Guild Wars 2

Or just give bigger zoom out (like on the dragon fights) while in lich form and fix its projectile angle?
Also Its in the top 10, but best elite is and will be moa till nerf.

Xomic.5792:

I’d like to see necros get Shields and/or pistols or rifles. I’d be nice if we had a long direct damage weapon, and rifles and pistols (imo) fit more with the more ‘modern’ setting of GW2.

I mean, if wizards were “for real” why wouldn’t they use an Kindle rather than lugging around 10 thousand books, for example? There’s no reason why these professions shouldn’t modernize themselves with the times.

Why shields? Because they’re under used! That’s why. Maybe make it a main-hand condition weapon :P

a) pistols and rifles are for those that want to compensate for their own not being able to shoot anything but dummy bullets
b) shields are cover →
c) COVER IS FOR THE WEAK, I AM LIVING COVER!

I posted this a while ago, necro right side skill slots should just be swapped to their underwater versions, they never failed and are way slicker to operate. Ofc that a giant mountain or wall would still stop it from hitting the target, but never a pile of cardboard boxes that probably have a really old spy inside them or a small hill.

Minion rates now:
Attack what you attack – 85% of the time
Follow you around instead of derpwallwalking – 99% of the time
Gang up on 1 target if you are healing/using something that isnt a auto attack on a group of mobs – 40% of the time
Dont aggro everything in a 1200 zone around them – 50% of the time (depends on the minion and if you are in combat or not)

Minion rates before
Attack what you attack – 25% of the time
Follow you around instead of derpwallwalking – 15% of the time
Gang up on 1 target if you are healing/using something that isnt a auto attack on a group of mobs – 60% of the time (one thing hit one of them all tried to hit back)
Dont aggro everything in a 1200 zone around them – 0% of the time

They overall got a lot smarter, less stuck and tend to not stick in combat all the while they are out, they learned to leave 1 of their own behind if you need to run away and in general tend to follow your 1 attacks (wurm and shade less so but still way better than before), golem seems to still love moowalking into walls for some reason and be 24/7 in combat if there are enemies close by despite not attacking them thus not being able to regen up, but at least he knows how to bullrush a enemy and not miss for 120°+

As every companion they are still to stupid to walk in a straight line over a hill or down a slide instead of running around like a idiot, but thats general AI flaw not just minions

Lich form (5 Jhorrors with 1 spam can stack up to 7 or even 10 bleeds on a target), Bone Fiend, Flesh Golem and Wurm are probably the best minions to stick to, shade is just a early level tank and bone minions die just as fast as jhorros (what they are just with a poof at command.

By historical/religious standards “necromancers” used daggers and scepters/wands (have both word by word) for rituals, a sort of talisman or sacramental (beads, rosary, bells, etc – for short the focus weapons), a staff was a general symbol of a man that uses some kind of “unhuman powers” (also have, divine or not), but modified into weapons at time of war (halberd, poleaxe) and if working on a battlefield ususally carrying a grimoire listing the beings that got a proper burial by said necromancer and one or two ceremonial “hand-and-a-half swords” usually made from materials that can hurt beings that steel doesnt cut (stone, platinum, electrum or obsidian).
Scythes were used by those that retired from work on warsites to being local undertakers/priests because most households had to have at least a basic piece of land and a modified scythe that gets taken care about on a daily basis was just as strong if not stronger than the generic polearm.
A crescent would be a funny weapon but i think that the dagger already got the main theme of it; i do love the idea of a scythe but sadly there are already staves that look like some of them and most animations show as such; greatswords seem to clunky and gravitational for such a precise and utility focused practice.
What i do wanna see and would work are both dual wielding axes and swords.

Daecollo.9578:

Andele.1306:

So you want the underwater spear for land combat?

I WOULD LOVE A SPEAR on land…

It seems that there is no MMO with spears.

Paragons say hi.

For early pve you can do anything, same for spvp if you got stun breaks, later on id say going for wells or Crit/DS build for fractals.
Either way here:
http://www.guildwars2guru.com/topic/70626-list-of-necromancer-builds/
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Epic-conditionmancer-TPvP-with-commentary/first#post1403015
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/The-definition-of-glass-cannon-tutorial/first#post1368918
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Fear-is-my-weapon-6x-fear-WvW-build

(overall any build nemesis makes is at least viable if not better than some “top” builds other classes have)

So you want the underwater spear for land combat?

lettucemode.3789:

sorrow, I notice that while you’ve made your point that GW2 should be more well balanced, you haven’t offered any suggestions as to how this could be achieved. I don’t bring this up to belittle you, I am bringing it up to make a point. Let’s take a look at the example already given in this thread – eles vs. warriors. Let’s say you tweak things so that a signet warrior has an equal chance vs. a D/D ele at all levels of play. But then the warrior switches to rifle and shouts. Does that balance still hold? Now you have to tweak the rifle vs. D/D balance while somehow not messing with the signet vs. D/D balance. But then the ele goes S/D. And even if you get every single build between eles and warriors balanced now you have probably screwed with all their matchups against all the other professions.

Here is the point: balance on the level you describe it is simply not possible in complicated asymmetric games like GW2.

sorrow.2364:

you can get equal performance without have complete equality and this what we should aim to get balance.

The problem with this statement is that there is no historical precedent for it. There is no asymmetric competitive game that is balanced for all levels of skill. Video game gameplay systems are often so complicated and have so many things going on that balance to the degree you want it is simply not possible. And so some strategies work better at low levels of skill than at higher ones, some strategies take less effort to pull of than others, etc. It is simply the nature of asymmetric, complicated games such as GW2. Take a look at other such games – Starcraft, Warcraft, WoW arena, CS, LoL DotA and HoN, BLC, Tribes, etc etc etc – none of them are well balanced at every skill level of play.

Since the designers can’t balance for all levels of skill, they have to focus on just one to balance for. And the only choice that makes sense is the high level of play. The differences between the lines in your graphs is representative of the game, I’m not disputing that, but it is a tradeoff the designers have to make to get the game balanced for skilled players. That’s simply the way things are.

Actually, both Dota and SC2 had long time periods of perfect balance all the way from medium to high end gameplay, for Dota: mid skill level is great if both teams know the basics and work together and for high end Korea using Axe Veno -and other debuff kill focused- combo to kittenslap BKB teamfight abuse and then EU getting back with single target control gankers -bane, clockwerk, beastmaster- against both did show that it was just that the rooster was so big that not all people thought of hardcounters that exist; for SC2: Blizzs love for map shuffle and terran buffs because of popularity did kitten it up, but lost temple, xelnaga and metalopolis didnt favour any race in a special way and if the player knew how to scout you could just counterbuild. Also Tribes and Planetside got balance patches out really fast and it was mostly of knowing what the enemy has (not to run into a Doombringer as a Pathfinder and then complain why the remains of your face are all over his helmet or complain why anything with burst of armor-piercing damage can kill a Flail if you went out without a equipped team).
The example of Ele vs Warrior should be more based on their general benefits (warrior trying to get the ele to use his burst combo so that he pops stability and just spins/jumps away or stuns the ele back, while the ele wants the warrior to spend his cooldowns so that he can burst him without retaliation) and poping cooldowns, not actual builds, if a player choses to remove one of his weaknesses, he shouldnt be able to do more than normal in one of the areas he could be really good in. Random pvp should not be a judge for it, nor may WvWvW since they are based on chaos and luck, just like pugs in DotA. Balance is a state of equilibrium where both sides have the same total sum, that does not just fall under kill potential. Thus balance examples would be a Mesmer that can chain stop a hunter from getting him, but never deal enough damage to actually kill him no matter the time count, a Necromancer who while being able to tank 5 people unable to kill even 1 of them no matter how long he tries because his damage would be too low, a thief who can stack 20 stacks of bleeds in a second and half, but unable to do that again for a amount of time that would result in just as much damage delt back to him OR chose to know that it would be a waste and instead deal 5 stacks of bleeds every second over 4 seconds.
Offense/Defenses/Utility/Enemy Control/Self Control are all parts of balance so a warrior with 10/4/2/5/3 fighting a 4/6/6/6/2 would be balanced and then just dependant on player interaction and the actual skill interactions.

Problem with lich is, on any enemy that isnt your size (or max norn/charr size) it overshoots the target if its within 450 range and there are enemies behind them (test it on the dummies in LA or any small-medius sized human enemy, not evident in spvp because of hitbox generalization of players but you still cant hit stuff like a bone minion/jhorror if its infront of you in lich)

CoF armor is nice with the right dye setup (you can go with the flames by saying you are a demented war priest or something like that). Arah is cool if you can get over the bodysuit chest on female characters. TA is for those that had a crush on Maleficent back in the days (other chest/pants are a option to look more classy, but still works well).

First of all ignore Bhawb and Bas, they are probably some russian duo that live just for trolling around the forums with stupidity.

For fractals and explo dungeons on a general scale in comparison to other classes
Rabid condition damage Necro: 6/10
Condition control necro with hybrid itemization: 9/10
DS based p/v/t build going for utility (Life transfusion, invogration, plague form, etc):10/10
Pure direct damage crit necro: 5/10
Minion Master: 1/10 (you might survive but chances are you are ruining your team
Minion Bomber: 3/10 (works… kinda…)
Well Necro: 8/10 (your team can go into higher level fractals with 5 less agony with no problems since aoe heals you can dish out in timed bursts are pretty strong, you can keep up protection on allies in 9/10 of the important cases and the aoe blind is a “kitten you” to mobs)
Siphon necro: 4/10 (works but would be better of with another build)

Leveling is insane fun no matter the build if you go with aoe and group mobs and then watch em explode, minion aggro pulls are ususally a nice thing then and probably second best explorers by DS combined with spectral walk (jumps), well of darkness (no more veterans stopping you from getting a skill challenge) and flesh wurm (port back to a safe place).

Skyro.3108:

I think people are confused. Life siphon skills have 2 components, the damage component and the heal component. They are 2 separate figures. The healing component of some life siphoning skills is affected by healing power, but it does not affect the damage component. So there is no offensive power gained from stacking healing power.

Bottomline is right now all life siphoning traits do not scale with healing power, which does not make any sense. Fix these traits (along with bloodthirst not affecting all life siphoning skills either), and then we can talk about more drastic changes if necessary.

Not true, just like in the original game, the prime definition of life siphon (vampiric) deals 25 additional damage and then gives you 25 hp pre hit at level 80 being a single component of transfer, Signet of the Locus works the same since it heals for a base of 936 hp at level 80 pre target, despite the additional heal component being 778 because the first 158 is actual siphoning, same with wells and on crit siphons. Ironically the Dagger Life siphon isnt a actual siphon but a 2 component spell that heals upon tick check ignoring if it deals damage while the other skills if blocked dont heal for the siphon. Currently some scale of healing power, some from power and some dont scale at all past your current level (or the fractal/other level 81+ zone bloodlust bug).

Daecollo.9578:

Andele.1306:

a) Again life siphoning is direct damage, it ignores armor because it uses the blood of the victim itself (well it should but doesnt for balance reasons on dagger 2 and transfusion), thus Vitality/your hp or if it would be to snowbally Power, condition damage (Curses/Hex skills) doesnt have anything to do with healing and siphoning.
b) Life siphoning can only heal for as much as it deals damage (thus signet of locus would deal 1000~ damage at level 80 to everyone in a area, no special heal part, but instead the damage dealt being added to your hp, same for all other applications).
c) Necro damage overall is less from both from weapon sources and wells, having a capped 100 siphon pre hit doesnt seem like such a problem if the class really is about attrition. Also it is always possible to just, you know change to vampiric only siphons off non crits and vampiric precision changing that so you siphon on crits too.

“Uses blood of the victims..”

But blood IS condition damage. (Bleeding.)

Your saying it uses blood. (which is condition damage.) isn’t that a bit contradicting?

Bleeding, being hurt thus losing blood is a condition, using the actual fluid (or life force) to rip itself out of a body causing damage to the flesh and bones is the same as hitting someone with a whip made of lightning, direct damage.

a) Again life siphoning is direct damage, it ignores armor because it uses the blood of the victim itself (well it should but doesnt for balance reasons on dagger 2 and transfusion), thus Vitality/your hp or if it would be to snowbally Power, condition damage (Curses/Hex skills) doesnt have anything to do with healing and siphoning.
b) Life siphoning can only heal for as much as it deals damage (thus signet of locus would deal 1000~ damage at level 80 to everyone in a area, no special heal part, but instead the damage dealt being added to your hp, same for all other applications).
c) Necro damage overall is less from both from weapon sources and wells, having a capped 100 siphon pre hit doesnt seem like such a problem if the class really is about attrition. Also it is always possible to just, you know change to vampiric only siphons off non crits and vampiric precision changing that so you siphon on crits too.

Obviously Grenth, hello patron god of Necros~

1. Remove the Skill Slot requirements and make it “suggested amount” as a check button so that players that already know what they want/are making a alt dont need to spend skill points on some skills they dont need. It was a nice teaching requirement early on, but i think that with the amount of time GW2 already had, its just a pointless waste of players time.
2. “collectors remake golem service” new tab in the bank that includes all weapons and armor (like pvp lockes) that if you fill once with the fitting skin or place a skin consumable in its slot, you can take out the skin as many times you wish as a account bound version (also solves problem with legendaries), for all i care it could even be a 1000 gem cost to unlock thing.
3. Change the items from the my story tab from the hero section to a miniature scyring pool in each of the home instances that would include those items, all one of event only items (the locked from the parents for human orphan, map of southsun cove, the mysterious shell, the chapters of the mad memories, etc) for the sake of nostalgia and bragging.

Daecollo.9578:

Besides increasing the heals, stealing life ignores armor, so why not make it be effected by “Condition Damage.”, since its pretty much conditional damage?

No… as lore states the amount of power a necromancer can siphon from enemies is proportional to how adept he is at blood and life (force) manipulation. Thus either power or vitality.

Terrordoll.4652:

Because simply out healing doesn’t mean outlasting and comparing apples and oranges doesn’t help anyone’s case. I think most necros want to see the siphoning skills and traits get some kind of love. I just don’t see how pointing out disparities in classes with totally different play styles is going to get us closer to that love.

The only difference between a avoidance DD theif farm tank and necro aoe siphon one in terms of avoiding damage is one is evasion other is DS, both being damage not going to hp… thus no there aint that much difference in siphon gameplay with the 2 (both relying on hybrid damage, siphoning hp, using tricks for condition removal and ulitmates if they pull too much).

4 people that like to work together to finish a dungeon + minions = chaos and a lot of grape of behinds. Its not much about min maxing but that they will make all equivalents of the graveling scavengers aggro (it was kinda fixed with the attack focus patch, but minions still dont like being alone for a long amount of time).
If you really do wanna roll with it id say a 20/0/30/20/0 with knights armor and berserker trinkets would do the job if the party and/or your minions can ensure enough death happends around you to be in DS 75% of the time (WoB/Blood Fiend – for bosses, Bone minions, Bone Fiend, Flesh Wurm and Golem/Lich -for bosses; being the slot skills)

Bas.7406:

Andele.1306:

Visionary.5681:

Maybe instead of siphon and proc heals, we should be asking for more boon access?

Im pretty sure that the whole point of necros was that we dont rely on boons/dodge that much but facetank, fear and DS around to absorb damage and then regenerate the resource spent, with our on hit heal being 25-27 at level 80 while a thief has the same amount at level 20 makes it kinda pointless, just as most other siphons (since trait ones dont scale of power nor healing and signet of the locus goes from a 4:1 Damage-heal ratio to a 1:4 damage heal ratio making it just a weaker heal if mobs are hugging eachother).

You only get 25-25 on your on hit heal at 80? I have seen 60-70’s for on hit heal and way more than that from my minions.

We have to remember that we have a significantly longer lifetime thanks to DS, multiple ways to do direct heals, and access to Chill, Weakness, Blind, and as you pointed out fear. All of which are designed to reduce the amount of damage we take. I think many times people look and see that we have no aggressive huge heals, but forget that we have a multitude of little heals that just keep coming back. I remember going into DS one time with my minions at half health, and then coming out of DS at 90 percent health :P. Granted that was a hilarious one time event where everything went off from minions siphoning to life transfer heals and siphon heals.

Vampiric on its own is 25 at level 80 or if you have bloodlust at around 59, minions are up to 125 if i remember right, but by going minions you pretty much cripple yourself in most other aspects making em unviable for pure siphoning (not to mention that healing them isnt important its the self heals that are, necros are the masters ally healing). Signet of the locus is a weaker heal for utility slot upon hitting all targets healing up to 5500, but ususally less because of limited aoe and lock on requirement (thus placing it on 3k heal – half of your real one) with special NPC attacks not ignoring weakness and not being affected with chill in 9/10 ways (auto attacks aint slowed because they dont have a cooldown and monster only skills are timer proced or %hp based making only caster/light armor npcs like risen corruptors actually affected by the dps reducing component).

Overall if we take a Theif healing kit (only requires Shadow Arts 10 points) a Necromancer has to take up 20 points into blood magic and have 100% crit chance to be even close, losing instantly if the thief has any healing power because all of his regenerative abilites scale of it from 1%-5% pre tick and direct heals gaining from 20% to 50% of healing power.

Thus if a necromancer is supposed to be a attrition class, why can a theif outheal him in long term both solo and aoe, with necros having short time period burst aoe heals in favour because of well of blood+transfusion+invigoration combo?

Also heals dont affect the necromancer in DS because it is calculated as your curret hp but cannot be increased by effects that dont gaint life force meaning your story is utter bs.

Bhawb.7408:

Until you face a necro, and all your boons are turned into conditions, then a few bleeds added on, then epidemic’d to your entire team, and everyone dies because you put boons on yourself.
But yeah, necros don’t need boons, we are fine as is on that front.

No necromancer ever can do that, even if you do it in WvWvW on the worm and epidemic 25 bleeds, poison and 25 vun, all 5 enemies will just cleanse em. Also Corrupt boon conditions have under 5 second durations and aint applied in stacks making it impossible to kill someone with it unless you hacked the game and fight a level 1 as a 80.

Visionary.5681:

Maybe instead of siphon and proc heals, we should be asking for more boon access?

Im pretty sure that the whole point of necros was that we dont rely on boons/dodge that much but facetank, fear and DS around to absorb damage and then regenerate the resource spent, with our on hit heal being 25-27 at level 80 while a thief has the same amount at level 20 makes it kinda pointless, just as most other siphons (since trait ones dont scale of power nor healing and signet of the locus goes from a 4:1 Damage-heal ratio to a 1:4 damage heal ratio making it just a weaker heal if mobs are hugging eachother).

DS is great, but i would like some features:
Life blast scales with every 10% LF not just drops on 50%, both land and water versions transfer 1 condition from you to all targets hit, 3/4 cast time
Life Transfer if speced into transfusion heals you for the same amount it heals allies without having to do the end of DS trick
Normal HP and conditions/buffs are visible
While in DS nearby deaths give you 5% life force instead of nothing
Leave DS heal trait heals based on % of LF you have left
Foot in the Grave (and all transformations for that matter) stability is permanent while in form and counts as effect not boon.

@lettucemode.3789
WoBs regeneration is the point that scales nice, the actual starting heal is just like every other, overall the Healing power stat is pretty much useless since scailing of Power (life siphons) and Vitality (general heals) or Boon Duration for ticks (Regeneration already does) would be better without the need of a stat that doesnt actually give you the amount of + healing it says it does.

Gaertan.4512:

btw i dont know if its related or not, but since the patch if you enter DS while in a transformation (IE the ghost one in ascalonian catacombs path 3 or in a charr in the ascalonian fractal) you turn into “yourself” with the DS effects. What it did before is applying the DS effects over the transformation.

My guess is DS finally fully counts as a transformation (didnt get turned into DS moa since patch vs a mesmer despite being in DS) using the player character as the default skeleton for the texture and effects, thus just being late on going out of the full transformation and into original form.

Engels.8537:

Daecollo.9578:

5% of toughness = power should be changed and renamed, it should be 5% of toughness = Condition Damage, Power Necromancers benefit from Daggers, and the Toughness tree mostly benefits staffs (condition damage weapon.)

+1

This kitten needs to happen NOW,

Can’t believe i didn’t realize sooner,

And the rest of the kitten needs to happen too,

Staff isnt a condition weapon, its a jack of all trades and kinda master of all since, just like the necro, its highly utility focused.

Its not RP, dont have any points in Death Magic and still happens.

Rennoko.5731:

I am all for water cast speed spells on land, and remove the stupid animation delays for when spells hit (I AM LOOKING AT YOU DAGGER #5), but as to why they don’t just make land spells work like water spells is because they would have to more or less make targetted spells ignore obstruction.

If you remember that was what led to being able to cast I-berzerks through walls and into keeps. No one wants that again (except for maybe mesmers).

Well 2 things, WvWvW is and always will be imba and cant they already do that with pistol and greatsword? Also all projectiles still dont go trough walls and reefs underwater, its just that they dont fail to pull or cast if the ground is 1 mm higher on one spot between you and the target.

Drachshyish.2319:

Lich is kinda silly… The projectile flies so low it doesnt hit anything up on walls or on the ground from walls, so slow one can outrun it. Same goes for staff, other than it can actually hit stuff, if they stand still.
And Lich 1 hits less than my warrior GS 1 do even with a necro power build.

Lich looks cool, but is kinda “meh, why bother”. Elite skills are supposed to be elite, ie possibly turning a defeat into a win. Most elite skills are kinda kittenty. Some of the best gotta be Thieves Guild and Supply Crate, those can actually turn a hairy battle into a win. Plague is a good Elite though, at least for WvW zerg battles.

Im pretty sure that you outdps a Zerk Warriors 100b with Lich claws post mark drop with a generic power build unless he gets 6+ lucky crits.
Also i never had any projectile start/flight problems… it does start from his hand whats pretty high (it does overshoot enemies behind giants and such but thats so with all transformation projectiles).

lettucemode.3789:

To get back on topic: I don’t think this trait is worthless. From experience I’d say that each horror does about 600 damage before it dies (I do WvW roaming, so small fights or 1v1s). I’d welcome a buff or change to the minors, but I don’t want to call it worthless.

Depends on how much condition damage you have (some patch actually got the minion cond scailing off your right iirc), how many you have (the only use i had ever of it when i went 10 into DM for staff cd is 6 horrors from Lich mark), if the enemy has any aoe/toughness (every risen used to kill it in 1 attack, dont know how its now) and the fact that in WvWvW you can do stuff you cant in other (use items are blocked/enemies immune to em in pvp/dungeons, how keeps and buffs work with minions and pets and the fact that you use PvE gear for a type of PvP thus pretty often fighting someone of lower/higher stats). Also it still doesnt excuse why there are build specific minior traits instead of them being major ones of T1…

lettucemode.3789:

So why are you here, commenting on the relative value of a trait if you don’t even play the class or read notes to see what’s been fixed?

Its nice that people get to know the perspectives from other classes, it makes you able to make a more objective judgement (i check thief, hunter and mesmer forums almost as often as necro despite thief just being my farm alt and not playing the other 2).

Solesaver.8764:

I insist on comparing reanimator to last refuge because while you consider one to be clearly superior to the other they live in the same place, putting a single aspect of the class into an adept minor trait slot. Sure, most thief builds use stealth in some way because it has been deemed “good” (demonstrably or otherwise), minions on the other hand have been deemed “bad”.

You are forgetting that people came up with these builds where they are “forced” to take reanimator long after the class was designed. A good design team is not going to change the design of the class to meet the needs of the builds. That is not how games work.

In this line of discussion, comparing reanimator to last refuge, I’m not trying to make the point that reanimator is good. All I’m trying to show is that it makes perfect sense to be where it is, a minion trait in the minion trait line.

1) They are not in the same place since Last refuge doesnt hurt any build nor does it stop the users from using Shadow Arts because it would leave you directly weaker in comparison.

2) Its not about changing the game to meet builds, its changing the game to remove build limits, big difference since it affects class balance (being unable to use a entire trait line because it makes you weaker in comparison of using another). And yes that is how MMO games work, they remove flaws that reduce the fun. I mean did you ever see how much Dota/LoL, Planetside (in its original times and already with 2), PoE and pretty much every other game that has at least little care about a fair environment (hell even WoW counts with its countless changes to skill trees).

3) Every line of traits has 2 or more options for specialization with with minior traits being universal, not the case with DM. I could actually take this to false advertising since its one of the “features” on most promotional and commercial lists of what GW2 has.

Rennoko.5731:

Drarnor Kunoram.5180:

Corrupt Boon never has a cast time, but it’s suspected that it works better underwater due to terrain issues being nonexistant there (not that those should matter on land). We’re not sure why it doesn’t work too reliably on land.

Just to note:

While it has no cast time, this skill has an aftercast delay and cannot be used in the middle of other skills.

From the wiki. It isn’t really an instant cast ability in the standard sense. Its much closer to a 1/8 second cast, since you cannot use it while chaining something else.

I also think the cones of activation on that skill work differently underwater, where differences in elevation are not a factor with skills like they are on land.

Then they really should change most skills into their underwater versions since they seem to work perfectly.

Kiriakulos.1690:

For the love of god change the 15 one to Morbid Armor.
What the hell were you thinking with Morbidial?!?!?

PS- I really liked the suggestions.

Morbid+Residual (remains of diseases you got and use yourself on enemies slowly turning into your own armor), its from the Forgotten realms campaign, one of the pale masters passive effects… i guess that the pre 3.5 names trying to be cool with kinda old english and combination of words aint good anymore sad face.

P.S. Thanks

How about this (all kinda based on other class traits):
5: Undead Conversion: Healing allies gives then 15 seconds of Protection (45 second cooldown – works on minions, only first tick of WoB, doesnt work on self)
15: Morbid Armor: 5% Condition Damage to Toughness
25: Unholy Vigor: Gain Vigor and Regeneration for 3 seconds upon removing a condition from yourself pre condition removed~

Edit: I actually forgot what Deadly Strength did so it would be a good replacement for any of em and name change for MA.

Free Beer and hot wings.7120:

I’ve never really understood why the projectile is so unfortunately slow. Were it not for the massive utility the marks provide I wouldn’t equip the staff.

As for lich form, a thousand times yes… I only wish for two things:
1.) Shrink the absurd size of the avatar
2.) Increase the speed of Deathly claws (keep it balanced as need just speed up the kitten thing)

I do like the size but it would be nice to return the 2x hp (now just 1.5x) and toughness multipliers it had to compensate for turning into a “look at me im in uber mode kill me!” sign.

I just noticed something, on a base SoLs damage component is actually a life steal component if you got the vampiric trait (really easy to test on a single mob). Not that it really makes the active any more useful, but i think that it does explain why it falls from a 2.5 Damage : 1 Heal to 1 Damage : 2.5 Heal ratio, it level scales like the trait (as in kittenty).
Maybe the first bug that a necro could actually use as a exploit, probably not but still there is hope~

P.S. never got why it isnt a true steal dealing like 1k base and then stealing how much damage it dealt.

Same here so bump for justice and possible full ui and design fix of DS!

lettucemode.3789:

So I use Spectral Grasp a lot and want to clear up a few misconceptions about how it works.

It doesn’t home in on the enemy, as you may have noticed, but behaves like a normal projectile. It will also lead an enemy who is moving, so if someone is moving, even perpendicular to you, you CAN hit them with grasp. If they are using a movement skill when you cast it though, like Ride the Lightning, it will fly way too far to the side because it leads them at the speed they are traveling when you cast it. So don’t cast it during those times.

Second, since it doesn’t home in, it’s possible for an enemy to change directions after you cast it, causing the grasp projectile to miss (again, because it doesn’t home in). At this point you will see the “Obstructed” error. It really should say “Missed” because the target moved out of the way, but all projectile skills in the game have this problem so whatever.

I haven’t noticed people getting stuck on terrain while being pulled, but I have noticed that sometimes Grasp will fly a bit farther than 1200 range to grab someone (like if your target is running away from you in a straight line, and you are running after them), and in these situations they will not be pulled all the way back to where you cast the spell. I think this is because it will only pull a max of 1200 distance. Of course, it could be that there are low rocks or something in the way, I haven’t paid enough attention to tell.

If you keep the projectile leading in mind you will hit people with Grasp much more reliably.

1. Projectiles will fly for as long as they go to the range away from you calculating your current location counting the enemy/ground they hit as the 0 point (reason why projectiles from a highground can fly up to 1500 if they had a 1200 range)
2. All projectiles if cast while having a non-allied target are set to homing, no exceptions
3. Point 2 doesnt work on projectiles that emulate bullet drop/arc for no reason except cosmetics (throw boulder, fire net, spectral grasp, rocket spray)
4. Scorpion Wire cannot fail from basic projectile, just not do a full pull like all pull cc skills because of pathing problems.

Panhauramix.2784:

Casting time in water for nearly all our spells are almost halved, if not instant cast.

Seems like the animation on land takes longer than the actual casting, I don’t know if it’s intended though.

Not just that, but stuff like Epidemic always holds to set range, cannot be cast on enemies that are behind walls/out of LOS, corrupt boon never fails to “hit” the target so that its just a self poison, hell even spectral grasp works way better (still pull issue, but all pulls are buggy so its probably behaviour code not the actual skill) also really? Didnt notice the cast times till you mentioned that the cast times are halved (made the thread since i actually enjoyed UW combat when i did the daily underwater kills and didnt just spam Crimson Tide/Frozen Abyss).

They are (and work) better than the normal/land versions… How come?

Solesaver.8764:

Kiriakulos.1690:

Solesaver.8764:

Yes, I compare it to Last Refuge because it is the same thing. It is a specific utility that, if it isn’t a part of your build, is minimally useful, slightly more useful if you do focus on building for it, and makes sense where it is because it is highly relevant to the trait line that it is in. Stealth is no more or less an inherent property of thieves than Minions are for necros. They are each class abilities that are available as a rather defining characteristic of their class but aren’t necessary for every build.

No, they are in no way, shape or form anywhere near similar.

Last Refuge is one of the most clutch life-saving traits in the game for PvP and I hate all thieves who have it.

Reanimator does less then nothing.

Ok, now we’re talking. So what I’m hearing is that reanimator needs a buff. I’m not here claiming that Reanimator is as good a trait as Last Refuge (though a separate discussion/argument could be had over that). What I am saying is that they are in the same vein. It is just as legitimate for them to put a minion specific minor trait at the beginning of the Death Magic tree as it is to put a stealth specific trait at the beginning of the Shadow Arts tree. Stealth:Thief::Minion:Necromancer.

And no, reanimator does not do less than nothing. If you are still trying to make that point your are running on fumes. Yes, initially there were many bugs with reanimator, but they have fixed them. Any remaining bugs with the trait need to be addressed as such, bugs, not reasons that the trait should be removed.

If I have convinced any of the audience the slightest bit (especially ANet) that it is perfectly legitimate for there to be ‘build specific’ adept minor traits I have succeeded. The rest of you stubborn minion haters can come to terms with that fact, or you continue to bring up this tired old complaint and wait for ANet’s designers to change their character designs to match your theoretical build (which I hope to God ANet’s designers are good enough of designers that this waiting period is FOREVER).

Sorry what now? Last refuge is a piece of kitten cake with cookies and jelly beans over it all served on naked woman if you compare it to reanimator no matter the build, it saved the kitten of my theif countless times when going for lifetime survivor without crafting. Also not all necromancers use minions, in fact 4/5 options dont have anything to do with em (random mixed up traits that should be replaced with the staff ones pushed into DM after the Press demo in end 2011), while the only thief build that doesnt is evasion spam tank, there are even 2 stealths options in the weapons.
If you look at every (and with that i mean every other class) the only trait except reanimation that people would be justified to kitten about since it doesnt do anything for them in pretty much every build is the Tactics warrior line (filled with really nice traits), but that line actually helps your allies and by a nice chunk thus you wouldnt shy away from it.
The whole DM line for a necro is right now blocked, imagine for a theif having ricochet instead of serpents touch in the deadly arts line or warriors with powerful banners instead of fast hands, making no reason and forcing you down a build (note i had to use major optional traits for the comparison because there are no objectively bad minior ones you get and cannot chose if going down a line in any other class).

Withering precision is great if you have over 50% Crit chance, offhand dagger is the better than main hand, not only because of nice aoe, but also that mh dagger puts you into into danger in that you shouldnt be for its basic damage and LF generation (so unless playing DS D/Wh tank not really a great option), focus as a offhand is best if you either have Golem as elte and paired with a nice chunk of melee or vs dredge/centaur/other 3+ boon enemies. PvE versions of the runes were fixed before Lost Shores if i remember it right.

Should just be a giant claw that appears from above the target and then yank/throws them to you with frozen/dark energy, not a projectile.

Putting it kinda short, rolling a Necro is a trade of specialization for control and utility.
Pretty much every other class does something that necro does way better (e.g. Warrior or Thief bleed builds, Mesmer pvp zone control and minions, Guardians with damage negation and sheer team support), except for direct aoe burst healing (Well of Blood+Life Transfusion+DS Invigoration combine into a pretty massive aoe heal), with that said the benefits of a Necro are that he can do all of it at least ok (if i had to scale it would be about 4/10) while other classes are lucky if they can do more than 3 things good no matter the spec.

@wiazabi.2549 – noone ever said necro is hard to play, but it sure is the hardest to play at max potential, unlike the mesmers with a vertical learning curve but medium skill ceiling, necros got a valley learning curve but the skill ceiling is just a tad lower than the Everest since of DS timing and pretty high cooldowns of all builds in comparison to 99% of other class builds.

Here:
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fQAQNAW7YjMaV7haOb8bKgpCdDVY3oHFfMzUKKfdA;TsAg1CsoEy8j4HbROhkFtCYAy2DA

Situational Frontline tank/Midline weakness and control
Pull is in case a mob decides to get on a ally, if you need a melee knockdown or just LF, WoD chill+blind ensure some time for a ally to rez or heal, Plague is now pretty epic in pve too with chill+blind working.
Runes would be 2 MK, 2 Lyssa, 2 Grenth/Ice (depends on what role you wanna focus on more, just like armor setup but a 50% crit chance is obligatory) since both bleed and weakness on a ususal 1/3 attacks is really nice.
(on Dredge swapping WoD for, as AgedGnome mentioned, CPC is also a typical thing since the blinds go to waste).

General notes from my side:
Norn Mesmer – control and kill pvp (giant illusions make re-targeting kinda hard); not really anything special in pve exept for the chaos armor, mass quickness and warden (team support or anti caster with mass confusion – most bosses can just aa you to death making it pretty situational)

Asura Ele – great kite/distraction in pvp; massive versitility for combat style and team support for pve, amount of different one trick pony builds is insane and most of them can transition into viable “end game” builds with a few trait and skill changes.
There is too much to type about em so just youtube it (from hardcore bleed earth setups over weapon conjuration crit to 10000000000 buff builds like WoodenPotatoes runs).

Sylvari Necro – the amount of utility necros have is too kitten high! charr with McMillan hair smashing a table with a hammer also the masks look kitten on sylvari and charr, Lich form is one hell of a cannon while plague makes you unable to die for a while unless there are 10+ veterans on you (would say necros do have the most kitten if nt also the best ultis in game), can also turn into the closest thing GW2 has of a dedicated healer with Protection from Wells, Mark of Blood, Plague Signet, Signet of Undeath, Life Transfer/Transfusion, Well of Blood and Exit Death Shroud.

Btw ele have the hardest time leveling since most fall over downed if a early boss even looks at em in a weird way and have 3 times the armor a level 80 would have.

ProxyDamage.9826:

Drachshyish.2319:

except for Flame Legion armor that is

I’m sorry but is that Citadel of Flame armour we’re talking about? Cause I’m sorry but that one looks like crap on everyone. No exceptions.

@OP: Human for me. But honestly Necromancer is one of those classes that works for every race.

Im sorry what?
(looks even more kitten in white, dark red, silver)

Wow, this thread is still alive? Also guys, its a gargoyle staff, they have/had little to do with the depths of orr in the original, shores maybe (mergoyles were all the way up to mid kryta), but what could still be is that its a reference to who the gargoyles would be protecting, the kings/people of ascalon, if you remember all the tombs were full of em in GW) and the ghosts cant get their final rest~

Game files/Caladbolg code pretty clearly states he is a Guardian, Mesmer, Warrior, Elementalist upon picking it up, since it are the requirements for it.
Also he isnt a actually stronger necromancer, for him to summon all those golems took as much time as for you to destroy 3 waves of undead krait and thralls, all the PC summons are more of a “in combat” version, since by GW lore, animated flesh tends to decay really fast, so preping a giant army of undead before a fight would mean that they would just fall over dead not even half the way into the battle.