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Six years and the Necromancer is still... Underwhelming?


MrMadMan.2904

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When I started playing GW2 1-2 weeks after the initial release I decided to play the Necromancer. As it turned out Necro wasn't considered to be very good and, judging by the forums at the time, in quite a desperate need of buffs. As its rather frustrating to be playing an unwanted class in a MMORPG (I've been there before) I started to loose interest and decided to shelve the game after about a month in hope that things would get better later on. This ended up being a almost six year long break and I just recently decided to try the game out again. However, judging from the forums and different videos I've come across, the necromancer still doesn't seem to be in a very good spot and just downright bad in endgame PvE content like raids (which is what I was hoping to be doing).

So I guess my question is - is the necromancer still underwhelming or have I misinterpreted the current state of the class? Because I find it quite hard to believe that it would stay in a bad state for so long.

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Depends what game mode you want to get into. Wvw is still pretty much aoe spam and necro's aoes stack better than any other class due to pulsing boon corrupt on wells, especially with scourge adding sand shades to the aoes. Its boon rip is also pretty much mandatory, and viewed as op in pvp and wvw. Recent buffs has also given it some fangs, axe2>spinal shiver will down unaware players. (Though given the 1 3/4 sec channel on axe 2, and the lack of stealth and reliable gap closers on necro, it's hard to land this unless your target is preoccupied with something else)

In pve however, boon rip doesn't matter. Your worth as a class is dependent on either how much dps you do, or how much utility you bring, necro's peak falls behind other classes. At best it's a noob saver, good for saving your average pug in t4 and raids via blood magic traits: transfusion and ritual of life. Its dps via reaper is more competetive now, but is still the bottom, and more complex. Though most pugs will only do about 12-15k+ in raids, and around 10k+ in fractals. With the really bad ones not being able to break 5k.

EditI thought it wouldd be worth mentioning: Anet has said they don't mind dps meters so long as they only show dps. They've even worked closely with arc dps to ensure it follows their standards. Because of this, people are more willing to give pugs a shot and only kick if they can't break the 10k dps mark as a rule of thumb.

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Necromancer of 2012 was very underwhelming. Necro of 2018 is roughly competitive with all other professions.

There are still some complaints about individual skills and traits, as well as unfavorable comparisons to other professions, but the profession is not redicously under-powered, anymore.

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@"Anchoku.8142" said:Necromancer of 2012 was very underwhelming. Necro of 2018 is roughly competitive with all other professions.

There are still some complaints about individual skills and traits, as well as unfavorable comparisons to other professions, but the profession is not redicously under-powered, anymore.

I'd argue that 2012 necromancer wasn't underpowered, it was more "inadapted".

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It really is sad to hear that its actually still falling behind other classes even if its not as bad as before. Good to hear that its useful in WvW at least, even though its a game mode that I've never been very interested in. Mainly because, as said, its mostly aoe spam.

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@Dadnir.5038 said:

@"Anchoku.8142" said:Necromancer of 2012 was very underwhelming. Necro of 2018 is roughly competitive with all other professions.

There are still some complaints about individual skills and traits, as well as unfavorable comparisons to other professions, but the profession is not redicously under-powered, anymore.

I'd argue that 2012 necromancer wasn't underpowered, it was more "inadapted".

It was quite underpowered, most traits didn't synergize well, and because it is/was a mostly condi-based class on a game where you had to share a total pool of max 25 stacks for any condi with everyone else in your party, and conditions were applied first come first served, with no regard to which one is stronger, it was clearly inadequate.It took the pre-HoT reworks to condition stacks and the rework to traits that renamed them to specializations and turned out the current system, for Necro to be even close to other classes in terms of power and usability.This was 3 years later.After that Necro has suffered from mostly community hate. Every time a necromancer specialization is anywhere close to being prominent it gets it's legs cut of from under it.Reaper used to be a pretty great tank with decent damage, but we couldn't have it being effective, it had to be nerfed to the ground.

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It really depends on what you want to do.

Reaper should be viable for fractals and raids in pve, and spvp as a team fighter, especially since they hit really hard now.

There is a difference, but even that's not huge anymore, because its like 2 to 3k difference now instead of 6 to 8k difference.

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@Axl.8924 said:

@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:there was a time after HoT release that condi necro was good, it lasted a while but then about what seems like over 9000 nerfs later and now necro is complete kitten in PVE, you know the mode that makes up 80% OF THE GAME

But reaper is viable, AND.... scourge is viable for WVW and meta.

I'm really not sure what people are complaining about. Aside from the times necro has been broken op, we're in the best spot we've ever been in.

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I can't really speak for PvP/WvW, but in terms of PvE content Necromancer has come leaps and bounds forward since the beginning of the game to now. From notoriety as the class you don't take in content to four effective builds in high-end content, a very safe and effective build for open world content, a highly customizable support build that has a pure "gradient" from total support to total damage in the form of Scourge, and comparable damage levels (when played well, as I would expect of any build) to other classes in general; all of these contribute to Necro being in one of the best spots it has been in since launch.

Don't get me wrong, Necro still isn't an "optimal" choice at many raid/fractal encounters, but a lack of optimal position does not mean the class is ineffective. It still has amazing sustain/supportive ability that you can choose to incorporate into an otherwise full-damage build that allow it to operate as a fantastic "carry" build. It has really grown into a true jack-of-all-trades class that no longer suffers as much for being a master of none due to being able to do so many things effectively.

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As said above, the difference is smaller.It isnt a must, but at least necro is viable. Depending on your gamemode and skill level, necro can actually be better than instadying on a squishy top tier.

The only persistent problem with necro is Arenanet.They simply balance slow + they have this concept in their heads, that necro NEEDS to be slow and have his reactive counter skills have cast times, while the rest of the game playes a different version of guildwars...... like "midcasting an instacast through a wall".

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@Axl.8924 said:

@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:there was a time after HoT release that condi necro was good, it lasted a while but then about what seems like over 9000 nerfs later and now necro is complete kitten in PVE, you know the mode that makes up 80% OF THE GAME

But reaper is viable, AND.... scourge is viable for WVW and meta.

power reaper, and it is not consistant due to loss of dmg bonuses from scholar runes etc etc etc, also @"Lahmia.2193" best state ever? look at epi it is a shadow of a shadow of a shadow of its former self, "best state its ever been in" MY ASS

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@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:

@Axl.8924 said:

@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:there was a time after HoT release that condi necro was good, it lasted a while but then about what seems like over 9000 nerfs later and now necro is complete kitten in PVE, you know the mode that makes up 80% OF THE GAME

But reaper is viable, AND.... scourge is viable for WVW and meta.

power reaper, and it is not consistant due to loss of dmg bonuses from scholar runes etc etc etc, also @"Lahmia.2193" best state ever? look at epi it is a shadow of a shadow of a shadow of its former self, "best state its ever been in" MY kitten

I guess you just ignored the bit where I said "Aside from the times necro has been broken op".

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@Lahmia.2193 said:

@Axl.8924 said:

@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:there was a time after HoT release that condi necro was good, it lasted a while but then about what seems like over 9000 nerfs later and now necro is complete kitten in PVE, you know the mode that makes up 80% OF THE GAME

But reaper is viable, AND.... scourge is viable for WVW and meta.

power reaper, and it is not consistant due to loss of dmg bonuses from scholar runes etc etc etc, also @Lahmia.2193 best state ever? look at epi it is a shadow of a shadow of a shadow of its former self, "best state its ever been in" MY kitten

I guess you just ignored the bit where I said "Aside from the times necro has been broken op".

I agree with you that Necro has never been better as a whole. Epi still does what it was supposed to do and there are no broken-OP mechanics left for people to poke at.

Dagger has cleaveAxe is not super-weakBlood Magic and Scourge both offer real group support and enough to make the dps cost worth itPower builds are not half the dps of other professionsDowned health is also not half-sizedWe no longer are forced to choose between horn and S Walk to moveStaff has large marksand so on.

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epi does what its supposed to do? half condition duration of all condis transferred, it was the main way a condi necro could spread its damage instead of pure single targetdamage, but now its shit at even that, in PVE necros were never really OP compared to other classes like say zerker and such but still because of mainly WvW and PVP necro got 5k nerfs and is now at the bottom of the barrel

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@"Xxnecroxx.4039" said:epi does what its supposed to do? half condition duration of all condis transferred, it was the main way a condi necro could spread its damage instead of pure single target

It could have been worst, ANet could have make epi copy only 1 stack of each condition with a specific duration instead of what we got now. The very same treatment that "we heal as one!" got. In a way, necromancers are lucky here.

damage, but now its kitten at even that, in PVE necros were never really OP compared to other classes like say zerker and such but still because of mainly WvW and PVP necro got 5k nerfs and is now at the bottom of the barrel

Necromancers aren't really in a bad place right now and with each patch they are closer and closer to other professions' average damage potential, we no longer talk about a damage potential that is 20% lower than other professions, we are now only between 5%-10% lower. More than that, since PvE is your main concern, there is no longer any need for reliable blast finisher in order to complete the content, necromancer's fields type are no longer an issue in order to complete the content, The fight no longer require exclusively a high power burst that the necromancer lacked in the vanilla game, necromancer's mobility is no longer a point of shame to complete the content, necromancer can now grant might to it's allies... etc.

I won't say that the necromancer is perfect, because he isn't, but nobody can say that, outside of the exploits, he isn't in a better position than ever in PvE. Lahmia is totally right.

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Necro is still in the spot where it's only really good in bad groups. While it is viable for high end PvE content if played well, you are better off playing anything else if you are interested in speedclearing Fractals with CM's daily, or want to be welcome in Raid squads across the board, instead of just tolerated some of the time.

It's a crutch, and no good group will be excited to have you. But it is certainly viable to play and clear endgame PvE content just fine.

I have certainly noticed in Fractal CM runs when playing Necro, or having someone else join as one, that the average time to fill the LFG easily triples, if people already in the group aren't outright leaving in the first place.Personally I stay away from groups with a Necro too, and while I don't leave when one joins, I'm certainly not excited about it, considering any other profession could provide drastically higher dps and multitudes of group utility.

While I don't want to take away anyone's enjoyment of the profession, I just feel it's fair to warn people, especially new or returning players who might not have alternative options and will focus on a single profession at first, about the problems they may encounter if they choose to main this class.Just consider the alternatives, there is plenty of fun to be had on them too, even if you would enjoy Necromancer thematically the most.

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@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:epi does what its supposed to do? half condition duration of all condis transferred, it was the main way a condi necro could spread its damage instead of pure single targetdamage, but now its kitten at even that, in PVE necros were never really OP compared to other classes like say zerker and such but still because of mainly WvW and PVP necro got 5k nerfs and is now at the bottom of the barrel

Necro was doing 40k, which is way too much with epi. They were way out damaging everyone in dps, so yeah it was broken in pve.

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@Axl.8924 said:

@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:epi does what its supposed to do? half condition duration of all condis transferred, it was the main way a condi necro could spread its damage instead of pure single targetdamage, but now its kitten at even that, in PVE necros were never really OP compared to other classes like say zerker and such but still because of mainly WvW and PVP necro got 5k nerfs and is now at the bottom of the barrel

Necro was doing 40k, which is way too much with epi. They were way out damaging everyone in dps, so yeah it was broken in pve.

was it soloing bosses? no, was necro used on all bosses? no, was necros mandatory? no, was that high DPS due to good groups and allowing the jagged horrors to slowly build up due to excess heals healing the? YES, was the extra dmg from epi only from co-ordination and investing at least 2 party slots? YES

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@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:

@Axl.8924 said:

@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:epi does what its supposed to do? half condition duration of all condis transferred, it was the main way a condi necro could spread its damage instead of pure single targetdamage, but now its kitten at even that, in PVE necros were never really OP compared to other classes like say zerker and such but still because of mainly WvW and PVP necro got 5k nerfs and is now at the bottom of the barrel

Necro was doing 40k, which is way too much with epi. They were way out damaging everyone in dps, so yeah it was broken in pve.

was it soloing bosses? no, was necro used on all bosses? no, was necros mandatory? no, was that high DPS due to good groups and allowing the jagged horrors to slowly build up due to excess heals healing the? YES, was the extra dmg from epi only from co-ordination and investing at least 2 party slots? YES

It was happening because groups of necros were using epi to bounce as much damage as possible in raid.40k is more than any class does right now by quite a bit.

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@Axl.8924 said:

@Xxnecroxx.4039 said:epi does what its supposed to do? half condition duration of all condis transferred, it was the main way a condi necro could spread its damage instead of pure single targetdamage, but now its kitten at even that, in PVE necros were never really OP compared to other classes like say zerker and such but still because of mainly WvW and PVP necro got 5k nerfs and is now at the bottom of the barrel

Necro was doing 40k, which is way too much with epi. They were way out damaging everyone in dps, so yeah it was broken in pve.

Glad Bannerslave and Boon Chrono are fine though, considering the party DPS they provide, not on certain bosses, but all of them.

Considering Weaver can still pull 38k on large Hitboxes, massively cleave inflated Epi numbers of 40k sure was too much...While I actually agree Epi bouncing needed a nerf, I disagree with the fact that it came to the detriment of even a single Epi, halving it's effectiveness at it's intended purpose, because they couldn't be bothered to make Epi apply a debuff to all enemies hit, which halves the effectiveness of further Epis cast on that target to bounce back.

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