Guild Wars 2

1) It is impossible to have more than 12 minions at once in GW1, 10 is the general limit (18 Death Magic is the highest you will have under normal conditions). I realize they were summoned from corpses, but from a non-gameplay standpoint they are still the same; just in GW2 necromancers summon them from the dead material already in the area (instead of needing to kill someone to use).

Yes it was incredible when you were in PvE, AB, or FA and you just got steamrolling people with a full batch of minions, because you became near unstoppable. However, for every time that that happened, you were just as likely to have 1 time where you faced a mesmer that completely shutdown your summoning while the enemy team killed you, or you just never got off the ground. PvE they were amazing in group situations just from Death Nova and other crazy micro managing (which, btw, was usually done via Heroes because they were kitten good at microing things that were humanly impossible).

As for the difference, our summoned builds aren’t complete trash. Guardian Spirit weapons suck, Ranger spirits aren’t more than a niche build, Elementalist summons are time-constrained (and they only have access to 2), Engineer summons are stationary turrets (again, a niche build, though less niche than ranger), Mesmer summons work on a completely different level, warriors have no summons, and Thief summons are based off an Elite alone. Racial summons fall into an above category.

2) Yes we are close, but it doesn’t mean they had to keep that part of the game. They totally axed most of the Dervish playstyle (enchantment managing), shutdown builds, and a lot of the more niche playstyles.

4) Wells do allow for AoE life stealing, as does Locust Signet.

5) We can AoE immobilize via Epidemic and any single target immobilize. Whether you like it or feel our ability to shut people down is opinion, we have the highest access to debilitating conditions in the game, bar none.

6) Yep.

Ok, I’m back.
Got swamped with work for a while there.

I’ll have to spend some time reading through all the new comments, however I am going to refrain from arguing with anybody anymore. It’s a waste of time. If my first argument doesn’t convince you, nothing I could ever say will.

Instead I think I’m going to try focusing on suggestions and possible ideas for what I would imagine the Necromancer to be, if it were an actual faithful representation of the original, given the tools currently available in the game.

I may even draw some pretty pictures to illustrate my point.

Necros should of had Risen as minions. Strong risens, like something you fight in PvE.
And with Death shroud, instead of those random 4 crap skills. They should of amped the power of the weapon skills we already had.

Ex:
Staff-
1) Channel attack that causes random conditions and steals life force (Health)
2-5) Better effects on marks. And a 4 second fear on 5.

Also, if we are a class that focuses on conditions. Then ours bleeds shouldnt only be doing 4k over 39seconds :/. Elementalist get a burn that does loads of damage over 5 seconds. We should be the best at applying them if we run condition builds, not the weakest.

Another problem I found is the lack of themes for weapons. For example daggers would be a perfect life sacrifice and life stealing weapon. The recharge on all skills should be fast, but costs health.

For example dagger/dagger:

1: Auto attack (ranged life stealing, weak damage)
2: Reduce recharge (no recharge, cuts currently recharging skills’ cool down by 10 seconds, but cost 10% health)
3: Immobilize and bleed (fast recharge, but cost 5% health)
4: Transfer conditions, bleed, blind and weakens targets (fast recharge, but costs 5% health)
5: Blood Bond (special hex that cannot be removed, any allies hitting that foe for the next 5 seconds gains regeneration, costs 10% health)

Another example staff should be a minion weapon. Reduce all physical damage from marks but change the following:

1) Auto attack (lf gain)
2) Mark that bleeds foes, heal allies and summons 3 bleeding horrors for 5 seconds that bleeds foes for 1 seconds when it hits a target.
3) Mark that poison, chill foes and summons 3 death nova horror for 5 seconds that blows up when killed, poisoning foes for 2 seconds. If they die naturally nothing happens.
4) Transfers conditions from allies to foes, and summon 3 condition horrors for 5 seconds. These minions have Plague Signet on by default and will drain 1 conditions from nearby allies each second. They transfer all conditions on them to foes on each hit.
5) Cause fear on foes and summon 3 fear horrors for 5 seconds. This horror runs 50% faster than normal by default. When this horror hits a foe suffering from fear, it adds 0.33 seconds to that fear.

CHIPS.6018:

Another problem I found is the lack of themes for weapons. For example daggers would be a perfect life sacrifice and life stealing weapon. The recharge on all skills should be fast, but costs health.

For example dagger/dagger:

1: Auto attack (ranged life stealing, weak damage)
2: Reduce recharge (no recharge, cuts currently recharging skills’ cool down by 10 seconds, but cost 10% health)
3: Immobilize and bleed (fast recharge, but cost 5% health)
4: Transfer conditions, bleed, blind and weakens targets (fast recharge, but costs 5% health)
5: Blood Bond (special hex that cannot be removed, any allies hitting that foe for the next 5 seconds gains regeneration, costs 10% health)

response to 4/ 5 points
1.cant do that u would be stealing the alredy super op mesmer half the map range greatsword auto atack &we alredy have our staff weapons that’s rly something..
ex: Chat main:
Kylock: move a bit to the left john some necro is aiming at you "
john slowly walks 1 yard to the left
10 minuts later necro atack reaches & misses
2.mesmer again clones that are infininit and with 0 cd
3.it probaly would be either :blocked dodged or repelled back on to us etc to not be op…or some other nerf
4.the other clases would 100% for sure get something o counter it cuz they alredy can to almoust all our skills

And all this adds up to mesmer apes rulling the world and hearding all the poor necros

Just wanted to poke my head in and say I’m happy with the way this thread turned out – a place for GW1 vets to discuss their perception of the necromancer, and how to bring its old themes and ideas back. Thumbs up.

Where is my Well off silence?
Where is my Life transfer..? The real life transfer.. not this happy go lucky no HP regen crap..
Where is my parasitic bond?
And most important..
Where is my Insidious parasite!!!

Oh and where are my blasts?

Well since someone raised this thread I may as well put in that months of play and patches haven’t changed my simple opinion that Necromancers are a rubbish class. I keep levelling toons to 80 and playing them WvW and dungeons and every bloody one is just better. The only reason I maintain my Necro is sentimental value and some masochistic desire to play an underdog.

In the end i have to say that the op is right.
The most disappointing thing in my opinion is that necromancers do not really get stronger when monsters or opponents die in range. In Gw1 it was like:“Yey, corpses! I can summon strong minions, let them explode or use some deadly wells or teleport to the corpses” especially the last thing would be really nice in wvw and pvp.. without being too strong. (pretty weak compared to the Mesmerport, but fun!)
I mean.. everything gw2 has is the parasitic bond trait.. come on?! >:O

And the condition instead of hex thing weakens the necromancer pretty much.. i mean the only thing the necro has is terror. My engineer twink is the better conditionmancer.. even epidemic can’t help with that..

In fact.. im waiting for an addon and new profession to re-role or leave the game.

Typing on my phone so I can’t elaborate too much but I played GW1 since the beta and still find the GW2 Necro very fun. It’s clearly seen some changes in the translation but given the combat system in GW2, most of the mechanics shed would’ve been awful here. Can you imagine trying to fight for corpses with dozens of other necromancers in WvW? Hexes added depth, but with the self-sufficiency paradigm of GW2 it would be just a nightmare (most professions have enough difficulty dealing with just conditions). I would love for a minion-summoning weapon, but the game is designed with the idea that specialization would be limited.

I totally agreed about the loss of Blood Magic, though. In a world with Guardians and Water Eles who can heal themselves up all day, a drain spec Necro should be more viable than it currently is.

The class will keep being garbage as long as inept developers keep listening to forum zealots.

Why not have a 1 second recharge reduction on all skills each time someone dies in the area? That will make up for the crazy long recharges of signets and wells.

CHIPS.6018:

Why not have a 1 second recharge reduction on all skills each time someone dies in the area? That will make up for the crazy long recharges of signets and wells.

They are supposed to have a long CD, that is the point of such powerful utilities like them.

Ramiah.5648:

I am really surprised to hear all of this, truth be told.
I think it comes down to this: When I play a game, I want to play in a way I have the most fun. I find minions to be fun. I find Debuffing and supporting a team to be fun. In Guild Wars 1, sometimes I couldn’t do what I wanted because I needed corpses or fleshy enemies or high armor enemies.
So, I had to play a build I didn’t want to- I ran the Spiteful Spirit build or some other thing. Basically, I played something that was NOT fun in order to get back to a place I could start having fun again.
I love LOVE the new necromancer. I can summon minions whenever I want. Are there issues that need fixing? Sure. But almost all aspects of the game can be played the way that is most fun for me. Plus, my friends see me coming from a mile away with my small army of undead- no corpses necessary. And wells, oh my goodness, wells. Something I can place wherever I want that does damage and blinding or condition/boon removal so I can DPS and support my team at the same time? Yes please.
Thank you Arenanet, for finally giving me a game where I can play the classes I like in a way I enjoy all the time.

I’m more of this opinion. Having lots of highly situational abilities gets old very quickly. Unlike some GW2 classes, necros have a ton of viable builds that are effective and require totally different playstyles.

There’s lots of variety there. Is it the same? No. It may not be as versatile as GW1, but it isn’t as limited by situational mechanics either.