Guild Wars 2

Totally agrre on the lack of real data. Combat log is missing lots of info, and Death log in PvP is not a good tool.

For example: On some fights that lasted for 3+ min, Terror was showing for 9k im my Death log, Bleeding for 22k. Yet what really killed me in that long fight over a point was a backstab for 4-5k at a moment where I couldn’t prevent/dodge it. Yet this backstab hit was so small compared to others DoTs for that long fight, that it wasn’t even shown in the Death log, or completely at the bottom. Lots of players looking at this would say that Bleeds or Terror killed them, not the last burst. Yet they could have regen enough or healed in between DoT to survive longer.

I was only discussing Terror damage nerf there, not a full combo burst. If you include all the steps (not instant, only Doom is) to produce this “burst”, on one player (because this burst is not AoE) and compare it to others real burst like thief, ele, warrior mace/gs, etc etc, it will be subpar and all that “high” damage can be negated by a stunbreaker or some condition removal (be it from you or a teammate).

All the burst of the others class is not negated by a stunbreaker or stability. You won’t get the CC, but you will still take the full damage.

Thus, in my humble opinion, Terror is not the culprit here and another nerf to it will not remove the feeling of OPness we seem to radiate.

30/20/0/0/20 seems more to be the culprit of this uprising, because of a combination of Dhuumfire, Torment and adding Terror on top of it. However, even there, I wouldn’t call it skillless play, you must still decide to use your fears offensively instead of defensively, and at least wait for a stunbreak or 2 before trying to go for the kill it against good player.

Now if those players are out of stunbreakers or dont have one, what player with full burst combo ready wouldn’t put a dent in them?

Videos and examples of OPness against players of equivalent skills would be the best proof, not our feeling about it or the fact that we can stomp new/ less knowledgable players in a spectral wall corner trap.

Every time you killed someone with Terror burst, or that you died to a Terror combo, is there really nothing they/you could have done to prevent that damage all together?

Are we still just talking about a 1v1 matchup, or dueling, or exceptionnaly good or bad personal experience? Fact is what need here, and it feels like peoples are riding the OP wave based on myths/legend of that dreaded epidemic once in a blue full moon

Reading more and more of posts about OP necro, I can’t really find a good argument that make the “accusers” prove their point.

It seems mostly cause by 2 things:
-Ignorance of the class that killed them.
-False evidence of what exactly killed them. (Even worse in PvP, with a Death log that doesn’t represent what happened, just numbers from highest to lowest, and a combat log that doesn’t show all numbers.)

Some myths about OP condi necro 30/20/0/0/20 build:

- They have unblockable marks that can one shot you from 1200 yards.

- They can burst from 1200 range (when the real “burst” is under 600)

- Terror damage is OP (we’re talking about 1k damage a second, removable by both Stunbreakers AND conditions removal and negated with Stability before hand.)

- OP necro seems to have up to 8 or 9 skills slot at all time: They can use Signet of Spite, Epidemic, Spectral wall, Spectral armor, Plague Signet, Corrupt boon, and all wells, all instant cast, with no way to evade/invulnerable/block them.

- All necro are 30/20/20 conditions, therefore when I kill someone with a DS power crit build or a MM vampire build, I’m a noob with a FotM class.

- Plague gives you 20 second of invulnerability.

So can anybody tell me why exactly is necro OP? In a 1v1 setting that favors the necro if he starts with full lifeforce and full Corruption stacks? I really think that class knowledge is the real issue here, exactly like when I hated facing thief until I started one and just learned what they could/couldnt do and what to counter and how to do it.

@Haccks: About the loser who can’t dodge a hammer strike: The point is, you will get hit by one sooner or later with only 1 dodge every 10 sec, and when you do get hit, it will hit more than a full 5 sec of Terror, except the damage is instant and knocks you down. I don’t know about you, but I don’t become invulnerable when I’m knock down for 2-3 second, so every hit still register, exactly like Fear/Terror.

So I really don’t see why Terror needs another damage nerf. Being CC for 2-3 sec can be lethal to anyone regardless of the skill used to CC if you’re caught without a stunbreak.

Terror damage is the only CC that deals damage, and that damage is too high?

What about every attack in the game that knocks you down/stuns/daze/blow out?

I’ve been hit, in TPvP stats, for 4k by a hammer warrior with his knockdown strike. At least with Terror (which deals what, 1,3k max (full condition stack) each second for a max of 5 second if you blow out all skills) I can use a stunbreak in between to cancel part of that damage, or even Stability to totally negate it before it happens. In the case of the hammer strike, you still take it in the face with stability, you just dont get knock down.

If you compare every skills that applies a CC effect from every class, you’ll see that Terror, while it is a good one, has plenty of counters and ways to negate it’s damage, and need to be traited. Some other classes’ weapon skills offer better controls and direct damage, which you can’t prevent even with a stunbreaker.

In a lot of game they have an option for Colorblind, which normally just change Green nuances to something else to help see who’s allies/enemies.

As for me, I turned off ally’s nametag, so in WvW/Pvp I no longer waste a spell trying to hit my teammates, I know that if I see a name it’s a bad person.

It would be 6 second (cap at 100% condition duration) However our fear source dont give a 3 second base fear.

You have:
Doom →1-1,5 second to 2-3 sec at 100%
Reaper’s Mark → 1 second to 2 sec
Reaper’s Protection → 2 sec to 4 sec
Fear on Downed → 2 sec to 4 sec
Downed Fear → 2 sec to 4 sec
Spectral Wall → 1 sec to 2 sec

Been testing those lately in WvW a lot, most of my juicy numbers comes from when you pop Lich. Stats goes up the roof and boost wells like crazy. Someone foolish enough to stay in them will litterally melt in second. Suffering can tick close to 3,5-4k in lich form.

I guess you could achieve something similar with lots of might and the 50% crit DS trait.

I can level from 2 to 80 in WvW if I want (and I did it for 3 characters), I don’t see how I would miss some parts of the game if I do the same thing in PvP also. Now they could really say “Play the game the way you want it!”.

More “kitten ” means they will be able to play a lot more together, and leave the “elites” (gotta laugh at that notion) clakitten out together instead of farming the kitten .

Nothing wrong with peoples quitting, it happens in all game. Fresh blood keeps the game growing and moving. There is some crazy good players that solely play in WvW because there’s no incentive to pvp. I was a full time WvW player until recently, just because of time restriction I started doing PvP for my dailies because it was easier and took less time to complete. And guess what, it hooked me for a bit, even got a Champion achievement out of it because I stick with it.

Also some kitten may rise as elites if you give them enough incentive to stay and learn. Why stay up all evening getting farmed in pvp to learn it, when you may as well play in a mode where you earn something for the long term (by that I mean character slots, banks slots and other permanent upgrades to your account). There is no long term right now in PvP.

I think on the contrary, it would draw more players to come and try it, because they wouldn’t feel like putting the rest of the game on hold while they enjoy a couple of solo queue and hot join. No need to turn them to full time pvper, but at least if I invite a couple of pve friend to a pvp game, they would gain something out of it.

The only incentive I have right now with PvP (apart from the fun I get from it) is that I’ve won a Black and White dye from their chests, meaning my brain wants more dye to make more gold to help my PvE side.

First thing we would need, is a real combat log, with a good detailed “What Downed me exactly” instead of the top damage I received.

I saw Bleeding for 22k as the top contender last time I played. Is bleeding damage OP? Of course not, the fight lasted a good 3 min, 3v3, we had Regen going.

People are seeing Bleed, Burning and Terror coming on top because the fight lasted so long, they had time to tick. When I fight an ele that can use his fire sword ele, hit me 21 times with it for 21k in the space of 10 second, how can anyone perceive Burning as OP?

If 2+ peoples tries to apply Burning to the same Immobilized source (can’t dodge, invulnerability on cooldown etc) , it’s almost as if they wasted a skill, the damage is constant, not bursty. You wont have 2 Burning stack, only longer duration, so more time to cleanse/be cleansed and even better, more time to counter attack too.

Now, put 2+ people that does direct damage (that hits normally higher than a Burning stack, looking at you burst ele and thief) and your target, in the same no cooldown-no dodge situation, will all receive those hits directly to his health pool, instantly with no way to counter play. And if someone says that if he had dodge/invulnerability he could, guess what, he could’ve too vs skills that applied conditions.

If you perceive the Death Toll as a page of reference of what actually kills you, and that condition comes on top, ask yourself how long did the fight last, could I have removed some of this damage, and what exactly downed me in this situation. I normally die because of a burst skill that hits me for 4k-5k (even more lol) when I’m loaded with pressure (aka conditions). The death toll won’t put it at top, but if that burst hit wouldn’t have touched me, I probably wouldn’t be dead even with bleeds/burning on me.

The only thing about blind I find strange, is how do you miss an PBAoE/TGAoE attack? Ex. A blind downed guardian creates a bubble around him, he don’t target anyone, yet he misses everyone around him.

PBAoE shouldn’t miss in my opinion, only your next targeted attack.

Go back to other games where old styles quest giver ask: “Go kill 20 something (but they dont count if you killed them before), walk back to me, kill their leader now, walk back to me, go see behind the leader, there was something precious that you couldn’t see before I told you to.” It will feel so tedious that you will come back crying for more hearts instead.

I prefer hearts x10000 than old style questing and would love more if just to feel more complete. You can pretty much skip every cool events in Orr if the timing’s not right. At least with hearts you stick around and know that this zone is meaningful.

When a necro use Plague against me, I just evade from his blind field, remove Stability and hit him from range with axe and stack him with conditions with staff. Now he can be a translucide pincushion pingpong ball instead. Necro in Plague/lich form lose all other utilities/weapons skills. Transformation skills are normally not that great because it removes options instead of bringing more to the table. It’s not rare to see a necro having to get out of lich/plague earlier to just heal/use utilities. Then you’re stuck with a 3 min cooldown elite that brings you no good.

@Krayiss: I understand what you’re saying, and I think you nailed it when you said the commotion must be due to more casuals/new player not knowing how to counter necros chain fear (and necro in general). I’ve just finished my Champion Phantom in solo queue with a Power build (30/10/0/0/30) with Berserker amulet, 2 Well+ Lich combo and Rune of Air x6. I would down 3+ players with the wells + lich combo…. Try to do that to a real Tpvp Team, and you will be the only one to go down instead. People were still whispering me saying how OP necro was, while I was using nothing that could be called OP. Ignorance in that case would be what killed them. For fun, if you’re on NA server, I’ll gladly test my build against yours to see if it’s really unkillable

When logging on my guardian/mesmer, I have better tools to counter those CC chains, and I do not need to go out of my ways to use them. Lower cooldown stunbreak ,easier access to invulnerability/stability/block/vigor. Now that my Phantom is done, I’m gonna work on my guardian, and I think the run will be way easier than it was for my power necro.

Yep, peoples are saying that you dont have enough stunbreaks to survive 2 necros fearing you, but it’s the same against any 2 classes that wants to CC you and if they time it well you won’t budge before dying (at least as a necro)

2v1 nobody should win, bring a teammate that can help cleanse/put stability and those 2 CC classes will have slotted their utilities for nothing.

People are really trying to bash a CC just to bash a CC.

If I’m stuck without stability or stunbreak, any CC isn’t fun to receive. Any of those CC have the same counter, Fear as a condition can also be removed by AoE cleanse. I’ve never seen an ally remove my stun, daze or knockdown status though, as they are not condition.

When necro is being lock down by a single Warrior hammer from 100% to 0%, without being able to react because he’s out of stunbreak, should we ask for a 2 sec immunity between each knockdown too?

Also if I’m not mistaken, Fear can stack to max 5 sec, so a good “skillfull” necro won’t spam them mindlessly with his face on the keyboard, he will chain them in a way where he can get the maximum duration from each Fear. Else he’ll be losing quite a bit of damage and control. (with 100% Fear duration, Doom 3 sec within 600 yard, Wall 2 sec, Mark 2 sec, Reaper’s prot 4 sec, Fear on Downed 4 sec, Downed Fear 4 sec)

In WoW, where when you used a trinket to remove CC on you, you were immune to any CC for 5 sec, just to give you control of your character for a while. Peoples will always hate when they have no control over their character, but Fear is not the only culprit here.

Krayiss I know you are trying to prove your build is OP in the last few days, but any competent team would just change you into a Pingpong ball and be dealt with quickly. Again, not because you’re the highest threat, but because they can and there’s little you can do to stop it, even with 3 stunbreakers equipped. What is the team doing, letting you stacking vulnerability for 16 sec? Any good fight ends way faster, even more if a necro is the target.

I agree that we gained some survivability while using Spectral Armor for 6 sec, IF people are stupid enough to try to burst us while it’s active. Remember that the lifeforce generation now has a internal cooldown of 1 sec between each gain, for Spectral walk and Spectral Armor. And remember that we gain nothing except protection for 6 sec or swiftness if nobody touch us, on a 60 sec cooldown…. At least if not attacked at all we should gain 20% LF or something.

We’re far from invulnerable, last I know when peoples attack me I receive all their effects even when in DS. Immobilize, CC, conditions, you name it. When I attack a Blurring frenzy mesmer (9 1/2 sec cooldown on a weapon skill for 2 1/2 sec invulnerability with no ressource requirement) it receives nothing of the bad condi/effects/damage I tried to put on.

On topic: Chain fear is all nice and hated because of lack of control, but again so is Knockdown, Blowout, chain dazed, Immobilized. This game has no diminishing return, so any stacking of loss of control character is seeing as bad. A single stunbreak and/or stability would negate all those, even Fear.

The answer is the same for all CC in this game, and getting chain CC when everything is on cooldown should mean bad things are gonna happen.

When I’m chain KD by one class (engi warrior main culprit here), see my health go down, go into DS (no access to Stunbreaker in DS remember) a good player will just chain CC me until I have to get out or my lifeforce runs out. When I do get out, I suffer from this 1-2 seconds lockdown bug on heal/utilities and have to try to cast my heal when I’m getting focused and again the good player knows that the heal has to come up else I’m dead, because DS is still on cooldown for 8 sec and/or there no more lifeforce to enter it, it’s my only survival tool so it’s easy to interrupt the heal.

Anyway, chain Whatever CC is bad, because CC that long in a game where you can be burst in seconds is never fun for anyone on the receiving end.

When you look at this video, the stun break wouldn’t have helped I’m afraid. Except if you’re talking about a stunbreaker that renders you invulnerable. But even then, the second you’re hit, you’re down.

But the build you’re all calling OP is not using those stunbreaks.

I want to be constructive, but reading posts that just put all our skills in the pot as if we can use it all at the same time, instant cast, with no possible counter, is detrimental and just add more noise to confuse the dev/readers.

Get a necro to level 2, solo queue in tPvP with any build you like (better use the OP one to put all chance on your side) go to Clocktower, hold it and play 20 match straight. Try not to die, bring your stunbreaks and your dodges. Then just for the sake of it, do the same thing on a guardian, ele, mesmer, engi, ranger, thief and warrior.

Come back with your result, I would love to see how it ends up and if DS is the God mode some people claim it to be.

Or I can save you some time, say I’ve tested those things already, and that it’s far from God mode compared to some weapon skills from my others classes.

At least, could we now enter “Our Special World” when going into DS, and only see other necros that are also in DS, so that we can share a cup of tea, talk about how life is good without the fear of a thief jumping on you and pet the other end of our flesh wurm (who lives in both world).

Gathering lifeforce would now have a greater goal, and because Lifeforce decreases by itself, we would strive to return to this world and gather lifeforce even faster. Rabbits’s population in WvW will decrease faster than it can spawn, but life will be good.

step 1) hear the treb shout
step 2) count to 3
step 3) dodge

congratulations, you just took 0 damage from a treb shot without wasting an invulnerability cd or whatever

step 1) hear the treb shout
step 2) count to 3
step 3) dod….kitten only 1 dodge every 10 sec on this class with no acces to vigor

I can dodge them quite well thank you, but guess what, I can do better with other classes survivability tool WHILE stomping and being under treb fire. No need to dodge! I just wanted to show that our super duper DS “Live infinitely” tool is not working as well, and it’s all we have when our 2 dodges are done.

We’re Tpvp’ing in Khylo this week, and I had a perfect example of the not-so-tough DS issue vs classes that can block, go invulnerable, perma-evade etc.

Ever try to bunker/hold Clocktower while it’s been treb as a necro? As a guardian and mesmer, I can go invulnerable at the right time to even stomp while eating a treb shot. As a necro, you change into DS to “absorb”, and gasp, with the new change you lose all your DS and almost all your life in one shot + the knockback. Even if you try to stomp by shifting to Plague (good way to waste a 3 min CD elite btw) to prevent the knockback, you still eat it full blast and normally will go down.

I repeat, I can bunker this with other classes while being trebbed, so there is definitely something wrong with our substain tool when it’s all we have.

Also about our Spectral Armor, if nobody hits us we gain nada, 0. For a 60 sec cooldown, it’s easy to see it’s wasted potential. If it said “If you’re not hit, gain 20% at the end” or something like that, it would be better I think. Any burst class just have to wait 6(!!!) seconds and then can burst us with us winning 1 single % Lifeforce.

I also hate the feeling when I “burst” into a 0 taking-damage Warrior, but who’s fault is it really, I had to watch more closely their buffs/effects. At least some class can run away and come back when their burst cooldown are back on, we’re stuck there until the end, one way or another.

@jmatb: I can’t really help you there, because you seems so inclined to think we can solo a group only with staff. Just try it out in a couple of solo tPvP, spam all you 4 marks on someone and watch him melt under the pressure. Then when you’ll see that he’s well alive and kicking, and that you now try to hit with a slow auto-attack that don’t hit hard for condi build and almost always miss while your good marks are on cooldown, you’ll quickly change to your other weapon set.

There is no burst from 1200 range. The burst comes from being close, so that you can’t react. Putting a wall behind you, fearing you through it and spam marks, scepter 2-dagger 5 and then DS to pop another free dagger 5 (traited) + DS #3, #2 and #5 is the burst you’re speaking off.

That easy to do “burst” has put all our freaking abilities on cooldown, I do hope at some point it achieve something. I can do easier and faster damage with only one weapon set from my mesmer, warrior and almost any other class really. Most of this burst is not instant, it has cast times, can be evaded or negated, and it is normally against me.

Peoples are crying that fear is cheap, what about knockdown, blowout, pull, stun and daze? Stability is the answer to all those, yet only fear get targeted as the annoying CC that removes control of the player (ok and for it’s damage). It’s a good thing that you don’t play necro, you’ll rename this class to Ping-Pong ball in no time against classes that can hard CC you.

And when stability is mentioned as a counter, people jump on Corrupt boon, then that he used Signet of Spite, Plague signet, then Spectral wall, Well of Corruption, Spectral walk and Spectral armor and… and… and… we have 3 utilities box like any other class…. Ignorance is showing in a lot of posts, like when I was dreaming that mesmer/any “OP” class get nerfed to the ground when I didnt understand their timing and cooldown.

Now if you are facing 3 to 5 necro in the same team, they could have all those combos available, but then I wouldn’t call that team balanced. The same amount of warriors could just stomp this team in the ground. Same for a full cleanse ele team, guardians or 25% immune to condi engi.

Anyway I hope people at least try them more than 6 hours, and play them against good players that knows how to deal with necro. They’ll see pretty fast the weakness of the class once 2 or more people focus them with CC and raw damage. (Please dont put conditions on them….)

Just asking, because we can’t really reason with someone who is raging against necro just because one build is over the top (and at some point, maybe it’s the conditions damage the real culprit and not it’s application, I see so many Burning/bleeding hybrid warriors now it’s not funny).

What makes other classes weapons skills/utilities less OP than our (only) capability to absorb damage in DS? Mesmer have 2-3 sec invuln on a 9,5/12 sec cooldown, can evade a lot more than us, have access to block, and don’t need to build up another ressource to use it (clones are way easier to manage).

Engi can block for 3-4 sec, same for guardians and warrior, and thief could evade all that combo with only SB#3. Rangers are evade master too now. This “burst” from ele must be timed well to be effective, against all classes.

Most of these classes dont even need to put utilities for their survivability, only weapons skills could negate that burst.

We need to grab weapons that gives us lifeforce, use a 60 sec cooldown utility and eat damage. If you would just wait for the buff to wear down (6 sec), you wouldnt give any lifeforce to the necro and just roll him afterward. You see him go in DS, just go away, come back after he returned to normal and you have a full 10 sec to burst him, and that’s if he got any Lifeforce left.

They put Spectral Armor as a deterrent to been trained, and while it’s not working against a team, it’s sure do it’s job against 1 player dumb enough to continue attacking throught it. Just remember that’s is a long cooldown, too long for a prolonged fight, and you’ll be winning every fight against them.

I like your ideas Bas, although I don’t see why we should only be healed 50% while in DS. We need to work for that lifeforce, we should gain benefits from using it, not be penalized because we had to go into DS when our guardian used his full heal spell, or somebody blasted those water fields.

No other class is invulnerable to incoming buffs/heals/effects from teammates when they’re using their special abilities. Adjust the numbers after if needed, but that’s one mechanic that would help the necro survivability more.

Anyone knows the trait/gear/rune of the Necro dummy in the Mist? This guy can block, steal life like crazy and do some weird thing with his dagger. I think we are a shadow of what this guy can do right now, maybe he still is a beta necro and we’re getting change based on the number he can do?

On another note, I did test our DS against direct damage yesterday and my god, I would like to know the numbers before/after the bug fix, I was in Berserker/Cavalier gear and was staying longer than ever in DS, where before all my lifeforce would just evaporate when 2-3 players were looking at me with bad eyes.

People are so “angry” about the Terror/Dhuumfire combo that they now call necro OP whenever they die to one. I kill them with a powerbuild while they try to AoE me down, OP. I minion master them to death, OP again. Built around vampiric, the healing received from it is too much…

The peoples hopping on the bandwagon and playing them because it’s the FoTM are just making it seems even worse, because 2-3 necro can be a bad day, as can be 2-3 of anything really if you’re not prepared.

When I want to relax from the hate I receive as a necro when I solo tPvP, I hop on my guardian and just build for an anti fear/anti burning build, and normally kill these necro with ease. Does it work everytime? Of course not. Is it a viable counter? Sure is.

These burst build do have cooldowns, and knowing them goes a long way. Like any other burst build, if you’re stuck out of stunbreakers you’ll normally eat dirt, especially if you face them alone.

I think a mix of not facing us often and that we were merely a speed bump before is what created the whole Armaggedon in the first place. I do however hope that we can use this spotlight to bring our class more in line with the attrition style we were “promised”, not just mindless nerfs to calm the mass.

I think right now most peoples cry OP as soon as they die at the hand of a necro now. I’ve main my necro since launch, and use in solo tPvP a 30/20/0/20 build using axe/focus dagger/warhorn, wells and Berserker amulet. No fear except DS #3, no Dhuumfire, no “cheese” to make them cry more. I handicap myself and have more fun doing it.

Yet every time I kill someone, they remind me by whisper or /m how OP necro are at the moment…. Somebody even told me that dagger #2 was crazy healing and OP.

I think a lot of (solo) tPvPer are bad/ignorant unfortunately, we were free kill/rare sight before so they dont know how to counter us/dont want to learn. This hate bandwagon needs to stop or we will be nerfed just for the sake of it.

About necro been as survivable as engi if focused, I’m sorry but this is not what I see all the time. My engi is way harder to take down by multiple opponents. I even saw in Tpvp a engi build hold 2 of us almost indefinitely by evading, healing, blocking almost non stop. You can be a really good tank if you know how to time your cooldowns.

On a necro, if you got 0 Lifeforce, you’re dead in 10 sec top if you’re focused. If you have Lifeforce, you still lose access to all healing/skills while in it, so you are really predictable. And it melt like butter to a hot knife if more than one enemy is hitting you. We’re not the attrition class we’re supposed to be, by far.

Marks are too strong, too easy to land? Do you feel that staff as a weapon is too strong for the long cooldown of almost all of it’s skills, and it’s slow auto attack that won’t hit 2/3 of the time at 1200 range? Do you play a staff necro?

Just dodge twice when a staff necro comes near you and you normally evaded all 3-4 skills all together (they normally spam them all before switching), then it’s useless for another 20 sec. Of course if 3-4 peoples of your team stack on point and eat them all, you’re supposed to be punished for that. And again, a guardian could just AoE remove all of those with almost as much cooldown.

I think marks should be mini-wells, when triggered you left a 2-3 second X effect of whatever the mark was supposed to provide, so that people can’t just roll through it and ignore all damage. Or send 1 person to dodge all the marks so that the rest of the group is good to go.

Necros sure are the FOTM right now (although it’s more of an hype thing than because they are stronger than other classes as a whole), but peoples are now crying left and right about things that existed since day #1 and were never seen as too strong or skill-less before.

Now if they really want to revamp AoE skills, then please give us more options with staff than just 4 marks, this would be incredible!

Why not have it merge with you as an active, shielding you for X sec or until he dies, and then explodes in a cloud of smoke that blinds enemy. Now that would be a minion worth having and bring a bit more survivability in a full minion build.

Hehehe had to login just to say nice song choice for this video You’re totally right, it’s only “OP” against peoples who tries to bumrush you without looking. Against good players it’s a group protection giver and that’s it.

If you have some karma (but not enough to buy temple exotic), you can buy PVT 80 rares from WvW vendor. Also look on the TP for green soldier amulets/ring/back, it’s not really expensive (around 1-2s each) and the stat difference between those and the exotic one aren’t that big for the price difference.

It’s a good trade-off if you want to quickly get your build in gear (pun intended ).

You have easy access through Ascalion Catacombs, Temples for Karma and WvW vendor with badges. Depending on what you find easy, you’ll be able to get a full set in no time.

Here’s a link to some other ways:

http://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Equipment_acquisition_by_stats

Close to Death hits everyone under 50%, has no cooldown, and favors Power.

Dhuumfire helps you bring them to 50% faster, but only hit one target unless you epidemic (which you should ). You can also keep it on for 80% of the time with 100% condi duration, but it will not trigger on anyone else until 10 sec has passed.

Personally I use Dhuumfire, the burst it gives us with all those Poison/Fear/Bleed/Torment is really good. But I think in the long run Close to Death should be more damage, the more against you the better.

Guardians can use their Shelter healing, blocking for 2-3 sec, or Focus #5 for another 3 blocks. Corrupt boon and Epidemic unfortunately gets blocked by those abilities but not by Aegis.

In short buff dont block it, ability that activate a blocking effect does. Mind you, DS #2, like Greater Marks, is truly unblockable, it will port you to a Shelter/Focus #5 guardian/Toolkit Engi/Shield Warrior no prob. So the solution is here, just need to be implemented correctly in those 2 skills.

@Myrmidian: No, I got owned by a necro (and his team) because I didn’t have enough experience with my engi and was overextending to get his tag. When I was one on one, I managed to show him how the lack of stability/CC could throw a wrench (pun intended) in anyone’s plan.

Btw, I’m mostly in WvW, so in my little time playing PvP, if I can manage to see a dev playing necro, with my own eyes, for me it’s still a good thing! I resisted the urge to spam him with questions, I spammed him with grenades instead.

@Kitedyou: Do you mean the ability is on cooldown when you get downed and you’re stuck waiting for it to cast, or just that the spell is available but it takes long to cast?

Skill queue will mess your Fear, as you will cast it immediately on Down without even seeing your Downed bar, and when you’ll see it appear it will be on a 7-8 second cooldown. Make sure to not spam 2 if you’re near death

@MGJam: You see the Area Weakness proc from Putrid Marks into the Chillblains poison field. If Chillblains would hit that hard, now we could talk about how a full staff rotation can down someone!

Good damage indeed! Shame we can’t do it that often

Ok ok no need to flash all the lights I know, but I liked the small encounters we had. I was on my engineer, and for some reason I couldn’t resist targeting him and trying all sort of CC and conditions.

It turned out quite well for him at the end, winning most of our “duels”. He even juked 3 of us with Spectral walk (Noobs ) I’m even happier that this class is getting a look at, and that Chaplan is testing builds with it!

I’ve grab a couple of small footages that I will try to upload to youtube to show you how he owned me hehe. (Still lack experience as an engi in pvp, I’ll get you next time, just you wait!)

Just wanted to share my… joy, I guess, maybe that next patch will really make me main a necro again! *Crosses fingers until they bend weird ways!

Same here lol, my bank is necro-set only. PVT, Berserker, Rampager and Rabid for now. But Laurels are not Alt-friendly, so before I make the switch, I’ll wait for that exciting next patch

Same here, I’ll listen to it to see if I can share the excitement. My laurels are still not used on my other classes!!!!

As an IT guy myself, I just hope you don’t let those affect any of you personnally. “Clients” just want their needs satisfied, and in gaming we can be nasty clients.

Keep up the work!

If we put minions in our utilities, then we normally can’t combo off ourselves. As an engi I can put down a 4 sec water field, and do 3-4 Blasts within that 4 sec, I can even put a Fire field and do that same 3-4 blast in it for AoE Might, and a light field for AoE Retal, Smoke field for AoE stealth etc etc. I can bring a lot of fields, and I can do multiple finisher at the same time because I have the option to do it, regardless of build.

With necro, you gotta put 30 point for Death Nova to gain the 7 fields you’re talking about. And then it means that your utility skill is dead, so it may means that you don’t have as much finishers ready. If you spam wells, you only have one blast finisher and one 20% projectile finisher. Try casting wurm inside a 2-3 sec well and good luck getting much out of it.

When you play as any other class, a new game unfolds before you, and this is where new tactics and possibilities can grow. I would like necro to have more part in that game, and I think this could be a good way to make us more group-friendly.

Engi are beasts too with self combos, I don’t agree that necros should suffer the “can’t solo combo” theory. It really add depth to the gameplay and open up more possibilities.

It seems to works for the first 6-7 sec, which is the untraited duration of the wall if I’m not mistaken? Have you tried it untraited? Each trait seems to create a different version of the spell, which can act different from the others. The visual effect and protection doesn’t seem to bother if the field effect is still there.

I think I’ve read somewhere that the actual field was at your feet instead of the wall itself, but they fix it if I remember correctly.

Now if you take it traited, I assume it do change the spell, like our glitched Marks, so maybe the traited version still act like that, the actual field is at your feet at the time you cast it.

This bug was here even before the patch where they disabled Weapon swap in DS. You’ll notice it happening a lot when you get CC and kicked out of DS, or sometimes just switching out at the wrong time and your heal/utilities will be locked.

I’ll try to reproduce it a couple of times in videos if it can help getting it fix.

I play a tougher hybrid too, but build around rampager armor, 100% condition duration and Cavalier trinket and I find it rock my boat. I would miss the staff too much, I’ve tried to gain more dps by leaving it in my bag, but then you lose a 1500 yard territory control it provides.

I also prefer 30/30/10 just for the option of targeted wells and Greater marks, to even more excel in siege offense/defense or even when soloing camp.

If you already have all the armors for your builds, I would just try it out to see if you like the playstyle. I know I couldn’t live without staff in WvW so it’s a no-no for me though.

Yet the problem still remains, retaliation is only good against fast low hits, not big bad burst one. Those D/P who stack stealth by jumping multiple times in the smoke field (bad stealth mechanic at his best) screw up any “count in your head” you can do, and you’re still stuck in combat while they heal and remove conditions.

I’ve already done Perma-Ret build with full Soldier gear for max survival, and it’s nowhere as good as Guardian or Mesmer’s one, because right now burst in WvW is X times stronger than any defense you can muster so you won’t live that long with Soldier and won’t kill fast because of lack of damage, a loss-loss in my book.

Good thiefs hit you for 6-7k bs, stealth and stack it. Wait for regen/removal, then come back full while you get another 6-7k bs (sometimes a free 3-4k HS through Smoke field because hey, it’s free damage and he got to stay in stealth! Bad stealth mechanic again!) Just with those 2-3 attacks, he now forced a heal or eat up a lot of your lifeforce/health, and he wakitten from retaliation for 350(max)x2-3, that healed easily while in stealth. You can count to 4 all you want, it will be 5-6 instead, and you’ll be hit far more often from stealth than you would like to.

IMHO, you would be better to focus on an all-around build, and accept that good thiefs will stomp you if you’re caught alone. Trying to build a counter that need luck to be successful in the first place is never a good idea.