Guild Wars 2

I’m coming back to the game after a few months of not playing.. Thinking about making a new character and I really like how necromancers look. But I keep seeing all these negative threads about necromancers. Are they really that bad? Or are people just QQing about L2P issues?

Level another character (guard or mesmer probably being best 2 options) till december, if the staff bugs aint fixed and they stick to not buffing necro survival, probably better to keep playing that character.

I already have a guardian! And a mesmer!

Out of curiosity, what are the staff bugs? And are they really that bad? I want to play a staff power build..

Or am I better off doing something like dagger/scepter for berserker stats?

Play a necromancer if it is something you are interested in. See how you like playing it then decide if you like the playstyle or not

I highly recommend the class despite some shortcomings. All classes have shortcomings. Except warrior right now

Warriors have been flawless for a while. They were OP when I took a break.

Keelan.7498:

Out of curiosity, what are the staff bugs? And are they really that bad? I want to play a staff power build..

Or am I better off doing something like dagger/scepter for berserker stats?

First off the staff “bugs” were actually intended according to a dev. I think the thread is in the bug forums and it was a stealth nerf. Staff skill #4 is supposed to remove condis from you and allies inside the mark when it activates and transfer them to opponents inside the mark. It does not do this for allies, and on top of that if you interrupt the skill it goes on full cooldown. The justification is it’s one of the best skills in the game, yet they could have made it transfer one condition per ally and make it the normal 3 seconds on interrupt like everyone else instead of sitting down and taking a big kitten on it. How it’s one of the best skills in the game in this state I have no clue, although Staff 2 is about to be nerfed as well because it’s “versatile” when it reaches it’s full potential, which rarely happens.

As for a Staff power build, I wouldn’t recommended it. PvE is really easy so it should work, although don’t expect some dungeon runners to take you especially if you want your main damage weapon to be staff. Necro already has the worst group utility besides maybe thief, and most of our good debuffs like vulnerability, weakness, blind, and fear are nearly useless in the current state of “stack in this corner and burst the champ down” since Champs halve weakness/vulnerability duration and blinds and fears are near useless, which is why guardians are sought. They can offer good dps, great defensive utility (Boons, reflects, blinds, blocks) and bring condi removal/conversion.

If you want to play power necro though, most players use Axe/Focus and Dagger/Warhorn and their traits are usually either 30/25/0/0/15 or 30/10/0/0/30. Most necros don’t use staff as their main damage weapon (be it power or condi build); power especially because the auto-attack projectile is very slow and only Putrid Mark (staff 4, aka the “bugged” one) does decent power damage. Staff is seen as a utility weapon and is usually used in Condi builds along with scepter/dagger, but like I said the devs took a kitten on it’s utility because it was “too good in PvP”. Instead if you want Power DPS beyond 600 (axe’s max range) use your Death Shroud’s Life Blast, it does pretty good damage.

Despite my attitude of “you’re better off rolling war” in this post, play the Necro yourself. I picked it early on despite at the time it was bugs galore because like you, I was interested in it and liked the way it looked. I love my Necro and will continue to play it despite the dev’s incompetence when it comes to balance, although I’ll bring my war/guard/mes if I have to run some dungeons.

On a side note, if you just want to role a power staff build and not specifically a necro power staff build, role ele.

If you got those, the other profession quite similar in setup (but sadly not full on aggressive gameplay) to necro i have been playing is ranger. Either way so far, as someone with 1.7k hours in a necro and who quite loves the characters look n name, id stay away from necro till the next balance patch to see what happens, if you want level one, its quite enjoyable (and you can afk it to around level 60 via minions, probably even past that with the now buffed hp), but making a necro a main right now would be quite a, shooting yourself in the foot so to say.

For points of comparison to other professions:
Ele – harder to get into, but once you climb the vertical line its a cake walk/no special requirements for timing DS or dodges because of high vigor uptime, good enough heals to make up for the low hp pool and one easy invul and 2 ok (the rock shield is very good now in pve btw, well every summon weapon is except the axe).
Ranger – as stated similar… feel? You got condis all over to help you fight, there are pets, can work as a dedicated healer but not really a thing you should reakky specialize into (again same as necro) unless running with friends, some pets are very fun and the S/WH is a lot like D/WH but with free dodges instead of siphon, sadly the 1 skill is annoying unless you esc cancel it since it roots you.
Engie – same end game complexity but via kit swapping instead of DS timing, turrets are just as kittenty if not worse than minions, very fun condi build/more in the face but also way more elusive than S/D from necros, some racials have fun with toolkits, kinda a pain to level till you get some skill points and weapon skins seem wasted on them most of the time (unless you go for a cool rifle since its ok on a discharge build).

Thief and Warrior are too far from the necro spectrum to really compare.

I am the kind of player who will play the class he likes no matter how crappy they are.

But if you are interested in how Necro’s are doing… In group PvE our power builds are still worse dps than every other class while also bringing no unique utility or support… we are a very bad dungeon/raid class. For WvW, we are great. Well builds and Condition builds are both strong. For Spvp, we are still a good class as condition spec, but slowly we are dropping in effectiveness, partially due to how much warriors counter us.

Stx.4857:

I am the kind of player who will play the class he likes no matter how crappy they are.

But if you are interested in how Necro’s are doing… In group PvE our power builds are still worse dps than every other class while also bringing no unique utility or support… we are a very bad dungeon/raid class. For WvW, we are great. Well builds and Condition builds are both strong. For Spvp, we are still a good class as condition spec, but slowly we are dropping in effectiveness, partially due to how much warriors counter us.

Actually, lich form is a moving 30 second 100b and the strongest short term aoe bursts of damage are in well bombing with it, but its not consistent DPS like Thief, not strong single target burst like Ele, not a combination like Warrior (and lightning hammer builds), but it is stronger than guardian, mesmer, engie and ranger power/direct damage. Also we got the easiest permachill setup, so no, we aint even close to as bad in dungeons as some other professions that require specific specs to even be taken into any serious party or do ok, but the lack of evades/blocks/invuls hurts our encounter survival power and necros cant do a lot of exploit runs because of it (like CoE, CoF, CM and the new TA path ones).

Perma chill is pointless in pve.

To answer op. No, I wouldnt recommend necro if you want to be useful in pve. However it can be a fun class. Although Ive been playing ele recently and the fun you can have with ele is far more entertaining than necro. Plus its a top tier pve class so id recommend ele if your simply looking for a fun useful class in dungeons/pve.

They all QQ Necromancers are OP.

youlostthegame.8102:

They all QQ Necromancers are OP.

I tell you what I completely agree. I have to beat off people with a stick clamoring for more necromancers in parties. PVE groups just fall all over themselves to recruit us because of our huge team utility and synergy with rangers to make the best dungeoneering combo of 3 necro 2 ranger.

I thought you were serious until you said 3 necro 2 ranger haha.

Reason why people being so negative is the result of the difference between what devs give us and what players really want.

PVP, the devs fails to see the balance problem of our class and thinks changing numbers can bring people to use our blood line which imo needs a complete overhaul.

PVE, the game balance only around pvp making necro one of the worst if not the worst class in pve. As pve is all about dodging and ally buffing which necro has next to none of those.

I’ll say try it and see yourself.

The real meta is 5 necros though. Unfortunately not enough of my friends have 80 necros so we cant steamrole arah and so on with necro stacking!

spoj.9672:

I thought you were serious until you said 3 necro 2 ranger haha.

Sorry, I like to poke fun at the bleed cap. We go way back to the days when bleeding was all we could do and my team single target DPS in a group with mesmers was so low ranger pets would out-damage my rabid necro.

I shouldn’t joke though. The PVE in the game currently does not warrant a supreme group, and necro really is fine enough to get through the content, which is all it is there for. There is no “Top End” dungeon in this game like WoW, requiring group comp.

I do hate the bleed cap though.

http://en.gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQRBIhhu1IjW6elmxG9eCA6RuS7cMjjXm+w6A-jAyAY/BRTRgJNgUhAl8KiGbxtIas6aMlLRUdQAjC-e

This is my traits. Main pve&wvw . I to not focus on pve output . Because condition damage stacked limit. so…fun Because I like I am an enemy to flee and stacking dmg.
Although this game debuff system not ideal. But looking at the enemy slowly loss of life very pleasant. You say it?