Guild Wars 2

I will preface this by saying I am only level 37 on my necro, but even then…

I have been amazed multiple times in the past few days when talking to other necro’s in game. Why? They do not understand how to take advantage of what the Necro does. They all say the necro does meager damage and feel weak/die easily. None of them seem to realize the combo’s.

Every one of them avoided ANY utility skill that applied a condition on themselves. They couldn’t see how it was beneficial to apply things to yourself.

I think a vast majority of players fail to realize the ‘master of conditions’ that is the Necro. I tell every one I meet that putting a condition on a necro is more like giving them ammo than it is hurting them. You can consume conditions to heal more, deathly swarm to transfer conditions AND blind them, you can well of power to change them to boons, for soloing Blood is Power applies two very nice separate bleeds by the time you transfer yours while also giving a huge 10 stacks of might… i mean the things we can do to remove conditions and gain a benefit from doing so is insane and yet so many people are not making this connection between our abilities.

TLDR: Does there need to be something in game that more strongly hints at these combos for those that don’t see it AND don’t read message boards? Alternatively, do you think it’s kind of nice that it seems this failure to realize combo’s is what is making the Necro a not so popular choice while being powerful for those that use it right?

Necro will probably never be popular for that very reason. Something has to be strong and basic for it to be popular—like Warrior.

I think this is a straw man.

Many of us love transfer conditions and consume conditions. That said, many of us also don’t want to have 1 or 2 mandatory skills.

We were told that the game is about options and many of us don’t feel like we have options.

Not to mention that ‘Deathly Swarm’ is bugged. ‘Plague Signet’ is bugged.

This is personal opinion, and I have absolutely no information to back it up- so take it with a grain of salt:

Whereas power builds benefit from crit chance, critical damage, and power itself, condition builds rely upon only a singular stat for their primary source of damage (excluding on-crit effects, which happens to be in the same tree as condition damage anyway). I feel like this was done in an attempt to either use conditions as supplementary effect to weaken the target and add a secondary source of damage (hybridization), or to allow condition based builds to focus heavily on other stats that grant survivability (healing power, toughness, vitality).

I don’t believe condition-based necromancers were ever designed with damage as their primary role, as many people set out to make it.

Now to unopinionated information:

Necromancers do use self-applied conditions such as blood is power, corrosive poison cloud, corrupt boon, and epidemic. All of these, I’d like to point out, are affected by the reduced corruption cool-down trait in curses. However- much like any class- necromancers are limited to only 3 utility skills (not accounting for the heal and elite), and this leaves absolutely no room for defensive utilities. Even if I were to run a condition based build again, I’d be tempted to only use 1 or possibly even 2 self-inflicting conditions.

More to the point, all of these afflictions require methods of removal. In PvE, this is a relatively easy task. But for PvP, let’s take a closer look at these “transfer” abilities.

Offhand Dagger #4 (Deathly Swarm)- This transfers only a single condition, unless you’re fighting multiple opponents in close proximity. Chances are pretty high that your opponent already has his own conditions that he’ll be applying to you, and removing the one you just placed on yourself becomes problematic. This issue compounds when fighting more players, as even though you can remove up to 3 conditions, the chance of those enemies applying a variety of conditions to you increases significantly.

Staff #4 (Putrid Mark)- This is the absolute best condition transfer we have, and a well placed one results in every condition you just applied on yourself to be transferred to the enemy, alongside anything he applied to you in the process. In PvE, this is a very simple task. In PvP, unless you specifically trait for increased mark size, it can be extremely problematic. Now, before people exclaim “gg learn to place marks,” I’m sure many of you already understand how unreliable an untraited mark is against a mobile player who knows how to avoid your marks through either dodging, charging, teleporting, pulling you, or a myriad of other abilities designed to grant them avoidance. The best part? You have to be within basically melee range to make use of it.

Well of Power- Not much to say about this one… it requires you to stand in a big target on the ground while you get pummeled in melee with only a 5 second duration and 60 second cool-down. You’ll have more conditions applied while standing in it than you would have otherwise removed.

Plague Signet- The only saving grace that allows condition necromancers to pull this off reliably. However, chances are pretty good that it’s your only stun breaker, and the fact that it has such a large cool-down makes it questionable to use for anything but that.

Seriously, condition necros do use the abilities you’re suggesting. But they’re not as useful, nor reliable, as you seem to think.