ZeftheWicked.3076

Quite a lot happened. Things i would point out:

1. Runes overhaul - some got major changes, some were left alone, generally now fewer runesets are boring trash.

2. Legendary armors - you can make them now, be it via spvp, wvw or raids. Benefit of lege armor is free stat swapping and ability to remove old runes without destroying them (they are returned to you inventory).

3. Path of Fire xpac landed with it's specs and mounts.

4. if pink is your religion - legendary accessories can now be made too. If not, nothing to see, move along.

5. Several professions had some updates to their skillset.

Quite a few ppl voiced my opinion here. Price and no auras are just fine. It's the horrific UX that's making us scream. I could design better myself.

Wait i take that back. **I already designed better one**, when not being able to enjoy my bath in peace, thinking how cumbersome and overbloated the current "solution" is.

I doubt they would dare. Guild Wars 2 is one (and NcSoft's only) representative among MMORPG "four titans" (FF XIV, WoW, ESO, GW2). If this was GW1, which did not have the cult following nor brand awareness comparable with Elder Scrolls, Final Fantasy and Warcraft brands, then yea, they might be thinking about giving it the axe.

But at this Moment Guild Wars brand awareness is global thanks to this game, and even if not most profitable, axing it could have catastrophic consequences in terms of player trust and getting ppl to commit to any other huge project they may try to launch. Even by value of being a starting platform for Guild Wars 3, the game is well worth to keep around and not piss it's playerbase off.

> @"Crab Fear.1624" said:

> Yeah, Marine Corps billboards randomly all over Tyria will probably improve the aesthetics of the game.

I don't wanna say nuthin', but if you go to a certain "fortified spot" in Jahai bluffs, near cliffside ... oops gotta go, they're on to me!

Short and sweet: 2 stacks on foot, but stunbreak gets moved to grandmaster minor.

Stab has risks - getting corrupted, getting stolen. Stunbreak is always safe. Now basic degree of anti cc is always present (stunbreak on minor), while bigger package is an option (Foot).

That being said, that solution is a bandaid fix - it would armtwist players more into Soul Reaping. True solution involves anti cc tools (not necessairly stab) being placed in other places, so Soul Reaping becomes an option, and not a necessity.

Death magic is one such good place to start. Few anti cc options i would envision there:

- minions taking cc for you like ranger pet with shared anguish. Each minion type would have separate cooldown for this.

- Passive hard cc duration reduction. Something silimiar to Rune of Melandru. Fits passive defense thematic of the spec.

- Unholy Sanctuary granting stab stacks when you exit shroud (opposed to Foot that gives them on entry). Good combo with beyond the veil.

**Necro and Rev** should be on top of your list. Healing, power, condi..**blah blah blah** - they got it. So do others. No shockers here.

What you really wanna focus on are things that are needed in fractals badly, but come in short supply. And these badboys come prepared:

**1. Revenant.** - imho the most verstatile guy out there. Here are few things he brings to the table where others might struggle:

- tons of high uptime, low cost projectile hate. "We bleed fire" instability up? You'll be glad you chose rev!

- party resistance. Siren's Reef says hi. It's costly, it's simple, it's just one skill..but it works.

- boon corrupt. "No pain no gain" fractals are gonna be horrid without boon hate. Banish enchantment has you covered there

**2. Necromancer.** - making your party that much more beefy in life or in death..plus obvious boon hate.

- nr 1 boon hate profession hands down

- no one serves big, fat, party approved barriers but the necro

- There's necro ressing with transfusion...and then there's attempts at ressing by everyone else.

- quite often is the last man standing due to natural tankyness...and then look point above this one.

> @"Vagrant.7206" said:

> Except the new shroud/shades add some MASSIVE bonuses to core necro. F-gyro has always had extremely limited utility. Why does the f-gyro require a more significant tradeoff for what is actually worse than the core skill?

That's a problem of core necro being really bad, those "MASSIVE bonuses" just put necro elites in line with other elites, not above them. Once we go back to core, necro is sorely behind the rest of the pack, least PvE wise.

Rest assured a lot of necros would gladly accept elite nerfs, if core was properly buffed making them alternate playstyle and not must haves to catch up with the rest of the world.

> @"Kuulpb.5412" said:

> as a necromancer main I can safely say scrapper gyro taking f5 is not "a replacement" that works, the gyro system becoming wells was bad enough, and now they lose their mechanic in exchange for what is effectively a bad warbanner ( warrior elite) smaller range, no boons, warbanner can't be destroyed, if it's replacing the possibility of huge CC, then it should be something that works, but you have to basically stand on top of the target to cast this, so why not just res them anyway?

Warbanners didn't stomp downed ppl. That for starters was the biggest issue with function gyro. Not to mention function gyro did not need 180s to be used again. You're comparing an elite skill that is made to have huge impact, has huge cooldown and requires an elite slot, to a free utility, that costed nothing save equipping scrapper traitline.

Now actual cost (F5 slot) has been introduced. As for how effective this new gyro is - that is up for debate, but the old one was pretty disgusting to say the least. Paired with nigh unkillable, cc heavy scrapper it meant guaranteed stomps or resses. Hell even without those scrapper has ways to seal the deal, like stealthing a downed ally, then ressing them. Or the elixir R. or...let's just say that ressing and stomping are pretty powerful on engi. And if most engies don't take advantage...that's not my problem.

Signet of Undeath without signets of suffering is gonna be a very fringe use case. Once you use the active you will have to wait a loooong time for next use. Without the passive. Even with passive up, it'll not work in shroud.

It is one way to bring ress utility without blood magic, but you better be sure someone dies there (grab and push them into sure death red circle, lol) else you're shooting your own foot there;p

If traited with signets of suffering...then it's utility goes up hard....hard enough to slot it? Don't know myself.

New shroud/shades replace old one.

F-Gyro did not make toolbelt dissapear.

It was not a replacement but an add-on. Making it take up elite slot is an actual trade-off and some justice to core engi.

Here's my little fun condi build for core necro harder PvE:

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?vRAQNBLhZakkG6pxWbw6G4vxhxQRDioYImH9CkDxfOAOAA-jBSAQBPU9Hrt/AAeAAfU53/0HITlgh4QAItzAAA-e

#Pros:

Great sustain, despite being condi (amazing heals, strong anti-condi, reasonable life force generation, some protection)

Fun, fun FUN!

Respectable condi damage (for a core build)

Easy to change to your tastes (no problems going terror build with this, getting more anti condi, or more cc)

#Cons:

Expensive (trailblazer + rune of tormenting costs)

#How it works:

Generally you do what any condi necro would do -stack condies! But here you reap massive payoffs in self healing when you do!

Blood Bond will heal you for huge amount of health every 20s or so, as long as you put a 4th stack (or more) of bleed on something.

But the real star of the show is Rune of Tormenting - each single stack of torment you apply will heal your for a small amount, except if you play it right (5 condies target + devouring darkness + other mobs nearby) that small amount will jump up to even 5k heal each 10s.

What's that? You want more?

No problem - how about 6k from tainted shackles? Go into shroud, tether yourself to victi....targets, then pop out and the remaining 3 pulses of shackes will heal you!

Plaguelands...well....if it has torment and bleeds (hint: it has, a lot!), you're getting your rear healed again.

And what is that blood is power doing there you ask? Well...whatever you want it to!

Cast it (it'll still heal you, cause rune of...you know the drill), then use staff to transfer condies to enemy - why waste a good condi?

Not too impressed? Then cast well of power before BiP and watch your torment get converted to might! Then anotehr BiP cast, more might...and might from well of power...and might from BiP itself...yeah it's a "powerful" combo.

Or you can just slot consume conditions and eat it! your call!

Or unholy martyr to fuel your lf bar....

You have options, you pick!

Other then that you get protection from your well of Blood and well of power (given you won't forget that you even have a healing skill with this build) and spectral grasp is there to round up your medici...enemies for those juicy 5 target torment casts. Feel free to change it to epidemic if you feel the latter is more needed, but be warned epi bounces will not trigger rune of Tormenting's healin.

Other then that same old - good cc (warhorn 4, shroud 3 fear and shroud 2 chill, staff chill and fear), long lasting condies and general aoe condi havoc and mayhem.

_**You're welcome!**_

I say good job a-net. Sorry but i was quite often on the receiving end of scrapper as a necro and let's make some things clear:

1. old gyro + scrapper = guaranteed stomp. There was no defense.

2. F5 moa was disgusting. I pop lich or other transform, it gets shut down by toolbelt skill...

3. being able to ress/stomp without putting your neck on the line or burning a crucial skill is a big deal

Maybe some fine tuning is needed here and there, but i say good riddance to f-gyro and F5 moa on scrappers.

For raids snowcrows.com is the website to go to.

Good news for you - among all necro variants reaper has highest raid dps - 31k if going full damage power. Which is sufficient to enter a raid and not be called dead weight.

I don't think condi breaks the 30k dps barrier so, hard to say there. The power wariant still uses minions, so no loss there if that's your preference. Blood Fiend, Shadow Fiend and Flesh Golem all get a slot.

Now I don't do raids myself cause i hate elitists and their demanding attitude (got my lege armor from pvp where i impaled elitists and their expectations:3), but from Fractal T4 experience i can tell you that far more important then 31k dps is for your team to stay on their legs. That is to say, that when i saw my run go to shit, i would make some sacrifices to boost team sustain (Signet of Vampirism + Singets of Suffering, Blood Magic with Transfusion and Ritual of Life) leading to cleared fractal intead of top dps team dying over and over at first boss.

In raid that should be healer's job, but there's a difference between "should" and "what you got", and if everyone is full glass, then necro will by default will be the last guy standing and able to act on it if he builds for it.

Ofc i can't speak with full authority, as i'm not a raid guru, and raids are a mode i despise because if how ppl are "meta or gtfo" while i'm the guy who has no qualms about making varied builds for varied purposes.

Depends on the minions used. Blood Fiend and Flesh Golem don't need Death Magic so badly. In competitive flesh wurm is first and foremost an escape tool, not a damage dealer, so also often no Death Magic there.

So that's like 3/5 slots that can be minions are are not in dire need of death magic.

Don't throw that necro into the gutter so soon. Last time i checked when it comes to raids at least, the necro you want/need is Reaper, not scourge. And he's tons of fun. I personally hate scourge with a vengeance, to the point i would only use it to save team from hopeless situations (like siren's reef T4). Other then that i spent most time on core necro and can pop reaper, both for some amazing good time.

I experiment a lot with necro builds (and it's fun af) so if something on necro is going south for you - ask away! I may have a solution for you.

**Condi itself is not the problem** it's how it's applied by most professions. See necro condi - that's how it was supposed to work. Slowly applying conditions for mounting pressure. Not burst ppl with 20 stacks of torment, 12 of confusion and whatever else that condi mesmers do.

To further this travesty, let's not forget that condi necro is still a necro - he has to fight to survive every second as he tries to build damage. Meanwhile said mesmers have access to invulnies, stealth, clones, phantasm and reliable escapes when things go south, while having insane burst.

I would strongly suggest you buy HoT. There is a wealth of content is HoT exclusive and you will want/need it.

- HoT specializations. PoF has it's own set, but lack of things like Reaper, Chornomancer, Herald etc can hurt.

- Gear stat combos. HoT introduced **a lot** more gear stat sets then PoF and some of them are very crucial (Viper, Trailblazer) or fun (Crusader, Wanderer)

- Gilder - don't miss out on the fun, especially in HoT zones that are glider oriented.

- Tons of weapon skins and collections. This is the fabled HoT replay value and it holds to this day.

- Living Story 3 maps - the legendary Draconic Mons inside (spider-man map).

- mindblowing core maps - getting lost in beginning may suck...but their beauty and depth are amazing once you get a handle on things.

Minions are there as a playstyle and if he wants to use it he is free to do so. Also while they most certainly can be used in a braindead way, they can also involve certain level of management (active skills, healing and protecting them vs letting them die) to get better results.

Now pardon me, i got me a core necro build for xpac content to test out :3

**weapons** - no. Least not as they are. Imagine a core necro with it's "abundant" access to stability running around with a greatsword. New necro players would flood the forums and reddit with rage, asking what is this shit. And for a good reason. Reaper can use gs because rest of his kit is tailored to support that playstyle, unlike core and scourge.

**4th traitline** - hell no. It would kill choice and build diversity. 3 lines is perfect. Any less and your character would do too little and feel boring and limited. Any more and you'd be able to do everything at same time without any consequences. Like building full dps and still getting a defense line for sick sustain.

Huge part of fun in GW2 combat is that you have to make choices and accept some trade-offs. That way you have your own, relatively unique role in which your character shines while some weaknesses you have to play around with your own skill and other systems (like runes, gear stats, foods, pre-made party member etc).

@"Daddicus.6128" said:

> Also, I despise meta builds with an utter burning passion. That stance hurts me in WvW, but I don't care. "Meta" means "don't think for yourself." blech!

> However, none of those are relevant to the questions: is there a reason, or is it a bug?

I fucking love you.

As for minion issue - i think the core reason for this has to do with utility swaps - swap out a minion utility when its summoned - it dies. I guess majority of these situation are categorized by the game as a utility swap in one way or another. Could be that simply shroud is also such case, but due to it being obvious it was secured to not do that. While these cases are yet uncaught rogue "util swaps".

Sure thing. Now i on the other hand will assume you're core nec. So here's a few hints to get you started real nice:

- **blood bond** (blood magic adept trait) is a huge sustain tool on condi necro - basically a 2nd healing skill on 20s cd with passive activation

- **Spite** can also provide nice sustain + might generation. Signets of suffering + signet of vampirism and locust heal tons of hp.

- **Curses** are an obvious must, but don't be blind to power side of things! Viper crit chance sucks, but with furious demise + target the weak your shroud life blasts are no joke.

- **Soul Reaping** is awesome for viper gear users. Death Perception to make life blast do hard power damage, dhuumfire if you want bit extra condi damage, foot in the grave for anti-cc. Fear of death will provide you with nice and fast life force generation from shroud 3 and staff 5, not to mention extending these fears to 2s. Soul marks for further life force generation.

- **Death Magic** - great for minion builds, synergizes nicely with blood magic (minion lifesteal, can heal minions with transfusion). Also provides nice protection uptime for nearly no investment (beyond the veil). If you need to pump damage, death nova is great (and aoe weakness when you detonate a bone minion). Other then that corrupter's fervor can net you you over 500 tougness when shrouded due to all free tougness in this traitline.

Tbh there is a **lot** of ways to build a condi necro, more then power i believe, which makes sense given necro is the master of conditions by design. Condi necros mostly suffer from low damage rampup and low sustain. Above i given you hints for sustain issues:)

As for damage - plaguelands is absolutely great, epidemic makes mob clears a breeze. Blood is Power is nice for might but also very **very** long lasting bleed stacks on enemy - great for epidemic bounces. But most of all i would say, that unless you're going heavily into poison, **don't underestimate your torment**. Traited scepter 3 + tainted shackcles + plaguelands + epidemic, can put a lot of it and it is by far your strongest condi. Just keep them walking (be it with fear or kiting) and it'll quickly do massive damage.

My ideas for them:

**Spite active** - gain 300 ferocity and 100% crit chance for 6 seconds . Cooldown: 30s.

Signet of spite is about aggressive use. Giving necro crit chance and ferocity is a great boon for non crit-capped builds (encouraging build diversity with low/no precision gear), while not breaking raw dps ones (no passive power boost when it's on cd, and if you take Sinets of Suffering you lose close to Death raw damage bonus).

**Plague passive** - transfer one/two (SoS traited) conditions with your next attack every 6 seconds.

**Plague active** - pull 5 conditions off nearby allies (up to 5 allies) and reduce condition damage taken for next 6 seconds by 50%. 30s cd.

The current passive sucks - it does too little (2 random conditions of one random ally at best) to be a real help to allies, while enough to annoy the hell out of yourself (happy times grabbing all those chills and cripples when you were trying to get somewhere, preferably in out of combat mode).

Being able to passively (and aggresively) condi cleanse oneself sounds much better to me. While this may raise issue of "necro condi cleanse op" let's not forget that utility slots are extremely contensted for necro in competitive, and plague signet is hardly a top contenter. The skill needs to be strong to be no pair with other necro top picks like spectral armor, CPC, Spectral Ring, Flesh Wurm, Well of Power and the like.

Other games: xpacs.

GW2: LS 5.

Since it was both said LS5 will heave xpac like content and other games dropped their literal xpac content, A-net does need to tout the horn and let the world know very clearly what's coming with Season 5 and how cool it'll be, least people really do start thinking the project got abandoned!

I'm a long time necro main so i'll adress things on necrotic end of things:

1. **Builds - necro absolutely rocks in this department.** Can basically use any and all gear stats and make it work, can use almost all traitlines for a given purpose no matter what it is, no must have utility skills or elites, yet plenty of good ones for a given situation.

2. **Simple with strong solo and good supp.** Nothing comes close to necros aoe + sustain combo in open world. Unlike others necro does not compomise - amazing AoE with powerful sustain are the norm here. Mass ressurection is more then enough support in open world, especially in xpac content where ppl love to die.

3. **Spellcaster with melee options.** Power necro is mostly melee (save axe). Condi necro is the caster side. And shroud/spec is where you decide which you want more of - core/scourge for spellcaster feel, reaper for melee onslaught.

My vote goes to necro - mobility may be shite, but if it's 25% movement speed, necro has it (be it signet of locust or quickening thirst in blood magic).

If it's jumping puzzles, necro takes the first spot due to spectral walk - you can lieterally undo botched jumps every 40s. other profession's leaps may at best lead to one, not get you out of it.

On combat side of things - the damage is there - gs is the heaviest hitter for constant power dps (axe has better burst, but weak aa between). As for sticing to targets - you have necrocopter (reaper shroud #2) as well as the gs skill 5 to pull enemies to you (along with chilling them). Yet when it comes to crazy evades and leaps - nope, not here. That's primary warrior's and ranger's shtick.

I saw a thief run past me one time. He had Chuka and Chumpawat. My heart sung knowing he won't be polluting my airspace with unicorns but shoot manly tigers instead!

Considering the cost of legendary, that really shows he cared!

**Warning! This threat is actually serious**

#Preface

If you say nothing, no one will hear you, or worse they'll hear what they want to hear. So here i am making a real, non-sarcastic theme about why i <3 necro. So the devs can read it and understand what I (and other fellow necros who post below) value and appreciate in our profession. Hopefully to not take wrong turns with it in the future.

#So why do I love necro?

**1. The theme & feels.** Tastes are a personal matter, but the necro community and the amount of vocal players it has say it clearly - the necro nailed it on the head for many when it comes to it's overall thematic (death/curse/condition mage) and it's execution. The color scheme is awesome (black + green + tints of red), the skills are oozing with vile, accursed and undead thematic, and everything he does feels necrotic to the bone (which will soon be revived to serve it's new master!)

**2. Uniqueness.** One of the last things you'd associate with a profession played by hordes of players is uniqueness...but that's exactly the word to describe the necro. On every step he differentiates himself from the rest of the pack. How many have aceess to boon corrupts? How many have half the condition manipulation capability that he has? How many sustain via life steal and swapping two healthbars? How many have fears that make your foes flee in terror and trait to capitalize on that?

While other classes have their strengths, they are still too similar to one another. Almost every one of them has a block. Almost every one of them has evade frames. Almost all can boon bomb their party or condi bomb their enemy. Every one of them can cleanse condies, But in general **if feels the same**. Buff up, pop "wonder defense", burst.

Is there any single class that can manipulate boons like necro can condies? Maybe mesmer but even that is not close to depth of necro's capability with condies. What is their cc again? Dazes, stuns, knockbacks, pulls, launches...all have that. Nothing unique there. If feels like they all stand on one side, and necro on the other, getting nearly none of theirs, but them getting nearly none of his.

Now i will give revanants props - that is one class that does feel as unique as a necro in it's own field. It's also closest to overlapping with necro's condi manipulation depth, but necro was first. In that area Rev is a follower, not a precursor.

**3. Builds**. Necromancer has extremely wide array of possible viable builds and gear setups. He is not pigenholed to one gear type or one build type to be relevant. This is a result of 3 aspects of necro's gameplay coming together:

* very balanced and interesting traitlines - necro traitlines are amazing work of balance (save slightly weaker Death Magic). Almost every line fits into any scenario, promoting huge build variety. Curses? Can work great with power builds (extra crit, weakness on crit, condi cleansing and boon corrupt) Blood Magic? Huge sustain for both power and condi, can add some power dps (vampiric presence) Spite? Can be used a healing/sustain line with signets of suffering (huge sustain from signet of vampirism and locust). Hardly ever is a line "Meh, useless in my case" when you build.

* no godmode defenses. Necro's defenses are like swiss knife - he has tons of them, but each is situational and right for certain scenarios. This means variety in your utility bar and synergy between utilities and traits (so one covers the aspects other is not dealing with).

* Excellent synergy with gear. Due to above, and necro's profile as attrition fighter, stats from gear actually matter on the defensive end. Top that off with tons of free stats he can get from traits, and it's not another "equip berserker gear and rest is done with utility skills" profession. Necro can reliably use almost any gear set there is, and it'll work and provide him with actual benefits.

**4. The missing RPG experience** - almost every other profession feels like action game - planning and experimenting be damned. Just slab meta gear, this and that and press the panic button at the right time. With necro i feel the strongest that my stats actually matter, my gear choices are my own, and 50% of the victory is done away from fighthing where i pick and choose things for my build, rather then focusing just on piano play in actual combat.

#My fears for the future

Obviously necro has issues. In spvp you focus necro first becuase he is the only one that can't pop a wonder defense and flush all your party's burst down the toilet. Core is underperforming, obviously, and scourge is either OP or nerfed to ground (10s nefarious favor, eeesh). That being said, my biggest fear for necro is trying to make him like the rest. He has proven to be a counter profession, someone who counters their kits that he himself does not have. And that's how i hope it'll be developed - giving him defenses and mobility unique to himself (just pls not that broken ass dark path that misses anything, anywhere anytime) that can counter the current cheap dogpile tactics when used correctly.