Guild Wars 2

Ahh yes it’s the age old question, but I’m asking it again due to the new changes that have just come by. Specifically because of ascendant armor being so expensive I want to make sure I’m going the best route.

The two major things that have changed which call me to ask the question are; reanimator’s cooldown being reduced once more so we have more jagged horrors that cause bleeds and death novas. And secondly the 25 minor trait being upped to 10%, meaning with an easy to obtain 2000 toughness we get a 200 boost to power. ( as a side note doesn’t that mean dark armor now gives 40 power during channels?)

Condition build would probably use staff, scepter/focus. And power Axe focus, dagger war horn. For either build I would invest in traveler’s runes for the much needed speed boost.

ArmageddonAsh.6430:

I saw it, Though not sure what to give up to get it:

Unyelding Blast
Spectral Mastery
Death Perception

You’re running a life blast build? Drop SM. The longer time spent in DS will make up for the cooldown reduction

I haven’t had a chance to thoroughly test it out, how big is the difference? How noticible is it in battle?

Is it true that minions can’t trigger the active part of the signet? I was thinking that it could be used as a way to heal them.

Overkillengine.6084:

Overkillengine.6084:

Anyone not running CC/condi removal.

I’ll commit the hubris of quoting myself.

And then pontificating.

There is a reason I said something non class specific as my answer. What do necros get a lot of regardless of spec? What do they have issues with regardless of spec?

A lot of the specific examples fall under what I was talking about; builds/players that either did not bring anti- CC/condition abilities; and often did not bring an offensive CC tool or three to the fight either, expecting pure damage to win.

Skimp on those too much and in a straight up cage match a Necro has a kitten good chance of outright winning 1v1. Cage match implying the opponent is unwilling or unable to withdraw/reset the fight.

This. This right here. If we are talking about using a wvw roaming condition necro (which I believe we are) I submit my opinion based on personal experiences:

I run 30/30/0/0/10 full dire, S/D + Staff, Consume Conditions Epidemic SoL Corrupt Boons and Flesh Golem. My traits include Terror, -20% corruption skills, +30% minion damage, path of midnight and dhummfire ( I know this community is not a fan of dhummfire but it gets results)

Who are my easiest targets? Basically anyone who underestimates me. That includes either playing poorly, not having condition removal/stability/stun breakers, or anyone who thinks I’m an easy kill because I’m a necro. These people I just pepper with conditions and fear them away for the kill. On the opposite hand the ones that kill me the easiest have the most CC/stunbreaks/and condition removal or immunity. It’s no coincidence that I find the latter fights much more fun.

Now of course the question is which class and so I would have to say Guardian: their natural high armour and lower health makes the particularly vulnerable to conditions, and their often used stabilty is an easy corrupt into fear.

spoj.9672:

Or dagger deals more. Which it does.

I hate this argument. It doesn’t. Lich Form > Life Blast > Dagger Chain. And first two can pierce which can effectively double or triple their damage, and in a berserker build both also have a 100% Crit rate.

Here’s what I use:

Full Zerkers (Edit in some Valkyrie if you want defence, but that’s what deathshroud is for)

D/W and X/X (Really up to you, but I prefer Staff or Dagger/Dagger for condition migation)

10/30/0/0/30: Reaper’s Might. Reaper’s Precision, Spectral Attunement, Banshee’s Wail. Unyielding Blast, Spectral Mastery, Deathly Preception.

Utilities are: Spectral Grasp, Spectral Armour, Spectral Walk and Lich Form.

How to play: Use spectral skills to keep up your LF and use Life Blast to smash face in. I wish it were more complicated than that but it really isn’t. You have two stun breakers, and both can be used to mitigate damage. Use Locust Swarm or Spectral Armour or Walk before going into deathshroud to gain life force instead of losing it. Lich form does ridiculous damage in this build.

Seriously though, Life Blast hits like a truck and pierces. It also gives you might and gives your opponent Vulnerability.

Let me know if you have any questions.

These threads always confuse me. How is playing Necro that difficult? Name your build type (Power, Condi, Hybrid, Minions) and I can easily lay out a good build, game plan and how to fight most opponents for you. (Also, are we talking about pvp or WvW?)

Tired of getting knocked around? Well aren’t you running something to deal with it? Stunbreakers, blinds and even Foot in the Grave will help you there. Else time your dodges better and start learning how to fear appropriately. Learn how to use Deathshroud to make bursts useless.

The Necromancer forum is really a sorry sight. There is tons of negativity but even at a glance it is easy to see why. It’s a dead zone where a red thread shows up once in a blue moon. It’s demoralizing to know that neither our compliments or critiques matter as they are never addressed.

This problem causes animosity between Necromancers and Anet. This will only grow with time if not addressed.

Right now the Death Magic Master-Minor trait gives us +20 toughness per minion we have. Many are disappointed with it, as it doesn’t really help non-minion builds at the moment.

My proposed change is that the trait would become:

Whenever a Minion is summoned you gain protection (Incoming damage decreased by 33%; stacks duration) for X seconds.

Here is my reasoning; first of all this would give the Necromancer more control of the trait instead of it just being a passive boost that we barely notice. Secondly it no longer requires you to run 5 minion skills in order to make the most of it, allowing players to run just one or two minions and still benefit. (Jagged Horror would obviously proc this) Finally it has always been apparent that necromancer minions weren’t built to last: Beyond GW1’s minion degen, even Guild Wars 2 seems to want you to let your minions die and get resummoned “It’s my fault for making them so disposable!”

I left the time as X, because that is clearly something that needs to tested and I cannot pretend I have time or knowledge to do that myself. Of course the second point what have to be if it would have an internal cooldown, though I would highly argue against it.

I think this change would make the trait stronger for both minion and non-minion builds, and give the Necromancer a form of defence without leaving the idea the Dev’s have for the class.

Yobculture.5786:

I find that when I use my staff, my LF tends to charge VERY quickly, esp if I use marks on multiple players/mobs.

Only gives life force with the “Soul Marks” trait in Soul Reaping. I really do recommend it though as you gain ridiculous amounts of LF with it.

Flumek.9043:

But great idea, i would take it even if only for the sound effects.

I can not explain in words how visually and audibly satisfying it would be every time I pressed F1.

Right now Spiteful Spirit is “Gain retaliation for 3 seconds when entering Death Shroud.”

I was thinking why not make it into the equivalent of Curses IV, Weakening Shroud (Cast Enfeebling Blood when entering death shroud.) but instead it would cast Unholy Feast? The end effect would be similar with the user gaining retaliation, but it would be an active trait rather than just a defensive one. Of course just like Weakening Shroud it would have a 10 second cool down to prevent it from being over used by those who take the Near to Death Trait.

Login.5102:

Alkaline.2809:

What gets me bored sometimes is the few weapons to choose.

How is that when all of our weapons are viable and good? The only valid complaint I see about weapons is that staff is a must in most builds.

Remember this about “fun” not “good”.

The Axe would be my favourite weapon if it felt like I was doing something with #1. I don’t care if it inflicts how many seconds of this or that, or if it cleaves. I just want it to look less lame then my Necro swatting at an enemy with an axe. Make the cuts come out faster or improve the sound- Make my necro swing more aggressively! Axe #2 and #3 look great and feel great to use!

I couldn’t agree more with the points raised. I miss my Gw1 Necro’s silly awesome builds. The skills were just more unique and niche!

Look at Dark Aura: (for those who never played gw1 the numbers would have changed depending on how invested you were into Death magic Also life totals were around 600 not 20k)

Enchantment Spell. (30 seconds). Deals 5-41 damage to adjacent foes whenever target ally sacrifices Health. Damage cost: you lose 5-17 Health.

That sounds awesome does it not? In fact if you want to be amazed on how skills used to be go scroll through this: http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/List_of_necromancer_skills

I miss our old capabilities.

gnam.6407:

I run a Condtion/power hybrid build, and I find it does awesome in almost any scenario.

I run with full Soldier armor, with runes of Undead. My weapons alternate between Soldier stats and Carrion stats. Jewelry is a mix of Carrion and Rabid with a soldier back piece. The weapons have sigil of Battle, and the jewelry runs with Carrion jewels.

I have a 20/0/25/25/0 spec right now, with Staff and Scepter/Daggeror Dagger/Focus depending on the fight. Utility abilities alternate between Corruption and Wells with Signet on Undeath in Dungeons and Signet of the Locust in WvW and open world PVE.

I have tried running Curses and Precision, but the survivability was lacking as i had to take points out of Blood or Death.

Honestly this is why I’ve been avoiding Carrion items. Malice and Power are great but I really do prefer Toughness on us necromancers. If Valk had toughness instead of Vitality I would be even happier about this. Then again Vitality adds to Life in Death Shroud which is pretty important in this build.

Also I’ve been wondering if I can change the offhand dagger for something. If we take spiteful removal to make up for the condition removal we are losing we can grab the Focus or the Horn. Focus being pretty useful in 1v1 in WvW, Horn being great for controlling crowds.

I love my Necro. Played one in GW1 and though it has changed and developed into something else I still enjoy playing it. DS is a great mechanic to switch in and out of and it feels good to do it. In WvW we are beasts being able to take more than one person on at a time easily.

All we need is minions to hit things better and we are all set!

Tuccos.8592:

because the developers long know about the broken Minions, probaly since beta and they just ignore it since then. they sincerly saw all the complaints here on the forums. they sincerly have the broken Pets on their Agenda, but probaly not before Spring 2013.. if ever. i beth not one Anet developer plays a Necromancer, well why should he ?

its pointless to further discuss if or why and when a Minion attacks or not or how bad the pathing is. they, the devs have better things to do. Warriors could use a few more buffs, guardians arent good enough yet…

play another class, one without pets or minions and enjoy the game..

The developers here are aware but do not care…… obviously

What we should stop discussing is this. No one at ANET plays necromancer? Yeah and I bet none of them play Human either.

They are aware of the problems and they do care. But people like you alienate them, making them out to be apathetic people who hate a certain class. We have bugs, all professions do, but you are suggesting we give up and stop trying to help them fix our class. That’s right, us discussing how to fix Necros can give them ideas and solutions.

What we need less of is that kind of blind pessimism. You don’t want to play Minions? Then don’t, that’s fine. You don’t want to talk about either? Then don’t make threads about it. Necromancers are fun to play and I’ll be playing mine till they fix all the bugs and then some.

Yeah power is a bit low for my liking, but considering the split I think it’s understandable, and manageable. Considering Scepter doesn’t really gain a lot from power means that power is almost exclusively going into DS.

Unyielding Blast is pretty good when you get them to line up, but I’m also considering this for WvW where that is less common. The 2% extra damage per hit may be useful. I’ve always passed over Path of Midnight for it’s 15% instead of 20%. And finally Reaper’s Prowess has always been a great way to gain life forces over time, and Feast of Corruption; though being not the best method of gaining LF, still works pretty well on big targets with lots of conditions.

Most of this is theorycraft as I am away from home and have no computer to run GW2 on. Most of this comes from all my experience playing Necro and a little help from the wiki.

Alright, this is what we were designed to do right? Be able to do both Power and Condition damage? That way we can take advantage of our bleed stacking but not be overtly worried about the bleed cap. We can make sure we still do damage in DS and not use it only for #3.

Stats

Armor: Valkyrie (Power Vitality/Prowess)
Slots: Rabid (Malice Precision/Toughness)
Trinkets: Rabid " "
Slots: Exquisite Emerald Jewels (Precision Toughness/Power)

Power: 405
Precision: 513
Malice: 672
Toughness: 513
Vitality: 224
Prowess: 16%

Traits:

10 Spite
VI – Reaper’s Might

30 Curses
V – Reaper’s Prowess, VII – Master of Corruption, XI – Lingering Curse

30 Soul Reaping
II – Vital Persistence, X – Soul Marks, XII – Near to Death

Stats:
Power: 100
Condition Duration: 10%
Precision/Malice: 300
Life Force Pool/Prowess: 30%

Reaper’s might speaks for itself, and the new Parasitic Bond helps keep health topped off. Reaper’s Prowess makes up for the lack of Life Force from Scepter/Dagger. Rest should speak for itself.

Other options: Spiteful Removal instead of Reaper’s Might for more condition removal. Master of Corruption and Soul marks can be replaced with Spectral Mastery and Spectral Attunment.

Skills:

As always Consume Conditions is our best friend and one of the best healing skills in the game.

1. Blood is power. Really you should not be surprised here. Amazing skill all around, and I can’t think of a reason not to run it.

2. Epidemic. Once again I shouldn’t need to explain why.

3. Signet of Locusts is great for the speed boost. But Plague Signet has a great ability, but I would recommend grabbing signet mastery if you want it.

Elite: Plague/Lich, which really translates as AoE vs Single Target. Both really good in their own way, really situational when it comes down to it. Just switch out when you please.

So yeah, idea is to do the regular S/D stuff you do; stack bleeds and what not. Then switch into DS and take advantage of Furious Demise, Target the Weak, and Strength of Undeath and hit hard with Life Blast.

Final Stats:
Power: 505 + 916
Precision: 813 + 916
Malice: 972
Toughness: 513 + 916
Vitality: 224 + 916
Prowess: 46%
Condition Duration 10%
Life Force Pool: 30%

So that’s the idea.

Comments and Critics appreciated!

Softspoken.2410:

I’ve always found it interesting that the Underwater version of Death Shroud #3 is pretty much strictly better than the on-land version. AoE and a longer duration than Doom. My secret hope is that eventually the two ability sets will be merged into one Death Shroud with essentially all the abilities of both sets that changes only slightly between underwater and on-land. It might be brokenly good though, just because of the insane versatility that would provide.

Oh I love the underwater fear. Feels like what we should have had on land. Even better it has a really nice animation with it.

I find using DS underwater so much more satisfying than on land.

Life Blast hits hard and transfers a condition, making me less reliant on condition removal in my build.

Dark Water is AoE poison and blind. Amazing to shred ball up Krait.

Wave of Fear: A 2 second fear that hits in a cone? So much better than Doom. And hits twice with the new Terror

Gathering Plague: an amazing support skill that builds conditions on you to transfer back to enemies!

Honestly underwater DS is so much more fun, and feels like the DS we should have gotten. Anyone agree?

Wasdclick.1764:

-Snip-

I was mainly thinking for WvW.

When fighting against players I tend to assume they have condition removal so the way I see it is that it’s good to put a large amount of bleeds, and then use any form of disruption to keep them distracted while the bleeds do their job, and then repeat on recharge.

Something like Scepter 2, Dagger 5, Scepter 1 a few times and BiP, DS fear and DS2, switch to staff and 2-5 on top of them.

Scepter 1 has 4s of bleed so I would only need 25% more duration for an extra tic. But what about lingering curses? That kind of changes the formula.

Each Weapon gives (heh.) 10% Condition Duration so now this is possible:

2 Givers Weapons = 20%
Rune of Centaur + Afflicted + Krait = 45%
30 points into Spite = 30%
Hemophillia = 20%
Lingering Curses +33%

So we have 115% Bleed, + a 33% after that.

Unless my math is wrong that means Blood Curse will bleed for eleven seconds.

That’s pretty awesome if you ask me.