Guild Wars 2

Now that we’ve had a solid week and two weekends to try reaper, and have experienced the nerf of the trait that was arguably the main reason to take reaper, I thought I’d articulate my thoughts on the elite spec as it pertains to organized pvp at a semi-competitive level. Note I pretty much only play conquest, not stronghold.

The Good

Reaper’s Shroud is wonderful on nearly every build. Fast frantic cleave is what we’ve needed for so long, and while some may disagree with me, I feel as though I can’t go back to playing normal death shroud. The two just don’t compare. And stability is extremely helpful for pointholding, sustain, and stomps.

Shout skills are some of the better necromancer utilities since we were able to give feedback and have them tweaked, unlike many of the base class utilities that remain quite weak. In particular, the heal and elite feel at home in any build.

The Bad

Build diversity is at an all time low since the blighter’s boon nerf. We are forced into soul reaping for vital persistance on nearly every build, and spite tends to be the best other option on most builds since without it, blighter’s boon is useless and spite synergizes with chill spam quite well. Death magic is the next most viable line for bruiser builds that don’t use blighter’s boon, that may wish to use shouts instead of signets and want more passive sustain instead of damage. Curses has its problems of having all of its good traits in the same tier, and blood magic is genuinely too situational unless you run wells, and unholy martyr is hard to run without death magic. Even condi builds are dropping curses to run spite, as are some bruiser builds, and every power dps build. The other traitlines need some love to work better with reaper.

The greatsword can’t hit people that move. Greatsword works best in a bruiser/pointholder build, but then it has trouble making the damage feel solid compared to other choices. In particular, there feels to be very little reason to gravedigger spam a downed target with soldier’s amulet, when you can just pop into deathshroud, stun the person rezzing with RS5, pop stability, and stomp (15% boosted stomp speed with reaper’s onslaught too). Gravedigger needs a guaranteed critical hit effect against people that are trying to rez, otherwise it doesn’t output the pressure needed to be good downcleave and deny the rez.

Compared to base necromancer, Reaper works with the following types of builds much better than with base necromancer:

Condition Builds (arguably the best type of reaper build to use)
Tanky-Pointholder in Teamfights
Minion side node holder
Mightstacking soldier’s bruiser

But base necromancer does these types of builds better:

Celestial-hybrid/boon corruption (overly reliant on synergies in spite/curese/SR)
Rez/transfusion/heal support (no room to take blood magic with reaper, and blood magic doesn’t give enough persoanal sustain).
Power wells/lich bomber/marauder (needs more range and needs blood magic).

Overall I’d say reaper is definietly fun to play, but in higher level pvp, I’m worried about it being two polarized, either amazing in 1v1s but risky and hard to use/survive in teamfights (condi) or amazing in teamfights and pointholding, but incapable of killing most opponents 1v1 (soldier’s bruiser with GS). To me, its hard to find a middle ground that will handle both scenarios equally well.I’m also worried that certain sustain oriented bruisers, such as scrapper, tempest, and druid will overshadow bruiser reaper builds, when reaper was billed as a bruiser in esscence much more than the others were, offering “frontline support” and heals. Reaper is just as selfish as base necromancer, but its able to still be competitive by offering the debuff pressure and unblockable CC needed to kill the cele/supporters that rule the current meta. The greatsword offers the most room fot tuning and improvement.

So those are my thoughts, feel free to post yours.

I pretty much agree with you. I think reaper’s shroud is enough to justify using reaper. Actually, I am currently playing some WvW with my reaper for which I haven’t unlocked anything but the shroud and the heal. And I still use it over curses.

I do feel like things could be very much improved if the devs went again through all core necro’s skills and listen to our feedbacks. Reaper should have a clear niche and not be good in all builds (since we loose range) but it is so good and polished compare to core necro that we still rather take it even on builds in which it should not make sense.

I think we’re at that spot again where we need to go back and point out that massive swaths of the core profession are still woefully inadequate. Yes those of use who just got Reaper are still a bit in a honeymoon phase, but having played it through the BWEs I’m back looking at the core profession, and noticing all kinds of issues.

Reaper alone still has plenty of problems (though thankfully Shroud really only has one, with the strange stopping at the end of RS2). GS really needs its AA improved, and some QoL fixes here and there. Shouts are looking nice, but we really need a second stun break across the skill type (on Rise most likely, considering it is the longest CD and defensive one). And the traits still need improvements, especially Soul Eater and Blighter’s Boon, along with a slight adjustment to Chilling Victory imo.

Then we’ve got to look at the base profession. Corruptions are still in need of fixes, Spectrals not only are often weak on their own, but also don’t properly interact with the trait always, Minions still need QoL changes. We’ve also got issues in every trait line, some bigger than others, weapons are still a bit lackluster in some cases, and the ever present Death Shroud, which is so obviously inadequate compared to Reaper Shroud.

Hopefully during this time of rapid followup we can get some work, because while we’ve been receiving good changes here and there, the reality is this expansion was great, but also allowed for months of ignoring huge issues on the base profession because of how shiny and great Reaper was.

I am so happy with my Reaper that I have nothing to complain.

First time in GW2 I am accused to be Pay 2 Win because I am using Reaper

Problem with Reaper isnt so much reaper itself but the core of the class. There are very few traits on necro you would call strong traits. The class still doesnt handle being out numbered at all. I can understand being useless when outnumbered but a sitting duck?

Was in an outnumbered fight between a necro, engineer and warrior. Was focused on the engi but because of all the random stuff i had to avoid, everytime i was just about to finish him, he would go invulnerable or use stealth. Got the same engi alone later in the match, got in a nice damage string and ofcourse went invulnerable at around 10% hp. I waited and timed a spec grasp to hit the instant it ended, it worked and started a dagger AA to finish. Got the first hit in and engi went invulnerable again and then stealth.

Out of annoyance i chased in the likely direction and found him at half hp attacking someone else. Charged and got ganked by 3 people but ofcourse there was no clutch double invulns, no stealth so i can escape and not feed the other team like the engi did. According to Anet i am meant to go into Shroud and miracles will happen but ofcourse shroud doesnt do anything but delay the time of death. At least i managed to down the engi in the end

The Reaper is so good against steath escapers before Necro did not have anything to cleave the stealth, now if a Thief drop SB or Engi stealth, use shout Elite and then cleave everything to death

Before my D/D was great to cleave stealth now Reaper is awesome with it.

posthumecaver.6473:

The Reaper is so good against steath escapers before Necro did not have anything to cleave the stealth, now if a Thief drop SB or Engi stealth, use shout Elite and then cleave everything to death

Before my D/D was great to cleave stealth now Reaper is awesome with it.

What are you on about? DS 4, DS 5, signet of locust, axe 3, marks,… .

Every thing what you said above only tickles the guys in stealths and except DS4/DS5 I have all of them in my Reaper build plus RS4 deals 5K power damage and I am seeing poison damage ticks for 1K for 4s and the cleave of RS AA 1.5K/1.5K/3.5K with %100 crit chance against medium armor guys.

Sry but you can’t even compare DS cleave with RS cleave.

I’m trying to find a use for skill #3 greatsword… 900 range maybe ? Or change it to a second CC since Anet doesn’t want to give us mobility.

posthumecaver.6473:

Every thing what you save above only tickles the guys in stealths and except DS4/DS5 I have all of them in my Reaper build plus RS4 deals 5K power damage and I am seeing poison damage ticks for 1K for 4s and the cleave of RS AA 1.5K/1.5K/3.5K with %100 crit chance against medium armor guys.

Sry but you can’t even compare DS cleave with RS cleave.

I will say, using RS #4 inside a Shadow Refuge feels really, really good.

Also, I use GS #3 for the LF + Vuln stacking + Blind removal (while still getting benefit). It could probably use a range boost though.

If skill #3 was a grab similar to necrotic grasp (reaching target’s position instead of grabbing him to us) on a low cooldown… this just might solve some of our mobility problems.

I understand reaper is supposed to stick to its target by continuously applying chill. But we have 1 gap closer on RS and no suitable initial chill (#5 won’t hit on not-immobile targets) and going out of RS just after the gap closing makes me feel uneasy.

Sure, we have an AoE grab on our gs, but the long cooldown just makes it too risky to initiate.

It would make sense IMO for the Reaper who is a melee spec to have the tools to stick to its target.

PS : many of my pvp friends (and myself) are avoiding Reaper since it’s just too easily kited.

Reaper is crying for an axe fix. Crying… The major thing holding back the reaper is lack of ranged pressure.

#Anetfixaxe

And again, the ranged pressure doesn’t have to be great but it does have to exist.

I’m worried about the Blighter’s Boon nerf. Necromancer couldn’t get access to boons because of Blighter’s boon, but now the trait is bad and the Necromancer still doesnt have boons.

Would have much rather had increased boon application across all trait lines than the 25% or whatever increased heal they gave.

I think-wait Bhawb’s been here and said everything I would say….only much more organized and not in a jumbled mess.

So! Tagging on my two cents, reaper feels great, I think it can do well in PvP even after the BB nerf, but we still need work and changes to the core primarily now. I’m just worried that instead of bringing core necromancer up to reaper, they’ll nerf reaper down to core necromancer….which would make me a very sad panda.

I’ve been playing PvP with Axe/Focus instead of Staff and have been pleasantly surprised. With the 10% damage talent Axe 2 really lays into people now. Additionally Axe 1 can’t be body blocked so anyone that stays in range takes continuous damage. On Reaper at least I’m enjoying axe more than I expected.

nearlight.3064:

Rez/transfusion/heal support (no room to take blood magic with reaper, and blood magic doesn’t give enough persoanal sustain).

I don’t know that I agree with this one. I’ve been running Blood/Reaper/Spite just fine lately. Blighter’s Boon gives a lot of sustain through Unholy Feast + Spiteful Spirit + Chilling Victory (which also gives a lot with Sigil of Hydromancy), then you sprinkle some siphoned power, Reaper’s Might, and Life From Death + all the multi-hit abilities Reaper has with siphons, and there’s a bunch of passive regen going around. You even get to use Transfusion more often!

I’ve been trying something like this lately, and I’ve been enjoying it quite a bit!

My major gripes with variations on it are that I still miss Vital Persistence more than I should, I really wish Reaper’s Onslaught’s cooldown refresh was slightly easier to obtain (for even MORE Transfusions!), I can’t seem to get away from Blighter’s Boon even after the nerf, and every time I slot in ‘Suffer!’ I run into a shield Warrior or Guardian who blocks me and makes me wish I had put in ‘Nothing Can Save You!’ instead. >:{

Notes
- Leeching Bolts not healing through shroud is pretty awful and destroys a lot of synergy that could be had with our Dark Fields + Soul Spiral. They’re neat on Grave Digger though!
- You get a proc of Blighter’s Boon for each foe hit with Unholy Feast/Spiteful Spirit.
- You get 3 procs of Blighter’s Boon each time Plague’s stability pulses.
*I haven’t yet tested how Plague’kittens work against chilled foes when you have Chilling Victory. I really wish you could add chill to Plague, instead of cripple.
- Blighter’s Boon’s tooltip is always less than the actual healing it gives.

EDIT: I included a screenshot of the last game I played (badly) tonight. I have no idea if any of those stats are even decent, but it was an enjoyable game!

I just dont agree that curses are ussless .
Im using this build and its very like old dhumfire build sometimes it seams just slightly op,and beauty of it is that with change of sone sigil and one trait i change to marauder power with same if not better effects:)

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNAW4dn0ICV2g92AmbC0bilgBLuIuEjiUXhpQvKKBEAKXA-TpRHABDcQAKb/hkKDQ2DAAgjAQwXAAA

Sometimes spectral wall dont do any dmg at all and its not Ds ele or zerk.stance wr its just bugged sometimes, even in combat log other condi deals dmg but fear from wall does not…

Exos.3472:

I’m trying to find a use for skill #3 greatsword… 900 range maybe ? Or change it to a second CC since Anet doesn’t want to give us mobility.

I am still kind of bummed that we didn’t get the arti slide on the GS. But yeah, mobility is probably too much to ask for.

I’m not sure I’m playing the same game as everyone I see talking about reaper on the forums…

POWER reaper seems to be the way to go for me, condi reaper seems ok in 1v1’s maybe slightly stronger than power but it has a huge drop off once it’s a teamfight. And the only reason it might be a little stronger in 1v1’s is because power reaper is just easier to kite.

GS is good I don’t want to sound like a kitten an tell everyone to l2p but I get matched against pretty good opponents regularly and I’m able to use GS effectively. It’s just a bit situational but I seem to put myself in situations to use it. Your not going to be spending most of your time on GS and you might think I’m nutz but I go full melee gs d/w with 3 shouts 2 signets marauders amulet and hoelbrek runes spite,curses,reaper. This brings me to curses…. it’s an amazing traitline even on power builds I don’t see how anyone could possible think a transfer that corrupts and stacks might, another corrupt, and aoe weakness and weakness on crit could possibly be bad.

Only issues I’ve had with my build has been rangers and daredevils ( regular theives get eaten alive) and the occasional DH catching me when I don’t have a stunbreak.

With the shouts healing me, sol healing me, 2 condi transfers condi duration reduction from hoelbrek and the constant might spam, weakness spam, plenty of precision due to fury marauder amulet and target the weak, boon corrupts for those pesky boon spammer and plenty of cc courtesy of gs, d/w, and of course the damage reduction from reaper line the constant weakness and of course Rise all contribute to what I have found to be the best Power reaper build available.

NeXeD.3042:

I’m not sure I’m playing the same game as everyone I see talking about reaper on the forums…

POWER reaper seems to be the way to go for me, condi reaper seems ok in 1v1’s maybe slightly stronger than power but it has a huge drop off once it’s a teamfight. And the only reason it might be a little stronger in 1v1’s is because power reaper is just easier to kite.

GS is good I don’t want to sound like a kitten an tell everyone to l2p but I get matched against pretty good opponents regularly and I’m able to use GS effectively. It’s just a bit situational but I seem to put myself in situations to use it. Your not going to be spending most of your time on GS and you might think I’m nutz but I go full melee gs d/w with 3 shouts 2 signets marauders amulet and hoelbrek runes spite,curses,reaper. This brings me to curses…. it’s an amazing traitline even on power builds I don’t see how anyone could possible think a transfer that corrupts and stacks might, another corrupt, and aoe weakness and weakness on crit could possibly be bad.

Only issues I’ve had with my build has been rangers and daredevils ( regular theives get eaten alive) and the occasional DH catching me when I don’t have a stunbreak.

With the shouts healing me, sol healing me, 2 condi transfers condi duration reduction from hoelbrek and the constant might spam, weakness spam, plenty of precision due to fury marauder amulet and target the weak, boon corrupts for those pesky boon spammer and plenty of cc courtesy of gs, d/w, and of course the damage reduction from reaper line the constant weakness and of course Rise all contribute to what I have found to be the best Power reaper build available.

Can you post your build? It sounds very similar to mine. I’ve run D/W with GS a lot. All melee is a big gamble but I love the utilities and situational buffs it gives.

Interesting.

You are specializing in RS skill 2, our main movement gap closer – I actually remember this skill being quite deadly on celestial necromancers, since we could follow up with fears, immob an other nice stuff once up close.

I think the main reason we are failling is because we just went full pve (valkyrie amulet, wurm rune + spite + SR + reaper and 0 sustain since BB got hammernerfed).

NeXeD.3042:

I’m not sure I’m playing the same game as everyone I see talking about reaper on the forums…

POWER reaper seems to be the way to go for me, condi reaper seems ok in 1v1’s maybe slightly stronger than power but it has a huge drop off once it’s a teamfight. And the only reason it might be a little stronger in 1v1’s is because power reaper is just easier to kite.

GS is good I don’t want to sound like a kitten an tell everyone to l2p but I get matched against pretty good opponents regularly and I’m able to use GS effectively. It’s just a bit situational but I seem to put myself in situations to use it. Your not going to be spending most of your time on GS and you might think I’m nutz but I go full melee gs d/w with 3 shouts 2 signets marauders amulet and hoelbrek runes spite,curses,reaper. This brings me to curses…. it’s an amazing traitline even on power builds I don’t see how anyone could possible think a transfer that corrupts and stacks might, another corrupt, and aoe weakness and weakness on crit could possibly be bad.

Only issues I’ve had with my build has been rangers and daredevils ( regular theives get eaten alive) and the occasional DH catching me when I don’t have a stunbreak.

With the shouts healing me, sol healing me, 2 condi transfers condi duration reduction from hoelbrek and the constant might spam, weakness spam, plenty of precision due to fury marauder amulet and target the weak, boon corrupts for those pesky boon spammer and plenty of cc courtesy of gs, d/w, and of course the damage reduction from reaper line the constant weakness and of course Rise all contribute to what I have found to be the best Power reaper build available.

While I do think marauder reaper is probably more viable now than ever before, I will just say that I feel as though condi reaper has a more powerful niche at the moment. Basically the meta on all the super sustainy builds on other classes has shifted away from maximum AoE condi cleanse as a result of having to drop a line to pick up their new elite specs, such as earth/air cele tempest (beware the occasional diamondskint though) or mesmers dropping inspiration for chronomancer. Also since minstrels got axed, shoutguard and shoutwar don’t really have the base survivability needed to hold a point in a teamfight while rezzing and shedding condis AoE, so they’re much less common. As of now, the most common cele-support build in the meta is druid, and they’re much weaker to condition pressure than bunker guard or D/D ele ever were. As I’ve said, most tempest builds are relatively condition weak, dragonhunter is condition weak if it runs full traps, and still relatively weak with contemplation of purity, herald gets kittened with condis, and scrapper is only slightly less condi weak than normal engineers.

And condi reaper is the best case to deal with these builds because reaper raises its condi damage output through the roof, to the point where you don’t even need terror anymore. Chill is very strong pressure even though people have lots of ways to cleanse it right now, and being able to cleave burn stacks and poison burst is very strong. In fact I think the biggest thing holding condi necro back was base death shroud’s lack of sustained condi pressure, and reaper completely fixes that. I don’t necessarily agree with Nos that full on signets is the best way to go though. I prefer carrion spite/SR/reaper aristocracy/grenth/nightmare runes with heal shout, flesh wurm, corrupt boon, and either rise or plague signet myself. I take spite mainly for bitter chill and chill of death, and then use spiteful spirit for a bit more boon rip. I haven’t felt as much of a lack of pressure in teamfights as I felt on condi necro in the previous meta though.

nekretaal.6485:

Reaper is crying for an axe fix. Crying… The major thing holding back the reaper is lack of ranged pressure.

#Anetfixaxe

And again, the ranged pressure doesn’t have to be great but it does have to exist.

I’m worried about the Blighter’s Boon nerf. Necromancer couldn’t get access to boons because of Blighter’s boon, but now the trait is bad and the Necromancer still doesnt have boons.

Would have much rather had increased boon application across all trait lines than the 25% or whatever increased heal they gave.

Axe DPS with cele or soldier is useless, but it’s actually amazing with Marauder. It’s easy to underestimate the DPS we can get from a weapon that can’t be juked/reflected. I think that’s why the axe goes so well with the GS. Although independently they can be complained about (low axe damage, slow GS attacks), they can really work in tandem if you’re willing to use an aggressive amulet.

I find that most of the reaper is excellent but the GS is just not good in PvP. Just made a pretty comprehensive post about it.

If the GS gets buffed, I’d be pretty set.

nearlight.3064:

I prefer carrion spite/SR/reaper aristocracy/grenth/nightmare runes with heal shout, flesh wurm, corrupt boon, and either rise or plague signet myself. I take spite mainly for bitter chill and chill of death, and then use spiteful spirit for a bit more boon rip.

If running Rise, are you also running Augury of Death? If that’s the case, how much have you explored ‘NCSY!’ as a swap for Corrupt Boon?

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBhQD7kZTobTsyGwzGgeTsgLYxVxuYYE6qFAWARbt81HA-TpQQAB1WGAg9HAA

sigils are up to you but i suggest at least hydromancy, energy, and the new quickness + swiftness sigil.

@dristig ive seen a few of your posts lately i was fairly confident you were using something similar to mine as well and enjoying it.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBhOD7kjGooGsbTwcTgeTsgLYxXxu4YE6qFAaBRbg819C-TJhBwAAeCA82fIyFBocZAA

This is the build I put together, I have had lots of fun with it, the main goal was doubling synergies (if you chill add vulnerability, if vulnerable add crit, etc)

Dead.5829:

nearlight.3064:

I prefer carrion spite/SR/reaper aristocracy/grenth/nightmare runes with heal shout, flesh wurm, corrupt boon, and either rise or plague signet myself. I take spite mainly for bitter chill and chill of death, and then use spiteful spirit for a bit more boon rip.

If running Rise, are you also running Augury of Death? If that’s the case, how much have you explored ‘NCSY!’ as a swap for Corrupt Boon?

You can run rise if you want. As for augury, even with two or three shouts I’d prefer to have -% on movement impairing conditions since if you play condi, you’re positioning is more important for Survival than anything else, and shrugging off that soft CC is huge (especially against immob, since immob=death).

The boon rip shout could work, but corrupt boon is just better since it Gives you more leverage to convert stability off of someone trying to Rez/stomp.

Marauder, no SR, only one stun break, going into teamfights, you certainly like to live dangerously Nexed.

And Halcyion, 0 stun break with rampager, I would only try that when I’m on tilt. :p

50% damage reduction on a very reasonable cooldown, bb, 10% more damage reduction against chilled foes, leeching shouts (not that it’s very much but you spam the kitten out of that heal shout against some people), constant weakness, 2 stunbreaks sort of. The only reason I’m not running 2 stunbreak utils, and double energy sigils is because of reapers access to stability.

Well, I’ll say nearlight might be right about this whole condi business.

And I can’t tell you how useful Rise’s minions are for dealing with… everything, but especially Dragonhunter traps.

At least, this is the most damage I’ve done in an spvp match so far!

I just did a few matches of Stronghold with a couple of friends running this build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBHhF6kZTo5GsbTwzGgeTsYNYSBgQ2vKuDOCThUrgYwkC-TZBCABAcCAw4IAkxDAwn9HavMAA

Empty sigil slot is Sigil of Swiftness.

Pros:

• shrugs off soft CC with ease. With a -58% (-81% in shroud) duration on movement impairment conditions plus constant shedding of conditions in shroud, soft CC is virtually a non-factor. Plus, Death’s Charge ignores cripple and chill’s movement reductions.
• High sustain. With high life force generation and Unholy Sanctuary (ticks 200hp/second), this build is almost impossible to outlast. It gets to be extremely durable in the presence of stronghold NPC’s.
• High damage reduction. Rise, 3.1k armor, and Cold Shoulder. Oh, and lower uptime damage reduction from CPC and Beyond the Veil.
• Strong damage. With the ease of hitting 100% crit chance in shroud and easily being able to hit 30+% out of it, as well as sporting 2206 Power (2387 in Shroud) without Might, the build can deliver some decently hefty hits.
• Good stomp denier. With 5 hard CC’s available to deny channels, this tends to work well.
• Good stomper. With good Stability and Reaper’s Onslaught speeding it up, many stomps are picked up with reliability. Chilled to the Bone can also do wonders to secure a stomp in a teamfight. CPC garuntees stomps against Warriors and Engineers as well as negating Revenant Slow. Nightfall helps out when everything else is unavailable.

Cons:

• Very little team support. Limited to just a couple of hard CC’s and CPC. Plague Signet passive is not available very often, due to shroud and use.
• Only one stunbreak. Often needed to get rid of a large stack of conditions instead of breaking stun. Mitigated by Runes of Melandru.
• Poor boonstripping abilities. Although I’ve gotten top player for boonstrips in a couple matches, Unholy Feast is the only way the build can accomplish it. You’re looking at luck to get anything worthwhile.
• No Z-axis mobility. Less of a problem in Stronghold, but still a thing.

I first ran the build with Blighter’s Boon, then realized boon generation was terrible and swapped it for Reaper’s Onslaught.

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

I just did a few matches of Stronghold with a couple of friends running this build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBHhF6kZTo5GsbTwzGgeTsYNYSBgQ2vKuDOCThUrgYwkC-TZBCABAcCAw4IAkxDAwn9HavMAA

Empty sigil slot is Sigil of Swiftness.

Pros:

• shrugs off soft CC with ease. With a -58% (-81% in shroud) duration on movement impairment conditions plus constant shedding of conditions in shroud, soft CC is virtually a non-factor. Plus, Death’s Charge ignores cripple and chill’s movement reductions.
• High sustain. With high life force generation and Unholy Sanctuary (ticks 200hp/second), this build is almost impossible to outlast. It gets to be extremely durable in the presence of stronghold NPC’s.
• High damage reduction. Rise, 3.1k armor, and Cold Shoulder. Oh, and lower uptime damage reduction from CPC and Beyond the Veil.
• Strong damage. With the ease of hitting 100% crit chance in shroud and easily being able to hit 30+% out of it, as well as sporting 2206 Power (2387 in Shroud) without Might, the build can deliver some decently hefty hits.
• Good stomp denier. With 5 hard CC’s available to deny channels, this tends to work well.
• Good stomper. With good Stability and Reaper’s Onslaught speeding it up, many stomps are picked up with reliability. Chilled to the Bone can also do wonders to secure a stomp in a teamfight. CPC garuntees stomps against Warriors and Engineers as well as negating Revenant Slow. Nightfall helps out when everything else is unavailable.

Cons:

• Very little team support. Limited to just a couple of hard CC’s and CPC. Plague Signet passive is not available very often, due to shroud and use.
• Only one stunbreak. Often needed to get rid of a large stack of conditions instead of breaking stun. Mitigated by Runes of Melandru.
• Poor boonstripping abilities. Although I’ve gotten top player for boonstrips in a couple matches, Unholy Feast is the only way the build can accomplish it. You’re looking at luck to get anything worthwhile.
• No Z-axis mobility. Less of a problem in Stronghold, but still a thing.

I first ran the build with Blighter’s Boon, then realized boon generation was terrible and swapped it for Reaper’s Onslaught.

Reaper’s onslaught speeds up stomps?

NeXeD.3042:

Reaper’s onslaught speeds up stomps?

Yeah I need to see some evidence on that. I’m not seeing it that way.

NeXeD.3042:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

I just did a few matches of Stronghold with a couple of friends running this build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBHhF6kZTo5GsbTwzGgeTsYNYSBgQ2vKuDOCThUrgYwkC-TZBCABAcCAw4IAkxDAwn9HavMAA

Empty sigil slot is Sigil of Swiftness.

Pros:

• shrugs off soft CC with ease. With a -58% (-81% in shroud) duration on movement impairment conditions plus constant shedding of conditions in shroud, soft CC is virtually a non-factor. Plus, Death’s Charge ignores cripple and chill’s movement reductions.
• High sustain. With high life force generation and Unholy Sanctuary (ticks 200hp/second), this build is almost impossible to outlast. It gets to be extremely durable in the presence of stronghold NPC’s.
• High damage reduction. Rise, 3.1k armor, and Cold Shoulder. Oh, and lower uptime damage reduction from CPC and Beyond the Veil.
• Strong damage. With the ease of hitting 100% crit chance in shroud and easily being able to hit 30+% out of it, as well as sporting 2206 Power (2387 in Shroud) without Might, the build can deliver some decently hefty hits.
• Good stomp denier. With 5 hard CC’s available to deny channels, this tends to work well.
• Good stomper. With good Stability and Reaper’s Onslaught speeding it up, many stomps are picked up with reliability. Chilled to the Bone can also do wonders to secure a stomp in a teamfight. CPC garuntees stomps against Warriors and Engineers as well as negating Revenant Slow. Nightfall helps out when everything else is unavailable.

Cons:

• Very little team support. Limited to just a couple of hard CC’s and CPC. Plague Signet passive is not available very often, due to shroud and use.
• Only one stunbreak. Often needed to get rid of a large stack of conditions instead of breaking stun. Mitigated by Runes of Melandru.
• Poor boonstripping abilities. Although I’ve gotten top player for boonstrips in a couple matches, Unholy Feast is the only way the build can accomplish it. You’re looking at luck to get anything worthwhile.
• No Z-axis mobility. Less of a problem in Stronghold, but still a thing.

I first ran the build with Blighter’s Boon, then realized boon generation was terrible and swapped it for Reaper’s Onslaught.

Reaper’s onslaught speeds up stomps?

It does. It functions the same way as malicious sorcery for Mesmer, where it’s been documented to speed up stomps and the speed of utility as well as weapon skills, including the heal. Unfortunately since its in shroud, that doesn’t apply to necro heal/utilities, but it does make reaper the best choice for the primary safe stomper on a team.

I’m not totally sure, but I’m pretty sure the 15% bonus doesn’t apply to rezzes.

People keep saying the Reaper is good in sPvP, but I see more threads about why they suck in sPvP than I do people posting builds that work. Which is it?

irishww.7842:

People keep saying the Reaper is good in sPvP, but I see more threads about why they suck in sPvP than I do people posting builds that work. Which is it?

Reaper is good in PvP. The complaints are on the GS auto-attack speed. GS is still a great weapon despite the complaints, just don’t use the auto-attack.

irishww.7842:

People keep saying the Reaper is good in sPvP, but I see more threads about why they suck in sPvP than I do people posting builds that work. Which is it?

We’ll probably have to wait until the ranked season starts to really get a feel. People claim things don’t work against “good” players all the time, but words are wind. We’ll see how things shake out as time progresses, and I’ve seen a few builds pop up re: sPvP in particular that I think have potential.

Cogbyrn.7283:

irishww.7842:

People keep saying the Reaper is good in sPvP, but I see more threads about why they suck in sPvP than I do people posting builds that work. Which is it?

We’ll probably have to wait until the ranked season starts to really get a feel. People claim things don’t work against “good” players all the time, but words are wind. We’ll see how things shake out as time progresses, and I’ve seen a few builds pop up re: sPvP in particular that I think have potential.

And Lannisters always pay their debts.

Cogbyrn.7283:

irishww.7842:

People keep saying the Reaper is good in sPvP, but I see more threads about why they suck in sPvP than I do people posting builds that work. Which is it?

We’ll probably have to wait until the ranked season starts to really get a feel. People claim things don’t work against “good” players all the time, but words are wind. We’ll see how things shake out as time progresses, and I’ve seen a few builds pop up re: sPvP in particular that I think have potential.

Yeah, people said tempest overloads wouldn’t work against good players, but considering how nearly every ele main at the top level on NA is taking up aurashare tempest, that says a lot for how wrong people can be. Just because something is so slow or has a long cast time doesn’t mean it can’t wreck face.