Guild Wars 2

Hi, the only playstyle that I have enjoyed for the necromancer thus far is a life siphon build, even though some mechanics are subpar with it.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNBIhZakRrTPTzSjhPBIVA7pHcPu4RPIe5hB

Weapons: Dagger/Warhorn and Staff
Heals/Utilities: Consume Conditions, Well of Power, Well of Corruption, Well of Suffering, Lich Form

Stat priority: Power or Precision, toughness, vitality

Logic behind trait choices:
Curses:
-#2, kind of useless for this build, but necessary to get to the other traits
-#8, reducing the CD on an interrupt, and a small-range aoe attack that life siphons for you which does benefit from healing power. The added swiftness is a bonus.
-#9, Having the flexibility to put down a well wherever I want has been nice. Not having to always be in melee range to put down the core of my abilities is a plus.

Death Magic:
-#4, 3seconds of protection when using a well. Since I have three wells in the build, this adds to my own survivability.

Blood Magic:
-#2, increases the life siphon of a lot of the abilities that I use while in combat. I think warhorn #4, dagger #3, and consume conditions are the only abilities that do not benefit.
-#8, faster well cooldowns = more damage and more life siphons.
-#12, life siphons per tick per target. Decent damage, and on a group of 4 or 5 mobs, the life siphon only goes up.

Some of the minor traits contribute to the effectiveness, such as vampiric…

Overall, I find this to be pretty solid in dungeons so far. I go down a lot less due to high vitality, high toughness, and some life siphoning, which translates into group members that do not need to stop what they are doing to rez me. I provide multiple combo fields. I provide an AOE condition removal. I provide 10 stacks of vulnerability via well of suffering, and I think 9 via lich form.

Con: The damage, imo, is sub par and is the only drawback for me. Along with other factors that go into aggro and hate, since the DPS is a bit low, it is hard to gain aggro on mobs at times. I would rather have the mobs focus on me a bit more and my group mates a bit less. No, I dont want to tank 100% of the time. If I can take some aggro off the group for a few seconds here and there, Id prefer that.

Alternatives:
I have been debating on subbing out one of the Well traits in Blood Magic to pick up vampiric precision, but I am not sure. It would almost defeat the purpose of using wells all together, thus crippling the build.

Thoughts on all of this?

I’ve tried a lot of time to make a Vampiric build work, and unfortunately, while it is still a nice ability when paired with Warhorn #5 and other quick successful attack, the fact that it doesn’t scale with anything make it quite poor against big incoming damage.

Your build has a lot of synergy, like PTV and Well protection to make you more durable. It’s a shame really that Life siphon is just not that good. I’m gonna wait for a small buff until I spec into that trait again.

Did you notice that you were an aggro magnet with that much vit/toughness? In dungeon with a similar build I couldn’t even get them off me, even after rezzing and coming back to the fight the boss would switch to me immediately.

Hi,
No I wasnt an aggro magnet. Just the opposite. I think due to the relatively low DPS compared to the other possible glass cannons in the group, I had a tough time getting aggro.

Concerning big hits, I don’t think a life siphon build will ever make up for big hits that take 1/4 of your HP in a swing. More over, I do not think any builds in the game should be able to sit there and soak damage for an unlimited amount of time.

The purpose of this build is to hopefully take some aggro off teammates, take a few punches, life siphon a bit, take another punch and then dodge out. All the while, dropping wells providing combo fields for teammates.

It isnt meant to tank since I am a firm believer there is no such thing in this game…or rather there SHOULDN’T be such a thing.