Guild Wars 2

I am running a power+tough/vit build and I feel completely safe when fighting most classes. I have no much CC if I play it right I can 100% to dead most classes inside of my own CC chain and if I don’t kill them I put them on the defensive which they never recover from. The only thing that gives me trouble is a stance warrior who manages to charge and get a 1bazillion blades while burning stability and quickness. Yes I realize this is a very specific example; I was hoping someone could give me pointers on how to counter what appears to be a hardcounter for my spec.

Initiate on them first. The only way that a warrior will be able to 100b a necro, ever, is if they have stability (you should always save boon strip for big strips like stability) or if you wasted your DS. If they don’t, you have multiple immobilizes and cripples, and in a pinch you can Flesh Golem charge, plus if they catch you without stability you can just jump into DS, hit 3, keep going.

If you absolutely have to tank the burst, because they have stability and got into you, just pop DS. Even if you are low on LF, save it for a little bit later in the burst, so that the final attack breaks DS.

Actually the 100B is the easiest class to kill once you know what to do.

1). If you have Death Shroud when he charges, wait for frenzy and hit DS to eat the 100b.
2). Carry Flesh Wurm, and if you see the warrior drop the Wurm when he charges wait till 100b starts hit the portal and disappear.
3). Option 3 – hit shadow fiend’s button as soon as he charges and by the time fiend hits it will blind one of his hits haha. Okay that was a bad one, actually use Flesh golem to run him down.

Once you use either of these, use Bone Fiend to stop him in place or chill to slow him down and kill him off.

The hard counter for MM is Grenade engineers and Trap rangers.

Sorry, I’m not a huge necro person, but doesn’t fear go through stability? So if you have DS up you should be able to activate it and throw 3 on em.

PS: my 100blade friend hates fear, I’m assuming that’s why.

No, fear doesn’t go through stability, although stability can be corrupted into Fear.

I assume he hates fear because he can’t have 100% stability uptime, so could get feared out of a lot of 100bs.

Bhawb.7408:

No, fear doesn’t go through stability, although stability can be corrupted into Fear.

I assume he hates fear because he can’t have 100% stability uptime, so could get feared out of a lot of 100bs.

Ah that may be it! I know immobs hit through 100b so if you have a bone fiend the cripple will hurt their bulls rush and immob can help keep gap open, other than that generic advice I don’t think I have anything else to contribute!

PS: thanks for letting me know fear doesn’t work on stability! This will help a bit more now xD

If you’re a necro with a staff you don’t ever have to be hit by a warrior so long as you see him coming – and with Minions I would think it gets even easier with the added cripples and blinds. Every Warrior animation is obvious and extremely telling once you get used to recognizing them. As long as you don’t waste dodges or chills/cripples he won’t ever get to you.

To be clear: an HB warrior will always lead with what looks like a sword throw to cripple you (and immboilize if traited for it) – this typically results in you using a dodge, which is what he wants (good warriors are counting your dodges and after 2 they will know you are easy prey). He’ll then use one of his leaps to try and close the distance and hopefully catch you, but they’ll be happy so long as they get you to use another dodge (your last if you dodged the first attack). At this point the long immob or stun is coming followed by the Hundred Blades, and if he’s good he’ll save the Whirlwind attack for after HB incase you manage to get away or survive the HB. If that fails to kill you they’ll switch to their other weapon set. At this point, if he’s holding a shield then he has another leap and a stun, and other CC – this is why you can’t afford to waste dodges. If he’s holding a rifle (becoming sorta popular it seems lately) the be prepared to avoid the Kill Shot. A good PvPer will know when his opponent is out of defensive options and will be patient enough to patiently, methodically, creat that opportunity.

So what’s the appropriate response to this? Never under any circumstance do you want to let him get or stay within melee range of you. Kite and keep him at range and the fight is yours. Standing in with him will only get you killed. Strafing is a good way to dodge their ranged attacks/CC, save your dodges for when you absolutely can’t avoid the attack any other way, and save your fears for when you kitten up and he gets within melee range. Flesh Golem KD can be a life saver in a pinch as well.

Get the hang of that and a warrior will never bother you again. That being said though, a good Warrior won’t ever let you see him coming before it’s too late.

Hope that helps. Good luck!

As soon as the warrior is near you, put down a well of corruption. This will instantly turn his stability into fear, and his other boons into conditions, giving you room to counter.

esoteric I was about to say exactly that. u could switch it out when u see the warrior coming and sacrifice ur least useful minion. the extra damage ontop of fear will be a nice counter follow the fear from corrupting his stability with ur ds 3 them let ur minions eat his face.

In sPvP you can’t just switch skills in the middle anymore (or maybe its tPvP that you can’t). That said, every MM should have a focus off hand, and that should be enough to strip his stability (and do a nice chunk of damage), and chilling him at the same time.

On a slightly different note – Minionmancers really do have a viable role in sPvP! I tried it once, a long time ago and was completely ineffective. After that i switched to a hybrid well’omancer build with which I have had a lot of success in sPvP.

About three nights ago I encountered (for the first time after the update) a Minionmancer in the enemy team. Piece of cake pinning him down and wiping the floor with him, right? WRONG! This tiny Assura Necro, along with his horde of minions had me constantly on the defense – so much so that I could barely pull myself together to counter him and when i did manage to counter one of his minions will take the brunt of my rage.

It was a frustrating and demanding match-up! That Asura Necro made me feel proud of our class. Sure we may have a lot of things that don’t gel well together, but if you know your class well you can be overpowered. In fact, the entire team was complaining about the Asura Necro and his minions.

Point is, MM’s are viable in sPvP.
Now if only I had more time to figure out the perfect counter…

its tpvp u cant swap out skills. and yes the focus would counter stability nicely when followed up correctly.

DayLight.9603:

On a slightly different note – Minionmancers really do have a viable role in sPvP! I tried it once, a long time ago and was completely ineffective. After that i switched to a hybrid well’omancer build with which I have had a lot of success in sPvP.

About three nights ago I encountered (for the first time after the update) a Minionmancer in the enemy team. Piece of cake pinning him down and wiping the floor with him, right? WRONG! This tiny Assura Necro, along with his horde of minions had me constantly on the defense – so much so that I could barely pull myself together to counter him and when i did manage to counter one of his minions will take the brunt of my rage.

It was a frustrating and demanding match-up! That Asura Necro made me feel proud of our class. Sure we may have a lot of things that don’t gel well together, but if you know your class well you can be overpowered. In fact, the entire team was complaining about the Asura Necro and his minions.

Point is, MM’s are viable in sPvP.
Now if only I had more time to figure out the perfect counter…

Lay down all the aoe you can, and stack conditions on him. It’s really the only way to work. Force him to use Consume conditions early than stack them on him quickly, and use epidemic to spread it to his minions. Most MM, prefer kiting around while using Minions to kill you off.

Get in close, so that all the minions, you and the MM are stacked together and drop your wells. It’s the only way I am beaten by other necro’s aoe conditions mixed with stacking my minions in melee.

What? You can’t just epidemic my minions! OP!

Bas.7406:

Snip.

Thank you Bas! I will definitely give this a go next time that I get an opportunity to do so. Normally in sPvP I am one of the anchors that keeps a point secured. I just love it when an enemy waltzes right in to engage me and then gets wiped. But that Asura sure gave me a run for my money! I noticed that if I threw down a mark with my staff he would simply order the Flesh Golem to breach it – which was incredibly annoying as the Necromancer stayed at range. Still – an inspired couple of bouts! Thanks again for the advice!

In It To Win It.2315:

I am running a power+tough/vit build and I feel completely safe when fighting most classes. I have no much CC if I play it right I can 100% to dead most classes inside of my own CC chain and if I don’t kill them I put them on the defensive which they never recover from. The only thing that gives me trouble is a stance warrior who manages to charge and get a 1bazillion blades while burning stability and quickness. Yes I realize this is a very specific example; I was hoping someone could give me pointers on how to counter what appears to be a hardcounter for my spec.

I’d be interested in what build you’re running here? I’ve run the cookie cutter MM build, but wasn’t impressed at all.

PinCushion.7390:

In It To Win It.2315:

I am running a power+tough/vit build and I feel completely safe when fighting most classes. I have no much CC if I play it right I can 100% to dead most classes inside of my own CC chain and if I don’t kill them I put them on the defensive which they never recover from. The only thing that gives me trouble is a stance warrior who manages to charge and get a 1bazillion blades while burning stability and quickness. Yes I realize this is a very specific example; I was hoping someone could give me pointers on how to counter what appears to be a hardcounter for my spec.

I’d be interested in what build you’re running here? I’ve run the cookie cutter MM build, but wasn’t impressed at all.

My best guess is he is running pvt gear with a build more down the lines of 20/0/30/20/0 or 20/0/20/30/0. Though I did run into a MM the other day who was running 0/0/30/30/10. 30k health and 2800 toughness and was a pain in the neck to kill he didn’t do much damage though.

I don’t sPVP all that often, but I do run an MM build when I do. I go for the more tanky build, since I prefer being able to lock down / capture points in spvp than just run around killing things for no reason.

So much CC…. and it’s amusing watching people trying to target me and hit my minions instead.

I almost hate to give out my build as I certainly don’t want to face another necro with it, but for the good of my necro brothers here it is

So far I haven’t met another player or build that I can’t counter 1v1 with this build and I can usually handle up to 3v1s pretty effectively.

First of all a link to the build (copy and paste it into a browser):
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAndWCh6JApHPT90TK4GcIF5KNA;TsAA1CtoEyImQMLUOhkQtAZUwEEA

This build is a minion master build, but it focuses on control (chill) and survivability. You’re probably thinking “but necros have no real CC”. Ahah but we do! We have access to the most applications of chill of any class and chill is absolutely devastating.

With this build I have 4 ways to apply chill to people (focus 5, staff 3, DS 2, and on weapon swap). I could stack up to 29 seconds of chill onto a target if I blow everything in sequence but of course that would be overkill. The point is that you can keep someone permanently chilled which….
a) slows them and keeps them from escaping your minions and getting to you.
b) slows down the recharge rate on all of their skills.

Even if classes have access to condition removal there is no way that they can keep up with the number of ways that you can reapply the chill.

Other highlights of the build:
- very high HP
- very high armor
- lots of incoming heals from both minions and your own attacks via life siphoning
- minions leave an AoE poison patch when they die
- high power so you have decent direct damage from your own attacks

Make careful note of the runes and sigils that I am using as they are a big key to this build.

@kid – your link leads to a build with only well of suffering and mark of blood on dodge traits along with some very odd traits chosen. i think it’s not sending to the correct place.

Bas.7406:

Though I did run into a MM the other day who was running 0/0/30/30/10. 30k health and 2800 toughness and was a pain in the neck to kill he didn’t do much damage though.

That might have been me. Here’s about what I currently run, if anybody is interested:

http://gw2buildcraft.com/calculator/necromancer/?5.0|6.1n.h2|7.1n.h2.d.1n.h1|1c.7f.1c.7f.1c.7f.1c.7f.1c.7f.1c.9c|1c.64.1c.64.1c.64.1c.64.1c.64.cc.64|0.0.u2ab.u27b.a2|1k.1|0.0.0.0.0|e

For skills, usually I use Blood Fiend, Signet of the Locust and all the melee minions. Sometimes I will swap in Bone Fiend for Shadow Fiend. Sometimes I will use Necromantic Corruption instead of Death Nova. I spend the vast majority of my time in WvW, swapping between zerging around with whatever commander’s available (I am a filthy pug player) and soloing / small grouping supply camps.

Bas.7406:

@kid – your link leads to a build with only well of suffering and mark of blood on dodge traits along with some very odd traits chosen. i think it’s not sending to the correct place.

Bas, thanks for catching that. I’ve updated the link in my original post. Here it is as well:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAndWCh6JApHPT90TK4GcIF5KNA;TsAA1CtoEyImQMLUOhkQtAZUwEEA

Hopefully it will work this time.