Guild Wars 2

Let me start by saying that this is a little biased since I actually like DS alot. I am a power based necro where DS is most effective

why I like death shroud
So the vanilla DS without any traits provides you at 100% LF the amount of hit points you carracter has in normal form. That in its own is priceless.

The skills:
Life blast for a crit/power necro this can hit hard but it is slow its a trade off, for condition necro ive not found its use maybe for might stacking.

dark path – very useful for power necros to get close, bad for condition 2 bleeds isnt much, support necros help the team with chill. all necros can use this for chasing targets.

doom – useful for all any time you get jumped on by thief/warrior any other burst class muscle memory should kick in f1->tab target->3 =burst damage nullified for a few seconds, out of LF? DS on cool down better luck next time (or said warrior/theif skillfuly watched you recently leave DS)

Life transfer – many ways this can be used if your creative.
1 support healing other players when traited (its not much unless you have high amounts of healing power).
2 power builds this skill can easilly do 6-7k damage to muliple foes.
3 condition spec forget the direct damage this skill hits 9 times in under 4 seconds to multiple targets with 5points in curses and a earth sigil that a chance to cause quite a few bleeds on multiple target might I add.
you get interupted? as with warriors and theifs watching you for DS use you should watch them and other classes for interupt uses, if you know they are on cool down the games on.

TLDR DS is best for power necros but still should play a role however you play necros

Adding traits
Death shroud is a knife in the hands of a power necro its a great big cleaver, condition/support its more of a vegetable knife.
You dont have to add any traits to make DS a useful tool but with them It can be transformed into the swiss army of knives!

Spite
Spiteful Spirit – Gain retaliation for 3 seconds when entering Death Shroud.
Best when used with high power necros this will destroy burst clases that jump you, they use one button to smash your face in you use f1 to deal damage back. 3 seconds is not alot but all you need + arena net said they are going to reduce retaliation game wide I think they are all going to be 3-5 seconds soon.

Reaper’s Might – Life Blast and Plague Blast grant might for 15 seconds.
might helps both power and condition necros equally

Close to Death – Increases damage by 20% to enemies below 50% health.
not strictly a DS trait but i think it needs to be mentioned – if synergised with the fury from curses using Life transfer during the mid/end of a team fight where foes are usually around the 50% hp mark this can kill mulitple foes for your team

Curses
Furious Demise – Gain fury for 5 seconds when entering Death Shroud.
20% crit over 50% of the time = awesome for bleed stacking and power necros dont leave home without it. condition necros should be poping in and out of DS on cooldown

Weakening Shroud – Cast Enfeebling Blood when entering death shroud.
amazing skill wish my builds could have it more often. weakness is a very underestimated condition and is great for any kind of necro for survival

Death Magic
Death Shiver – Apply vulnerability for 10 seconds every 3 seconds to nearby enemies while in Death Shroud.
not used this one much I theoryize that it would work best in a high HP high toughness support necro to boost damage in a team fight.

Shrouded Removal – Lose a condition when you enter death shroud. – a little poor considering the much stronger weapon and utility condition removes available to the necro

Blood Magic
Deathly Invigoration – Heal in an area when you leave death shroud.
Best for support which high healing power to maximize the effect.

Soul Reaping
Foot in the Grave – Gain stability for 3 seconds when you enter death shroud.
not really worth the 30 points in soulreaping for 3 seconds but can be used in pvp for revivals and stomps, it is useful to ensure life transfer fully channels and can be used to help with longer casting skill such as heals/minon summons and lich form

Near to Death – Death Shroud recharges 50% faster.
best used with builds built around fast LF generation to ensure that LF is put to use soaking up damage, unfortunatly alot of the traits mentioned above have a 10+second cool down.

Speed of Shadows – Move 15% faster while in death shroud.
I personally dont use this one but it may be of use to people who like to kite.

Vital Persistence – Life force drains 25% slower while in death shroud. If your doing alot of life blasts this will help keep you in DS

Path of Midnight – All death shroud skills recharge 15% faster.
If you like using dark path/doom/life transfer every little helps

Unyielding Blast - Life Blast pierces and causes vulnerability. helps increase Life blasts usefulness for support/condtion and power necros, support helps the team with vulneabilty, condition is helped by hitting multiple targets for more bleed potential, power benefits from both aspects of this trait

Thanks for reading and let me know if you have any questions

Lovely writeup Thanks.

I originally started the post intending to compare to DS to all other class mechanics but it got too long.
Another biased oppinion and I dont know all the ins and outs of every class mechanic but I think DS is without a doubt the best mechanic

“Blood Magic
Deathly Invigoration – Heal in an area when you leave death shroud.
Best for support which high healing power to maximize the effect.”

Ummm…it heals like 300+ life. One more trash trait

As a pure support necro, I know it heals for about 725 standard. It’s like Life Transfer’s traited heal in the way it doesn’t actually seem to scale at all with Healing Power.

would you consider that a good thing karther I would like to get both condition and support necros thoughts on DS

merch.1026:

I originally started the post intending to compare to DS to all other class mechanics but it got too long.
Another biased oppinion and I dont know all the ins and outs of every class mechanic but I think DS is without a doubt the best mechanic

While there is potential there, i find the interface clunky compared to other professions.

If i want to quickly use the fear for instance that are 3 buttons that needs to be hit. That almost begs to be macroed if Anet thinks we should use it as a interrupt.

merch.1026:

Life blast for a crit/power necro this can hit hard but it is slow its a trade off, for condition necro ive not found its use maybe for might stacking.

dark path – very useful for power necros to get close, bad for condition 2 bleeds isnt much, support necros help the team with chill. all necros can use this for chasing targets.

TLDR DS is best for power necros but still should play a role however you play necros

Yeah, I love the role half the skills play on my condition necro.

merch.1026:

would you consider that a good thing karther I would like to get both condition and support necros thoughts on DS

I consider it a bad thing, Merch. I stack healing power in all my gear. Armour, jewellery, backpack, weapons. The fact that two Necromancer traits get no boost from them is a bit of a slap in the face.

The Life Transfer trait that makes it an AoE heal is still worth it because all the ticks combined mean it heals roughly 2600 in a 600 range. However… Guardians that stack healing power get a 3k heal from their staff that also gives 12 might with exactly half the cooldown. But then, there’s nothing Necromancer can do better than Guardian except put out conditions.

Otherwise for support, the only other really useful skill is Doom. Someone casting a Finisher on your downed comrade? Unelss they have Stability, the 1 sec fear will interrupt them. I also use it to interrupt other casts such as Meteor Shower and 100 Blades, as well as combining it with the staff fear to guide foes off of cliffs. It’s especially great for jump puzzle griefing.

I use the 1 key for Life Blast sometimes, purely because it’s my best damage ability I have in support spec. I only really use it in 1 vs 1s and then only usually if I’m totally sure to win or if I’m being kited. Overall, there’s no support to come of it – but there’s no support from the 1 skills on my regular weapon sets either, no big deal.

Dark Path, the 2 key, is another matter. I use it for the same reasons as Life Blast but it’s flawed heavily by the fact it takes forever to hit a target and it’s ridiculously easy for enemies to obstruct it partially because of that and the fact it’s not instant. I can’t think of any Thief, Warrior or Guardian gap closers that fail this hard, having played them all. When it does land the Chill is really nice, but it’s a matter of when it does. Again, like Life Blast, no support there.

If you fancy, there’s two vids on my youtube page of me playing Support Necro in WvW. The older one is the better one for displaying the profession and use of Death Shroud, but also worse quality. I really ought to make a new one that combines the better quality with better content – I’ll get around to it at some point: http://www.youtube.com/user/RhelexKarther/feed?filter=2

very informative write up. much easier to read here and think of some strategies then to go ingame and read every description ^^.

There is always the wiki.

I haven’t tested it and so far I have seen no difference but I will ask anyway: Does Vital Persistence also apply to damage you take or does it just reduce the “natural” drain from DS’s life force bar?

As a support necro, I think it’s great. A couple of things however:

• Transfusion (heal from Life Transfer) does not (as Karther noted) scale with Healing Power.
• Deathly Invigoration does scale with healing power, but only heals for about the same as one single tick from Well of Blood. This and the above point are things I hope they fix/reconsider; maybe double the Deathly Invigoration heal, and make Transfusion scale, even if it means nerfing it a bit for necros with no Healing Power.
• Shrouded Removal is an instant cast condition removal on a 10 sec cooldown. I wish I had room for it in my build.
• Foot in the Grave is, imo, very useful in SPvP and TPvP, but I guess opinions differ.

I stand corrected then, thanks Daiva. Either way, Deathly Invigoration is underwhelming.

so far it seems all the trait based heals do not scale, or scale poorly, with healing power. Could be that they are running off the same section of code, and that code is buggy or poorly tuned.

Foot in the Grave is a slap to the face when it comes to stomping. If you downed someone, and you aren’t in melee range, just getting to them probably scrubs off half of the stability. Most downed stun skills have casting time too, and you won’t have stability throughout the stun.

Not to mention it is the biggest giveaway…ever.

if your not in melee range either dont use DS till your closer or use DS and use dark path to jump too them

I have done power DS Necros in both PvE and PvP. They do fair damage if left alone, but the cast time on 1 is so awful that once you get pressured, you lose almost all ability to do damage (I’ve seen 1v1 siutations where I can get 2 #1s of after using a fear).

That said, where did you get information about HPs in DS? I have heard it is 75% in another thread. In neither case have I seen tests/official word to determine this.

Also, is damage in DS mitigated by toughness/armor? I have had high Vit builds, and it in no way felt like I was running around with 60k life. Also, if LF = 100% of HP, does that mean Vit builds are always superior to toughness?

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Life_force

And i would say that unless your going to face a primarily condition damage threat, a balanced mix of toughness and vitality is a acceptable way to go. This because toughness, being part of armor, reduce the direct damage before it hits health. Armor in a sense acts as a health multiplier when faced with direct damage.

merch.1026:

if your not in melee range either dont use DS till your closer or use DS and use dark path to jump too them

Between latency, and the downed players reaction time, this will not matter. Its a complete shot in the dark.

A good player will use his disrupt towards the end of your stomp anyways. 3s stability may be good for other things, but stomping is not one of them.