Guild Wars 2

This is WvW small group/roaming ..

I’m just coming back to the game and so far my Necro is the one that has really drawn me in I love the new blood magic changes. Looking at different discussions between here, reddit, and videos on youtube it looks like krait runes seem to be the rune of choice for condi builds now.

I have a set of rune of nightmare which helps that I am not running reaper’s protection anymore. My build is curses, blood magic, soul reaping all the siphoning traits along with transfusion, curses I take condition damage heals me over lingering curses. In soul reaping I am torn between increased fear duration or vital persistence so I am still trying to decide which one there and I take FitG.

With the changes to conditions is condition damage and duration still as equally important or is the scale tipped more toward damage now? I have about 2000 condition damage in WvW with the runes of scavenging that I’m trying on now and 85% bleed duration.

So is krait> runes of nightmare or anything else for a condition build now when it comes to output?

Krait with appropriate foods/oils and traits can get upwards of 180-200% duration.

Perplexity (while super aids and cheese) has powerful synergy with Terror and acts as extra condition pressure for your total burst.

2 Krait/2 Mad King/2 Lyssa combo well for overall condi duration increase, plus other minimal bonuses.

Undead have powerful synergy with the higher base stats, the already recommended Rabid armor set, and the Corruptor’s Fervor trait.

Nightmare add desirable stats and have obvious high synergy with Terror (debatably the best Rune-to-Build synergy in the game imo) allowing you to gain total DPS and CC increases.

A number of things are possible, and a number of choices come down to personal preference.

I use Krait Runes on my condi Necro sustain/support builds.

Basically if bleeds and bleed application are practically your main/only source of condi DPS, you should buff them with Krait runes.

With Rabid amulet in PvP Krait does about 21% more damage than Undead Runes. On Settlers (which is toughness primary) Krait runes do a bit less damage compared to Undead (about 19%). The downside is that you’re less tanky with Krait Runes by giving up the toughness bonuses. Also Undead Runes are front loaded condi DPS while Krait rely on duration and the lack of condi clears. Lastly Undead runes up other condition damage from poison, burning and torment stacks.

Still, those stacks don’t compare to the amount of AoE bleed stacks we get.

However, it sounds like you’re build is mostly a Terrormancer with Parasitic Contagion for sustain while dabbling in BM. I would probably take Fear of Death over Vital Persistence since Parasitic Contagion does nothing for you in DS. Also, you can’t build up burning stacks in DS using FitG when you exit for extra healing. I would then take Nightmare or Perplex runes. In BM you’re going to want Blood Bond for sure, Vampiric Presence and Vampiric Rituals or Transfusion, depending on whether you want to use wells or not. For WvW Transfusion may be the way to go if you’re group roaming. In PvP/WvW solo roaming, Vampiric Rituals feels more useful to me with Well of Power/Darkness.

Zero Solstice.9754:

Krait with appropriate foods/oils and traits can get upwards of 180-200% duration.

The 100% cap still exists, so with Krait + Barbed Precision + pizza you’re already exceeding the maximum.

Zero Solstice.9754:

2 Krait/2 Mad King/2 Lyssa combo well for overall condi duration increase, plus other minimal bonuses.

They all give 5% with their 2nd bonus, why wouldn’t you just take 6 nightmare instead?

Balekai.6083:

I use Krait Runes on my condi Necro sustain/support builds.

Basically if bleeds and bleed application are practically your main/only source of condi DPS, you should buff them with Krait runes.

With Rabid amulet in PvP Krait does about 21% more damage than Undead Runes. On Settlers (which is toughness primary) Krait runes do a bit less damage compared to Undead (about 19%). The downside is that you’re less tanky with Krait Runes by giving up the toughness bonuses. Also Undead Runes are front loaded condi DPS while Krait rely on duration and the lack of condi clears. Lastly Undead runes up other condition damage from poison, burning and torment stacks.

Still, those stacks don’t compare to the amount of AoE bleed stacks we get.

However, it sounds like you’re build is mostly a Terrormancer with Parasitic Contagion for sustain while dabbling in BM. I would probably take Fear of Death over Vital Persistence since Parasitic Contagion does nothing for you in DS. Also, you can’t build up burning stacks in DS using FitG when you exit for extra healing. I would then take Nightmare or Perplex runes. In BM you’re going to want Blood Bond for sure, Vampiric Presence and Vampiric Rituals or Transfusion, depending on whether you want to use wells or not. For WvW Transfusion may be the way to go if you’re group roaming. In PvP/WvW solo roaming, Vampiric Rituals feels more useful to me with Well of Power/Darkness.

Thanks a lot for the feedback you pretty much hit the build I’m running on the head. This is what I was thinking, but wasn’t sure.

Since I would lose dps by taking FiTG, then Nightmare or Perplex would help me get some of that back I have a set of each of those and I’ll try them out. Also in a roaming setting the 4 piece from Perplex or the 6th from Nightmare would provide a suitable defensive alternative since I’m not running Reaper’s Protection.

flow.6043:

Zero Solstice.9754:

Krait with appropriate foods/oils and traits can get upwards of 180-200% duration.

The 100% cap still exists, so with Krait + Barbed Precision + pizza you’re already exceeding the maximum.

Lingering Curse adds 100% condition duration to your baseline, so you can effectively stack an upwards of 200% duration on your bleeds, cripples, and poisons via scepter skills.

Zero Solstice.9754:

flow.6043:

Zero Solstice.9754:

Krait with appropriate foods/oils and traits can get upwards of 180-200% duration.

The 100% cap still exists, so with Krait + Barbed Precision + pizza you’re already exceeding the maximum.

Lingering Curse adds 100% condition duration to your baseline, so you can effectively stack an upwards of 200% duration on your bleeds, cripples, and poisons via scepter skills.

1. If you double something twice you multiply by 4, so that would be +300%.

2. Lingering Curse only affects scepter skills.

3. A trait that modifies base durations isn’t really a duration increase but something that changes a skill entirely, and that new skill is again subject to the 100% cap rule.
So turning your scepter bleeds from 5 seconds into 20 seconds doesn’t mean +300%, but that you have a trait that gives you different scepter skills and in addition to that you also have +100% bleeding duration.