Question about necros with shield

Hey

I keep seeing necros with a shield and sword/shield and wondering why they have got these as it seems pretty pointless to me.

Thanks

It's likely a requirement the build they are using, for the 20% longer lasting enchantments and such.

Caster sword: +5 energy +20% enchants
Shield: 16 AR, even if you don't meet the req you still get +8 AR. With a -5/20% and +30hp that's pretty good protection.

Tai, that's...quite wrong...

Sword for +5E / -5E (Hiding energy) and +30hp, Shield for +10AL vs *type* and +30hp.

well, its pretty pointless to be having ur +60health set out at all times...
so it is possible that it is an enchant sword...

in fact its pretty pointless to be holdin a shield at all unless ur bein attacked

im thinkin teh most typical reason is vanity

where exactly r u seein these necs?
pve? pvp? obs mode?

i see a lot of pve'rs showin off their high-end pve equips in ra
which is kinda ironic, cuz most of teh time they suk at pvp

No sneak, its not vanity. A shield with the right +10 armor mod provides ~23% damage reduction. I would't call that vanity. I'd call that functionality.
Since weapon swapping isn't instantenous (it takes time for the game to register that you have done it) it is very difficult to time weapon swaping like that. Against pressure builds, swapping out of an armor set all the time defeats the point of having one, and agaisnt a spike build swapping won't happen fast enough.

In addition to what others have said, soul reaping allows the necro to sacrifice some energy pool for +8 armor.

yeah some times you might see n/w whit shield/sword,axe
mostly because of the above post's
or ursan

Ok, you caught me, I use a focus 0.o

yes...i kno teh functionality of shields...
but since teh op has provided little information of where hes seen em

its highly likely that teh ppl r in fact showing them for vanity
situations where u actually have lots of time to look at other ppl and their equips

btw...weapon swapping isnt seriously hard...
in pvp...u have time to see wars coming at u
and u have time to see if their holding an axe or a hammer

that is of course...unless u have no battlefield awareness at all...


btw...ur sayin weapon swapping is bad...
but u recommend al+10 shield sets (as do i)
yet ur forggetin to realize that al+10 shield sets promote weapon swapping
(switchin to al+10 vs slashing, al+10vs blunt..etc...etc)

I'm not saying weapon swapping is bad. I'm saying staying in with a wand/offhand as a "default" set and switching to a shield is bad. It should be the other way around. Keeping a shield up as a default protects against unexpected spikes, rangers, ele damage, and hides extra energy from e-denial mesmer.

And it is highly likely he is seeing this in PvP... most likely RA or AB. And... even if somebody IS showing off a weapon for vanity... that doesn't change the fact that it is also functional.

Certain builds allow you to place +7/8/9 in tactics giving you the full benefit of the shield armour (Ursan being an obvious one).

Regardless: even if you don't spend those points you get +8 armour plus modifier effects, it's hardly pointless.

I don't think I've ever seen someone weapon swap in RA or AB (not counting myself).

+5 armor weapon, +8 armor (16 if meeting req) shield with +10 vs damage type

Thats a minimum +13 (21% reduction) armor vs all attacks, or +23 (33% reduction) armor if you have the damage type right. Taking a third less damage just because you swapped weapons? It's a good trade.

In PvP, all characters should have all available +armor shields and swap them based on what they think the enemy will be using when they first see them.

In PvE, just take +vs fire, slashing and blunt, as those are the most common and deadly forms of damage.

edit: Fixed my borked numbers

Lol

-5/20% is among the least optimal mods for a shield there are. If you can do the math, -5/20% is basically -1 dmg/hit. Wow. You'll find as you move onto "high-level" PvP that +10AL mods will, literally, save your life. Making 1-5 sin combos do 200 dmg instead of 300 helps a lot when you're in a tight situation.

And Tylas is right, decent casters have at least 4 sets, a defensive set, a casting set, a high set, and an alternative casting set. The necros you see are just in their defensive set, probably with a +30 mod (20% enchant mods are pratically useless if you wep swap before you cast an enchant) w/ either a +5/-5 energy mod and a shield w/ a +30 mod and a +10AL vs X (vs. Slashing is optimal because, well, slashing is probably the most common damage type there is with all the sins and Crippling Slash wars skipping out there).

Your first statement is correct, but your example is wrong. Sin combo's are 95% armor ignoring damage, so you would see the least effect with them. You see the most effect vs things like ele nukes (100% armor affected), or dervishes and warriors (all auto attack damage is armor affected). +damage skills are all armor ignoring.

Also, Taisayacho was already corrected and posted saying "thanks for the correction." No need to post again with the same information going "LOL" (with some incorrect statemnts thrown in).

The % reduction seems wrong, since +24 armor is 33% reduction, and +40 armor is 50% reduction...

What the damage reduction is percentage wise is also variable on what the base armor of the profession we are talking about is.

The percent reduction is how much less damage you would have taken than if you didn't have the armor bonus. It doesn't matter what your original or base armor is, you're taking that much less damage so long as you have that boost.

For example, +48 armor (two hits of +24, if armor stacking was still allowed) reduces your damage by 55.5% (4/9ths), vs +40 armors' 50%.