Guild Wars 2

Ok, now i’ve gotten quite a bit more experience with the necro…and I think I see what the developers were going for and kinda what they ended up with. Be warned i’m trying to avoid a wall of text but it might happen regardless.

Death-shroud: “Ok, Necromancer is all about being a bringer of death. The second lifebar mechanic is nice, but lets add some abilities that show necromancers mean buisness! Even better lets let people augment the mode to their playstyle!” I think that is what they were thinking when they came up with this… but it is clunky to say the least. Not only does it make us a highly visible target but the traits and the lines they are in don’t synergize. Ok we have a trait that makes DS pierce and cause vulnerability, but lets put it in a line not where minion masters could take natural advantage of it. On top of that lets put everything in DS on long cast times and cooldowns then reduce the attack speed to painfully slow.

Fear: As far as I can tell no other class can reliably put fear up like the necromancer. However this condition does…nothing. Yes it interrupts, and is useful if not lifesaving. But as a control mechanic, and it took me a while to realize that this IS our reliable control mechanic, it falls flat. When a thief can steal an AoE fear that lasts 3 seconds at range, well they have stolen a fear that is better then ANYTHING a necromancer can normally do. Read that again, they STEAL an ability that is better then what the class can naturally do even with traits! To make it worse all our cooldowns with fear last upwards to at least 40 seconds. I have verified that a thief could steal and fear about 2 times easily if traited. So not only do they get our control but better, they can use it more often!

Conditions: This is pretty much the trade of the Necromancer. Everything we do leaves a condition of some sort. Well no, actually the staff only one that does not but that is a different matter. Now no other class deals with conditions quite like we do. They basically do the inverse of Guardians in that we are better at turning boons into conditions to their turning conditions into boons. But the problem is that we…kinda lack at it. We have ONE ability that spreads conditions around, and here is the thing. With our corrupting wells, our ability to suck conditions from people around us to send back at foes, and just in general almost everything we do dealing with conditions it has lead me to one conclusion. We are supposed to be the answer to large amounts of damage dealing targets; in pvp terms the “zerg”. But we fall flat because we have a hard time spreading the conditions out, and that is our flaw because conditions is our bread and butter.

TL, DR; I could go on but basically i’m getting tired of, assuming I see this class for what it is, the flaws. We are the class that is supposed to be able to confront large groups and have our power increase. The more people we see the better! But with no burst, trouble spreading conditions, very limited CC, and basically what feels like a half backed class. This is not me saying that the class is ineffectual or broken however! It is like a hybrid car, if you take the battery out can you still drive it? Yes. Is it as good as it could/should be? Not really. Can we play this class while succeeding and enjoy it? Yes. Is it as good as it could/should be? Not really.

I would recommend you try out a real solid conditionmancer build such as this one: https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Post-Your-Build-Thread/462406

You can spread a lot of conditions with epidemic.

I agree thats one thing you have wrong, we spread conditions better than we even produce them. Our ability to SPREAD conditions is fantastic, whats funny is that we personally dont produce as many bleeds or vulnerabilities as other classes such as ranger or sometimes a thief.
We have plenty of ways to SPREAD them, epidemic, dagger4, plague signet, 3 ways right there. And epidemics cd is really really short for a utility.

Although I definitely agree with you that death shroud is extremely limiting, I personally really enjoy the death shroud animation. You’re right, that it makes us a visible target, but who wants to target the necro with an extra 18k hp saved up before they can even deal any damage? With our high base health pool, mediocre damage, and death shroud, we are not priority targets… even if we are easily spotted out of a group. As for the extra “stance” options for more offensive or defensive abilities in death shroud, I agree entirely.

I also agree that something needs to be done about the fear mechanic in this game. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe at one point it actually had a long enough duration to justify giving thieves, rangers, and warriors 3 second fears. I definitely understand the short duration on the staff fear. Not only does it have the potential to fear 5 targets simultaneously, but I could only imagine the havoc it would create in PvE with that idiot necro in the back of the group spamming an aoe 5 second fear every time it’s off cool-down. Instead, perhaps an additional condition or a higher base damage to compensate would put the staff #5 in line with the other marks. As others on this forum have already mentioned, I’d really like to see the single target death shroud fear duration be increased. On the same token, I’d also like to see the duration of the fears other classes have decreased (although I’d settle for just an increase on ours).

And I think Jaydee already explained our state of condition manipulation quite well.

@Kayotik I think we ‘are’ a priority target. If people leave us alone in a team battle our condition manipulation can turn the tide of battles extremely easily.

Putrid mark > epidemic, or maybe a corrupt boon into epidemic and the group wipes because all the conditions are transfered.

Or maybe a plague signet into epidemic.

Or even just Marks spam, conditions hitting multiple targets with an AOE fear every so often.

Plus people attack necros cause they’re easy targets. We are easily CC’d, we don’t stealth so the target locks dont get disabled, and people know once Death Shroud is down we can get bursted so fast its not even funny. I see people just sit around waiting for me to drop my Shroud even from time or just I had to drop or else lose all my Life force, and once it drops they completely burst me in a few seconds or CC chain me until I die.

Its also why warriors/eles are easy targets. They dont break locks and usually run very fragile builds. However if you leave them alone they can wreck your face. Also their downed state is very weak just like ours. You just need two people for a stomp on a warrior, necro, only 1 for an ele.

If you feel so confident about us being a priority target in PvP, then why do you think we ever “fell short” of anything. From what I’ve determined, the nerfs we got before the games release were necessary. I think they may have gone overboard with them, and they definitely broke many abilities/traits in the process… but I think as soon as all of the bugs get worked out, we’ll be in a decent spot.

If you’re concerned about being focused, build tankier. In Spvp I’m using a 1600 toughness 27k hp build that, despite being extremely tanky, still performs a moderate amount of damage. The necromancer class wasn’t designed to be squishy and rely on avoidance abilities. We are a higher damage guardian-higher survivability warrior that primarily attacks from range. You don’t see either of those classes with stealth.

People attack necromancers because they think we’re squishy. Between death shroud, consume conditions, plague form, back into death shroud, consume conditions again, and the ability to have 100% up-time on protection with easy condition removal and high base health, I’d much rather them target me than a variety of other classes using more offensive builds. The fact that we don’t have easy access to a longer duration stability is our only major drawback (Although I could definitely list a few minor ones).

If you know for a fact that you’ll be a focus target, try activating spectral walk before even getting in melee range, and then once they blow all their CC on you, use the second portion to stun break and position yourself behind your allies. Use protection early, open at 1200 range, make sure your life force generators will be up immediately after exiting death shroud… just don’t run into a 5v3 and wonder why they blew you up in 10 seconds.

Oh, and our down state is on par with almost every class aside from mesmer, thief, and of course the elementalist.

I do worry about being focused and I have built for tankier. But I felt the trade off for the increase in tankiness isn’t worth the loss in damage.

I feel the counter pressure damage is more defensive than actual defense. By forcing them to do defensive counter measures it is an indirect defense. I see thieves all the time try to burst me hard, and I would die even if I went full tank eventually. The more chances they have to open on me and burst when they see fit the more chance I have to eventually die. It is better to instead counter pressure with damage as if they make a mistake and overpress they’ll realize they’re going to get downed quickly and this happens a lot more often than people realize.

And the lack of stability/invults/stealth/mobility/CC IS part of being squishy. Sure if you look at all our healthbars it would look like we have a massive advantage in sheer numbers. And it will be that if people don’t know what they’re doing versus necros. CC absolutely destroys necros so bad. If they’re cc’ing us, they don’t have to worry about defense. The cc in itself is a defense. Stealth is a defense, mobility is a defense.

So here’s why we’re squishy and why people target us. Yes you pointed it out a little on the lack of avoidance. They just keep wailing on us, we can’t escape, and can be easily cc’d out of our heals.

And yes, I do agree with you that I actually want them to attack me. I ‘want’ to be a priority target. We can handle the most punishment and a lot of our traits/skills/abilities rely on us taking damage. And what better way than us who can build life force (as a seperate healt bar) compared to other classes?

You do state about the range we should fight at. I think medium range is best, it takes advantage of our marks the best, wells, and fields. I personally die to rangers sometimes if they are allowed to keep it at super long range. Staff autos move so kitten slow, and marks suck at such a long range don’t get to benefit from the regen.

And yes I agree the fear is too short. I feel 1.5 seconds is perfect. Half a second more and it should be okay.

And our downed state is not on par with other classes. Here the order I feel goes the best for downed states.

Mesmer>Thief>Guardian>Ranger>Warrior>Necromancer>Engineer>Elementalist

We are 6th out of 8.

Mesmers and thieves abilities can’t be blocked/blinded for a stomp. They can pick any target and it will still go off.

Guardian and ranger are next because they are AOE. Guardian is more useful due to knockback.

Warrior is next due to Revenge.

Then it comes to us, we have a single target fear.

Engineers are here because their first skill to come up actually brings the foe closer to them, which is pretty awful. However the second skill actually blows up.

Elementalist cause you know why.

If you knowingly built squishier for more damage, then you really shouldn’t be complaining about the survivability. I agree that putting your enemy on the defensive early in a fight is a huge advantage, but the ability to do so comes at a price… I’m sure you already realize this.

Like I already mentioned, we don’t have many avoidance abilities simply because, as a class, we were designed to be tankier- In the same way guardians, warriors, and engineers are. Could you imagine giving a guardian an escaping teleport? Or a warrior stealth? That’s the tradeoff we accept by playing a tankier caster.

I agree that the extra health pool and toughness does not guarantee a victory- and if it did, ArenaNet would have been doing an extremely bad job at balancing the game. You also stated that our biggest problem is dealing with CC. I can agree entirely. But we aren’t the only class that is affected by CC in the same way. Most tankier classes, though, have forms of stability to resolve this issue (which I did mention was a major problem we face).

When I mentioned fighting at 1200 range, I was under the assumption that you were using a glassier build, and in which case the best form of defense is proper positioning and correct timing on when you engage. The difference of a few seconds can mean a great deal. However, since you said that you’re running a tankier build, completely disregard that.

As for the fear, you can invest 20 points in soul reaping to pick up 50% more fear duration. Or place points in spite for up to 30% duration. Both of those are pretty easy to pick up without going far out of your way, but I don’t think you’ll really see any noticeable difference with a .5 second duration twice every minute.

As for the downed states- I agree that in 1v1 situations, the necromancer’s is extremely lacking. Keep in mind though, that the #1 skill actually drains life from your target and helps to mitigate the blood loss while simultaneously dealing damage. This literally forces the enemy to finish you. Otherwise, you’ll remain in downed state, continuing to deal damage, longer than any other class. In PvE, this is a much greater advantage. In PvP though, through a combination of both your own and your allies’ cc… oh who am I kidding? You’re right. Our downed-state fear needs to be an AoE.

Jaydee.8143:

I agree thats one thing you have wrong, we spread conditions better than we even produce them. Our ability to SPREAD conditions is fantastic, whats funny is that we personally dont produce as many bleeds or vulnerabilities as other classes such as ranger or sometimes a thief.
We have plenty of ways to SPREAD them, epidemic, dagger4, plague signet, 3 ways right there. And epidemics cd is really really short for a utility.

Actually no, that is not spreading that is transferring and usually single target unless other people are really close with dagger4. Epidemic is really the only ability we have that actually SPREADS rather then move conditions from ourselves to our enemy. even then it doesn’t really spread. Even with a short(er) cooldown with traits you still are waiting 10 seconds to spread again. The only other skill I would stretch to call spreading would be plague form, but that has a large cooldown and isn’t useful in a world where everyone and their dog can cleanse since it does not build them up quickly and limits you from doing anything other then adding one of three conditions at a time.

Spreading would be more if say staff1 acted like the elemental lighting staff1. I.E. it bounces between many targets inflicting conditions. But the thing is if you think about it, with all our AoE we still don’t actually have much AoE. Take our wells that corrupt or transform boons/conditions. Why exactly do we have two separate wells that do pretty much the same thing? Further why do we have to trait 20 points to make that actually useful? Even pve if something has that many boons that I need to go out of my way to corrupt them, it probably isn’t something that I want to stand anywhere near.

@Kayotik.5790, I enjoy the animation for Death Shroud and I think the look of it, the staff, and lich form are pretty much the defining looks for necromancer. (I personally would like to see something done for each of the necromancer weapons, or at least scepter but that is asthetics.) The point I wast trying to state though is to augment the already clunky mechanics you have to go into lines that may have little synergy with what you might naturally expect, such as having vulnerability in a tree outside of the minion tree. On top of that the mode is not really that much a threat in and of itself considering even with the 25% drain reduction you might get 3 shots in combat before you hit 50% and your damage goes down the toilet. For something that makes us stand out, it does not really match the natural threat it puts us in. On further reflection I would say the same for lich form. Yes it does good damage, but do we really need to be Godzilla sized for the duration? I would think the ALL GLOWY GREEN BODY would be a big enough hint to other players.

Furthermore, I want to reiterate that we as a class are pretty limited. As was stated previously the large health pool and second lifebar does not make up entirely for poor cc and few defensive options. Even with all that we can still be rather squishy since we, being shoehorned into being conditionmancers, are more limited then even the supposedly weak elementalist if we wish to compete. We have the option of minions or conditions, but not much else. We cannot burst, we cannot reflect, we cannot control, and our conditions are harder to spread despite that our entire point is to spread conditions. Our mechanic is clunky and both it and our 30 point elite make us stand out needlessly for what they actually are. This does not mean the class is stupid or broken, but it is make a clanking noise under the hood that probably needs to be looked at.

I recently created a new character, a necromancer, but after reading this thread, I am a bit worried I won’t enjoy the build. So far I’ve reached level 10 but am very squishy and am not happy with my damage output and survivability.

@Lynspottery: It isn’t a bad class or even broken. But it is a very rough cut gem of a class. I love caster classes and this is pretty much the toughest to kill caster I have ever played, even beating the mesmer. However it does have serious drawbacks, the lack of burst and reliable and accessible cc to name a few. Also get used to fighting from your back, you will do so a lot. But on the other hand, no other class really can keep fighting when they get downed, every other class it is a desperate battle but as a necro getting downed doesn’t faze me all that much.

Don’t get me wrong, the class is far from ideal. But if you play it you might find that it is still pretty enjoyable. I bring up my complaints not because I feel the class sucks, but because I get frustrated at seeing what the class is as opposed to what the class seems to want to be. Go with a scepter/dagger+staff build and give it a go. You can’t really tell what a class is about till about 30.

I too have noticed the shoehorning into being either a conditionmancer or minion master build for PvP. The main thing i’m unhappy about is the ridiculously short CC, if none at all. We’ve got a couple of freezes on hand, but they’re short and don’t end up lengthening the cooldown of our enemies as much as what proves useful. I would really like to see staff5 to reach 2s or even 3s(like others) fear.

Countless times have i seen and experienced a 1v1 between a necro and thief and watched it end in less than 10 seconds. I’m pretty sure we know how pathetic our burst potential can be.

Also, fix the siphon health and healing power scaling confusion please, it shouldn’t take 25+ points in the blood magic tree to do decent healing.