Guild Wars 2

I realise asking “what are good stats to have for necros” is a bit like asking “how long is a piece of string” but the problem is that my necromancer doesn’t have any particular use. I have a guardian, ranger, thief, engineer and elementalist and so I am pretty covered when it comes to dungeons, fractals, open world PvE, WvW etc, etc. But I do want to take her out for a spin from time to time.

She’s level 80 and currently has PVT armour from HOTW. I choose PVT because she was dying a lot when I was taking her through her personal story, doing story mode dungeons and I did make her earn her own dungeon tokens for her armour. So PVT made sense as it allowed me to survive. But I have been thinking of replace it but not sure with what stats.

She’s running a 20/30/10/0/10 build with sceptre + off-hand dagger for a bleed build. I equip a staff for a well + mark thing in dungeons and for WvW zergs to go with the sceptre + off-hand dagger. I don’t have a axe, focus or a second dagger for d/d. All her weapons have the berserker stats.

Her trinkets are… a bit of a mess and really why I need to know what stats would be good for her. She’s my only character who doesn’t have an ascended necklace. I have 5 laurels away from being able to get her one. But I am not sure what to get her. She does have ascended rings but I can replace them easily. But I can’t easily replace an ascended necklace if I make a wrong choice. But I honestly don’t know what stats to get her. So any help would be much appreciated.

If you want to maximise usefulness of the class in pve then i would recommend beserker.

Heres a guide for dps necros in pve:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Guide-DPS-Necro-for-PvE/first

If you want to run a bleed build, avoid Berserker, Soldiers, or really anything that doesn’t have Condition Damage as a stat.

As Drarnor says, first choose which build you will be using. If you will be using a condition-based build, look mainly for Condition Damage on you equipment.

I myself use a power-based build ( http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAoYWjMaV6hbGbM8JiJFfTbQP617dGlC3tOA-jwDBYLJDdRQkgIgkGI0HQ0IYZPFRjtcqIasqHY6SJV9SQ2qDwMGySG2DQZFA-e ), and use a PVT equipment, because I want to run a tankier, more resilient, necro.

I love my build, it works for me, and I am normally the last man standing on dungeons and fractals, so I can’t agree with spoj about berserker maximizing necro’s usefulness. But I do agree that you should use berserker equipment if you want to maximize necro’s damage.

Well the only 3 gear types that would be useful in pve are rampager, beserker and assassins. Healing is a bad stat for pve and vit and toughness doesnt help anyone but yourself. All damage can be mitigated or dodged so theres no need for defensive gear once you are familiar with the encounters.

I would never recommend wasting laurels on defensive trinkets for pve. You can easily take defensive armour and replace that at any time. Trinkets are a bit more difficult to replace so I would recommend beserker or rampager trinkets for pve even for someone who is quite inexperienced.

condi necro? Dire stats, all dire.

spoj.9672:

Healing is a bad stat for pve and vit and toughness doesnt help anyone but yourself.

To be fair, we ARE a self centered class.

Necromancer’s can be quite durable with enough toughness or vitality. If you’re looking for more of a run-of-the-mill build that does decent damage and will give you some survivability, then you can always go with Knights gear, and focus on Power.

Zerker is really for when you want to absolutely maximize your damage at the expense of all your defenses. That may work for some people, but probably not for every area of the game.

We’re actually not a self-centred class. We have many mechanics that are unique pertaining to ally/enemy condition management and spam blinds, but you have to build for it by going Wells. The only problem has been PVE content has lacked any serious use of condition/boon mechanics until recently.

The basic breakdown of gear is this:

Powermancer Necro: Zerker, Knights/Zerker or Soldier/Zerker and like minded variations, or pure Soldier. Be warned that although Zerker was “the” stats for the first few months of the game, a lot of content is becoming more difficult for zerker builds compared to tougher more defensive/heavy builds. Experienced Zerker players shouldn’t have too many problems though.

Condimancer Necro: Dire, Rabid or Dire/Rabid mix.

Support/Wellomancer: Clerics, Apothecary, Soldiers and/or Valkyrie.

MM: Any of the above works. Some gear synergizes better with minions than others for different reasons.

Hybrid: Rampagers, Celestial etc.

Thanks for the replies so far folks. This is all really interesting and useful as I haven’t played my necromancer at all in months. I don’t really want to go “pure” damage with my necromancer with beserker and assassins as my engineer, thief, ranger and my ele are all pure damage. So it would be nice to have something a little different. So maybe I will look into the more condition heavy things like dire, rabid and rampages.

Well, regardless of opinions, the most efficient way to play in dungeons is to gear for pure damage(zerker for power, rabid for conditions), and gain defense from dodge/boons, etc.

Now if you aren’t in an organized group and just want to casually run dungeons/world pve, then sure run with toughness or healing power or whatever you want really.

Now I would recommend using some soldiers gear if you are having trouble surviving in full berserkers. I did this on my thief because I found surviving all the random cleaves and AE with 11k hp very tough. The best way to maintain dps and gain survivability is to switch out berserkers legs, chest, and helm for soldiers, and if that is still not enough then weapons.