Guild Wars 2

Kravick.4906:

Blaine Tog.8304:

Kravick.4906:

Blaine Tog.8304:

Right, try it again, I fixed the link and added another.

Also, simmer down there, Tex. It’s just a game. No need to get nasty about it.

Ah yes, all those up levels that didn’t exist in the videos I posted, except the 6 up levels that jumped the ranger, who promptly stomped them into dust. Leeto also wasn’t 1v4ing like the ranger and engineer were. Any time a necro does 1vX, its always against up levels. Kinda hard to lose against that. Now try it against two level 80s and get back to me.

You had less than 5 minutes from the time I fixed the link to the time you claim to have watched the two 10+ minute videos. Putting aside the obvious Moving the Goalposts fallacy in your objection and putting aside that my original point was about 1v1s, not 1vX (trace back the conversation chain into which you inserted yourself if you don’t believe me), it’s chronologically impossible for you to have watched all of both videos.

And hey, putting all that aside, another 1vX video, this time with no upleveleds as far as I can tell.

It was Leeto 3. I have already seen that video. No goalpost moving here. Leeto 2 also had up levels, but as well as assistance from random strangers. Have already seen that one too. Have I mentioned that I have already searched for these videos and have never found anything even remotely close to what thieves, elementalists, guardians, engineers, and rangers are capable of doing?

The Moving the Goalposts was your addition of the “no upleveleds” criteria. And you’re perfectly in your rights to call those videos less impressive for you, but they are examples of Necro 1vX.

Why are we still fighting about 1vX?

Blaine Tog.8304:

The Moving the Goalposts was your addition of the “no upleveleds” criteria. And you’re perfectly in your rights to call those videos less impressive for you, but they are examples of Necro 1vX.

No, it isn’t. I have always said no up levels. Even in this thread I stated up levels don’t count before you even got involved. Up levels are a non factor in any engagement in WvW. They do more harm to their own team than good as they bring nothing but the ability for their enemies to rally from their deaths. Saying they’re examples of 1vX is just down right asinine, and insulting to this class. You’re basically saying that its perfectly ok for necros to be handicapped in these situations when every other class has a build that is capable of 1vXing level 80s.

Honestly, people like you on these forums are really starting to kitten me off. This masochistic view you guys have where its totally fine for necros to need their hand held in PvP is really doing a disservice to this class and those that have been pointing out the major flaws of this class for months now. We have people making honest to god excuses for why minion AI is bad as it is and being apologetic about it. ANet had a perfectly good working minion AI with GW1. Hell, ANet has perfectly good working AI with every other classes pets in GW2. Look at the guardian spirit weapons for crying out loud. Those things ARE minions too! ANet has no excuse. No excuse what so ever. Its down right appalling the state this classes mechanics are in currently. Then there is the whole shenanigans with the downed state HP thing that we’ve been kittening about for months. Turns out, the reason they couldn’t reproduce it is they kept testing it in the mists, when we’ve repeatedly told them it doesn’t happen there!

Maybe you’ll start to understand my frustration now. Or perhaps not. Honestly, I don’t give a kitten about this class any more. I’ve spent to much time, in game money, and effort trying to make it work. I roll any other class and instantly start doing better than I ever have on those classes in just a few days at being level 80. My latest level 80 is my ranger. A class that supposedly has trouble in WvW just like necro, except it doesn’t. Rangers are amazing roamers and do extraordinarily well at attrition fighting using the right build. You know what? People are actually calling rangers OP. No one has ever called necromancers OP.

TLDR: kitten sucks and I’m done. I’m playing a ranger now. Hell if I don’t get just as many bags as my necro and I’m doing a lot more for the team than any necro does.

Andele.1306:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/List_of_historical_traits#Necromancer_traits; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_UzwdXK5CU and for lich http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfE_Xu9H1Bw at 11ish minutes – just from beta 1 to 2, on the old press demo/alpha lich dropped a orb/urn that had around 50k hp (but low armor) and made lich immortal till destroyed (2 was a 3 second 1 minion spawn, 3 the vuln, 4 aura of chill, 5 aura of fear), DS let you absorb life force while in in and upon exiting worked like spectral walks second activation (you ported to where you entered DS).
Also we had pretty much permanent stability, perma retaliation, DS was a stun break and in addition to corruptions there were sacrifices that gave condition like effect for user hp, also like every 4th ability siphoned hp (as seeon on warhorn and staff in TBs video).

Also sweet old 50% damage reduction for 11 seconds on a 60 second cooldown from Sarmor…

Oh man, this must be the biggest sledge-hammer nerf so far…the smiter boon of GW2.
Necs sure were an amazing attrition class back then……

Kravick.4906:

Honestly, people like you on these forums are really starting to kitten me off. This masochistic view you guys have where its totally fine for necros to need their hand held in PvP is really doing a disservice to this class and those that have been pointing out the major flaws of this class for months now. We have people making honest to god excuses for why minion AI is bad as it is and being apologetic about it.

amen to that…

the fan boys need to F off so we can get some of our kitten fixed, they dont seem to realize they are kittening kitten up for the rest of us.

Something that really needs to be addressed that wasn’t in this, and may have already been in previous replies is that THERE IS NO PROJECTILE REFLECT/BLOCK. Every other profession has at least one, even Warriors can trait into having it.

I am also very glad Zzod brought up the axe. My necro is an axe necro, and I can hit arond 10k if I go zerker and that’s only if I get a glass cannon to 25 vun and get 20 might from BiP and the might on life force trait. If you have the same conditions on any other profession you’ll hit for twice that.
The axe warrior auto-attack, powerful as it is, can still hit for more damage than if you could use the necro’s 2 as an auto-attack. I know it’s melee and takes 2s to do the entire thing, but it’s not a burst skill.

Andele.1306:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/List_of_historical_traits#Necromancer_traits; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_UzwdXK5CU and for lich http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfE_Xu9H1Bw at 11ish minutes – just from beta 1 to 2, on the old press demo/alpha lich dropped a orb/urn that had around 50k hp (but low armor) and made lich immortal till destroyed (2 was a 3 second 1 minion spawn, 3 the vuln, 4 aura of chill, 5 aura of fear), DS let you absorb life force while in in and upon exiting worked like spectral walks second activation (you ported to where you entered DS).
Also we had pretty much permanent stability, perma retaliation, DS was a stun break and in addition to corruptions there were sacrifices that gave condition like effect for user hp, also like every 4th ability siphoned hp (as seeon on warhorn and staff in TBs video).

Also sweet old 50% damage reduction for 11 seconds on a 60 second cooldown from Sarmor…

Oh hey Andele, thanks for that. That was actually the exact link I was looking for to cement this theory:

Sadly, I think the core issue with the Necromancer goes a little bit deeper than most people are giving it credit for. As in, we seem to be based off of one of the first few iterations of Guild Wars 2 as a whole, where combat was -not- supposed to be burst-dependent, and was supposedly more drawn out. We don’t appear to have gotten nearly as many iterations as the other Professions have as the game evolved, which threw this Profession to the wayside. And now that the game is actually released, a proper fix would probably take far more manpower than Arenanet is willing to pour into the Necromancer.

The most blatant, indisputable example of this? Look at our Downed Life issue. Directly from Jon himself:

Ok we found a good repro case. It has to do with how death shroud and downed used to interact. I will get someone on it today and try and get a fix to you all asap.

How long ago was the iteration to change us from being dependent on Death Shroud when downed to it actually being our core mechanic? I’m rather certain that this was months prior to release. Which means that we probably haven’t had a real iteration pass in approximately that long.
That’s not good.

Guys, seriously. Our balance and performance issues are not nearly as surface deep as a lot of you are thinking. The pace at which the Necromancer in Guild Wars 2 was being updated on the design curve fell exponentially behind in comparison to where Guild Wars 2 actually evolved to.
If people would actually look up previews and blogs about how the game played during the early phases, and what our skill set, traits and Profession mechanics actually were back then, we fit what Arenanet had in mind for us -perfectly-. We were the epitome of an attrition class that locked players into combat with us.

The issue was that the game evolved from what was once longer, drawn out battles into faster-paced burst combat. In order to make sure Necromancers were not simply “Wait out enemy’s cooldowns, whittle away, have no chance to lose”, Arenanet axed the vast majority of options that made us an attrition based Profession because who wants to play against a Profession that will inevitably win, but take forever to do so?

This would have been perfectly fine if they had actually -allowed us to keep up with the pace of the game’s changes-. But they didn’t. We fell to the wayside, as is apparent by our abundance of absurd issues, our horrible lack of trait synergy, our wretched Weapon sets, our terrible AI, and faulty Profession mechanics. It was even more pronounced after they made the swap from Traits being anything the player desired to being a tier-based system. The build variety for Necromancers were gutted, possibly more so than other Professions.
What Arenanet did was say “Oh hey, we have to change the Necromancer so that they’re not brokenly strong. But we won’t run any actual balance passes because what they were at point X in the game’s life was perfectly fine. They shouldn’t need another pass.” This is why you see Arenanet stating that we are fine; because to them, we are perfectly fine on paper given the current iteration they have down for the Necromancer Profession.

I’m not sure how this is even something that can be argued. Take a look at our bugs, take a look at our traits, take a look at what was taken out of our Profession. The link Andele provided by itself shows that we -did- have the tools for attrition… At one point in time. They were simply taken away from us because of X and Y issues.

Edited in: Does anyone else remember when Dodge wasn’t actually an invulnerability, but was… A dodge? That’s another marker in the design phase for us, given that we didn’t rely on dodging to a degree as high as the other Professions.

Kravick.4906:

Honestly, I don’t give a kitten about this class any more. I’ve spent to much time, in game money, and effort trying to make it work. I roll any other class and instantly start doing better than I ever have on those classes in just a few days at being level 80.

This pretty much mirrors my own experience with the class. I’ve played a mesmer in WvW for the past couple of months, and I’m ultimately enjoying it more simply because I’m able to better contribute. Making the decision on what you want to play based on game mechanics rather than personal preference isn’t optimal, but it’s ultimately more rewarding. While the necromancer is my clear favorite in terms of flavor, the mechanics that I love – sustainability – are nowhere to be found in the class.

Having never seen the beta version of the necro, I’ve never understood A.Net defining us as the “attrition” class. Deathshroud as a survival mechanism fails entirely. Stacking more facetank on top of nothing but facetank doesn’t help at all. The mechanisms that actually help you sustain yourself in combat – stability, protection, vigor, stun breakers, life steal – are either not present or simply not viable choices. In fact it seems to me that, precisely due to the lack of these mechanisms, the necro has become the antithesis of an attrition class. Because other classes typically have access to these mechanisms in some form, and you don’t, the longer the battle drags on you tend to be at a disadvantage.

Either way, until something changes my necro will continue to collect dust at the character selection screen – as she has been doing for a few months now.

- Mana

Arianna.7642:

If people would actually look up previews and blogs about how the game played during the early phases, and what our skill set, traits and Profession mechanics actually were back then, we fit what Arenanet had in mind for us -perfectly-. We were the epitome of an attrition class that locked players into combat with us.

The issue was that the game evolved from what was once longer, drawn out battles into faster-paced burst combat. In order to make sure Necromancers were not simply “Wait out enemy’s cooldowns, whittle away, have no chance to lose”, Arenanet axed the vast majority of options that made us an attrition based Profession because who wants to play against a Profession that will inevitably win, but take forever to do so?

This would have been perfectly fine if they had actually -allowed us to keep up with the pace of the game’s changes-. But they didn’t. We fell to the wayside, as is apparent by our abundance of absurd issues, our horrible lack of trait synergy, our wretched Weapon sets, our terrible AI, and faulty Profession mechanics. It was even more pronounced after they made the swap from Traits being anything the player desired to being a tier-based system. The build variety for Necromancers were gutted, possibly more so than other Professions.

Edited in: Does anyone else remember when Dodge wasn’t actually an invulnerability, but was… A dodge? That’s another marker in the design phase for us, given that we didn’t rely on dodging to a degree as high as the other Professions.

All of the released versions of dodge had a invul frame (the actual jumpy mid part during that a thief goes invis/throws around cut black stripes of leather that dont nearly look enough like shadows what the art team thinks it looks like), its just that you could still get hit by aoe (what makes sense) and projectiles were 60000 times more kitten
Either way if we continue to dwell on the past, we will never get to dream about the future~ It took 2.7 years for GW to be close to balanced (and no the original wasnt balanced, the expansions just derped up the obvious flaws up quite the notch) for 2-3 months, the least we can do is wait another 9 months for the pvp scene to get going and for a-net to double the amount of people actually working on the game.

ManaCraft.5630:

Kravick.4906:

Honestly, I don’t give a kitten about this class any more. I’ve spent to much time, in game money, and effort trying to make it work. I roll any other class and instantly start doing better than I ever have on those classes in just a few days at being level 80.

This pretty much mirrors my own experience with the class.

…

Either way, until something changes my necro will continue to collect dust at the character selection screen – as she has been doing for a few months now.

- Mana

This. 1695 hours played on my necromancer and until some major class rework is done, I don’t see a reason to give a kitten any longer.

I’m usually the type of person who prefers to play “Dark Magic” themed class such as Warlocks and Deathknights in World of Warcraft, even though those 2 classes had their flaws it was still very enjoyable. I’ve put so many hours Dungeoning for token gear, gold for gear in the AH, laurels for exotic gear to test out different builds for my Necromancer… and I sort of regret it.

I leveled a Thief, Mesmer and Elementalist for WvW in the past few months and I’ve honestly enjoyed each one of them much more than my Necromancer. Atm, all my Necromancer is doing is taking up a character slot. :\

Hooglese.4860:

Something that really needs to be addressed that wasn’t in this, and may have already been in previous replies is that THERE IS NO PROJECTILE REFLECT/BLOCK. Every other profession has at least one, even Warriors can trait into having it.

I think it may have been mentioned, but you’re right. We have no reflect, no blocks, no invulnerabilities, no evades besides dodge, no vigor. We only get Death Shroud which takes all the damage from every attacker, unlike those other things mentioned that can mitigate damage from an entire zerg for their duration.

Something else I want to point out is that we also have no weapon based movement skills. None. Every single other class in the game has a weapon based gap closer. And the other scholar and adventurer classes also have a weapon based ability to create distance from an attacker. We also don’t have any.

I can’t imagine the Devs look at the Necromancer and think, “Job well done!”

I think most everyone feels the frustration here being expressed, even if they are not quite yet willing to admit it. Having spent a day getting sacked on like a punching bag playing necro, I will occasionaly spend a day on my thief, where I can win outnumbered fights, escape, enjoy my hard to decide on traits that are non-standard, but still work very well.

I really do enjoy the necro most of all in playstyle, conditions much more so than power, but when you are in WvW, as was already touched on, up-levels present a real challenge to a necro, especially a condition necro, when they pile up to a level of 3+.

My thief can 2 shot an up level no problem and stealth stomp it out of the fight. My condition necro has to stack up conditions on him, which deal no bonus damage to his lack of armor, I have to down him with those conditions. Now they clear off him, and I have to stomp him with no stability/stealth/invulnerability, while the other 2-3 up levels are biting my ankles.

Its embarrasing in WvW playing a condition necro, and knowing that if the 4 up levels I run into are smart, they are going to kill me, while any other class in that scenario is going to mop the floor wth them. This is a condition problem, a balancing problem with how grossly underpowered up levels are against power builds, yet strong still against conditions builds, but the point still stands.

We all play for fun, and anyone who has played an up-level in WvW knows you are a walking loot bag, but while leveling up my lower levels in WvW, I would never run away from a level 80 necro, if I had anyone with me, even at level 20 on my thief.

Did I mention Necros are amazing..

Arianna.7642:

We were the epitome of an attrition class that locked players into combat with us.

Here’s another thing about the whole “attrition” concept that I feel is missing today. Our ability to keep an opponent in combat with us seems lackluster to me. I’m fine with the necro not getting to dictate whether or not battle occurs in the first place – others get to pounce on you, not the other way around – but once it does, we should be able to force them to commit. I realize this problem probably solves itself in sPvP/tPvP, since if an opponent leaves they also concede the point. But as it stands, in WvW most other classes can just up and leave if they sense the battle is not going their way.

In order to qualify as an attrition-based class, it seems to me we should have at least a realistic chance of 1) holding our enemies in combat and 2) outlasting them.

- Mana

This also belongs here:

Iceflame.5024:

I would like to point out that Necro’s way of damage mitigation is facetanking and it’s kind of a really difficult tanking mechanic to balance since it is “relative” as in its effectiveness is relative to the number of damage sources that are attacking you:

Some examples of what I mean:
If the facetanking capability is enough for 1v1 then it begins to drastically suffer the more sources are attacking you so it becomes unreliable and ineffective in these situations. If the facetanking capability is effective enough to be reliable in a situation against multiple attackers(let’s say for example 4), then it becomes OP in the situation with less attackers. So as a result the facetanking capability(LF pool, LF generation as well as DS CD) ideally needs to be a dynamic variable that changes depending on the number of attackers if you want it to be equally effective in all situations. We are in a situation where our facetanking capability is not OP in 1v1 and so it’s in the state where its efficiency drastically drops with 2 or more sources attacking you. Facetanking does not prevent you from being CCed in our case either.

As another example I would like to put attention to the soul marks trait. I suggested making it baseline along with greater marks and a person disagreed bringing up an example of it being OP in WWW zergs where 1 or 2 marks give you a full life force bar. Actually this might be the mechanic that takes care of the relativeness of the LF generation but at the same time it’s not quite enough. We still are limited by the LF pool and a 10 second CD(5 second CD if traited which is actually freaking awesome and I personally see it being better than the stability trait), these things ideally need to be dynamic too. I still think the soul marks trait should be made baseline for staff in addition to greater marks.

So you can see that facetanking efficiency is a relative thing. If we talk about blocks, invulnerabilities, evades and other stuff, they are absolute. They ignore all the damage and effects that are flying towards you in a short time and they do not care about the number of damage sources. And we have a game where a lot of classes have these mechanics that are absolute at mitigating damage.

All in all I think that if you want Necro to be in a somewhat ideal spot, the only way to achieve it would be a huge freaking redesign.

P.S. It would be nice to make the stability trait go back into being immune to CC while in DS since we have limited abilities that we can use and our utilities aren’t available to us while inside DS.

KarlaGrey.5903:

If the facetanking capability is enough for 1v1 then it begins to drastically suffer the more sources are attacking you so it becomes unreliable and ineffective in these situations. If the facetanking capability is effective enough to be reliable in a situation against multiple attackers(let’s say for example 4), then it becomes OP in the situation with less attackers. So as a result the facetanking capability(LF pool, LF generation as well as DS CD) ideally needs to be a dynamic variable that changes depending on the number of attackers if you want it to be equally effective in all situations. We are in a situation where our facetanking capability is not OP in 1v1 and so it’s in the state where its efficiency drastically drops with 2 or more sources attacking you. Facetanking does not prevent you from being CCed in our case either.
…
So you can see that facetanking efficiency is a relative thing. If we talk about blocks, invulnerabilities, evades and other stuff, they are absolute. They ignore all the damage and effects that are flying towards you in a short time and they do not care about the number of damage sources. And we have a game where a lot of classes have these mechanics that are absolute at mitigating damage.

All in all I think that if you want Necro to be in a somewhat ideal spot, the only way to achieve it would be a huge freaking redesign.

I had the exact same thought. But I don’t think there needs to be a “huge freaking redesign”, but the new DS5 skill could introduce a mechanic that allows exactly that:
LF generation, relative to the amount of opponents you have to deal with.

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/DS5-focus-should-not-be-a-new-condition/

I posted this in the pvp thread. The bold fonts didn’t carry over from the copypasta sorry it looks like a huge wall of text now.

On the topic of Vigor. All classes except Necromancer have atleast 1 source of Vigor and other ways to restore endurance.

Engineer – Adrenaline Pump-Gain 10% of your endurance when using a tool belt skill.Elixir R – Remove conditions and refill endurance. Adrenal Implant – Endurance regenerates 50% faster.Elixir H – Change to gain Vigor. Invigorating Speed – When you gain swiftness, gain 5 seconds of Vigor. Engineers can have perma Swiftness + Vigor.

Warrior – Building Momentum – Burst skills restore endurance. Furious Reaction – Gain Vigor (10 seconds) when taking more than 10% of your health in a single hit. Vigorous Focus – Gain Vigor when using a stance. Call to Arms – 10 seconds of Vigor 20 second CD, can be reduced by 20%. Signet of Stamina – Gain faster endurance regen.

Guardian – Save yourselves – Gain lots of boons including Vigor. Vigorous Precision – Gain Vigor for 5 seconds when you crit. 5 second cd.

Thief – Signet of Agility – Refill endurance and cure condis. Wild Strike – Strike your foe gain 10% endurance. Felines Grace – Dodging returns some endurance. Bountiful Theft – Stealing grants Vigor for 15 seconds. Vigorous Recovery – Gain Vigor when using a heal.

Mesmer – Critical Infusion – 5 seconds of Vigor on crit. Vigorous Revelation – Shattering illusions grants Vigor to allies. Sirens Call – Chance to apply Vigor.

Elementalist – Arcane Energy – Arcane and signet skills restore 25% endurance when used. Soothing Disruption – Cantrips grant Regen and Vigor. Renewing Stamina – Gain Vigor on crit. Heat Wave – Burns and grants Vigor. Phoenix – Removes conditions and grants Vigor. Zephyrs Focus – Endurance regenerates 100% faster while channeling. Vigorous Scepter – Endurance regenerates faster while wielding a scepter.

Ranger – Nautral Vigor – Increases endurance regen by 50%. Lightning Reflexes – Evade and gain Vigor. Primal Reflexes – Gain Vigor when struck by a critical hit. Vigorous Renewal – Gain Vigor when using a heal. Vigorous Training – Moa, Birds, and Jellys grant Vigor to allies when summoned.

Necromancer – * Cough * …* crickets * .. Nothing!!!!!
Edit. I had no idea how bad we really had it until I typed this up. Elementalist has 7 ways to gain Vigor or regain Endurance, we have 0. What am I missing here? How did this go un noticed?

I was thinking a lot how to improve necros skill and in my opinion necro is opposite of mesmer (i mean skills ). Mesmer is stealing buffs(and using them) or removing them from enemies . He is stacking also confusion and few others condis . Necro should convert boons into debuffs on enemies but shouldn`t be able to buff himself like other classes . Somebody wrote really good opinion “buffs>debuffs” . its true that`s why necro should convert buffs into negative conditions .So necro would be class debuff> converted buffs + extra condi .Just imagine scepter first hit bleed,second bleed,third convert buff into debuff . Necro mobility can be fixed using traits(connect few weak traits into one ) or new weapon (gs pls ) which will make necro immune like second skill on mesmer sword .

@Copenhagen nice post, proves that we lack damage mitigation on huge amounts.
In theory we have access to vigor too, if we can convert a bleed or a chill from our well of power, but that is just too low on duration and it won’t work vs builds that don’t use bleed or chill.With the same logic we have access to every boon, but it is not that simple as we all know.

Altho Vigor is not the only “boon” problem of necro.
How many sources of “Fury” we have?
One trait that gives you fury when you enter DS for the amazing duration of 5 seconds.
How many sources of aegis? If we take out WoP, none.
How many for stability? 1, 3 seconds, 30 points grandmaster trait, thats awesome.

Aegis, vigor and stability are 3 boons that we SHOULD have easier access to if we want to be called the “master attrition” proffesion as the devs use to call us.

@VOLTCIEAGE converting boons into conditions is stronger than boon stacking but ONLY when the enemy can’t restack them as soon as your conditions wear off, and that is not happening right now.

Note on the vigor thing, we really shouldnt need any (well unless you count BIP+WoP but everyone knows thats like saying anyone except a ele has a elemental armor skill, yes possible but requires bigger sacs unless build around).
4 things that would make necro facetank mechanics work:
Perma stability (in DS) and retal (out of DS) from early on in their effect not boon form.
Siphon scailing
Passive way to generate LF from getting hit instead of only hitting *looking at you spectral armor*
Skills being a general threat against blocks and evasion (as in no obstructed because of small rocks, LoS only being a issue in cases you cannot actually target the enemy, good zone control) - we kinda have this one but hey game engine derps are game engine derps

My reasonings - vs vigor, necros, aka big tentacle blobs dont run like sissies for cover, we are walking cover!
Ok then why no protection - simple, protection in its current 33% form is quite op (both pve and pvp standards), thank god that condis ignore it or it would require a nerf, but with power creep i can see it getting a issue, it would be, as a-net like to say, playing whack a mole.
Ok then aegis? *kittenslaps* What do you think we are some poofy pillocks that run around in light blue armor, slap drawings of a 5 year old on the ground and shoot swirly lights out of needlessly large rods? WRONG We are cynical kittens that run around in slightly darker blue green armor slap drawings of a 7 year old on the ground and shoot grope hands out of our needlessly large rods!

^So you are pretty much telling me that necros should be meatshield without any damage and only “control” the enemies in masses because we are not “sissy” or “poofy pillocks” and instead of that we are some “scary green/black things” .

Well this is not what a necromancer is, a necromancer will curse you, will summon things from the dead, will suck your life and heal, and will defense himself within the shadows.
Aegis,Vigor and protection does not fit the above concept of the necromancer, but we are playing a game with BOONS. Which means if you want to increase your defenses, you will either dodge(vigor) block(aegis) or reduce the incoming damage(protection). Now ALL of these should fit the necro, but because we are “shadow” and “scary” and “poisonous” we can’t have a “blue shield” or “don’t run like sissies” ? Guess what, that’s the only way we can get our defense, and if it fits or not we have to use it.
Go ahead and persuade ANet to change Aegis to something green, protection to something black, and vigor to “big tentacles” that lifts us off the ground and moves us around.

natsos.3692:

^So you are pretty much telling me that necros should be meatshield without any damage and only “control” the enemies in masses because we are not “sissy” or “poofy pillocks” and instead of that we are some “scary green/black things” .

Well this is not what a necromancer is, a necromancer will curse you, will summon things from the dead, will suck your life and heal, and will defense himself within the shadows.
Aegis,Vigor and protection does not fit the above concept of the necromancer, but we are playing a game with BOONS. Which means if you want to increase your defenses, you will either dodge(vigor) block(aegis) or reduce the incoming damage(protection). Now ALL of these should fit the necro, but because we are “shadow” and “scary” and “poisonous” we can’t have a “blue shield” or “don’t run like sissies” ? Guess what, that’s the only way we can get our defense, and if it fits or not we have to use it.
Go ahead and persuade ANet to change Aegis to something green, protection to something black, and vigor to “big tentacles” that lifts us off the ground and moves us around.

In WvW and PvP, necromancer is an attrition on class that doesn’t have the tools to facetank anything. No stability, blocks, vigour or stealth/blink/clones/etc.

The 3 most popular classes in WvW – guardians, thieves and elementalists have good condition removal.

Rangers, warriors and other classes with weaker condition removal can also eat lemongrass food and equip Melandru runes to cut condition duration by 65%.

I don’t recall my guardian ever being killed by a Necromancer in WvW.

Copenhagen.7015:

I posted this in the pvp thread. The bold fonts didn’t carry over from the copypasta sorry it looks like a huge wall of text now.

On the topic of Vigor. All classes except Necromancer have atleast 1 source of Vigor and other ways to restore endurance.

-The List-

Edit. I had no idea how bad we really had it until I typed this up. Elementalist has 7 ways to gain Vigor or regain Endurance, we have 0. What am I missing here? How did this go un noticed?

Believe me, I’ve been aware of this for months now, and it’s bothered me. Every class has some way to play with the endurance bar, and many have traits that respond to how full / empty it is; the Necromancer does not.

I don’t even need / want Vigor, if ANet has a problem with the Necro having access to a lot of boons. I just want something (On either an adept or master level minor trait) that lets us access more dodges at the expense of more aggressive options. The idea of gaining endurance as you gain life force has been rattling around in my head for a while now.

If block / invuln / reflect / evasion / endurance abilities ever come in for the Necromancer though, I think they should show up in Death Shroud or minor traits. It’s the sort of thing that has the possibility of “too good to give up” just by nature of actually being a block, etc, so forcing people to sacrifice utility slots / major traits for them seems like a step backwards.

@Andele you make me think that you have never played a necromancer in the past and in any game. You have mixed some stuff on your mind and that makes you believe the necromancer is a trickster with a dose of shaman.

Necromancer is SIMPLY, the lord of Death and anything that comes with it. It doesn’t have to do with manipulation, it has to do with “dark energy” , with rasing the dead and sucking all life.

" And yes i am calling you a little b?tch if you want to rely on petty boons to play and would rather exploit fights than bullcharge in and kill kitten the right way. "

And in my post you said that I want to become a mesmer..
I guess you want a warrior.

P.S. Necromancers use Curses, check our scepter auto attack, doh just check our 2nd trait line , our trait lines describe EXACTLY what a necro is.

Hey mate, I am not a forum warrior
This goes way off-topic but:

You might call me “nerd” , I like theorycrafting and after practicing the theory, but this specific guy comes up on any post and mocks people, he can’t prove a point without making fun of what other people say, go ahead and check his posts, every 5 or so he does the same thing.
Anyway I am done with him , I will keep the ideas and theorycrafting flowing without paying attention to this kind of people.
Discussion is what we need now.

Wow, this thread went all over the place haha. I saw Zzods forum post, and I have read most of these. I even brought up these points with Gibbly and Zombify who are probably two of the top Necro’s in tournament play right now.

I could not comment on high level play as I am not playing it.

In regards to Zzods weapon choices and skill choices, it’s obvious he doesn’t have a ton of experience with the necro based on the fact that he misstated how a lot of skills work that are evident to most players. Including the axe options, Axe 3 plus Axe 2 timing after a dodge is amazing in tpvp. No self-respecting Axe wielding Necro just throws out Axe 2. You always wait for the dodge axe 2 boom.

However he is absolutely correct in that the real issues with the Necromancer only come up when you get up to the top levels of tournament play. So I went to the guys who still play the class in tournaments, Symbolic of EU (went ranger for 80 percent of the maps), Zombify of SOAC, and Gibbly of JFK.

Here is a synopsis of their replies to me over the last week.

1). The Necromancer is incredibly powerful if played correctly. You have to be more aware of your positioning, and when played right and you stay within your position it’s one of the most beautiful classes in the game. It synergizes well in team play and you can literally win a team fight by proper application of CB and Epidemic.

2). They have a ridiculously tough time with certain comps that have classes that can attack your positioning with impunity aka Double Engi comps.

3). If you get out of position you are screwed. They used more choice words, but their essential them was the Necro is the only class that relies so much on positioning and that if you aren’t watching and get caught out of position you are royally screwed.

4). You have to have a peeler. If your team doesn’t have a peeler find a new team or switch classes. Guardians/Ele’s/mesmers are peelers and they need to be specced and aware of their role as peelers. If they aren’t or they miss a peel you are screwed.

5). You have no business roaming or moving away from the main fight where your peeler and guardian are. You are the slowest class in the game and even with Spectral walk you will only get caught by the Thief/Ele/Ranger roamer and then you are dead.

6) The lack of any sort of disengage, vigor, or easy stability access is what hurts the class. All we want is one of them. Give me one of the three and I am a happy man, make DS 2 a port, or make Spectral Armor give Stability or jsut give me a better vigor access so I can choose to use DS offensively.

7). Fear is the single greatest weapon we have. Our weapons are not designed to deal damage but to setup our tools to help other players kill.

8) The necro is so close to being perfect and so dangerously close to being op, that any adjustment that’s too far in the benefit direction would immediately create a disadvantage to anyone we face. All we know is that we need a few minor changes.

9) There are maps where because of the Necro’s lack of stability/disengage/mobility it’s better to either sub out your necro for a player that can actually be effective or swap professions (namely Khylo and Spirit Watch).

After watching players play in the torunaments I must say I agree with them, the Necro is beautiful to watch in the hands of an expert, but there are some severe deficiencies that prevent it from really being a strong tournament class.

I can’t agree more about the trait lines being kittened up… I mean I run staff with any of my builds power or condition and I have to put 3/4 of my points just to make staff acceptable…

I’m really sick of necros getting 0 attention from the devs since they are the profession that needs the most help but they seem to want to tweak engineers and rangers more. Rangers are meh, Engineers are okay, Necros are worse than kitten. And with the incoming(?) nerf to AoE, what will necros be then?

I love my necro, it has over 1,000 hours and I’ve experimented with a lot of builds…It’s not nearly as good as my guardian. So when I do fractals(and almost all dungeons) I feel like I’m letting my team down by not bringing a guardian, mesmer or warrior. And it really feels kitten when people say “no necros” when looking for group.

If they completely reworked our traits to be on par with warrior which would give more of a consistency between all profession’s traits and buffed our axe #1 and daggers #2 and #3, while giving scepter a faster attack rate. While giving staff #1 a complete rework while adding maybe a bleed to it with a faster auto attack which would make sense. I would be happy. But who am I kidding?

Bas.7406:

Wow, this thread went all over the place haha. I saw Zzods forum post, and I have read most of these. I even brought up these points with Gibbly and Zombify who are probably two of the top Necro’s in tournament play right now.

I could not comment on high level play as I am not playing it.

In regards to Zzods weapon choices and skill choices, it’s obvious he doesn’t have a ton of experience with the necro based on the fact that he misstated how a lot of skills work that are evident to most players. Including the axe options, Axe 3 plus Axe 2 timing after a dodge is amazing in tpvp. No self-respecting Axe wielding Necro just throws out Axe 2. You always wait for the dodge axe 2 boom.

However he is absolutely correct in that the real issues with the Necromancer only come up when you get up to the top levels of tournament play. So I went to the guys who still play the class in tournaments, Symbolic of EU (went ranger for 80 percent of the maps), Zombify of SOAC, and Gibbly of JFK.

Here is a synopsis of their replies to me over the last week.

1). The Necromancer is incredibly powerful if played correctly. You have to be more aware of your positioning, and when played right and you stay within your position it’s one of the most beautiful classes in the game. It synergizes well in team play and you can literally win a team fight by proper application of CB and Epidemic.

2). They have a ridiculously tough time with certain comps that have classes that can attack your positioning with impunity aka Double Engi comps.

3). If you get out of position you are screwed. They used more choice words, but their essential them was the Necro is the only class that relies so much on positioning and that if you aren’t watching and get caught out of position you are royally screwed.

4). You have to have a peeler. If your team doesn’t have a peeler find a new team or switch classes. Guardians/Ele’s/mesmers are peelers and they need to be specced and aware of their role as peelers. If they aren’t or they miss a peel you are screwed.

5). You have no business roaming or moving away from the main fight where your peeler and guardian are. You are the slowest class in the game and even with Spectral walk you will only get caught by the Thief/Ele/Ranger roamer and then you are dead.

6) The lack of any sort of disengage, vigor, or easy stability access is what hurts the class. All we want is one of them. Give me one of the three and I am a happy man, make DS 2 a port, or make Spectral Armor give Stability or jsut give me a better vigor access so I can choose to use DS offensively.

7). Fear is the single greatest weapon we have. Our weapons are not designed to deal damage but to setup our tools to help other players kill.

8) The necro is so close to being perfect and so dangerously close to being op, that any adjustment that’s too far in the benefit direction would immediately create a disadvantage to anyone we face. All we know is that we need a few minor changes.

9) There are maps where because of the Necro’s lack of stability/disengage/mobility it’s better to either sub out your necro for a player that can actually be effective or swap professions (namely Khylo and Spirit Watch).

After watching players play in the torunaments I must say I agree with them, the Necro is beautiful to watch in the hands of an expert, but there are some severe deficiencies that prevent it from really being a strong tournament class.

…But you have gone over with many of your high level Necros that if you really want to be competitive you might be best off without a Necro, and that Necros need to have a team built around them in order to be successful.

So while a lot of your praise is great, Necros still don’t compare to other classes in a lot of ways.

Bas.7406:

5). You have no business roaming or moving away from the main fight where your peeler and guardian are. You are the slowest class in the game and even with Spectral walk you will only get caught by the Thief/Ele/Ranger roamer and then you are dead.

well, this is a serious problem. if we are an attrition class, we should be great in any 1v1.
I think we need more raw damage in our weapons or more burst regeneration.

vicious.5683:

Bas.7406:

5). You have no business roaming or moving away from the main fight where your peeler and guardian are. You are the slowest class in the game and even with Spectral walk you will only get caught by the Thief/Ele/Ranger roamer and then you are dead.

well, this is a serious problem. if we are an attrition class, we should be great in any 1v1.
I think we need more raw damage in our weapons or more burst regeneration.

The irony of this kills me.

Even in WvW I will try to stay with the group or the party so I can be effective but far too often the players around me run off chasing some thief, mes, or ele leaving me to eventually die at the hands of the more stationary DPS machines or the thief, mes, or ele that eluded them and came back to get me waiting for my best skills to come off cool down.

I say this often; Keep your friends close but keep your Necro’s closer.

(PvE only point of view)

I loved playing with my necromancer, I didn’t have any troubles whatsoever leveling and getting the explorable achievement. Nor did I have any kind of difficulties running dungeons with my guild (the only ones I didn’t try with my necromancer are CoE).

Of all the classes I leveled, it’s the one I had the least problems with (but maybe that’s because I crafted for at least 30 levels for the rest of my characters).

But now that I have every classes except rangers and engineers, when my guild wants to do a dungeon (full guild group or with 1-3 PuG) :
-I bring my guardian when I want to run to go without difficulties
-I bring my warrior when I want to finikitten quickly
-I bring my thief when I can’t/don’t want to take my warrior
-I bring my mesmer when the guild mesmer doesn’t want to come
-I bring my elementalist if it’s needed in AC

But my necromancer ? I bring her to hear my guildies QQ. The run will go without too much problems, but it could be so much better and bringing my necromancer when I have access to these other classes is simply annoying everyone.

It wouldn’t bother me too much if their DPS fell short when compared to other classes, but there isn’t a single thing a necromancer brings to a party that cannot be found somewhere else.

Boon removal ? Mesmer and thief can take care of that. Sure “Corrupt Boon” is really a great skill, but when was the last time you honestly thought “If only someone could take care of all of those everlasting boons ?!”

Conditions ? Ignoring the fact that some bosses are virtually immune to conditions because they remove them excessively fast, any other classes (such as thief and mesmer) can apply them sometimes better than the necromancer. And fear…well not that great because when enemies are all tightly together, allowing every attacks to hit all of them (aside from the necromancer of course), fearing them is the last thing your team wants.

Damage ? If your only goal is to bring damage, your best bet isn’t playing a necromancer.

Necromancers aren’t awful. It’s pretty easy to play and a team blaming the necromancer for an awful dungeon run is an awful team to start with.
But when you compare it to other classes, you wonder what’s the point of bringing a necromancer to a dungeon when every build you could think of can be found on another classes and with better options.

sPvP might be another story. I like playing sometime with my necromancer there, but I’m far too awful in it to be able to judge. But all I know is that I never thought when I was playing with another class “that’s it, I’m bringing my necromancer to get back at them”.

chefdiablo.6791:

vicious.5683:

Bas.7406:

5). You have no business roaming or moving away from the main fight where your peeler and guardian are. You are the slowest class in the game and even with Spectral walk you will only get caught by the Thief/Ele/Ranger roamer and then you are dead.

well, this is a serious problem. if we are an attrition class, we should be great in any 1v1.
I think we need more raw damage in our weapons or more burst regeneration.

The irony of this kills me.

Even in WvW I will try to stay with the group or the party so I can be effective but far too often the players around me run off chasing some thief, mes, or ele leaving me to eventually die at the hands of the more stationary DPS machines or the thief, mes, or ele that eluded them and came back to get me waiting for my best skills to come off cool down.

I say this often; Keep your friends close but keep your Necro’s closer.

I don’t know what kind of builds you are using, but in 1v1s necros are boss, especially in WvW.
It’s a serious problem when 2 or all 3 (thief, ele, ranger) catch you, then you are dead for sure, while one of those other classes would have a chance of survival. But just one roamer… in WvW? If you are a lvl80 max geared necro, you should win at least 9 out of 10 fights.

vicious.5683:

if we are an attrition class, we should be great in any 1v1.

As I said, we already are. But “attrition-class” should not just define your dueling capabilities.
I’ve just seen a video of 5 guardians in WvW who just stand on one spot for 30 minutes and hold off a small zerg like that, they litterally just stand there and create a buff-each-other rotation. Most of the time their hp bar doesn’t even move.
Now that is attrition, 5 necros could never do that.

^They could, all on healing power/toughness, each time one heals (LFT,DI) and the other 4 use plague , rotation goes on !

/sarcasm off

flow.6043:

I don’t know what kind of builds you are using, but in 1v1s necros are boss, especially in WvW.
It’s a serious problem when 2 or all 3 (thief, ele, ranger) catch you, then you are dead for sure, while one of those other classes would have a chance of survival. But just one roamer… in WvW? If you are a lvl80 max geared necro, you should win at least 9 out of 10 fights.

Eh… while I think it would be wrong to call our odds bad, I also don’t think they’re anywhere near as good as you describe. In any case, in the few situations where it does come down to a 1v1, I often find that winning depends on whether or not the opponent is willing to actually let you. Whether by some superior means of in-combat mobility, or simply throwing some CC at you and running away, my experience is that many players will just disengage when they feel they’re about to lose the fight. The generally clunky nature of our snares (particularly scepter2, focus5, DS2) doesn’t help either.

More important though are the situations you describe, where you find yourself taking damage from multiple sources – which can basically be in any XvX fight (at the non-zerg level). Here, the value of the facetank mechanic drastically drops, whereas many of the other “outs” available to other classes retain their usefulness.

Which of course leaves zerg fights. Here, the necro is fine (in fact rather powerful). But, offensive output aside, so is any other class as a matter of course. The complete lack of any defensive capabilities becomes a non-issue when you have 20+ people around who are effectively babysitting you. All that is left then is the inevitable random AoE that you will need to soak once in a while, for which facetanking is sufficient – and since you’re typically dishing out more AoE as a necro than you’re taking, the payoff is good.

flow.6043:

I don’t know what kind of builds you are using, but in 1v1s necros are boss, especially in WvW.
It’s a serious problem when 2 or all 3 (thief, ele, ranger) catch you, then you are dead for sure, while one of those other classes would have a chance of survival. But just one roamer… in WvW? If you are a lvl80 max geared necro, you should win at least 9 out of 10 fights.

You can’t be serious. Supposing that you have the upper hand in a 1v1 scenario the only way that your opponent doesn’t escape is if they make a mistake and you land a clutch snare at just the right time. That opponent is then free to reset the fight and come back until they get the upper hand at which point you cannot escape to reset unless they make a mistake. Even Guardian has superior mobility to Necro.

1v1 in WvW, where Crit damage can reach higher than 100% and thief 2 shot you even with full toughness? Nah we don’t have the defense required to take good one out. Each thief I kill is a bad/out of cooldown thief that got greedy thinking I was an easy kill (or theyre build for conditions). I’m getting crit by HS spammers for 7k with 2600 armor. That’s a lot of damage to take, even with 20k life and a 16k DS that doesn’t last long enough against these.

You can look at Leeto video #3 first couple of fights, he gets HS Stealth then Backstab and downed, all instant cast in one sec. The thief can HS into Blinding powder and still hit you for 7k and not get out of stealth because of the timing of stealth via this combo. So a 7k HS + Backstab 8-10k + Steal for 4k followed by HS spam (if needed). You need a lot of luck to “evade” this combo. And luck is not skill. (Nothing against thieves, more against bad stealth mechanic )

Now if you’re talking 1v1 against guardians, I totally agree we should win them all regardless of skill

I S/TPvP, and I wanted to try necro for a change of pace. My necro was actually my first level 80. PvPing with my necro was like banging my head against a brick wall. Either I wasn’t doing it right, or it’s that weak compared to other classes. Unless someone can enlighten me, and tell me I was probably doing it wrong (MM build), then I’ll shelf it for now.

SallyStitches.4096:

I S/TPvP, and I wanted to try necro for a change of pace. My necro was actually my first level 80. PvPing with my necro was like banging my head against a brick wall. Either I wasn’t doing it right, or it’s that weak compared to other classes. Unless someone can enlighten me, and tell me I was probably doing it wrong (MM build), then I’ll shelf it for now.

Unless you are talking about playing high level tPvP games (pre-made v pre-made ladder teams/comps) you can have fun and do fine with a necromancer, but it requires a significantly higher level of skill to be effective than other professions.

As a necro you have no mobility and no “get out of jail free” stun breaks/invulns on a reasonable cd. I never cared for minions in PvP myself, but plenty of necro’s do run them effectively in low level tPvP.

My advice would be to build tanky in the beginning in order to extend your survivability and get you through the learning curve. A Shaman’s amulet terror build is kind of like training wheels in low levels. You should be able to wear down opponents and survive reasonably well. Also, try to stay in/near team fights and carry Sig of Undeath. Your best defense if having someone alive to peel for you in the area.

Myrmidian Eudoros.4671:

SallyStitches.4096:

I S/TPvP, and I wanted to try necro for a change of pace. My necro was actually my first level 80. PvPing with my necro was like banging my head against a brick wall. Either I wasn’t doing it right, or it’s that weak compared to other classes. Unless someone can enlighten me, and tell me I was probably doing it wrong (MM build), then I’ll shelf it for now.

Unless you are talking about playing high level tPvP games (pre-made v pre-made ladder teams/comps) you can have fun and do fine with a necromancer, but it requires a significantly higher level of skill to be effective than other professions.

As a necro you have no mobility and no “get out of jail free” stun breaks/invulns on a reasonable cd. I never cared for minions in PvP myself, but plenty of necro’s do run them effectively in low level tPvP.

My advice would be to build tanky in the beginning in order to extend your survivability and get you through the learning curve. A Shaman’s amulet terror build is kind of like training wheels in low levels. You should be able to wear down opponents and survive reasonably well. Also, try to stay in/near team fights and carry Sig of Undeath. Your best defense if having someone alive to peel for you in the area.

Myrmidian is correct. You can’t say it any better. I play berzerker MM in tpvp, and Bhawb plays bunker, but in high level play the sheer volume of dangerous aoe, and the chance that a Necro could epi off a minion and wipe out your team is too much.

SallyStitches.4096:

I S/TPvP, and I wanted to try necro for a change of pace. My necro was actually my first level 80. PvPing with my necro was like banging my head against a brick wall. Either I wasn’t doing it right, or it’s that weak compared to other classes. Unless someone can enlighten me, and tell me I was probably doing it wrong (MM build), then I’ll shelf it for now.

You need a team that doesn’t have a problem building around you as a necromancer to be successful in tPvP with this class. Unlike the other classes, necromancers require support from their team mates in order to not get destroyed constantly. Other people are necessary to protect you and peel other people off of you. This is one of the primary reasons you don’t see any necromancers on the top level teams. They’ve all expressed their opinion that having to baby sit this class is overall detrimental to their team composition. The other classes all have ways to reduce or remove pressure themselves through various means. Necromancers have no such mechanic. ANet thinks Death Shroud does this, but it doesn’t.

I managed to eventually get myself the Champion Phantom title for my necromancer without having a regular team. It was quite painful to say the least. Exactly like you describe. Banging my head against a brick wall. I’ve tPvPed with a couple different classes since then. I’m absolutely terrible at engineer. To much APM for me I suppose, but even then I did so much better playing the engineer in tPvP than I ever have with the necromancer. I play a ranger full time now in tPvP. I can actually bunker on points and not get killed in two seconds in team fights now. Its… pretty obvious the necromancer has some serious balance issues at this point.

People say there is this skill cap that necromancers have that is supposedly higher than the other classes. I disagree. If anything, engineers have a way higher skill cap. I believe the skill cap for necromancers is really the same as everyone else TBH. There are only so many possible skill combinations that can be achieved. The only thing that really requires some time to learn is when to DS flash dance against certain classes for proper Doom usage. IMO, the truth of the matter is this. Necros that “do well” have a team backing them up. Thats it. I’ve run into some of the big named pro necromancers before while in tPvP. By themselves, they didn’t really strike me as a threat. I was able to handle them just like any other necromancer. However, running into some of the big names that play the other classes is drastically different. They actually manage to be a serious threat, and its apparent that their skill level is above mine, or perhaps they’re running a build designed to beat my build at the time. In any case, necromancers don’t generally pose a threat. They only reason they’re targeted first is because of possible Signet of Undeath, and the fact they don’t have the ability to protect themselves. They’re easy kills basically.

Kravick.4906:

…People say there is this skill cap that necromancers have that is supposedly higher than the other classes. I disagree. If anything, engineers have a way higher skill cap. I believe the skill cap for necromancers is really the same as everyone else TBH. There are only so many possible skill combinations that can be achieved. The only thing that really requires some time to learn is when to DS flash dance against certain classes for proper Doom usage. IMO, the truth of the matter is this. Necros that “do well” have a team backing them up. Thats it. …

Skill Cap is an entirely different issue than what I was eluding to, and frankly skill cap only comes into play in high level PvP, which I think we can safely say is not where this “new-ish” necromancer is at. While playing Necro at the Highest level is not markedly more difficult than other classes, the results that you can achieve by so doing fall woefully short of other classes, but that is an entirely different discussion, and frankly I rather doubt we have any substantial disagreements in principle as it pertians to “Skill Cap”.

I was referring to what would more commonly be talked about as “Skill Floor”. The minimum level of skill required to be remotely effective against opponents. It has long been my belief (and the belief of many others) that due to the nature of Conquest as a game mode the general lack of mobility, resistance to CC, knockbacks, dodges (compared to other classes), gap closers, etc. makes it far more difficult to play tourney as a necromancer and be effective. Consider Ranger, for example, that can build a bunker spec and focus on staying alive and completely dominate at low levels, because of the high sustainability brought to the table through a huge amount of evades, passive condition cleanses and healing over time coupled with moderate passive damage output from the combination of SB conditions and Pet white damage+utility. There is no build in the necro profession that lowers the bar to this drastic extreme for new players. Carrying that example to other professions, but considering different purposes a D/P thief can safely roam and kill with minimal resistance, a Phantasm Mesmer can defend close without much skill, Warriors will be able to hit their HB’s and make kills against low level players, cantrip eles can still roll their face across the keyboard and there are plenty of other examples for low level play. All of these builds are couterable when you hit better players, but in low levels they are still the type of stuff that wins. The only profession with a comparable skill floor to necro in my opinion is the Engineer (which you kind of pointed to already).

natsos.3692:

Necromancer is SIMPLY, the lord of Death and anything that comes with it. It doesn’t have to do with manipulation, it has to do with “dark energy” , with rasing the dead and sucking all life.

Yeah, not really. If you want to talk about Fantasy Necromancers, then you cannot have a singular opinion, because there is no singular archetype of fantasy necromancers. There is a lot of variance in the different fantasy ideas on Necromancy, everything from the moral/ethical implications, to what their power entails, to even the magnitude of that power.

As for “actual” Necromancy, it deals solely with the raising of the spirits of the dead. No sucking out life, no poisoning, no curses/hexes, all of the stuff comes from the association with Black Magic.

Kravick.4906:

You need a team that doesn’t have a problem building around you as a necromancer to be successful in tPvP with this class. Unlike the other classes, necromancers require support from their team mates in order to not get destroyed constantly. Other people are necessary to protect you and peel other people off of you. .

I have got many screenshots from pvp,pve and even www . People are refusing party with one necro (2 necros means suicide for them ).On pve our dmg and armor are too low . In pvp they treat us like free kills ,we can solo point , we can bunker captured point and on www I hear sometimes necro commander LOL. Its nice to be support class but people kitten on our support .

VOLTCIEAGE.3029:

Kravick.4906:

You need a team that doesn’t have a problem building around you as a necromancer to be successful in tPvP with this class. Unlike the other classes, necromancers require support from their team mates in order to not get destroyed constantly. Other people are necessary to protect you and peel other people off of you. .

I have got many screenshots from pvp,pve and even www . People are refusing party with one necro (2 necros means suicide for them ).On pve our dmg and armor are too low . In pvp they treat us like free kills ,we can solo point , we can bunker captured point and on www I hear sometimes necro commander LOL. Its nice to be support class but people kitten on our support .

I hear other classes can support better.

Other classes can support in more meaningful ways, is more accurate. Necromancers have viable support with strong control and healing, but in PvE boon stacking as support is more viable because of dungeon mechanics, and in PvP our support doesn’t mesh with the meta, and requires people to stand in wells, which is difficult and not always safe.

Basically other classes support by removing conditions and buffing and healing allies. Necromancers also heal allies, and we do have some condition removal, but we don’t have the same ability to buff allies that they do. Our support requires you to stand in a well for its full duration, something that isn’t really the best way to support in PvP. Now, the extra thing that we bring that no one else does, is tons of condition application, notably lots of weakness, and lots of chill.

So whats the problem? It lies in the fact that our method of support (debuffing enemies instead of buffing allies) isn’t wanted, and the way that we support (with wells) can be counter productive and easily countered. In addition, every support brings a second thing they can do. Eles can burst or bunker, Guardians bunker, but Necromancers bring AoE condi pressure. Problem is, the meta really hurts that pressure.

Necro support has a niche, but it won’t be seen in PvE until they make different boss mechanics, or in PvP until that niche is worthwhile.

Bhawb.7408:

Other classes can support in more meaningful ways, is more accurate. Necromancers have viable support with strong control and healing, but in PvE boon stacking as support is more viable because of dungeon mechanics, and in PvP our support doesn’t mesh with the meta, and requires people to stand in wells, which is difficult and not always safe.

Basically other classes support by removing conditions and buffing and healing allies. Necromancers also heal allies, and we do have some condition removal, but we don’t have the same ability to buff allies that they do. Our support requires you to stand in a well for its full duration, something that isn’t really the best way to support in PvP. Now, the extra thing that we bring that no one else does, is tons of condition application, notably lots of weakness, and lots of chill.

So whats the problem? It lies in the fact that our method of support (debuffing enemies instead of buffing allies) isn’t wanted, and the way that we support (with wells) can be counter productive and easily countered. In addition, every bunker brings a second thing they can do. Eles can burst or bunker, Guardians bunker, but Necromancers bring AoE condi pressure. Problem is, the meta really hurts that pressure.

Necro support has a niche, but it won’t be seen in PvE until they make different boss mechanics, or in PvP until that niche is worthwhile.

I support all points in this post. Very well said.

Bhawb.7408:

Other classes can support in more meaningful ways, is more accurate. Necromancers have viable support with strong control and healing, but in PvE boon stacking as support is more viable because of dungeon mechanics, and in PvP our support doesn’t mesh with the meta, and requires people to stand in wells, which is difficult and not always safe.

Basically other classes support by removing conditions and buffing and healing allies. Necromancers also heal allies, and we do have some condition removal, but we don’t have the same ability to buff allies that they do. Our support requires you to stand in a well for its full duration, something that isn’t really the best way to support in PvP. Now, the extra thing that we bring that no one else does, is tons of condition application, notably lots of weakness, and lots of chill.

So whats the problem? It lies in the fact that our method of support (debuffing enemies instead of buffing allies) isn’t wanted, and the way that we support (with wells) can be counter productive and easily countered. In addition, every support brings a second thing they can do. Eles can burst or bunker, Guardians bunker, but Necromancers bring AoE condi pressure. Problem is, the meta really hurts that pressure.

Necro support has a niche, but it won’t be seen in PvE until they make different boss mechanics, or in PvP until that niche is worthwhile.

Maybe if they made “control” conditions more meaningful, like weakness, poison or vulnerability, then our support and offense could be buffed in one fell swoop.

I’ve always thought that was really one of the bigger problems with the Necro, in that a lot of conditions are pretty meaningless. If I ever have weakness on me, it’s really not a big deal. Vulnerability is the same way. Poison is also usually not very meaningful and we don’t have a lot of access to it anyway. This is ultimately why corrupt boon isn’t as powerful as it could be, because the more effective role of it is to wipe the boons, not to apply any meaningful conditions.

They can make them more meaningful in PvE just by making bosses more difficult, and stop with all the punishing for conditions, and completely lack of boon punishment. Right now there are quite a few bosses with mechanics that punish using conditions, but close to nothing that punishes boons.

For PvP, issues are a bit more complicated. Its not that weakness, poison, and chill are weak (in fact, letting chill stay on you for a long time will devastate just about any build, weakness nullifies vigor, poison craps on a lot of healing), its that the other forms of support are much easier to utilize. You can stick a guardian on a team, and it takes very little coordination for him to do his job. I think Necro support will see more play when teams are much more comfortable with playing with the more difficult mechanics.

I’d bet that a Necro support, put into a strong condi-cleave comp could do wonders. The conditions could cover each other, a Necro with a smart team can heal for a lot, put up boons, remove conditions, and apply strong pressure with either Epidemic or CB. But again, it requires a team that is willing to run the difficult comp instead of the much easier guard/ele support combo.