Guild Wars 2

Bloodgruve.6038:

Hello Necro community. I’m helping a buddy get setup to start running dungeons and I’m looking for suggestions on a build that is relatively easy to run and is effective, I have very little experience in this area. Optimization is not a large concern right away but survival with decent damage output is.

What build and gear would you suggest in this situation? This is his first MMO but he is 80 and does possess a decent level of skill.

Are condition builds most effective or are there power builds that are feasible also?

TYVM

It’s largely dependent on what type of playstyle he enjoys and what group he is with.

There are 5 main build types, and each is effective in dungeons.

1) Condition damage
2) Power
3) Hybrid
4) Minions
5) Support

Check out the SOACGaming youtube, Nemesis Youtube, and Chips Encyclopedia Youtube information.

There are so many builds that are currently viable in PVE/Dungeons for the Necromancer it’s a lot of fun.

Either way the current way the Blood magic tree is setup and based, there is no way to build a competitive Siphon build as you would never get enough healing to offset even the weakest condition damage dealt to you.

Since this has no effect on your Death Shroud, and you receive no healing benefit from it through Death Shroud, Blood Magic is actually less effective than maintaining a bunker build around Death Shroud, as Death shroud is more reliable and provides a greater net benefit to our health supply.

He is completely weak, and a pretty pointless addition except as a cute little pet to enjoy. The benefit he provides is that he receives all the bonuses your minions skills give so if you are running a full MM at 80 than lives a little bit longer, and does some nice bleeding, but in reality he is just a funny little bugger that no one pays attention too.

Execrable.1064:

I feel like this issue isn’t getting the attention it deserves. This is a big issue. Necromancer has only 1/3 (33%) of the hp pool of every other class in downed state. Targuil has done the research as shown in these threads:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/support/bugs/Necromancer-PvE-downed-state-health/first#post1874197

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/professions/necromancer/Necromancer-downed-state-bugged/page/2#post1828038

This is a BIG DEAL. This bug exists in PvE and WvW, but NOT in sPVP. I am reposting this to try and ensure that the problem is noticed and corrected in a timely manner. If it was a quality of life thing or a tooltip error, I wouldn’t be trying to shine such a light on this issue, but it’s not, it’s a very important issue that puts necromancers at a disadvantage.

Creating a new thread doesn’t have the same effect as continuing to keep the old thread going.

Awesome! I am looking forward to seeing how cool this will turn out. I have invited the guys who messaged me. If you don’t have an invite please let me know. Flow, I believe you are invited, and should have the ability to invite everyone. If not, let me know.

I couldn’t find our original post, but this has come up a lot recently so here it is again.

http://youtu.be/riyMsBRxXHs

Minion AI explained quickly and concisely.

In this week’s exciting Consecrated podcast, Clik from IDL joins Danto and Professor Beard. Clik is one of the best tPvP EU guardians. He talks about his weapon choices and why he doesn’t run hammer. Clik also talks about how he thinks guardians are headed toward a more support role and might not be running dedicated bunker builds in the future. He also shares some of his teams strategies on each of the maps. If you are into pvp you don’t wanna miss this episode.http://sittingonacouch.com/guild-wars-2-guardian-podcast-consecrated-ep-3/

SOAC Youtube

Guardian Central

SOAC Audio Only Podcasts

Consecrated: Episode List

SOAC Live Stream

SOAC Twitch

We have ostrich eggs on board for the NA update. Could use a few more players on the NA side?

Anchoku.8142:

You are definitely not playing “wrong” for using staff and scepter/dagger. Put 10 points into Curses for Chilling Darkness or Terror to support your off-hand dagger or staff, respectively.

Demonic Spirit is right in that you should keep regen (staff #2) and putrid mark (staff #4) on minions you do not intentionally want dead (again).

Technically, you can run any weapon you want with minions as they aren’t based on your stats. Axe/focus is just the easiest way to max out their damage, so is the most common way to play, plus it gives you the burst a s/d build does not have.

Staff is really good when open world where the regent can keep them alive. However, in dungeons staff 2 is not enough so its better to just push your own damage, and let the die off.

In It To Win It.2315:

They don’t pull any more mobs than normal. The issue is they die immediately to any form of aoe. MM is not viable in dungeons or fractals ever.

Ignore this completely, as it was written by a player with no concept of reality. Minions are not only viable in every dungeon they are extremely powerful, fun, and your survival goes way up. Carry the bone fiend, bone minions, flesh wurm, and Flesh Golem. Check out the all minion videos on my signature connecting to YouTube.

The only place minions are not viable are high end tournament play and wvwvw zergs. Minions do not die to every single aoe in the game unless you are dumb enough to not take the necessary traits and/or stack all your minions right next to the boss. Also your bone minions should be used as fodder to blow things up.

There are three different main ways to run minions, staff support, soldier bunker, and my personal favorite berzerker axe, all are viable in dungeons and are a world of fun. I have numerous videos, and there are at least 5 to 6 Necros I can name off hand that run minions in dungeons regularly, and at least one or two who run them in Fractals.

Any claim as to their viability due to early deaths in dungeons are shortsighted and made by players with no experience or proof of the matter.

I am in jury duty, but will comment on the suggestions later. Just to help Andele out. Andele is constantly giving me tips and advised us some time ago on me talking less :P. I do appreciate the critiques. Keep letting us know

This week from Mesmerized, Pyro, and everyone favorite Necromancer Bas, did a streaming dungeon run with Curse Gaming

You can check out our adventures from their perspective, and watch as your favorite SOAC hosts took over the feed. Bas did record it, but the push to talk button was so loud on vent that it is all over the place on his recording so you will have to catch the feed.

Don’t worry, Pyro showed them that he can’t stop talking :P

http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2guru/b/391476794

This week from Mesmerized Pyro, and everyone favorite Necromancer Bas, did a streaming dungeon run with Curse Gaming

You can check out our adventures from their perspective, and watch as your favorite SOAC hosts took over the feed. Bas did record it, but the push to talk button was so loud on vent that it is all over the place on his recording so you will have to catch the feed.

Don’t worry, I showed them why Necromancers rule the roost.

http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2guru/b/391476794

Zombify

I was talking with Ostrich today, and you me and him need to get together soon. About SOAC tPvP. He is on board :P

Did I forget to post this already?

Battosai.5620:

daydream.2938:

Dude what is with EU not using rangers more. They are so common in the Na meta.

i guess it’s mostly trap rangers, which get easily shutdown.

You have the BM guys too, but they aren’t quite at the same level as Battosai :P

Lady Sara Goldheart.2764:

daydream.2938:

Dude what is with EU not using rangers more. They are so common in the Na meta.

There are some rangers, even Battosai plays mainly a ranger.
But I think there are more engineers being played on EU than rangers.

engineers especially the HGH build is currently a hard counter to elementalists so it’ more prevalent in EU. Rangers in NA are all trap or BM rangers so its not quite everywhere. Rangers are difficult to really play well especially against highly mobile classes so there is a tendency to stray from them where more thieves and eles are present.

Just making sure everyone is ready to go today :P.

Hugs.1856:

2 hours is quite a long time to listen to a podcast in one go.

You can just record the 2 hours then split them in several releases so that content would keep coming throughout the month.

That’s a really good idea. What I may do is split it up into a specific strategy podcast and a more general update one? I am not sure, but I do agree with you that anything more than 1 hour seems long. I will see what I can do.

selan.8354:

oh i like!kylia is a great commander and it’s fun running with him.His tactics always change and we have an awesome communication!

Yeah it’s a brilliant podcast. Definitely my favorite one of his so far.

Hugs.1856:

Pretty cool show, I prefer it to the state of the game to he honest since players are actually discussing the current game and tactics.

Plus it’s much more enjoyable to listen to as you guys seem to be genuinely having fun talking.

All in all I’d say: good for tactics/strategies insight, gameplay discussion and the atmosphere. I can’t emphasise it enough but 8 months after launch we lack so many relevant discussions on strategies that this show is a drop of water in the desert:p

Neat time management from the host as well and very nice to see him making sure everyone participates equally.

As for stuff to improve, we’ll it’s mostly my preferences here but I like talks where the host orientates the discussion but let the guests do the talking:p Also i wouldn’t mind less focus on “who’s the weakest class” who’s the strongest? As I think it’s all down to players skills and team tactics. Finally any topic about the community -teams players dramas- are more than welcome!

Finally 1 hour is good IMO, especially when it’s only sound:p split it in two episodes if you feel like having guests for 2 hours:p

The problem with only 1 hour is that we were missing Symbolic and we never made it to Forest in terms of Battleground discussions, we also want to incorporate what we will call the solo queue special where we bring in a solo queuer or player who we notice exhibits skill and is looking for a solid team.

I do think that less talking from me is a good idea :P. I don’t have nearly the wealth of knowledge our hosts have. I will do my best to serve as a moderator and question gatherer.

Next month we will probably focus more on class objectives in battleground and strategies against specific comps and teams. As well as other ideas that came up during the podcast. I will also get our hosts a list of the topics we want to focus on so there is less wandering by myself.

AirWick.1769:

Terror Trait so like it deals an additional 50% damage if the target has another condition on them. Is it only for that one extra condition other then fear itself?

I calculated it based on if you had 800 condition damage.

2+(level * 4.5) + 30% of condition damage.

I ended up with 903 damage dealt if it only was one condition extra.
Is this correct? Can anyone confirm if Terror does more damage if there is more conditions on the target or its only towards that one extra condition?

What is the full potential of this mechanic?

I have seen ticks of 1800 before with a full condition build in pve, and heard of numbers that high in wvwvw. It’s the conditionmancers burst.

It hits the same regardless of the amount of conditions. If you use fear with no conditions, it does some damage and then does more if you have one or more conditions with the damage increase being the same.

Example

Fear without conditions 600
Fear with one conditon 900
Fear with 3 conditions 900

Sheobix,

I respect what you have done in the past, but truth be told, ny build works in hot joins that doesn’t include full signets.

Several counterpoints to your build.

1) Any damage build that doesn’t contain furious demise loses immediately lacks the damage to take down any bunker build.

2). It would have been better to put the 10 extra points into death magic for greater Marks as nothing is better than unblocked marks for harassment.

3) Condition duration is one of the worst traits for PvP except in the case of terror builds. Chill is better suited as a reapplication condition than a duration condition. A good thief, else, mesmer, guardian, and ranger will cleanse the condition before the traits set act the way you want them too.

Having said that, you did clearly say it was for hot joins.

Welcome back

Allie Murdock.8152:

Loved it! Thanks for sharing!

No problem! Glad you liked it! Now if I could just convince one of you to appear on a podcast haha ;P

If you have video Zombify, than check your pm ;P

SupahSpankeh.8452:

Will watch later, thanks.

Is there an EU equivalent of BoC?

BoC does not have an EU equivalent. We don’t really worry about guild missions and representing the guild. Its mainly a place for Necros to fellowship and do events which I have been slacking on setting up. We do have quite a few EU players where we are working on getting them setup to do things together.

You are free to join and simply message me with the fact that you are EU and I will put you in the rank.

Leuca.5732:

As if the pvp community didn’t already know that Spirit Watch sucks, and that rangers have access to a very select few effective builds that lots of people can’t handle because the concept of paying attention to more than one thing at the same time from the same person makes their heads explode.

I’m sure the effort is honest, but I can’t help but think it’s misplaced; this game will never have really serious PvP.

I am not sure what you feel serious pvp entails, but some of the highest rated pvp games like DoTA and LoL are simple strafe back and forth boring stuff.

As for Spirit Watch, you misunderstood their point. They loved the concept and idea, but the implementation, bugs, and key skills that are out of balance. The place itself we love and the idea that there are two things to do instead of just one.

In this weeks Guild Wars 2 Necromancer Podcast, Bas and Bhawb finally manage to get Zombify in for a conversation about the current state of Necromancer Tournament play. Zombify educates a lot of players on the current state of Epidemic and Corrupt Boon in tPvP. They spend a few moments talking about how leaderboards work, and the prospect of solo queueing as a Necromancer.

We also asked him to give us 5 things that currently prevent the necromancer from being more effective in the current tournament mode.

We don’t currently have gameplay video so the Youtube video will take some time to post. We are working on getting some video of Zombify playing in structured at least.

http://sittingonacouch.com/guild-wars-2-necromancer-podcast-but-of-corpse-ep-10/

Editor’s Note: Since the podcast was recorded Zombify has watched our All-Necromancer Tournament team and found it quite funny.

Haha no problem. I will toss you an invite tomorrow

Updated with a Fantastic WvWvW Podcast called Lessons from a WvWvW commander. It’s audio only at the moment.

Tiborb.1453:

This (ArenaNet have an account on soundcloud too) :

https://soundcloud.com/arenanet/guild-wars-2-voiceover

I will take a look and see what I can do.

Invites extended to those requesting them. You should see them when you logged back in.

Lady Sara Goldheart.2764:

Tiborb.1453:

Why don’t you upload podcast on soundcloud so people (or you) can add comments into the timeline, for example to say “hey, we are talking about Guardians here”?

Or put it on Youtube where the description of the video has time stamps or whatever they are called to skip to the beginning of the topic one is interested in.

I will try to answer both questions here.

I should get into doing timelines and transcripts especially for this type of a setup. We did not get into class specifics, because we wanted to keep it to an hour. Next month we will do something for a longer period of time where we will cover more class specifics, the Forest (we completely forgot to cover this one), and other tournament specifics. We plan on possibly going to two hours next month since we will have Symbolic and a special solo-queue guest.

We are working on getting it on youtube. I have never heard of soundcloud so forgive me for not having an answer on that one.

http://www.youtube.com/user/SOACGaming is our youtube channel.

I am working on getting gameplay of our hosts so we can add it to the podcast and then upload it on to youtube. I am not sure how to put in timestamps, but I will read up on it.

If anyone is interested in assisting us with an NA version of this please let me know.

Arvid.3829:

If you ever need a replacement or something, I’d love to play with you guys someday. GMT+2 atm

Flow will be taking the lead on setting it up, but we will make sure to add your name to the roster.

We do need someone with the capability to record the video.

spoj.9672:

Id possibly be up for this at some point. GMT +00:00. Can guilds span across NA and EU servers or do you have an EU BoC guild aswell?

Its the same guild. I will just move the players to an EU rank so other players will know who is EU. We have quite a few EU players in Guild. I just haven’t gone through and adjusted all their ranks.

Acaro.4067:

Just watched the newest vid, dudes, u really need to make someone go 30 into sr for stability shroudstomp, it´s just horrible to watch how the enemys rally all the time

And I would love to see a full berserker team that just pops lich form all at the same time and melts people away with focus fire

Yeah I think we will have one guy absolutely have that ability this Thursday. Most likely it will be the forward bunker since our burst power necro prefers 25 in curses.

Haha, actually Talentless was our third guest. It just took us this long to get gameplay videos from him. He is notoriously lazy about recording since he got blasted for his gameplay previously haha

Caris.1594:

I see.

What about weapon sigils? I was thinking of the Sigil of Force for the flat dmg bonus, but saw someone somewhere talk about sigil of perception, so maybe that would be a better choice?

It’s personal Preference I like bloodlust for more power, and crit for might stacks :P.

Also i am thinking special edition Podcast :P

Welcome Back Sheobix

Sheobix!!!

Haha, You have missed alot mate. Necromancers have seen a lot of bug fixes, some Axe buffs, and an epidemic/Corrupt boon nerf that is being recalled due to it being almost useless in competitive play.

There are about 50 different builds out there right now, but we kind of categorized them down to 5 main build types with variations out of each.

1) Condition Damage
2) Hybrid
3) PowerMancer
4) Minions
5) Support

All are currently viable in pve. In tournaments, Conditions are most wanted, Power is used, but is tough, and Minions/Hybrid are great for low to mid level. WvWvW you see a little bit of everything

I have a copy of some of the best new stuff on the Necro table.

1) CHIPSSS Encyclopedia of Necro skills

2) Nemesis Tutorials

3) SOACGaming Podcast - sittingonacouch.com for audio only

Each of these are fantastic ways to get immersed into the spirit of the Necromancer and what they bring to the table.

Technically I like the Podcasts best but that’s just me :P. Nemesis has taken over your role as Elder Tutorial Statesman. I am the Rainbow up the butt salesman, and Bhawb is our resident Minion Expert :P.

wookie.8934:

Honestly, your biggest problem is physically calling targets and chaining your epidemics in the second video.

Hopefully that will come with experience. I usually solo queue on off days with my ranger (been testing some abilities that Battosai told me about). We only do it once a week, as some of us are very busy. So we do it on Thursdays. This will make our development slower, but hopefully we can put out a slightly better performance each week.

FLIMP.8172:

Great podcast. Enjoyed it

Thanks, we are looking at doing an NA one as well, but it’s really tough to get the NA guys locked down.

Awww, Bull!!! We will miss you on the NA Side. At least now you can help show them how we did it a bit :P.

Kylia Deprigen, our Mesmer Podcast Host, was sent a PM asking about advise on being a Mesmer and being a commander. Kylia is the WvWvW commander for AVTR on Fort Aspenwood in Tier 2. He invited the fan onto our channel and pressed record!

Hope you all enjoy this special podcast that answers questions such as Zergs, communication, dealing with those disruptive people in /t, playing against other commanders and lots of other commander related stuff (and we do promise that there is some Mesmer points in there too!)

If you’ve ever wanted to be a Commander, or just want to see how the mind of a commander works, this is the podcast for you!

http://sittingonacouch.com/the-gw2-mesmer-podcast-mesmerized-special-lessons-from-a-wvwvw-commander/

Kylia Deprigen was sent a PM asking about advise on being a Mesmer and being a commander. Kylia invited the fan onto our channel and pressed record!

Hope you all enjoy this special podcast that answers questions such as Zergs, communication, dealing with those disruptive people in /t, playing against other commanders and lots of other commander related stuff (and we do promise that there is some Mesmer points in there too!)

http://sittingonacouch.com/the-gw2-mesmer-podcast-mesmerized-special-lessons-from-a-wvwvw-commander/

If you’ve ever wanted to be a Commander, or just want to see how the mind of a commander works, this is the podcast for you!

Symbolic has given me his word he will make it to the next podcast ;p

Mesmer’s can do everything, but they are more specialists. Necromancers are far from specialists, we do a little bit of everything regardless of how we spec.

Fungalfoot.7213:

Minions do not attack stealthed opponents. Full stop. This is not debatable, this is simply how the game is coded. Putting down a well on the other hand will effectively damage the thief even when in stealth and it’s thankfully not influenced by the laggard AI. Of course I’m assuming he is immobilized which is kind of the entire goal when using dagger and warhorn against one, yeah?

Wait, so your thief stealths but never moves making wells a great drop. Full Stop. Nope, only bad thieves stay in a location long enough for you to throw down a well. Please let me know where your stationary thieves play so that I might face them.

Fungalfoot.7213:

Look, I get that you two are on this constant crusade to defend the viability of minion masters and whatnot but even you have to realize that at this point it’s just kind of getting silly. But I digress.

I could care less about the viability of Minions in tournaments. I know their shortcomings and their positives. I don’t play Minions when I play tournaments, because they don’t fit my role on the team. Plus with the current meta favoring AOE spamming engineers berzerker minions die too quickly.

We aren’t defending viability. We have freely admitted that they lose effectiveness at certain levels. What we are defending is trumped up assumptions and ridiculous over exaggerations that stretch the truth in an attempt to blackball anyone who thinks differently.