Guild Wars 2

I’ve asked for help fighting thieves before, and you guys gave me some great tips! Now I’m struggling with Minion Master Necros.

I’m usually using a GS/x shatter build, and I’m really open to any 2nd weapon set.

I usually end up getting pretty overwhelmed by the minions. I can usually get 1-2 good shatters in, but then Death Shroud goes up and I have to back off. The only times I have really managed to take one down are when I use the environment to LoS and screw up the pet AI, and that still isn’t easy.

What tips do you have for fighting them?

Moa

ruins an MM’s day every single time.

they often don’t even have a dodge and just have to take it.

Yeah, but I hate slotting an Elite just to take out a MM every 3 minutes. Invisibility seems much stronger in all other fights.

Dps him from range with GS, kite the Minions. Wait for the heal, interupt the heal, go in for the final burst. And hope the Minions don´t catch you to early. Sounds easy, but is hard to do. Otherwise if he´s camping on one node, just ignore him and go for the other points or 2v1 him if you have the time.

Had a funny fight with a MM necro today, I destroyed most of his minions and he goes into death shroud. I was dying but I decided to run in circles around him at almost zero range, which caused him to miss like 3 life blasts and gave me just enough time to use ether feast. There is no guarantee that this will work, but it really made my day.

Hey Eleivo I play a minion mancer necro ALOT although my builds a bit different from most. The biggest thing with us is honestly just being aware. Were always going to be trying to control you in order to let the minions feed on you. (The necro himself acts as a control class while the pets are the dps).

One of our opening combos is staff 3-4 for chill poison and weakness. Dodging that will help keep you away from the golem for a bit longer. Having a teleport for when we immoblize you and a on command jump or stealth for when the golem and bone minions get close can be a big help.

One thing I HATE to happen is when mesmers start letting there staff auto bounce among my pets. My main method of killing mesmers is to transfer the control conditions they put out Like that whirl cripple spike from the phantasm. So once you put a control condition immediatly watch for a dagger 4 (ball of shadow flying at you that bounces between clones as well) or staff 4 both transfer condis. if we cant hit you with it well use it on a clone.

So one tactic may be to hit us with a control condition immediatly shatter your clones and either go invuln or use stealth. So we waste one of our condi transfers trying to hit clones that just vanish annoyingly by the time we finish the cast.

One last tip. Our minions can be kited fairly effectively as long as your aware of the necros positioning. Take them off point. kill them (cause the necro wont want to leave point if he can help it) and hten focus the necro. If the necro walks off point to try to save his pets then. Use the greatsword knockback or that wall of light pull thing and yank us FURTHER off it. then decap it.

Just remember that while were tanky and have decent survivability our CC resiliance is based off transfers/curealls and our mobility is about as kittenty as it gets :P

Thanks for the tips everyone!

@shadelang
So is it definitely worth trying to kill a few of the pets, then attack the Necro? Also, could you elaborate on the staff auto-attack part? Should I try to kite the minions off the point, GS Shatter the minions, then try to finish the rest off with staff?

Don’t kill the pets, as mesmers have crappy AoE and you’ll just release poison clouds while giving him more life force.

Dodge the golem rush and his mark bomb and you should be good.

Eleivo only certain builds can really take out our pets when it comes to you memsers. Ive actualy found PU mesmers have more success against them due to there “drop out” style of combat that lets them dot up the pets and me then dropping away from our agro long enough to let them tick some. Certain pets are worth killing if you can.

Flesh golem is very worth killing mainly because it creates a “moment” of strength for us when we hit you with the charge on it and when it attacks you and cripples you. This makes it easier to chain the bone minion mark combo.

Blood fiend if he has it is very worth killing. That blood fiend IS his sustain unless hes running something similar to me.

For the staff auto if hes using it this is gonna be his secondary mitigation source. that life force he gets from it hitting you and your clones (if there in a line) will be his best defense against whatever burst your build uses. If your a clone/phantasm spammer youl also be forcing us to use the marks (our 2-5) more carefully than we will against others. since we cant afford to have them be wasted on a clone if we can help it.

One big thing to remember. A smart minion mancer is going to STOP ATTACKING if you enter stealth. This will keep you has his minions priority target. So when you pop out of stealth they will immediatly bee-line for you and give us a clue as to your positioning. Stealthing and then staying near hte minions is ASKING me to pop my bone minions in your face. Which is usually all it takes to decide a fight unless you are REALLY quick on your panic button.

Just be aware that minion mancer necros gain ALOT of life force when 3 specific pets die and when one is sacrificed. (Bone Fiend, Flesh golem, Shadow fiend on death. Flesh wurm on sacrifice) Monitoring htere health and hte number of attacks hes hit you or his clones with will give you a clue as to how much life force hes gained between shrouds.

You shouldn’t need to burn your shatters on the first wave of adds. Try using that on the second and use the beserker phantasm to cleave through the bone minions and cripple the flesh golem. this will HEAVILY reduce our damage potential

We are very well centered for long term fights with periods of high and low strength. High strength is at the beginning and when the first cooldowns come off. Low strength is when were trying to kite/control you to limit your damage onto us. Simply knowing what we can do and when we can do it will give you significant advantage over us. Hell not just us but any A.I. centered build

fight AI with AI. If they’re gonna make u deal with minions, then instantly drop 2 phantasms on the necro while ur kiting their minions. lmao

chaosmike.8405:

fight AI with AI. If they’re gonna make u deal with minions, then instantly drop 2 phantasms on the necro while ur kiting their minions. lmao

The thing is necro pets work without line of sight.

Mayama. Currently MM necros are suffering from some MASSIVE issues with pet control. ranging from them randomly selecting nonrelated targets to completely losing there target to being unable to even reach there target. In fact playing a MM necro through these issues is requiring a rather large amount of situational awareness. (Knowing whether are not the bone minions/fiend/flesh golem are actualy in range or attack before activating or if there picking daisies.)

These issues get worse the farther away they are from the necro generally. I.E. if you kite them to the edge of there leash range they will probably just…..stand there and take it.

In the words of the unholy necro forums. “Go go gadget Summon Flesh Cheerleader”