necro - primary attribute

I haven't played a necro, so i just don't know and am clueless.

but the primaryr attribute of a necro gives you energy when someone dies right?

how usefull is this? it seems conditional, while other professions can directly benefit from their primary attribute.
are the skills linked to it very good?

i'm only interested in pvp side here. 4v4 and tombs.

i think its meant to be used in conjuction with a bone minion build so each time a minion dies u get more energy i personally find this attribute most benefical in pve to keep up energy

In pvp, it's not that great, as it requires for someone/thing to die for you to get energy. If it's someone on other team, your team is already winning, and it will only make the match shorter. If it is someone on your team who you are reaping... Well, then you've basically lost already.

And there are no skills linked to it.

In pve, it is useful, as with a good team you won't run out of energy, no matter how much you use skills.

Minions are good energysource, with decent soul reaping. But they require a corpse, which leads back to start.

Against spiritspammers, or with some, it works, as each time spirit dies, you'll get energy.

I've found it pretty much "crappy". Nevermind the PvP issues. In PvE a very large portion of the game you will struggle to find a corpse. So now you get this nice vicious circle :

1. Need corpses to cast anything decent [especially to raise minions]
2. No corpses = Not using energy [unless you go into blood-magic and run around sacrificing all your HP = suicide without a decent monk]
3. So when something do die, and do leave a corpse, you probably didnt need the energy anyway [because only when the thing died can you actually cast something :P]


Someone on the forums suggested Soul-Reaping change from "a set amount of energy gained" to "+energy regen for a set amount of time" ....now that would be something worthwhile. [if it is indeed giving you energy regen, then i guess i'm mistaken, last i checked i believe you just get x energy "instantly"]

In the end, i'm certain you will be more effective energy-wise simply being Elem prime [energy storage] and then being Necro secondary....

Be careful when you speak. You may show your ignorance.

If you look at the rest of the blood magic line, you will see life stealing skills. Those go in conjunction with life sacrificing skills.


Back to the origional topic, yes soul reaping is helful in PvE, and in PvP, since deaths are more common than anyone wants to believe. However, having energy storage is FAR more helpful, as would be fastcasting, or Divine favor. The real looser is a necro in PvE that gains all sorts of energy at the end of the battle and is ready to go on, but is fighting next to a Ele that has just used all thier energy and has to regen. Lots of good that soul reaping did there.

So, the end result, a Necro primary build is only useful if you are planning on having 16 in some Necro skill. Then, it is still questionable, because I have seen that necro skills do not seem to improve dramatically over 12 in the blood magic line, raising minions is nicer at higher levels, however.

well, i got some insights from a r/w, me/n and a w/mo.

does any primary necro want to take up the gloves and defend their primary attribute?

I love the Soul Reaping part of my Necro. She was necro/ele for most of the game....but here in late game I have changed her secondary to monk (just because rebirth is so darned useful in these last few missions). The soul reaping does keep her in good energy most of the time. She is having less issues about running out of it than my E/Me (who ran out all the time). Of course, there are times when she does run out.

My SR is at 9, and blood and death are at 12 each. Still need to get the last 15 attribute points and consider using a major rune.

I find using putrid explosion is not only fun but makes my reaping very handy.

Sometimes Soul Reaping gives me too much energy. It just depends on the situation you find yourself in.

It is very good in PvE, not particually useful in PvP compared to other classes.
All they need to do sort out the degen on minions the it would be a good class, and more useful as minions are not only poor fighters, (max lvl 17, which means any decent lvl 20 player or creature actually does like 180% damage on them so they die fairly easily, but they are a good destraction.) but as energy storage, (which with soul reaping they are) they are also poor due to the fact they ofen die before you reach you next battle which is pointless, as you want them to die when you actually need energy not when you energy is full. Going off topic. srry, but as with all classes skills and attrib are interlinked.
In PvP primary necro is a poor choice, simple as that. Soul reaping in PvP in theory is just as good as any other class primary attrib, but, as an example a mesmer (the advanced class) beats a necro hands down in PvP, for both killing others, usefulness and simplicity of play. Some may play necro and kick serious but, for average joe this is simply not the case. Necro are very good in PvE, average in 90% of cases in PvP, where other classes actually outshine them.

Necro have some awesome curses, they work a treat in PvE, but not the case in PvP, the AoE curses are fairly useless, the health degen skills pale incomparison to rangers poison, warriors bleed, mesmers phantasm. Mesmers hex's are as good if not better than a necro's curses, but you don't sacrifice blood. The only plus side is they have minions, and a high death magic build can create lvl 17 fiends which are apain in the rear, but then necromancer is not the class that can pull a battle back from the brink. (It's not impossible, but not as likely as with other classes)

'Flame on'

Indeed, but ive found THEN i never have the energy to do a "sacrifice+leech" combo properly :P Corpses just didn't drop that fast.

Anyway, the sad part is, and that is why i think there is some sort of imbalance here, that a secondary necro on Mo,Elem,Mes with all the points placed into said class' primary attribs and ONLY necro attribs, will probably easily beat a primary necro with all their points in their necro attrib + ONLY necro skills. This really should not be possible :P Unless they -want- Necro to be a truly support class only.

Either way, my Mes/Necro in PvE got everything in Fast Casting + Death Magic/Blood Magic , and it is just scary how fast i'm throwing things like Deathly Swarm and Summoning Minions [with FC, i actually feel more comfortable summoning minions IN battle instead of BEFORE/AFTER battles]
I can't imagine a prime necro will be able to keep up with that.

I think soul reaping is usefull even though I don't tend to play my necro. And there has been a few things I have wanted to try in the Tombs and HoH. Can you imagine 8 necros running around-7 life stealers, 1 summoner/life stealing. Sounds pretty deadly if they can focus.

It's usefull I will say that. However as a primary attribute I think it's somewhat weak compared to other professions attributes.

OK from a Necro that has over a million exp on his character.

There are many advantages to being a necro and it is a very fun character to play, also if played right one of the most deadly.

forget the primary attribute we get. it is not really helpful most of the time.

it is the blood/curse line that does the most damage to the enemy team.

from life stealing skills to enchantment take downs, to powerful heals and energy regens, to enemy heal prevention, the Necro has so many things it can do that in the right hands it maybe the most dangerous character in the game. (maybe a little bias)

anyway after playing tombs the last couple days it seems as if the Koreans have changed strategies a bit to start killing necros first rather than monks or mesmers in PvP.

not sure if that means much or not maybe they are just trying something new, but it could mean they have learned a good necro kicks ass as well

Hmm, yes that is what this post is about. Who is tougher? I can build you a Necro Primary that can tear apart a single target and leave the battle with full health. But, that is no good to a team. I build characters that are good for a team. This is Guild Wars.

BTW my single target destroyer build has a 1 in soul reaping from my minor Rune. So, your theoretical "put your Primary attribute point to the test" theory is out. Besides, do you want to go one-on-one? Soul reaping sounds like the dumbest thing to put attribute points into.



I built a Warrior destroying Ele/N. Warriors are dumb and stan still often enough. Earch magic+Life Transfer+Vampiric touch+Vampiric Gaze+life siphon=full health after yout target goes down. Doesn't really work to it's full effect on monks, since they tend to run around in Arenas and I would not bring a non-team build to the Tombs.

Ha, yes I saw this a couple of weeks ago. Teams actually do target Necros first!!! Made me happy to get wiped out so quickly. Just for the reconition.

SR is really only good pvp for very specific builds like a BiP or OOV spammer because it keeps energy up very well.

Necro is a pretty shallow pvp line. Yeah, there are ocassional uses for for stuff mentioned above and there are a few good curse skills; stuff like putrid explosion can be used in certain circumstances but not generally.

Really the only all around good necro spell is rend enchantments, and thats because it's a must-have for pretty much any team to carry.

I'll say that there are four reasons to go primary necro with a caster secondary - I don't think it's a fair question when asked with a noncaster primary as the decision is then based more on two factors - energy and armour:

Runes
Armour
Soul Reaping
Targetting

Of these -

Runes: Do you need many points in your necro lines? If so, primary is good. If you are using 2-3 lines of necro abilities and don't need as much power in your secondary this is a good reason to be primary necro.

Armour: Are the necro armours useful to you? Do you expect to be facing arrows (piercing) or not much holy damage, or are scars worthwhile?

Soul Reaping: In PvE I love this ability. In PvP is it better than your other caster primary? Are you planning a team build that can take advantage of Soul Reaping?

Targetting: Are you more or less likely to be targetted as a necromancer? Mesmers for example are on many people's kill list ATM - but a Nec/Mesmer can do good interruption anyway, and while you can't have a 16 domination it generally isn't needed - A Power Leak at lvl 12 costs them the cost of their spell and 22 more, at 16 it adds 4 more energy loss - not much difference; Likewise, a backfire is very discouraging to casters - whether its 119 damage or 140, doesn't really matter - either way they are stopping and yelling for hex removal. The 0.25 second interrupts aren't helped much by fast casting, so depending on the style of play you might be better off tactically to choose a Necro primary.

I think that in PvE Soul Reaping is incredible. I think that Soul Reaping in a party built around it is the most powerful primary attribute in the game, capable of delivering more energy to a team than anything else, and thus more of an advantage. I think that there are likely then PvP builds to exploit Soul Reaping that would be incredibly effective, but agree that the limiting death count in most PvP makes it less desirable.

Up to you - I will always view it as one of the most powerful primaries, but one that is misused often and underappreciated, much like the rangers out there who take 6 expertise and complain that it's pointless.

ok being a primary necro is very important in pvp. First of all the most important skill for a death necro in pvp is putrid explosion. See if you have 10+ soul reaping when someone diesit makes the putrid free to cast. Considering in alter situations and when groups are packed together a necro can kill an entire team with putrid and the only way to be able to continously putrid is soulreaping. for the hall of heroes in the very last min putrid is one of the most important skills to take down the alter.

Soul reaping is also usfull since as much people don't want to admit it people die A LOT in pvp matches they are just rezed quickly which makes it seem like not a lot of people are dieing. Also there are a lot of necor skills that cost a very high amount of mana and soul reaping helps to keep your mana up.

lol. yeah, that is what made me start this topic. i'm a ranger, and having high expertise is essential. i just can't think of a ranger without high expertise.
but the trend of this thread seems the opposite for a necro:
their primarary seems not really that essential in pvp

I would take fast casting or energy storage long before I took soul reaping.

I think that the usefulness of Soul Reaping in PvP depends on the type of PvP and the necromancer build, as well as the team's build. In GvG, in which there are NPCs involved in the battles you get many more deaths. If there are spirits around expiring and minions being raised and destroyed you get a lot more energy, but those are odd cases. I think for arena it is next to useless, and for HoH it is limited unless worked into the team build.

Soul Reaping is very useful... more than fast casting on many ocassions. It's not just useful in PvE, it's useful in PvP, even in the arenas.

I hate it when people speak without knowing anything.

I'm sorry to brag, but I just had to. I got a N/W who ocassionally takes down 2-3 enemies all by himself. I have another necro too, cause they're just that good.

Tell you what, when I'm killing 1 enemy, before going to the next one, soul reaping allows me to cast a combo of my expensive spells. And whoops that enemy falls down, now on to the next one, again soul reaping kicks in.

Another thing my first 3 combo of spells easily takes down enemies to 1/2 their health, while giving me that much back. Guess what happens, I'm almost guaranteed to win.

Minions not useful? You haven't pvped much my friend. I have wiped an entire team in GvG with 15 or so bone horrors all lvl 18. in GvG our team beat the opposition. In their base, while they're attacking the guild lord, I stood by the enemy spawn point. When they respawned the minions just obliterated them. Of course I'm helping too with disease, and poison, all the good stuff.

How come minions are that powerful?

1) They can be mass healed!
2) They are immune to many condition
3) They make targetting difficult
4) They block ways.

Necro IS very powerful. If their skills seem conditional it's because they're very strong. And oh, a good necro can keep his minions almost indefinitely. So you should be gaining more and more minions over time, no matter which side is winning/losing.

Why in PvE, I amassed nearly 30 bone minions. I had a literal army trailing me around which simply wipe out anything in its path. And with every death, I get even more minions.

I have a primary Ne/Mo that currently does this:

Death Magic - 13
Soul Reaping - 9
Healing Prayers - 9

With scar armor on my arms/legs, and my truncheon/cesta combo, my total energy is over 60, with a -1 to regen.

Soul Reaping is awesome, because everytime something dies I get +9 energy. Often when the party is Cntrl+Clicking their energy bars and the Monks and Eles are really low, mine is either full or close to it at the same time, and I've received several surprised comments regarding it from other spellcasters. I'm constantly healing, raising horrors, and casting spells which target corpses and minions, so it's not like I'm being frugal with my energy in the least bit. The only times I generally run out of energy are when some Mesmer casts that spirit shackles spell or some other energy draining spell, but I'll simply stop attacking and let my minions fight while I regen energy and heal the party.

I'm casting at least as much if not more than I did with my Elementalist and Monk characters, and rarely if ever run out of energy.

Finding corpses in long dry spells or in PvP hasn't been a big issue so far, since my horrors are at a very high level and I use Heal Area and Heal Other to keep them alive for a very long time. With several mod bonuses that increase Death Magic casting speed and recharge time (boots, weapons and cestas), I'm able to beat out most necro foes in raising minions the majority of the time. It's extremely rare when there isn't at least one horror at my side, even in areas with few or no corpses.

Well, I personally need energy for things other than corpse manipulation, such as Deathly Swarm, Healing Seed, Heal Other/Area and Ressurect, depending on my skill set at the time. When I'm not controlling minions, the focus turns to being a support healer and casting Deathly Swarm to help finish off AOE attacks.

This is really kind of a narrow view of how soul reaping works, since it doesn't take into consideration the death of allies and minions. After I raise horrors and during the battle itself, I'll frequently cast Death Nova on them and then use Taste of Death like a trigger switch to set them off - this is good for both setting off a timed explosion and/or pulling 9 energy at a specific moment. Death Nova can also be place on teammates who are about to die, and their corpses can be used to animate horrors from as well.

Two or more necros (or an open minded party) with ressurect spells, health sacrificing spells and some vampiric weapons can pretty much kill themselves, raise a horror/fiend/minions from the corpse and then resurrect each other repeatedly, creating a vast army when there are no corpses around...

When a party member dies, one can raise a horror and cast Healing Seed on them to help the rest of the party, then take the time to resurrect that dead ally while the monk is busy healing and the horror is doing damage. Casting Death Nova on that horror then timing Taste of Death to explode them (85 Dmg to all surrounding foes) so that at least one creature dies, and then immediately casting Putrid Explosion to blow up that corpse (101 Dmg to all surrounding foes) can help a party to lay waste to an enemy group quickly.

In PvP, these same types of strategies can be used, but it just takes more patience and timing since there are less corpses to deal with. One also has to consider their allies, and possibly even themselves, as corpse fuel as well. And then have some form of non-corpse related skills that help the party during the times when there are no corpses, whether hex or enchantment removal, non-corpse based damage spells, or healing/protection buffs.

Imho primary Necros are an often misunderstood class, especially by those who haven't played it well or just dont' like the approach. It's a class that requires a certain type of gameplay that isn't necessarily straightfoward like the more popular classes, and is more akin to a Mesmer or trap-based Ranger than anything else. I've tried Warrior, Monk, Elementalist and Mesmer primaries... and Necro is hands down my favorite, which I never would have imagined upon first glance at the profession - it was the one I thought I'd probably never play. But playing it has made me a better all around player, I believe, and I feel more prepared for eventually approaching a Mesmer character again at some point, because I feel like I "get it" now.

Grenth watch over your soul...

I love it in a party that has never really experienced a high level death magic necro that uses minons for more than just tanks, when all the "holy crap!" and "that's a pretty serious army there" and "go minions!" and "we rock!" comments start popping up. I espeically love it when a well coordinated group of AoE Ele attackers and Warrior tankers get into the whole minion bombs and healing seeds approach. Lots of fun.

first char i made was necro/mesmer deleted him during beta bbefore i even left presear...........made it mesmer/necro TONS BETTER necros primary attribute is slacking if it was you gain energy regen for however many seconds depending points into that would be cool to have 4 extra regen for 9 seconds then something else dies 5 regen for 8 seconds that would be cool

I've read a few threads on this tactic, sounds like a very creative solution [both in PvE and PvP]. I'd imagine 2 necros can do this indefinitely with someone resurrecting them. Having minions do all your work, it probably wouldn't matter whether you got -60% DP either..and THEN soulreaping will certianly kick into gear [because you probably will only have 20 or so max energy]. Now i don't know if that was the idea of things, but with sacrificing you can so easily commit suicide it almost -wants- you to do it, rather amusing :P [Almost makes sense from a RP "master of death" point of view too ]

It's not as bad as the monks one, their is only relivant while you have enough energy to cast. So if you stop casting it is utterly useless.

In this is the order of Best unique attribute first (IMO)

Ranger
Elementalist
Mesmer (not sure never played one)
Necromancer
Warrior
(insert two other imaginary professions here)
Monk

At least for the Necro it's in perminant effect and it dose not rely on you haveing to have full energy and be able to cast spells to use it.

I'd say the monks Divine Favour should be a 2 point heal for evel rank in it and this should happen every 5 seconds. it would make the monk slighly less usless as a primary class.

Wow, I have to say I disagree with you more than you could possibly imagine. Have you ever played a monk? Divine Favour is pretty much the best primary out there - within the narrow scope of healing, at least, it does pigeonhole the monk into a healing role - it gives you Divine Boon for example, and with Divine Boon running a healer has more raw healing power than anyone else. The passive is even nice, 3.2 per lvl on any monk spell. With a divine boon running you can smite a hex off someone if you want, and you are still healing him for 100.

It wouldn't work though, once a necro dies, their minions become masterless and attack anything.

Also, I am going to end this debate right here with:

Soul Reaping is the best primary for a Necromancer.

Fast Casting is the best primary for a Mesmer.

Expertise is the best primary for a Ranger.

Divine Favor is the best primary for a Monk.

Energy Storage is the best primary for a Elementalist.

Strength is the best primary for a Warrior.

There, I win.

Unless im mistaken, and i have no idea how well this would work, but i'm sure these spells can "intervene" :P

Veratas Aura:
Sacrifice 33% of maximum health. All hostile animated undead in the area become bound to you. Verata's Aura ends after 120-264 seconds. When Verata's Aura ends, you lose your bond with any undead bound to you.

Verata's Gaze - Spell
Sacrifice 16-67 health. If target hostile animated undead has a master, its bond to its master is broken, making it hostile to all other creatures. If it had no master, you become its master.

Verata's Gaze would probably be the best idea.

A basic rule is:
If more than 3 enemies die Necros energy is the best, if less die its not.

now the funny thing is, if a necro kills one it makes a chain reaction most times.

People are also forgetting the Curse line, someone erlier said its good in PvE but Sucks in PvP, well i have to disagree, iv just got my necro/mesmer to level 10 and decided to fight in the ascalon arena while i still could, i took my points out of death magic put them into Curses so i was using Blood, Curses, SR and Domination. My team got about 4 Flawless victories in a row, i just went from target to target casting Soul Barbs then stacking hexes, it was the easiest time ever, wr probably would have won even more if i haden't got lagged out.....Damned err=7....

I'm seeing more and more though that MoP is being turned useless due to the requirement of physical damage. Warriors weilding fiery dragon swords and trying to look cool basically make it useless.

Though, enfeebling blood and shadow of fear alone are worth taking curses. Spiteful Spirit is hilarious when sticking it on more than one warrior pounding on you. If you get two of them stuck on you for whatever reason, you can enfeeble them, then spiteful spirit (pray your staff or offhand 20% recharge kicks in) both of them. better than empathy IMO.

None of the stuff about curse line etc... has anything to do with the necromancer primary. Those are good reasons to bring curses along, and I agree that curses are powerful, but a secondary necromancer can do all that, or a primary without soul reaping. Let's convince people that Soul Reaping is good.

At first I though all the health sacrificing stuff was stupid, and didn't get the point... then one day, it hit me that I was looking at it too narrowly, thinking like a character from another profession who didn't want to die at all. Now I do think that the devs designed the Necro as a sacrificial character, now only with their health but with their lives as well. Necros are masters of death, just like Monks are masters of life... once a Necro stops fearing their own death and sees it as an advantage, a whole world of potential opens up that wasn't there before.
From a straightforward perspective, this is true. But I've done it, and it does work when two or more characters work together and use the right skills. When both members each die rather than only one of them, then Verata's Gaze solves the problem, and Veratas Aura will work in most situations because you don't really need them for more than 4 minutes in a situation like we're talking about, since by then they will have either been killed, blown up or mined for health.

Many Necro spells at first glance seem dumb... they dont' make sense. Why would anyone want to raise a masterless horror? Or sacrifice a huge chunk of their max health for an entire battle? It's when one starts to use skills in combination with each other, and often across the differenct attributes or professions, that they begin to make sense.

Like consider the Vengeance res spell... i read a lot where monks use this on problem party members, and that's cool. But consider a N/Mo who uses this... no death penalty on the member it's cast on, and it has an off switch, or at least a guaranteed death in 30 seconds, that will reap energy while creating two opportunities at raising a horror or using a corpse manipulating skill - before the res and after the subsequent death. One could use Vengeance over and over on a fallen party member when there are few enemy corpses around, without that party member incurring any death penalty. As long as the party member is open minded, two people could do this indefinitely and purposefully.

Meh, soul reaping isn't all it's cracked up to be sometimes. SOMETIMES.

I went necro because, well, they look damn ****ing cool. That and they're less targeted in PvP than Mesmers and Monks.