How bad is it?

So I recently came back, I love playing the Necro type classes but being someone who also enjoys getting into raiding in MMO's how bad is it to main a Necro? Almost everything I read online is doom and gloom hoping to find a bright spot lol

Depends on your goals.

Necro is strong in open world PvE.Necro is good in PvP.Necro is okay in WvW.Necro is decent in Fractals.Necro is okay in Raids and Strikes.

Necro sucks in optimized min/max ultra-nerd level raiding.

@Phraq.5802 said:So I recently came back, I love playing the Necro type classes but being someone who also enjoys getting into raiding in MMO's how bad is it to main a Necro? Almost everything I read online is doom and gloom hoping to find a bright spot lol

Play guardian or thief they are.If you play necro your own life will get deducted by half from dealing with the constant nerfs while other classes will kept their skills that gives them obvious advantages over the rest of the classes.Necro is a lot of fun to play but you might get kicked more often in raids if you got lucky to even join a party to begin with.

For now I think the necros are in ok spot but it’s no where near what it should beEspecially the scourge you will need ton of skills to perform half good as the other classes

@silent killer.5732 said:

@"Phraq.5802" said:So I recently came back, I love playing the Necro type classes but being someone who also enjoys getting into raiding in MMO's how bad is it to main a Necro? Almost everything I read online is doom and gloom hoping to find a bright spot lol

I get it that at this point playing a victim by claiming "my class keeps getting nerfed, but the others don't!" is tradition on this forum regardless of which class you play, but this is far from the truth, so stop spreading these lies in threads like this.

Necro is a lot of fun to play but you might get kicked more often in raids if you got lucky to even join a party to begin with.

Necro is fine in raids unless you want to get your ultra-optimized top of the crop squads and there's pretty much no reason to do that, so... Sure, to each their own, but he won't have troubles getting random squads. li/kp is a different issue.

The necromancer isn't bad, it's just frustrating.The way PvE is designed make a lot of the necromancer's tools suboptimal when not completely useless. Like other said it's fine, but there will always be more optimal options simply because the necromancer's niche can't be expressed within the PvE end game.

Unless you are in min-maxer territory, necro should be able to compete with everything but Guardians.

In fact, having 3 or 4 Reapers in my group resulted in some of my best Fractal (T3) runs.Reapers are always monsters, but with Quickness and Alacrity from Chronomancer, its fun to see how quick they can mow down bosses.

Barrier Scourges are great if you need healing to be covered.

For raiding it's fine. Not the best, and I personally have started raiding with Soulbeast, but it still does more than enough damage to clear content without holding the team back.

@silent killer.5732 said:

Play guardian or thief they are.If you play necro your own life will get deducted by half from dealing with the constant nerfs while other classes will kept their skills that gives them obvious advantages over the rest of the classes.Necro is a lot of fun to play but you might get kicked more often in raids if you got lucky to even join a party to begin with.

Ye this isn't true. Sure necro's not OP but if anything, it keeps getting buffs in pve. In PvP you will do well enough and WvW it's not bad. I personally maintain that Reaper is the best dps for Fractals:

• massive cleave
• Well of Darkness and Nightfall shut down mobs
• Well of Suffering gives mob wide vulnerability
• fantastic damage for Fractals (and yes talking T4 here)
• got a decent pull as part of your existing kit
• self reliance
• stability is there when needed

The good thing about Reaper is that it can comfortably take a raid build because it is so self reliant.

@Sobx.1758 said:

@silent killer.5732 said:

@"Phraq.5802" said:So I recently came back, I love playing the Necro type classes but being someone who also enjoys getting into raiding in MMO's how bad is it to main a Necro? Almost everything I read online is doom and gloom hoping to find a bright spot lol

Necro is a lot of fun to play but you might get kicked more often in raids if you got lucky to even join a party to begin with.

Speaking facts 100%The current reaper is dealing massive damage by being broken in its range not because of him being well balancedReaper is literally one “bug fixed That make reaper shroud 4 hit 400 range” away To be absolute garbage

Say whatever you want but the history of the nerfs/buffs is still there on game release formsI will not argue About who got nerfs and who is not but the necro needs overhaul because I don’t remember when was the last batch where they actually left us without nerfing it

@Methuselah.4376 said:For raiding it's fine. Not the best, and I personally have started raiding with Soulbeast, but it still does more than enough damage to clear content without holding the team back.

@silent killer.5732 said:

Play guardian or thief they are.If you play necro your own life will get deducted by half from dealing with the constant nerfs while other classes will kept their skills that gives them obvious advantages over the rest of the classes.Necro is a lot of fun to play but you might get kicked more often in raids if you got lucky to even join a party to begin with.

• massive cleave
• Well of Darkness and Nightfall shut down mobs
• Well of Suffering gives mob wide vulnerability
• fantastic damage for Fractals (and yes talking T4 here)
• got a decent pull as part of your existing kit
• self reliance
• stability is there when needed

One day if they decided to fix that you will comeback pissed off when you no longer can break 8k dps

I haven’t talked about how fked up heal scourge is thoHave you ever seen or heard about a healer who can’t actually restore health?We heal by reviving and spamming barriers which is not half as good as the hfb who can give boons and passive health restoration and a lot more

So guardian is > necro

For the thieves they can run circles around the necro in everywhere but pve

@silent killer.5732 said:

@Sobx.1758 said:

@silent killer.5732 said:

@"Phraq.5802" said:So I recently came back, I love playing the Necro type classes but being someone who also enjoys getting into raiding in MMO's how bad is it to main a Necro? Almost everything I read online is doom and gloom hoping to find a bright spot lol

Necro is a lot of fun to play but you might get kicked more often in raids if you got lucky to even join a party to begin with.

Yeah, the patch notes are all there and they prove how untrue your claims are. You "will not argue", but that's exactly what you do despite the history showing what you say is false. Nobody is out there to get necro with nerfs while not touching other classes, get over yourself.

Oh wait, you weren't even around for the last 2 years. Good job with your empty statements.

As others have said, Necro and its elites are good for everything but speed runs.

The balance team still struggles with a desire to break things that work or replace them with new things that do not. It is an obsessive compulsion and job security.

Depends on what you want to do.

If you want to do dungeons, open world, and the like you'll be fine.If you want to do raids, you may be sad because some groups insta-kick necros from what i've been seeing on the forum. This could be wrong but i dont raid...If you want to do PvP, stay away from scourge and you'll be fine.If you want to do WvW, stay away from scourge and you'll be fine.

In all seriousness, Scourge isn't good in PvP or WvW as they are balanced like other necros but have essentially half the effective health and no benefit...Reaper will serve you well in WvW and PvP, and while uncommon in WvW, core necro will serve you as well as reaper.

@jpsssss.7530 said:If you want to do raids, you may be sad because some groups insta-kick necros from what i've been seeing on the forum. This could be wrong but i dont raid...

This is a myth. I have both raided as a Reaper and raided with Reapers, and no one has bat an eye in the past year.

Top end guild will not let you raid with a necro. You will get the ocassional negative comments for playing a necro in raids and fractals. You will do significantly more DPS while buffing others playing a meta class like Guardian.

I no longer raid on my necro. It is my favorite class but i easily do 20% more dps on otber classes with less effort. Necro is still my favorite to play. I feel they are fine for all other PVE content. Just dont expect arena.net to ever make them competitive in a raiding enviroments.

Seconding @Josiah.2967 's comment. I raid with my guild and with pugs. My guild doesnt mind when I bring my reaper. Pugs generally give the boot the moment I tell then I prefer it over other dps classes. You need to find a kind and understanding pug comm with the rationale to understand the reaper perks.

Its a surprising rare trait. And similarly, raiding experience in pugs with my guardian is strictly better on all fronts.

When you lose to a reaper in WvW roaming you seriously learn to kite. The build is garbage now.

@gebrechen.5643 said:When you lose to a reaper in WvW roaming you seriously learn to kite. The build is garbage now.I fought a thief once on my reaper then immediately quit the class.

@Phraq.5802 said:So I recently came back, I love playing the Necro type classes but being someone who also enjoys getting into raiding in MMO's how bad is it to main a Necro? Almost everything I read online is doom and gloom hoping to find a bright spot lol

if you want to make an impact, dont play necro unless you want to be a boon corrupt bot that is about all necro is relegated to, the other positions it COULD FILL can be filled better by a different class

@Phraq.5802 said:So I recently came back, I love playing the Necro type classes but being someone who also enjoys getting into raiding in MMO's how bad is it to main a Necro? Almost everything I read online is doom and gloom hoping to find a bright spot lol

Hit your mark and work the class. If you find a good guild they'll let you run necromancer and be happy to have you. You have stable damage on reaper and if you learn the scourge rotation you should be good for most raids.

If you want a lesson in Condi scourge I can help you learn it if you like. It is my specialty and my guild doesn't let me play anything else all too often...

In the 8 years since launch Necro was Meta for endgame PvE twice, each lasted for about ~2 weeks or so before getting nerfed into the ground. Once at the launch of PoF with Scourge, and a second time with abusing pre nerf Epi bouncing on a select few encounters.Unsurprisingly, that history formed quite the impression on the community.

Unlike for example Elementalist, Warrior, Mesmer, Ranger, Guardian etc., which barely ever were not meta picks and in many cases completely uncontested in their roles (Chrono Tank/Boon support, Druid Main Heal), or others like Engineer, Revenant and Thief which all had and have their Meta moments and usually remained solid picks for years at a time, Necromancer is the single profession in PvE which remained at the absolute bottom of the barrel in performance for almost a decade, across all available roles.

It's been consistently far below in terms of DPS of even semi group support specs like the Bannerslave up until the very recent Reaper buffs, never was a mainsteam Healer or had the capability to be main heal, never had a boon support role, etc.

At this stage, after many, many, many massive (misguided and clunky band aid Shroud) buffs over many years, is Necro viable? Yes. Both as Power DPS with Reaper and as Condi DPS as Scourge, as well Scourge ress bot in niche cases, it can be played. It's never been optimal for anything, but it's indeed viable now.

@Methuselah.4376 said:

@jpsssss.7530 said:If you want to do raids, you may be sad because some groups insta-kick necros from what i've been seeing on the forum. This could be wrong but i dont raid...

It's not. Even for Strikes when I still did those daily (and Necro there having a decent role with providing Flesh Worm for WoJ, Epi for the Kodans and being able to swap to Ress Scourge for Boneskinner, I have repeatedly encountered players threatening to kick unless I swapped from Necro to something else.That's after presenting Envoy's Herald and linking 1500+ LI/LD and 1000 Cosmic Essences, and still they weren't confident I could contribute anything of value on Necro.I haven't pugged Raids much for years since I have a static for those, but if it happens in Strikes, I can't imagine it happening any less in Raids.

Is it silly and is Necro completely fine for that content? Yea, but it still happens.Not always ofc and it may never happen to some such as you, but still, it's not a myth.

@Asum.4960 said:In the 8 years since launch Necro was Meta for endgame PvE twice, each lasted for about ~2 weeks or so before getting nerfed into the ground. Once at the launch of PoF with Scourge, and a second time with abusing pre nerf Epi bouncing on a select few encounters.Unsurprisingly, that history formed quite the impression on the community.

Unlike for example Elementalist, Warrior, Mesmer, Ranger, Guardian etc., which barely ever were not meta picks and in many cases completely uncontested in their roles (Chrono Tank/Boon support, Druid Main Heal), or others like Engineer, Revenant and Thief which all had and have their Meta moments and usually remained solid picks for years at a time, Necromancer is the single profession in PvE which remained at the absolute bottom of the barrel in performance for almost a decade, across all available roles.

It's been consistently far below in terms of DPS of even semi group support specs like the Bannerslave up until the very recent Reaper buffs, never was a mainsteam Healer or had the capability to be main heal, never had a boon support role, etc.

At this stage, after many, many, many massive (misguided and clunky band aid Shroud) buffs over many years, is Necro viable? Yes. Both as Power DPS with Reaper and as Condi DPS as Scourge, as well Scourge ress bot in niche cases, it can be played. It's never been optimal for anything, but it's indeed viable now.

@Methuselah.4376 said:

@jpsssss.7530 said:If you want to do raids, you may be sad because some groups insta-kick necros from what i've been seeing on the forum. This could be wrong but i dont raid...

It's crazy too since condi scourge isn't easy to learn and it's very easy to lose thousands of damage just by doing one thing wrong. Compared to Condibrand which is pretty faveroll and provides similar support qualities while way out pacing condi scourge in DPS.

Its frustrating because of the 3, core, reaper and scourge, Scourge is the closest to its mark in desired viability in most raids. Yet it's still missing just a bit too much to really hit that mark.

I feel the scourge changes need to be fairly minor in comparison to Core and reaper. Core and reaper both need utility in shroud at a minimum, which is pretty major change.

@"Asum.4960" said:In the 8 years since launch Necro was Meta for endgame PvE twice, each lasted for about ~2 weeks or so before getting nerfed into the ground. Once at the launch of PoF with Scourge, and a second time with abusing pre nerf Epi bouncing on a select few encounters.

There is a third time a few weeks/months after HoT launch, when you could maintain the horror from the previous iteration of Lich form by healing them. It didn't last long, it was around the time they released the 2nd wing of the forsaken thicket. In a week players had become crazy with the horror and a few day later they were coming with a hard nerf of the horror closely followed by a full "rework" of lich form. They never reworked a transformation skill as fast as that time, they managed to release 4 new skills in a record time.

@Dadnir.5038 said:

@"Asum.4960" said:In the 8 years since launch Necro was Meta for endgame PvE twice, each lasted for about ~2 weeks or so before getting nerfed into the ground. Once at the launch of PoF with Scourge, and a second time with abusing pre nerf Epi bouncing on a select few encounters.

That was a fun build...

@Dadnir.5038 said:

@Asum.4960 said:In the 8 years since launch Necro was Meta for endgame PvE twice, each lasted for about ~2 weeks or so before getting nerfed into the ground. Once at the launch of PoF with Scourge, and a second time with abusing pre nerf Epi bouncing on a select few encounters.

Oh you are right, I had completely forgotten about that. Wasn't that also linked with some badly placed Adrenal Mushroom abuse to pump out a massive amount of minions by resetting the CD while healing them?

Although tbf, in any case that was also closer to a short lived exploit than Necromancer actually being good.

@Lily.1935 said:

@Asum.4960 said:In the 8 years since launch Necro was Meta for endgame PvE twice, each lasted for about ~2 weeks or so before getting nerfed into the ground. Once at the launch of PoF with Scourge, and a second time with abusing pre nerf Epi bouncing on a select few encounters.Unsurprisingly, that history formed quite the impression on the community.

Unlike for example Elementalist, Warrior, Mesmer, Ranger, Guardian etc., which barely ever were not meta picks and in many cases completely uncontested in their roles (Chrono Tank/Boon support, Druid Main Heal), or others like Engineer, Revenant and Thief which all had and have their Meta moments and usually remained solid picks for years at a time, Necromancer is the single profession in PvE which remained at the absolute bottom of the barrel in performance for almost a decade, across all available roles.

It's been consistently far below in terms of DPS of even semi group support specs like the Bannerslave up until the very recent Reaper buffs, never was a mainsteam Healer or had the capability to be main heal, never had a boon support role, etc.

At this stage, after many, many, many massive (misguided and clunky band aid Shroud) buffs over many years, is Necro viable? Yes. Both as Power DPS with Reaper and as Condi DPS as Scourge, as well Scourge ress bot in niche cases, it can be played. It's never been optimal for anything, but it's indeed viable now.

@Methuselah.4376 said:

@"jpsssss.7530" said:If you want to do raids, you may be sad because some groups insta-kick necros from what i've been seeing on the forum. This could be wrong but i dont raid...

Yea, it wouldn't take much to make Scourge more viable.

As I recently proposed in another Thread, I think I good route to go down would be to change Insidious Disruption to 2-3 Stacks of Torment from 1 (PvE only), and to make it also trigger on Corrupt usage (if boons are actually corrupted or not) in addition to triggering on CC.

That way Scourges would use Garish Pillar on CD to trigger the Trait for increased DPS, drastically reducing their available LF, replacing Nefarious Favor and Sand Cascade in usage, therefor lowering a DPS Scourge's support capabilities, essentially nullifying the condi cleanses and allied Barriers it applies (outside of the Heal skill), as tradeoff for the increased damage.

At the same time it would bring another weapon, Off Hand Dagger into viability to replace the condi Transfer lost with Plague Sending which is needed for Blood is Power, as well as give Corrupts at least some value in general PvE by providing extra damage, even against boonless foes which are the vast majority.

Some other similar minor changes could be increasing Dhuumfire's Burn from 1 to 2 stacks of Burning (possibly PvE only, although in conjunction with Scourge this Trait has already been utterly killed in competitive modes anyway), and possibly also doubling the burning on Sadistic Searing to two Stacks, considering it's a fairly slow and clunky interaction with having to use a specific Utility and then place a Shade to get value, one little burn always felt slightly underwhelming as pay off.

Now I doubt at this point Scourge could compete with the likes of condi Renegade and such still, but it would have to be tested.At least it would be closer.

Idk why Anet takes months to years (if at all) to even just play around with some Traits like this in minor ways, just adding a bit here and there to underperforming things until they are pushed into an acceptable range.

They are either doing nothing at all, or go for some "major" rework like Death Magic or Blood Bank which generally completely misses the mark as just yet another obscure and niche/unused thing which doesn't fix any of the issues of the profession anywhere.It's a mystery.

@"Asum.4960" said:Yea, it wouldn't take much to make Scourge more viable.

As I recently proposed in another Thread, I think I good route to go down would be to change Insidious Disruption to 2-3 Stacks of Torment from 1 (PvE only), and to make it also trigger on Corrupt usage (if boons are actually corrupted or not) in addition to triggering on CC.

That way Scourges would use Garish Pillar on CD to trigger the Trait for increased DPS, drastically reducing their available LF, replacing Nefarious Favor and Sand Cascade in usage, therefor lowering a DPS Scourge's support capabilities, essentially nullifying the condi cleanses and allied Barriers it applies (outside of the Heal skill), as tradeoff for the increased damage.

At the same time it would bring another weapon, Off Hand Dagger into viability to replace the condi Transfer lost with Plague Sending which is needed for Blood is Power, as well as give Corrupts at least some value in general PvE by providing extra damage, even against boonless foes which are the vast majority.

Some other similar minor changes could be increasing Dhuumfire's Burn from 1 to 2 stacks of Burning (possibly PvE only, although in conjunction with Scourge this Trait has already been utterly killed in competitive modes anyway), and possibly also doubling the burning on Sadistic Searing to two Stacks, considering it's a fairly slow and clunky interaction with having to use a specific Utility and then place a Shade to get value, one little burn always felt slightly underwhelming as pay off.

Now I doubt at this point Scourge could compete with the likes of condi Renegade and such still, but it would have to be tested.At least it would be closer.

Idk why Anet takes months to years (if at all) to even just play around with some Traits like this in minor ways, just adding a bit here and there to underperforming things until they are pushed into an acceptable range.

They are either doing nothing at all, or go for some "major" rework like Death Magic or Blood Bank which generally completely misses the mark as just yet another obscure and niche/unused thing which doesn't fix any of the issues of the profession anywhere.It's a mystery.

I'm not on board with Insidious Disruption being bumped to 3 stacks, that's too much for a minor. That puts it well above Terror, which it already is stronger than terror, which should tell you something about terror... 2 I feel would be fine, maybe, but its not going to change much as you're sacrificing a lot to take it with a dagger. you slow your rotation way way down by doing that without much payoff for doing it. So its not a change I'd make.

As for Dhuumfire change, the only change I'd make is to remove the 1 second internal cooldown. Its needless complication to the rotation and punishes the player way too much for such a small burst of damage. If I changed Dhuumfire at all it would be to Add some burn duration on top of its ability as well. So like a 20% burn duration plus the Burn on shroud skill 1. Necromancer doesn't have a tone of sources of burning outside of scourge so it would just be nice to have. But not at all necessary imo.

Some changes I'm more looking at for Scourge specific would be to Change Manifest Sand Shade's Torment duration from 2 seconds to 3 seconds. This might not seem like much but it changes it from being a maxed at 4 seconds to 6 seconds. That's a good start.

Another thing I'd change is Harrowing Wave which I'd probably add an extra burn stack to it so its 2 for 8 seconds instead of 1 for 8 seconds. Maybe 2 for 6 seconds, but I'm not sure.

As for Other changes, I'd remove Herald of Sorrow and replace it with something else. And I'd Change Sand Savant to convert manifest sand shade to be 100% supportive.

The last change is Blood as Sand. I'd remove this entirely and replace it with some form of damage boost for allies that received barrier from you for their next attack or something.