Guild Wars 2

Do you think it could work for PvP and pve? One set with Dagger main hand onother one with Axe to maximize my damage? I don’t get much benefits from my Staff, so i’m thinking to replace it with Axe instead to increase dmg, but i’m not sure if this is a good idea Anyone can share some builds and tips?

I think we get more dps from running dagger/focus and then dagger/warhorn on the second set if you don’t want to use death shroud. Dagger auto-attack is amazing and the warhorn 5, focus 4, while using auto attack, I think is more DPS than using the axe’s burst.

Staff is good because it’s a 2h weapon which means more damage if you go into death shroud while wielding it, you don’t get that with axe/dagger since they took the flat damage buff trait off axe.

Axe isn’t very good, as it deals hardly any damage. You’re better off using staff for the extra DS damage and utility (regeneration, poison, CC, condi-transfer, etc.) Switching to Axe won’t increase your damage, not by much anyway.

Sabre.8627:

Staff is good because it’s a 2h weapon which means more damage if you go into death shroud while wielding it, you don’t get that with axe/dagger since they took the flat damage buff trait off axe.

I didn’t know that! Tnx for info! So Staff in death shroud means more dmg than one handed in ds? Why tooltip doesn’t show that?

Experiment with your hero panel up. DS and elite transformations have better stats with a 2H weapon – greatsword should be the same.

You can do axe/X and dagger/X but the two weapons are not very complimentary.

Staff has twice the range, a great AoE burst, a condition transfer, a regeneration, a fear, it pierces and can be unblockable… Staff may not have great dps but it can do many things dagger/whatever cannot. Axe has, what, vulnerability and retal?

For spvp I’ve been using dagger/horn+axe/dagger recently and haven’t felt like I’ve been missing out on much with staff. Been running a bunkier build with SR/DM/BM with a knight Amy and have no problems dealing with any build be they power or condi. Even find myself holding out 1v3 on points without dieing to taking on d/d eles with minimum problems tho those fights due last like 2-4mins before more join in the fight.

Staff is garbage, so is axe. Choosing between the two is like going to a restaurant and being given an option of two steaming piles of crap with slightly different garnishes.

Dagger/Warhorn Axe/Dagger is just fine though. Staff is pretty garbage, doesn’t really bring anything special outside of its range, so if you don’t need that range Axe is an option, especially for bunkers. The only real loss is the extra damage in Death Shroud.

Well I think the main selling point of staff is the fear mark. That pretty much it, since axe/dagger does everything else the same with worse range, better damage, but it’s clunkier. The reason I usually take staff is because soul marks is easy to take in any build, while the axe trait is never taken because of chill of death, and it’s not even that great regardless.

No. Staff is very good in pvp. Pretty much mandatory actually. You probably can run axe instead of it in some gimmicky bunker/mm builds.
For pve dagger with focus warhorn is ideal.

In pvp staff is more support with cc, condi transfer and poison and nice life force from aa
Axe is semi range with good dmg but lack the fear cc which is very important

Staff is total garbage once 4 and 5 go on cooldown. Axe is total garbage (but let’s you use offhand dagger or Warhorn).

Staff is good in sPvP due to the Soul Marks trait, which makes your staff marks unblockable and generate life force. Don’t just blindly spam your 2-5 staff, use #4 to transfer conditions, use #5 to interrupt Guardian heals, aka play smart.

Axe is terrible. Like the worst weapon Necros have. Especially since the trait that buffs axe in Spite line competes with Chill of Death trait, which is an amazing trait.

Staff really isn’t mandatory if you use dagger and locust swarm to help build LF. Axe even though it lacks some damage can still preform well if you know how and when use axe#2. Don’t really need to say much about axe#3 since the retal,cripple, and boon strip just makes for a nice setup for fighting mesmers and thieves.

Soul Marks isn’t at all mandatory, it just makes staff worth using. Power builds that don’t need the 1200 range LF generation can generate LF just fine without it, only condi needs it.

I’m always gonna be the minority that suggests scepter because although it brings little damage it still has decent utility.

In PvP/WvW I prefer to use Dagger/Focus and Scepter/Warhorn on my power/roaming build. Scepter has Poison on it’s AA, Grasping Dead can crit some pretty nice numbers, I’ve gotten as high a 5,000+ and my favorite, Feast Of Corruption, can do great numbers as well with the right preparation (might, vulnerability, condition stacking, etc).

Of course, staff has far better utility but I enjoy being able to take both Focus and Warhorn without losing the Poison and Chill that staff #3 can apply.

Before people bash me as they always do, yes, scepter is a very sub-par choice for a power build. Still, it has it’s benefits and if you don’t want to use axe (personally I refuse to use it because it’s horrible and I find the damage between scepter and axe pretty similar) then scepter is another okay choice.

For PvE however, I’d say just stick with dagger for the most part. Dagger/Focus and Dagger/Warhorn should do just fine.

@SpellOfIniquity don’t know why ppl would bash you for finding a interesting way to use scepter that works for you.

When not using staff as backup, I prefer scepter as well. It does completely different things than dagger but the low LF generation is a pain.

Yeah Scepter can work too. Kinda sad that our weapon situation is so awful there are 3 equally “valid” power weapons that deal fairly similar damage and have similar utility, and one of them is a condi weapon.

@Bhawb it’s not sad just disheartening laughable

I tried playing with axe again for like the past week. Try to get a good feel for it, and find some good uses. But I really can’t find many situations where it’s shining.
The range is too short for it to be considered a real ranged power weapon, and the dps of the weapon as a whole is horrible compared to dagger auto.

At the moment for PvE I would probably go with Dagger/Warhorn + Dagger/Focus. Or Dagger/Warhorn + Staff.
Staff isn’t great either, but unlike axe it at least gives you a few things:
1) Utility (condi cleanse, fear, chill)
2) AoE. Not particularly good. But if you’re up against 5 opponents at least dropping a few marks is decent damage.
3) 1200 range. Frankly the 600 range that axe provides provides no real advantages over the melee range of daggers. 1200 (and 900 largely as well) range on the other hand gives you room to work with if encounters require you to keep some distance.
4) 2H damage in Deathshroud

Again staff is still mediocre at best, but it provides a few good things. And that’s not even considering the Soul Marks trait.
Axe on the other hand provides nearly nothing over daggers. The damage is lower, the burst isn’t really there, the range is not enough to provide a noticeable advantage, LF doesn’t stack faster really. Hell dagger even has better utility as the quasi-heal on #2 and the immob on #3 tend to have more uses.
Axe might have the vulnerability going for it, but from testing it this week, I generally found the stacking to be too slow to make much use on it. Might be more beneficial if the vulnerability was put on the #2 ability and making it function a bit more like Rapid Fire (Ranger – Longbow #2).

For PvP it’s a bit harder as it’s more about what you want to achieve and which tools you want in that regard.
That said, I don’t really see how the axe would help you out here. The damage is insufficient and at least the staff gives you unblockable condi transfer chills and a fear.

I use axe/dagger on my offset over staff cuz I trait and use skills for condi removal and transfers. Plus the retal helps with additional damage while in DS mix with my spec armor and VP for defs. The extra vuln from axe#1 and lifeblast can really up my damage output before I switch to dagger to just cleave and stick to them like glue with dag#3 or locust swarm.

The baseline marks and the new merged version of soul marks along with autoattack velocity buff made staff a lot better.

But it was still a staple of pretty much every pvp necro build since forever. Think of it as shortbow on thief.

Staff has:
a fear interrupt #5 (put it down and get saved from any follow up to a basilisk venom jump by a thief)
a condi transfer #4 (well thank you, I’ll take your 14 stacks of burning from one skill burn guard.. not op at all… and here you can have them back)
a chill and a poison field #3 (d/d ele i heard you like fast rotations, chill bro)
a somewhat crappy bleed #2 that actually heals you and teamates while you are in it
and finally a pretty crappy slow auto attack that pierces and has 1200 range (sit on a ledge and let sigil of fire and air proc on cooldown)

So compared to all other weapons it actually is the most versatile choice for a necro. Unfortunately any PvP or WvW build w/o is severely crippling your potential.
I hoped GS would change that a bit, but so far from everything i’ve seen that’s very unlikely. You can go S/X – staff for condi builds or D/X – staff for power builds until axe gets a rework at least.

On the brighter side, there was a time when there were no good weapons. Period. And Necromancer was far from acceptable.

As long as you can stay on your target, I’d rather go D/Wh + D/D than use A/D so you don’t take a dps hit…Axe 3 can’t carry 1 and 2, unfortunately.