... well... Brutal now. I'm sure that 'sins, for sure, are gonna find a way to use it. Even rangers... This + Forked Arrow? A killer skill for random formats... cool.

Signet spiking 'sins are gonna like the buffs Cheers! As are SS rits... happy days for unorthodox builds

And I'm ready with my popcorn to watch all the PvE necros start QQing.

Crippling Slash Ftw

Cripple Slash, Mighty Blow, no scythe nerfs except Rending - this next season will be bloody.

I seriously urge you to reconsider this for PvE. Come on, most builds kill several creatures within a 5 second time period (SF much? Or even SS build). This is heavily gimping the Necro's EN gain in PvE, while the change seems to have been aimed at PvP. A better solution would have been 0 EN from Spirits, which would solve the current problem in HA.
I myself will get cheated out of 13* (how many critters in the mob -1) a lot of times. That's a very heavy nerf compared to the PvP side of the game.

All of Anet's Skill Balances need less Mesmer rape.

Mesmers are better in PvE. We have the mighty signet of clumsiness. Searing flames Ele's And SS necro's look out.

The fixed duration of thpse hexes will hurt, esp in PvE where they are usful energy and aoe damage, against a boss the 6 seconds is could down to 3 almost making it a direct interupt, which is not really what those skills were good at. The only upside is that it may help with attribute point spread.

The other changes are'nt too bad really. Gives me a reason to play with signet builds again. Diversion and price of failure are the hardest hit. I'll need to see how these are affected in real play before commenting.

The more I think about it, the more the GoLE change was a nerf for other classes, than a buff for Elems. There are very, very few spells that cost more than 15 energy (MS, Rodgorts, etc). What would be nice would be to gain back some of the energy, rather than it costing less.

R.I.P Soul Reaping and Glyph of Lesser Energy :'(
I understand why the glyph was nerfed (a lotta fun though), but why Soul Reaping? -_-

ill be taking a wait and see policy on these skills and changes. things of interest though:

ability to do something about a recall split. not what i, or a lot of people would have liked. will wait to see it in action, but not sure anything was really done, aside from being able to maybe see it coming now.

soul reaping. again, want to test it out before i make any claims. the pve aspect will definitely see problems with it. but i think it just ends up meaning fewer bone fiends per mob, with the changes to horrors. a hit, but not doomsday. at least, i think.

price and spirit of failure. lets see them in action now. maybe this helps. maybe not. would have liked to see the durations scale too. 10..25 or something similar.

GoLE. we will see. maybe its enough, maybe not, but at least its a start.

derv and assassin changes. half-hearted woot. whatever really. didnt break anything (that i can see. maybe avatar but im not sure) and tapped rending which needed it. its good. warrior changes. i like them. crip slash will see a lot more use now. shields up! needed a change, as it was actually forcing some teams to drop a ranger over another warrior. para changes. whatever. still broken to some extent. doesnt need buffs or nerfs. needs a retooling. mesmer changes. not sure why, but whatever. didnt break anything beyond repair, but didnt help much either. we will see if these skills fall out of the meta. ele changes. mind blast got enother buff. was decent before. wonder what its like now. monk changes. serious anti hex buffs! and the change to ZB is ok. doesnt break it, but doesnt really hit it either. ranger changes. trappers and beast masters ftw? sure. rit changes. brutal looks brutal, but nothing else of note.

Judging from what the update provides regarding Soul Reaping: Thanks for destroying the Necromancer class. If this change is going to be as bad as it sounds, I guess GW is done for me. I've enjoyed playing my necro as of lately, but with the nerf to soulreaping as describe, it won't be fun at all anymore.

Instead of taking away a necros backbone, it would be more feasible to change the elements that trigger the issue - spirits and minions. why not reduce the energy gained from minions to half the energy, like from spirits? Or reduce energy gained when a minion/spirit dies? gah... this change sounds wrong on so many levels.

HAHAHA!!
Yeah, diversion is changing the toucher meta.

THEY BUFFED OTYUGH'S CRY!!!"

OMG, best update ever!!!

Notes:

Glad to see ZB get nerfed. I'd love to see it get nerfed even more. Let the invincimonk whining begin. :P

Antidote signet will help ease away from Mending Touch. Good.

Shields Up nerf will make thousands of W/x FOW farmers cry blood. Since I'm always asleep when the US has favor, I don't really care much. Even though the nerf wasn't farming based, it was the power of 2 copies of SU at VOD.

Dwarven Battle Stance still sucks. At the very least, let it be affected by all weapons, OR make it end if you use an attack skill.

Crippling Slash: awesome buff, it needed more than it was. Of course, since crippled and bleeding aren't removed by Antidote Signet, Mending Touch may not be let go after all...

Soul Reaping got what it needed. Actually, if Anet had just made it affect "fleshy" or "non-summoned" creatures only, the current mechanic would have worked just fine. Spirits and Undead are, well, non-living, so they wouldn't have a soul to reap. But whatever. We'll see how the mechanic works in practice.

What do you mean why Soul reaping

1, This is HARDLY a nerf for pve, most pve necros are MM, they just reduced minion Spells energy, and you now get more energy from soul reaping just only at 5 second intervals. If you get something like 32 energy for 16 points of soul reaping and most mm skills are now only 15 energy each kill gets you 2 minions if your not a MM its still not a big deal because you were probably focusing on 1 target.

Now lets work that Paragon shouts do not work on other paragons idea o' mine.
As soon as thats tweaked in buff some stuff make paragons a buffer and Ritualists holders (Put the spirits down to assist in damage and pressure) and Whammo...got buffs...heals...and additional damage that doesnt need a corpse (mms).

wow, you made Otyugh's cry not suck!

Why is it that all the classes that people are saying need to be better are getting more and more nerfs(paragon and mesmer)? I've said it alot: make paragon shouts not effect other paragons(I've said it ever since the first skill update after NF's release). And for the spirit problem you could make it non-spirit ally like it is with alot of other skills (on a side note: can spirits even hear sounds?).

Other than that I think it's great! Warriors finally have a good swordsmanship elite, monks got some improvements for hex removal, necromancers have cheaper minions, and assassins got some better lead attacks.

First off it's not a few complaints. Other then the players abusing it, SR has been on the list to get hit in some skill balance update for over a year now. The abuse of the attribute is sickening, and is destroying PvP. And to show you proof that the PvP community never wanted this as a fix work your way down past the little PvE Happyland into the PvP Section of Guru and read.

Where exactly did this come from? Anet didn't even look at any suggestions that any of the PvP community has mentioned. Basically they are getting the same amount of energy, only now every 5 seconds. How do you even believe this is going to stop the abuse of the attribute? Sure it might slightly hinder some of the builds abusing it now, but in no way is it close to a fix.

For the sake of PvP and to save Anet from the swarms of angry PvErs look at the simple solution of destroying the benefit of Soul Reaping from Spirits alone. The major abuse of SR came/is coming from Minions and Spirits. Minions took a hard hit with Jagged Bones being nerfed, however you have yet to fix spirits. This is but one suggestion that has been brought to light, and I would suggest Anet figure out a different solution to the abuse rather then the one they intend to implement.

I like some of the changes but I am not sure I like the changes to ZB as to the gain of 7 energy that is fine if you are a Mo/E but not if you are a Mo/X.It is sort of beginning to look like smiting is maybe a different way of protecting those who need it and maybe accepted more in competive play.It would be nice to see savage slash even more reduced in energy cost not 15 more like 5 or better yet make it a adrenal skill like disrupting chop.

@HiKan Trilear .Warriors got a great swordsmanship elite in Factions Dragon Slash.

I'd love that Mind Blast buff. ^^ It's one of my most favorite spells to use and I'd love for it to do a tad more damage, all the changes sound good/needed.

I largely like what I'm seeing and am looking forward to testing things out to see if my initial optimism holds up.