Guild Wars 2

It isn’t a secret that the necromancer was intended to be the magic user who studied the school of Aggression. many of there skills where directly associated with this concept. The Monk, Necromancer, Mesmer and Elementalist in the first game followed these schools very closely and they each felt very different because of it. The satisfaction that one would get from a Ele wouldn’t be the same as what someone might feel from the others.

From a gameplay standpoint, they don’t feel nearly as aggressive as they used to be, leaning more towards preservation then anything, especially with there death shroud mechanic. However, seeing as how they are still a mage of aggression they don’t seem to do this very well. (Hopefully this will be fixed in the upcoming patch)

Looking back at how the GW1 necromancer played, its very clear that the necromancer should do more of what they did in the past.

Skills like these that really made them stand out as creatures of absolute spite:
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Barbs
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Mark_of_Pain
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Order_of_Pain
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Order_of_the_Vampire
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Shadow_Strike
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Blood_Bond
http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Deathly_Chill

I would really like to see these ideas played on. Give the Necromancer a Vampiric aura they can grant to allies. Give them a condition that functions how Barbs did in GW1. Gives us party buffs at the expense of ourselves. Makes us care about foes with full health more then low health, adding a new twist on a spike build idea for necromancer. Make there healing for allies function based on there attacks.

The necromancer should reward there allies for being as blood thirsty as they are. This is honestly the biggest thing that I miss from GW1. You boasted about how your professions where designed to fit everyone’s desired play style. Well. You missed mine. You missed the play style that I enjoyed from GW1 and learned to enjoy in all other games because of it.

So please return the style of play that I loved.

I agree. I miss Spiteful Spirit, and the combination of two skills that made mobs attack faster but miss 50% of the attacks, and another one that made them take damage when they missed. That was some pure fun.

I agree too. I miss too much that aspect of the old days Necromancer. I thought they can do orders really easy in this game: give us some more spells for party buffs (ie. might party wide) and with a trait on blood magic like this (when you apply might to you or your allies, their attacks steal life).

This way we would be again a nice party supporters without implementing new Boons for example.

Ithir Darkleaf.7923:

I agree too. I miss too much that aspect of the old days Necromancer. I thought they can do orders really easy in this game: give us some more spells for party buffs (ie. might party wide) and with a trait on blood magic like this (when you apply might to you or your allies, their attacks steal life).

This way we would be again a nice party supporters without implementing new Boons for example.

I kinda like the idea of having a skill that sacrifices health in someway to give the party 10 stacks of might. I kinda miss saccing health for power. Also, I’ve mentioned before. You know about the fire, chaos, lightning, magnetic and frost armors? Well what if the necromancer could have there own aura they could give to allies called Vampiric armor? It would add a bonus damage to there attack that steal health.

As a GW necromancer vet (7k hours in GW1, 2k hours in GW2), I must say that in both games the class has something to offer that I greatly enjoy.

In GW1 PvE higher-end group environment I used to -mainly-, but not exclusively, play Spiteful Spirit, Minion Master or BiP necro. All of those builds brang something unique to the situations, making you feel like you are a powerful, useful addition to the group.

It had a lot to do with the way the PvE combat was designed in high-end areas – such as UW, FoW, DoA, etc. Large groups of foes which spammed attack after attack made kitten really hard, and their corpses afterwards made MMs have constant access to the resources they need. In addition, our main attribute, soul reaping, which gave us mana (energy) back every time something around us dies was nigh overpowered in a PvE environment.

GW2 PvE, however, has some differences. The front – mid – back line setup of GW1 combat has been thrown out of the window with the style of combat A-net have chosen, making everything be up to how much damage someone can put out. The lack of requirement for healers and the lack of complex mob group setup (GW1 mobs had healers, DPS and tanks among themselves, they could revive one another, etc. This called for organised group play and priority targeting) has left most classes out of the “meta”. This, however, is not to say that I do not enjoy GW2 necromancer. I think that we have a solid kit of abilities, which, unfortunately, are not too useful because of the way the PvE encounters are set up. Boon hate, condition manipulation and area control are not too useful in dungeons, and party-wide support for high-end fractals is something other classes like guardian and ele can do better.

On the PvP side, however, I do believe that the necromancer is more fun than in GW1. Yes, it does have a lot of problems, yes, we are not part of the EU meta right now, but I do think that it requires much more skill and has a higher ceiling than its GW1 counterpart. Aside from some gimmicky builds like Minion Factory and Blood Spike, GW1 necro had one build that people ran continuously over the course of the game – Lingering Curse. It was never a build that I particularly enjoyed, so I often played mesmer instead. The Soul Reaping class mechanic was not of huge help in PvP, since because of the presence of monk healers, deaths were not something common.

In high-end GW2 PvP there is currently, again, only one or two common builds – the condition pressure necro, and its Terror variation. In low to mid end play, however, we see minion masters, powermancers, chill necros and all kinds of other variations. From my personal experience, the variation is much greater and I find the class much more fun to play.

To sum it up – while the two iterations of the class have different skills and mechanics, the PvE portion of GW2 does not give the necromancers a chance to shine with their abilities. The PvP part, however, makes me feel more comfortable with GW2 necro than I did with its GW1 counterpart.

Most Curses involved complicated stuff and both Necromancer and Mesmer skills with punishing effects were cut down by quite a bit.
There’s pretty much just blocks that counter attackers and Confusion now what it comes to that stuff.

Life Steals in GW2 were meant to be for Necromancer “tank” builds that constantly drain health in order to be harder to kill.

That’s why Dagger, a melee weapon has Life Siphon and lots of Life Force generation.
Life Stealing is just way too weak right now and it’s just awkward with the whole concept of Healing Power.

Good life steals are definitely something I miss from GW1.
They were a blast to run in Jade Quarry.
Maybe not optimal but viable and tons of fun!
I also miss Health-sacrificing skills, but I have my doubts about those returning.

Also I feel the Necromancer is a bit aimless in it’s goals in GW2.
Anet says they want the Necromancer to be an attrition fighter, but I feel like the Necromancer is dangerous but easy to kill.

…also I like that you said “Aura”.
I know you probably meant something applied like Boons and Venoms, but it also made me think what if Necros had skills that worked like Warcraft 3 Auras?
Essentially any allies within a certain radius from you would receive the effect, but gain nothing outside the radius.

It’d certainly make them different from Thief venoms and everything the Guardian has.
It would also benefit Minions much better than Boons.
Of course it’d need a target limit for WvW, but yeah.

I’m gonna say it. No one I know cares about where the necromancer comes from. No one. I certainly don’t care if he studied the school of aggression or the school of ponies, as long as his “kit” is usable. Whichs state is questionable, at best, at the moment. Sure. We do many things well, we can do attrition, pure power, burst or just tanking, but that is also our problem. We do everything and nothing well. Our CC is useless in PVE/Dungeons because Anet decided to have a dumbed down AI, which can not handle more than “blast this, insta-gib that.”. Our PvP is decent, although, as stated, we do nothing really good. Our support capability is bad at best. Mark of Blood does grant regeneration, but what else can we provide, than regeneration? While the guardian behind me is buffing me up like crazy, with protection and stability and stuff, I can give people healing? Wow. Gee. Thanks.

What we need is not a GW1 necromancer, what we need is a clear line and a way to help parties. Wells are NOT GOOD at this. The only moment a well is great, is in PvP, where you have a designated area, in which everyone has to fight. And even then, 10 seconds of blind are easily avoided. Our main purpose at the moment is just standing behind our team and trying to land CB and EP one after the other. This does not make you support, this makes you a bad condition spreader golem.

What I would like to see for the necro is a usable trait line, which makes you tank, dials down your damage output greatly and allows you to help your party. Why can’t the shroud traits like reaper’s might or Foot in the Grave be an aoe buff for your group? We get 3 seconds of stabiltiy, that is about a tenth of what guardians provide, atleast that one could be aoe.

What else did I want to say… RIGHT

What we need is either a way to sustain ourselves without a thief babysitting us (escape mechanic plox?), or a way to buff a group.

I like the overall design of the necromancer, either skills which hurt yourself and others, or resurrecting the dead, or being “somewhere in between” worlds. I love the shroud and it’s design, the skills are useful for every build, but man… I can’t sustain it for 2 seconds in a real battle, even as a tankmancer. As it stands, we are another liability for a team, and not an asset. We get killed to easily because we are the “play ball” of others, getting smacked around. Foot in the Grave is nice, but not enough. Our builds hit heavy, IF they hit at all, because someone is throwing us around again.

All in all, I love the design of the necromancer. I love how it feels and how it plays. I hate that I am a liability for my group because if I get CCd and Consume Conditions is not up, well, I’m the one who just rezzed 3 of the enemies. I would like to be of help for my team. ‘Wells apply protection’ is not great. We need more than that.

What really bugs me, is that even a mesmer, who just pops Time Loop every 5 minutes is more helpful than a necromancer.

Had to get that off my heart.

psygate.5632:

I’m gonna say it. No one I know cares about where the necromancer comes from. No one.

You completely missed what I was suggesting. And second note, lots of people care. You have no idea how large the group of necromancer players coming over from GW1 is and how many of them seriously feel an emptiness in the way the necromancer plays. You many not care, that doesn’t mean NO one does. At least 40% of the necromancer players Do actually care.

What you missed was that I was talking about a play style that people enjoy. Arena Net stated that they wanted to make sure that people could play they way they wanted and so they could fit any archetype that those people enjoyed. Well, this aggressive style of support is something that they missed in the game. I could do a bit of aggressive support on my guardian or I could roll a warrior and give might. However, this isn’t the same as what I’m suggesting. This aggressive style of support I’m talking about isn’t in the game. The necromancer doesn’t reward people for staying on there target.

I’m talking about a play style I enjoyed along with many other players as well. And the necromancer shouldn’t be more tanky…. Thats just gross….

Lily.1935:

psygate.5632:

I’m gonna say it. No one I know cares about where the necromancer comes from. No one.

You completely missed what I was suggesting. And second note, lots of people care. You have no idea how large the group of necromancer players coming over from GW1 is and how many of them seriously feel an emptiness in the way the necromancer plays. You many not care, that doesn’t mean NO one does. At least 40% of the necromancer players Do actually care.

What you missed was that I was talking about a play style that people enjoy. Arena Net stated that they wanted to make sure that people could play they way they wanted and so they could fit any archetype that those people enjoyed. Well, this aggressive style of support is something that they missed in the game. I could do a bit of aggressive support on my guardian or I could roll a warrior and give might. However, this isn’t the same as what I’m suggesting. This aggressive style of support I’m talking about isn’t in the game. The necromancer doesn’t reward people for staying on there target.

I’m talking about a play style I enjoyed along with many other players as well. And the necromancer shouldn’t be more tanky…. Thats just gross….

Well. Throwing some percentages in there will up to 90% not help. You can reward agressive play. I think you just don’t see the necromancer as I do. Agressive play playerwise is greatly rewarded with the necromancer, we have enough skills to do that. (Well of Suffering, Well of Darkness, blablabla…). Epidemic, Fear, we are a very aggressive class. We are just not able to help our team, because the second we go in, we get focused down and killed, because we have basically no sustain. Even with 30 in Soul Reaping, our sustain and peeling is just attrocious and unusable.

Lily.1935

You have no idea how large the group of necromancer players coming over from GW1

No. And neither do you. Noone does, because the subset of people posting here does not in any way represent the necromancer player base. I atleast stuck with stating that noone I KNEW cared about this stuff, but going here and making the bold statement that you actually know each and every necromancer or atleast a scentifically sound subset is just, well, I don’t think so.

Lily.1935

The necromancer doesn’t reward people for staying on there target.

Yes we do. With our insane amount of options to curropt everything and everyone we greatly reward people focus firing someone. We fear them to death, we blind them, we chill them, we rip their boons. We don’t need more agressive play options. What we need is either a “friendly” version of our destructive support, or a way to sustain ourselves longer.

Lily.1935

And the necromancer shouldn’t be more tanky…. Thats just gross….

Yes. It should. And not in a way that enhances our status in a 1v1, which is already acceptable, if you know what you are doing. What we need is a way to simply land our wells and our conditions in a team fight situation. As it stands, we just get focused down, and death shroud does NOT help this in any way. It is depleted the moment someone looks at you the wrong way. We are an attrition class, that is meant to tank and slowly grind away every health point that someone has. We are meant to use fear to control the movement of others. We are meant to support in an offensive way. But neither of this really comes into play in a XvX situation (where X=/=1), because we go down so fast, and are CCed so easily, that we don’t get a chance to do anything. To land you wells in more than 2 people, you have to pop your plague or lich, just to get in there and not being smacked around like a ragdoll.

Anet wanted this to be an upcoming esport. Then please, do something to make this an esport. Stop making it a Thief vs Elemantalist with Guardian support and maybe mesmer.

psygate.5632:

No. And neither do you. Noone does, because the subset of people posting here does not in any way represent the necromancer player base. I atleast stuck with stating that noone I KNEW cared about this stuff, but going here and making the bold statement that you actually know each and every necromancer or atleast a scentifically sound subset is just, well, I don’t think so.

the hypocrisy of this is astounding. And you didn’t let me sight that for you.

psygate.5632:

I’m gonna say it. No one I know cares about where the necromancer comes from. No one.

And fine. Let me be fair about it. Every single person I talked to who mains a necromancer. The people who migrated from GW1 to GW2 all care about this. Either they stopped playing GW2, moved onto another profession, or tried to like the profession for something else. All of them do care through. The people I’ve noticed don’t care, never played GW1 in the first place. And even a few of them have stated that they would love to see some of those features return when I’ve talked to them about the necromancer.

Is that better? I hope so.

As for them being more tanky. It appears that we both have different meanings for the word. I’ve had an argument with someone about the meaning over a word, so I’m not going to make that mistake here and try and argue with you over something that doesn’t really matter.

What tanky means to me is a single character designed with extremely low damage who is made to hold a large amount of argo for a long enough duration of time so that the bulk of your party can blast down your foes. It has nothing to do with PvP or 1v1.

I apologizes for misunderstanding your definition. It wont happen again.

As for everything else. I stand by what I said and believe it hole heartly. Do I want more classic style for the necromancer? yes. Do I want more party support in the forms I have suggested? Absolutely. Do others want it to? Absolutely. If you don’t like the suggestion, fine. You don’t have to. Adding these suggestion to the game doesn’t harm your style of play in the slightest. No one said you would have to play like we do.

Necromancers are absolutely meant to have a tank build or two.
This is why the Necromancer has so much Life Stealing and a second Health bar.
Whereas a Guardian uses tons of Boons a Necro tank is meant to drain life from all around him to stay alive.
Essentially being less of an armored knight and more of a bloodthirsty vampire.

In fact good Necromancers using Life Stealing and Life Force generation smartly were nearly impossible to kill before launch.
I’ve heard of the really good ones holding 4 opponents at once on them infinitely.

Additionally Anet told us multiple times that Necromancers are THE hardest Profession to kill by design.
This was back when we knew of only a handful of skills per Profession.

Before launch Necros got nerfed to the point that their defenses are now worse than their offensive skills and they pretty much lost their whole identity of being about attrition in the process.
They did obviously need a nerf, but Arenanet whack-a-moled it to the ground.

This philosophy shows in Wells, which are great for area control, Marks which were/are meant to be pre-casted to have an advantage when defending an area and Flesh Wurm which is essentially a defense tower.

Necromancers were meant to excel in control and be extremely hard to kill, but all they really feel good for now is putting out damage and messing up Boons.

The amount of Chill and Cripple is very nice, and that’s one bit of Necro that has remained of Necro’s control aspect.
Fear to an extent is an another, although it’s now used more for damage and interrupt than actually for moving people…

LastDay.3524:

Necromancers are absolutely meant to have a tank build or two.
This is why the Necromancer has so much Life Stealing and a second Health bar.
Whereas a Guardian uses tons of Boons a Necro tank is meant to drain life from all around him to stay alive.
Essentially being less of an armored knight and more of a bloodthirsty vampire.

In fact good Necromancers using Life Stealing and Life Force generation smartly were nearly impossible to kill before launch.
I’ve heard of the really good ones holding 4 opponents at once on them infinitely.

Additionally Anet told us multiple times that Necromancers are THE hardest Profession to kill by design.
This was back when we knew of only a handful of skills per Profession.

Before launch Necros got nerfed to the point that their defenses are now worse than their offensive skills and they pretty much lost their whole identity of being about attrition in the process.
They did obviously need a nerf, but Arenanet whack-a-moled it to the ground.

This philosophy shows in Wells, which are great for area control, Marks which were/are meant to be pre-casted to have an advantage when defending an area and Flesh Wurm which is essentially a defense tower.

Necromancers were meant to excel in control and be extremely hard to kill, but all they really feel good for now is putting out damage and messing up Boons.

The amount of Chill and Cripple is very nice, and that’s one bit of Necro that has remained of Necro’s control aspect.
Fear to an extent is an another, although it’s now used more for damage and interrupt than actually for moving people…

suggest it somewhere else. This suggestion isn’t about improving an old option we already have, its about adding an option we should have that was dropped from GW1 onto GW2. You should be discussing the possibilities of this suggestion and not talking about something unrelated. You want to talk to me personally about my thoughts and feelings about tanking and the necromancer profession, I will be happy to discuss it in private. This thread isn’t the place for that.

I haven’t suggested anything.
I told you what Arenanet said in the past.
To show that your statement is just plain wrong; it is against Arenanet’s vision.

Unless they later changed that vision, which they might have.

LastDay.3524:

I haven’t suggested anything.
I told you what Arenanet said in the past.
To show that your statement is just plain wrong; it is against Arenanet’s vision.

Unless they later changed that vision, which they might have.

the suggestion isn’t wrong, there is nothing wrong with wanting to play a classic concept. There vision was to give players access to all play styles. And this play style isn’t in the game.