Guild Wars 2

Hi guys,

I left the game before the Necro buff, then I read a lot about Necros (or other Condi Builds) became the hard counter for the D/D Ele’s so I decide to give a try.

So I read the forums so I was warned before, I go for Soldier gear and Cleansing Fire and Etheral Renewal (or wse)….

So when I countered first Necro in sPVP, he pulled me his full combo and I had at least 6-7 condi on me No Prob, Cleanse Fire no condies but to my shock, until I click my Cleanse half of 19K HP pool was gone.

So Water heal up, then he corrupted my boon again lots of Condis, half of my HP Pool gone again, Evasive Arcana and cleared some condis also, then he loaded me again with some Condies (may be CD of his full Combo is off) I don’t know, only thing I had left was Ether Renewal but even when cleaning conditions, heal could not even kept up for the Condis and I died

So after this experience, I am guessing the Necro was running some Dhuumfire/Terror build, can somebody tell me what is their full combo? I think he was running Staff – Scepter/Dagger and he can only have 2 fears, what makes this build so effective.

After he loaded me with Condis, I could only stay defensive and could not do anything to him.

What would you do differently then I did?

And before I was never using Ether Renewal for Healing Skill, so when this thing channels for 6-8s I can’t do anything else, I mean it seems it is a must against Necros but not able to do anything for 6s is tough.

There are a few necro fear builds that are just ridiculous. Armor of Earth is our only Stab and doesn’t last long enough, and we haven’t got stun-breakers on Cleansing Fire and Lightning Flash anymore.

The only way I’ve found to kill them is to bug their skills by literally standing inside of them. A lot of our PbAoE’s will still hit, but moving around on top of/inside their characters will cause many of their skills to do nothing upon activation. I know it’s cheap, but so are their fear builds.

use a build that isn’t reliant on boons and conditions, so that their corrupt boons and condition transfers do nothing
you now get hit with 500% fewer conditions

Dodge?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=dgyk71VRoUE

I LOVE that vid you linked – it’s my new favorite. It’s not possible to overestimate the importance of dodging in this game. tyvm =D

In WvW, where you can customize everything, I’d give the same advice: dodge. But in PvP, where your options are far more limited, you just haven’t got enough dodges to last the duration of the fight, since your severely-nerfed offensive power causes fights to last longer, and you can’t use food to enhance endurance regen.

Trying to avoid boons altogether is similarly difficult; I normally have perma vigor, might, and regen, almost perma fury and swiftness, and occasional protection and stability. I’d say I have an average of 4 boons. I would have to retrait specifically to avoid boons, which would be more effective against necros, but less effective against every other class.

The only viable way to fight necros without speccing specifically to combat them that I’ve found is to abuse melee-stacking them. I know it’s probably a glitch that this will bug out most their skills, but it works, and until Anet nerfs their fear builds, I feel perfectly fine abusing this tactic. When the opposition’s abusing a mechanic, you’ve got to fight fire with fire.

sorrychief.2563:

Dodge?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=dgyk71VRoUE

If the Necros marks are not dodgeable what will be the exact use dodging and playing without boon I have to be just glass cannon, kill them before they kill you.

Marks are dodgable.

For sPvP you must use a zerker or valkyrie amulet to have any chance of killing a necro or warrior by yourself (or anything else really). Alternatives don’t give you enough damage to get past life force gains/heal sig and you will lose in a prolonged fight.

Zerker amy is your best bet agains’t necros since the small amount of vitality is much better than valk’s toughness and 12k health vs condi.

I have both classes Ele is my main but I am pretty familiar with the necro terror build.
The best thing is to understand how it works:

Standard Terror build is 30/20/0/0/20 It is always 30/20/x/x/x I personally run 30/20/20 so I have less life force generation it still plays similar.

The insta-gib combo is ideally

Pop into deathshroud Fear,

Dark Path – Chill and Bleeds

tainted shackles Torment

If not dead swap to staff with a hydromancy or geomancy sigil on it lay reapers mark for more fear.

Lay spectral wall bomb with marks from staff. The person should be dead.

It isn’t particularly difficult to pull off but it depends on what your fighting also. More tankier builds you have to run through the rotation a bit more glassy you probably only need to hit them with half of it.

There are variations of that instagib setup it isn’t so cookie cutter as when you cloak and dagger you should be trying to backstab. There is Fear – hit with Signet of spite also. Then it depends on if they have a focus for more chill a dagger off hand.

The important thing as a ele is good cleanses. If you are d/d ele you can win the fight but it is in the necro’s favor especially if they run corrupt boon. Ether renewal can help if your disengaging but anyone who has fought ele’s or know how they work will fear you when you ether. It is really easy to interrupt ether as a necro.

The key things to know is that the build is pretty glassy usually sitting around 2.5k armor and 18-20k health. Some people think it is tanky but that is just deathshroud after you get past deathshroud the necro itself is squishy. Any necro with 20-30 points in soul reaping will seem tanky because of deathshroud.

Most will go 15 points in soul reaping for Spectral armor at 50% health. If a necro has spectral armor up and goes into deathshroud it will actually gain life force the more attacks that hit it and 1v1 you can’t get through deathshroud with spectral armor up.

It isn’t a fight where you can eat the conditions wipe them and then mop the floor with the necro because application is easy. You have to get through the deathshroud that is the most imporant thing.

Like Zencow said burst is good against necros don’t eat marks as best you can.

S/D eles can give me trouble more so than D/D because S/D has range and blind sucks and no necro uses the staff auto attack so you get blinded when you are doing imporant attacks which are pretty much what the necro is always using.

Also if you get hit with tainted shackles and you can’t get outside the 900 range before the immobilze hits don’t wipe it until after the immobilize hits you. Alot of times people wipe as soon as they see the shackles but the real danger is the immobilize and the damage at the end.

Important Provided a necro has at least 10 points in Soul Reaping(which most do) they can fear you every 17.5 seconds.

sorrychief.2563:

Dodge?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=dgyk71VRoUE

You have no idea how regularly I hear Piccolo screaming DODGE! when I play GW2.

I play burst elementalist (S/D) and I’ve found a pretty hilarious way to deal with the “meta” necro build.

It takes advantage of the fact that they have no stun-breaks.

It starts out with me charging up Earth 2.
Then I lightning flash onto them with Earthquake (knocking them down).
In the time in which they’re knocked down, I put as much hurt on them as I possibly can (fresh air burst). This should get them down to half health; now either they’ve panicked and switched into Deathshrouded or they’re ballsy/scuicidal and just get up.
Since you’re in Air attunement you can just knock them down over again with updraft and burst them down to dead or very low (at which point you should have no problem winning).
If they’re in Deathshroud, you should pop stability and tank them through it… do NOT waste your updraft.
As soon as DS goes down they’re probably gonna try to heal, RTL + Updraft them.
Then burst them down to dead.

This strategy capitalizes on the fact that lots of them run around without stability or stunbreaks.
With practice you can hold a necro in place for the whole duration of the fight.
Of course this doesn’t work 100% of the time because there are necros who are able to dodge/counter, but it works a swell amount of time.

If you’re fighting them away from a point or you don’t need to contest the point, you can break up their rotation and spread the condi burst out by staying at long range and LoSing. If you don’t have to deal with that initial fear/15 bleed bomb, necro’s ability to condi burst is much less scary (but still potent). Bait out death shroud before you burst, much like you would bait out water against an ele tank. Trying to DPS through their death shroud, especially a full bar, is a complete waste of time; even more so if they pop spectral armor first. Break LoS or range until they leave DS and then hit them hard.

Mash Hog.5672:

It starts out with me charging up Earth 2.
Then I lightning flash onto them with Earthquake (knocking them down).

Unfortunately, this almost never works 1v1 against above average or better players. When playing S/D burst I cancel cast EQ at the start of a fight to see if my opponent is terrible or not. EQ is just too telegraphed. It’s generally better to start with blink phoenix if your opponent isn’t moving erratically.

Yea I forgot that fact Mash Hog is correct. Necromancers have very little access to stability it comes from their elites of Plague or Lich a trait for 30 points in Soul Reaping called foot in the grave. That trait is usually on ran in 30/10/0/0/30 power well neco’s not condition builds. A well that not many run also has 1 sec of stability.

Also mash is correct most necros run around with 1 or no stun breakers at all. The popular choices for stun breakers are spectral walk, spectral armor or plague signet.

zencow.3651:

Marks are dodgable.

For sPvP you must use a zerker or valkyrie amulet to have any chance of killing a necro or warrior by yourself (or anything else really). Alternatives don’t give you enough damage to get past life force gains/heal sig and you will lose in a prolonged fight.

Zerker amy is your best bet agains’t necros since the small amount of vitality is much better than valk’s toughness and 12k health vs condi.

Uhm there is a trait that make the marks un-dodgeable or not?

posthumecaver.6473:

zencow.3651:

Marks are dodgable.

For sPvP you must use a zerker or valkyrie amulet to have any chance of killing a necro or warrior by yourself (or anything else really). Alternatives don’t give you enough damage to get past life force gains/heal sig and you will lose in a prolonged fight.

Zerker amy is your best bet agains’t necros since the small amount of vitality is much better than valk’s toughness and 12k health vs condi.

Uhm there is a trait that make the marks un-dodgeable or not?

No there is a trait that makes them unblockable but you can still dodge them. If the Marks are large 240 radius those are the unblockable marks.