How to start out as necromancer

How to start out as necromancer

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Posted by: Board.9176

Board.9176

Q:

I recently started playing guildwars 2 (never played the first), I leveled up a guardian to 80… explored the map 100%, finished storyline and that’s about all the experience I have in guild wars 2.

I have no guild (yet) to ask questions, never did dungeons before and I got no clue which armors are better or how to craft. So basicly… I’m a big newbie when it comes to guildwars and I have no guidance. Which is why I’m here.

I tried out guardian.. and it seems fun. But i wanted to play a bit more of a caster-profession. I’ve always been fascinated by all the cool and special effects. So my first thought was to make an elementalist, but as I see my playstyle…. I tend to jump in the fray, head first. And that’ll probably get me killed as an elementalist.

But the necromancer, he’s got a nice healthpool and some “tankiness” to him as I’ve read the skill descriptions. + that deathshroud seems like a real lifesaver. And who doesn’t like to be an evil kind of sorcerer?

Now, I know there are different kind of builds and setups and whatever and read some, but I have no clue what they all mean cuz i’m too new I guess.

So I have a few questions I hope you guys could answer.

1) Is the necromancer viable?
No i don’t mean… is it a OP class that will roflstomp everything i see. But I mean, does the necromancer add any value to a dungeon party or WvW, because eventually I hope to do some of the group/guild stuff without being completely useless while my team carries me. Is his damage / survivability ratio’s strong etc.

2) I plan on rolling an asura necro, how will this affect me? Which slotskills should I use? Or do you suggest me to play another race?

3) As a new guy, which traits should I focus on? And which skills should i select from the traitlists.

4) What stats should i look for on armor that I buy?

5) Which weapon(s) should I use?

If anybody could take the time to answer these questions for me and more importantly tell me WHY, so I can get a better understanding of the profession and the game, I’d be very very grateful!

And I’m sure there are more newbies out there that could use your help!

tl;dr
I’m fairly new to the game and want to try out necromancer.
I’d like some basic answers to the 5 questions above, because I don’t understand the posted builds and please explain why so I can understand your response and learn from it.

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Posted by: Tim.6450

Tim.6450

A:

Before we start these are my personal views on the necromancer and are possible not complete or accurate.

1) It can be argued that the only way a necromancer can be usefull in a team PvE is by going full dps and we are lacking in it a bit. It’s not that we don’t have nice features like lot’s of debuff (weakness, cripple, vulnerability, blind and chill), boon stripping , condition damage and aoe but the most important fights are single boss fights so aoe falls. The bosses have either no boons or boons that refresh so quick it isn’t even funny anymore so boon stripping useless. Debuffs most bosses bareley move in group content and some can teleport, so cripple and chill gone. blind? reduced to 10% chance of hitting. Vulnerability is 50% reduced in duration. Weakness is 50% reduced in duration and most enemies have one hit kills so out of the question. Condition damage might work but most of the time in a group we suffer from teammates which place their own conditions and override your damage.

That doesn’t mean the necromancer is completely useless solo I believe wecan do very well but in group their are better choices.

2) race has barely any effect on skills since they are most of the time UP. Asura is a good choice though for it’s confusion but radition field is over shadowed by corrossive poison cloud. I prefer human though since it the avatar of melandr 5 skill is quite power full in a necro’s hand.

3-5 is depending on your build so I will take the three mayor build type:

powermancer: the power mancer is not a playstyle I play much but this is what I belive are the basics. weapons axe and dagger with a off hand of choice( most take either focus or warhorn but dagger is a valid option as well). Your gear should be either berserker or valkyrie. Here you try be as much as possible in death shroud at a rather close range. The most important trait lines are spite and soulreaping.

conditionmancer: weapons scepter/dagger and staff. The best gear choice gear is probably rabid or dire. Here you will be in the backrow spamming your condition skills. The most important trait lines are spite and curses. The most important traits are hemophilia, master of corruption, lingering curse. You can swap one of the last 2 with terror though. In spite the most important trait is dhuumfire. Your skill set will most likely exist of epidemic and blood is power.

minionmancer: the minionmancer is a build where you take at lot of minion skills. It is a rather free playstyle with lot of options (you can justify any weapon set or nearly any armor set). The basic of the build lies in death and blood magic with most important traits: flesh of the master and vampiric master.

EverythingOP

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Posted by: Board.9176

Board.9176

but in group their are better choices.

Thanks for your quick reply.
And not to completely discard necro, because I will play it as I like the mechanic & idea behind it.

But if i were to search for a (long)ranged DPS profession for group pvp & dungeons. Which would you suggest? I’m guessing for caster an elementalist?

(edited by Board.9176)

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Posted by: Muchacho.2390

Muchacho.2390

For pve, necro is not in an amazing spot but to be honest if you dont want to rush though dungeons, i think necros are ok (though i cannot speak about high level fractals, i dont pve much).

For WvW if you run with the zerg/organized group necros are amazing. Solo roaming on a necro is difficult due the lack of mobility, but doable if you know to play a necro.

In spvp/tpvp again necros are not amazing (op) but atleast they are useful unlike eles. Having a necro on your team is alway nice.

To be honest from what you said, how you want to play, necro will probably be the better choice than ele. But the best would be maybe play both a little in spvp and find out what play style you like more.

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Posted by: jpersson.7368

jpersson.7368

You’ve gotten some good answers already and yes…

I tend to jump in the fray, head first. And that’ll probably get me killed as an elementalist.

…necro:s have some “tankiness” — just remember we can’t reset fights as easily as most other classes. Then again, I might be a bit skittish from too much WvW solo roaming.

When it comes to your /actual/ questions, I would say start out hybrid and try out different weapons and play styles. People say conditions doesn’t work in PvE but I’ve leveled a pure conditionmancer just fine. It just isn’t suitable for structural damage or dungeon speed runs. Then again, I’m no build fetishist, and I have no problem using “the wrong weapons” for my build just to gain utility. I’ve also found that switching builds will help you tackle different situations.

When it comes to traits I would say 1) we’ve got some strong adept/master traits compared to some of our grand master traits, 2) always check for undocumented cool-downs (google is your friend) and 3) I would say Death Magic is the least useful trait-line unless you are a minionmancer.

Relax… nothing is under control

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Posted by: Muchacho.2390

Muchacho.2390

You’ve gotten some good answers already and yes…

I tend to jump in the fray, head first. And that’ll probably get me killed as an elementalist.

…necro:s have some “tankiness” — just remember we can’t reset fights as easily as most other classes. Then again, I might be a bit skittish from too much WvW solo roaming.

When it comes to your /actual/ questions, I would say start out hybrid and try out different weapons and play styles. People say conditions doesn’t work in PvE but I’ve leveled a pure conditionmancer just fine. It just isn’t suitable for structural damage or dungeon speed runs. Then again, I’m no build fetishist, and I have no problem using “the wrong weapons” for my build just to gain utility. I’ve also found that switching builds will help you tackle different situations.

When it comes to traits I would say 1) we’ve got some strong adept/master traits compared to some of our grand master traits, 2) always check for undocumented cool-downs (google is your friend) and 3) I would say Death Magic is the least useful trait-line unless you are a minionmancer.

Conditions dont work in pve because of the stack limit of conditions, which only matters if you are together with other players that also use conditions. For solo pve condimancer are fine.

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Posted by: jpersson.7368

jpersson.7368

Conditions dont work in pve because of the stack limit of conditions, which only matters if you are together with other players that also use conditions. For solo pve condimancer are fine.

“Don’t work” is a bold statement. The cap can be an issue in some scenarios — yes — but I think of it as an intermediate issue and not a beginner issue …but that’s me.

Relax… nothing is under control

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Posted by: Anchoku.8142

Anchoku.8142

Perhaps Necromancer’s most useful skill in PvE and WvW is in croud control; particularly AoE conditions. Spamming a lot of AoE condi in WvW affects zerg mobility by dropping 5 players into combat speed for each AoE, which adds up fast, and can induce players to burn a condi-removal skill. The AoE conditions are often just annoyances at an individual level but Necromancer can dish out a lot of it.

In group PvE, the conditions on bosses are not very effective and Necro dps suffers but, with Epidemic, a boss loaded with conditions can be used to clone the entire set onto any surrounding trash mobs melting them so they have a much harder time interfering with your group’s focus on the boss.

Necromancer is primarily a support job but the level of support varies wildly depending on the situation.

Necromancers have no escape skills – none. Shroud-turtling will just delay the end a second or two and the fears are all short. Necro’s are in the fight until death. The only combat mobility skills are a gap-closer and two dodges.

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Posted by: Muchacho.2390

Muchacho.2390

Conditions dont work in pve because of the stack limit of conditions, which only matters if you are together with other players that also use conditions. For solo pve condimancer are fine.

“Don’t work” is a bold statement. The cap can be an issue in some scenarios — yes — but I think of it as an intermediate issue and not a beginner issue …but that’s me.

Yes my word choice was not the best. I meant it in that way that in a group more than 1 condi build will reduce the overall dps of the group so it its a bit pointless to take more than one condi spec and even that is risky as even non condi build put out burn/poison/etc.