Guild Wars 2

I have a controversial stance to take on the necromancer. And before anyone replies, please understand that I’m not taking this stance based on how effective they are in combat or how they rank of the top 8 professions. This is a stance I am taking from a GW1 veteran player’s perspective who dedicated over 3 thousand hours exclusively to the necromancer.

The GW1 necromancer was my favorite profession in the game. Hands down. I spent 6 thousand hours playing the game and a little over half of those hours where on my necromancer. This was because of how versatile and Fun it was to play them. They could do just about everything your party needed at any given time. Necromancer’s where almost always picked up for grouping in PvE and even had some very interesting runs in pvp. What defined the necromancer in GW1 was how much it relied on enemies suffering from afflictions, punishment and its use of death to further its goals. Many necromancer builds where designed around this concept. Discordway was a popular build that used a skill that would literally did nothing unless X, Y and Z where in place.

Compare this to the necromancer of GW2. What defines the necromancer in GW2? The necromancer can cause dot damage, tanks pretty well, causes fear, and has pets. So far this doesn’t sound anything like the GW1 necromancer, lets dig a bit deeper to see if we can find something that they both share besides the name. Well the Necromancer of GW1 was pretty good at causing conditions. They only used about 5 of them but they had hexes to back that up with and many of their hexes caused bonuses if they suffered from a condition. Does the GW2 necromancer have skills that gain bonuses if the foe is suffering from a condition? They have a grand total of 3 skills that care about conditions on your foe. We wont count removing conditions because that isn’t exclusive to the necromancer. They also have 3 traits that care if a foe is suffering from a condition. Is this enough? I can’t say it is, especially seeing as this also isn’t exclusive to the necromancer.

Lets look at how each of them use death. The GW1 necromancer uses death even in the build that relies on it the least. With death to gain energy, this was a very important part of the necro’s build. If something didn’t die, many necromancers would run out of steam and just start to fall off the deep end quickly. This was both a good challenge to over come by newer players and a powerful weakness that helped define who they are. They also needed deaths to occur in order for them to summon minions, use wells, or even use necrotic traveling skills. So what does the GW2 necro use death for? Life force. Gone are the days of the necromancer needing corpses to fuel their spells. This has a very major consequence to how the necro fights. It means that the necromancer’s spells have to be balanced without situational uses in mind. Which in turn, makes the skills feel less necro in nature.

What defined minions in the first game was their mindless mass of flesh that was near unending as long as the corpses where provided. Minions where slow, kinda stupid, and didn’t know what AOE was. The advantage to them was you could have a mass of them and if half or all of them died, you could replace them almost instantly. Now in GW2 the minions don’t require corpses but have the same weaknesses of the first game. They gained a few new abilities of their own but became weaker in the process and completely lost their ability to be spammed. You would think with how Arena Net put the philosophy of everyone gaining their own resource nodes and individual loot tables that using corpses as a resource wouldn’t be too difficult for them to do. Minions from GW1 had real party applications and uses in both PvE and PvP. In GW2, they are nothing more then a novelty, brushed aside by far more useful skills.

Another defining factor for the necromancer in GW1 was the punishment. The Necromancer was queen of punishment in GW1. Some might argue that the mesmer had more punishment skills but if you really take a step back and look at it, they where about even. Although the Mesmer punished for the foe doing something or lack of doing something, the necro had a different approach some of the time. While the mesmer punished for action or inaction independent of the skill landed or not, the necromancer would punish more if the foe’s skills actually connected or if they specifically didn’t connect. The exceptions are Spiteful spirit and a few others. Necromancer also punished through party support, giving life to allies or causing damage to foes who just so happened to be standing too close to their ally.

The necro from GW2 has something else besides punishment. They use Dot damage. Which was an extremely minor part of the necromancer of GW1. They had dot damage, but it wasn’t what defined them. It was more used to pressure a foe into wasting energy or cause a slow death. They didn’t use it much outside PvP and if they did, it was because they had party support to make it enhance damage. Your primary damage for the necro is going to be from your bleeds and poison. Which when compared to other professions who can specialize in conditions feels extremely weak and causes unsatisfying deaths.

The necromancer in GW2 doesn’t even get the disease condition that was used almost exclusively by the necro from GW1. Which leads into the next topic. Fear. Fear is a worse CC ability then knock downs, knock backs or stuns in every way imaginably. Its duration is a 1/3 or 1/2 the duration of the other CCs in the game and, unlike the others, this one can be removed by both stun breaks and condition removal. Worse then that, the necromancer gets the worst fear skills in the game. When I run into a battle and a dog has a better fear skill then I will ever have even with all the buffs on it, I know there is something wrong with it. Why build up this condition so much as an amazing new feature for the necromancer then make it so laughably bad? The GW1 necromancer’s condition disease may have bit you in the butt sometimes but at least it caused more problems for your foe most the time. And even if the necro in GW2 had Disease it wouldn’t make them that much more powerful, it certainly wouldn’t break them.

Another thing the GW1 necromancer did that the GW2 necromancer doesn’t is sacrifice life. When I saw that the necro in GW2 was going to have a large life pool, I thought “That makes sense. They use their life as a resource. This will make using those skills a little easier.” little did I know that that wasn’t the reason for it. To this day I’m not sure why the necromancer has such a large life pool. Life for the GW1 necromancer was important, and used cautiously, which when used right was both rewarding and powerful. The closest thing the GW2 necro gets to that is afflicting themselves with conditions. Which doesn’t have the same impact as cutting a chunk of my own life to cause massive problems for my foes.

GW1 revolutionized how I look at the necromancer class in other games. The GW1 necromancer is what I stand all other necromancers up to to see if they are worth playing and worth my time. The GW1 necromancer was so well designed and built that I don’t feel like I’m running just any profession. I feel like I am the necromancer, That I am the mistress of death, the sovereign of affliction, or the puppeteer of the kitten So does the GW2 necromancer live up to the powerful Legacy the GW1 necromancer put in place? Well, no. It doesn’t. And that is why I feel that the necromancer is the worst profession in GW2. I don’t feel like a necromancer. I feel like I’m playing a Warlock.

Can the necromancer in GW2 be fixed? Probably not. Nothing about it feels natural. Everything feels forced. The whole design of the necromancer was clearly not designed for the Necromancer veterans of GW1. The necromancer was designed for the Warlock and which players coming over from other games. And to me, that is the worst sin Arena Net has done so far. My once favorite profession is now the biggest disappointment I have in GW2.

If you have read all this, well you are a trooper. I appreciated the time anyone has taken in reading this. You may disagree with me if you like, you are entitled to your opinion. I’m just expressing how I feel about the profession while directly transitioning from GW1 to GW2.

As someone who has played necromancers in GW1, I feel exactly the same way you do. Yes, I read all of it. Its pretty much spot on IMO.

The Necromancer is a theme they brought over. There was no possible way they could have recreated everything a Necromancer was in GW1 while losing at least 50% of the skills, and having totally new mechanics. It wasn’t a direct transistion in the slightest, it was a theme (curses, blood, death, minions, etc) that they then applied to a totally different game.

The GW1 Necromancer is, and always will be, exclusive to GW1. If you don’t like the transition, you outlined why that is a totally valid feeling (I miss a lot of what you mentioned), but this isn’t the GW1 Necro, this is an entirely new game, with new mechanics, and as such a whole new Necromancer profession.

Bhawb.7408:

The Necromancer is a theme they brought over. There was no possible way they could have recreated everything a Necromancer was in GW1 while losing at least 50% of the skills, and having totally new mechanics. It wasn’t a direct transistion in the slightest, it was a theme (curses, blood, death, minions, etc) that they then applied to a totally different game.

The GW1 Necromancer is, and always will be, exclusive to GW1. If you don’t like the transition, you outlined why that is a totally valid feeling (I miss a lot of what you mentioned), but this isn’t the GW1 Necro, this is an entirely new game, with new mechanics, and as such a whole new Necromancer profession.

Regarding the actual mechanics we do have vs other classes, the complaints are absolutely valid. Necro pets vs ranger pets. Necro fear vs thief/warrior/ranger fear. Necro condition application vs other classes ability to apply conditions. Our ability to group support vs guardian/elementalist ability to group support. The disparity is staggering in what we can do vs other classes.

Regarding fear, it was supposed to have been our class defining skill. Instead it got gutted, given to other classes, and ours was nerfed into the ground. All the while the other classes that got it got to keep the original versions.

1) Whose pet is better is debatable, it just depends on what your intent is
2) The fears don’t even begin to compare. Thieves get a single fear, only against necromancers, on a 45 second CD; warriors get a single fear on an eighty second CD that only lasts longer than ours if you are close enough; every Necromancer gets a fear on a 20 second CD, staff gives us an AoE fear on a 40s CD, we can also get 2 fears from flipping boons, one from being stunned, and one from being downed, can be traited to do huge damage per tick, and can be traited to have double duration. It is incomparable what we can do with fears and what they can.
3) Epidemic. A single epidemic totally and completely outclasses everyone else’s condition application.

Bhawb.7408:

1) Whose pet is better is debatable, it just depends on what your intent is
2) The fears don’t even begin to compare. Thieves get a single fear, only against necromancers, on a 45 second CD; warriors get a single fear on an eighty second CD that only lasts longer than ours if you are close enough; every Necromancer gets a fear on a 20 second CD, staff gives us an AoE fear on a 40s CD, we can also get 2 fears from flipping boons, one from being stunned, and one from being downed, can be traited to do huge damage per tick, and can be traited to have double duration. It is incomparable what we can do with fears and what they can.
3) Epidemic. A single epidemic totally and completely outclasses everyone else’s condition application.

Ranger pets can actually be controlled. This alone makes them infinitely better. Then theres the fact they heal themselves out of combat. This makes them a lot more useful and gives them a lot more sustainability between fights. Right now, I have to switch my skills out, wait 20 seconds, and resummon my minions if I don’t want them to get killed by the first thing that hits them after every fight. Its extremely annoying and doesn’t add any kind of depth, fun, or unique mechanic to this class.

I’d rather have the other versions of fear. They’re better, and they’re all AoE by default. You can do a hell of a lot more with 3 seconds of AoE fear than a paltry 1 second single target fear. 1 second fears are nothing more than a glorified interrupt. I’d rather have a stun or a daze than a fear if its only going to last 1 second. The staff fear, quite frankly, isn’t any better because its tied to a weapon that can’t even stand on its own. If staff was a weapon that was capable of being the focus of a build, I’d change my mind on it, but personally I find the staff to be extremely weak as a weapon.

2 seconds of fear is still pretty kittenty when you have to invest so much to make it last those 2 seconds. Especially when everyone else gets it 3 seconds base, and they can still improve the duration further if they wanted to make a build around it. I would much rather have the 3 second fear with the longer cool down, as I feel it would be a hell of a lot more useful than what we have now.

Epidemic is crap now. I would have agreed with you before the nerf, but now its not even worth the space it takes up in a utility slot. Its just to easy for it to flat out fail. You already know how I feel about skills that I find unreliable. Furthermore, balancing an entire class around one skill, a skill that is only useful to one specific type of build, is horribly bad game design. I would suggest you play an engineer and then come talk to me about condition application. Just as many bleed stacks, plus confusion, poison, and burning (oh god, the burning is so beautiful and does soooo much damage). Its not even comparable I’m afraid. Engineers can do all of this AoE as well. Epidemic doesn’t even come close really because all we have is bleeding and poison.

It is no secret that this class lacks proper design direction. Its trying to do to much and failing to do any of it properly. It also doesn’t help any that we’re suffering from a severe case of, “Afraid of being over powered” syndrome by the developers because of some one trick pony build in BWE. A build that still exists on guardians, engineers, and elementalists today.

Bhawb.7408:

1) Whose pet is better is debatable, it just depends on what your intent is
2) The fears don’t even begin to compare. Thieves get a single fear, only against necromancers, on a 45 second CD; warriors get a single fear on an eighty second CD that only lasts longer than ours if you are close enough; every Necromancer gets a fear on a 20 second CD, staff gives us an AoE fear on a 40s CD, we can also get 2 fears from flipping boons, one from being stunned, and one from being downed, can be traited to do huge damage per tick, and can be traited to have double duration. It is incomparable what we can do with fears and what they can.
3) Epidemic. A single epidemic totally and completely outclasses everyone else’s condition application.

This is really beside the point of this post, but I will address this anyway. The warrior also gets knock backs and knock downs on just as short a cool down as necromancer’s fear. And its more plentiful. Which was also a point in my post.

Also. Epidemic doesn’t make the few conditions the necromancer does have any better. It is good, but out of the other skills they have this isn’t justification for how poor almost everything else is.

Not sure why we didnt get hex’s. There is atleast one sort of hex in gw2. The guardians binding blades on the greatsword puts a non condition dot on enemies (a type of hex). Dont see why they scrapped hex’s completely. It could of been a much better set of utility skills instead of corruption skills and would of given necros a stand out set of utilities other than the poor adaptation of minions.

Lily.1935:

Epidemic doesn’t make the few conditions the necromancer does have any better.

If you think necromancers only have a few conditions then you still have a lot to learn about the class.

Alestes.4081:

Lily.1935:

Epidemic doesn’t make the few conditions the necromancer does have any better.

If you think necromancers only have a few conditions then you still have a lot to learn about the class.

Anything less then all but one condition for the master of conditions is “only a few” In my eyes, the only condition the necromancer shouldn’t have access to is burning. And fear doesn’t count because its going to end before you finish casting epidemic.

spoj.9672:

Not sure why we didnt get hex’s. There is atleast one sort of hex in gw2. The guardians binding blades on the greatsword puts a non condition dot on enemies (a type of hex). Dont see why they scrapped hex’s completely. It could of been a much better set of utility skills instead of corruption skills and would of given necros a stand out set of utilities other than the poor adaptation of minions.

I personally don’t see why the necromancer wells couldn’t simulate some of the GW1 hexes. They have the right properties, and what they can do seems like it would make up for some of the punishment the necromancer has lost form dropping hexes. A barbed well would be interest. Whenever a foe takes damage while in the well, in the well, the well damages them. Or maybe make it so when they take damage in it, the well causes bleeding. Or a well that when a foe would hit an ally in the well, they steal a bit of health from that foe striking them. The potential for hex like skills is in the game, Arena Net just isn’t using it.

Lily.1935:

Alestes.4081:

Lily.1935:

Epidemic doesn’t make the few conditions the necromancer does have any better.

If you think necromancers only have a few conditions then you still have a lot to learn about the class.

Anything less then all but one condition for the master of conditions is “only a few” In my eyes, the only condition the necromancer shouldn’t have access to is burning. And fear doesn’t count because its going to end before you finish casting epidemic.

I can’t remember when this was said, shortly before BWE or during BWE, but necromancers were promised access to confusion. 8 months later and we’re still waiting.

1. Epic username (yay for girl on girl action – those that get japanese im sorry yes i know its not correct but its still a good pun imo)
2. Have you played a Blood battery touch Necro/Dervish (was pretty unpopular since you couldnt do kitten solo and relied on the Ele wards, but still cool in pve), if you ever did the current necro shouldnt be any problem to you since its baseline is still efficiency, not specialization or direct power (despite how much we all miss AEchoed SS to melt 40 charr at once for farming)
3. I know this is no fix, but if you had fun with the curses restoration N/Rit variation of Discordway, you will love the mesmer, they and necros are kinde two sides of the same coin in GW2 (just as guardians and eles; rangers and warriors)
4. With all that said, GW2s combat system is quite a lot different than GWs, that must be in mind when asking for changes and im pretty sure that changing our wells and overall abilites to be even more reactive with their effects than passive would pretty much destroy the necro (except minions) because of the high cast times, cooldowns and lack of steady zone control outside of staff (moving it from a highly recommended weapon to pretty much limiting the necro to only 1 weapon set or you are kitten).

I didn’t play Necro in GW1. But it sounds like GW2 Mesmer clones work the way GW1 Necro minions worked. Very easy to summon, could have many of them, sacrifice for buffs/damage.

I really like the idea of using Life Force for something else. Of course similar ideas have been in other games, but it would truly fit in well here, especially for builds that just don’t get that much effectiveness out of Death Shroud other than a sponge (full condition).

Let us convert some LF into real health, or into popping a boon that gives us Might, Regen, or maybe ones we don’t have access to at all, or nearly so.

Maybe best of all, let us convert it into an escape or mobility move that we so desperately lack. Even something like the old Dark Path that was a teleport/blink type ability, bring it back at the cost of 1/3 our LF bar or something. Give us the choice to be defensive in another way beside face tanking. But at the cost of depleting our sponge so we can’t do both in the same fight.

Lily.1935:

Also. Epidemic doesn’t make the few conditions the necromancer does have any better. It is good, but out of the other skills they have this isn’t justification for how poor almost everything else is.

I would easily give up epidemic if we got all the things we lack/need. I think its overrated, especially now. Sometimes when I’m trash farming, I will change it and forget to reslot epidemic, and groups still die almost as fast, because its kind of redundant to what the Necro already has a lot of, AoE conditions.

It’s unique in being able to spread other players conditions, sure, but I find most other professions don’t actually have very long conditions or durations, so mostly you end up spreading your own, or maybe 1 or 2 seconds of burning or confusion, its not that big a deal outside a very dedicated team organizing everything to a T. Most of the Necro playerbase is not in that environment, so doesn’t ever approach having it be maximized in the way the devs likely feared or rated it on.

Pendragon.8735:

Lily.1935:

Also. Epidemic doesn’t make the few conditions the necromancer does have any better. It is good, but out of the other skills they have this isn’t justification for how poor almost everything else is.

I would easily give up epidemic if we got all the things we lack/need. I think its overrated, especially now. Sometimes when I’m trash farming, I will change it and forget to reslot epidemic, and groups still die almost as fast, because its kind of redundant to what the Necro already has a lot of, AoE conditions.

It’s unique in being able to spread other players conditions, sure, but I find most other professions don’t actually have very long conditions or durations, so mostly you end up spreading your own, or maybe 1 or 2 seconds of burning or confusion, its not that big a deal outside a very dedicated team organizing everything to a T. Most of the Necro playerbase is not in that environment, so doesn’t ever approach having it be maximized in the way the devs likely feared or rated it on.

I have to agree with this. Especially the part about other classes conditions not lasting long enough to take advantage of them. Its nice hitting a fat stack of 25 bleeds with Epidemic, but I find that the stack disappears so darn quickly after the epidemic goes off. Maybe if conditions lasted longer in general, but as it is, confusion duration is so low that I almost never see people killing themselves on any confusion stack I Epidemic.

GW1 player here too, since the beta. I haven’t put nearly as many hours into GW1 as you but I did put quite a few on regardless and I did play a Necromancer fairly regularly.

I would agree that the GW2 Necro is a much different beast, but I don’t think that that’s all that special to the Necromancer. ANet put /every/ profession through the ringer for GW2. All those I’ve played play quite differently from their predecessors with only echoes and homages to their prior selves popping up here and there.

Mesmers in GW1 didn’t have clones or illusions to shatter and they certainly didn’t want to regularly get into melee range outside of strange specs emphasizing secondary professions. Elementalists were primarily known for their big burst damage, not for their versatility and how difficult they were to kill (though GW1 Earth Eles could make themselves literally unkillable for certain groups). Can you imagine the Ranger’s shock when suddenly they weren’t spending all their time twitch-interrupting everything their opponent wanted to do? Or what about the poor Ritualist? They were cut up and sewn onto darn near half the professions in the game! Even the Thief plays quite differently from the Assassin; both are about spike damage but gone are they days of pressing 1234567 repeat until everyone’s dead.

My point is, the closer you expect GW2 to match GW1 the more dissapointed you’re going to be, because they’re not the same game. GW2 isn’t just a systems update. It’s not intended to be just GW1 with a modernized combat system and better graphics. GW1 still exists so there’s no real point in making it over again. I’m not going to say the Necro in GW2 is perfect as-is, but I do think it can do nasty, grisly thinks to its enemies and control a fight like few other professions. Minion Mastery still leaves you as an unstoppable wall of corpses crushing everything before you. Death Shroud still rewards you for killing things.

Also, I think you’re unfairly undervaluing the Necro’s Fears. In addition to simply having more of them (more of a short CC is better than one slightly longer CC particularly since, as you note, it can be stunbroken out of), the Necro can also apply them much more quickly. Death Shroud’s fear is basically instant if you get good at swapping into Death Shroud quickly. The Ranger’s wolf fear has an insanely long cast time and a ridiculous delay preceding the cast, making it difficult to use except as general distruption. The Necro can be surgical in its use of Fear, and no one else can dish out Fear that deals damage.

Long story short, ANet took the game in a different direction from GW1 and the Necro reflects that. However, it still has echoes of the old Necro if you want to see them and it’s a rather fun class in its own right. You just gotta be ready to expect something a little different.

Lily.1935:

To this day I’m not sure why the necromancer has such a large life pool.

It’s a light-armor profession that’s supposed to win wars of attrition, and it’s supposed to be better at manipulating conditions than other professions. It doesn’t get blocks or invulnerables or serious mobility options so it’s supposed to be able to deal with spike damage simply by having a bigger health pool (and using Death Shroud for clutch absorbs).

Blaine Tog.8304:

It’s a light-armor profession that’s supposed to win wars of attrition, and it’s supposed to be better at manipulating conditions than other professions. It doesn’t get blocks or invulnerables or serious mobility options so it’s supposed to be able to deal with spike damage simply by having a bigger health pool (and using Death Shroud for clutch absorbs).

Which doesn’t do to well at the attrition part.

Kravick.4906:

2 seconds of fear is still pretty kittenty when you have to invest so much to make it last those 2 seconds. Especially when everyone else gets it 3 seconds base, and they can still improve the duration further if they wanted to make a build around it. I would much rather have the 3 second fear with the longer cool down, as I feel it would be a hell of a lot more useful than what we have now.

You forgot that a thief can actually kill you in 3 seconds.

Monoman.2068:

Kravick.4906:

2 seconds of fear is still pretty kittenty when you have to invest so much to make it last those 2 seconds. Especially when everyone else gets it 3 seconds base, and they can still improve the duration further if they wanted to make a build around it. I would much rather have the 3 second fear with the longer cool down, as I feel it would be a hell of a lot more useful than what we have now.

You forgot that a thief can actually kill you in 3 seconds.

Oh I didn’t forget. Its what I do on my thief when I fight necromancers. Get them to about 50% HP, hit the fear, CnD → Backstab, they’re pretty much dead. Conditionmancers are especially easy for me to kill what with having so many ways to remove conditions.

Its part of the reason why I find 1 second fears to be rather useless for anything other than an interrupt, and even then there are better mechanics to do even that with, like knockdowns, knock backs, daze, etc.

Kravick.4906:

The staff fear, quite frankly, isn’t any better because its tied to a weapon that can’t even stand on its own. If staff was a weapon that was capable of being the focus of a build, I’d change my mind on it, but personally I find the staff to be extremely weak as a weapon.

Dude -.-
I’ve postet my build over two weeks ago. It’s a staff build, as in: standing on it’s own, build-focus and everything… and I incorporate terror too.
Maybe you’ll see it in action when we have our EU necro tournament.

Kravick.4906:

Blaine Tog.8304:

It’s a light-armor profession that’s supposed to win wars of attrition, and it’s supposed to be better at manipulating conditions than other professions. It doesn’t get blocks or invulnerables or serious mobility options so it’s supposed to be able to deal with spike damage simply by having a bigger health pool (and using Death Shroud for clutch absorbs).

Which doesn’t do to well at the attrition part.

Ah, but it does! Attrition builds can only work if they allow you to survive through burst, which is exactly the point of the big health pool and Death Shroud.

To be clear, I’m speaking conceptually. I’m not claiming the Necro’s tuning is perfect.

flow.6043:

Kravick.4906:

The staff fear, quite frankly, isn’t any better because its tied to a weapon that can’t even stand on its own. If staff was a weapon that was capable of being the focus of a build, I’d change my mind on it, but personally I find the staff to be extremely weak as a weapon.

Dude -.-
I’ve postet my build over two weeks ago. It’s a staff build, as in: standing on it’s own, build-focus and everything… and I incorporate terror too.
Maybe you’ll see it in action when we have our EU necro tournament.

Staff hits like a wet noddle even when fully traited. This is mainly due to its hybrid design. The same problem occurs with warriors and one handed swords. Split focus weapons have, in other MMOs, shown to be poor concepts that might look good on paper, but never pan out in practice. This has not changed in GW2.

Staff is not a stand alone weapon by any means, and going by what I’ve read on these forums, most necromancers agree. Its a weapon you swap to for a specific purpose and then put it away as soon as humanly possible. It simply does not have the damage output, or staying power, to be considered anything other than a support weapon. Theres also the major problem of the auto attack projectile being laughably easy to sidestep unless you’re at point blank range, which is where you don’t want to be with a 1200 range weapon.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Ah, but it does! Attrition builds can only work if they allow you to survive through burst, which is exactly the point of the big health pool and Death Shroud.

To be clear, I’m speaking conceptually. I’m not claiming the Necro’s tuning is perfect.

I’m speaking from experience. In PvE, nothing ever bursts you so you’ll never see it there. PvP is an entirely different ball game. It is not uncommon for people to easily burst through your DS with a single combo. It generally absorbs no more than 2, maybe 3 hits before its completely gone. This burst often continues through your DS and into your normal HP if you’re facing a high burst classes like thieves, mesmers, or warriors.

Thieves can, and will, out attrition a necromancer quite easily if they play smart. Constantly going into stealth to regenerate and popping up with high damage attacks. The amount they regenerate while stealthed is quite substantial, and they don’t even need +healing gear for it to be that effective. Fortunately for me, having played a thief for a while, I generally know how to counter them. However, if I am playing condition build, there is a type of thief that no matter how well I play, I’ll never beat. This thief is typically known as sword/dagger thief, and will most definitely out attrition any necro build.

You can’t even make the argument that guardians aren’t better at attrition. Then there is the insanity that is the bunker engineer. Its really a toss up which is better at attrition. Guardians or Engineers. Both of which just put necromancer attrition to shame.

Kravick.4906:

flow.6043:

Kravick.4906:

The staff fear, quite frankly, isn’t any better because its tied to a weapon that can’t even stand on its own. If staff was a weapon that was capable of being the focus of a build, I’d change my mind on it, but personally I find the staff to be extremely weak as a weapon.

Dude -.-
I’ve postet my build over two weeks ago. It’s a staff build, as in: standing on it’s own, build-focus and everything… and I incorporate terror too.
Maybe you’ll see it in action when we have our EU necro tournament.

Staff hits like a wet noddle even when fully traited. This is mainly due to its hybrid design. The same problem occurs with warriors and one handed swords. Split focus weapons have, in other MMOs, shown to be poor concepts that might look good on paper, but never pan out in practice. This has not changed in GW2.

Staff is not a stand alone weapon by any means, and going by what I’ve read on these forums, most necromancers agree. Its a weapon you swap to for a specific purpose and then put it away as soon as humanly possible. It simply does not have the damage output, or staying power, to be considered anything other than a support weapon. Theres also the major problem of the auto attack projectile being laughably easy to sidestep unless you’re at point blank range, which is where you don’t want to be with a 1200 range weapon.

I know that people on the forum believe it’s a weak support utility weapon.
But with my build it really hits super hard, I wouldn’t play that style if I didn’t believe that it’s the strongest I can be as a necromancer (or any class tbh).
@auto attack projectile: Yes necrotic grasp is kinda lame, but with my build all the cooldowns are so low that I barely ever get to fire a single grasp.

Kravick.4906:

I’m speaking from experience. In PvE, nothing ever bursts you so you’ll never see it there. PvP is an entirely different ball game. It is not uncommon for people to easily burst through your DS with a single combo. It generally absorbs no more than 2, maybe 3 hits before its completely gone. This burst often continues through your DS and into your normal HP if you’re facing a high burst classes like thieves, mesmers, or warriors.

.

Blaine Tog.8304:

To be clear, I’m speaking conceptually. I’m not claiming the Necro’s tuning is perfect.

:)

Why?
Because game do not give chance to win 1v1 in wvw.
When I see enemy I try to run but Im too slow and easy target.

I got my necro to lvl 40. then i played other classes to try abit.
At this time i also needed a new character spot free.. so i deleted my 40 necro.

Abit later, i got my gold fixed and bought up all character classes.
So i went to try necro again… it got to lvl 5……..

Then i felt: What The Hell is this crap.

Do i feel like an Evil necromancer ? not one bit.
More like a badly dressed circus animal trainer, and a bad trainer, as pets do what ever they want.

Necros has become one of the best classes for WvW, ofcouse there is no best in GW2, but its very good.

as many others one needs to know how to play it before its good, and i wont be one who teaches anyone anything, its up to each to play and learn their way of doing things, but ofcourse not all playstyles works.

I agree. Especially about minion’s part. I knowed bfore I started playing it won’t be the same as GW1 but I didn’t expected it will that bad.
Ok. No complaining now Something I would change to fix it.
Life Force should become minion resource (along with Death Shourd). Life Force should be used to keep minions alive. You can summon as many as minions as you want, but you must keep your Life Force up to keep them alive. So you have to choose if you use Life Force to control army of to make your self stronger.
When Life Force runs out minions don’t die instatly they start to loose their health. You can still heal them with healing skills.

Whether or you need corposes or not to raise minions is matter of disscussion.

In any case I strongly believe that minion part of necro need total rework to make it much more similiar to GW1. Currently necro doesn’t really have any class mark mechanic like other classes. Except Death Shourd which I barerly use anyway.

If we’re comparing GW1 to GW2, can we at least mention the painful absence of GvG?

Jiiub.7135:

Necros has become one of the best classes for WvW, .

yes, that why I see only few necros and lots of gladiators and warriors and mesmers and thieves.

As another GW1 Necro veteran, I also agree entirely with this post. GW2 Necro was the first toon I took to 80 and did soley as a MM. There was an entirely foreign feeling to this class and I frequently found myself talking to others about how GW1 necros were far more exciting and interesting to play (for the reasons you have mentioned). After putting necro down (and completely falling in love with mesmer who have far more utility than necro ever will at this point) and coming back after a several month hiatus from necro class, I am still finding myself feeling underwhelmed.

One major thing that has changed, however, is my approach to relating to the class. You’re absolutely right that it seems geared more for players who played Warlock in other games and that is now my approach as well. I’m really trying to learn how to enjoy this class in order to maximize my overall enjoyment of the game. At this point, I’m willing to let go of my need for my old GW1 mentality to find my place in GW2. In this spirit, I think its only a matter of time until you start seeing party builds similar to discordway parties. For example, I was recently in a party with another necro and two mesmers (don’t remember the 5th) and we cleaned up a dungeon with great efficiency in part because we were able to stack a vey high amount of conditions. It leads me to wonder how we can further experiment together in parties to really maximize our skills and find better utility across the entire game.

Necro may suck now but we must continue to find a niche. Otherwise other classes will believe this and make it that much more difficult to find parties and exist as a class. I have seen a few very creative uses for necro in pve and have gotten my kitten kicked by a couple necros in pvp so I don’t think its as bleak as it feels right now. Its taking me a lot of patience and time researching to find what works well.

my two cents.

Wormy Slyme.2913:

Necro may suck now but we must continue to find a niche. Otherwise other classes will believe this and make it that much more difficult to find parties and exist as a class. I have seen a few very creative uses for necro in pve and have gotten my kitten kicked by a couple necros in pvp so I don’t think its as bleak as it feels right now. Its taking me a lot of patience and time researching to find what works well.

Thank you for the note of positivity. Staying positive is all too rare in the GW2 community.

Talentless.5708:

If we’re comparing GW1 to GW2, can we at least mention the painful absence of GvG?

I never played GW1 and I think that the lack o GvG makes the game’s title misleading.

Kiriakulos.1690:

Talentless.5708:

If we’re comparing GW1 to GW2, can we at least mention the painful absence of GvG?

I never played GW1 and I think that the lack o GvG makes the game’s title misleading.

The Title is a typo. This is Zerg Wars II.

I played a GW1 necro not for a great amount of time, but long enough to do all the campaigns and EotN with him, a curses necro.

When i first played the GW2 necro, i got to 15 and deleted him. It just didn’t feel right.

But now i’ve got an 80 necro for a while, and it’s definately been growing on me as i see more and more simularities with what these two necromancers are (though there aren’t many replacements for specific skills i used to use, like barbs or spamming necrosis sadly)

I think there’s more similarities than you’re giving the GW2 necro credit for. In GW1 i looked at my necro as the king of death-by-tiny-numbers, and i’ve found a niche where its still the same way. For example, you mentioned the GW1 necro punishing enemies for standing too close together(Mark of Pain, R.I.P)..is that not what epidemic and all of our wells and staff skills and pretty much anything but dagger does? what about Insidious parasite, which hurt them and healed you each time they attacked. Now there’s something that hurts them and heals you every time YOU attack (vampiric traits), just one slight change. Retaliation on the axe, hurts them for hurting you. Some traits like parasitic bond for only 5 points is the same exact thing as in GW1. kill something → it heals you.

a simple rotation of the staff 2-3-4 leaves a whole group completely debilitated, bleeding, poisoned, chilled, weak. traited Wells are a good representation of what necros are: screw them over while helping yourself. Well of darkness leaves mobs helpless blind, chilled, and heals you for each person in it. The more wells you stack on a group, the more scewed they are and the healthier you stay. etc. DS 4 hurts them, heals you, and can heal teammates at the same time. There’s so many ways the GW2 necro has double purposes for their skills, and most of them at the AOE cap limit that when i run my build i feel like i AM a master of spreading death-by-tiny-numbers, while helping my team more than i could before in most cases. Now we have boon-flipping and boon removal too. Corruptions are a perfect fit for the necro because even our momentary suffering becomes their suffering with skills like Staff #4 that transfers ALL conditions we have.

In the end, i think the only thing Anet failed to transfer faithfully from a GW1 necro was the feeling of a curses necro, but hey these are two totally different games and you just have to adjust and come up with new favorites rather than comparing it all the time.

Blaine Tog.8304:

GW1 player here too, since the beta. I haven’t put nearly as many hours into GW1 as you but I did put quite a few on regardless and I did play a Necromancer fairly regularly.

I would agree that the GW2 Necro is a much different beast, but I don’t think that that’s all that special to the Necromancer. ANet put /every/ profession through the ringer for GW2. All those I’ve played play quite differently from their predecessors with only echoes and homages to their prior selves popping up here and there.

Mesmers in GW1 didn’t have clones or illusions to shatter and they certainly didn’t want to regularly get into melee range outside of strange specs emphasizing secondary professions. Elementalists were primarily known for their big burst damage, not for their versatility and how difficult they were to kill (though GW1 Earth Eles could make themselves literally unkillable for certain groups). Can you imagine the Ranger’s shock when suddenly they weren’t spending all their time twitch-interrupting everything their opponent wanted to do? Or what about the poor Ritualist? They were cut up and sewn onto darn near half the professions in the game! Even the Thief plays quite differently from the Assassin; both are about spike damage but gone are they days of pressing 1234567 repeat until everyone’s dead.

My point is, the closer you expect GW2 to match GW1 the more dissapointed you’re going to be, because they’re not the same game. GW2 isn’t just a systems update. It’s not intended to be just GW1 with a modernized combat system and better graphics. GW1 still exists so there’s no real point in making it over again. I’m not going to say the Necro in GW2 is perfect as-is, but I do think it can do nasty, grisly thinks to its enemies and control a fight like few other professions. Minion Mastery still leaves you as an unstoppable wall of corpses crushing everything before you. Death Shroud still rewards you for killing things.

Also, I think you’re unfairly undervaluing the Necro’s Fears. In addition to simply having more of them (more of a short CC is better than one slightly longer CC particularly since, as you note, it can be stunbroken out of), the Necro can also apply them much more quickly. Death Shroud’s fear is basically instant if you get good at swapping into Death Shroud quickly. The Ranger’s wolf fear has an insanely long cast time and a ridiculous delay preceding the cast, making it difficult to use except as general distruption. The Necro can be surgical in its use of Fear, and no one else can dish out Fear that deals damage.

Long story short, ANet took the game in a different direction from GW1 and the Necro reflects that. However, it still has echoes of the old Necro if you want to see them and it’s a rather fun class in its own right. You just gotta be ready to expect something a little different.

Lily.1935:

To this day I’m not sure why the necromancer has such a large life pool.

It’s a light-armor profession that’s supposed to win wars of attrition, and it’s supposed to be better at manipulating conditions than other professions. It doesn’t get blocks or invulnerables or serious mobility options so it’s supposed to be able to deal with spike damage simply by having a bigger health pool (and using Death Shroud for clutch absorbs).

Except Ele feels like ele, Theif feels like Assassin, warrior feels like a warrior, Ranger feels like a ranger, and even the mesmer feels a bit like a mesmer. The necromancer feels nothing like a necromancer. It feels like a warlock. And that is my problem. Its not that I’m expecting it to be the same game, I’m expecting it to feel right. And it doesn’t feel right. It feels wrong and forced. My post was never about balance of the profession it was about its over all feel. If it doesn’t FEEL right it doesn’t matter what your argument is to support it. It still feels wrong. All wrong.

Malleus Maleficarum.2603:

I played a GW1 necro not for a great amount of time, but long enough to do all the campaigns and EotN with him, a curses necro.

When i first played the GW2 necro, i got to 15 and deleted him. It just didn’t feel right.

But now i’ve got an 80 necro for a while, and it’s definately been growing on me as i see more and more simularities with what these two necromancers are (though there aren’t many replacements for specific skills i used to use, like barbs or spamming necrosis sadly)

I think there’s more similarities than you’re giving the GW2 necro credit for. In GW1 i looked at my necro as the king of death-by-tiny-numbers, and i’ve found a niche where its still the same way. For example, you mentioned the GW1 necro punishing enemies for standing too close together(Mark of Pain, R.I.P)..is that not what epidemic and all of our wells and staff skills and pretty much anything but dagger does? what about Insidious parasite, which hurt them and healed you each time they attacked. Now there’s something that hurts them and heals you every time YOU attack (vampiric traits), just one slight change. Retaliation on the axe, hurts them for hurting you. Some traits like parasitic bond for only 5 points is the same exact thing as in GW1. kill something -> it heals you.

a simple rotation of the staff 2-3-4 leaves a whole group completely debilitated, bleeding, poisoned, chilled, weak. traited Wells are a good representation of what necros are: screw them over while helping yourself. Well of darkness leaves mobs helpless blind, chilled, and heals you for each person in it. The more wells you stack on a group, the more scewed they are and the healthier you stay. etc. DS 4 hurts them, heals you, and can heal teammates at the same time. There’s so many ways the GW2 necro has double purposes for their skills, and most of them at the AOE cap limit that when i run my build i feel like i AM a master of spreading death-by-tiny-numbers, while helping my team more than i could before in most cases. Now we have boon-flipping and boon removal too. Corruptions are a perfect fit for the necro because even our momentary suffering becomes their suffering with skills like Staff #4 that transfers ALL conditions we have.

In the end, i think the only thing Anet failed to transfer faithfully from a GW1 necro was the feeling of a curses necro, but hey these are two totally different games and you just have to adjust and come up with new favorites rather than comparing it all the time.

I have a Level 80 necromancer as well. it still doesn’t feel like a necromancer. And the aoe spells don’t have the same appeal or feel as the punishment I was talking about. Wells, marks and the AOE skills don’t punish foes for being too close to each other, they just damage them for being in your aoe. How is that different then an Elementalist, Mesmer, Engineer, guardian or any other profession’s AOE? The answer: It isn’t.

The only thing that is really similar, and I mention this in my long post, is the DoT damage. But as I mentioned, Dot(degen) damage was a minor ability the necromancer had. And was almost exclusively used in pvp. Life stealing is close, but not quite the same and the Curse and death builds you had in GW1 have no counterpart in GW2.

Lily.1935:

Except Ele feels like ele, Theif feels like Assassin, warrior feels like a warrior, Ranger feels like a ranger, and even the mesmer feels a bit like a mesmer.

I would argue that the feel of the Ele from game to game is much more different than the feel of the Necro. The Ele in GW2 is extremely slippery, all about mobility and versatility. The GW1 Ele mostly asked himself whether he was planning on nuking AoE or single target, and he was going to be squishy no matter what he did. I picked an Ele for my first champion because I wanted to play a heavy ranged nuker like in GW1 and was extremely disappointed when I found out that you can’t really do that. I learned to appreciate the GW2 Ele as the unique creation it is and have a ball with him, though.

Lily.1935:

Its not that I’m expecting it to be the same game, I’m expecting it to feel right. And it doesn’t feel right. It feels wrong and forced. My post was never about balance of the profession it was about its over all feel. If it doesn’t FEEL right it doesn’t matter what your argument is to support it. It still feels wrong. All wrong.

This is totally valid, though, and I wasn’t trying to tell you that your feelings are wrong. That would be crazy. I just think you would probably be able to enjoy the Necro if you tried to let go of those feelings and approach it from a clean slate. That’s what I did and I’m really loving the game. I know it sounds harsh, but the game’s probably not going to change. You don’t have to play GW2, but you’re not going to enjoy playing it if you keep letting your expectations dictate your fun.

Blaine Tog.8304:

Lily.1935:

Except Ele feels like ele, Theif feels like Assassin, warrior feels like a warrior, Ranger feels like a ranger, and even the mesmer feels a bit like a mesmer.

I would argue that the feel of the Ele from game to game is much more different than the feel of the Necro. The Ele in GW2 is extremely slippery, all about mobility and versatility. The GW1 Ele mostly asked himself whether he was planning on nuking AoE or single target, and he was going to be squishy no matter what he did. I picked an Ele for my first champion because I wanted to play a heavy ranged nuker like in GW1 and was extremely disappointed when I found out that you can’t really do that. I learned to appreciate the GW2 Ele as the unique creation it is and have a ball with him, though.

Lily.1935:

Its not that I’m expecting it to be the same game, I’m expecting it to feel right. And it doesn’t feel right. It feels wrong and forced. My post was never about balance of the profession it was about its over all feel. If it doesn’t FEEL right it doesn’t matter what your argument is to support it. It still feels wrong. All wrong.

This is totally valid, though, and I wasn’t trying to tell you that your feelings are wrong. That would be crazy. I just think you would probably be able to enjoy the Necro if you tried to let go of those feelings and approach it from a clean slate. That’s what I did and I’m really loving the game. I know it sounds harsh, but the game’s probably not going to change. You don’t have to play GW2, but you’re not going to enjoy playing it if you keep letting your expectations dictate your fun.

I am finding enjoyment in the game. just not with the necromancer. The engineer and mesmer have better feel to them and are far more fun then the necromancer.

If I had to use a comparison for these three professions I would use Magic: the gathering. If we look at the necromancer from GW1, in theme and flavor it most resembled black. The necromancer was extremely black in flavor and execution. If we do a comparison for GW2’s necromancer they are closer to Red/white. The philosophy of red and white combined are leagues apart from what the philosophy of black is.

If you compare the Engineer or Mesmer, Engineer would be Red/Blue, which I love the feeling of that and Mesmer would most defiantly be blue. Since the Engineer wasn’t in the first game we will talk the mesmer. The Mesmer in GW1 was blue as they come. There was no profession or anything else in any other game that actually managed to capture that blue feel. The GW2 mesmer may not be exactly like it is in GW1, but it still has a very blue feel to it which I can enjoy.

If you play or have played Magic the gathering, I hope this makes sense to you.

Lily.1935:

Alestes.4081:

Lily.1935:

Epidemic doesn’t make the few conditions the necromancer does have any better.

If you think necromancers only have a few conditions then you still have a lot to learn about the class.

Anything less then all but one condition for the master of conditions is “only a few” In my eyes, the only condition the necromancer shouldn’t have access to is burning. And fear doesn’t count because its going to end before you finish casting epidemic.

So you think having easy access to bleeding, poison, weakness, chilled, vulnerability, crippled, blind and fear is “only a few” conditions?

What you need to realise is that your idea of what a necromancer should be isn’t what ANET thinks it should be. You need to stop trying to turn the GW2 necromancer into the GW1 necromancer, the sooner you do that the happier you’ll be. Once you stop trying to make it into something it will never be maybe you’ll start to figure out some interesting builds and actually enjoy playing the class.

If you’re still not happy you could always just go back to playing GW1 since you seemed to enjoy it, it didn’t cease to exist as soon as GW2 came out did it?

Alestes.4081:

Lily.1935:

Alestes.4081:

Lily.1935:

Epidemic doesn’t make the few conditions the necromancer does have any better.

If you think necromancers only have a few conditions then you still have a lot to learn about the class.

Anything less then all but one condition for the master of conditions is “only a few” In my eyes, the only condition the necromancer shouldn’t have access to is burning. And fear doesn’t count because its going to end before you finish casting epidemic.

So you think having easy access to bleeding, poison, weakness, chilled, vulnerability, crippled, blind and fear is “only a few” conditions?

What you need to realise is that your idea of what a necromancer should be isn’t what ANET thinks it should be. You need to stop trying to turn the GW2 necromancer into the GW1 necromancer, the sooner you do that the happier you’ll be. Once you stop trying to make it into something it will never be maybe you’ll start to figure out some interesting builds and actually enjoy playing the class.

If you’re still not happy you could always just go back to playing GW1 since you seemed to enjoy it, it didn’t cease to exist as soon as GW2 came out did it?

You should really read the full post I made. This isn’t me trying to change it. Its more a review of the profession from someone who dedicated a tone of time to it in the first game. Because I also said the profession can’t be fixed, and that it wasn’t designed for me. I said it was designed for the Warlock players who are transitioning from other games. The GW2 necromancer was NOT designed with the GW1 necro player in mind.

Lily.1935:

Malleus Maleficarum.2603:

-snip

I have a Level 80 necromancer as well. it still doesn’t feel like a necromancer. And the aoe spells don’t have the same appeal or feel as the punishment I was talking about. Wells, marks and the AOE skills don’t punish foes for being too close to each other, they just damage them for being in your aoe. How is that different then an Elementalist, Mesmer, Engineer, guardian or any other profession’s AOE? The answer: It isn’t.

The only thing that is really similar, and I mention this in my long post, is the DoT damage. But as I mentioned, Dot(degen) damage was a minor ability the necromancer had. And was almost exclusively used in pvp. Life stealing is close, but not quite the same and the Curse and death builds you had in GW1 have no counterpart in GW2.

to answer how our AOE is different than ele’s, guardians, engi’s, Mesmers: hm lets take a look. most classes have one main AOE weapon so we’ll compare those.

Ele AOE: attunements roughly translate in order to damage and burning, healing, stun CC, cripples and bleeds. None of that but earth magic is like a necro’s AOE.
Guardians AOE: Healing, boons, and warding CC. quite different than Necro, we tear down, they build up.
Mesmers: they honestly don’t have much AOE. Chaos storm is about it, which takes longer to dish out conditions than we can with staff- their enemies have to stay inside the whole time.
Engi’s AOE: probably the most similar to us, but they have to use utility kits to do it. I leveled all the way to 80 using bomb kit as my main weapon. smoke bomb-> well of darkness(except ours can steal health and chill), but then there’s the emphasis on damaging conditions and immobilization while our AOE is more about debilitating conditions.

The combat system of GW2 itself will make most classes have simularities: before every hex was unique, now skills just distribute damage or an array of boons/conditions. There’s only so much you can make different.

the punishment doesn’t feel the same because they all but scrapped punishment as it existed in GW1. You’d be even more disappointed if you played 3k hours of a mesmer before, and tried to transfer that mindset to GW2.

Necro and Mes were the most hex heavy classes, and now there are no Hexes. They both had to go through re-envisioning and Mesmers came out OP while most don’t like the equivalent result for Necros. classes like ranger and warrior that never used hexes or enchantments had no need to be remade, so they feel like their old counterparts. I’ve got an 80 necro, ranger, ele, engineer, and thief, and only the ranger feels the same as before.

Malleus Maleficarum.2603:

Lily.1935:

Malleus Maleficarum.2603:

-snip

I have a Level 80 necromancer as well. it still doesn’t feel like a necromancer. And the aoe spells don’t have the same appeal or feel as the punishment I was talking about. Wells, marks and the AOE skills don’t punish foes for being too close to each other, they just damage them for being in your aoe. How is that different then an Elementalist, Mesmer, Engineer, guardian or any other profession’s AOE? The answer: It isn’t.

The only thing that is really similar, and I mention this in my long post, is the DoT damage. But as I mentioned, Dot(degen) damage was a minor ability the necromancer had. And was almost exclusively used in pvp. Life stealing is close, but not quite the same and the Curse and death builds you had in GW1 have no counterpart in GW2.

to answer how our AOE is different than ele’s, guardians, engi’s, Mesmers: hm lets take a look. most classes have one main AOE weapon so we’ll compare those.

Ele AOE: attunements roughly translate in order to damage and burning, healing, stun CC, cripples and bleeds. None of that but earth magic is like a necro’s AOE.
Guardians AOE: Healing, boons, and warding CC. quite different than Necro, we tear down, they build up.
Mesmers: they honestly don’t have much AOE. Chaos storm is about it, which takes longer to dish out conditions than we can with staff- their enemies have to stay inside the whole time.
Engi’s AOE: probably the most similar to us, but they have to use utility kits to do it. I leveled all the way to 80 using bomb kit as my main weapon. smoke bomb-> well of darkness(except ours can steal health and chill), but then there’s the emphasis on damaging conditions and immobilization while our AOE is more about debilitating conditions.

The combat system of GW2 itself will make most classes have simularities: before every hex was unique, now skills just distribute damage or an array of boons/conditions. There’s only so much you can make different.

the punishment doesn’t feel the same because they all but scrapped punishment as it existed in GW1. You’d be even more disappointed if you played 3k hours of a mesmer before, and tried to transfer that mindset to GW2.

Necro and Mes were the most hex heavy classes, and now there are no Hexes. They both had to go through re-envisioning and Mesmers came out OP while most don’t like the equivalent result for Necros. classes like ranger and warrior that never used hexes or enchantments had no need to be remade, so they feel like their old counterparts. I’ve got an 80 necro, ranger, ele, engineer, and thief, and only the ranger feels the same as before.

The problems don’t just end at hexes. There are more. Why can’t I sacrifice life to fuel a few of my spells? Why can’t I use corpses to summon minions? Why don’t more skills actually give a kitten that my foe is suffering from a condition? Although this is also a problem with lack of complexity in the game, which GW2 suffers from being WAY too watered down from the first game. I understand dropping much of the complicated stuff in the first game, such as damage location, or the vast number of hexes that do a million different things. A few of them doesn’t make sense to me why they would be dropped. like typed damage or skills that have a major function change based on what conditions or boons you happen to have or if a foe is suffering from them.

This is a completely different problem though and I might have to address it in another post, because although its relevant, it isn’t the focus.

So much disappointment.

while life sacrifice is a …mood setter? for the necro, and unique to the profession, is it really desirable beyond that? do you REALLY want to help yourself die faster by cutting into your HP? in what way does that help? at least with corruptions you can transfer the conditions onto your enemies.

Same with MM. It added complexity in needing corpses, you were next to useless stepping out of a town until you killed something, now you can be full strength while roaming without keeping an eye and saving a skill slot for healing minions(though i agree that they’re not nearly as good once in battle)

I suppose my stance is good riddance of overly negative things, even though they set a cool mood, but that i wish there were more skills representative of the old hexes and playstyle(more single target lulzy you’re-screwed things like wail of doom used to be)

this thread is so serious.