Guild Wars 2

I’ve been mostly using the Blood Fiend as my #6, but something about this has been bugging me a bit which I finally twigged today: in general I do not receive any healing from it.

I find the Blood Fiend to be the better of the set of possible Necromancer pets/minions (if it should be classed as such), in that it seems to do pretty good damage, it gets ‘stuck in’ and it draws a lot of agro to itself. The mobs definitely seem to prefer to attack it than myself.

So in general when I’m engaging a mob, its attention gets focussed onto the Blood Fiend allowing me to manage the mob at range and I don’t take any damage. Because of this, any hits that the Blood Fiend makes are not providing me with healing as I simply don’t need any. If and when the Blood Fiend gets very low on health (which seems to be a good time to sacrifice it for its main healing ability), I don’t do this as I’m still generally unharmed.

It’s only if it dies that I’m then ‘exposed’ to any mobs and may start taking some damage, but during that time the Blood Fiend is on cool down (i.e. when is healing abilities would actually be of benefit). Hmm.

I like the Blood Fiend and definitely find it to be useful, but it seems, in PvE, that its role becomes that of a minion rather than a ‘healing spell’. Ironically, if I did not use the Blood Fiend, I would for sure be taking all of the mobs’ agro onto myself and actually have need of its healing ability.

Perhaps I’m making too much of all this and in fact it’s just good game design; the other healing spells give you more healing, but you’re more likely to take more damage so things even out overall.

I’d just like to ask what healing spell people choose to use in PvE and their reasons for doing so.

Thanks :-)

Consume Conditions.

I really see no other option. Blood fiend is still good, but if you’re in a long battle, summoning the blood fiend then desummoning him right away for health is going to slow you down. Some conditions last a long time and keep you in combat while they’re up as well. So, without a shred of doubt, consume conditions is the best.

I used blood fiend for a long time, but I found I never paid attention to its health and it always died before I could heal.

Not just that, I found it always died BEFORE I needed to heal, then the enemy would go after me and I’d need a heal but its on cooldown. Try Well of Blood. It has a high heal amount and heal over time. You can combine blast finishers for extra healing I believe, and it also helps allies if you do PvE with friends.

I personally never use consume conditions unless I’m in PvP or a specific dungeon encounter where I know theres going to be a lot of conditions

I use Well of Blood, a very nice support heal for myself and team.

Consume Conditions mostly. To make full use of Well of Blood we need to stand still, and the game is not really built around “tank and spank”. Add to this the cooldown is 5 seconds longer than Consume Conditions. Tho i may opt for it if i am speced for back row support and have wells traited for ground targeting.

blood fiend is nice choice on easier areas where you dont need heals, but in dungeons or www consume conditions is lot more reliable.

I run a “Cleric’s” minion master build and I use well of blood it’s not essential for keeping my minions up but it does provide a nice burst if I they need it. I rarely need to heal myself at all since I keep regeneration rolling indefinitely and the minions tank pretty much all of the damage and draw my conditions.

What do you mean which? Necromancers have only one healing ability which is Consume Conditions

I like to run a Wells build, so my personal leaning is towards Well of Blood. If you’re good with Bone Minions and a staff, you can actually set off quite a few blast combos within the well. Considering my PvE build has a ton of blind as well, it’s not hard for me to keep foes off my back during the wells time.

However as others have said, if you’re going into PvP Consume Condition really is the only option.

I’ve fond that Blood Minion is just all around a weak skill. It suffers the main crippling problem that the other Minions have and that is a low health pool. It simply dies too fast, resulting in 0 net gain in health. The paltry amount that it heals you for noming it doesn’t justify the ‘health gain’ that it’s siphoning does due to its incredibly short life span. And that’s assuming you nom it before it kicks the bucket.

Thanks for the replies folks, good food for thought. I haven’t tried Consume Conditions as yet (I didn’t find well of blood particularly useful overall) so I’ll give that a try.

Swadow.6213:

What do you mean which?

Ah, I do apologise, I should have made it clear that I was not referring to representing a specified antecedant, but instead its use related to making a choice. English can be tricky to use in a non-ambiguous manner at times :-)

Depends on the situation. If it’s a condition-heavy dungeon, I’ll use Consume Conditions for myself, and have my Well of Power available for myself and allies. If the dungeon is more non-condition damage-heavy, I use Well of Blood for myself and allies. In WvW, it’s Consume Conditions hands-down. I don’t even bother with the Blood Fiend at all.

Depending on my build, I either run Well of Blood or Consume Conditions. I can’t actually remember when I last used my blood fiend, it’s just bad overall in my opinion… The thing I dislike the most about it is that it’s a pet, and pets can be killed. So if you’re unlucky, your heal is dead when you need it. I’d rather run with something reliable that I know is available to me whenever I need it.

Well of Blood. It gives me three seconds of protection. Yum.

Consume conditions.

I wish Blood fiend wasn’t so weak and prone to attracting aggro, otherwise I’d probably use that.

Well of blood, it heals me and my golem.

Thanks again for the replies folks.

I’m currently levelling up my Necromancer and also a Mesmer.

I find that I have far better control over the battlefield with the Mesmer; she’s died just once thus far due to me being stupid and biting off far more than I could chew, but I was dying all the time when playing the Necromancer to the point where I simply wasn’t enjoying the game. Admittedly, that was mainly because I’m very new to the game and its mechanics.

Since switching back to the Necromancer and re-working her build, I’m doing much better. How all this relates to this thread is that I find using the Blood Fiend gives me a degree of control over the battlefield (at least, until it drops dead), which I find I lose when using a different healing ability. I’ve tried using other minions for this purpose, but they’re just not worth using up skill slots for IMO.

When I first started playing, I actually thought that DS #4 healed you :-D Would that be over powered, or a sensible change? It does nice AOE but I don’t see that the 3% LF steal is of any value. I can’t tell from the wiki if DS skills cost LF or if it’s just the passive loss of LF that’s happening, but I don’t personally see the point of ‘gaining’ LF from DS #4.

As my first character, I love my Necromancer and I’m going to stick with her. Having said that, my Mesmer has better ranged, better CQC, better AOE, better ‘minions’ (read: clones and phantasms), better healing abilities and better control over the battlefield. Oh, and just to rub it in, seemingly better condition management (isn’t that supposed to be the feather in the Necromancer’s cap?)

I dunno, perhaps it’s just because the Necromancer is a harder profession to play and I need to up my game considerably.

I personally use the blood fiend, but I’m running a pure minion master build, so it’s much more effective on me than lets say consume conditions.

In PvP I’d either run consume conditions or have to take the trait that transferred conditions from me to my minions.

CC. Make sure to pop Blood is Power and Epidemic before using it.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Which-healing-skill-do-you-use-in-PvE/436910

This is a very good idea for condition builds ive found.

I just rolled a Necro over the weekend and found the same thing to be true of the Blood Fiend as the OP. He held aggro, I didn’t need heals, he died, I need heals, he’s on CD.

I now use WoB and am much happier. While staying immobile isn’t ideal, the well is big enough that I can still dodge and stay in it. Unfortunately, if I don’t have a minion out, I’m getting pounded on in a group of mobs.

Consume Conditions really isn’t useful for me yet because at 16 nothing is really spreading conditions.

Consume Conditions, easily the best option and even if there are not many conditions present in an area. speaking from lvl 80 perspective (disclaimer: using a skills/traits setup with the least amount of bugs). with the right build, you wont need minions to control the battlefield or wells for that matter, and still be able to take on 3-5 mobs.

Seras.5702:

I just rolled a Necro over the weekend and found the same thing to be true of the Blood Fiend as the OP. He held aggro, I didn’t need heals, he died, I need heals, he’s on CD.

I now use WoB and am much happier. While staying immobile isn’t ideal, the well is big enough that I can still dodge and stay in it. Unfortunately, if I don’t have a minion out, I’m getting pounded on in a group of mobs.

Consume Conditions really isn’t useful for me yet because at 16 nothing is really spreading conditions.

Don’t look at it as consume conditions, look at as a nice heal + also consumes some conditions on the side. The heal alone is pretty nice.

I found myself using the Blood Fiend as just a tank as well – and he’s definitely not ideal for that. Now I just get my Flesh Golem to do that and use CC for the heal when necessary.

Also keep in mind even though you may not be getting many conditions from mobs, you might still want to cast spells that put negative effects on you as well. Chain that with CC and you’re golden =P

@Magix: That’s a good thought. I wasn’t sure if the heal from CC was worth it without conditions compared to WoB as a combo field. But the CD is much shorter on CC and I’ll soon be using skills like BiP so it’ll be clutch when Dagger OH is on CD.

Well of Blood 95% of the time

Blood Fiend gets 1-shot in higher levels. I tank better than it can, and the damage output sucks at level 80.

Well of Blood is my choice of skill. It’s useful primarily in WvW, as you can heal a large amount of people on the field at once. With the trait that allows you to target Wells, it becomes an effective ranged heal the melee or ram users on gates. I already have the other Well traits (apply protection, reduce cooldown), so it works fine in my build.

Consume conditions is definitely nice, though. I think it’s good if you’re more of a Melee Necro instead of a ranged support like mine.

Perhaps I was a bit down on my Necromancer in my last post. I’ve now hit lvl 25 and have opened up slot #9 into which I’ve equipped the Signet of the Locust. I’m finding PvE much easier now, happily pulling 3-4 mobs and mopping them up.

Still using Blood Fiend; I think he could do with toughening up a bit or perhaps have some passive self-healing, but I do like having him around.

PvE: consume conditions or well of blood
WvW: see PvE
PvP: consume conditions.