Guild Wars 2

I’m being kited by everybody as soon as I go in Shroud.

What can I do?

I can’t really recommend anything but to build for it. I usually run a power build making use of spectral walk and armor. If I am using the reaper line and they get out of range, I immediately drop shroud and start axing them to death. Then when they try to come in, I swap to dagger to proc hydro, land immobilize and dive back into shroud if necessary.

Just don’t stay chasing melee range if you realize they’re kiting you. Swap ASAP to something that can hit them.

Speed of Shadows! and leave shroud right after your opponent starts kiting. Make sure to have skills like Nightfall (blind), Staff Marks (denial area), Posion Cloud (projectile block), wells (damage ticks) … ready to drop at your feet to secure your position when leaving shroud and waiting for that 7 second cooldown.

And in general use shroud before your HP drop and not after. If you leave shroud on 10% health it’s pretty much GG when you fight an at least semi competent opponent.

Like Famine said. I use the ABC’s (always be casting), if you realize you are being kited, swap weapons and use something that can hit whether it is range, spectral grasp is a good utility as well. Or simply disengage and wait for them to come to you

Play a necro instead of a silly reaper?

Dawdler.8521:

Play a necro instead of a silly reaper?

Mmm, I like this ^

Intelligent use of Dark Path + Spectral Walk/Wurm jukes save me from being kited a lot. The only kiter I can’t keep up with is a decent Druid but I’m learning to slot Plague Signet before an engagement so I can transfer the immob’s.

Besides that, Foot In The Grave + the aforementioned skills do a great job of preventing kiting. Tainted Shackles + Chills to keep them in range which ends in Immobilize is also great.

Reaper is great and all and generally easier to use, especially if you’re condition, but don’t count out vanilla Necro just because it’s old.

zectra.6978:

Like Famine said. I use the ABC’s (always be casting), if you realize you are being kited, swap weapons and use something that can hit whether it is range, spectral grasp is a good utility as well. Or simply disengage and wait for them to come to you

Totally not headshot fodder.

Don’t count out vanilla necro? What?

There’s absolutely nothing about Death Shroud anymore that makes it worth.

You miss 6 whirl finishers on top of aoe poison.
You miss 20% dmg and condi dmg reduction.
You miss an aoe fear.
You miss a chill field.
You miss faster auto atks incase you thought burning is nice.

There’s not 1 build that works with Death Shroud, not for power and not for condi.
If power, you can’t use greatsword and if condi you miss your biggest condi dmg: bleed.

Sun Lian.4075:

Don’t count out vanilla necro? What?

There’s absolutely nothing about Death Shroud anymore that makes it worth.

You miss 6 whirl finishers on top of aoe poison.
You miss 20% dmg and condi dmg reduction.
You miss an aoe fear.
You miss a chill field.
You miss faster auto atks incase you thought burning is nice.

There’s not 1 build that works with Death Shroud, not for power and not for condi.
If power, you can’t use greatsword and if condi you miss your biggest condi dmg: bleed.

You can just as easily say you miss stuff when taking reaper. Goes both ways.

You miss whatever traitline you gave up
You miss 1200 range instant fear
You miss 600 radius 5s reveal
You miss aoe immobilise.
You miss a a strong ranged homing attack
You miss LoS ignoring 600 radius attack

etc etc

Reaper and its shroud is designed for melee combat. DS is more of a medium to long range shroud. You will have an easier time not being kited on DS than RS.

Also really depends on what game mode you are in since the OP didnt specify.

Sigmoid.7082:

Sun Lian.4075:

Don’t count out vanilla necro? What?

There’s absolutely nothing about Death Shroud anymore that makes it worth.

You miss 6 whirl finishers on top of aoe poison.
You miss 20% dmg and condi dmg reduction.
You miss an aoe fear.
You miss a chill field.
You miss faster auto atks incase you thought burning is nice.

There’s not 1 build that works with Death Shroud, not for power and not for condi.
If power, you can’t use greatsword and if condi you miss your biggest condi dmg: bleed.

You can just as easily say you miss stuff when taking reaper. Goes both ways.

You miss whatever traitline you gave up
You miss 1200 range instant fear
You miss 600 radius 5s reveal
You miss aoe immobilise.
You miss a a strong ranged homing attack
You miss LoS ignoring 600 radius attack

etc etc

Reaper and its shroud is designed for melee combat. DS is more of a medium to long range shroud. You will have an easier time not being kited on DS than RS.

Also really depends on what game mode you are in since the OP didnt specify.

Sure you can turn it around just as easily, but the difference is that all of these things are worse than what you gain in Reaper, doesn’t matter what situation.

I don’t know why anyone would try to prove this wrong.

Core Necro is actually better in some matchups like fighting Thieves because of the reveal and instant ranged fear. The core shroud also pulses torment for covering your bleeds and weakness. While this makes Necro lose some of the cleave potential (and the means to do a Condi Shout build for personal defense), its survivability changes and it can focus on kiting and doing jump puzzles to get better positioning.

Core Necro won’t have as much of a presence in teamfights, but it will be okay on the side nodes.

In PvP where Deathly Chill gives one stack of bleed only, traited Fear damage can actually be a viable source of pressure that can force stunbreaks.

Some have referred Reaper as a sidegrade rather than an upgrade to core in PvP. While I think Reaper is easier to handle, I cannot dispute that the above may be so for players of better skill than I.

So you’re saying fear damage trait, that only applies for Staff 5 and a single target fear in shroud, over Deathly Chill that has synergy with like half of all of your skills?

Okay then, good to know there’s people out there that believe so.

And the reveal for thieves.. yea that’s nice and all but what are you gonna do after you revealed them, because you literally have 0 damage to kill them if you’re using Death Shroud, it’s worthless.

Core Necro has seen better days. I still remember when they took a stack of bleed off Scepter and Staff to make way for Dhuumfire (which was a proc rather than applied by DS1).

I’m more of an amateur with Necro compared to a friend who played 1000+ games even before HoT as Necro. Some of the stuff I learned when he kicked my money in duels. We’re still rather casual so any input from more experienced Necros is welcome.

Scepter auto has been beefed up in HoT (bleed on final chain + Boon corrupt) but the loss of Geomancy has really taken away the burst Core Necro can do. Now your best pressure is just spamming Scepter auto and trying to cover your bleeds with the other skills.

With Core Necro you can bring Spectral Wall to force people through it with your other fears. Shroud fear is longer and instant so it’s easier (though you can also bait with this and combo Staff with Wall instead). You don’t stay in Shroud to do damage, you flash Shroud for the 3 -> 2 combo (+Weakening Shroud) and exit immediately to let it recharge and follow up with skills (just be ready to kite off the shroud CD with Wurm/Walk). You also have to watch for stun breaks that grant stability because you get another fear off that. You will usually take the Fear on getting CC’d trait as well and if you have Foot in the Grave you can follow that up immediately. Too bad you don’t have Runes of Nightmare with the passive Fear which allows the build to play itself…

The good thing about Tainted Shackles is its near uninterruptible cast time. Sometimes you can stop Blinding Powder backstabs or a stealthed Skull Fear cast. However Daredevil does have Dash to remove the immobilise, Signet to remove fear and Shadowstep. If you’re lucky, at the very least you will be using up all his CDs.

All that’s left after using your instants is to stow bait and jump onto parts of map where they can’t Steal to you… and how good the Thief is will determine how long you live/he leaves. Core Necro is definitely not forgiving if your opponent is good.

Sun Lian.4075:

Sigmoid.7082:

Sun Lian.4075:

Don’t count out vanilla necro? What?

There’s absolutely nothing about Death Shroud anymore that makes it worth.

You miss 6 whirl finishers on top of aoe poison.
You miss 20% dmg and condi dmg reduction.
You miss an aoe fear.
You miss a chill field.
You miss faster auto atks incase you thought burning is nice.

There’s not 1 build that works with Death Shroud, not for power and not for condi.
If power, you can’t use greatsword and if condi you miss your biggest condi dmg: bleed.

You can just as easily say you miss stuff when taking reaper. Goes both ways.

You miss whatever traitline you gave up
You miss 1200 range instant fear
You miss 600 radius 5s reveal
You miss aoe immobilise.
You miss a a strong ranged homing attack
You miss LoS ignoring 600 radius attack

etc etc

Reaper and its shroud is designed for melee combat. DS is more of a medium to long range shroud. You will have an easier time not being kited on DS than RS.

Also really depends on what game mode you are in since the OP didnt specify.

Sure you can turn it around just as easily, but the difference is that all of these things are worse than what you gain in Reaper, doesn’t matter what situation.

I don’t know why anyone would try to prove this wrong.

Reaper isn’t such a huge upgrade that it completely overshadows the vanilla spec like Thief and Guardian for example.

Reaper is like Scrapper, it’s an upgrade but the vanilla spec is still comparably strong if used right.

I disagree that it’s so significantly worse that you’re putting yourself at a disadvantage by using it but I do agree that Reaper is better in the majority of encounters.