Guild Wars 2

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmQDbkkGapxGbw4G4wxBuQJ7huefhtZA0C0zoNeWA-TFCBABVcRAqZ/BD1N0wRAINlgep8DgHAQmq/QKgx2aB-w

Death magic is the basis of the build, the trait Deadly Strength is what makes this stat build work. I went with the classic life blast build to make it easy to illustrate but this setup would work with any power based build. The big weakness of the build are crit chance and crit damage but the base stats of the knights/cavalier covers those weaknesses enough to fake it with sigils and food.

Things to pay attention too:
1: 215% crit damage, achieved with Furious Sharpening stones, and ferocity food.
2: A not in Death Shroud 50% crit chance is achieved with full stacks of Perception, so in Death Shroud you still get the 100% crit chance while wielding the staff.
3: 3200 armor
4: With the food and Spite tree you stack 25 stacks of might in about 10 seconds of hitting people with Life Blasts
5: If you hover over the stat summary, it turns out that I have 5 more points of power then toughness because of the Deadly Strength trait. It’ll only go up when in Death Shroud.

Thoughts while playing this build in PvE: Since I wasn’t running the food/sharpening stones(they’re kinda expensive, wvw only :P) my crit damage was only around 180%. While I can still get to 25 stacks of might it is not as fast without the might on crit food. I was still able to achieve 6500 damage life blasts on average. Still only in mostly exotic but planning on making an ascended set for this build. 2400 power in exotic and 2800 armor. The condi clear while in Death Shroud and the healing in Death Shroud up the sustain, and the mini consume conditions is used quite a lot and helps with conditions as well. This build would not be as deadly in Spvp as you cannot hybrid into Cavalier or assassins for extra precision/ferocity.

Sorry this might be a stupid question, but why would you want crit chance over 100%.

It is not over 100%, with the Sigil of Accuracy on the staff and 25 stacks of Perception you get 49.86 chance to crit, which the game rounds up to exactly 50%. Then with Death perception you get to 100% exactly.

Unless I have missed something you saw?

I love Death Magic, it’s a build that allows you to tank up while actually boosting power higher than non-DM builds. The only issue with this build is the lack of siphon heals that Blood Magic offers. I ran the Death Magic build initially when the patch came, loved it. But found myself in hairy situations where lack of siphon heals were wearing me down slowly. This is speaking of large scale WvW as well as GvG.

I’ve since switched to Blood Magic for the siphon heals and improved dagger/warhorn traits. Sacrifices yes, I miss my over 4000 power with full stacks. But I gain sustain that’s almost required in the current meta.

Anyways, I do think Death Magic offers a very unique rugged build. The toughness to power synergy is great in that spec. I love on demand cleanse, and the extra protection you get when leaving shroud. Worth trying as it’s a high risk, high reward build. Just know the downside to this build. The lack of siphon heals make it more difficult to play in the current meta. We can be upset at Anet all we want about how they’re treating necros, but Blood Magic’s siphon heals do make a big difference in the current meta. It offers sustain, where as Death Magic’s build offers spike damage protection.

In the end, what inspired this build was that a zerker life blast build is too squishy to run in a havoc squad. Which is what my guild runs, this allows me to not-insta die but still maintaining the role of blowing people up. I have literally 2 shot glass thieves after they pop me because I go into DS and just blast them. I don’t run this solo, but it is awesome with friends and in PvE because you get zerker level stats but are not zerker. So if you miss a dodge or screw up or get overwhelmed you don’t just insta die.

Honestly, in light of this build I don’t think I will ever run Berzerker again. The high defense vs DD is just awesome. You are also still a necro with a second HP pool on top of having a high natural health pool. Unless I get stupid wtf spiked, by either conditions or DD, I usually have enough time to kill most people. I bounce Thieves and Mesmers, good Mesmers still get me but everything has it’s limitations.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmQDbkkGapxGbw4G4wxBuQJ7huefhtZA0C00oNeWA-TVCBABbpEaUVVk4KA4lyHAeIAFt/Qe6GyUtCJVCGAAB4m3Mb2mBDdoDdoDdodzbO0bO0bWKgB2aB-w

I just tweaked you already had so that you wouldn’t have to use stacking sigils (really just personally not a fan, but if it works for you that’s fine also.)

dropped about 150 armor, which at levels this high isn’t a huge loss especially since in combat you gain an extra 300 from the death magic line as long as you are getting some conditions up on enemies.

Crit damage is 8% lower, but I swapped out The 100 Ferocity food for Seaweed Salad. 10% extra damage while moving is entirely too good not to take, and lets face it, in WvW/GvG you are always moving unless you’re dead.

So TLDR on stuff that I changed (You may like it, you may not, but it’s always nice to get feedback right?)

Variation on your build:

-150 Armor
-8% crit damage
+12% crit chance (opens up a sigil slot as stacking sigil no longer needed)
+10% more damage while moving
+60ish Power (based on if you had filled in infusion slots with power)

This is definitely some good tweeks, I still like the might on crit food better as it is less expensive then the seaweed salad and helps with the might stacking of the build. I had completely forgotten about Captain’s trinkets and they really fit well in the build thanks, I was never a fan of the stacking sigils either but they were the only thing that came to mind at the time.
With some additional tweeks I got it to where I like it, and I personally believe really hard in the might stacking and the Runes of Strength are a huge part of that. The might really pushes it from decent DPS to gross standards.

Here is a link to my edits
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmQDbkkGapxGbw4G4wxBuQJ7huefhtZA0C00oNeWA-TVCBAB1s/wWKxMU3gEXBgPVBxLlHA8QAyU9DJVCGAAB4m3Mb2mBIFwYbtA-w

MasterElements.5023:

This is definitely some good tweeks, I still like the might on crit food better as it is less expensive then the seaweed salad and helps with the might stacking of the build. I had completely forgotten about Captain’s trinkets and they really fit well in the build thanks, I was never a fan of the stacking sigils either but they were the only thing that came to mind at the time.
With some additional tweeks I got it to where I like it, and I personally believe really hard in the might stacking and the Runes of Strength are a huge part of that. The might really pushes it from decent DPS to gross standards.

Here is a link to my edits
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmQDbkkGapxGbw4G4wxBuQJ7huefhtZA0C00oNeWA-TVCBAB1s/wWKxMU3gEXBgPVBxLlHA8QAyU9DJVCGAAB4m3Mb2mBIFwYbtA-w

I never found issues getting might stacked up high even without Strength runes, so I always like the Overall raw stats of Pack runes.

I really really wish they had Captains for Armor =( Maybe someday. Would add to build flexibility options

At any rate, I like the changes made with a bit of captains trinks in there. Really upped the Crit chance so you aren’t forced into using stacking sigils.

I’ve been thinking of adding a sigil of energy and a sigil of cruelty to the dagger/warhorn weapon set, to use it has a defensive, run away, CC kinda set, and full stacks of cruelty puts me at 220% crit damage which is icing and not wholly meant to be relied upon.

I’ve been doing this type of approach for a while and it works really well for me.

I use blood magic instead of soul reaping because I don’t like shroud for damage dealing. You can use sustain really well with that much toughness so blood magic is perfect.

Also I think without any healing power, Corrupter’s Fervor is better than Unholy Sanctuary. It’s easy to stack with pretty much any build.

Lifesteal food is really good for survival when needed but for standard dungeons you’ve got the right food imo. I think you should also carry some omnomberry pies for really hard content because the sustain it gives this type of build is crazy.

Finally, I suggest you try a toughness primary staff with sustain sigils because the staff isn’t great at damage dealing, and with this much toughness you can dagger most of the time. So I use the staff as more of a defensive/utility swap.

edit: One more thing. I use sigil of rage + sigil of strength on the horn/dagger set. The quickness always procs within 1 second if I do well of suffering+locust swarm and autoattack.

Tried to keep berserker armor (most people already have it so its cheaper to keep it).

a bit more power and a bit less armor but still over 3k (armor infusions could be switched to toughness though):

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBmQDbkkGapxGbw4G4wxBuQJ7huefhtZA0C00oNeWA-T1BBABScFAiUJIAPEAF1NUz+Ddp8rS1fCAgAczbmNbzgzbezbezbe25O35O35OLFwYbtA-w

Similar build here, I gave up a fair bit of ferocity in favor of raw power. Still very tanky; been running this in WvW since patch.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBIhZakjGapxaawxG4vxxyQJvgbenn9cA8C0g4ISVA-T1SBABU8EA0SZUh6D4SJxVKV8UtiKVVho9HW4QAAwJAISlgBAQA2ZdWn7MwQH6QH6QHaXXnDdnDdnlCIilRA-w

Not meta by any means, but I am a survivor. I would like to take spite, but I found that with blood the warhorn buff and life siphon have become to good to give up.

Meh, quite easy to do in WvW and PvE with the amount of items you can mix and match.

Khristophoros.7194:

Finally, I suggest you try a toughness primary staff with sustain sigils because the staff isn’t great at damage dealing, and with this much toughness you can dagger most of the time. So I use the staff as more of a defensive/utility swap.

When weapon damage is added it takes an average of the weapons you are wielding, 2 handed weapons have a higher average as it is only 1 weapon. Duel wielding lowers your DPS by a bit, which is why I go into Shroud primarily when I am wielding the staff and why my offensive sigils are there. Not to mention the range, soft/hard CC on the staff is awesome.
Also to your point about blood magic, blood doesn’t fit well in a life blast build because life siphons are all about as many small hits as you can to proc the siphons. A life blast build is all sustained big hits, so for me Blood magic doesn’t work as a mechanic for the role of the build.
I like unholy sanctuary better because it covers my stupid more, I get FocusFired a lot and having a small safety net that makes me go into Shroud when stuff hits the fan is comforting. It covers my stupid, and I can be stupid.

Dromina I like your stat spread up until I found out that you rely on infusions to get your crit chance to 49.6%, I also noticed that you have only offensive infusions, I only have one set of ascended and it doesn’t allow me to have all offensive infusions. I doubt other sets will, which is why I don’t include infusions in my calculations. I don’t know exactly what I can place and how many offensive/defensive slots I’ll have. I treat them as icing more then an integral part of the stat spread.

Tommyknocker I’d be interested to see how it shook down ingame, from my experience a life blast build relies heavily on crit damage for the bigger numbers which is why I tried to get at least 200%.

MasterElements.5023:

… snip Tommyknocker I’d be interested to see how it shook down ingame, from my experience a life blast build relies heavily on crit damage for the bigger numbers which is why I tried to get at least 200%.

You can switch out the sigils of bloodlust for sigils of cruelty if you prefer. I tend to take the bloodlust though for when I am not in shroud as it seems to hit higher when I don’t crit.

without infusions its 48.19% CC. You could switch backpiece to captain to get to 49.29% CC but that lowers your armor to 2987. Maybe switching food could work.

MasterElements.5023:

Khristophoros.7194:

Finally, I suggest you try a toughness primary staff with sustain sigils because the staff isn’t great at damage dealing, and with this much toughness you can dagger most of the time. So I use the staff as more of a defensive/utility swap.

When weapon damage is added it takes an average of the weapons you are wielding, 2 handed weapons have a higher average as it is only 1 weapon. Duel wielding lowers your DPS by a bit, which is why I go into Shroud primarily when I am wielding the staff and why my offensive sigils are there. Not to mention the range, soft/hard CC on the staff is awesome.
Also to your point about blood magic, blood doesn’t fit well in a life blast build because life siphons are all about as many small hits as you can to proc the siphons. A life blast build is all sustained big hits, so for me Blood magic doesn’t work as a mechanic for the role of the build.
I like unholy sanctuary better because it covers my stupid more, I get FocusFired a lot and having a small safety net that makes me go into Shroud when stuff hits the fan is comforting. It covers my stupid, and I can be stupid.

Dromina I like your stat spread up until I found out that you rely on infusions to get your crit chance to 49.6%, I also noticed that you have only offensive infusions, I only have one set of ascended and it doesn’t allow me to have all offensive infusions. I doubt other sets will, which is why I don’t include infusions in my calculations. I don’t know exactly what I can place and how many offensive/defensive slots I’ll have. I treat them as icing more then an integral part of the stat spread.

Tommyknocker I’d be interested to see how it shook down ingame, from my experience a life blast build relies heavily on crit damage for the bigger numbers which is why I tried to get at least 200%.

I see your point if you’re focusing on using life blast. I prefer using dagger for damage and I mostly use shroud defensively.

Dagger requires you get up close and personal and unless you can slow/immo them being beside your enemy is IMO a bad idea. The build doesn’t have the heally sustain of a Siphon build so in as much as you are tough, it is still a good idea to not take damage when you can.