Guild Wars 2

With so many high profile problems with the class in general, and to see only 2 changes; a bug fix and a heavy hefty increase to resource cost.

Abilities with Z-axis or other issues that result in less, or no damage on target or general mechanic failure:

• Hammer 2 – The ground field that deals damage does not work on an incline or ledge
• Hammer 3 – The damage occurs at the exact height of the player, and not the target, does not work on an incline or ledge
• Hammer 4 – Targets at a higher angles above or below the player can get projectiles through the front
• Mace 2 – Flame field does not consistently work on inclines, ramp bridges, etc
• Mace 3 – The eruptions do not consistently trigger on inclines
• Sword 2 – Targets non-existing environmental objects resulting in projectiles flying into walls and the ground
• Sword 4 – Shackling Wave does not work on inclines
• Sword 5 – Does not pull target when going up any incline even subtle ground hilly terrain
• Axe 5 – Does not work on inclines
• Chaotic Release (Glint Elite) – Does not work consistently on inclines, and has the largest visual CC callout in the game that most everyone can avoid it
• Phase Traversal – This will get the player hung up on small ledges and even steps between the player and target where other class’ teleport abilities have no issue. In water, any object or even terrain that is blocking direct LOS gets the player hung up on that object and uses up the resource cost of the ability

Abilities with X/Y-axis issues that result in canceling the ability:

• Sword 3 – If target is in a corner, up against a wall, or standing on a ledge… the ability will cancel. It requires all 3 hop points around the target to be unobstructed
• Vengeful Hammers – Ability cancels if hammer projectiles hit an environmental object or wall

Not counting healing skills, that is 13 out of 42 weapon skills/utilities/elites that have issues so glaring that they simply do not work in many situations. That amounts to 1 in 4 abilities have no effect based on an incline or environment.

Where are the patch notes that say these have been fixed?

When you start factoring in 2v2 and 3v3, and AOE such as Epidemic, healing, prolonged fights, the fears amount to very little overall damage. Yes, in 1v1, where your opponent is standing still and you kill them outright, it’s more, when you get into a 1v1 duel that factors in several minutes, the damage percentage it contributes drops drastically.

We ran Terror build tests after the Dec patch, and while the build was neat at first, it’s actual contribution in WvW and SPvP was found lacking when compared to most all other builds.

No matter how you spin it, the DPS of a Terror build resides with bleeds, not fears. The total contribution of Terror damage coupled with the long recharge timers of the fears available, made up an estimated 5% of total damage dealt. The tests were run in a controlled SPvP room among friends, and used the ‘on death’ damage breakdown to compare both inactive killing (killing someone standing still), and duels ranging from 1v1, 2v2, and 3v3. The damage from conditions and direct damage vastly outstripped Terror, especially in prolonged encounters.

While the video provided here shows active WvW, the necro’s damage contribution is extremely below par, which is what several individuals are picking up on. A change in playstyle can fix some of that; such as picking a target more off to the side, to build up conditions, and then Epidemic. Allowing auto-target to repeatedly choose the closest target, or directly choosing the obvious target will result in little to no condition stacking, and constant condition removal. Which is what your audience saw.

What the audience didn’t see was the use of fear for control, which is one of the strengths when running this style of build. Enter DS, use Dark path to teleport to your opponent, run through them, and then chain fear them into your allies. Standing back and using your fears the way the video demonstrated did little to help in the grand scheme, because your targets were pushed out of range of yourself and your allies; effectively helping your opponents survive.

This video also demonstrated what a typical condition type necro runs into during WvW, with the large number of condition cleanses. Save for a few cases where 1 player was being focused by the entire zerg (in which case they were going to die regardless), the average bleed stack across the entire video was 3-5, and not all of which were even from the main necro, Nemesis. The net result was minor damage ouput, over the course of the recording.

@Softspoken

That’s the point I’m hoping players begin to see.

Take a direct comparison between necro and ele. The base hitpoints for an ele @ 80 is 10,805 while the necro comes in @ 18,372. That is a difference of 7,567 in favor of the necro. But what about the other areas?

Avoidance

• Ele wins by a clear margin. Multiple means of gaining vigor, can maintain 100% uptime during combat. End result is twice the avoidance of a neco

Healing

• Ele wins by a clear margin. The culmination of water abilities, Signet of Restoration, and regen uptime dwarfs the necro vamp+healing.

Damage reduction/mitigation

• Necro wins here, but it’s very close. DS is essentially a mitigation ability, and if you go for a well build that traits protection, those can add up. However, the Ele does have more natural uptime of protection than the necro does.

Movement

• Ele… no contest.

Utility and adaptation

• Ele wins here. Necro utilities are extremely focused and generally regarded as weak. The ability to manipulate conditions and boons is only useful on a condition build, and are extremely lacking on a power build. Ele has a sold addition of survivability built into their utilities without relying on specific builds.

Anti-CC and escape

• Ele hands down winner. Necro has one 30 pt trait and lack luster “breaks stun” abilities. Necro has no means of escaping combat.

CC and extending combat

• Necro wins here, but it’s almost solely based on 1 elite ability.

So the questions are, how many extra dodges does it take to make up the 7,567 hitpoints? How much healing to be equal the extra hitpoints? How many fights can be determined by moving and LOS? What about invincibility to counter burst? and so on…

There’s too many areas where the necro doesn’t compete. And none of these take skill into consideration. Skill doesn’t generate additional dodges from nothingness. Skill doesn’t give a class movement capabilities.

@Talentless

Do you have anything outside of vague rhetoric to substantiate your comments? Cold, hard, facts? Not “I have a super secret build that works wonders in most situations” If you’re not going to discuss the topic, or actually prove your comments with abilities/stats/builds/screenshots/ect, then there’s the door. Have a nice day.

I already know you have nothing. Post your build(s). I dare you. Prove so many others wrong, and yourself right. Back up your claims. We both know you’re not going to, because you can’t.

No one is whining, though many are frustrated, and no one is requesting the necro be bumped up to OP status. That’s just you, in a failed attempt to deflect. Please stay on topic.

Here has been your list of advice, please let me know if I’ve missed anything.

• Depends on the thief build. P/D ones I just ignore
• Given that two of my favorite Necro builds include plenty of SR, a thief wont be able to kill you quick enough before he/she gets scared.
• think outside the box
• spam blind and chill in a large area for 20 seconds
• pop into Shroud and instantly obtain what amounts to a second HP bar
• I enjoy my Necro; have found a couple of builds that work well; and dont think they need any assistance

So you ignore thieves; and putting points into SR somehow causes thieves to be scared; learn something new every day. So, you mentioned spamming blind/chill for 20s, I actually thought that one made sense, and thanks for letting everyone know what happens when they hit F1. As for that last comment.. that little gem is signature worthy.

@Kyskythyn.6471

The thread was written to provide a compilation of pitfalls from a view where the necro is compared with all other classes, as a whole. It was also designed to bring to light that due to many of these issues, the necro as a class, has less performance at the highest levels, than all of the other classes.

The downside is, several individuals decided it would be more productive to post the typical; L2P, Necro is fine, I’m amazing on my necro you all are terrible, and other rhetoric. And it was getting old rather quickly. Which was never what this thread was about.

It’s about performance of a class based on game mechanics, not about opinion or skill.

Take Talentless’ comment as an example, “Necro’s design is around having higher survivability than other casters”. And no, I’m not picking on you, i’m actually returning to the topic of the thread.

There is a difference between design, and mechanics. At a glance, that statement is true, but it is also false. Does having higher starting hitpoints equate to having higher survivability? No.

Survivability is determined by so much more than hitpoints.

• It’s determined by avoidance, and the ability of a class to maintain avoidance throughout combat
• It’s determined by healing, and the amount a health per second a class can regain over time
• It’s determined by damage reduction or mitigation
• It’s determined by movement, and the ability to extend outside your opponent’s reach/LOS
• It’s determined by utility, and the ability to adapt to your opponent, and to counter
• It’s determined by anti-CC and escape mechanisms
• It’s determined by CC and extending combat

Now, back to that comment, “Necro’s design is around having higher survivability than other casters”… When comparing the necro to just the other 2 casters, can you tell me with absolute belief, that the necro (under any build variation) actually has higher survivability?

Design != mechanics
Survivability != hitpoints

Talentless.5708:

I would just like to request that people like the OP keep whining about Necro. Your personal failures and/or shortcomings ensure that one of the most powerful classes in the game remains safely away from the nerf bat.

just my 2¢

Srsly? No information to back up your vague comments? How is the neco one of the most powerful classes? Or does completing a thought cost more than 2¢?

Talentless.5708:

Depends on the thief build. P/D ones I just ignore. I dont use my necro to go solo, but do use it in havoc and zerg equally fine.
Given that two of my favorite Necro builds include plenty of SR, a thief wont be able to kill you quick enough before he/she gets scared.

So let me get this straight. You don’t solo, you run around in multi group, or zerg form in WvW, and you say the necro is just… fine? A post ago it was “one of the most powerful classes in the game”.

Your SR build can’t out survive/DPS my D/D Ele. The fight itself is pre-determined due to game mechanics. D/D Ele even trumps a duel build necro, thanks to game mechanics. My Cleric/Shout Guard is drastically superior over your SR necro. But you really aren’t to blame. ANet has done nothing to curb the current class/build meta which is why everyone has already rolled Ele and Guard alts.

Your grand advice on one of the most powerful classes in the game is to ignore a thief?
I’m truly awestruck by the profound depth of your insight.

As for everyone that really wants to know the quality of this player… Here is a bit of insight of my own. After SBI was pushed out of Tier 1 WvW, and after SBI again lost to Tier 2 servers, SF (this player’s guild) server hops back into Tier 1 onto JQ. As it turns out, SF’s need to be in T1 WvW trumps server loyalty, challenging game play, and hard work to get back into T1 as a server. But again, you’re really not to blame, ANet made it easy to jump ship (*Looks at a broken statue of liberty and shouts, “ kitten those filthy game mechanics…. kitten them!”). Now that you’re on JQ, would you please roll an Ele or Guard alt so we aren’t carrying your necro?

Edit: Uhh… D. A. M. with an N. is a filtered word? So much for my Planet of the Apes parody… Even the mechanics of the necro forums are keeping the man down!

Just an an FYI, the ‘count’ of combo fields and finishers in the OP was based on the pre-Dec 14th patch. In which case it was accurate in both count and functional participation of the combo game mechanics. The lists I was using were originally from last summer, and remained accurate (for the most part) up through the Dec patch. The Dec patch added quantity, but didn’t actually give the necro any more practical involvement in the combo system. I was also going off of the wiki sources, which haven’t been updated for a while, but illustrate the point.
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Table_of_necromancer_combo_skills

The actual value and meaning behind the comment is, accurate. If the only point you can add to the discussion is the literal quantity is now off, while the content and implication of the statement holds true, then in the end, you really haven’t added anything of consequence to this discussion, which IS based on balance and class design.

The same holds true for the “burst movement speed” statement. The community at large (not just the necro community sub-set) refers to abilities that allow for fast travel pursue & escape as “burst movement”. While the literal definition does hold true for some of the necro abilities, none of the abilities the necro possesses actually fulfill those roles. Again, the comment holds true, and this discussion is about balance.

Unless you have any dispute on the balance aspects the OP comments describe, your contribution to this thread has been wasteful.

Never said all classes should be able to solo AC, merely pointing out you’re quick to nay say against the necro when it’s convenient for you.

And, you’ll find no posts about wanting to instant spam kill people with the necro, those were your words. The point of fact is that other classes can do it, and little to no action has taking place to curb that gameplay.

The current meta of the game is impacting all aspects. Watching guild groups switch to flavor of the month classes due to ANets lack of balance changes. Ran into an SOS guild group in T1 WvW with 8 D/D Eles, 4 Staff Eles, and 7 Shout Guards.. and that is the class make of of their group. The ongoing lack of class updates is taking the game into a downward spiral. Not just for the necro, but for the community as well.

For looking over your posts, it’s just me being me.. thorough. I don’t tend to judge people by a very small subset of posts in a single thread. But your posts were more liken to a vein attempt to pass gibberish off as English, and an overall blind need to defend the integrity of the necro class, even when in the wrong. Which is why I understand your need to lash out at other posters here. How dare anyone talk down your beloved necro. In all honestly it doesn’t bother me. I do however, like to keep things interesting and poke back from time to time.

Call me ironic, or whatever else you prefer, it doesn’t change the validity of the OP or follow up comments in this thread. Say it’s QQ, attempt to vaguely address and dismiss it, lash out at other posters… it doesn’t make it incorrect.

abelooi.9156:

I am with Jknifer and Somoe, less QQ – L2P. Necro is a very difficult class to master and not your typical spam spam spam 2 skills ftw.
If we are talking about insta-spammage winnage, then yes, necro is outperformed by many (if not all) other classes aside from engineer…

I don’t want to barge in on an argument, but this thread is of no value at all beyond QQing, which I also agreed with what Jknifer has said. Nothing you guys have posted are of any value at all too, which is ironic coz that’s what you shot Jknifer with in the above post.

Your above post also, to quote you, "post needless … comments, backed by hollow insults (implying he/she is not skillful), and no real content that proves yourself (again, by saying he/she lacks the comprehension required).

Sorry, but you sir, are most ironic.

You do realize that the “difficult to master” comment you are parroting, is a running joke on the necro forum due to its satire, right? GW2 classes in general are very linear, and none of them are difficult to master, especially when pared up against some other MMOs.

I guess to you, someone knowing the class mechanics, builds, and comparison of how all 8 classes stack up against one another is of no value? Pointing out the discrepancy of where the necro is falling short through actual experience, is of no value? In truth, you have already made a point that you lack that knowledge. A quick skimming of your other posts on the forums here, clearly indicates you only have the necro 80, and only “lowbie alts”, and you “got bored of them”, etc, etc…

You demonstrate little to no experience, but condemn others that have that experience because you have a need to be argumentative; why? Irony is making posts like this in the ACP1 solo clear thread. “i’d really love to see people try this with necro. REALLY. Those who claimed skill of a player offset the class. Have fun burrowing. ^^” but in this post, all other necro players here are QQing and lack skill…

But the best quote of all is your simplistic, “If we are talking about insta-spammage winnage, then yes, necro is outperformed by many (if not all) other classes aside from engineer”

Thank you for proving my point.

@Jknifer.6803

All in all, your posts resemble someone that thinks they are good… but in point of fact, you’re one that never truly has the skill, or comprehension required to reach the full potential of a given class in any mmo. This leaves you disillusioned with the feeling of being good, or even great.. when in comparison your contribution is furthest from.

This thread was created to show discrepancies in class balance at the design level. Give 7 out of 8 classes burst movement abilities for example… why not all 8? Give 7 out of 8 classes vigor, but 1 doesn’t get it? See the theme? The shortcomings are a list of design pitfalls, and not open to interpretation or opinion, as you seem think they are. It’s simply stating a fact.

I, like many players here, are passionate about the necro. I have multiple other 80s, yet I keep returning to the necro, wanting it to be better. Players here have pushed the necro to the design limits, and then compare their results to what they can accomplish on other classes are disheartened to identify that the necro isn’t up to par in a lot of regards.

In your own haste to sound off your self proclaimed greatness to us all, you’ve mistaken this thread as a QQ post, when it isn’t. The tone of this post is to objectively list out areas where the necro is the only class to fall short of core features/abilities given to all other classes. While a few commentators here have poured a hint of their frustration with some of these specific items into their posts, it was still bad-form of you to post needless, and repeated inflammatory comments, backed by hollow insults and no real content that proves yourself.

To that end, I would simply ask you to quit posting in my thread, and take your opinions elsewhere, or PM. Obviously, you are free to do as you will (within limits), but to continue to post here would simply prove my summary of you as an individual to be spot on. No offense, I just find nothing of what you posted to be of any value in this discussion, outside of being disruptive.

Best of luck to you and your future.

Somoe.3621:

How can people complain about Necro’s Staff #1 when Guardian’s Scepter #1 is so much worse? Sure Necrotic Grasp’s projectile is slow but it also hits EVERYTHING in a line, gives Life Force for each enemy it hits, and has a 20% chance to act as a Projectile Finisher. Necro’s Staff can at least deal damage to moving targets thanks to Marks, unlike Guardian’s Scepter with Smite.

Sounds like you’re in the wrong forum.

Guardian scepter, since you wish to compare, fires 3x faster, and is just shy of being 3x the DPS. And, it has an immobilize to compliment it’s ground target Scepter 2. The fact that you bring up moving targets and Necro staff, is however, the biggest punchline I read from your post.

In close range (0-600), most ranged weapons have no problem landing. However, in the medium range (601-900), the staff begins to fail due to projectile speed. Any target in the 601-900 range with sprint (even with ‘in combat’ speed reduction) can out run a staff projectile when running away from the necro. Any side to side movement in this range will cause upwards of 1/3rd of the Staff 1 attacks to miss. Factor in long range (901-1200) and your attacks can be out ranged by anyone running away ‘in combat’ without sprint. More to the point, any type of fighting that occurs in this range with an opponent that moves around, will inadvertently avoid over 1/2 the Staff 1 attacks, without having to dodge.

Somoe.3621:

Just flat out wrong/overly dramatic.

Which profession can the necro out DPS? Is this where you bring up a power “well” build, show 5 seconds of good dmg, and then I respond with footage of the next 40s of the weakest damage in the game? I would really like to know which profession has less DPS than the necro.

Somoe.3621:

Necro’s have 3 more finisher abilities and 2 more types of combo fields.
Necro’s have 2 more finisher abilities, 2 more field abilities, and 2 more types of fields.

You list them out, but you don’t take the time to understand. Every combo field is disabled in water, except 1. The one that does work in water, moves the character along and out of the combo field, and doesn’t actually work on itself. The necro has no self combos in water. Adding all of those finishers to the underwater weapons back in Dec. was just shy of an April’s Fools prank, but I guess it was good enough to fool you.

I guess to clarify, I would alter my statement to be, “The profession with the lowest combo field participation in the game.”

Somoe.3621:

Necromancers are also the only profession that can send all of their conditions (or hindrances) to an enemy. Hmm, I wonder why.

Only condition builds are able to handle this mechanic fluidly, and the mechanic itself is fluff instead of practical. The end result are abilities that hinder ourselves with no real practical gain. It also shows how each of the necro’s utility skills are too focused on specific builds. Wells in a non-well build, what? Minions in a non-minion build, say it ain’t so? Necro utilities aren’t choices. They are predetermined by the build.. And if you do pick something different, you actually hurt your own capacity.

Somoe.3621:

• Necrotic Traversal
• Spectral Walk
• Dark Path
• Foul Current
• Locust Swarm
• Decaying Swarm

The fact that you listed swiftness as a “burst movement” ability, is somewhat embarrassing. I honestly shook my head, with a blank look on my face, after reading that.

The whole point of having a burst movement ability is to fulfill the need to; 1. chase down other players, or 2. exit from combat with relative reliability in getting away.

Necrotic Traversal has a 1.5s cast time. If you’re chasing after someone (or running away), with swiftness active, and cast it, you can teleport a massive 200-250 units by the time the teleport becomes active.

Spectral Walk, by default, doesn’t provide any means of chasing someone down, obviously. And when running away, that means you can only go backwards…. to where the opponents are that are going to kill you? Get the picture? Starting to see the reoccurring theme here?

Dark Path… not particularly useful after all other professions have used their burst movement to leave 900 cast range. And rarely is there a perfect setup to use it on a critter/mob while running away. And once again suffers, similar to Necrotic Traversal, due to cast time/travel time resulting in the same lack luster end travel distance of 200-250 units of actual porting when running in a direct line.

All in all, your dissection here, shows a complete lack of actual experience.

The OP’s point is valid. There is no means of defense that can stop a portal bomb, period. And to that end, the mechanics placed in game to give smaller forces a chance to hold off larger forces (IE siege), is trumped without any recourse.

Anyone that has an excuse or supposed means of stopping a portal bomb from occurring, is only lying to themselves, plays with inexperienced players, or has no practical WvW experience.

Case in point, on my mesmer alt… my bomb setup is: Focus offhand, Torch offhand, Mirror, Mantra of Concentration, Blink, Portal, and Mass Invis. There is no defense in the game that can stop me. Add thief stealth to the mix and I can get to any point I want, fully stealthed.

Swiftness, 2 dodges, blink, projectile reflect, 3 stun breaks, stability, and stealth. I dodge, reflect, and blink through your AOE fields without so much as getting hit most times, and walk through your knockdowns and guardian walls like they aren’t there. All while being stealthed. And when I do drop my portal, expect to have it placed under your siege, behind objects, or half way clipping into the wall. When my allies come through, expect another mesmer or two to drop down their exits, completely overriding the quantity nerf, and expect 5-6 of your nearby players to be downed before culling finally renders most anyone coming through. Like clockwork, your defense is dropped in the matter of seconds, and your keep is ours.

The idea of portals is neat, and gives groups some interesting options when in open field fighting. The implementation of portals to completely negate lord room siege/defenders turns what ‘would have been’ great fights, into an exercise in facerolling. It cheapens the experience for both the defenders and attackers. Right now, the only defense to holding anything, is the walls/gates. If your opponent breaks into inner Bay/Hills, you’re done.

And as an FYI, all tier 1 servers (including mine), do the exact same thing every time Bay/Hills/Garry has defenders. All of the “Oh just do <this> to stop a portal bomb” that you see up above… just screams inexperience.

drwookie.6391:

I agree. if I’m going to trash talk it’s going to be about my own server. I’m glad to see that people on the outside still see that about JQ because to be honest the past couple weeks has really pushed me to my limit. We have FAR less people listening to each other than we have in the past. Our TS is typically empty outside of Friday. PUGs are arguing with commanders, instead of helping them out. Sometimes I wish we would drop down because in the long run it might help us.

QFT.

JQ is having a problem with PUGs in all of the BLs. It’s definitely been escalating over the past several weeks. Causing queues on Fridays/Saturdays due to the sheer quantity of them, and not following the overall plan set out by the commander(s) that are there. This is directly resulting in only a fraction of players being in the right location, working towards a common goal.

Fridays and Saturdays are especially frustrating; our main force on many BLs are almost always outnumbered because our PUGs are off doing their own thing, or standing around AFK. Sure, I get it, guilds want to go in with their 1-2 groups and do their own thing, but with the numbers of folks doing this, they are actually hurting more than helping.

The 20 character limit is near pointless. If you need more than 20, simply have any other mesmers drop their entrance, take the portal another mesmer placed, and then drop their exit. Need more than 40? Have a 3rd mesmer do the same, or a 4th, or 5th…

The only effective change limiting the characters per port did, was make more people roll mesmer, so they can drop their ports in conjunction with each other.

Setting up a golem portal chain? Let the golems take the port first, and any stragglers can run, or have any extra mesmers drop their ports.

Correct.

One thing to note, Epidemic has a target for the spell and an AOE that hits 5 people, not counting the target.

zortek.9607:

@Quillixx and @ Durkon,

I question your motives for doing your laundry here. JQ culture has had no problem with introspection, self-analysis, and port-mortem debates at jadequarry.com

You are entitled to your opinion. However, public forum cannibals instantly lose respect and credibility. All comments are welcome, however, don’t expect anyone with integrity to respond to or defend against cannibalism in this venue.

@Zorteck.

I was merely carrying on a conversation with others covering a topic that was brought up by another player. If you find any of what I posted above to be factually inaccurate, please feel free to iterate.

You’re entitled to your opinion, but I’d point out 2 things. Between myself and you, you’re the one that decided to make a personal attack against others. So.. I’m a forum cannibal, disrespectful, and have no credibility or integrity? All done passive aggressively and IMHO, is pretty rude of you. And second, if I was even remotely of that nature, or intended to use this forum/thread to vent, don’t you think I would have named names? Or brought angst and foul comments towards those that made those decisions? Which as you can see for yourself, didn’t occur.

As for follow up, I fully intend to bring this up at our next TS server meeting for a proper discussion, and can’t say I frequent www.JadeQuarry.com, let alone have an account there.

As for your post in general, the only one being disrespectful here, is you.

ComeAndSee.1356:

You had the opportunity to take SM many times, but you left us scratching our heads.

Can’t argue with that. Some of the JQ commanders in NA primetime have, as of late, been all about the “Smash -N- Grab” approach to WvW, like it’s more liken to GTA than an MMO. So many feel a need to go and flip things constantly, that they neglect, and even ‘GIVE’ for free towers and keeps because they would rather perpetually attack instead of defend.

I was pretty disappointed yesterday evening with a slew of poor decisions, one after another. We went from being camped outside our spawn on SBI BL, to taking their entire map. Only to have the commander on TeamSpeak say, “It’s not SOS, so everyone move to SOS BL.” And like that, we went from a queue on SBI BL, to outmanned in about 15 seconds.

Our commanders literally walked away from a 140 point income map, that we could have held on to for hours if not most of the evening, and fortified even. A map which had a level of control that put us at a 380-415 PPT tick at the time. But no, let’s let SBI take their entire map back without any contestation. Then, a slew of poor decisions on SOS BL, including giving Hills to 18 SOS members for free while a botched attack on a fully upgraded Bay (through bad communication and smash -n- grab planning)… led to a lot of people leaving.

There was no recovering from that point forward, we continued to drop… going from a 415 tick, all the way down a nice cool, +65 in the late evening. Pretty embarrassing.

What’s really unfortunate this week, is SBI is putting zero pressure on SOS BL. For what numbers SBI is fielding, it’s all being focused in; JQ, EB, and SBI’s home BL.

Virtually no map presence for SBI what-so-ever on SOS BL. It’s giving SOS way too much leeway, and artificially bolstering SOS’s score higher than it should be had SBI’s coverage been more evenly spread across the BLs.

As it stands now JQ and SBI are both in a bad position this week having to take on 2 servers each, while SOS is only having to contend with 1. JQ is simply loosing too many points during NA primetime, while SOS’s score is being padded due to SBI’s inaction towards them.

No & no, minions don’t have variable damage, and minions don’t receive a benefit from Close to Death. All minions have a fixed damage range based on player level (including level bolstering/down ranking). Minion damage can be augmented by the +30% minion damage trait, but player based stats/traits do not come into play.

You can read up on the minions and what impacts them here:
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Minions

Yeah, the projectile trajectory of both Staff 1 and Lich 1 were raised vertically. This caused so many of the piercing attacks that used to occur during beta to no longer occur. The angle of the projectile barely skims your target’s head, and is too high to hit most everything else in between. There are times when a small asura will be standing on a slope or ledge, standing still, and you’ll have 100% miss rate with Lich 1, it just goes right over their head.

The mechanics behind Death Shroud also needs to be looked at. The fact that having a staff equipped in the background directly impacts damage over the other weapons is a problem. If you don’t use staff in a DS build, you are limiting your DS 1 damage output. The currently equipped weapon shouldn’t impact damage output.

It seems like most utilities or traits the necro has, are watered down, or mechanics in play work against the design of the profession. So many traits affect only power based builds, while the profession is heavily designed around conditions and condition manipulation, yet no traits that bolster +condition damage itself, because evidently the mesmer needed them more.

Of the 75 total trait options, both minor and major, there are only 4 that actually increase damage, not duration, for conditions builds. 2 traits are an increase because they apply conditions, Barbed Precision has a 66% chance to add a bleed on crit, and Weakening Shroud casts Enfeebling Blood at the necro’s current position when entering Death Shroud, and has a 15s internal recharge. The other 2 add might; Reaper’s Might, and Signet Power which adds 3 stacks of might when using a signet. And no, I don’t count Siphoned Power in this lackluster list, because no one has actually ever found a means of using it what-so-ever to actually benefit necro play.

There is so little direction and continuity with the necro profession. The profession honestly needs a complete overhaul on traits, utilities, and mechanics. But the downside is, I don’t see that happening, just ANet doing bandaid patches, which ultimately won’t fix the profession, even long term.

True, the only profession without a burst movement weapon skill or utility. Surprised I left that off of my initial list, as that is one of the more annoying ones. And one, if not the most defining lack of, the ability for either disengaging from combat, or pursuing those that have used their movement abilities to leave combat. You’re left in the dead zone of not being able to get away, and not being able to chase down.

The problem is that everything adds up. Then you see changes in the patch notes to other professions in the exact areas the nercos need the most help with, and necros are the only ones not on the list of changes.

Granted, the last 2 patches have been large holiday content driven releases, but there was so much more class balancing and tuning during beta than now. And after months of patches, there really hasn’t been any changes on the scale necros will need to be considered a polished profession. I think the 6-7 month estimate mentioned by Brujeria above, is on the wishful thinking side if they continue at the pace they are.

Sheobix.8796:

There is a reason why it is slow btw. Use it to kite while you run in an arc. The straight trajectory hits a lot of foes and can fill your LF bar in a couple hits. If they made it a super fast projectile, you would have a lot of necromancers in pve upset.

On the contrary, ranger arrows pierce when traited, warrior rifle shots automatically pierce, same goes for engineer rifle and traited pistol. All of which are ~5x faster than necro staff 1, and all kite pretty much the same.

PvE kiting is based on mob speed, and player speed and positioning. These are the big 3 that establish ranged kiting. Projectile speed being faster, makes for a more accurate hit/miss ratio than a slower projectile. This will be more noticeable when factoring in range. The closer the mobs are, the less of a factor projectile speed has because time it takes for even a slow projectile to reach its target is lessened.

If the mobs aren’t clumped up enough, then it’s not the projectile speed, but the player’s speed and positioning that will need to change to hit more targets with a piercing projectile.

@ Druitt. Vigor is important due to the meta in sPvP and tPvP, granted more so than the other areas of the game. While yes, we have the indirect ‘condition to boon’ ability to gain vigor, it is no where near the level of access the other professions receive. This also was the first statement made in my list because ANet specifically calls out necros as having an attrition playstyle. The hypocrisy of the situation of imposing a playstyle on a profession and not following through with the abilities that assist in achieving those ends is only highlighted by that fact. But, different players spend their time in different facets of the game, I can see why Vigor would, for instance, not be of substantial value to a person that PvE’s primarily.

As for the ‘only profession’ comments, they are made because most abilities are spread across 3 or more professions, yet in many cases, we are the ONLY profession out of the 8 that can’t do something.

7 of the 8 professions have access to vigor, 7 of the 8 professions have a cleave attack, 7 of the 8 professions don’t have 4 out of 5 staff weapon abilities that don’t affect downed players… etc. These items weren’t to call out one off abilities, but to point out where the Necromancer profession is the only class without it when all others have it.

For the combo fields/finishers, I was adding them all together, fields and finishers. Effectively showing an aggregate participation in the combo field mechanic of the game as a whole. Again, there was a slew of changes for other professions to add to their participation level of this mechanic in a previous patch, but not for the necro.

Dakiaris.2798:

As for the max range thing that would be fixed if they simply made it so our projectile tracked targets again…. If not that they need to raise the projectile speed by 50-60%.

The thing that resonated the most with me was the projectile speed increase to the other professions’ projectiles in the Dec patch, but not ours. That really felt like they looked at it, and decided it didn’t warrant a speed increase.

To take the time to match up the water abilities across the professions and then blatantly leave the necro out of the projectile speed increase was quite specific and deliberate. What was even more disconcerting was the fact that the projectiles that did receive a speed increase, were already faster than the staff 1 projectile.

Damaging objects comes into play in all aspects; sPvP, WvW, and PvE. Necros are not only the worst at it, even with dropping both damage wells and dagger 1 spam + DS 4, we are the worst at it by a large margin. All professions can kill the treb in Kyhlo out right, by the time a necro can deal 35-45% dmg. This is very noticeable, especially to those of us that play the other professions.

Yes, condition builds have even more trouble, but power builds are still drastically behind the curve of the other professions.

• Elementalists – Meteor Shower, Frostbow 4, even Fiery Greatsword make a joke of objects. Objects sometimes don’t even spawn when an elementalist is in the group because they know how futile it is (/kidding).
• Warrior – Pick a weapon, face object, sneeze, object destroyed. Rumor has it, a single warrior destroyed every wall and gate in their own garrison from a single hiccup.
• Ranger – Barrage, Rapid Fire, haste Shortbow 1 spam, pet
• Guardian – Greatsword abilities, 1h sword 1 spam
• Thief – Haste Shortbow 2 spam
• Engineer – Grenade Barrage and haste Grenade 1 spam

Necro has dagger 1, wells, and Flesh Golem as the highest object damage loadout.. Assuming you can get the golem to actually hit the object, it still doesn’t compare to the other professions. I’m sure you’ve seen the complaints about Cliffside fractal.

Ipea.2974:

MarMaster.6241:

And the fighting continues. Well done all.

If you are happy to give your server props when i clearly showed them hacking into a tower, then more power to you…..

GJ on taking the lead through none legitimate means JQ

I, nor 99.9999% of JQ server condone cheating in the slightest. I’m sure the same can be said about the other servers. If you would like to be judged by the entire groups of SoS players that exploit into towers/keeps, then by all means please let us know and we will add your name every time we post screenshots of their actions. If, however, that notion offends you, then maybe you should have considered that prior to your comments and accusations of the entire JQ server.

Second, without a video, there is no proof. That player could have been under the arch behind the keep lord, or behind the pillar out of sight. Or through siege and knockbacks could have inadvertently been knocked into the wall, clipping inside it. The game engine is not fool proof and that does occur. You have no evidence at all, that the player in your screenshot got there through exploiting.

And third…. are you seriously saying that 1 warrior killed the 8 of you in that screenshot, and then took the tower by herself? Because that is exactly what your comments are stating.

You sir, should be ashamed of yourself.

P.S. To the rest of SoS, I, nor the other 99.9999% of JQ server, are judging you based off of this persons inappropriate accusations and comments. We salute you for the great times in WvW.

• The only profession without access to Vigor
• The only profession without a cleave style weapon attack
• The only profession that has active weapon abilities that do no work on downed players
• The only profession with a weapon projectile that takes 4s to travel to max distance
• The worst profession at damaging objects
• The lowest damage profession in the game
• The profession with the fewest combo field/finishers in the game
• The only profession that has abilities that hinder ourselves
• The only profession without burst movement weapon attack or utility

In addition to the above list, the Necromancer is the only profession that has a bugged core class dynamic, minions… and 9 supporting traits. If those 9 traits were simply blank, and left as empty place holders, they would have the exact same practical use as they do now. There is a reason there are no videos posted showing Minion Master Necros winning in sPvP or WvW.

Minions themselves are also fundamentally flawed. The minions’ damage output is static, and they do not scale with gear. As ANet has decided to begin placing Ascended gear in game, this spec (even if it were working properly) would ultimately fall behind anyways. Even without bringing up minion AI, there are a slew of problems inherent to minions that must be resolved before they are brought into line with where they ‘should have been’ at launch.

There are 5 traits that bolster all Necro damage by a percentage (%), all of which have no impact on condition damage. The condition damage itself is all focused on a single debuff, bleed. If this one condition stack is removed, all of the necro’s condition damage is effectively reset. Poison does damage, but with it being changed from stacking in intensity to stacking in duration, back in beta, this is no longer a source of consequential damage. And of the 7 weapon loadout configs, there are only 2 attacks in the necros weapon sets that actually apply poison.

There are also abilities that require the necro’s FEET to have LOS on the target or they miss, or are obstructed. Dagger 4, Deathly Swarm is easily the most frustrating in both PvE and PvP. This is commonly seen when standing on a ledge above your target, or vise versa. Spectral Grasp requires your target’s feet to be visible in order to trigger the pull, and even then, the pull rarely ever moves the target full distance, almost always stopping halfway or less when vertical elements are in play.

The irony involved with a slew of abilities is laughable. A power signet that has an active ability to apply short duration conditions… srsly? Another signet that states, “transfer conditions from allies to self” but instead copies the conditions to the necro instead of removing them from allies. A damage cap placed on our elite Lich Form, making it deal less average damage than other professions using their regular weapon attacks… it’s okay for a rifle warrior to F1 someone for 16-30K+ dmg on a 10s cooldown (seen in a tsunami of screenshots and videos including this…) but Lich form cannot be allowed to actually kill anyone any more? The mesmer has 5% toughness given as condition damage minor trait, and +condition damage signet, but ‘The Attrition Profession’ has no +condition traits choices or utilities? Other professions can stomp players with haste, stealth, stability, and even invulnerability… but the necro has to exploit in order to DS stomp?

I’ve put so much time and effort into the necro profession… the 6+ different sets of gear/weapons/accessories for various types of builds, all the while min/maxing the different traits/boons/etc only to see limited builds and versatility when compared to the other professions. Watching the necro community wait with high expectations on the Nov patch, only to be disappointed by the lack of design enhancements. Then the Dec patch, hoping yet again to bring the necro profession in line with the others… wow… did that patch fall short of every expectation.

Is that the point of the necro profession? To get the community to fall in love with the idea that is ‘the necro’, but not actually bring into fruition a balanced and fully featured deliverable? If so, you’re spot on ANet.

• The only profession that truly isn’t ready for a released product.

TLDR: Read the above post.

It’s not a good build. Granted, in his defense, the video was created back in Oct.

Defensive build but…

• Running carrion gear instead of rabid
• Running 2 corrupted sigils, when only needs one, even then at 25 stacks, can swap that weapon out
• Running force sigil on a condition build, that doesn’t benefit from 5% more dmg
• Running Signet of Spite on a condition build without gear/spec for +duration
• Running Death Shiver (applies vuln in DS form) that doesn’t increase condition dmg

In the end, it’s poor trait choices, wrong gear stat selection, incorrect sigil choices, and bad Signet choice. Everything else seems fine.

Tool tip error. Not to worry though, @ 20% of tooltips in this game are wrong or don’t update properly when being affected by other abilities, traits, etc.

Damage isn’t capped, the bleed stacks are. Targets can only have 25 stacks of bleed, regardless of who cast them. This typically isn’t an issue because most everyone has switched from +Bleed Duration, and moved to +Condition Damage as their stat choice.

It also isn’t particularly bad because you can take someone that does have 25 stacks of bleed on them, and Epidemic, spreading that same 25 stack and all additional conditions to 5 additional targets, but it uses your +Condition Damage stat, and counts as your damage.

With all of the condition cleansing that professions receive and utilize in WvW, having someone accrue and maintain 25 stacks is rare, for 2 reasons. First, if they don’t cleanse the 25 bleed stack, their character’s health will buckle under the DPS those bleeds are applying and they will go down relatively quick. Second, most all players will have some form of condition removal in their loadout, or their allies will have AOE removal (such as Elementalist’s Healing Rain that clears conditions, or Mesmer Null Field).

The damage faux pa comes more in a PvE environment. When you have 15 people killing a Boss mob in open world and the boss has no condition removal, your damage will be severely reduced when there is a 25 stack maintained, and your conditions are effectively lost/not applied because they exceed that cap and are voided.

Pizz.3698:

Munrock.3092:

Locust and the dagger trait stack?

They do, but you cant go past 33% running speed.

They do not stack. Confirmed tonight with multiple test runs and variations (equipping dagger first then selecting Signet as a utility skill, off hand fist, main hand first, Signet first, etc…) that dagger +speed trait still does not stack with Signet of Locust.

With Signet, dagger/dagger and Quickening Thirst active, my speed was an exact match when running along side 2 other friends running their profession’s +25% speed signets. When they both activated swiftness, they both ran faster than my Signet coupled with +25% speed from dagger/dagger.

joshisanonymous.5270:

Pizz.3698:

And who in his right mind would waste rune slots for a 6/6 centaur set!?

This is what I was thinking. Admittedly, I haven’t done much WvW, but when I have I’ve noticed many Mesmers just running at normal speed. I asked about speed in the WvW forums when I was choosing a class because I wanted something I could solo with and pretty much everyone listed the lack of speed for Mesmers as a huge problem. Even in when the centaur runes idea is brought up in the Mesmer forums, people immediately jump on it as a huge waste. Sure, every class has some way to gain swiftness but there seems to be a big difference between having to completely base your build off just having the ability to move fast and being able to just pick a trait or two for the same effect (as with Necros or Engineers).

6/6 Rune of the Centaur is one of the cheaper, and support oriented loadouts because a mesmer can give 100% swiftness uptime to their entire group.

Mesmer swiftness can also be maintained by using at least 4/6 Superior Rune of Air, Mirror, and Focus recharge trait Warden’s Feedback, and +boon duration food (if they don’t want to put points into Chaos for +boon duration via that trait path). Rune of Air is still a very solid rune set, even after the nerf.

Needless to say, my original point holds true, every profession has access to 100% uptime of 33% movement, yet the necro is the only profession without a burst speed ability.

As for Signet of the Locust and Dagger movement traits stacking, this was previously not the case. As I haven’t tested this out specifically since the Dec 14th patch, I can’t say unequivocally that they still don’t stack, but there were several threads/posts after the patch stating that they still don’t. I’ll look at it when I get home.

joshisanonymous.5270:

Nekroseth.5186:

I kind of summarized all the skills and realized, Mesmer has a lot more : Blink-teleport and get around.

Opposed by Necromancer, who 100% lacks all mobility, besides spectral walk.

Necros actually have a lot more mobility. Spectral Walk combined with the Warhorn (and 2 traits) gives you permanent 33% swiftness. Otherwise, you can just use Signet of the Locust and have permanent 25% swiftness.

Necros have the least mobility in the game. Every profession has access to perma swiftness through weapon, utility skills, traits, and/or rune combinations. For instance, Mesmers with 6/6 Centaur runes, Mirror, and Focus have perma swiftness.

However, necro is the only profession in the game that have no means of a fast travel ability. Because of this, the necro is the only profession that can never disengage from combat successfully if the profession chasing wishes to continue combat. Likewise, if the necro is chasing another profession that is out of range, they will never catch up

Conditions that are spread to other targets maintain their current duration, and do not reset to full duration. Multiple necros can amplify their condition coverage by refreshing their bleeds and spreading to nearby targets.

Other restrictions:

• Epidemic has the maximum 5 target AOE limit (does not count your primary target of the spell as it is the catalyst)
• Bleeds are stack capped at 25
• Any transferred bleed stacks that exceed 25 are lost (Ex. one add already has 10 stacks, and you transfer 25 stack bleed, 15 of which will not be applied)
• Conditions that are spread by a necro use that specific necro’s condition stats on all conditions transferred, even conditions not originally placed by that necro (Ex. you transfer burning, it will use your +Condition modifier, not the Ele’s)

• Necro
  • The necro boasts the highest natural health of all the caster classes, and also has death shroud to extend that life total even higher. While they don’t have some of the escape or damage reduction capabilities that other classes boast, they do have a lot of ways to win attrition fights. They have access to poison on multiple weapons, they are able to combine condition damage with raw damage, and they have multiple disables to interrupt enemy skills. Necomancers also have multiple movement disabling abilities, while allows them to chase down enemies who are low on health.

Reading through the various comments on each class, I found myself thinking the necro doesn’t even come close to living up to it’s own descriptor.

…they do have a lot of ways to win attrition fights.
Unfortunately necros are the only attrition based class. Such a description has NEVER been used to recount another profession in GW2. I can’t seem to even begin to properly describe the let down that such a dynamic is actually part of our balance, when none of the other professions are attrition based. The only comment that keeps popping into my mind over and over is, “Well, in an attrition necro vs necro fight, we can guarantee that a necro will win.”

The only fights that remotely resemble attrition based gameplay would be going up against a profession running a bunker build. Between the passive and active healing those builds maintain, and their cleansing capacities, our condition based builds fall embarrassingly shy of acceptable.

…and they have multiple disables to interrupt enemy skills.
This is another comment from the quote that really felt far from being unique, and definitely not something that allows the necro as a profession to overtake our opponents. Yes, we can interrupt, and we have few options. The primary downside to this is, all of our interrupts are such a short duration, that we don’t actually have an opportunity to capitalize on these moments. The responsiveness of our interrupts are also extremely clunky.

The most common example would be attempting to interrupt a heal our opponent is about to cast. The average cast time of a heal across most professions is 1s. If the necro is mid cast on another ability and attempts to interrupt, the queue system is such that by the time our interrupts are done casting themselves, they are too late. Staff 5 is 3/4s casting time, Warhorn 4 is 1/2s casting time, Spectral Grasp is 3/4s + projectile travel time, and Flesh Golem Charge is 3/4s cast time + 1-4s before the pet may actually initiate the ability. DS 3 is instant, but switching takes 1/2s, and we have no visibility if the recharge when not in DS form.

…allows them to chase down enemies who are low on health.
This comment actually makes me pity anyone that thinks it’s remotely true. Necro is the ONLY profession without a burst speed weapon attack, or utility ability. The only utility that ‘could be’ used as a teleport is Flesh Wurm. But with the 1-1/2s cast time, it cannot even conceivably be used as a gap closer. If you’re chasing after someone and you cast it at max range, by the time it goes off, you’re practically standing on where it spawns. EVERY other profession in the game has a means of disengaging the necro from combat, and once outside cast range, the necro has ZERO CHANCE of catching up to them.

The fact that it has been stated over and over that necros can keep opponents in combat, aside from it being completely untrue, is utterly disheartening. Every comment of this sort should include an asterisk that reads ‘So long as they remain in range, and don’t use their abilities to get out of range.’

Did anyone else read that quote and think to themselves that the current version of the necro in-game doesn’t live up to that class balance description?

The necromancer dye scheme is:
Black
Midnight Green
Purple

Depending on the specific armor piece/texturing, the same color will appear to have slightly different color shades.

On a condition build that is sporting wurm/golem, I’d opt for minion damage. The downside is you end up losing 100 toughness and only gain around 5 power by making the change (because of the minor trait Deadly Strength), but the overall damage increase is worth it, imho.

For my power build, I use Berserker’s gear and weapons with 5 Ruby accessories. Power, Crit, and Crit Dmg are the stat focuses.

For my build:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQRBHbhG2IjWlemm6G9eiQSB2+F0jc9enFpAZGD

The build’s primary rotation revolves around the 3 channeled abilities; Axe 2, Dagger 2, and DS 4, with the rest of the weapon abilities being used as filler between waiting on recharge timers and weapon swap. These abilities hit quickly and have higher chances of proc’n might, so are always the priority cast in the rotation. There are also 3 primary abilities that trigger might off of crits especially in AOE situations; Locust Swarm, Well of Suffering, & Well of Corruption.

For the elite skill, I used to have Lich Form, but it ends up having a high cost to benefit ratio. The 30s duration of Lich Form becomes a double edged sword, because you lose your might stacking rotation. Your initial casts with Lich 1 spam are very high damage, but the the longer you go the more might you lose.

With the food buff, this build has an effective +100% might duration. But as Sheobix mentioned, the higher APM can be busy at times. With the cost of the runes, you may want to make sure it’s something you want to do before you invest. I personally found it to be refreshing, being it’s somewhat unique to the necro class, and how active the playstyle is from the run-of-the-mill power/condition builds.

That’s why there’s a ramp up time for might stacking. Your initial hits for the first 5-8 seconds (depending on rotation) will be slightly under the undead rune setup. The major gap filler in the might rune setup vs undead is the use of Blood is Power. In my power build variant, my rotation leads off with BiP, to start combat followed by an immediate weapon swap giving 13 stacks from the start of combat.

Using the same principal, we can slightly alter your posted rotation to get a faster might stack going. Lead off with Blood is Power followed by an immediate weapon swap. Let’s say for this example we started as staff and you swapped to scepter/dagger. This gives us 13 stacks in the first second of combat, followed by dagger 4 to send the 2 bleed stacks to our target. Complete the rotation with dagger 5, scepter 2, scepter 3, scepter 1×2 (5 seconds have passed by this mark), and then enter Death Shroud.

Lead off with DS 4 first. This is due to our minor trait Furious Demise in Curses that gives us 5s of fury when we enter DS. Because DS 4 hits 9 times in 3s, and each crit has a chance of giving us might, this has a much higher return by using it first while fury is active. Follow up with DS 1 x6-7. You also want to spam your weapon swap while spamming DS 1. This will rotate you to staff and also begin the 10s weapon swap recharge while still being in DS form gaining additional might stacks. When you drop out of DS into staff, complete your normal rotation At this point, you should be sitting 18s into combat and be around 22-26 stacks of might.

On a constant weapon swap rotation during longer fights, weapon swapping alone will return 9-12 stacks of might (depending on spec). You can maintain 10 stacks from BiP, and you can rotate into DS form every 10s to build another 6-7 stacks. Because staff has longer recharges on most of its abilities and staff 1 spam isn’t very beneficiary, you can opt to stay in DS longer and drop out with enough time to cast your marks and immediately swap back to scepter. You will just need to utilize the weapon swap to staff during DS 1 spam.

Another option would be to opt for a scepter/dagger + scepter/warhorn weapon loadout. This means you’re constantly building bleed stacks during recharge periods by scepter 1 spam, while not in DS form, and you can utilize locust swarm for generating might stacks from the crits. For reference, locust swarm hitting 5 targets for its duration can generate 6-7 might stacks on average.

The crazy benefit of this, is when your in a group that has a lot of might boons, because this build extends the duration of the boons you receive from your group members as well. I have been in groups where I’ve maintained 36+ might stacks. Warriors, mesmers, and guardians are great sources of might, and doubling the duration of their boons adds up fast.

Listing of God Karma armor sets:
http://dulfy.net/2012/09/08/gw2-templegod-karma-armor-sets/

Somewhat disappointed there is no light armor set equivalent to the Whispering medium armor set. Also, there is no God Karma light armor chest or boots with +Cond Dmg, which is unfortunate.

One thing to remember is the armor pieces have different stat budgets, so choosing which pieces to sub out as different stats will be directly impacted by the specific armor slot.

• High Stat Budget
  • Chest
  • Legs
• Medium Stat Budget
  • Helm
• Low Stat Budget
  • Shoulders
  • Gloves
  • Boots

With a focus on +Cond Dmg, the God Karma set pieces that do have +Cond Dmg have more than Rampagers. Ex. Rampagers legs have 48 Cond Dmg, while God Karma legs have 67 Cond Dmg. For that reason, on my Cond Dmg gear set, I went; Helm, Shoulders, Gloves, & Legs as God Karma pieces with Chest, Boots, weapons, & all 5 Accessories as Rampager. Add in Master Tuning Crystals for 6% Toughness is added as +Cond Dmg, & 4% of Vitality is added as +Cond Dmg. And food that can give +70 Cond Dmg.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Master_Tuning_Crystal
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Bowl_of_Fancy_Potato_and_Leek_Soup

Power is needed for staff auto attack, mark detonations, wells, Lich Form, DS, etc. If you choose to go full-on into Rabid style gear, you will see a dropoff in other aspects of the necro playstyle. If you’re PvE focused, this may not be a huge problem.

Another solution you may like is +Might Duration, which is my current build (running as power, but the same principals apply to Cond Dmg). Use 2 Superior Runes of; HoelBrak, Strength, and Fire for +60% Might Duration. Chocolate Omnomberry Cream for another 20%, and any points into Death Magic for additional +boon duration. All in all you can extend Might duration to +110%. Add in Sigils of Strength and Battle for; On Weapon Swap get 3 stacks of might, and 30% chance on crit to gain might.

With the trait selection of Master of Corruption in the Curses line, you can lower Blood Is Power’s recharge to 24s, and have a permanent uptime of 10 stacks of might from that utility skill alone (depending on spec). All in all, I maintain on average 27-30 stacks of might on my power build, which comes out to +875 power.

Because this works the same for Cond Dmg as it does for Power, the comparison of 6 Undead Runes would be ~270-285 Cond Dmg, add in an average 5 stacks of might uptime for Blood Is Power in a non-might stacking build for an additional +175 (which is generous) to be 445-460 depending on your Toughness, vs 875 +Cond Dmg when you have your might rotation in full swing. You’ll have to factor in the loss of Sigil of Earth, as it adds additional bleeds on the non-might stacking build, but it will no where near compensate for upwards of ~500 additional Cond Dmg.

The downside to a might stacking build is it requires a higher APM to play, and maintain your might stacks through constant weapon swaps, and enter DS for gain might on DS 1 casts. There is also a ramp up time as you build up your might stacks from other sources. All in all, it is an active playstyle that I have come to enjoy much more than other types of builds.

Wayfarer.2051:

Doesn’t the shield push back?

No, the Shield of Absorption for the Resolute Healer trait doesn’t push back. It’s still listed in the bug compilation thread on the Guardian forums as not pushing back, though I’m not sure if it’s a bug or intended that way because of the very small recharge. I also checked all of Oct’s and Nov’s updates, and it has not received any updates.

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Game_updates/October_2012
http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Game_updates/November_2012

Many of the talents weren’t revamped after balance changes, and the implementation of the tier system for traits.

This particular trait was more useful back when the fear duration on it was 3s, which could in most cases lead to a successful rally of a teammate, as well as a mass CC. But, as part of the balance changes, fear duration was halved on all abilities.

While this trait isn’t as useful as it once was, you can still combo it with Staff 5 to fear enemies off your ally, and then begin the rally thereby planting a second AOE fear mark, to fear any returning players that attempt to stomp again.

To further point out, the guardian and mesmer abilities don’t actually stop anyone from stomping your ally, they merely mitigate incoming ranged damage. Mark of Revival can actually stall, or stop a stomp from occurring.

Siphoning traits may help (unfortunately in the vitality trait line), but until players are in game and running the dungeon, it’s all speculation on how useful some abilities are. DS generation builds may actually give the necro a leg up on survivability over other classes. But then, I’d hate to have to switch out gear/traits to run a specific dungeon.

Below are the 2 points I’m hesitant about, but am reserving judgment until the content is released and players are running the dungeon.

— A higher requirement will be placed on gear for running these dungeons. Since they took player inspecting out pre-launch, how will you create a group for going deeper into the dungeon without specifying gear requirements in your invite messages? This also means that players/alts that are not present for the initial surge will find it harder to get groups later on.

— A higher requirement may also be placed on specific professions, for support reasons, to deal with Agony. Elementalists, Guardians, Engineers all have great group support variants. What demand will there be for necros when so few of our spells compete in this area against other professions? Not all professions are equal, and I fear some may be treading water, while others become a pre-req for group composition.