Guild Wars 2

Test.8734:

leman.7682:

Could we see future reworks of exisitng professions to make them on par with Revenant or should everyone just reroll the new profession on day one and forget about the past?

Specializations.

How do specializations solve the problem? From what we know, they take something away from a profession and give something new…

They don’t add cool animations and effects, they don’t make badly designed skills/weapons like necro axe/dagger, ranger sword/axe or warrior rifle good out of the sudden. Why? Because these weapons are based on simple tech like spam one to do dmg, press 2 to knock back, etc.

Not solving the problem.

I just watched the Revenant stream and all I can say is I am deeply concerned about the existing professions.
Revenant is designed using new tech, new animations and taking into consideration many lessons Anet learned after the game launched. It not only seems to be very fun to play, amazing to look at, but also skillfull and useful.

Writing this from a perspective of a necro player fills me with sadness. For instance, Mallyx legend seems like everything necro should have been and it seems to be taking high-end PvP meta into consideration, unlike necros. Existing professions, maybe excluding engie and ele, at least to me, feel extremely boring compared to what Anet has shown with the Revenant.

Could we see future reworks of exisitng professions to make them on par with Revenant or should everyone just reroll the new profession on day one and forget about the past?

Link to the stream for those who missed it: http://www.twitch.tv/guildwars2/b/627401366

What everybody thinks? Do people share my concerns?

EDIT: Clarification – this is not a discussion about power creep. Revenant won’t be stronger in numerical terms, Anet wouldn’t let that happen.
What it has high potential to be is being superior to other classes mechanical-, gameplay- and animation-wise and this is what this topic is all about. Why play a dagger necro spamming ‘1’ 90% of the time if you can play revenant that does balanced damage, but in a way that is ten times cooler and more fun.

Bhawb.7408:

Chukree.1756:

Any professional response to my complain?

Stop being bad and you’ll realize that turret engi isn’t that good.

He’s actually a very good player from EU. That response is quite below the standard I would expect from you.

Now, let me show you how discussion is properly done.

What Phd (OP) is saying is that turrets have an insanely high payoff-to-effort ratio and actually work in an unorganised PvP. When I play Ranked Arena solo and encounter turret engies, I get insanely mad, because there are a limited number of good players who will adjust and outplay a turreteer through rotations.
Usually you don’t land with only such players on your team and get some PvE heroes that will just get screwed sooner or later and then just rush back over and over again leading to an ultimate wreck.

Point is, in unorganised play the turret engie is extremely likely to contribute a lot with very little effort. The build allows players who use it, to bring their contribution to levels that is unattainable by them with ‘normal’ builds (much like power LB pew-pew ranger) and this is the problem here.
When I play as a premade team, I don’t care in the least if there are turret engies on the other team; they will get rekt. But when I see these baddies winning over other baddies just because of the build, I understand these complaints.

Your build looks like a mess to me.

You’re using 2 signets and 2 spectrals, yet no specialization traits, which I’d say is a huge mistake.
The Blood Magic traits are a complete waste, compared to how much more the Staff Mastery gives you for the same cost.
I tested Sigils of Torment and I find them lackluster compared to more mainstream options like Geomancy, Energy or Air/Fire combo, bah, even Frailty does something more valuable.
You’re using Parasitic Contagion in a build that deals damage by sitting in DS and spamming Life Blast (hence taking Reaper’s Might), where it doesn’t work. Signets don’t work in DS either.

As I said, not to my liking with many inconsistencies and efficiency leaks. Not saying there isn’t a semi-decent celestial build for necros out there, but it surely isn’t this one.

Here,
http://gw2skills.net/editor/?fRAQNArYWjc00YbtNe2wfbCchCyFIAiMDmAq3ix4ZB-TpBFwACOCAy3fQxJAYxDAAaZAAHCAA

I tried to use some of the skills you were originally using, building at the same time on strengths and optimizing the build. There are many possible changes, but please take a look and notice how the options I propose increase the overall power and condi DPS without sacrificing too much defense.

Well, it isn’t a secret that power LB ranger is an amazing 1v1 build, especially in the Beach fights.
With that said, your build is just a variation of a standard build, which is very cheezy. Yes, that’s it, power ranger is cheezy as kitten.

Don’t know what’s all the fuss about.

Jamais vu.5284:

You have not played GW1. Proof: You don’t know about the popular game mode Stronghold is based on (Fort Aspenwood), which was already in GW1.

GW2 newbs are funny.

What an utterly ridiculous attempt at discrediting the OP. Stronghold looks FAR different from FA. It also looks less appealing.
It has much more in common with GvG – two sides, two guild halls, two lords, trebs.
I agree it has parts of FA, but attacking the OP in such a childish manner requires me to step in.

I had millions of Balthazar Faction and played all game modes in GW1

I agree with the OP, just like I agreed in the thread from September 2012.

Here we are, over 2 years later, and ArenaNet seems to have finally came to a possible solution that was a basis of players’ decisions to leave or ignore PvP originally.
They’re potentially close, but so were they with Conquest at first glance. We all know how it turned out to be.

It is hard for a GW1 player not to think about all this and think that those are the same mistakes all over again.
Is Stronghold going to be a success? Yes, considering how big of a failure Conquest is.
Is Stronghold going to be the best PvP mode ever? Unlikely, considering how dull it looks compared to both DOTA2 and GW1 GvG.

One Leman is always better than even above-average ele.
One average necro is always worse than even below-average warrior.

Jokes aside, necro sucks in PvE and no argument is able to fight the rigidity of maths that go into that evaluation.

Over a year ago Anet sat down with the community and talked about possible new game modes in a Game Modes CDI.

Here we are 16 months later with an announcement of Stronghold that will initially consist of one map and new gameplay.

There are already topics discussing this horrible, unexplained example of slugginess.

What I would like to ask is: how come that during the HoT announcement Colin Johanson comes on the stage and says that guilds are going to form guild teams that will play Stronghold to fight for the top spot on guild leaderboards and then Grouch and Nightmare say something completely different during the Ready Up?

You’re either making it a feature connected to guilds with separate matchmaking, ratings, leaderboards or combining it with Conquest into one queue using the current leaderboards and MMR. In either case, someone wasn’t telling the truth.

Is this going to be the ‘fractal leaderboards’ all over again? Get your stuff together and for once decide what you want from your game. You know, like professionals do.

I want to be able to sustain myself mostly through a skillful use of my own skills and partially through a good coordination with the team.

I don’t think healing needs to work in Death Shroud. Necro with Life Force is a very survivable profession. Still susceptible to CC, but survivable nonetheless. What it lacks in sustainability or the ability to replenish health, it gains in LF generation and being able to burn through the life pool for much longer than other professions.

What I want is some reliable sustainability outside of builds that rely heavily on DS and LF generation. I feel these builds lack sustain.
How to make it so that you can’t combine both LF builds with sustainable build making an ultimate sponge necro with a health pool that can’t go below, say, 10k? I have no idea.

Baconbit.6970:

lol wow. I’m new to the game (about 2 weeks, level 22) and necro is my first choice (warlock kinda guy) and I really wish I didn’t look at this thread. But eh I’ll see what I can do with this “useless” class cause it’s the one I wanna play so nertz to you naysayers! : D

Hi. Not to shatter your dreams, but there are (suprisingly considering the easiness of rerolling) a few people who have been trying to make necro work since the beta tests for years in both pve and pvp and it mostly didn’t work out.

As spojerinos mentioned, there is some hope, especially since the guy who was the original reason for necro restrictions left the company. It fills me with good feelings.

I think one fundamental question that needs to be asked and answered is how ArenaNet is making sure that every profession has a wide spectrum of viable roles.

In Conquest it is apparent that some professions are simply not fit for certain roles. Is this somewhat applicable to Stronghold as well? How to make sure that every profession brings something to the table and is worth taking?

In the blog post, the authors give much space to the ‘roles’ topic, but it is hard not to imagine some professions like elementalist being superior to others just because of how relatively versatile they are by design. The question is quite personal for me, because I have been in a limbo for over a year hoping for some changes to necros that would make them more usable in competitive PvP, which never happened.

The rationale behind the question is past experiences with how Anet handled the balancing, with months or even years of some professions being unfit for PvP and/or PvE (some examples are the initial warrior in PvP, necro or ranger in PvE/PvP).

Hahaha @ that dude with troll win ratio playing turrets. He wins life, that’s for sure.

Anyways, what I gather from this topic…

1. Garbage design of the leaderboards – checked
2. Garbage design of turrets – checked
3. Garbage players abusing the above – checked

Who gives a kitten about these kitten leaderboards? Who cares about some randomb bob, who won’t stand a chance vs even a mediocre player as soon as Anet get their act right and nerfs these builds to where they belong?

Chill out, guys! This is not even a cometitive game yet.
Josh Davis may claim otherwise and provide all kinds of wishful thinking disguised as facts, but it really isn’t and it won’t be before these problems are solved. That’s their problem if they want to make this game any good. But you, guys, getting angry because of some poor design that wasn’t thoroughly thought through and is obviously a fail is just a waste of your time. If Anet are intelligent people, they know they failed and they will work on fixing it.

One thing seems rather promising – turrets won’t probably work as efficiently in Stronghold. That’s the hope. And I can assure you that some random guy, like the one mentioned in the OP, won’t be able to succeed in Stronghold because of a negative map awareness caused by turret-induced tunnel vision.

Exactly,
I duo queue with one of the best multiclass players on EU and most things are going to work for us, because he has the flexibility to support me and provide the damage that is necessary for me to do my job. Joining solo as condi, I’d say, is straight hindering your team. It’s like picking a mes vs 2 thieves.

But being able to stay mostly independent of what your teammates are doing is what makes a good spec in solo queue. Power gives me some of this independence.

Hey, guys. It’s Leman.

So, lately I’ve been testing some specs in a rather competitive environment because I was bored of Terror and Power specs.

First thing that came to my mind was making a celestial utility spec with axe+focus. As anyone can imagine, it was an absolute disaster. I headed to Blowout Central also known as Unranked Arena and tried the build. Still won the matches, but using mostly staff and death shroud.

1. Axe auto is really bad because of different reasons while facing different professions. Against warriors and eles, the damage is really low. Agains thieves, you can’t hit them porting and dodging around. Same vs mesmers. An off-guard is going to burst you down before you swing it 5 times. Generally a very underwhelming experience.
2. Axe#2 is good for life force generation, but I’m yet to see someone eat the whole channel. The attack breaks often due to people porting around and LoSing.
3. Axe#3 is potentially good, but I don’t think it has a high impact on the teamfight.
4. Focus#4 Absolutely horrid. I have no idea how a skill like that – full of randomness, clunky mechanics and a mediocre effect – can remain not reworked. Hitting it with blind mitigates it completely. Opponent strafing slightly or dodging mitigates it completely. Similarly to Axe#2, I have no idea what circumstances would have to occur for it to be fully utilized in combat (which is hitting 5 times between the necro and one opponent).
5. Focus#5 I remember talking to Powerr, who at the time worked on balance, and him saying that this skill is amazing against warriors. Well, not really. Actually it doesn’t seem to accomplish anything substantial against anything in the current meta.
6. The traits – they improve numbers and that means nothing from the practical standpoint. Why would I need Reaper’s Touch on 1200? For stealing Svanir? Sure lower cooldowns and slightly increased damage are nice, but the problem is not being able to hit these skills at all, not hitting with them for too little damage.

If axe+focus were supposed to be our offensive support skirmishing weapons, then they fail severely at fullfilling that design. In fact, I can’t imagine a thing which they don’t fail at.

I would love to hear what others think about the combo. Did anyone manage to make them work in any kind of spec in competitive PvP? What you guys think needs to happen to change them from being a hit-or-miss necro version of Rapid Fire with at least twice shorter range, less damage and much less utility, without actually making them as dumb as Rapid Fire.

@Azeriath:
Sorry, I didn’t visit the forums past few days. Sure, if you still need some tips.

One thing of note is, I lately have been feeling less and less useful on terror spec for some reason. It’s probably because EU meta right now sees just too much mild-to-hard counters that make condis really a difficult thing to pull off and it’s directly reflected in me not seeing any buddy necros in Ranked matches of late. There is very little time for condi build-up. Seen much more success coming from rangers, warriors and engies and even mesmers using condi specs (burning with burst condi applicarion is the key).

Things that I am most discomfortable with are mesmers, eles and offguards. Stacking spiky specs with CC-specs and with celestial roamers is condi necro’s worst nightmare.
Been feeling more useful and much more comfty with a non-standard power spec. Non-standard means warhorn instead of dagger and obviously Plague Form, because Lich is unreliable.

Also one thing of note that I were very painfully reminded on Sunday morning is that terror spec requires the team to work with the necro and if it doesn’t you’re in for some harsh times. If you have a team that, as I wrote in my original post, doesn’t focus or doesn’t do any damage, terror necro is a liability. But I guess a team that doesn’t do damage and doesn’t focuse will lose no matter the spec you play

Narkodx.1472:

wow you wasted a lot of keyboard strokes on leman the truth is he’s really bad too

Hey, bro… bro… why does it hurt soo much?

I wouldn’t say I’m ‘really bad’. I pretty sure my MMR rests in the upper 50% on EU.
Cheers, really bad Leman.

P.S. I’m one of the few necros that actually stick to the profession no matter what and yeah, I get rekt from time to time, because of numerous counters, but still somehow I come out victorious. Do I get carried? I don’t know. If no, then you’re mistaken and just hating. If yes, then I must have some amazing friends I can rely on (shoutouts to Panda!). In both cases though, I’m getting the fullest of my game experience.

ArrDee.2573:

• Trying to be esports when not esports!

…b-but… e-sports… ;(

Whatever the new legendary greatsword is called.

These people are actually playing minions. This is disgusting. Should be deleted from this game.

0/10 would ban.

Rym.1469:

^My opinion, based on 500 hours as an Axe/Dagger+Dagger/Wh power Necro, though

500h without a staff? Absolutely bonkers!

jportell.2197:

No my friends all of power necro damage comes from lich form, and we are useless outside of that, our entire build is dependent on a 3 minute cooldown. Just ask the ESL shoutcasters….

Yeah, I don’t mind the shoutcasters. I think the EU ones do a tremendous job, although Jebro lacks a bit knowledge or just tends to simplyfy which can be misleading.

To be honest, I play power necro in Ranked in what seems to be the top MMR and I don’t even use Lich. Plague Form is hundreds times better and more versatile. Hundreds….

I can also confirm that most damage comes from Life Blasts and Air/Fire combo.

If you want to improve and move closer to the skill cap, use the Wurm.
It may look redundant at times, but it’s the only skill that lets you reset the fight.

As I’ve said before, Kyhlo and Legacy – can’t imagine playing without it. Learn the spots and practice.

If you’re from an EU server I can show you around, just whisper me (Leman) in game.

Plague Signet is an interesting skill, but I rarely see a reason to use it. You’ll see as your MMR increases that Wurm becomes more and more valuable.

incisorr.9502:

-snip-

Hey, incisorr.

You seem to be pretty mad. With your comments, you’re showing your lack of experience. I know that because I sometimes play against you in Ranked matches.

You run some weird GS+CC-weapon build that kills my necro no problem, but do I run to the forums and complain about GS warriors?
Also, even though you can kill me, I am yet to see a match you win against me, think we’re going 4-0 for me. You know why? Because this game is about teamplay and you working with your team instead of complaining that conditions kill you.
It’s not about winning 1v1 while the points tick for your opponent.
It’s not about making conditions bad so that your build (that is btw insanely good vs condis) can stand them.

All I have to say – l2p issue.

Taygus.4571:

100,000? really………………………………………………=.=’
because the game has only been out 2 years and approx 6months
at that time frame..you’d have to be playing an extra 80 hours a day, than a day has………………………………………………

Figure of speech, bro.

tboneking.2531:

@Leman I agree with the hydromancy/energy combo. However (at the level im at at least) I have had a lot of clutch situations where WoD changed the momentum of the whole fight. I also like the combo of the pull into the blind field. As for dagger being more universal than warhorn, I like the utility both of them provide- especially if I keep my chill on blind trait. I am considering switching out staff for axe/ dagger.

The primary rule of the necro club – always take staff. Axe is useless.

Generally, stick to what works for you, what is fun for you to play and see how it goes. But yeah, if you want to stay with the build you’re using (and I assumed writing my post that you would) then stick with it. Hydromancy/Energy is the only change I’d primarily push for if I were to convice you.

Looks okay for a super-entry level.

Few things:

• the effectiveness of Well of Darkness is debatable, even if traited, because of the enormous cooldown. At top play, I’d consider taking CPC + Weakening Shroud (not even joking about CPC, though it’s still bad, I’d probably take it over WoD)
• as mentioned above – get rid of Geomancy – it makes no sense whatsoever. Force is debatable, I much prefer Air/Fire combo in both weapon sets for power necro, but it may be a bit too offensive for a beginner. If you want to go with a somewhat cohesive set of capabilities, consider taking Energy+Hydromancy in both sets. The second sigil will supplement WoD, Spectral Grasp and Dark Path.
• I’d ditch Ogre’s and take Traveler’s. I know you have swiftness, but Traveler’s is a very well-rounded set that works nice with chill duration you are going for.
• Dagger is more universal than warhorn and I’d use it if I played your build, at the same time getting rid of Banshee’s Wail and taking Spectral Attunement or Terror instead.

Ropechef.6192:

When I play my Necromancer.

I find myself in a state of almost god like power.

and utter uselessness

brilliant! +1

Full premade vs full solo.
Ranked. EU.
Blow-out.
16:53-17:02 UTC+1

Justin ODell.9517:

Moobs! You’re killing me here. The forums displays post date in relative time and isn’t accurate enough to be useful. Be kind, post time.

Hey. Are you planning on summarizing your findings?

I really like where engies are at the moment.

I’ve recently palyed with 2 friends who never touched PvP and one of them came to the game after months of inactivity. We were able to cheese win our way through pretty much everything with all the CC, turrets, crates, etc. It was disgusting to say the least.

By disgusting I mean people who suck against this condi, cc and damage overload. I mean it’s not like others can’t outplay that if they’re good since the game’s balanced and engie=any other class. Yes, that’s right. Obviously.

If anything I can confirm that the healing turret has too high of a cooldown which should be lowered with a possible addition of initial condi removal, because Consume Conditions removes all condis so it’s clearly unfair for engies.

Teutos.8620:

Chukree.1756:

Don’t need comments from people who don’t have atleast 10 000 pvp games. Thx.

Screen shot or you don’t have 10k pvp games yourself.

IF you have 10k pvp games, and still have problems with Slickshoes, you are the perfect examples that the number of played games means nothing.

In your case, I’m more than sure. Regardless of how many games you have played.

See? I can use worthless argument against strangers as well.

ArrDee.2573:

Even when the queue pops, the subsequent match is boring because conquest!

Wahoo! Bye frands!

Spot-on, well-argued, concise and funny. Very well done. Are you a prodigy?

Teutos.8620:

Please read the whole thread. It was already confirmed, that the thread generator only THOUGH he had experienced it.

You’re the one who didn’t read the whole thread.

First of all, Justin was talking about a couple of past games, which had happened significantly later than the one’s mentioned in the OP.

Secondly, I linked to screenshots from matches of full solo queue vs a full premade of top EU players.

So no, I don’t think anything like what you’ve said was established. Please if that’s all you have to say, refrain from posting in my thread; you’re derailing it.

I play with 3 friends on regular basis. For the past few they’ve been experiencing substantial lag and dc’s. I was the only one unaffected.
After the last patch, even I started going through periods of everything around porting and my game freezing.
Post hoc ergo propter hoc, I know, but still…

uberkingkong.8041:

-snip-

Who are you again?
Well, whoever you are, I’d be grateful if you read the post I referred to and stopped with your childish kittentalk.

kdaddy.5431:

lol my guess is your not very good, also solo que was a long time ago. It be like players saying i won alot of games when there was paid tourney tickets.

Ha, funny troll. Your response is as far from being factually correct as it gets and about twice that at being worth reading. It literally makes no sense.

World would be a better place if people like you or the second guy put as much effort into writing cohesive posts using proper English as you put into starting fights on the forums without even having read the topic. Quite shameful.

Justin, ignore them and tell me how is it that I have games where I know all the players in the match (the good, balanced ones), the ones where I land on a team of complete noobs (like 2 guys who literally just bought the game), where I can usually kill someone with autos (unenjoyable matches regardless of the outcome, I think I landed at least two of those on Saturday night) and then those from the screenshots from yesterday…

Justin ODell.9517:

All your recent solo games have had players near the same rank as you. Is there a specific game you have in mind?

Hey, thanks for the answer.

Take a look at https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/pvp/Tracking-Thread-Bad-Matches/first#post4755745

<continued>

Putting it all together…

Match highlights:
When a match starts, you should focus mostly on surviving, building LF and putting pressure before you can move to the juicy part.
I like to go over close with whoever caps it to make sure it’s not being pushed by someone (engies and warriors like doing that, and you’re a perfect deterrence).

When you start fighting over mid or close, stick to ledges, place your Wurm in the escape spots and start putting pressure. On average, your favourite targets would be engies, other necros and squishies.
I like to pick targets myself, if you play solo a lot, this is the best thing you can do in the beginning. At this point, there is usually someone already training you hard and this is the crucial moment, because you now have to survive and put pressure waiting to make use of your true strengths. If your team focuses correctly, opportunities for Corrupt Boon and Terror spikes should happen and this is the time where you add your damage interrupting the targets and fearing them to negative hp, i.e. the downed state.

At all times I’ll try to stay at a safe distance to make sure I can avoid as much pressure as possible and not to get gibbed by some crazy spikes or cc-locks.

In practice though, you will find that having a thief and a warrior jumping at you with all their cooldowns forces you to start kiting them around and usually it’s best to stick near to the node so that if things go south you may get rezzed by your team.

As for the duels, I honestly don’t feel comfortable dueling over a node as a necro. I not only find other professions inherently better at fighting over small areas than the condi necro, I also believe that the current meta makes it rather hard for condi necros to perform that already difficult role. I also don’t think that’s where necro can shine the most and thus doing it as necro isn’t optimal.
However, fighting for a node against an engie, another necro, a thief or a ranger I find, on average, to be skill-based, so you may very well go for it. With the others it’s more tricky, but a thing to remember is to avoid celestial eles above everything. Fighting them is a waste of time that will likely result in you getting killed with fire.
If you’re wondering on how to actually fight, I’d say try to force your opponents to dodge and pop their defensive cooldowns. You should bring their health as low as possible (around 50%) and push for a Terror spike. You should also aim at interrupting their heals and maintaining poison and weakness on them. When playing against other condi specs you can try playing with Deathly Swarm and Putrid Mark condi transfers – they can absolutely devastate your opponent.

Some additional advice:

1. I consider Nightmare runes not worth it because you don’t have any control over the proc and it was nerfed lately. Personally, I use Traveler’s and I’m happy with the passive mobility they provide, allowing you to rotate and kite more effectively.
2. similarly to the previous one – I hate Reaper’s Protection and instead have been running Greater Marks for a long time now.
3. I also use Soul Marks instead of Master of Terror to generate LF with my turbo marks – unblockable, with lower cooldowns, generating LF, what’s not to love? I also think that in general it’s easy to lose value on Master of Terror, because good players break stuns and dodge properly so the increased duration may never happen.

As you can see, my build is less focused on damage and more on keeping myself alive and performing careful, timed interrupts and corrupts, so playing on the strengths and offsetting the weaknesses.

I think that’s it for now. It’s quite late here and I still have some learning to do.
Tell me what you think and ask if you have any questions.

Hi, zaragoz.

I could answer your questions one by one, but I think it would be generally better to describe to you exactly what condi necro’s role is, what you’re capable of doing and what you should avoid.

As a condi necromancer your biggest assest are:

1. being relatively durable
2. ranged AoE pressure
3. shutdown & interrupts
4. boon corruption

Your weak spots:

1. close combat & node fighting
2. mobility
3. life force generation
4. downed state pressure

Now, I won’t go through all these, but let me say that with the above in mind you should:

• put pressure from outside nodes – your main role is to survive and wait for an opportunity to use your skillset to add a finishing touch. I’ve found through my experience, that condi necro won’t usually be able to bring a good opponent down by himself in teamfights (not 1v1’s, we’ll come back to that). This is connected to how much condi clease there is in the game and a few other factors.
• push for fights where you have some assistance – you are most effective in small skirmishes – 2v2’s, 3v3’s with your team to support you and with you to support your team.
• interrupt stops/rezzes- this is rarely mentioned and I find it to be a crucial part of the necro gameplay.
• Plague-rezz, -stomp or -bunker

Notice how the above align with your biggest assets.

Let’s move onto the gameplay you should avoid:

• standing on nodes over longer periods of time – if you’re required by the circumstances to stay on a node – something is going wrong and your team is getting either largely outplayed or you and your team are rotating improperly.
• roaming too far from nodes – you should carefully push for objectives where you know you’ll contribute rather than hinder your team. You don’t have the capabilities of thieves to quickly bail out and fix a mistake and it will take you a relatively long time to rotate somewhere else if you happen to be in a wrong spot. I’d say your role should be something in-between a point-holder and a roamer. It’s hard to explain, but well come back to that.
• tanking with life force, unless Last Gasp Spectral Armour pops – you need the DS always ready off cooldown for Doom fear and Tainted Shackles.
• going in for stomps or rezzes, unless you have Plague ready and it’s a clutch moment – if your enemies get rezzed it’s usually someone else’s fault.

Okay, we have some general idea, so we can now think on how to achieve those things at the same time answering your questions.

1. Rotations – don’t think about it this way. The question should be how to be most optimal with your skills. There are skill you can usually fire at will (Mark of Blood, Grasping Dead, scepter auto :> ) and some that can’t be used unless justified (fears, condi transfers, Corrupt Boon and Dark Path, stun breakers).
2. Damage – you won’t be easily seeing damage comparable to some other professions and specs. This is how the build works. Your offense comes through stacking some bleeds and torment as an addition to the damage coming from your teammates, putting poison and weakness wearing down the opponents’ defenses and timed condi bursts with fears and boon corrupts.
3. Life Force generation – as you’ve noticed LF isn’t very abundant in this spec, especially if you’re having a hard time staying alive in some tough matches and even more so after the minion LF stacking nerf. This is where two things meet – using your LF sparingly and generating it at every opportunity. When opening a fight or when on staff you usually should go for landing a couple of staff auto-attacks – it is quite easy after all the buffs the skill received. Don’t expect Feast of Corruption (scepter#3) to give you a sustainable amount of LF, staff is the key here. Also make sure to land some autos on downed players after your team secures a win in a teamfight and consider sticking around to get the death bonus (you won’t get if if you go away too far).

To be continued…

1. 2 premades vs full solo in Ranked Arena.
   The two premades consisted of PvP players of whom I know or recognize everybody.
   My team with 4 players I’ve seen for the first time doing stuff like capping with a downed guy nearby getting rezzed. Obviously an indication of inexperience.
   Match @ ~8:30PM CET (UTC+1) on EU.
2. Edit: another one – 11:30PM CET (UTC+1) on EU. Same circumstances. Full solo team vs full premade oRNG. Ended in blowout.

Justin, I know it’s not your fault and that you were given literally the worst and hardest job at ANet to make something out of this mess, but it is really mind-boggling. Neither solo queuers nor premades enjoy that.

Maylo.5892:

Please welcome to the PvP side of game where players are gonna insult you a lot and you are gonna insult them a lot as well because that is what you will become no matter how hard you try. I realized this right after first time playing against old Car Crash team.

Lol, if that’s not the best example POsSIble, then I don’t know what is.

I’ve been contacted by a third party and informed that my initial assumption was wrong.

There were no transfers of goods or services connected to the publication of the above statement. Not at all.

Hahah, lookZ familiAr. I may kNow that guy.

Maybe…?

Have been playing since betas, used to play top100 soloQ, 6000 PvP games…

What happens? 500 AP (indicating a new player), ‘first time PvP’ players on my teams. They die to Svanir, they triple cap points, they don’t read the chat, they don’t look at the map. Absolutely horrid experience. SoloQ was okay at times, in the current system it would be more than fine.

But no… we have to get this…

Justin, I’m begging you – do something about it. I don’t care about ratings, esports and rewards. I just want to have fun after coming back from uni and the office…

Wurm gives you something that the other utilities like WoP or Spectral Armour don’t – a choice.
What kills necros? Direct damage, condis? Not really. CC is the ultimate necro killer.
That choice to disengage and go back to the fight or rotate somewhere else is the key to the efficient necromancer gameplay.

Also, I can’t imagine playing without Wurm on some maps (Kyhlo, Legacy, Temple). It just gives you so much compared to the other ones.

Targuil.3741:

Orders.

[characters]

This.

Luke.4562:

SigNET of Vampirism II

Because being trolled once isn’t enough.

This also, lol.

This topic contains garbage responses from uninformed people.

Anet hired an AI dev in April last year to consult on AI. There was never a statement that would go into details of that arrangement.

Never touch condis.

This topic is troll and should be deleted.

Literally some WvW guys talking about sPvP. You’re getting a new borderland, dude. Leave our game mode alone and stop complaining before you’ve even heard a single word about it.

^ The above list is absolute kitten… and it’s dated.
Don’t base your decisions on it and just play whatever you feel like playing.