Guild Wars 2

Hey guys, just wondering your opinions on the Reaper vs core Necromancer.

Do you feel that Necros will underperform if not specialized? Right now Chronomancer offers a lot of strong additions but each Mesmer trait line is good enough that there are still plenty of incentives to use regular Mesmer.

In your opinion, is it the same for Necro?

I main necro since the release, 5k+ h on that profession, for me it feels powerful once you master positioning, rotations and find the right teammates to play with. BUT once you compare it to the Reaper, the necro goes out in clouds and I just can’t wait to play this spec and outmaster it and give more viable support on my allies, they won’t have to drag me through all those resses because I was always main target. No now I will help them at peeling etc.

Hard to say but considering the reaper is heavely melee focused while the base necro has better range, i dont think so. Also the rework of bloodmagic could help.

But the reaper is a lot cooler then the base profession so thats a big minus for the necro….

No. I think Reapers really only serve a pvp function. I still think core necro might be better off in Pve unless the numbers on GS were based on something other than zerker. Even if it was based on cele, the numbers probably wouldnt get big enough to really matter in dungeons. Dagger still seems like the way to go for that. What GS does provide is vulnerability, which is nice but other classes can do vulnerability too, it doesnt suddenly make us unique or useful. Nothing in this new elite line is pve oriented, so if you do pve (like 75% of the player base does) base necro is still better than reaper.

The story changes for spvp and possibly wvw. In those situations, reaper looks amazing.

The restriction to melee in DS might not be someone’s cup of tea, and if they want to stand in the back lobbing hate, then I’d say they can probably skip the elite spec entirely.

EDIT – And the numbers in the video were very definitely not Zerker, unless something silly happened and the baseline Necro without Vitality gets 30k health.

yes. the new DS works SO much better offensively with DS traits than the old one. so much cleave and aoe. can easily and quickly build and maintain max vuln and might stacks….. can’t see why a power or syphon spec wouldn’t take it. even MM

condi builds will prob ably be a push or slight advantage to normal necro (reaper will be more defensive condis)
neither has an advantage in terms of ally support…none exists in pve and maybe backline necro will be more useful than front line tank reaper in wvw

I can’t see power Necro doing anything without Reaper and after the nerf to the curses line, I feel like many conditionmancers will turn towards reaper Dhuumfire and Chill. Of course, there are still several advantages to running condi necro without reaper, however, the terror nerf really makes these advantages feel weak in comparison. The only thing that Reaper doesn’t win out on is that its utilities are weak.

I think its a risk. If so its not the reaper’s fault though, its an issue of synergy between the other 6 spec lines. Power Necros make up the majority of players it seems, and they really didn’t have a third line that called out to them, reaper is that line.

Now, that said, they are changing up blood a bit. If that becomes viable then it should be less of a problem.

Even with Deathly Chill, reaper doesn’t seem like the best condition option so conditionmancers will probably want to stay away. I think at first we will see nearly every necro become a reaper, but once the shiny newness wears off, it will be a mix again.

Cecilia.5179:

I can’t see power Necro doing anything without Reaper and after the nerf to the curses line, I feel like many conditionmancers will turn towards reaper Dhuumfire and Chill. Of course, there are still several advantages to running condi necro without reaper, however, the terror nerf really makes these advantages feel weak in comparison. The only thing that Reaper doesn’t win out on is that its utilities are weak.

With the reworked bloodmagic, spite, bloodmagic and soulreaping could be really good for power necros. I think it comes more down to the question if you want to melee or not.

I can’t make a decent condi build with the current traits.

So yeah, I’ll be going Reaper, but I’m still 50/50 on the viability of class as a whole.

Darwec.3784:

No. I think Reapers really only serve a pvp function. I still think core necro might be better off in Pve unless the numbers on GS were based on something other than zerker. Even if it was based on cele, the numbers probably wouldnt get big enough to really matter in dungeons. Dagger still seems like the way to go for that. What GS does provide is vulnerability, which is nice but other classes can do vulnerability too, it doesnt suddenly make us unique or useful. Nothing in this new elite line is pve oriented, so if you do pve (like 75% of the player base does) base necro is still better than reaper.

The story changes for spvp and possibly wvw. In those situations, reaper looks amazing.

They used Soldiers i believe. And you can could get 100% Critchance without any stat-investment when taking “increase crit chance by 2% per stack invuln” alongside Deathly perception. Not that the crits would hurt much, but it is an option…

Nah I need to see base necro changes first they did give us that “we didn’t forget about necro” so I’ll wait and it will come before HoT anyway.

As Robert said, he is HEAVILY reworking the Blood Magic trait line. If it works out well, this will give a new viable playstyle within the core necromancer profession and fix the fact Blood Magic has been kitten for a long time.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Hey guys, just wondering your opinions on the Reaper vs core Necromancer.

Do you feel that Necros will underperform if not specialized? Right now Chronomancer offers a lot of strong additions but each Mesmer trait line is good enough that there are still plenty of incentives to use regular Mesmer.

In your opinion, is it the same for Necro?

reaper offers a very distinct playstyle.
so i dont think it will overshadow, that said, its a lot better put together, and i think the core necro still has some basic issues.

It’s more balanced in this matter than Chrono vs. Mesmer, I guess.

It has almost nothing really for Condition Necromancers. 15% less damage is okay, but we do get 10% anyway with DM. Or PoC with 6 or less seconds. We lose yet another traitline for it however, expose ourselves to melee and lose our only access to Torment.

It’s obviously aimed at Power Necromancers. Replaces the rather gimmick “spam #1” and that’s good.

Does Reaper overshadow Necro? Not really. It’s niche specialization. People are excited because it looks cool, but down to mechanics vs. reality, it’s not amazing I believe.

Interesting differences of opinion here. Do you feel Reaper will be better suited to WvW or PvP? It seems unanimously agreed that it will be great in PvE

I want to scream out YES!! But not exactly, it completely overshadows the PVE speedrun build necro which is melee ranged direct damage. PVP and WvW in the other hand it’s whole new role. Though it whouldnt surprise me to run into a staff/scepter dagger reaper running dhumfire and terror in pvp.

I think, like Mesmer and Guard, once the dust settles a few weeks from now and folks resume heavy theorycrafting, they’ll realize that it’s right where it should be.

It seems like a strong, new gameplay type for the Necro, but it’s not a better choice for ALL Necro builds in all game-play types.

Anyone not interested in Melee is going to reconsider going Reaper. Anyone interested in Boon support will probably be comparing builds after the changes Robert hinted at today. Anyone interested in a more bursty and mobile build probably won’t be too interested in making Reaping their focus.

I think it’ll settle down, and I think Reaper so far feels like an awesome implementation of an Elite spec. It’s a strong addition to the profession without dominating the profession.

I’d say it’s more like they’re very different. I could see many condies sticking with base-line. Anyone who prefers being a ranged bomber will probably avoid it too. It’s awesome, but it REALLY fits my playstyle, as I have always hated how Lifeblast works so I’m very biased toward Reaper’s Shroud mechanics.

Also, Reaper’s Shroud abilities are supposed to be a LITTLE better than DS in some way. You must realize, it takes up a minor space, so it does hold some “benefit” value.

Trait: Blood Bond. Your passion for death is contagious. Nearby allies gain 150 Ferocity.
Targets: 5

Idk where it could go really.
Blood Magic Master?

Revert ‘Axe Mastery’ change and add ‘Nearby allies gain 150 Ferocity’?

This could find itself in a variety of builds with either suggested implementaion. Or even make it BM adept depending on how good "Vampiric Aura’ is and where it fits in. Going into BM could up being Adept major: Blood Bond: Up to 5 nearby allies gain 150 Ferocity.
Master major: When entering and exiting Shroud, you and allies gain ‘Vampiric Aura’ for 5 secs.
Vampiric Aura: attacks steal 250 health. 1 sec icd. *number scales same as the Necro’s normal ‘vampiric traits’ is power/healing, affected by bloodthirsty. Numbers could change.

These are practical AND Necro(ey) traits that would help.

A Necro could increase party Crit same by 10% and with good use of DS/RS add some extra team damage/sustain

I do think the specialization is so well made that it really points out some of the deficiencies of the base profession. For example, when you compare our normal weapons and Death Shroud to greatsword and Reaper’s Shroud, you notice the real lack of fields/finishers, and overall synergy. Greatsword has really cool combos you can use with its abilities (blind/cripple field→ pull enemies → immediately start casting Gravedigger so that once they get to you you are already basically done), as does Reaper’s Shroud. Really great synergy all around, and we could use a lot more of it.

However, power wise I think it is balanced relatively fine.

Chaos Archangel.5071:

Interesting differences of opinion here. Do you feel Reaper will be better suited to WvW or PvP? It seems unanimously agreed that it will be great in PvE

I personally think it might be OK in pve, maybe pushing in to close to ele ranks after the ice bow nerf. I dont think we will push into a meta pve status, which i am very much ok with. We will finally be good-ish in pve. I think eles are falling in status, and we are rising. So we might become even with the new eles. Just never with thief or warr or guard.

I think it will be all kinds of fun in SPVP. I already play a strictly melee power necro in spvp (i dont follow standard power necro meta, i just blind/chill and dagger ppl in the face) so this will fit so well with my build.

Also FitG changed to Grave Master: Entering DS/RS grants 1xStabiliy (5 sec) to allies.
Range: 1200 Allies: 5 * Breaks stun Icd: 10 secs.

Note: 10 sec icd looks low for this trait, but the other traits that would improve this one (and make it OP) are rendered useless by the 10 secs so I believe it is fair and balanced. This includes the fact that having to use it for defense/support greatly hinder DS/RS offensive capabilities on the battlefield.