Necromancer Armor: Necrotic/Tormentors vs Bonelace/Fanatics

So I finally got to Droknars, and its time to get myself some armor. The question now is, which armor set should I get?

Scar Pattern: extra +7 energy from full set
Necrotic/Tormentors: +10AL, +25% dmg from holy damage
Bonelace/Fanatics: +15AL vs piercing

I decided against the Scar Pattern armor, because the extra 7 energy won't help that much in the long run, particularly in PvE, where things should be dropping like mad.

The choice between the Necrotic/Tormentors and the Bonelace/Fanatics, however, is proving much harder.

Necrotic/Tormentors
The +10AL over the normal effectively reduces damage from anything that checks armor by 16%. This is good.

On the other hand, it increases holy damage (which ignores armor anyway I believe) by 25%. The question then, is how often will I be taking holy damage? I don't know how many smite monks I'll be encountering in the PvE ahead (this is my first character), but I know in high level PvP smite monks are fairly rare, and while Judge's Insight would be truly unpleasant, it's not the first choice of most W/Mos.

Bonelace/Fanatics
A +15AL bonus against piercing would reduce damage from piercing attacks by 23%. My problem is, what exactly constitutes a piercing attack? Just bows? Bows and swords? Bows & some swords / sword attacks? Bows and certain projectile skills (Whirling Defense, etc.)?


I'm pretty confused, and I was hoping someone could help me figure out the long-term implications of this armor decision.

hmm, where did you find that info about +25%dmg from holy attacks? I myself have a Necro, and i had the same dilemma: Necrotic or Fanatics? I ultimately chose Fanatic's b/c it's a base Armor rating of 60 from all types of dmg, and an added 15 Armor rating vs Pierce attacks. Nothing lost, and a little gained.

Conversely, you can say pretty much the same thing with Necrotic or Tormentors. Higher Armor Rating vs Most enemies, with lesser armor vs. Holy attacks.

Perhaps, the answer isnt so much in what particular armor you choose per se, but rather you might want to look into putting a +5 defense mod on a weapon.

JMO.

GuildWiki says it's +25%, the armor itself just says "increased damage from holy attacks".

I was really just wondering if anyone could tell me how often I'll be getting hit with holy damage after Droknar's Forge, both in PvE and PvP; also, what exactly qualifies as "piercing" damage?

Two points:

The "increases holy damage" has been determined by testing that it's a 20 point flat addition for the whole set, based on number of pieces worn (4 pcs = 20, 3 pcs = 15, etc). See Resource

Regarding the occurance of holy vs piercing, if you're planning to wander in areas with griffons and nightmare/shadows/smites, then you'll see a generous amount of holy damage. If you are wandering in the SF area, you'll see lots of piercing damage, as the dwarves have archers.

IMHO, it's better to take the extra armor of the necrotic/tormentors and just watch out for the monsters.

Unless you have the space and supplies to carry both sets of armor, in which case, go for it!

For the most part, you'll almost never encounter anything that uses holy damage except for say... Aloe Seed type monsters and Azure Shadows. So you're safe for the most part.

In PvP though... I'd highly suggest you not wear the Necrotic/Tormentor armors. Although there aren't many pure Monks that smite, it is very common to see an E/Mo using Zealot's Fire and Balthazar's Aura (Balt's Aura is Holy Damage). Once in a while that smiter will also carry Judge's Insight.

It's just a matter of judgement though. I'd rather not risk taking extra damage due to armor choice.

Personally, I'd say go for Tormentors for PvE (Based on personal preference against Necrotic ) but definatly Bonelance/Fanatics for PvP. I tried wearing my Necrotic in Tombs .. splat goes the Necromancer. With a full set I think I was taking 46 damage from each Bathazzar's Aura hit.

This may be slightly off topic from what the OP is asking but... are scar patterns really that bad? The extra energy can really help sometimes, and a lot of monks I see use tattoos which are basically the same thing. I'm starting a necro now and was thinking of using scar patterns but since none of you are mentioning it I'm starting to get second thoughts on what to wear.

Why not mix and match? You get a more unique appearance that way, too...

The extra energy from the scar patterns is nice, but frankly, if your group isn't killing stuff fast enough to keep you at least close to full anyway, another 7 or 8 energy isn't going to help. Plus, if you get Bloodstained Boots, you'll look really stupid if the rest of your stuff is scar pattern armor.

As far as monks, they:
1) have no other particularly good armor sets
2) have no other visually interesting armor sets
3) always need more max energy