Guild Wars 2

I run a fairly standard conditions build:

0/30/10/10/20 with II, VII, XI in Curses II in Death Magic III in Blood Magic and III, X in Soul Reaping. Scepter/Dagger + Staff and for Utilites I use Consume Conditions, Corrupt Boon, Epidemic, Plague Signet, and Flesh Golem. Runes are 3 Krait 3 Afflicted with a Rabid or Carrion Amulet and Sigils are Agony on Scepter/Dagger and Energy on Staff.

The first issue I have with my build is deciding between Rabid or Carrion Amulet:
I feel like if i use Rabid, I’d be better off using 6/6 Undead runes instead just to make good use of the extra toughness, but I love having longer bleed duration from 3Krait/3Afflicted. Another plus to Rabid is the precision it brings for the 5 trait in curses adding an extra bleed on crit.

For Carrion Amulet, I do like the extra health but is it really worth trading around 6k health for 600 toughness? Also, how much do I actually benefit from the extra power i get from Carrion?

Another issue with my build is the utility skills. I would love to be able to use either Spectral Walk or Spectral Armor, but I feel like the utilities i have are too good to pass up. On the other hand it would help my survivability quite a lot having another stun break. If I were to ditch one of them i think it’d be Epidemic, even though it pains me because Epidemic brings so much to the table in group fights. Corrupt Boon is a no go for obvious reason. Plague Signet is also a possibility, but it’s still extremely strong VS other condition builds. What would you choose?

Anyways guys/girls, I would VERY much appreciate some feedback, I try and theorycraft and test numbers for a lot of things but I can’t quite decide. Thanks!

Rabid is used because of the earth sigil. The 5 trait is laughable but hey it doesn’t hurt. No reason you can’t go rabid + krait/afflicted.

Is it just a crappy bleed duration? I’ll have to test it sometime :P

it’s 1 second…

I think VItality is the best defensive stat for necro’s. Gives more room against bursty classes. Increases the amount of health you have while in Death shroud. Gives more room against condition classes/self inflicted conditions. Toughness and vitality are equal for a necro. Sure, toughness is better if you can get consistent heals off, but what class is going to let you consistently heal? Not to mention we lack stability. You’re going to get cc’d like crazy before they let you get the heal off. So the more health you got, the longer they gotta CC you before the heal gets off. Sure its not as effective as a toughness necro’s health when healed but at least you’re alive a little longer.

And you’ll notice later on, the really high damaging classes mix both. Direct damage affected by toughness and condition damage. Toughness only mitigates one, vitality helps both.

You just need to survive long enough until they die or run away.

I personally think precision is crap on a condition necro. The 66% chance for a bleed on crit only lasts a second. Thats 1 tick of MAX 130 bleed. That is utter crap. And then the % chance with scepter on crit? 25% of a crit. So thats like ~12% chance. Weakness isn’t even ‘that’ great a condition. And how often are they going to let you autoattack? Okay maybe you’ll run some sigils that have on crit chance. Getting all that precision just for some sigils? Thats terrible.

If conditions could crit, god yes I would do precision. But since they don’t, I think precision is worthless.

I think corrupt boon sucks personally. One target, 40 second CD, can be blocked can be dodged and it gives you a self condition. Look at Well of corruption. 45 second CD. ~500-1000 damage x5 pulses, AOE, and converts boons to conditions. Sure it doesn’t change the full stack to all conditions and you gotta be in closer range, but a lot of guardians think they can hold the point when they got their full stack of buffs. I drop that well, and they crumble in about 5 seconds with all my other conditions I apply as well.

Don’t do half/half armor sigils. I don’t think its worth the loss of the 5th armor bonus which is usually 100 condition damage. The only time I would stack multiples of differ armor bonuses is if I was trying to keep a boon up at all times, but necros have crap access to any boons besides maybe regen.

Thanks for the insight! I still think corrupt boon is strong, though i agree that it blows that it can be blocked, miss, etc. I’ll give Well of Corruption a shot. I’ll probably go back to the Carrion Amulet then since health does sound better, the 5 trait bleed is absolute kitten, and I don’t use earth sigils. And you don’t think the 30% bleed duration from 3/3 runes is worth it? If that’s the case do you just use Undead?

Just use a full set armor. Afflicted/Nightmare/Necromancer/Undead/Krait/Orrian. And 30% bleed duration isn’t worth the trade off of all that condition damage lost IF you’re going full condition damage. It isn’t a bad choice to go for defensive armor runes either as the opportunity cost of losing the condition damage might be offset by the larger increase in survivability.

With full Undead having the 5% of toughness as extra condition damage i only go up about 70 which is probably around 3-4 more per tick. I’m still on the wall. I do like some of the other armor set bonuses but I don’t think the condition damage loss is really that bad. I’ll toy with it though.

The difference between 1000 condi damage and 1200 is what? About 4? I’d rather try and get another tick on my bleeds rather trying to stat for a bit better damage, better DPS overall this way. The crit on bleed lasts for about 3-5 seconds I think (My scepter bleeds last about 8-9 seconds), with my build I have 62% crit so I can constantly keep up bleeds. If you go 2 krait, 2 afflicted and 2 centaur you will get 45% bleed duration increase along with 84 condi damage, if I’m honest as long as you have over 1k condi damage you’re good to go.

Well of Corruption is a much better option, not only does it help you but your teammates too, it is an AoE. Though I suggest when using wells to at least cripple/chill the person 1st and then dropping it to make sure you get a surefire hit, for example Dark Path>Well or Spectral Grab>Well. Well of Darkness is a strong contender too, helps with survive-ability, for me Spectral Armour is always a must. I don’t find Epidemic all that useful, in tournys you might fight 2 people at the same time at max, it’s great for WvW but not that great in sPvP, at least that what it feels like to me. :l

Hope that helps somewhat.

Difference between 1,000 condition damage and 1,200 condition damage isn’t significant.

But, the difference between 1,000 condition damage and 2,200 condition damage (what I run standard when I swap to condition build) is significant.

Well, let me correct myself… it’s 2,148, but same difference.

But then I am the type of player that likes to go all-or-nothing. If I want condition damage, I spec fully into that ideal and be the best condition nuisance I can. If I want survivability, I will spec to maintain the highest degree of survivability possible, even at the sacrifice of other specs.

This is probably why I have several armor/weapon sets. Thank Grenth for multiple 20-slot bags.

But, this is my playstyle. Something I do try to maintain on all builds, regardless of what it is built for, is a Crit rate of at minimum 50% (what I run on my survival build). My pure condition build maintains 68% by contrast.

I will very often be two entirely different builds between two different fights, and often tailor my build to my party I’m running with (no Guardian and an Ele that doesn’t want to do anything but D/D? Should probably put on my survival gear…)

Enerjak.2475:

Difference between 1,000 condition damage and 1,200 condition damage isn’t significant.

But, the difference between 1,000 condition damage and 2,200 condition damage (what I run standard when I swap to condition build) is significant.

Well, let me correct myself… it’s 2,148, but same difference.

1502 is the max a necro can get to without food.

Dibrom.6408:

Enerjak.2475:

Difference between 1,000 condition damage and 1,200 condition damage isn’t significant.

But, the difference between 1,000 condition damage and 2,200 condition damage (what I run standard when I swap to condition build) is significant.

Well, let me correct myself… it’s 2,148, but same difference.

1502 is the max a necro can get to without food.

Food, Sigils, etc. I count the full number I’m using when actually applying those conditions.

There are Necros supposedly running around with higher than that.

Enerjak
I was understanding from previous posts by other necros that anything really above 1600 condition damage was really irrelevant. Sadly I took someones word and ran with it . However in your post you are outlining that 2100+ is what you run with. Can you list what gear you are using and food sigil some of that etc stuff out. I’m sure others would love to copy that template of gear for themselves. Also what damage numbers are you seeing in the 2100+ condition damage area. Like how much does each tick for?
Sorry for the barrage of questions on a Monday =(

Much love,
Madame Moorshade Teknomancer.

Teknomancer.8475:

Enerjak
I was understanding from previous posts by other necros that anything really above 1600 condition damage was really irrelevant. Sadly I took someones word and ran with it . However in your post you are outlining that 2100+ is what you run with. Can you list what gear you are using and food sigil some of that etc stuff out. I’m sure others would love to copy that template of gear for themselves. Also what damage numbers are you seeing in the 2100+ condition damage area. Like how much does each tick for?
Sorry for the barrage of questions on a Monday =(

Much love,
Madame Moorshade Teknomancer.

I’m at work or I’d put together the full build on a template. PM me in game this evening and remind me if you’re still interested. As mentioned, others have hit numbers higher than me supposedly, so would also consider asking them.

For food/sigils specifically however, Superior Corruption (250), I keep Rare Veggie Pizza (40% condition duration, 70 condition damage) on me, though also use Bowl of Truffle Risotto (100 Condition Damage, +70 Precision) on occasion… being 400 Chef is fun.

Suffice to say however all gear, all weapons, etc wield the cap for Condition Damage along with all bonuses I can muster.

I do the same thing with Vitality/Toughness for tanking, Power/Crit for D/D, etc and have multiple sets.

Edit: I will FRAPS a TA run tonight so you can see some of the condition numbers.

I also would love to see what you have so I have something to achieve for.