Guild Wars 2

The hounds are a fairly decent compliment to any condi necro, but I rarely find them more useful than plagueform. They are a awesome addition for minion masters though.

Considering one of my engineers has over 3400 armor I find her to be very durable.

IMO Staff is OP in PvE. Staff clones cast Winds of Chaos. Combined with your own Winds of Chaos, Chaos Armor & Chaos Storm you can turn your iWarlock into a monster.

The iDefender utility skill is a pretty awesome tank for the earlier levels too. Stick him on the toughest mob while you clean up the weaker ones.

As for tips, I wouldn’t worry about getting Mantras until you’ve got some trait points to throw around. Decoy is awesome, and for 1 skill point it’s a steal. Your starting heal (Ether Feast) is pretty much the best one you’ve got. Remember your clones + phantasms are bound to the target you cast them on. It’s usually a good idea to not stick them all to one mob, unless you’ve got some fresh clones/phants ready for the other mobs.

Mesmer is a slow starter. You will not kill faster than most other classes, but with a staff and some common sense it’s pretty much impossible to die in pve.

This dev done video covers a lot of basic necro pve builds, it may be worth your time.
http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/c/2763537

CPC is actually pretty good in keep defense. People love to spam water heals over the rams and this is a great way to massively reduce the effectiveness of that tactic.

The necro is not completely void of group support as you make it sound. We can remove conditions from allies and easily spread them to the enemies. We can also provide poison/dark combo fields in spades. As well as permablinding mobs which voids any damage from the effected mob(s). With the recent change to Weakness that condition alone is more powerful than ever.

We also have some of the best vuln stacking abilities of any class. As well as boon stripping which is particularly useful vs dredge.

Yes, conditions suck unless you build for them. Because of their limited stacking ability I find it far more effective to build for condition damage vs condition duration.

We can fill up death shroud in <2 seconds from 0-full with spectral skills. With 30k hp and shroud we can have the highest effective hp of any class in the game by over double.

In terms of which Light armor class is “best.” There is no answer. They all have vastly different playstyles from each other. It’s definitely worth having one (or more) of each

DevonCarver.5370:

Agreed. We need to figure out how we want to handle this, however, so I can’t say when we’ll do something about it or what the nature of the solution will be.

The big thing with the bags is the Badges. Those should be moved to a currency similar to that of the laurels. Global account scale, and just automatically “granted” when appropriate. As for the other “junk” meh, i’ve seen 1 yellow in days upon days of wvw.

Even worse is idle people will remove the “outnumbered” buff even though you really would be outnumbered.

I could be mistaken but I’m almost positive apothecary gear (+jewelry) can be found on the orr temples pruchasable via karma.

The biggest problem with the scepter (imho) is that it’s 1/2 power and 1/2 condition based. If they restored confusion to the auto attack I would use it in a heartbeat.

GuilguiS.2738:

Agreed. Maybe now they can make the elixir skills on EG work with our elixir traits.

I would <3 that change.

I run 0/30/10/30/0 with 4 elixirs, supply crate, two pistols along with full (6x)Str runes and do just fine. Then again that engineer pretty much never leaves wvw so the build may not be as viable elsewhere.

I use a different engineer for kits/pve/etc.

RaynStargaze.6510:

*snip*Pistol isnt all that good aside from the poison and the 2 sigils.

If we’re talking about wvw the pistols are amazing, especially with coated bullets. You can tag every single red name with very little effort. Blowtorch is one of the strongest burn abilities in the game.

More on topic: I would suggest keeping 30 in alchemy and obviously 30 in Firearms. In terms of pvp (wvw or spvp) I find 10 points in Inventions is pretty much the sweet spot. Since you will get immobilized a lot and being stealthed on immob is invaluable.

nutspanther.2476:

Kind of changing my mind on my proposal right now. It would be kind of OP if all necro’s received access to quickness and stability by default. I’m going to work up something new now. Thinking basically, 3 different Death Shrouds. The current one, 1 for minions, 1 for condition builds…

A shroud for condition builds is basically our underwater shroud set as is.

I have a PVT suit for my necro. It seems to work best if you work in some Soldier gear to compliment the knights. Just remember shroud hp = your max life total. So if you push up to the 30k mark you’re solid with 60k effective, before you factor in the soul reaping traits/buffs. Add in the toughness and you won’t die easily (if ever).

We have Stability in Lich form…oh wait…Lich moves at the speed of a glacier.(fitting because the “chill of death” right?) Our Shroud #2 seems best suited to stopping people from running, it will still port you if it’s cast before you get knocked down.

Same issue here. Also have this problem w/ Spectral Grasp on my necro. Sometimes the immune thing is caused by Aegis, but still has issues when Aegis or Stability is not present. I rarely have this issue in pve. It’s almost always WvW so I agree with CriSPeh that’s it likely a lag issue.

Sebastian Knight.4736:

Nope. I will echo the sentiment that the only weapons that fit thematically are ones I very rarely use on my Necro.

I am, however, saving up for Eye of Rodgort, the true Necro “Legendary.”

I have the Eye of Rodgort on my necro and it is worth every single one of those 500 powerful bloods. Sadly I’ve yet to find a dagger (aside from legendary) that it doesn’t put to shame.

Que sarcasm: And yeah Bifrost rainbows fit sooo perfectly with the necro…

Gratz on the solo! With more and more classes posting these solo lupi videos combined with the eventual arah revamp you can bet he’s going to get a uber buff.

Nothing like a rainbow staff with a big black sickle sticking out….yeah perfect fit….

Dagger and maybe warhorn are the only two that fit at all. Trident is awesome but you’d never see it.

I was under the impression healing power scaled very poorly. IMO PVT is the way to go then you can maintain some form of damage. I do know that Regen does scale fairly well with hp but the stat loss vs healing gain just isn’t worth it.

This affliction doesn’t just plague necro’s, engineers have this problem too.

Necro’s biggest weakness is lack of easy access to utility boons. Vigor, Stability etc. I don’t consider our elites acceptable options for stablity. Even if they add vigor to bone minion explosions I’d be happy.

This is a very good question. 20 seconds of fear would be insane(ly awesome).

That was a great video. As others mentioned that thief fight was probably some of the most entertaining game-play footage I’ve seen in quite some time.

You definitely need to be using Scepter #2 a LOT more. I would also swap out Epidemic with Blood is Power. The might stacks do wonders. Also if you cast it without a target you just get the 10xMight and no bleeds if desired,

Kravick.4906:

Criselli.7462:

Sure an engineer with 409 can cure conditions one at a time via elixir toss/drink, but while they’re doing that you can still be applying conditions while he is busy doinkittenage and attempting to cleanse them. And every single one of those elixirs is going to give him a boon of some sort for you to finally corrupt in the end. Not only that but engineer conditions are applied at a relatively short range compared to the necros.

I have two engineers at level 80 and I am VERY much aware of their limitations. And even if they’re covered in boons doesn’t mean you can’t be destroying them with conditions or other damage…

You only need to clear the bleeding stacks to stop a condition necro from doing anything to you. Necromancers stack bleeding very slowly. Because of the way the condition removal system works, last condition applied is the first condition removed, bleeding is always the first condition to be removed. Range is also not an issue against a necromancer. Whats he going to do? Run away from you? They have no mobility skills to get away, so feel free to stand right on top of them while you out damage them with your burning and confusion, which necros can’t do, on top of your own bleeding and poison. Getting to much for you to handle? Pop Elixir S and heal yourself without fear of being interrupted, or drop a supply crate which applies more burning from flame turret and gives you health packs. Use Gear Shield to take some pressure off. Knock down the necro with Magnet.

I may not have the experience you do playing one, but I’ve seen plenty of engineers and what they do to me. It frickin hurts. At no point do I ever feel threatened when a necromancer shows up. An engineer on the other hand, I’ve learned to approach them with caution, because they can seriously hurt you very quickly, or turn out to be one of the tankiest kittens this game has ever seen. I have watched 1 engineer bunker a point against 4 people, and do so for a good solid minute before backup finally arrived.

Also, Signet of Spite? Just… no. I shouldn’t need to explain why that was a very bad skill to bring up. 5 seconds of conditions on a 90 second cool down? Yeesh, such a bad skill.

I do agree Signet of Spite needs rework, but it does have it’s uses. Granted there are far better choices.

Engineers probably take more work than any other class to be effective. Particularly ones with 2 or more kits loaded. If you see an engineer using multiple kits in the same fight I can promise you he has at most 2 elixirs loaded. Assuming they’re cleansing the bleeds, poison is pretty effective at curtailing any medkits from the supply crate. Engies healing power comes from the toughness tree which people usually don’t go more than 10 points in, even bunkers.

The staff 2-3-4 combo wrecks my engineers pretty effectively and can apply huge pressure forcing a condition curing spree. My engineer favors dual pistols with 4 elixirs loaded. And yes if you cover me in conditions I will cleanse them all, but I won’t be hitting you or your friends while I’m doing that. Elixir load-outs are pretty much the last bastion of engy dominance. So plan on dealing with 409 every time.

I’ve never had an issue with magnet. It’s tell is fairly obvious and if you have spectral walk ready hit it as soon as you see it and you walk recall after the pull instantly. Engineers are definitely one of our toughest opponents, but fortunately they are the least played class.

As for condimancers I think damage over duration is the way to go. If engies and other classes are cleansing a ton you want those conditions to hit as hard as possible while they’re on. Duration is great for pve, but not wvw.

As a melee power necro engineers don’t cause nearly as many problems. Keep a staff handy for the long range fights. Unblockable marks means gear shield is useless well.

EDIT: Fixed some grammatical errors (I’m sure some remain)

Kravick.4906:

snip
And as soon as you strip them, those boons go right back on. The classes that rely on boons are classes that have a far easier time reapplying their boons than we have stripping them. Especially against guardians who just turn the conditions right back into boons once they’ve been corrupted with: http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Contemplation_of_Purity Its also a frickin stun breaker! Our role as a bunker buster gets completely negated by a single skill. GG. Elementalists gain those boons right back every time they switch attunements, which is every 3 seconds it seems.
snip

Point of fact: Contemplation of Purity has 60 sec CD. Corrupt Boon has a 40 second CD. Furthermore Signet of Spite can cover him in conditions again, instantly.

Point of fact: Corrupt Boon is not our only boon —> conditions skill.

Point of fact: Once Contemplation of Purity (assuming the guard even uses it…) is used, there is a very high chance you have several condition skills ready to go immediately since very nearly every necro weapon skill applies one form of condition or another.

Sure an engineer with 409 can cure conditions one at a time via elixir toss/drink, but while they’re doing that you can still be applying conditions while he is busy doinkittenage and attempting to cleanse them. And every single one of those elixirs is going to give him a boon of some sort for you to finally corrupt in the end. Not only that but engineer conditions are applied at a relatively short range compared to the necros.

I have two engineers at level 80 and I am VERY much aware of their limitations. And even if they’re covered in boons doesn’t mean you can’t be destroying them with conditions or other damage…

With the cutback on quickness skills confusion is a far less urgent danger these days.

I’m 100% against increased cooldown at the expense of any “buff”. That said, it would definitely be nice to epidemic fear.

Well with Throw Mine you’re definitely getting a garbage Toolbelt skill. I doubt I’ve even seen it used since the massive “fix.”

Afaik Elixir Infused Bombs do not scale with healing power at all. At least, there’s no mention of it on the wiki. So I would discount that as a utility option. Power definitely works well with Bombs though.

I have an engineer that runs a full suit of knights/soldiers gear and she carries about 3200 armor, with 0 points in the toughness line. You could probably push yours to 3500-3700 armor without much trouble. You’d be one tanky bomb healing engy for sure.

If deployable turrets lets us place turrets on verticle surfaces or ceilings that trait just became 300% more useful.

I’m finding with enough practice I have a pretty good idea of when skills become ready. That said UI queues would certainly make it a lot easier than hours of playtime.

I favor dual pistols with Coated Bullets and Elixir U. You will literally tag every red name in that zerg with 0 issue in addition to doing some solid aoe with Explosive Shot (pistol 1). A well placed toss of elixir U will get you close enough to the zerg to use some of your short range skills.

Engineers are certainly not weak to conditions. Especially with 409 and 3 elixirs loaded up. I can promise you though that every engineer in tpvp is going to be carrying the Supply Crate elite though. Bring stunbreaks, or brace yourself for the grenades that follow.

Careful about using Immobilize on engineers as well. They have a trait with virtually 0 internal cooldown to make them invisible when immobilized.

What about Elixir U tossing of the Smokescreen? Assuming you got Smokescreen instead of the reflect wall.

I recently leveled a (second) engineer to 80 this time using no fewer than 2 turrets in the utility slots. I believe Deployable Turrets ruins most of the “ease-of-use” aspect that’s provided by the healing turret.

I found that the Thumper Turret with Flame Turret and a Flamethrower utility setup to be surprisingly effective. Alternatively using a Rifle, Rifle Turret, Rocket Turret, Toolkit setup worked even better. Particularly in using Caltrops to slow the advance of melee mobs and Magnet to pull them into turret range.

Turrets for standard fare PvE (including dungeons) work just fine as is. However, the exploding after 5 minutes is a serious issue. Some boss fights are considerably longer. If a turret destructs after 5 minutes don’t make us wait another 30-50 seconds on a cooldown all the while gimping our damage output. Make them immediately available for redeployment if the 5 minute timer triggers.

Sorry if this was tl;dr.

I can’t recall but doesn’t it state “unarmed bundle.” Like medkit. Could be wrong it’s been ages since I’ve been to the mists.

Had a blast defending SM against dual zergs. We held you guys out longer than I expected.

~Criselli

Chaos X because I do use a staff. As for the phantasm fury my crit chance is not 9% it’s more like 30% even higher if I have fury or sigil stacks built up. The gear page wasn’t fleshed out. I keep weapon of every type in my bag and traits/utilities change on the fly.

My post was more aimed at "Why are phantasms subjected to immediate beatdowns in higher tier fractals 30+. The mesmer using the above build isn’t at that point, however my original glass cannon mesmer is. And even then it’s difficult to get zerker to live long enough to spin through and run back to shatter. And I’ve had to rely on clone death to inflict most of my conditions.

Maybe I’ve just been unlucky with pugs.

Back when the farmers were rampant portal had some excellent trolling uses. Since most of them are afk/macro’d spamming their “use” key portal becomes a tool to send them to….less friendly places.

So the axe once absorbed and echo’d would inflict agony on the mossman? I know it doesn’t “absorb” but it seemed the best fitting word to describe the effect. Copy..clone..replicate..facsimile etc.

My original mesmer occasionally runs a pretty hefty daze/stun build that becomes surprisingly effective in most pve situations even boss fights since you’re chaining daze so often the resistance stacks melt off.

Thank you for the replies.

I recently leveled a second mesmer with the pure intention of almost exclusively using skills my first mesmer ignored. I’ve been using mantras, signets, along with the staff, scepter/sword combinations. The ride to 80 was easy as ever. I’m finding illusions to be mostly ineffective in the upper content as a form of dps (as opposed to shatter fodder). Which leads to the point of this post: Mesmer vs FotM.

+Mantra group healing is significant with a full suit of apothecary gear.
-Phantasms w/ traits + signet still die extremely easy.

So instead of using the standard 20/20/0/0/30 glass cannon gs meltface build my other mesmer favors I’ve been using 10/10/20/25/5 and it’s good, but not optimal and it feels considerably less effective in terms of raw damage despite Warlocks hitting for 3-4k on the high end.

More clearly stated: Why go this route when the other route is: easier, faster, and just as squishy. I’m looking for input from mesmers who have championed this type of setup for the majority of their playstyle and what you find works. Build as follows:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fgAQJArcl4zSqHRzhGadJhJFBH5nZEdnjWApCquUBcD;TEAg2A

Additional Questions:
Mimic – Can this absorb the agony axe of the Mossman. And if yes, can we throw it back at him for agony damage on him. (Hope this is yes!)

Is it typical for phantasms/clones to change target and attack the wolves when summoned on the Mossman. This seems like errant behavior.

Sorry if this was tl;dr

Thank you for your time,
-Vexor

Tintaglia.4762:

When it says retrying, can you just leave it and trust it’s really retrying? Or do you need to exit and restart over and over?

And that is the question. I suspect it’s not. According to the window’s resource monitor there is 0 network activity.

EDIT: It works…guess I was wrong.

Toroquin.3605:

Norn, no doubt.
The picture speaks for itself.

That is awesome!

You need to be very careful with confusion in WvW. In spvp it’s nerfed but in WvW even a couple of stacks will hit hard. Good chance you were fighting a confusion build with a Staff/Scepter/Torch combo. It’s going to be unavoidable if the mesmer is built for it.

Dastion.3106:

You can also use Mirror Blade to trigger Mimic’s Blocking. However, it doesn’t actually capture the Mirror Blade. The skill will continue to bounce between you and the enemy. Activating the Echo does nothing.

But still a nice way to trigger the block on demand.

Elidath.5679:

UnknownFreak.2805:

also it would be nice if you was able to reflect moamorph(unsure if possible), and then echo(if possible(unsure)) it again after, and then make your moamorph

I doubt you can reflect it, since ANet stance on Elite is that they can’t be reflected (Dagger Storm was adjusted for that). As for the capture, you’ll need to try to catch it while invincible, and tell us the results, as that’s the only case I didn’t try (silly me). Disclaimer : no other case worked.

Dagger Storm was adjusted to not be reflectable because Daggerstorm is also a projectile reflect. That means if you tried to reflect it the daggers would fly at the Thief then bounce right back. A smart thief could insta-down a Mesmer by dagger storming inside his feedback bubble.

Don’t ask me how I know this….

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaGw1DOzQhE

That is nuts.

On topic: Mimic needs more functionality. Aside from this bug it one of our most useless skills. It’s not outright bad it’s just that with three utility slots there are MUCH MUCH better choices in almost every scenario.

I run my engineer in a 30/0/0/20/20 setup and I have 0 issue in melee with p/s, bomb and elixir kits, and usually a situational elixir, typically R for extra dodges and group support. With a setup of soldier/knight gear with one or two pieces carrying pre I have about 3000 armor.

This is strictly in the pve sense. Although it could be modded for pvp easily.

Great video (2/5). I’m not sure how many aspiring mesmers caught your use of Into the Void to interrupt would-be helpers while you stomped their friend. Glad to see I’m not the only one using the Scepter/Sword combo.

google.3709:

-Projectile finisher: Projectiles have a 20% chance to have 1 additional bounce
-leap finisher : Cover yourself in oil, 50% chance to evade attacks
-Blast finisher: Creates an explosion damaging nearby foes.

Those would be pretty awesome. The leap finisher would have to be some kind of armor buff, like fire armor or chaos armor. And with 50% miss chance it would have to be a very short duration.

I do love the fact that engineers have so many blast finishers and so many field types. This one would be gravy.

And I agree a lightning field would definitely be a nice addition, but I have no idea where we would fit it in with our current stuff.

In light of all your excellent posts: I completely agree with the “what the _” engineers getting shafted sentiment.