Guild Wars 2

Hey everyone.

I would like to ask a few very basic questions about Necro gameplay in sPvP (solo Q).

About me:
I’ve been around GW2 since release (with a 1 year break), did a lot of WvW but also sPvP (rank 54, over 1000 Games, don’t know the number by heart) on Ranger and Guardian but am far from being at expert at either, as you will see below .
I am pretty new to the Necro and am having trouble finding my spot in a match.

I am using the Standard Power Necro Build of metabattle.com.

What I have understood so far:
Obviously the build is a DPS build, where my main DMG comes from #1 in DS.
Its fully glass geared, but still pretty durable due to the Necros Class mechanics and Utilities (DS 2nd Health bar, Spectral Armour, Plague Elite).
So my guess on sPVP behaviour is the following:

• My main target is other DPS classes (Thieves, shatter Mesmer, Meditation Guardians, LB/GS Ranger, etc.)
• I avoid fighting D/D Eles and Shout/bow Warriors
• my main Damage comes from DS #1 and (if I use it) Lich #1, those are the only two skills I use when in the respective form unless I have a specific reason to use e.g. Fear to prevent a stomp/ress, DS #5 to immobilize someone in my wells etc.
• I use my Wells and Staff Marks to control a point
• if I get a Dagger #3 immobilize off, I Well-Bomb the target to gain Life Force.

That’s about what I ALWAYS do in a match and what I think I saw Noscoc do on his stream.

Where I am deeply uncertain:

• Is the Power Necro a better Team or solo fighter? I have so much AoE Damage and utility that I don’t know how to use it properly (Staff Marks, wells, DS #4 and #5)
• I am using Traveller Runes out of convenience:
  Do I rotate points, am I a Home Point defender, or a Mid Point fighter? Or do I even go straight for far?
  It was my understanding in sPvP in general: you do not fight off point, you do not engage 1vX unless you know you can win, you don’t camp an uncontested point unless you are a bunker. SO how does Power Necro fit in there?
• How and when do I use my Utilities? Do Last Gasp and Spectral Armour share a cooldown? When do I Well-Bomb?
• When do I use Dagger/WH, when Staff? The only time I am certain is when I have to fight a D/D Ele, since they reflect so much I try to stay D/WH.
  I also try to use Staff #4 for condi remove and as blast finisher.
  do I apart from that just rotate through the skills like I would on an Axe/Torch + Sword/Dagger Ranger?

Sorry for the long post, I would really like love to improve my game and hope you guys can help me with that!

I’ll always try to burst down another dps class, but I wouldn’t say I got out of my way to do it. One big life blast and chill of death will knock a zerker out most of the time, by those classes usually have escapes or defensive cooldowns so personally I don’t go too far out of my way to focus them. I also don’t avoid cele classes, I actually seek them out (eles and shoutbows more than engis). I don’t avoid 1v1 with them, most shoutbows can’t really do a lot against a power necro except run assuming you aren’t royally messing up. They don’t have much cc or spike damage so necro does ok against them. Eles are harder but if you well bomb them after water attunement you are in good shape.

Power necro is sort of both a team fighter and a solo fighter, and sort of neither. You can swing a team fight quickly if people stay in your wells and don’t focus you down, or if you pop lich at the right time, but if you get focused, you’re in trouble. You can 1v1 very well against most classes, but a well played thief, dps guard, mes or engi will wreck you every time. Key phrase there is well played.

Last gasp and sa don’t share a cooldown.

I almost never go far unless I’m very confident I won’t get zeroed. I usually head to the midfight and float between mid and home.

Lately I’m trying to practice with other classes because it’s not always the wisest choice to be playing a necro, depending on the enemy team comp. Against a lot of celes I’ll play necro, but against more dps classes I’ll usually try something else.

That is already very helpful, Thanks Roe!
I was in the whole ‘Focus down other DPS at all cost’ from Guardian game play.
You are right about Warriors. They don’t do much but it just takes long to kill them for me.
I will try to find those fights more often and even try my luck against the much feared D/D Ele.

What still isn’t quite clear to me is when to use the wells most effectively and when to use my weapon skills properly.
I am also having a very hard time against classes with a lot of CC (Engi + Mesmers, mainly).

EDIT: And as for different classes: I always have the Guardian and Ranger to fall back to if there are e.g. 2 Necros in my team. But since I am trying to become better at Necro I try to limit the class changes to those occasions, even thought you are right for the DPS heavy enemy team.

For solo q there are few hard and fast rules. The lack of coordination adds a lot of variables.

- Generally Power Necro is a 1v1 spec and depending on the level you are playing team fights in solo q are really several 1v1s in close proximity.
- I would really suggest Pack runes, especially if you are using Warhorn. The damage increase is pretty important and the swiftness from the runes is enough to fill in the recharge of Warhorn.
- I would generally think of a build like this roaming around the map. Like most burst specs you want to be unbalancing team fights or decapping 1v1.
- Not sure about Spectral Armor. Well bombing is something you will have to learn. Bombing on a down is a pretty obvious option, as is bombing an immob’ed target.
- You don’t really use staff for the AA so the reflect is not much of an issue. In fact the staff chill and poison are quite strong against D/D, if timed properly (like right after leaving water). If you don’t need the utility to counter a specific fight, I generally think of the staff as a option to give yourself space, whether pushing back a thief or bombing a team fight. Dagger for everything else.

• I was also feeling that 1v1 is easier as a necro, so thats the situation I will seek.
• Pack Runes where the ones in the metabattle.com build. I might give them a shot. I am so used to the 25 % speed from Traveller Runes that I didn’t even try them.
• I guess I will just have to practice bombing. I got 2 immobilizes after all, just have to learn to make good use of them.
• thanks for clarifying the Staff for me! I find the ‘mark thing’ very odd and often found myself just auto attacking + kiting to get Life Force …
  I will try to make better use of the Chill/Poison mark.

I guess that leaves only the DS and Lich abilities: is it worth using anything but #1 and the Fear?

Wells are very tempting to get off quickly, but anyone who is a threat to you will dodge roll out of a well if they can. Wells are good to use on a point if someone is trying to prevent you from decapping, because they need to eat the well or use the point. They are great on immobilized targets, and especially when someone is trapped in ring of warding. In big group fights on point, they can get a lot of hits. But unless you immobilize and/or cc’d someone, they aren’t the best in 1v1 except to use to kite through or to make it dangerous to be stabbing you for those 5 seconds.

The most satisfying is when you have both wells up and someone is down, and someone else is trying to res them. Very easy to drop wells and cleave and get both kills.

Gorath.5076:

• I avoid fighting D/D Eles and Shout/bow Warriors

Why are you avoiding D/D Eles? Chill of Death, Chill in general, Corrupt Boon, Condition Transfer is perfect against D/D Eles, who rely heavily on boons and rotations.

• my main Damage comes from DS #1 and (if I use it) Lich #1, those are the only two skills I use when in the respective form unless I have a specific reason to use e.g. Fear to prevent a stomp/ress, DS #5 to immobilize someone in my wells etc.

Your Dagger autoattack is a great source of damage. If chill of death procs you can 50 to 0 thiefs, guards, mesmers… in 1 to 2 seconds with the dagger while rebuilding life force.

Warhorn 5 cripples all enemies around you for 10 seconds (good in team fights).

Replace Lich with Plague. Lich sucks at higher level spvp. Your enemies know how to deal with this form and kill you in 5 seconds, even 1vs1. Plague 20 sec. perma blind is a great support in team fights. Besides that your best support is massive damage.

• I use my Wells and Staff Marks to control a point

Bad! Use your staff for chill, condi transfer, interrupt! Putting marks on the ground for area control is a waste. Enemies can simply doge over them.

Wells… well, i don’t like them. Most enemies doge out of them and then they are useless and block an area for just 5 seconds.

• I am using Traveller Runes out of convenience:

Why travellar? Take pack runes! If you need swiftness warhorn 5 and spectral walk is enough.

Do I rotate points, am I a Home Point defender, or a Mid Point fighter? Or do I even go straight for far? It was my understanding in sPvP in general: you do not fight off point, you do not engage 1vX unless you know you can win, you don’t camp an uncontested point unless you are a bunker. SO how does Power Necro fit in there?

Your best place most of the time is at close and mid dealing massive damage, corrupt boons, interrupt stomps. Try to focus enemy thieves. This helpes your squishy teammates a lot.

But in solo queue everything can happen. I find myself very often at decapping far because my team plays some strange strategy and going for far is the best option to contribute something helpful (even as a necro).

• When do I use Dagger/WH, when Staff?

Staff is more like a second utility bar. Use it on demand (like mentioned above). Its damage is negligible.

Btw.:
http://metabattle.com/wiki/Guide:Rated_PvP_basics_-_Conquest

Roe.3679:

Wells are very tempting to get off quickly, but anyone who is a threat to you will dodge roll out of a well if they can.

That is exactly where my question of ‘how to use the utilities’ arose. Thanks for the application tips! I will try to use the wells more on certain occasions rather than as a damage tool you just ‘throw out’!

KrHome.1920:

Gorath.5076:

• I avoid fighting D/D Eles and Shout/bow Warriors

Why are you avoiding D/D Eles? Chill of Death, Chill in general, Corrupt Boon, Condition Transfer is perfect against D/D Eles, who rely heavily on boons and rotations.

I guess the Ele thing is a heritage from playing Guardian. There I felt them to be my worst enemy and hence Power Necro is also a DPS class I transferred that experience onto him. I agree, though that Necros have some great tools to counter D/D Ele.
Yet, due to my general problem of making right use of the Necros tools I have trouble fighting them.
I don’t (didn’t ) know how to use Well of Corruption properly and Eles hence just ‘floated’ out of them. when you talk about transferring Conditions you mean the Staff #4? That does work pretty well!
What sources of Chill do I have access to, though, apart from Staff #3?

KrHome.1920:

• my main Damage comes from DS #1 and (if I use it) Lich #1, those are the only two skills I use when in the respective form unless I have a specific reason to use e.g. Fear to prevent a stomp/ress, DS #5 to immobilize someone in my wells etc.

Your Dagger autoattack is a great source of damage. If chill of death procs you can 50 to 0 thiefs, guards, mesmers… in 1 to 2 seconds with the dagger while rebuilding life force.

Warhorn 5 cripples all enemies around you for 10 seconds (good in team fights).

Replace Lich with Plague. Lich sucks at higher level spvp. Your enemies know how to deal with this form and kill you in 5 seconds, even 1vs1. Plague 20 sec. perma blind is a great support in team fights. Besides that your best support is massive damage.

I noticed that the Dagger AA hits like a truck! It’s also the base of any Power PvE Necro build for that reason, right? I am just having trouble getting melee hits off on the target I normally pick (Mesmer, Thief, Ranger, Guardian is easier) and hence use it seldom … I will change that now Especially in conjunction with Warhorn #5!

As for Lich: I am switching it for Plague depending on my mood. the 5k hits of the Lich are pretty awesome I agree though that Plague has a lot more applications, be it the AoE Blind, Bleed stacking or just a safe stomp in a tight situation. I will also use that more!

KrHome.1920:

• I use my Wells and Staff Marks to control a point

Bad! Use your staff for chill, condi transfer, interrupt! Putting marks on the ground for area control is a waste. Enemies can simply doge over them.

Wells… well, i don’t like them. Most enemies doge out of them and then they are useless and block an area for just 5 seconds.

Yeah, that goes with what you said above. I guess the only good way to use marks is to just place them right under the target so they are immediately triggered. I find that very hard to accomplice though. I guess practice makes the master here

KrHome.1920:

• I am using Traveller Runes out of convenience:

Why travellar? Take pack runes! If you need swiftness warhorn 5 and spectral walk is enough.

Do I rotate points, am I a Home Point defender, or a Mid Point fighter? Or do I even go straight for far? It was my understanding in sPvP in general: you do not fight off point, you do not engage 1vX unless you know you can win, you don’t camp an uncontested point unless you are a bunker. So how does Power Necro fit in there?

Your best place most of the time is at close and mid dealing massive damage, corrupt boons, interrupt stomps. Try to focus enemy thieves. This helpes your squishy team mates a lot.

But in solo queue everything can happen. I find myself very often at decapping far because my team plays some strange strategy and going for far is the best option to contribute something helpful (even as a necro).

I agree, from what was said before I think my place will be in between Home and Mid point trying to add fights, rather than seeking 1v1, trying to contribute with my massive damage and boon stripping.
I also agree that Pack runes are a much better choice for that, especially since I have access to Speed through the WH.

KrHome.1920:

• When do I use Dagger/WH, when Staff?

Staff is more like a second utility bar. Use it on demand (like mentioned above). Its damage is negligible.

Btw.:
http://metabattle.com/wiki/Guide:Rated_PvP_basics_-_Conquest

Yeah, from what I have read now it becomes very clear to me that you never bring Staff for the damage in a Power build but for the Chill, Condi transfer and the Fear as an interrupt. thanks for clearing that up for me!
Thanks for the link, I never saw that on meta battle! I will study that thoroughly

The problem with necro in the meta right now is we don’t really have a role we’re good at. Our power build is the most useful one atm, but it’s still outshined by other zerkers due to sustain/mobility.

The best thing you can do solo queing is learning how to lich properly, it easily swings the opening team fight, but you have to definitely work on not being overly agressive because any competent player/team will focus you first.

I also still suggest vampirism over pack runes because that is the closest thing to defense we have with that build. And I normally run spectral walk over armor so I don’t need the swiftnes suptime as much.

Also landing dagger 3 makes your wells so much more useful.

And warhorn and dagger cleave are great for thieves on you/people rezzing someone.

Honestly the main thing I suggest is positioning and knowing when and when not to engage/go on point. If you mess up you’ll know it and fast, we have no get out of jail cards.

Positioning is something I heard quite a few times as well, when talking to Necro players …
That is something you can only learn by experience, I guess? or are there certain rules of conduct that tell me when to stand where?

No real rules. It all depends on if it’s a good time to be on point or not, if you need LOS or not, if you need to rotate to another point or not. You’ll start to notice that certain places will give you more LOS options while you can still leave or deal damage.

basically you will puss off teammates in soloq all the time if you play correctly. Every game I’ve got morons telling me to stand on point or to take home at the beginning. Sure I’ll take home as a zerker necro with no lifeforce, 10 seconds later I get insta gibbed from stealth, to which my teammates usually call me bad. =(

This spec is not for 1v1. You can do it but unlike other zerkers such as thief guard mes you have 0 disengage. So you risk dying instantly the fight becomes 1v2.

You say you have 1k games but you don’t know where to go? That makes no sense.

Traveler runes are not so great. You want to take them if you decide to go offhand dagger. They are a big drop in damage. Pack runes are so amazing with warhorn.

D/d ele has reflects? Except ring of earth(which blocks doesn’t reflect projectiles) they got nothing.
You want to use staff for ranged pressure or if you need the utility from marks. Chillblains is great for kiting and poison the downed too. Putrid mark is a blast finisher so you can combo area weakness and it’s also the highest damaging mark.

I prefer using spectral walk instead of armor and plague form instead of lich. Spectral walk is good to run away, kite and do fancy tricks like ninja immobilizes for decaps and whatnot.

Answer yourself if you can make use of your utilities in the fight.

Sometimes Wells are not useful at all. You may not like them.
Sometimes they will be brilliant.

Never copy Necromancer builds 1:1. Once you get more familiar with how Necromancer works, you’ll be able to adjust the build to your playstyle.

Personally, I find Wells useless in my Power playstyle. I also run one of the forgotten runesets (Speed) and make little use of Life Blast, focusing on Shroud dancing eith NtD.
And I’m pretty successful with that.

NeXeD.3042:

basically you will puss off teammates in soloq all the time if you play correctly. Every game I’ve got morons telling me to stand on point or to take home at the beginning. Sure I’ll take home as a zerker necro with no lifeforce, 10 seconds later I get insta gibbed from stealth, to which my team mates usually call me bad. =(

That was a really good advice! I have put that into action and it worked great for me!
I never went to keep home point at the beginning and had the ‘courage’ to fight off point, tolerating a decap rather than dying in AoE and wasting my wells and marks in order to controll it. I so was able to take the opponent down ( in case of thieves even 2) and just recap the point.

robertul.3679:

You say you have 1k games but you don’t know where to go? That makes no sense.

I certainly know where to stand as a Ranger or Guardian. For they e.g. have excellent 1vs1 potential and (in case of rangers) mobility. You yourself pointed out that Power Necro, besides being a DPS build is not very good 1v1. I am hence faced with a new situation here which I have trouble to handle and so I ask for help form experienced players

robertul.3679:

D/d ele has reflects? Except ring of earth(which blocks doesn’t reflect projectiles) they got nothing.

I was referring to Magnetic Aura, but your right, thats a Staff skill.

robertul.3679:

You want to use staff for ranged pressure or if you need the utility from marks. Chillblains is great for kiting and poison the downed too. Putrid mark is a blast finisher so you can combo area weakness and it’s also the highest damaging mark.

I prefer using spectral walk instead of armor and plague form instead of lich. Spectral walk is good to run away, kite and do fancy tricks like ninja immobilizes for decaps and whatnot.

I will take that to heart! I actually am using the staff #3 and #4 marks in exactly that way. Chill is awesome in deed, I will have to make better use of it.
As for spectral walk: I can see what you mean but I think I prefer the protection and higher life gain for now. Maybe I will switch to S. Walk in the long run. Are you able to teleport back up any ledge with it? that would be pretty cool.

Rym.1469:

Answer yourself if you can make use of your utilities in the fight.

Sometimes Wells are not useful at all. You may not like them.
Sometimes they will be brilliant.

Never copy Necromancer builds 1:1. Once you get more familiar with how Necromancer works, you’ll be able to adjust the build to your playstyle.

Personally, I find Wells useless in my Power playstyle. I also run one of the forgotten runesets (Speed) and make little use of Life Blast, focusing on Shroud dancing eith NtD.
And I’m pretty successful with that.

you are very right with that. I just went with it since I saw how well the build performed ( was my reason to make a necro) but will certainly customize it more in the long run.
but what is " Shroud dancing eith NtD." ?

Gorath.5076:

Rym.1469:

I…make little use of Life Blast, focusing on Shroud dancing eith NtD.
And I’m pretty successful with that.

what is " Shroud dancing eith NtD." ?

NtD=Near to Death, the trait which reduces the DS CD from 10 s to 6 s. By shroud dancing, he’s taking advantage of the low 6 s cooldown to constantly switch into and out of DS. He mentioned he doesn’t really use Life Blast, so most of his damage is going to come from dagger autoattack. If you get serious about “shroud cycling” (as I call it), you can have serious uptime (traited) on stability, stun breaks, fury, aoe weakness, condi removal, and come the new patch, protection. My power build is based around this; I only use the DS life pool to stall/bunk on point, absorb bursts (guardian’s WW, thief’s backstab, etc.), and use DS #3 to stop stomps/rezz’s. The rest of the time I’m shroud cycling for the boon fest.

Well the master trait in soul reaping is really optional. I prefer spectral mastery but near to death, soul marks, unyielding blast are good choices. Little known fact, it reduces the cooldown on last grasp too!

Same for spectral walk. Most people run armor cuz it gives more life force and protection. But when you are bursted it procs anyway from the minor trait. I really like spectral walk as you can’t be followed. You can also abuse it to negate fall damage and other things. And yes, it teleports you back anywhere. You used to be able to get back anywhere in wvw after waypointing but they fixed that.

Salamander.2504:

NtD=Near to Death, the trait which reduces the DS CD from 10 s to 6 s. By shroud dancing, he’s taking advantage of the low 6 s cooldown to constantly switch into and out of DS.

ahhh, alrite
I have to admit I have not even looked at alternative traits and builds so far, as I wanted to get comfortable with the classic Power Necro first. Could you post the build you are using? I will definitely have a look at that.
Boon stacking in a 6 second interval sounds pretty cool.

Gorath.5076:

Salamander.2504:

NtD=Near to Death, the trait which reduces the DS CD from 10 s to 6 s. By shroud dancing, he’s taking advantage of the low 6 s cooldown to constantly switch into and out of DS.

ahhh, alrite
I have to admit I have not even looked at alternative traits and builds so far, as I wanted to get comfortable with the classic Power Necro first. Could you post the build you are using? I will definitely have a look at that.
Boon stacking in a 6 second interval sounds pretty cool.

Sure, but I have to warn you, this really nontraditional, and I’m still in the testing phase. Whether this build is going to beat out traditional power builds for me is not yet resolved. It won’t be resolved until the new trait changes, and I’ll explain why. Here is the build: http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fRAQRBIhdu1IHNF12YjtN83m4YQk9zk4CQ90hBB-TJBFwACeIAn2foaZAAnBAA

So when you enter and exit death shroud, you gain: stability, fury, stun break, 1 condi clear, and an aoe weakness/bleed. You can repeat this every 6 seconds by never staying in DS (except to stall, absorb a burst, prevent a stomp/rezz, etc.), which means you have 100% fury uptime and 62% stability uptime (but just 1 stack). While we’re not talking 5 stacks of stability, it is going to make you into a stomping machine (pop DS for a stability stomp). Sometimes it works (their teammates cc’s are on CD), sometimes it doesn’t, but it will let you stomp more with the 6 second CD. We can quibble about my rune choice, but it provides ~60% protection uptime in the current build. The rune is going to be more important come the new traits because it provides 100% protection uptime with the new Beyond the Veil trait. To see what I mean, here is what my build will be in the upcoming trait system: http://dulfy.net/gw2traits#build=AgQCuAOsBdQ~

It pretty much stays the same, with 3 changes: (1) 100% protection uptime with constant shroud cycling, (2) slightly less aoe weakness uptime from the enfeeble trait, and (3) the trait Unholy Sanctuary. You won’t use Unholy Sanctuary for the health gain since you’ll rarely camp in death shroud. Instead, it allows you to always cycle DS, so that your DS can be on CD even when you’re about to die; the trait will proc and you’ll be put into DS and have protection (instead of dying!). It’s not really a big deal, but its the best synergy since you need to be in that trait line anyways. There is no synergy in any of the Curses GM traits, so that’s just a matter of preference. Like I said, I’m still testing the build, and while it’s getting a buff (100% protection uptime) in the new system, it may end up being unviable compared with other builds because of the upcoming siphoning changes, in which case camping DS may in fact be more beneficial. Only time will tell. In any case, I’m having fun with the build and it’s a very active play style. Cheers.

what an interesting post!

for solo qeue, I usually focus on what everybody else seems to forget: you have to cap points.

So i always go to the uncontested point and cap it. That’s my priority. If the point is guarded by a squishy, i also take it. If it’s guarded by a cele, then you better forget it. You can beat celes, but they will most likely get help in the time it takes you to kill them and you will lose. better join your team in that case.

As for team fights, you should actively seek them if:

- the numbers are even or will get even
- you don’t have to engage first
- your leech is off cd
- you have full life force

just don’t jump into the battle like crazy, you will get focused and shred to pieces.

leech is great in crossfire situations. That means, when the enemy is not watching out for it. A thief can be downed with just one shot. Same goes for mesmers and dps guardians.

dagger/wh is great to shred downed players and those trying to revive them. Just get on top of them, well bomb, and cut them good. one i downed 2 players and killed the downed one doing this.

oh, and i know i lose a lot of team fight power, but i like the axe/focus much better than the staff. More life force generation, and that damage spike gets people downed.

I’m interested in knowing how you all deal with condition rangers as a power necro