Guild Wars 2

Okay, so I went yesterday to WvWvW with my conditionmancer and it is very op in teamfights, 1v1 and 1v2, but it totally lacks escape mechanics when engaged by bigger group and encountered in situation where the escape is the only solution.

As there is no problem with conditions (obviously) what I lack in my build is mobility. ATM I miss swiftness very much.

I run with full rabid gear and 0/30/20/20/0 traits, I use scepter/dagger and staff, but in 1v1 and 1v2 situations I go with scepter which can stack around 5 bleeds/s with autoattacks only and I spam epidemic if needed. In group fights I swap between scepter and staff, depends if range is needed and try to cast epidemic to best of my team’s advantage.

From skills I took:
- well of corruption – very efficient against every profession by versus guardians in particular)
- blood is power – pretty useless imo but always gives 2 bleeding stacks and the ones I can transfer from myself, I thought about switching it to signet of spite but power is quite useless to me and as its active is very nice it has long cd, I also thought about switching it to spectral walk
- transfusion – this skill is the best thing in necro, especially in zerg vs zerg fights
- plague – imo it stacks much better with condition damage than the lich form, it’s bugged atm though and you cannot leave the plague form prematurely (just like elementalist’s tornado)

I was thinking about abandoning staff and take warhorn for its swiftness buff, but it’s 15s duration and 30s cd (wail of doom also doesn’t compensate its long cd) so I thought about taking axe/focus instead for extra boon striping, retaliation and life force generation, and switch it to staff during teamfights.

So, any suggestions what to change? I would like to keep 30 trait points in precision as I have high precision and use rare vegie pizza, precision oil, and sigils of earth to stack bleeds on crits.

I don’t know, maybe I am missing something? Does necro have only 2 skills giving swiftness? I was analyzing skills and traits and really have no clue how to increase my survivability.

Any help and suggestions appreciated.

Necros aren’t made to be mobile or escape. If you want to live, stay ranged, use chill, cripple, immobilize and fear as much as possible along with epidemic. Stay at the back of your group. Also using death shroud soaks up some damage if it’s not a lot of people chasing you down.

If Necros was given mobility it would be one of the most, if not the most OP class in the game. You need support if you’re running Necro, someone to provide swiftness and stability when necessary. Also having a thief protect you from other thieves is a nice to have.

But when a zerg steamrolls over your group you might as well bend down, but your head between your knees and kiss you kitten goodbye. You aint goin’ nowhere.

Omega.8625:

If Necros was given mobility it would be one of the most, if not the most OP class in the game.

yea we would be like mesmers! xD

Alright, firstly, none of your utilities synergize especially well with a Conditionmancer. Well of Corruption is somewhat nice, but not truly worth the effort to try and keep people in it as a conditionmancer. Blood is Power is useless for the bleeds against players, let me put it to you this way: I could have a 12 minute bleed that killed anyone who kept it on them, but exactly whom is going to ‘allow’ me to keep a 12 minute bleed on them? In today’s meta, you will see constant cleanses and passive cleanses, it’s not worth taking.

The transfusion trait is also not synergized strongly for a conditionmancer, because it means wasting precious Deathshroud for a heal that doesn’t heal you when you’re using it. Which reduces your survivability considerably, you’re better off taking Mark of Evasion so that you get Regen, and add more damage to your opponent, or move the 20 from Blood Magic into Soul Reaping for longer Terror duration.

If you’re fighting in a zerg, Well of Corruption can be nice, but what it does is less effective than advertised for helping your zerg, Corrosive Poison Cloud is now a very good thing to have to support your zerg, since it adds weakness to the opposing zerg and lasts for a very long time, reducing the opposing zerg’s healing and damage output. However if you’re looking for maximum AoE damage, choose Epidemic or Spectral Wall with Terror.

For your survivability, I would replace blood is power with Spectral Walk, and possibly add Plague Signet or Well of Power/Well of Darkness. Those choices would greatly increase your survivability.

As for your swiftness, you can sacrifice damage and the transfer from offhand Dagger, and include Warhorn if you like. It’s viable, but I personally prefer the damage. However, if you do include Warhorn on your Scepter set, do include Geomancy Sigil of you forsee any upclose battles.

Also, remember, duration is only useful for CCs against living players, focusing on duration for bleeds/regular conditions is simply wasting potential due to the cleanses.

Will try today with blood is power changed to spectral walk, was thinking for a long time what to swap it to.
As for condition duration being useless I cannot agree since I stack them like a crazy, and cleansing them is just ineffective since in 2 seconds I can restack 8 bleeds again not mentioning cripples, fear, weakness, chilled and vulnerability.

And any thoughts about axe/focus combo? It looks like it stacks bad with condition damage but is it worth to take it?

0/30/20/20 should be fairly survivable. I would experiment with Spectral Walk over Blood is Power. You can use it to get into the heart of a battle, fire off all your conditions, port out. Or save it for when you start getting focused, run your opponents away from where you really want to be (your team say) and port back 7 seconds later, they are far away, and you can escape behind cover of teammates.

Spectral Wall is also very viable for defense now. Run over on initial engage for the protection and to scatter enemies right off the bat that try to get on you.

You can gain survivability with sigils too, endurance on weapon swap, or life steal sigils, etc. Staff is a good choice for a defensive sigil since earth sigil doesn’t do much there.

If you are still having trouble living in fights, try using Plague more defensively, instead of offensively. Unless you are disrupting an entire zerg it can be a lot of noise without that much substance. When you notice a bunch of players getting on you, such that it looks hopeless, pop it right away, while still over 50% health, and just spam blinds and tank for a while into the middle of your team’s DPS. Enemies will die if they foolishly try to chip you down.

You might also consider moving out of Blood Magic and into Soul Reaping for Master of Terror and longer fears, which can help you break off being focused in a pinch, though requires a lot more timing. Blood Magic siphons are pretty worthless vs burst in a condition build.

For general speed, carry a warhorn in your pack and switch it on for the swiftness just to run away if necessary, before you are in combat and see a bad situation coming.

Most important thing for Necro above maybe any build thing is simply positioning. You have to spot a focus train coming immediately and act defensively long before 3 or more players are all on top of you. Necro needs to be a master of kiting even within a large hectic battle. If you have teammates doing DPS, there is good value in just leading people around with fears, chills, cripples, while you teammates kill them, even if your own offense suffers for it.

With the recent patch though the opposite method is just as viable, all out pressure and aggression, best defense is a good offense, I personally love playing this style, putting opponents on the defensive as their cleanses get overwhelmed and they are trying to get away from you. Be ready with Doom for anyone that tries to shut you down.

TheMightyAltroll.3485:

Blood is Power is useless for the bleeds against players, let me put it to you this way: I could have a 12 minute bleed that killed anyone who kept it on them, but exactly whom is going to ‘allow’ me to keep a 12 minute bleed on them? In today’s meta, you will see constant cleanses and passive cleanses, it’s not worth taking.

I really don’t think conditionmancers are taking BiP for the 2 or 4 extra bleeds (though they’re nice). It’s for damage ticks.

Terok.7315:

TheMightyAltroll.3485:

Blood is Power is useless for the bleeds against players, let me put it to you this way: I could have a 12 minute bleed that killed anyone who kept it on them, but exactly whom is going to ‘allow’ me to keep a 12 minute bleed on them? In today’s meta, you will see constant cleanses and passive cleanses, it’s not worth taking.

I really don’t think conditionmancers are taking BiP for the 2 or 4 extra bleeds (though they’re nice). It’s for damage ticks.

This. The 10 stacks of might can give a big whallop to your condition damage. Even with that, however, I still refrain from using it.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it now, I swear down on Chilling Darkness. That, Ground placed Well of Darkness and Plague. I sound like a broken record, but it works wonders in large WvW battles. Be it blinding and chilling 10 people on a charge, or forcing them into using one (often both) of their dodge rolls. Granted, this is on a T2 server and most zergs are unorganized, but still. It’s very satisfying.
Condition damage is just half of our possibilities. We’re not just a condition damage class, but a -condition- class as well. Blow up that chilling/Blindness, pals.

Lokyate.1387:

This. The 10 stacks of might can give a big whallop to your condition damage.

Having main point of build on condition damage & condition duration IMHO it’s not a good idea, as it’s boosting your not-so-good attack by 10% of your not-so-good attack

Beros.4506:

Lokyate.1387:

This. The 10 stacks of might can give a big whallop to your condition damage.

Having main point of build on condition damage & condition duration IMHO it’s not a good idea, as it’s boosting your not-so-good attack by 10% of your not-so-good attack

What?

BIP gives a duration of time where you condition damage goes up by 350 points? In the right circumstances it bursts as hard as a power build.

The long bleeds are somewhat useful in the smaller fights because there are often mesmers in WvW that don’t run condition removal, so a 45 second bleed on them is a good choice.

It has a short cooldown, it can be used from range, does’t requires a traited talent like wells. I always use it and epidemic in any condition build. Ever since the nerf to CB, I haven’t bother to change it out since.

Rennoko.5731:

BIP gives a duration of time where you condition damage goes up by 350 points? In the right circumstances it bursts as hard as a power build.

Yep, my bad :S Mixed up vuln & might effects.

Another question then, just to justify knowledge:
If I set some bleeding on foe & after that receive ‘might’, will it’s cond. damage rise?
Also, If I’ve transferred that 45sec bleeding under ‘might’, when ‘might’ is out, will it’s damage drop?

Beros.4506:

Rennoko.5731:

BIP gives a duration of time where you condition damage goes up by 350 points? In the right circumstances it bursts as hard as a power build.

Yep, my bad :S Mixed up vuln & might effects.

Another question then, just to justify knowledge:
If I set some bleeding on foe & after that receive ‘might’, will it’s cond. damage rise?
Also, If I’ve transferred that 45sec bleeding under ‘might’, when ‘might’ is out, will it’s damage drop?

Each time the damage ticks, it looks at the condition damage of the source. So if you have might at 10 while the tick is going on, it is +350, if your might drops off, the condition damage drops off accordingly

Yeah, the might bonus from blood is power is somehow nice, but when in zerg group few people usually aoe buff everyone and I do not feel I need that additional condition damage when roaming solo, so for me spectral walk will be better, I will give it a shot and see how it goes.

Thank you for sharing your experience, I haven’t played my necro since I dinged 80 and farmed some gear (was like 3 months ago or more) and out of boredom I reached conclusion it is time to farm 3 remaining parts from arah, so I basically did it daily with all my characters and I kinda liked the necro, I’ve already forgotten how much fun he was. Now I’m trying to catch up with changes and different builds so really thanks for helping me out.

Also anyone knows if it is possible to cast spectral walk, jump of the cliff and activate the spectral walk to get back up before hitting the ground?

vove.2768:

Also anyone knows if it is possible to cast spectral walk, jump of the cliff and activate the spectral walk to get back up before hitting the ground?

Yes

Really starting to think about the chill idea and plague with well of darkness. My biggest problem with this is still plague form itself.

I feel like its HP increase and blind spam is just a illusion of survival. Every time I go plague in the back of my head I feel like I’ve already lost. You have no heal, no conditions transfer(I don’t see why it doesn’t) no utilities. Just turn into a slow moving beacon saying “attack me now and kill me”.

Even fighting other necros I don’t even bother squirreling around and just bomb them. Now I know what you’re thinking “plague form soak damage, come out and eat the conditions for a nice heal”. Sounds good on paper but often not, unless your team is already mopping up or your still above 50% HP that’s just a gamble.

You are probably getting focused down plus with the condition running you are more like “come out of plague try and heal and get cced/bursted/condition into the dirt”.

Down skills arnt gonna do poop to help you ether. Worst part being that with your aggressive start you might even have forced a down or two with your teams damage. However thanks to rally you basicly did nothing but put your team at a disadvantage.

Atleast this is how I feel. People love my necro and love me in groups. I do very well when unorganized groups let me harvest their souls unhindered. However any average team knows full well “just kill the necro” cause they know we can’t stop it.

Maybe I’m wrong or maybe I just need to stowe my necro and run my Mesmer in conditions. I don’t think tanking up a necro is the best role for the character but I’d love to hear how others are surviving good players workings together just running you down into a free post hole.

Terok.7315:

TheMightyAltroll.3485:

Blood is Power is useless for the bleeds against players, let me put it to you this way: I could have a 12 minute bleed that killed anyone who kept it on them, but exactly whom is going to ‘allow’ me to keep a 12 minute bleed on them? In today’s meta, you will see constant cleanses and passive cleanses, it’s not worth taking.

I really don’t think conditionmancers are taking BiP for the 2 or 4 extra bleeds (though they’re nice). It’s for damage ticks.

“- blood is power – pretty useless imo but always gives 2 bleeding stacks and the ones I can transfer from myself, I thought about switching it to signet of spite but power is quite useless to me and as its active is very nice it has long cd, I also thought about switching it to spectral walk”

I was responding to him. However the 10 stacks of might are still unnecessary for a conditionmancer.

Blood is Power isn’t useless, but it’s true that it’s not required. With Master of Corruption it has a 24 second recharge, gives you 250 more power and condition damage and adds 2-4 stacks (if you combo the skill with Dealthly Swarm/Putrid Mark) of extra bleeds against a target. Bleeds which your target(s) are forced to remove because of the long durations which over time can do up 20K damage alone with the right build. Also the 250 more power from Might stacks (which always pops as long as you have a target, any target) in combination with Rabid armor, signet of spite (for when you’re not using Spectral Wall and are going for artillery over CC), with a 30/30/10 build, you can get upwards of 2700-2900 attack in combination with 1800-2000 condition damage and a 50% critical chance.

I find BoP useful on my conditionmancer build at camp/lord battles. You can easily apply SoS/BoPs to Guards/Lords while they’re up and epidemic off them to nearby players. It’s also funny how many times I have caught people in WvW without condition removal, because they depend on others to do it for them or just don’t bring it… Seeing BoP 1 minute bleeds ticking in the distance or throughout a fight is amusing, especially if that person(s) go down because of it.

I suppose I’m far too used to tPvP where Blood is Power is utterly useless against competent players for a conditionmancer.

TheMightyAltroll.3485:

I suppose I’m far too used to tPvP where Blood is Power is utterly useless against competent players for a conditionmancer.

Yep, but WvW is different in that you have mixtures of people with different skillsets, levels, NPCs/Numbers to exploit etc. BoP, skills like it and conditionmancer a whole only become ineffective against a zerg ball full of disciplined guildies using heavy condition removal.

Silas Drake.8946:

Really starting to think about the chill idea and plague with well of darkness. My biggest problem with this is still plague form itself.

I feel like its HP increase and blind spam is just a illusion of survival. Every time I go plague in the back of my head I feel like I’ve already lost. You have no heal, no conditions transfer(I don’t see why it doesn’t) no utilities. Just turn into a slow moving beacon saying “attack me now and kill me”.

That’s entirely fair. Though in addition to the massive boost to your health and the AoE blinding, you also get a buff to your Toughness whilst in Plague. The only view point I can offer is as far as WvW. Yeah, using Plague to keep up and wait for a heal is a good way of surviving an AoE-fest zerg, but at the same time, if you’re in the thick of it you’re likely to drop or get CC’d before you can pop off your Consume Conditions.

What you want to do is drop your marks and slap your Spectral Wall (if you’re running it) behind the group of Invaders and then whap your Plague on. Use your dodge as is necessary and when it’s about to fade, hop on out, heal up and focus on blasting and swapping conditions around from you and your allies with Putrid Mark. Again, I can only speak for WvW, but with -so- many people (assuming you are running with a zerg) you’re not going to get focused one bit unless you run up against an organized guild. Which is entirely possible, but, I wouldn’t base run of the mill tactics on that chance. You’ll have free reign to slap down your Wall/Well and Plague, and unless it’s -outrageously- crowded with immense AoE, you’ll be fine. Make smart use of your dodge rolls and the day is your’s.

As far as BiP is concerned, of course you most certainly don’t want to use it in tPvP or anything other than WvW I’d say, and even then I only ever swap it out if I need an extra damage boost to my bleeds/terror damage during a particularly prolonged fight. Sweeping in then pulling back to switch it out and diving in with 10+ stacks of might (plus whatever from, say, warriors) is a nasty surprise for the other group more often than not. Provided, it’s usually only a small battle when I bring it into play. But hey, it has it’s uses. Always be ready to swap out your skills as is needed.

My experience of WvW with my Condition Necro is a lot of fun. I run it in a regular Guild train that nearly always has more Guardians to anything else with Eles and warriors thrown in. Following a decent commander closely and keeping tight is important, follow instructions I find all the things I lack I gain by being close to zerg leaders. So I get plenty of Boons..including swiftness, Stabilty etc.

On the odd occasions I get separated I use DS, dodge with wells, staff #3 , sceptre #2 to slow them down, and staff #5 (if off CD) where I am running.

I often have to pick up so many loot bags sometimes, Epidemic is just a must in my opinion, for even foe downed with conditions applied you can spread the joy, I save Dagger off hand skill #4 for when I am immobilzed usually, I run some of them chasing don’t.

I will often be on a fringe of my server zerg when taking over a key point, hitting freeze and then fear (if built for extra damage) what it does though is weaken the incoming zerg by a few, so instant impact is less and gives others more time, plus I communicate my observations before I use my skills, if several others like minded as me do the same kind of things you severely weaken the first wave of foes attack, giving time for your team to react and counter attack if situation and commander agrees, but you buy valuable time along with others.

I sometimes feel great being a necro and sometimes sorry for opponents, but most of the time I feel I have to play to my strengths use the team to give me what I lack. Hence Listen to Commander get on Team speak or what ever is used by your server, target marker your commander or ask party too, so you know where they are at all times, you’ll find plenty of boons being spread to get you out of the lack in build. If Commander isn’t giving instructions clearly, then zerg against another is doomed to fail, or just get lucky, ask for clearer calls. While this may not answer your direct question OP it does in a different way.

You’ll find what works for you as Utilities go from adapting to the team and also I find many will run away when they are separated from your pressure, don’t be tempted to chase unless it’s clear your team is in a winning position, a bit of self discipline goes a long way to survival and helping your server to overcome.

A dead condition necro can still if before they died effect the outcome of a battle, if a wipe is a coming nothing really you can do but take some with you.

Just a thought. When you’re not running with the zerg i use signet of locust. It pretty much wastes a utility slot, but covering up that horrid necro speed is totally worth for me.

vove.2768:

As there is no problem with conditions (obviously) what I lack in my build is mobility.

Warhorn+spectral walk=permaswiftness in abundance

For condition build utilities Id pick epidemic, well of corruption, signet of spite, spectral walk/wall. Something from them.
Blood is power is absolutely useless in zerg fights.
Then again IMO condition damage necro is useless in zergs, because conditions will not stick and the best conditions are the ones that dont do damage anyway like chill/blind/cripple etc and a power necro can offer all that while doing impressive damage.