sabway really worth it?

hoovehand

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: Jan 2009

i keep reading about sabway... i find it hard to believe that it's really that good.

i can understand the importance of a necromancer in a group, specifically a minion master - my current hero setup is a jagged bones minion bomber (with the bonus of putrid bile and putrid explosion). but i don't believe that a curses necro and a healer necro are better suited than other primary prof.

a curses necro is a great tool to combat tougher mobs, reckless haste + spiteful spirit + enfeebling blood. but in such areas you can tweak your minion master to accomodate the essential curses - or do you honestly want to max out curses for the sole purpose of increasing SS dps?


obviously it's a soul reaping gimmick build. but is it really worth it? atm i use elementalist/mesmer heroes with searing flames, interrupts and enchantment removal. the pair of healer/protector henchies do the healing job, but i'm sure a healers boon monk would trump a necro healer... works fine.

concrete pete

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Apr 2008

MoG - Mercenaries of Grenth

A/E

sabway is a versatile setup that requires pretty much minimal effort
the whole point of necros is the near unlimited energy the receive
imo sabway rocks for general pve but discord way works better in some cases.
this is my opinion tho cause i dont mind pressing 123 kill lol.

FengShuiDove

FengShuiDove

Forge Runner

Join Date: Sep 2007

Trinity of the Ascended [ToA]

A/

Yes. It is 100% worth it. Straight to the point.

This build, with slight variations tossed in by the user for their personal bar and occasionally their heroes' bars can do near anything in the game with ease.

My suggestion: Try it. Then come back and let us know what happens.

fireflyry

fireflyry

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

New Zealand

A/D

Ummmm...seriously read and educate yourself more before you come to Guru and try to debate the worth of a default good hero build.

Sabway is win for a reason.

Your inability to comprehend that has little to do with the build and more to do with your inexperience.

The fact you use interrupts in PvE really says enough.

Sorry and good luck.

Edit:Out of interest...are you playing HM?

Anime Divine

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Nov 2007

W/

yes sab en discord are better.
sab used for anything discord for the harder areas when you want single targets to explode really fast. think of this call targets 6 discords available = instant death.

Lusciious

Lusciious

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Jan 2009

I'm from Singapore but i live in Shanghai ATM

Order of [Thay]

N/

the point of sabway is that you dont have to micro your heros . thats why everyone uses it . whereas for example GoLE HB, you might need to micro the hero so it uses party heal and GoLE instead of just spamming party heal without GoLE

Parson Brown

Parson Brown

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Apr 2006

In ur base...

The one true [Hope]

E/

It really is THAT good in 90% of areas.

It works because of the limitless energy. The bomber has an endless supply of minions. The curse Necro keeps the AoE flowing (you forgot to mention Barbs and Mark of Pain, which synchs nicely with the minion physical damage) and the N/Rt healer can't run out of energy and can spam Spirit Light for big heals all day.

Of course other things work, but this is pure win.

Pocketmancer

Pocketmancer

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: May 2005

Sabway is great because in hard mode, you can run into a group of enemies, alt + tab and look at ESPN for 3 or so minutes, alt + tab back, and have the enemies dead while you're still standing.

Eragon Zarroc

Eragon Zarroc

Atra estern?? ono thelduin

Join Date: Jan 2008

Madness Incarnate

[Duo]

W/P

minions provide alternate targets to subvert dmg from main group, they cause bleeding, explode for dmg, and cause poison on explosion. Curse necro provides aoe dmg and weakens targets to reduce dmg taken. Nec healer can spam skills because of soul reaping energy management and has excellent party wide heals with it's spirit and object drop. all this can be maintained during extended battle and allows u to traverse from one mob to another without having to wait for energy regen because of soul reaping on all necs. Discordway is similar but with just Discord as all the elites and slight skill variations so that there are always hexes and conditions. 5 energy armor ignoring attack with small recharge ftw? i think so when there are 6 necros among 2 real people.

CronkTheImpaler

CronkTheImpaler

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Apr 2006

midwest

AE

W/Me

i think all the above posts pretty much cover the usefulness of SabWay. reading the OP shows you havent even tried Sabway. If you havent tried it then you dont have a leg to stand on. SabWay is without a doubt one of the best hero builds out there. The synergy is flawless IMO.

Cronk

gw_poster

gw_poster

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Jan 2007

so cal

R/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Pocketmancer View Post
Sabway is great because in hard mode, you can run into a group of enemies, alt + tab and look at ESPN for 3 or so minutes, alt + tab back, and have the enemies dead while you're still standing. So true...engage a mob, help take out a healer or two, walk away and make a pb&j sandwich, come back and pick up the loot...

The 21 titles I have atm I can directly attribute to the use of Sabway I h/h 98% of the time and have used Sabway almost exclusively. I can only think of a couple of times that I've actually sub'ed Zed for the MM (where MM is not needed), or have had to switch up the bar (inserted extinguish on the MM bar for a fire imp area in Talmark Wilderness)...otherwise I've never had to change bars and/or micro them (except I have rez turned off for MoW ).

Are there other, more efficient hero setups (i.e. discord, etc.)? probably. And yes, standard sabway has some downsides, but very little, as in hex-heavy areas in my experience...but point is, sabway can handle basically anything PvE has to offer with little or no user participation. I've never bothered tweaking the builds to maximize efficiency because they do the job just fine. That ought to be enough to persuade you to use them, but the only way to really find out is to see for yourself. Just be sure you compliment sabway with your bar and the appropriate henchmen for the area (assuming your h/h'ing). If you are a necro or rit, then your bar can sub for a sabway bar, but frankly the heros would probably sync better...

anyway, gl

Spiritz

Forge Runner

Join Date: Apr 2007

DMFC

To understand sabway stop looking at the team seperatly - you need to see how they work in unison.Each necro has a key role to aid the others ( and you ).
Your ele/mes heros would struggle in a lot of places specially with aoe scatter - sabway hasnt really anything to cause scatter.
Also if on sabway you switch jagged bones for aol its a lot easier.
I run sabway with a few mods - i have 2 aol mm`s and 1 ss necro and this ensures that after a few mins i have an army to pulverise any foes stupid enough not to run away.
Also in a 4 man zone sabway team is great - your stuck with a 4 man team ( eles and mes ) where again us sabway users would have in a few mins of fighting say 10 man team ( including minions ).
Both sabway and discordway are adaptable and can be switched to cover almost any map on gw.
Personally ive done factions/eotn and prophs using sabway and i was a/d fighter and i seriously enjoyed it - no having to micro heros as they got on with the job.
n/rt healers have a slight advantage over monk healers - serious amounts of energy gain , we all know monks can heal more but also can run out of energy fast and then team struggles.
Ive also noticed that somehow monks will try and heal minions wasting nrg where n/rt wont waste healing minions.

Like majority here have said - either try sabway yourself or find someone who uses it and ask to tag along and see it in action.
IF sabway didnt work it would have been forgotten by now and unused within gw but your stated urself you keep reading about it - that means it must work.
(All us sabway users shud mob up an teach the disbelievers a lesson :P)

enter_the_zone

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Nov 2007

R/

sabway, combined with BHA for Dazed= pretty much permainterrupt on any boss. That's FTW vs ele and monk bosses in HM.

PS, it's not a gimmick, it's called synergy...

Wyndy

Wyndy

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Nov 2008

in the know

Chronic Chaos

N/Me

Once I put Sabway together, I never looked back. I have been vanqing and carting and watching the maxed titles mount.

I will say that it is a mindless setup. I know a get a little sleepy sometimes because it can be so BORING!

I am all for someone coming up with more exciting ways to put a team together, but if you just want to mow down all foes, go with sabway, FTW!

Wyndy

Wyndy

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Nov 2008

in the know

Chronic Chaos

N/Me

Once I put Sabway together, I never looked back. I have been vanqing and carting and watching the maxed titles mount.

I will say that it is a mindless setup. I know a get a little sleepy sometimes because it can be so BORING!

I am all for someone coming up with more exciting ways to put a team together, but if you just want to mow down all foes, go with sabway, FTW!

hoovehand

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: Jan 2009

i can't think of many areas in pve where energy was an issue...

most of the fun in pve comes from trying different builds, so i'm definately going to try it.

i'll admit my initial thought about the sabway was that it was just a simple build template which became like the bible for noobs.

i'd seen lots of people talk about using sabway, but never actually read about the general performance. i was interested to read your replies.

Super Igor

Banned

Join Date: Mar 2008

why should you kno? Oo

A/W

lol @ Healer's Boon trumping N/Rt healer Healer's Boon is terrible with heroes.

Put it this way: N/Rt - infinite energy can spam heals all day long. SS - combine with increased attack speed of mobs on hard mode + defense it provesfrom reckless and enfeebling.

SF eles are absolutely horrible for hard mode as they deal no damage.

But honestly Sab's loses out to Discord atm, alot.

marmar256

marmar256

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Nov 2008

Australia

W/

I have been trying alot of different hero setups (on RoJ way atm) and i believe that sabway and discord way are the best that i have tried so far. They are the easiest for lazy people to go AFK and also like everyone else has said the infinite energy is an added bonus.

Pocketmancer

Pocketmancer

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: May 2005

The only places I've had troubles with Sabway are in the desolation for Nightfall. However, that's because those places make you jump inside a wurm and having them die several times (and wrack up the DP) before the Necros get a chance to use a real skill bar.

Improvavel

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Apr 2007

Heroes are dumb. Dumb heroes with infinite energy>>>>dumb heroes with finite energy.

Paragon and Rangers are also quite good heroes, but they are frail like every physical to hexes/conditions and henchies don't pack much in that way.

Omgopolis

Academy Page

Join Date: May 2007

W/

Sabway is pretty awesome. The last few vanquishes I did were with the discord variant, but before that I used the standard restore-mm-curser, each with a copy of splinter weapon. Splinter weapon x3 is pretty sexy.

pingu666

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jul 2006

guildhall

[DETH]

i played through eotn on my monk as a echo ray of judgement, had some split discord/sabway thing going on, think i had 3 discorders, and took 2 henchie monks, a melee dude, and my ranger on my other account tagged along too (afking)

only had trouble in one or two spots, in destruction depths was the worst, died then had the destroyers in a large pack between me and the golems

bungusmaximus

bungusmaximus

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jul 2006

Guild Of Handicrafted Products [MaSS]

W/Mo

1 con about sabway is that it can be slow at times, Olias lags behind to cast spells on all of his minions often. For that reason I'm running different builds. But yeah, it's more or less a cookie cutter and it works fine.

It's actually a modded HA build .

Omgopolis

Academy Page

Join Date: May 2007

W/

I haven't loaded up my paragon in a while, but I think I was doing discord because ctrl+click is a bit easier than moving my hand to hit f5+f6+f7, which were the keys I had set to cast my heroes splinter weapons. Plus I like having 20+ minion bombs instead of just 9. I did manage to fit one splinter weapon in, but it didn't have as much awesome blue flashy stuff as the normal sabway.

Anyway, having 3 splinter weapons to spam is crazy awesome if you're not lazy and don't mind forcing your heroes to cast it every 5 or 6 seconds. I'm pretty lazy though.

Anwyn

Banned

Join Date: Feb 2009

YaRR Bear Pirates

P/W

Sabway is awesomeness for sure, but boring as far as I am concerned... It steam rolls, but I still prefer molding my heroes to suite what I am doing and what I wanna accomplish... If I run my paragon, I use 2 hero paras, War, same thing... Currently on my necro using AP, MoP, EVAS, and running a RoJ monk, Spear Koss and MM...

So to answer the OP, Sabway is really worth it, but at the same time, so is discord, paraway, rojway and usingyourownbrainstomakeyourownteambuildsway...

Super Igor

Banned

Join Date: Mar 2008

why should you kno? Oo

A/W

Why 3 Splinter Weapons? o_O

Ok youre going in melee but I doubt Mhenlo or Cynn will benefit from it.

Trader of Secrets

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jun 2006

the 3-necro builds are good only because of soul reaping and versitility. Also it depends on the builds and combinations. Like when i use sabway, I (a warrior) use 2 healers w/ splinter and 1 mm w/ dwaynas sorrow & hex removal. I didnt find the curses necro too useful.

I have to recommend discords though, just need to find the right builds (many variants on guru being discussed). AP not required but useful for effectiveness. Though this requires a little more attention than sabway.

random.name

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Oct 2006

South Africa

N/

The only weakness of Sabway I have found is those first few mobs, but once your MM has minions enough to provide energy it becomes EZmode. I personally dont run it that often, because I enjoy actually doing something.

AtomicMew

AtomicMew

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Apr 2005

N/A

Sabway is good, but is by no means the best h/h setup.

Back in the day, it WAS pretty much cream of the crop, but now you have, stuff like discord, RoJ, VoR and AotL....

Sabway still rocks 95% of GW and is self-synergizing, so it doesn't really matter what build YOU take. But you CAN do better if you bother to synergize your bar with your heroes.

Personally, my main is a Necro and I do discordway or RoJway. I play an AP caller for discordway and a SS or MoP nuker + Battle Standard of Wisdom with RoJway.

For dungeons 2-man, I sometimes take along GWEN with VoR or tease, but it's rarely necessary.

All these builds can be found on PvX, though most would say they are sub-optimal variations. You are rarely going to find people who are in agreement with every skill choice, so it's best to just roll with it and use as much common sense as you can.

Daesu

Daesu

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Oct 2008

Quote:
Originally Posted by Omgopolis View Post
I've found that the warriors do more damage than the other henchies, even though they're pretty horrible. Stefan spamming power attack beats whatever Dunham does, especially with splinter weapon on him. I don't see how it's a waste of 6 skill slots really, 3 splinter weapons is 3 slots, and I usually played an imbagon so PS and aegis were a bit of a waste. Enfeebling blood, SY and TntF were more than enough for defense.
Instead of bringing 3 splinter weapon, you can consider bringing a channeling rit instead for level 14 splinter. Level 14 Splinter potentially outputs 47 * 3 * 5 = 705 armor ignoring aoe damage per cast, not bad for a 5e, 5s recharge unstrippable spell.

Take a look at this build from Shaz: http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...0277418&page=3

Quote:
The only hex removal I ever took was a single Convert Hexes spell for if I was hit with Vocal Minority or Soothing Images, and that was only necessary for a few areas in Nightfall. You may need more powerful hex removal in certain areas. Peace and Harmony works but you need a monk hero. Otherwise, take a look at Shaz's build.

Gigashadow

Gigashadow

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Aug 2005

Bellevue, WA

W/

Sabway is a lot of fun to modify. For example, I'm not a big fan of Spiteful Spirit. Don't get me wrong, it's a decent skill, but it's not the superstar on the bar. I've been experimenting with various other secondaries. Interestingly, Blinding Surge (which is AoE) seems to work quite well instead of Spiteful Spirit. However, one problem with going N/E for Blinding Surge, is that there aren't enough top notch skills to fill out the rest of the bar with. You could add Meekness, but you still have a couple of slots left.

I've also been playing around with making the curses necro subspec into 10+1 blood for Dark Fury and Order of Pain, which STILL leaves you with an elite free and your entire secondary class free. I've been playing around with him using Empathic Removal, Signet of Removal, or It's Just a Flesh Wound (zero cast time fast recharging conditional removal) for his elite (while also having a Paragon hero that has the skill, party members gain X health when they use a shout, to help the necro recover from his health loss), but haven't really come up with anything I'm really satisfied with for that bar yet.