Showing Posts For Ichor.9360:
@Bas: Yes! I’m looking forward to trying that combo tonight. The survivability and control this build offers (while still being fairly powerful) shines more in WvW, so if you’re running dungeons or whatever else in PvE you can easily afford to swap the knight’s/soldier’s gear for berserker’s. I’ll be able to do that once I save up for the gear.
@DayLight: Yeah man, go for it! It’s tons of fun when everything comes together (i.e. your chills do their job) and you’re able to land that huge immobilize. Plus the 2 second fears feel so much more necro-y. I have a spreadsheet that calculates attributes using only exotic gear. I’m sure you could finagle ascended gear and wind up with close to the same spread only a little better obviously. Here are the numbers (including Superior Sharpening Stone and Rare Veggie Pizza):
Power 1959
Precision 1757 (44% critical chance)
Toughness 1491 (2411 armor)
Vitality 1404 (23252 HP)
Condition Duration +100%
Critical Damage 33%
As for Greater Marks, it’s nice in WvW but not necessary – especially when you’re out roaming or in a small team. I’ve never played PvP so I don’t know how it performs there.
I agree, Banshee’s Wail is meh, especially when there are so many good traits in Curses.
But I did want to confirm Wail of Doom isn’t affected by Condition Duration, as it’s not technically a condition (I think it’s an “effect”?). A 4 (6 traited) second cone Daze would be nasty…
I do use focus in dungeons, as #4 hits pretty hard and stacks 12 vuln if you hit all the bounces. So that’s nice. Epidemic-ing the long chill is always fun too. I really haven’t given WH the time of day yet in any content yet, but I’ll be sure to check it out.
If you want to make this build slightly more offensive in WvW, I suppose you could swap the OH dagger for focus, drop the Sigils of Ice (since you get another chill with Spinal Shivers) and replace them with something else. I do like having another condition removal (transfer) with dagger #4 though…
That’s some godkittened epic sauce right there. Bravo.
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I haven’t tried WH out roaming in WvW yet ‘cause I’m under the impression that condition duration doesn’t affect daze – does it? That’d be another epic lockdown if it did (even without Banshee’s Wail) and I would definitely give it a test run.
I like Dagger 5 with 15% CD reduction ‘cause of the blind and AoE weakness. I don’t have retaliation when I’m in close, so the miss plus long term damage mitigation is nice, seeing as people usually live with weakness rather than clear it.
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So I’ve been mustering the courage to share my build with you guys and DayLight’s post asking for help with his Well Necro finally pushed me over the edge. So here it is:
Gear (PvE/WvW prefixes):
Armor – Knight’s, slotted w/2x Lyssa, 2x Mad King, and 2x Ruby Orb
Weapons – Giver’s (that’s right, Giver’s), slot Daggers w/Sigils of Ice and Staff w/whatever you want
Trinkets – Soldier’s Back, Neck, and Accessories (slotted with Ruby Jewels) and Berserker Rings
Key features:
*You can really use any offhand you like. Inspired by Khalifa, I choose dagger for the area weakness (since I don’t have ground targeting wells), though the condition removal is obviously awesome, and because I take dagger cooldown reduction.
*You have the ability to choose important traits in Curses for PvE or WvW (mainly swapping in Focused Rituals for ranged well-bombing in WvW). Chilling Darkness, Weakening Shroud, and Terror are all very strong, so those are situational and/or your preference.
*I never do, but for more survivability you could flip the Blood Magic traits to improve Siphoning.
*Eat some Rare Veggie Pizza to give yourself a total of +100% Condition Duration. That equals 2 ticks on your Terror Fears and a 6 second immobilize with Dark Pact (guaranteed death if you then drop wells on a poor sucker who’s blown his cooldowns), plus the other non DoTs it doubles (weakness, blind, chill, cripple, and vulnerability).
*I recommend Superior Sharpening Stones in tandem with the pizza to boost your power up near the 2K mark.
Playstyle:
In WvW, the main idea is to bait people out of their condition removal(s) with long chills. Otherwise its pretty straightforward like well Necros tend to be. I like to open with Staff 2, then 3 to apply conditions before I switch to dagger and try to close. Now that Chilblains’ chill lasts for 8s, people will ALWAYS remove it after they blow their dodges and realize they’re still chilled and you’re about to wreck them with dagger autoattack. When approaching melee range, use #4/5 as needed. Once you’re in close you’re essentially waiting for your Sigils of Ice to proc and bait your opponent out of further removal. If you’re against a high mobility/evasion or removal class, DS #2 and WoD are in your back pocket for a gap-closer and added control. The added chills will further ensure your opponent isn’t saving any removals. Once you think you have an opening (and if you’re lucky they’ve used their heal at this point, too), lock them down with Dark Pact (6s!), drop WoS and/or WoC on them, and laugh maniacally.
In PvE, you can swap out Sigils of Ice for more DPS. You also won’t need WoD as much, though it is useful in situations. BiP is always nice, as is Epidemic for leveraging everyone else’s conditions against a ton of mobs.
In general, Dagger/Staff with Gluttony means Life Force will be on-demand, so I definitely advocate hopping into DS as often as possible (especially when your wells are on CD). With Fury you’ll have ~65% crit chance, so with your ~35% crit damage Life Transfer and Life Blast are heavy-hitters. If you’re running with Terror, make sure you Fear something/someone for 2 ticks of pretty nice damage (even with low condition damage) before you hop out. And if you’re running Enfeebling Blood on DS entry, weakness is very underrated CC if you need to tank until your heal is back up.
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Bad link dude!!!
I might have to, though I don’t want to stray too far from what’s considered the Necro play style. I like what we stand for too much.
And man do I love conditions. Nothing is better or more fun than epidemic in PvE with full Rabid gear. Stuff literally melts.
Because that just isn’t how we are played. Necromancers don’t necessarily cause high DPS, the goal is that we have relatively high DPS. Meaning sure a warrior vs warrior, those warriors are going to have really high DPS. But when a warrior faces a necromancer, they are going to be chilled, crippled, weakened, feared out of their gap closers/bursts, and are going to have significantly lower DPS than they would against pretty much any other class. Now, you can certainly argue about our effectiveness in doing that, but it is plain to see our theme in our weapon skills/utilities: tons of control, with some damage mixed in.
Right. I meant satisfying for us, not on par with other professions’ DPS. Because as of right now I think our physical DPS isn’t where it should be. Mainly because in the current PvP meta where conditions don’t stick to human opponents we’re losing out on a lot of our bite.
Great! Seeing as OP DPS for a MM Necro is plain ol’ P relative to anything else – wouldn’t you agree? It’s not like you’re running a bunch of crit or conditions on top of minions is it?
But how is that fair, to funnel DPS builds into having to use minions? Why can’t we achieve a satisfying level of DPS with our weapons and traits and gear – like every other profession is able to – without having to devote utilities to it. I’d rather choose utilities for utility (not saying minions don’t have utility) than to supplement lackluster DPS.
Oh, I don’t think Necros should have the highest DPS either, by any means. I enjoy being the profession more geared toward whittling away and outlasting rather than bursting down.
Taking a step back though, does any other profession have their class mechanic tied to one of the primary attributes? Not nearly as much. And it just so happens to be the one that adds to HP, which we have more than anyone else of (besides Warriors). Not to mention that the mechanic itself is another health pool.
So, I maintain that it isn’t fair or balanced how our large base HP + DS acts as a sort of deterrent to going into Blood Magic. And I suppose it being a deterrent is where we disagree. But for me, something isn’t designed correctly when an entire trait line’s worth is reduced by what we’re given by default.
Hmm, I’m gonna say no (Who’s with me?!).
For one, it isn’t very necromancer-y (IMO).
For two, I don’t think we need any more conditions.
And for three, I think they should keep the sort of exclusivity certain conditions have in this game – I like how not every class has access to every condition. Seems fair and intuitive to me.
Sorry…
Oh you mean how we were supposed to have fear, but infact everyone else does it better?
Haha, I’m with you on that. Though we do have access to more than one fear. Still doesn’t feel right does it?
And if we don’t use minions?
So, nerf our base HP (which highly nerfs our overall survivability) so we can buff damage, so we just offset it by gearing defensively? That is no different than where we are now, where we can gear offensively because of high natural defense, except that now our base damage is now high, and base survivability low; which completely goes against the profession design.
You’re right, if you rule out Death Shroud. I believe DS is the built-in survivability our profession was designed to have, and I don’t want to change the profession on such a fundamental level.
Would you agree that there is a point at which we, as Necros, can stack too much Vitality? Where that point is is arbitrary, just that there’s a point at which it does become poor/incorrect play and “thinking stupidly”.
I’ll also agree that this isn’t a problem most of the time, especially for those of us who are skilled (Necro) players. But I keep coming back to spending trait points in Blood Magic. I’m sure those of us who build for DPS would love to get dagger/siphoning/well traits without feeling like they’re losing out so much on precious power/precision/crit damage in a profession whose forums are filled with threads on how Necro feels weak unless you’re running a Zerker or Hybrid with little added survivability. What I’m proposing, yes, would raise our base DPS and lower our base survivability before we trait and gear. But after we do those things, and get our Vitality to any point before it becomes excessive in the context of our individual build, we would have attributes worth of gear/traits to spend elsewhere.
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So, maybe I am just nit-picking but your title reminded me of the way I used to think when I was a noob and did not use DS like it was meant to be. DS is a gap-closer, an attack, and effectively partial invulnerability, not a second health bar. Use it first, not last.
The skills/functionality isn’t what I think is wrong with DS. I understand what it’s there for and how to use it effectively. If you read my previous posts you’ll know that my problem lies in how DS (well, half of it) is a raw increase to our HP while we’re also given the highest base HP.
I also fully understand how health/vitality and LF/DS work synergistically.
So, @Bhawb (and Anchoku and anyone else): A nerf to our base HP is from a standpoint of balancing our profession more. Yes, it would nerf DS since LF pool size is tied to our HP/vitality. But, as it stands, stacking Vitality just becomes too much. Like that guy who posted his 40K HP screenshot – what playstyle does that use? Last-man-standing Necros – while there is a certain novelty in being able to live when the rest of your party wipes – are relatively selfish “support” builds outside Well of Blood. And when you have that much health, I doubt you’re running any precision/crit damage, and maybe not even conditions. AND straight power (like in the Juggermancer and similar builds) with no crit chance (and therefore no on-crit effects) isn’t very wise for our profession given its power scaling. Anyway, back to the point: nerfing our base HP would warrant buffing our attacks and/or scaling for attacks/conditions. This way, we could incorporate Vitality into builds via traits or gear while avoiding overkill. Yes, more Vitality will always be a good thing, but personally, I’d rather have less HP that’s efficient than more raw HP.
Even with a nerf to our base HP, adding Vitality would still be a huge boon to our total eHP. Without adding Vitality to a build after such a nerf, yes, DS wouldn’t be able to soak nearly as much damage. But the current line of thought if you’re trying to squeeze DPS out of your Necro is “I’m a Necro, I have the highest base HP AND DS, I don’t need to add another drop of Vitality.” But seeing as how the devs tied DS to Vitality, and because of how beneficial it is, it seems silly not to invest in any. That’s the whole point of this thread – that our base HP + mechanic creates imbalance.
If base HP is nerfed, for example, we could get siphoning/well traits without feeling like we’re blowing trait points (in terms of attributes) in Blood Magic. This would be because we don’t have that giant pool to begin with, and would have reason to build in Vitality besides how it interacts with DS.
I don’t see a problem with DS functionality or skills. In fact, I’m surprised by how many people complain about having a gap-closer (however reliable), an interrupt, and a strong AoE attack…
Let’s try to stay away from DS redesign in this thread though. I’m more concerned with how people feel about a nerf to our base health pool because of the strong, positive effect Vitality has on our mechanic, and considering it generally isn’t beneficial to stay in DS for more than a few moments anyway (to get skills off/soak damage). Such a nerf would allow us to make our regular HP (not DS) more effective, and allow for spreading more attributes into areas that improve DPS.
Hmm, I’m gonna say no (Who’s with me?!).
For one, it isn’t very necromancer-y (IMO).
For two, I don’t think we need any more conditions.
And for three, I think they should keep the sort of exclusivity certain conditions have in this game – I like how not every class has access to every condition. Seems fair and intuitive to me.
Sorry…
Haha, I’m not saying Vitality is bad on a Necromancer, or that DS makes it bad. I suppose what you could boil my argument down to is that I wish we wouldn’t have been given the highest base health pool. And that is because of all of the ways we benefit from Vitality (LF and DS and siphoning).
So from my point of view, it’d follow to have a smaller base HP pool, since we are already likely to be adding some amount of Vitality either through traits or gear. That way, our final HP tally wouldn’t be overkill, we could make sure it’s as effective as possible through Toughness, and we’d be able to dump more points into power/precision/critical damage to get us to a place where people are satisfied with our DPS without having to run such low survivability.
Does that make sense? Not just for you, but for everyone in terms of how other professions are able to build without having to take how their profession design (base health, in this case) and mechanic interacts with their attributes into such consideration?
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Right. I know how/when to use DS appropriately, and I didn’t mean that it doesn’t have a positive benefit. Going back to my original post, does any other profession mechanic have such an attribute-based benefit? Not that I’m aware of.
When you’re making a build in another profession, if you decide you want traits that happen to be in the Vitality line, you probably don’t gear for any more Vitality (unless you’re trying to make some sort of tank/support-exclusive build which, by nature, will have piddly DPS). If your traits don’t net you any Vitality, you probably pick some up with your gear. Right now, with how DS is, it feels like we are wasting attributes by spending trait points in Blood Magic because of our naturally high health pool + DS. Sure, DS scales with Vitality, but that only compounds the problem. We then need a bunch of Toughness to make sure that HP is effective. So what I’m saying is, for us to stack any more Vitality comes at the cost of DPS, which it obviously does for all professions, but we feel it the most as light armor wearers with the highest base HP with a profession mechanic that adds more HP. And that fact (I believe) contributes to why so many people complain about how weak we feel – compared to other professions – unless you build a glass cannon hybrid or powermancer.
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Doesn’t nemesis in the very same video in which he demonstrates the build play in fractal lvl35?
Well yeah, but its against the Shaman in the Snowblind Fractal, which is an incredibly easy fight where you hardly take any damage if you’re fighting from range…
Yes, LF degen is 4% (3% traited) whether you have base 18k HP or have 40k. Its why staying in DS more than a few seconds is bad.
Isn’t there something wrong with that though? Regardless of whether or not you trait to improve DS, shouldn’t using our profession mechanic provide a consistent positive benefit when we use it? Given that it operates differently than other profession mechanics, how is it fair to give us something that we aren’t going to use to its full extent because there’s a point at which it doesn’t become worth it to? Are there other profession mechanics like this?
I apologize for the unnecessary bump, but I wanted to say I changed the name of the thread in hopes of gaining more interest/being taken seriously – I didn’t want this to get passed over because it sounded like a pointless, whiny rant.
Let me put it this way, a lot of people like the saying “The best defense is a good offense” no matter the situation.
True, but hopefully this isn’t how I’m being understood. I like the idea of Necros being attrition masters, and want for us to keep that identity. I’m really just trying to get at how the “attrition” capabilities we’ve been given aren’t efficient and put pressure on our attributes, which I believe is unfair since no other profession mechanic is constraining like ours is.
I want to get this thread back on topic (not that I don’t like discussing the different professions and how they maintain their health pools).
Can some more of the more prevalent forum posters weigh in on my thoughts from the original post? I’d appreciate the discussion. Thanks!
EDIT: Fixed the quote.
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No problem! I’m happy to read and comment.
1) All right, I think I follow your math, or at least understand what you’re trying to say. Basically, more armor equals less damage reduction via protection (in terms of a raw number). Which is true (stacking Toughness without regard for your HP can tip the EHP scale too far the other way).
I agree with Elementalists favoring Toughness over Vitality, as it makes sense with their many boons and sources of healing and damage reduction. I disagree with Guardians’ defense being reactive. I’d argue that Guardians fall into the same category as Elementalists in terms of EHP, since they have access to tons of boons and damage reduction as well. Aegis is the opposite of reactive.
As far a Mesmers being reactive – that’s fine. But what’s the difference between absorbing an initial burst if caught off guard with Vitality vs. Toughness (or a mix of both)? Especially if the extra Vitality can’t be recovered through healing?
2) I agree with being good at too many things often leads to being OP. I didn’t suggest being good at other things with no cost though. My point was that giving us this much soft HP is a less efficient form of survivability (or “attrition”). Reducing the raw number of soft HP we get by default (including DS) would decrease survivability, that’s the trade-off. In turn, the Blood Magic line and gear with +Vitality would be much more viable/appealing, since we aren’t sacrificing DPS for more of something we already have plenty of in order to get traits we may want. Which reminds me: in no way did I mean anyone should trait for stats over actual traits – that’d be silly. Again, my point was that the BM line has a subtractive element to it when you take our base HP and DS into consideration.
I don’t think Necros should be the heaviest damage dealers either. But I think some of our damage-doing potential is hindered for reasons I have previously stated.
As a reminder, this game was developed so that professions wouldn’t specialize in DPS, tanking, or healing. Sure, you can lean one way or another to fit your playstyle. What I don’t think is helpful is when people talk about how you can neglect something (usually survivability) in favor of something else (usually DPS) because of such-and-such a party setup. I’d like for this thread to be as general as it can be across all game modes, leaving party composition (not to mention specific dungeons/fights, etc.) out of the equation.
I’ve never gotten passed over in pick-up dungeon groups. The only time that’ll happen is when you try to join a group that’s specifically asking for another class. For the typical pick-up group not to include a Necro they either have to be elitist, ignorant, stupid, or any combination thereof, and therefore not worth playing with in the first place.
The negativity you’re hearing has to do with endgame performance compared to the other professions. The main theme is “we can’t do anything that another profession can’t do better.” I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with that, but I will say that right now Necro does have a niche and rather than being great at a few things, it’s good at many things. Keep experimenting!
Crafting can only get you certain attribute combinations. Dungeon gear can have attribute combinations that are the same as what you can craft, as well as ones that you can’t craft (and are therefore unique to specific dungeons). So, dungeon gear can be both for the unique skins AND unique stats, not just the skins.
Power/Precision/Condition Damage is the Rampager attribute combination, FYI.
Check out the GW2 Wiki and look up crafted armor and dungeon armor to see what you can get from where.
Well, doing the Daily Achievement gets you laurels, so you’re killing two birds with one stone there.
As for which gear, the true Condition Necro gear is the +Precision/Toughness/Condition Damage spread (called Rabid), with Condition Damage being the main attribute.
Before you spend all those laurels though, I’d suggest combing through the forums and looking at build posts, as there is far more than just one viable build. Also, Minion Master doesn’t suck! Don’t believe what you hear. It’s just less common/understood.
Cheers on 80!
EDIT: Fixed a typo.
@Nay: I agree, DS-centric builds should trait and choose weapons that build LF quickly so they can hop into DS as often as possible. No argument there.
I wasn’t really getting at how Vitality applies to DS-centric builds though. I am, however trying to get at how Vitality applies to the Necro in general – calling attention to what I think is a drawback/fault in our profession design coupled with our profession mechanic.
Thanks for the feedback. I have some comments/questions though:
1) For EHP, I didn’t say 1 Toughness: 1 Vitality. In fact, I don’t think that’s a correct way to gauge EHP. I did realize, however, that the calculator I pulled that 1:10 ratio from was from GW1, so I’m not sure if it holds true for GW2. Anyway, how is optimizing effective health only a Necromancer and Warrior thing? Since I’m not really familiar with other classes on that level, can you provide examples of how Elementalists get more out of Toughness and Healing Power? Or how Mesmer and Guardian value Vitality? Guardian valuing Vitality doesn’t make sense to me BECAUSE they have so much Aegis/Protection/Regeneration.
2) I’m familiar with the playstyles and situations that DPS Necro builds require. But another thing that annoys me/I find unfair is how people say we can ignore defensive stats in builds, so long as X condition is satisfied. We don’t deserve to have to rely on kiting everything or party composition because the “attrition” buffer they’ve given us isn’t enough to compensate. This all goes back to my argument that the massive amount of health available to us isn’t as effective as other means of damage mitigation and limits our gear/trait choices from an efficiency standpoint.
3) I didn’t propose either of those things. What I meant by siphoning not being worth it is that I think it could use a buff and/or a rework. Do I think it should scale with Vitality? No. Healing power? Maybe. I really just wish it were more potent, so it would at least make up for what you’re losing by spending 10 -20 points in BM.
Ichor here. I’ve been following the Necro forums for a good while now and am finally to the point where I feel like I can add to the discussion, so here goes:
I want to preface my opinions by declaring my love for this profession. I’ve had tons of fun with it and it has incredible potential. But I love to hate it too, because I’m also one of those who believes Necromancer to be ArenaNet’s red-headed stepchild when it comes to professions in this game – both in design and implementation. It’s really evident (to me) that we don’t have a developer in our camp. And there are many reasons for that, but for the purposes of this thread I’m sticking to Death Shroud.
Now, I’m not one of those people who will sit here and moan about DS not being useful, because it can be. However, I am annoyed by the people who tout it for being a secondary health bar that can soak burst damage. That’s true, it can, and no other profession has access to something like that – but why should they? It’s OUR profession mechanic after all. And since ArenaNet decided that we’re supposed to take hits, it kind of makes sense. But what really grinds my gears (Peter Griffin voice) is how we already have the highest base HP AND DS scales with vitality. I understand that classes were given different base health pools as a matter of balance, but to combine the highest base with a mechanic like DS (in my opinion) is a redundancy that does more harm to our build potential than good.
If I understand effective health correctly, the golden ratio is 1 armor:10 HP (if this is wrong, please let me know). Having the highest base HP AND DS tips the scales heavily in the direction of HP, which has two very limiting effects: First, it steers us away from any gear with +Vitality, which limits our stat choices in terms of gear. Secondly, it steers us away from spending any trait points in the Blood Magic line, which has some very nice traits (for daggers, siphoning (if siphoning were worth it), and wells). Now, I realize this doesn’t stop people from succesfully running Carrion or Soldier gear and/or traiting down the BM line. My point is that, if you want to be efficient attribute-wise as a Necro, you really shouldn’t mess around a whole lot with Vitality. Imagine the extra DPS you could achieve if you were able to spend the 800 points worth of Vitality you get from a full Soldier’s set elsewhere! Sure, DS wouldn’t be as hearty, but it’d be much more offensive.
In no other profession does the design and specific mechanic have such an influence on building, and I don’t think that’s fair. One possibility would be for DS to not scale with any attribute (though Soul Reaping could still increase pool size). That would call for buffs in other areas. Another possibility would be to get rid of the second health bar characteristic entirely and give us access to more/different means of attrition through crowd control or damage mitigation. The risk with that, though, is is that we begin to lose our current identity and become more like the other professions (only with green/black/insect/skeleton effects). Personally, I think main problem is our high base HP, and the best option for us would be to knock that down and buff our damage output and/or mitigation accordingly. Then, depending on our build, we’d be able to pick up Vitality through BM or our gear without gimping ourselves in the process. DS would still scale with Vitality, allowing us to ramp up attrition capabilities (through health and DS pool size, anyway) to our liking.
EDIT: Got rid of a useless heading, fixed a typo, and finished a thought.
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