Necro Blastbones Changes: Time for a Class Rename?

Anumaril · March 2024

With the new update Blastbones was changed into a self-buff ability. There are other posts already about how lacklustre it is, but I'd like to focus on class identity here. Necro was already a class barely living up to its name, with only one proper offensive pet summon (Skeletal Mage/Archer), and then one quasi-pet summon in the form of Blastbones. But now with Blastbones gone we only have the 1.

Removing a necromancer's minion summons does nothing but eviscerate the class fantasy of being a necromancer in the first place, which wasn't exactly stellar to begin with. To say I'm disappointed with this change would be putting it lightly. I simply do not feel like a necromancer anymore, as what little class identity there was is being clawed away. If ZOS wants to continue down this route, then consider renaming the class "Dark Sorcerer" instead of "Necromancer". Otherwise, I'd kindly ask to rethink the approach to playing a necromancer.

A big part of being a necromancer should be about summoning minions to serve you in combat (not even permanent ones!). The damage rotation should ideally be about (re-)summoning the minions as they expire, empowering them, and then using a spammable like Flame Skull. Additionally, I think minions should also cost corpses to summon, emphasising the fact that you're raising the dead and not just spawning them out of Oblivion the way you might do with daedric minions. It might take slightly longer to wind up your damage potential in the beginning of an encounter, but that can be offset with other corpse-generating spells.

Addressing the elephant in the room:
Yes, Blighted Blastbones remains available as an offensive morph of the ability. But I don't consider this sufficient. First of all, if I'm playing a magicka necromancer, why should I be forced to use the stamina morph of a spell just to feel a shred of class identity while playing? We're basically being told to play un-optimally if we want to enjoy our own class fantasy. Furthermore, when necromancy in the Elder Scrolls universe is constantly associated with blue, why on earth should magicka necromancers be forced to use a summon with a green theme like Blighted Blastbones? It's not thematically coherent at all, and irks me to no end when I'm using my spells.

If ZOS is adamant on leaving necromancer class identity to languish, then at least throw us a bone by having the resource cost of Blighted Blastbones be determined by your highest max quantity secondary resource (if you have more max magicka than max stamina, it costs magicka, etc). Then have the colour change accordingly as well.

Lazarus_Rising · March 2024

Despite every feedback they did go through with it. Nothing to be done anymore sadly.

tsaescishoeshiner · March 2024

While I have issues with the skill, sacrificing a bone minion to empower yourself still feels very necromancer-y to me.

I'd love a skeleton-army-summoner class, but necro fits in with the other necromancers we see in the game, like in the worm cult or Fang Lair.

I think split cost on blastbones would be nice, and I do miss the color of the magicka one.

If anything, I'd like Flame Skull to get a new visual. It'd be cool if our spammable was summoning spears of bones from the ground under our target, and it could leave a corpse every few casts.

Mesite · March 2024

I once played Diablo 2. I was disappointed as my laptop at the time couldn't cope with lots of minions. I put the game aside, hoping one day to have a necromancer that would provide lots of minions.

I played Baldurs Gate. I could fill the area with summoned creatures, and I could summon lots of skeletons. Then there came a patch which limited the number of minions. I moved on.

Diablo 3 provided a witch doctor, not what I was after.

ESO has a different type of necromancer which doesn't summon the immense number of undead that I need. But he's very good at scrying and excavating.

Did anyone have the version of Diablo 3 with the necromancer?

IncultaWolf · March 2024

Mesite wrote: »

I once played Diablo 2. I was disappointed as my laptop at the time couldn't cope with lots of minions. I put the game aside, hoping one day to have a necromancer that would provide lots of minions.

I played Baldurs Gate. I could fill the area with summoned creatures, and I could summon lots of skeletons. Then there came a patch which limited the number of minions. I moved on.

Diablo 3 provided a witch doctor, not what I was after.

ESO has a different type of necromancer which doesn't summon the immense number of undead that I need. But he's very good at scrying and excavating.

Did anyone have the version of Diablo 3 with the necromancer?

Death knights in WoW can summon dozens of minions at once, I haven't played much of it, but when my friend used it, I was shocked at how many undeath thralls were following him on my screen.

Faulgor · March 2024

Sorcerers are already Dark Sorcerers, having Dark Magic and all that.

I vote for something like Plague Doctor, considering the main skills are poison/disease/bleed type.
Or just an outright Peryite cultist, given we already have a Herma Mora cultist as a class now ...

heaven13 · March 2024

Mesite wrote: »

I once played Diablo 2. I was disappointed as my laptop at the time couldn't cope with lots of minions. I put the game aside, hoping one day to have a necromancer that would provide lots of minions.

I played Baldurs Gate. I could fill the area with summoned creatures, and I could summon lots of skeletons. Then there came a patch which limited the number of minions. I moved on.

Diablo 3 provided a witch doctor, not what I was after.

ESO has a different type of necromancer which doesn't summon the immense number of undead that I need. But he's very good at scrying and excavating.

Did anyone have the version of Diablo 3 with the necromancer?

Diablo IV necro also has the option to summon quite a few minions, I think at least a dozen.

Lazarus_Rising · March 2024

A necromancer does not have to be a summoner only. If you are familar with Last Epoch you can see that a more like Death Magic Mage would also be great. Undead minions are mandatory of course but they are ways to make a necromancer more interesting. Still i do not get the vision from ZOS. Some kind you are the living corpse idk.

Xarc · March 2024

RIP necro.

it's quite funny, it was the only possible ending for him.

Naftal · March 2024

Does no-one complaining about necro know that we have hybrid scaling for abilities? You don't need to use the magicka morph just because you have more magicka than stamina.

Necrotech_Master · March 2024

Mesite wrote: »

I once played Diablo 2. I was disappointed as my laptop at the time couldn't cope with lots of minions. I put the game aside, hoping one day to have a necromancer that would provide lots of minions.

I played Baldurs Gate. I could fill the area with summoned creatures, and I could summon lots of skeletons. Then there came a patch which limited the number of minions. I moved on.

Diablo 3 provided a witch doctor, not what I was after.

ESO has a different type of necromancer which doesn't summon the immense number of undead that I need. But he's very good at scrying and excavating.

Did anyone have the version of Diablo 3 with the necromancer?

i played diablo 3 on the switch and had a minion build, extremely tanky not a lot of dps though

to keep this post more on topic, i was not really happy with the necromancer class either, a lot of the pet summons were underwhelming (i prefer quantity to quality, but if quality over quantity works too im OK with it, but the ESO necromancer neither has quantity or quality)

not to mention half of the skills being marked as criminal acts or just being kludgy in general

Aldoss · March 2024

Naftal wrote: »

Does no-one complaining about necro know that we have hybrid scaling for abilities? You don't need to use the magicka morph just because you have more magicka than stamina.

This critique falls short of helpful because it neglects two very impactful pain points of being a necromancer in ESO, lack of buffs and lack of damage skills.

Lack of Buffs

Necro has no in-class access to Major Brutality/Sorcery and no Major Savagery/Prophecy. We have to source these buffs from other sources. Sourcing these buffs from skills limits the necro's bar space, but allows them to use tri-pots for sustain. If you choose to use your bar space for other skills, then you're limited to alliance pots which get you both damage and crit, but only sustain for one resource and not the other. If 80% of your abilities are magicka, but the game forces you to use stamina costing skills, and your weapon heavy attacks only give you magicka back, then you have a class dilemma.

Lack of Damage Skills

Necro has very few damage skills because the class, like Warden, came during a weird period of combat design. Rather than having both damage and buff skills interspersed throughout our skill trees, we have very distinct damage, healing, and tank lines. Fire rune is a common necro spammable for example, because it's somehow easier to use than flame skull and our passive buffs the dot after the aoe direct hit.

If your damaging skills are direct damage, like blighted blastbones is, then you're limiting your potential burst by choosing to ignore the 12% buff from lightning staves. This used to not be a problem because Stalking hit so hard. I played a pressure build for a bit last patch that decent dot damage while still hitting 9-10k Stalkings. But guess what? ZOS deleted Stalking from the game. The best hit I can get right now is 9k with Blighted with a lightning staff. Choosing to use a bow drops that burst and choosing to use a two hander requires wrecking blow to get Bezerk, which helps to match the damage I used to get from a safe distance with a lightning stave.

Yes, the game is (almost) hybridized, but that to negate this feedback with "just switch your resource to stamina instead of magicka" is short sighted and blind to the problems that Necro faces.

Anumaril · March 2024

Lazarus_Rising wrote: »

A necromancer does not have to be a summoner only. If you are familar with Last Epoch you can see that a more like Death Magic Mage would also be great. Undead minions are mandatory of course but they are ways to make a necromancer more interesting. Still i do not get the vision from ZOS. Some kind you are the living corpse idk.

Yeah I understand that too. it doesn't only need to be about summoning minions. But I do think that should be a big part of it, or at least be reflected in more than just Skeletal Mage/Archer.

fizzylu · March 2024

Lazarus_Rising wrote: »

A necromancer does not have to be a summoner only. If you are familar with Last Epoch you can see that a more like Death Magic Mage would also be great.

I think the problem is that Zenimax doesn't seem to know what kind of necromancer they want their necromancer to be.

Diablo IV necromancer: blood, shadow, bone, summoner
WoW Death Knights: blood, frost, unholy, summoner
RuneScape necromancy skill: death magic, summoner
ESO necromancer: frost, fire, poison, lightning, death magic, partial summoner that can also be/become the undead thing?

I've played all of these.... and ESO's is definitely the worst take on the concept. And the most cringe visually.

Hapexamendios · March 2024

Necromancee --> Lackromancer

Vulkunne · March 2024

The more they mess with it the worse it will get.

Alaztor91 · March 2024

Can anyone even recall a single positive change to a Necro skill other than Death Scythe in the last 5 years? I'm sure there is probably one and I just forgot but all I can remember is:

-Major Vulnerability changed from 30% to 10% and no longer exclusive to the Colossus.
-Skeletal Mage damage cut in half when they reworked DoTs(even though Skeletal Mage isn't technically a DoT).
-Graverobber/Harmony nerf.
-Spirit Mender healing cut in half when they reworked HoTs.
-Grave Lord's Sacrifice

Those above are the ones I remember but they are all negative changes lol. Did Wrobel design the entire class and this is why ZOS no longer has a clue on what to do with it?

Araneae6537 · March 2024

Mesite wrote: »

I once played Diablo 2. I was disappointed as my laptop at the time couldn't cope with lots of minions. I put the game aside, hoping one day to have a necromancer that would provide lots of minions.

I played Baldurs Gate. I could fill the area with summoned creatures, and I could summon lots of skeletons. Then there came a patch which limited the number of minions. I moved on.

Diablo 3 provided a witch doctor, not what I was after.

ESO has a different type of necromancer which doesn't summon the immense number of undead that I need. But he's very good at scrying and excavating.

Did anyone have the version of Diablo 3 with the necromancer?

GW2 necromancer was fun to play, including the option to have lots of minions. I’m not usually into the necromancer fantasy, but I thought a tree-creature (I played sylvari) might adopt a more pragmatic view of cycles of life and death.

I made my first necromancer in ESO in the hope of making a character like Vastarie — alas that there were no options for that! I made others since… maybe still viable for PVE tank and healing? Although they haven’t been the best source of vulnerability for a long time now… Currently mule characters, alas.

Araneae6537 · March 2024

Faulgor wrote: »

Sorcerers are already Dark Sorcerers, having Dark Magic and all that.

I vote for something like Plague Doctor, considering the main skills are poison/disease/bleed type.
Or just an outright Peryite cultist, given we already have a Herma Mora cultist as a class now ...

I would like Plague Doctor as a title!

I have both the toxin doctor costume and an outfit made with the hat for one of my necros. I could get into the idea of manipulators of disease for the class.

I’m not keen on the Peryite cultist idea. NPCs vomiting is bad enought — I reeeally don’t want to see it from players!

Urvoth · March 2024

Alaztor91 wrote: »

Can anyone even recall a single positive change to a Necro skill other than Death Scythe in the last 5 years? I'm sure there is probably one and I just forgot but all I can remember is:

-Major Vulnerability changed from 30% to 10% and no longer exclusive to the Colossus.
-Skeletal Mage damage cut in half when they reworked DoTs(even though Skeletal Mage isn't technically a DoT).
-Graverobber/Harmony nerf.
-Spirit Mender healing cut in half when they reworked HoTs.
-Grave Lord's Sacrifice

Those above are the ones I remember but they are all negative changes lol. Did Wrobel design the entire class and this is why ZOS no longer has a clue on what to do with it?

Yep, the change to ruinous scythe has been the only real positive change in the last half decade

mariliaribas · March 2024

Definitely time for a class name change. With how clunky, inefficient and weak it is, just name it "clown" and be done with it. Maybe never touch it again, otherwise they will only make it even worse, like they did this time. Because it's not like several people didn't warn the team that this change was bad during PTS

C_Inside · March 2024

Alaztor91 wrote: »

Can anyone even recall a single positive change to a Necro skill other than Death Scythe in the last 5 years? I'm sure there is probably one and I just forgot but all I can remember is:

-Major Vulnerability changed from 30% to 10% and no longer exclusive to the Colossus.
-Skeletal Mage damage cut in half when they reworked DoTs(even though Skeletal Mage isn't technically a DoT).
-Graverobber/Harmony nerf.
-Spirit Mender healing cut in half when they reworked HoTs.
-Grave Lord's Sacrifice

Those above are the ones I remember but they are all negative changes lol. Did Wrobel design the entire class and this is why ZOS no longer has a clue on what to do with it?

They also buffed Flame Skull. It used to only be 20% extra damage on the 3rd cast.
And they decreased the ult cost of Colossus. It used to be 225. In the same patch they also made Glacial's Major Vuln last 17 seconds and I believe they also increased the damage of both morphs by a little bit. I could be misremembering though since who uses Colossus nowadays with Turning Tide being so common?

Also, to add to the skill nerfs, Syphon used to tick every 0.3 seconds. In U35 they made it tick every 0.6, even though it's not a sticky DOT therefore it shouldn't have had its tick rate changed. So they cut its status effect chance in half and made it less useful for sets like Azureblight and Runecarver.

TaSheen · March 2024

But what would a logical rename be even? I dunno.... "Mannimarco Not"?

Monte_Cristo · March 2024

TaSheen wrote: »

But what would a logical rename be even? I dunno.... "Mannimarco Not"?

Death Mage? Soul Sorcerer?

C_Inside · March 2024

"Elementalist" is the most descriptive name of the class at this point as almost none of the actual undead summons are worth using. Blighted Blastbones is the only summon that's worth a damn in the entirety of necro's toolkit for a DD.

The mage is a trash skill that does less damage than a sticky DOT like Entropy (the Archer is about on par, but still made obsolete by the fact the Entropy is more reliable and its morphs offer more utility).

The Colossus is made obsolete by Turning Tide/Archdruid Devyric which are both extremely common tank sets. It's raw damage pales in comparison to Meteor/Elemental Rage.

The Spirit Mender doesn't do damage so obviously you're not gonna use it as a DD.

And then we have SuckBones/Grave Lord's Suckrifice. I'm sure I don't need to explain why this skill is trash as there have been dozens of threads about this already.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot about Animate Blastbones. Because you're totally gonna use an ult that costs more than both Meteor and Elemental Rage (by a pretty big amount mind you) that does less damage than both and requires there to be 3 corpses present in its AOE.

Faulgor · March 2024

Anumaril wrote: »

Lazarus_Rising wrote: »

A necromancer does not have to be a summoner only. If you are familar with Last Epoch you can see that a more like Death Magic Mage would also be great. Undead minions are mandatory of course but they are ways to make a necromancer more interesting. Still i do not get the vision from ZOS. Some kind you are the living corpse idk.

Yeah I understand that too. it doesn't only need to be about summoning minions. But I do think that should be a big part of it, or at least be reflected in more than just Skeletal Mage/Archer.

In TES, Necromancy is practically all about reanimating the dead. There's also the concept of soul trapping, although that has shifted between Mysticism and Conjuration.

That said, I don't think the number of minions is really important. The main issue, for me, is that a) the minions we do have suck and b), you don't ever feel like you are reanimating anything because the corpse mechanic is backwards.

Currently, Necromancers aren't reanimators, they are summoners. While there is precedent for summoning Skeletons in TES, it feels like a step back from Skyrim where we could actually reanimate fallen enemies.
What would have made more sense to me for a Necromancer, is to generate corpses by killing enemies, special corpse-generating support skills (Spirit Mender, Bone Armor, etc) or even your spammable (Flame Skull), and then use corpse-consuming abilities to "summon" your Skeleton minions.

Otherwise, you are just a worse Sorcerer.

OldStygian · March 2024

Necro in ESO really is disappointing. No need to go outside the franchise, just look at any other TES game.

Off the top of my head... For starters Necro ultimates should be raise dead and lich form.

The game has skeleton models for many creatures (I was just in Fang Lair).... Ultimate to raise corpse, be it animal or humanoid gives you a pet you can buff and heal to fight for you. Transform into a lich to get pluses and minuses to whatever. Make it require both bars to stay active a la the pet skills or make it like WW and have a separate skill line altogether. Having any of these active around NPC's makes you KOS with guards and gives large bounty.

Other skills should be debuffs, DoT's and maybe CC.

Etc etc.

Anumaril · March 2024

Faulgor wrote: »

In TES, Necromancy is practically all about reanimating the dead. There's also the concept of soul trapping, although that has shifted between Mysticism and Conjuration.

That said, I don't think the number of minions is really important. The main issue, for me, is that a) the minions we do have suck and b), you don't ever feel like you are reanimating anything because the corpse mechanic is backwards.

Fully agreed. You're right that we don't even need a lot of minion summon abilities per se. It could even be condensed into a couple abilities (or hell, even one if you design it well). An example of what I'm talking about would be an ability that consumes a nearby corpse and raises an undead minion from it to fight for you for X seconds, and you can reuse the skill up to a maximum of 3 active skeletal minions. Or something similar to that.

No need to clog up ability slots with a bunch of summon abilities. Just one or two flexible ones.

Xarc · March 2024

in tesV i played a mix between magicka necromancer build (with magicka bound bow) and conjuring build using fire atronach, it was so fun to revive the dudes i just killed to help me fight their friends.

I just want to remind you that necromancer was a class very requested on this forum by the past until zos decided to make it real. (or not).

Vorkk8383 · March 2024

If motifs/recipes/blueprints, etc. were account-wide, I'd go remake another class ASAP. It's the only reason I still play a necro. We had it bad, and they just made us worse. It looks like they tried to make the rotation easier, but that wasn't our complaint. Our complaint is our lacklustre DPS.

They should just remove the class altogether and give necros a class change token because it's clear that they can't make it work and won't listen to anyone.

cyberjanet · March 2024

Lazarus_Rising wrote: »

A necromancer does not have to be a summoner only. If you are familar with Last Epoch you can see that a more like Death Magic Mage would also be great. Undead minions are mandatory of course but they are ways to make a necromancer more interesting. Still i do not get the vision from ZOS. Some kind you are the living corpse idk.

A Death Magic Mage sounds awesome! I played Necromancer in Guild Wars (original) but never really got into the summoning side. I loved the hexes and death magic though.