Necro w/NO 2ndary on PvE...What do you think?

Dark_Wolf

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: May 2005

04 May 2005 at 15:19 - 1
Would it be a good thing to try, or don't try it. I'm just starting out. Was thinking of a Ranger as a 2ndary.

Loviatar

Underworld Spelunker

Join Date: Feb 2005

04 May 2005 at 15:29 - 2
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dark_Wolf
Would it be a good thing to try, or don't try it. I'm just starting out. Was thinking of a Ranger as a 2ndary.
Quote:
Ensign

Congratulations, you've chosen to play the worst class in the game! Here are some tips on making your experience a good deal more enjoyable.

1). Learn to love PvE. This should be obvious by now, but it bears repeating. You'll stand around for an hour in tombs before getting an invite, and once you do it'll be a henchie team that goes down in the first round. Play where you can get parties. A well built Necromancer is an asset in PvE, not a liability. Take advantage.

2). Learn to love your minions. Let's be blunt - your damage sucks, your armor sucks, you're just some pasty white dude with a wand. You need a wall of guys in front of you to both kill things and protect yourself. So get that Death Magic up. 16 from a superior rune is a good start. A staff with +1 to Animate Bone Horror wouldn't be a bad idea, either.

3). Pick a secondary that will actually help the team. Running up front is just going to get you killed. Bow skills are awful without MARKSMANSHIP. Don't even think about making a Necromancer/Mesmer. Either take an Elementalist secondary to supply some supporting fire - and drain your energy quickly - or take care of your teammates with healing and protection. Given that you're going to be strapped for attribute points, you're much better off with the latter, but both are acceptable.

4). Don't just stand there, do something useful! Part of playing a Necromancer involves standing there babysitting your minions, while gaining a good amount of energy from things dying and energy regeneration. I know you're just a pasty white placeholder that minions come out of, but try to be productive. Use protections to guard the party, pile on some additional damage, buff people up - just do something. You don't get a bonus for being able to go to the bathroom mid fight without missing anything. Use that energy.

If you follow this advise, you can overcome the inherent suckiness of the Necromancer and actually help your team win! A good sample build was posted by Freyas in the Necromancer thread. Once most Necromancers look more like that one and less like the standard Necromancer/Mesmer Tainted Flesh piles, Necromancers might shed their stigma as a 'scrub class'. EDIT for quotes and marksmanship instead of rhe original expertise

Soul Monarch

Soul Monarch

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Apr 2005

In the between.

Heros Etc.

Me/N

04 May 2005 at 16:53 - 3
Loviatar, you get far too much enjoyment from bashing on Necro primaries.

Not that I disagree... I'm just saying.

Kilguri

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Apr 2005

04 May 2005 at 16:57 - 4
And make sure you have lots of inventory room for Soul Sha... er, wait, this is not WoW.

Moskel

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: May 2005

San Antonio, TX

Xen of Onslaught [XoO] - www.xoohq.com

W/E

04 May 2005 at 19:39 - 5
Why do I get the feeling that Loviatar has 4 Warrior/Monk characters on his account? Necromancers have the potential to be very "Monk" like, or very "Elementalist" like. They also could go the route of master of minions and create their own army of L18 rangers and L14/18 warriors.

They aren't so easy to play as ugh, lots of sword, ugh lots adrenaline, ugh lots of Healing Breeze and Mending, ugh I beat you with my sword, ugh!!

Some classes are more complicated than others and until the game is played a bit more you won't see how some of the classes can really shine in publically posted builds, well because this is PvP and GvG combat here and some folks may want to keep their advantages

That being said Necromancers are much better PvE than they are PvP, on the GvG scale they have a chance to shine again since they can hide and wreck havoc if they are a debuffer or get their army rollin' if they are a minion master.

Dark_Wolf

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: May 2005

05 May 2005 at 00:32 - 6
Thanks Loviatar for that wonderful pick me up! LOL
Ok, the reason I'm picking Necro is I'm tired of the old Fighter/Monk/Mage BS.

But, no one answered my question... Would it be wise of me to pick a 2nd class or just keep all the points for the Necro? I know there are advantages to a 2nd class, but I want to see how high a Necro can go. I like it alittle complicated. I just don't like starting off on a bad move that will hit me hard later on.

I do want to thank everyone for there responses!

I got the Collector's Edition of the game and I want to enjoy this game for the money I spent. haha

It's the only game I'm playing now. I was playing WOW and got tired of it. Was in the beta testing for awhile.

Thanks again!

DW

Shadowdaemon

Shadowdaemon

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Apr 2005

Anderson IN USA

Ecks Di [xD]

W/N

05 May 2005 at 08:31 - 7
i have a necro/ranger and i do just fine in pvp, and most of my points are in blood magic, i can drain most warriors right off the bat and use sever artery with my pet as well and they are down before they hit me a second time

warriors are boring, and they arent better than any other class...

Dreamsmith

Dreamsmith

Elite Guru

Join Date: Feb 2005

Minnesota

Beguine Guild [BGN]

05 May 2005 at 18:54 - 8
Quote:
Originally Posted by Loviatar
Bow skills are awful without Expertise.
False. They take more energy, but as a caster primary, you have more energy. But irrelevant in any case -- why are you assuming an N/R would use a bow?

Quote:
Don't even think about making a Necromancer/Mesmer. One of the best comboes, I'd say. I played a Me/N during the beta with hardly any points in fast casting, might as well have been a N/Me. These two classes compliment each other very nicely.

Quote:
Either take an Elementalist secondary to supply some supporting fire - and drain your energy quickly - or take care of your teammates with healing and protection. Given that you're going to be strapped for attribute points, you're much better off with the latter, but both are acceptable. Any are acceptable. I'd say N/Me or N/Mo are your best bets, though. Depends on how you want to play.

Loviatar

Underworld Spelunker

Join Date: Feb 2005

05 May 2005 at 19:41 - 9
i couldnt find a single word there i said about bows

in any case i have
elementalist/monk
ranger/monk

not a warrior/anything in the bunch

BChan

Academy Page

Join Date: Apr 2005

Parliament of Rooks

N/Me

05 May 2005 at 20:00 - 10
if you want to do that i would suggest doing a 11 9 8 8 for blood, curses, death, and soul reaping. From there i would pick the following skills: epidemic, disease, enfeeble, necrotic travel, order of pain, vamp gaze, shadow strike, and offering of blood.

The whole idea is to do more health degens, some damage with vamp gaze and shadow strike, and if you are not getting any mana right away from SR. I would wait to start doing necrotic transversal till later in the battle. You will be come a target pretty easy once they notice you dropping various conditions on people. NT will keep the melees off of ya and let you spread some love around the field.

Thats my thought on a decently all necro build for pvp. Now there are some other good ones that i know of but you have to be in a guild that is based on that type of strats.

Loviatar

Underworld Spelunker

Join Date: Feb 2005

05 May 2005 at 20:35 - 11
hi Dreamsmith

that bow expertise was in the quote from Ensign

badfish515

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Apr 2005

05 May 2005 at 21:44 - 12
some warrior/monk likes his class better then yours, so he makes a long post bashing it, please he clearly hasnt even played necro.

once things start dying i blow up bodies for 70 dmg and thats only at 7...i can blast 3 bodies in 2 seconds thats 210 AOE dmg<--just an example

anyways i wouldnt take what mr. i know all..ensign has to say to heart.


edit... i should add self healing for necros is cool, as you steal health, doing double heal/dmg spread.

Ill say yes, maybe necro isnt the stronger, but combined with other support classes can be very powerful.

Hes basically bashing cookie cutter build /ehh to each a zone

dugman

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: May 2005

05 May 2005 at 21:58 - 13
I'm still really new to the game, but I'm currently playing a lvl 10 Ne/Mo and have shifted all my attribute points into necro skills. So basically I'm playing as pure necro. Obviously at level 10 I can't say how pure necro compares to other professions at all, or how it'll do in the long run. I also have little interest in PvP. Even so, I can comment on one or two basic things.

- Obviously there's no reason not to take a second profession. In my case, I took a second profession, Monk. I just don't use the skills or have any attribute points in the Monk sets. There's no harm in having the profession, though, in case I change my mind some day. So I'd say you should still pick up a second profession, and just leave it sit in reserve if you like.

- In situations where opponents leave behind corpses, minions are fantastic. Against golems and undead, who don't leave behind corpses to exploit, I have a little more trouble if I'm totally solo but can still beat them easily one on one or one on two.

The strategy I'm using right now, aside from summoning minions whenever something dies, depends on how many opponents I'm facing. Against a single powerful opponent I start with Soul Barbs the lay on a bunch of hexes, including Insidious Parasite, Parasitic Bond and Life Siphon. The damage seems pretty good in combination plus the self healing is pretty huge. Against groups of opponents, I try and tighten them into a single clump then do Mark of Pain on the primary target and chain Deathly Swarm. Mark of Pain seems to work especially well in combination with the minions and if you have a fighter/archer in the party.


Curses strike me as a really interesting line, different from typical spells in other games. The combination of Soul Barbs plus a string of debuffs/DOTs is fun, and curses like Barbs and Mark of Pain look like they'd work great in combination with a bunch of minions doing physical damage. So it strikes me as a line having pretty good synergy. By contrast, spells which rely on corpses look good individually but have two weaknesses: there aren't always corpses around to exploit, and once you exploit a corpse for one spell you can't exploit it again for another (eg once you make a minion you can't then blow the corpse up for damage). So a lot of the death magic spells don't seem to stack with each other, and in PvP or against the wrong type of opponent you're stuck unable to use corpse spells.

I'm still undecided exactly where my final build is headed, but it's really tempting to fiddle with a curses specialist, say with blood/magic secondary. My main concern with the curse line is it seems slow at taking out groups of weaker opponents. But it looks great for taking out a single big boss. Besides, from the looks of things most necros do blood magic or death magic extensively, and it'd be fun to try and buck the trend a little.


Anybody out there more experienced with the curse line care to comment?

Forboding Angel

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: May 2005

05 May 2005 at 23:18 - 14
Didn't read all the posts but I got the main gist

Most ppl hate necros for some reason.

I reccommend ranger for the secondary simply for the spell troll urgent Put like 6 into wilderness survival and have 10 seconds of +6 Regen, plus it only costs 5. It's a great way to stay alive if ur taking a lot of dmg

Curses and blood magic are your friend, Pick between curses and blood magic and make one much higher than the other, you still want to be able to do the other

I would say put 8 into sould reaping, it comes in handy. Also, rotting flesh, well of blood, Life siphon are your best friends. If you are using blood magic mainly, you want 12 points in blood magic period. That 3rd pip in life siphon makes a huge difference.

Here is a tactic that will make ppl hate and love you at the same time. Use rotting flesh and life siphon in pvp, then use direct dmg to kill an opponnent, Immediately cast a well of blood on the corpse (keep in mind that your teammates will be poisoned as well). The idea here is that your enemies lose life faster that your teammates. Best thing to do is poison and life siphon their monks, they will be so busy healing themselves that they can't do a whole lot for their teammates.

Very important for being a necro. Poison and life siphon everyone, then pick one target and Kill it with direct dmg. If you do dmg to more than one person with direct dmg spells you will get nowhere except for frustrated and out of energy.

PPL may disagree with me but this works really well for me. I can take on 2 warriors for about 15 seconds (sometimes longer) without dying. If you kill one warrior, the other one is a piece of cake. If you have more than 2 attacking you, you are SOFL.