New WvW builds using Death Magic?

[EremiteAngel.9765]

I'm Hyped to try out any new DM builds you guys are finding fun or success with in WvW.Share those DM builds!

[Fellwitch.4536]

Probably are some new super secret builds but as they are secret I doubt anyone would post one :)

[EremiteAngel.9765]

@Fellwitch.4536 said:Probably are some new super secret builds but as they are secret I doubt anyone would post one :)

I heard whispers that minonmancers are back in business!

[Catchyfx.5768]

DM bottom-mid-mid for condi scourge. 30% condi protection while have protection. Great vs condi heavy fights while transfering to enemies. In pve i was able to dish out 40 stacks of poison at once. Idk if good in wvw

[len.7809]

I have a draft, Curses, DM, Scourge. With full celestial set, with 25 might, and 25 stacks bloodlust, 2.85k power, up to 3,2k armor with permanent proteccion in blob, 26k hp, 1.8k condidamage n 684 healing power. Seems pretty legit to me.

[NecroSummonsMors.7816]

I'm testin this, prob gonna test a cele variation tooThere you go, laugh in the face of any class trying to kill you with condishttp://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSwAsiZlVw8YcMRGJW8PqLfA-zVJYkRH/hEpIITlQISAJfQCieLu+pB-w

[EremiteAngel.9765]

Is there any build that can hit that sweet 25 Carapace stack Pulsing Protection?

[NecroSummonsMors.7816]

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:Is there any build that can hit that sweet 25 Carapace stack Pulsing Protection?

try the build i've linked, it's not 100% uptime but i can say an easily 75%. For sure during condi bursts su reach 30 stacks in few seconds, the point is then to matain them

[Catchyfx.5768]

@NecroSummonsMors.7816 said:

@EremiteAngel.9765 said:Is there any build that can hit that sweet 25 Carapace stack Pulsing Protection?

try the build i've linked, it's not 100% uptime but i can say an easily 75%. For sure during condi bursts su reach 30 stacks in few seconds, the point is then to matain them

its not pernament but the more you fight the more Carapace you get. Thats good design. So at some peaks you are 30 a lot, mainly in group vs group scenarios.

[len.7809]

curses 221, DM 332 or 322 if condition cleanse is an issue to you, scourge 111. Stack mantains around 27 stacks depending of weapon of choice. Celestial stat.Spite 322, DM 132, Reaper 213 if you play as power reaper, it sacrifices some burst damage by giving up soul reaping, struggles to mantain 25 stacks all the time, but is around 20-25.

[EremiteAngel.9765]

I am also thinking of trying this Poison Shaman Scourge build for group fights.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSwAYt/lNweYIsPmJWyPrvNA-zVQUaU/4gLE24IT1irKznGQ8pB-w

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

My old WvW reaper roamer is basically the same still except it’s just better now.

Shrouded removal + antitoxin = 600 toughness

You can stay soul reaping / DM or you can roll with spite / DM for more damage. If you roll spite just run with precision major stat set. Unholy sanctuary IMO is BIS but if you want the protection then you can go fervor.

You can also take DM / curses, which will make it easier to stack fervor if you are having trouble.

There’s another build I’ve yet to theorycraft which involves using Max toughness build and negating damage with passive heal procs from signet of vampirism. The idea is that you want to roll toughness major stats, and reduce damage with rise + protection from fervor (along with other damage reduction mods) to get enough damage reduction to get canceled out by passive healing procs.

[Fellwitch.4536]

@JusticeRetroHunter.7684 said:My old WvW reaper roamer is basically the same still except it’s just better now.

Shrouded removal + antitoxin = 600 toughness

You can stay soul reaping / DM or you can roll with spite / DM for more damage. If you roll spite just run with precision major stat set. Unholy sanctuary IMO is BIS but if you want the protection then you can go fervor.

You can also take DM / curses, which will make it easier to stack fervor if you are having trouble.

There’s another build I’ve yet to theorycraft which involves using Max toughness build and negating damage with passive heal procs from signet of vampirism. The idea is that you want to roll toughness major stats, and reduce damage with rise + protection from fervor (along with other damage reduction mods) to get enough damage reduction to get canceled out by passive healing procs.Nevermind!

Figured out my question :)

[Grahf.8725]

@JusticeRetroHunter.7684 said:My old WvW reaper roamer is basically the same still except it’s just better now.

Shrouded removal + antitoxin = 600 toughness

You can stay soul reaping / DM or you can roll with spite / DM for more damage. If you roll spite just run with precision major stat set. Unholy sanctuary IMO is BIS but if you want the protection then you can go fervor.

You can also take DM / curses, which will make it easier to stack fervor if you are having trouble.

There’s another build I’ve yet to theorycraft which involves using Max toughness build and negating damage with passive heal procs from signet of vampirism. The idea is that you want to roll toughness major stats, and reduce damage with rise + protection from fervor (along with other damage reduction mods) to get enough damage reduction to get canceled out by passive healing procs.

Can you post your build? Thanks.

[Catchyfx.5768]

@"EremiteAngel.9765" said:I am also thinking of trying this Poison Shaman Scourge build for group fights.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSwAYt/lNweYIsPmJWyPrvNA-zVQUaU/4gLE24IT1irKznGQ8pB-w

Yes, I was trying something like this,but with blood magic(i dont play necro usualy), but death magic same traits and scourge too except I was using Desert Empowermant.And When fights was at peak thanks to DM I was Rezzing, transfering condis back to mesmers and mainly corrupting... and hell I felt like a king of the hill( I need to say I have decent allies that knows if you support your necro little bit, he will melt enemies like hell).Bursty classes are still hard counter, but you have to jumping puzzle anyway(before patch too). But in coordinated groups, its good. You put Shade on the node and dancing in it. And pulsing protection (enhanced thanks to traits) is preeety strong. I like those changes. Especialy for PvP. I hope it will be useful in PvE endgame too(poison builds)

[Nimon.7840]

Tried it for power reaper, and it sucked.-to hard to build up and especially maintaining 25 stacks against any decent opponent (at least for my playstyle.)

• seems like it's more for a Condi build
• but there I got a problem. You can just play trailblazer, that gives enough tankyness

To me. It feels more like the traitline is still a pure open world pve traitline.And if I look at warriors tactic rework, the deathmagic rework feels like a huge joke.Tactics seems to be much more spicier (but I don't play warrior)

[Stand The Wall.6987]

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSwAc2FjRYZgjrjYjB-zlTQyFAA-w

small team build with antitoxinyou can run locust, spec walk/ armor, corrupt boon, suffer, or rise + lich and necromantic corruptionreapers onslaught or blighters boon for even more sustain loltry to stay in shroud for at least 10 seconds every timemaybe reapers onslaught + corrupters fervor with diviners and stack some boons

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

@Grahf.8725 said:

@"JusticeRetroHunter.7684" said:My old WvW reaper roamer is basically the same still except it’s just better now.

Shrouded removal + antitoxin = 600 toughness

You can stay soul reaping / DM or you can roll with spite / DM for more damage. If you roll spite just run with precision major stat set. Unholy sanctuary IMO is BIS but if you want the protection then you can go fervor.

You can also take DM / curses, which will make it easier to stack fervor if you are having trouble.

There’s another build I’ve yet to theorycraft which involves using Max toughness build and negating damage with passive heal procs from signet of vampirism. The idea is that you want to roll toughness major stats, and reduce damage with rise + protection from fervor (along with other damage reduction mods) to get enough damage reduction to get canceled out by passive healing procs.

Can you post your build? Thanks.

This is what i'm currently running.http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSDFcsFa4YFmnZZTKBP+rz2NA-z1gY7wIBbiK4EpwhkpUoXFQPjAJfQCk9wbpIxN-w

It's actually not optimized yet with the DM update, but the build still works (and actually performs better) But as you can tell, the build gives you 600 toughness on top of the 1700 toughness already there. So i might plan on just changing the gear around to lose some toughness, so that i can max out crit without soul reaping, and then take whatever trait line i want...whether it be Spite, Curses, Blood Magic, who knows.

Also if your wondering about summon bone minions, i incorporate it into my build strictly for building life force. Technically you don't need this utility in wvw as much as you would in spvp, but it's also useful just to keep it on your bar in wvw (normally you'd swap it out for some other utility before going into an engagement). If you desire to keep it on your build, you use it by setting it to autoattack so that the minions instakill themselves upon summon, giving you 15% LF per minion if you have Soul Reaping and DM. It's a reliable 30% LF every 16 seconds it's really not bad to have it on your bar during a fight.

Also, Spectral Walk can be changed for Spectral Armor (or Spectral Grasp) if you would like more life force more often. Spectral Walk is very nice, but you will only be using it for it's teleport abilities since this build already has massive condi cleanse potential.

[Axl.8924]

@JusticeRetroHunter.7684 said:

@Grahf.8725 said:

@JusticeRetroHunter.7684 said:My old WvW reaper roamer is basically the same still except it’s just better now.

Shrouded removal + antitoxin = 600 toughness

You can stay soul reaping / DM or you can roll with spite / DM for more damage. If you roll spite just run with precision major stat set. Unholy sanctuary IMO is BIS but if you want the protection then you can go fervor.

You can also take DM / curses, which will make it easier to stack fervor if you are having trouble.

There’s another build I’ve yet to theorycraft which involves using Max toughness build and negating damage with passive heal procs from signet of vampirism. The idea is that you want to roll toughness major stats, and reduce damage with rise + protection from fervor (along with other damage reduction mods) to get enough damage reduction to get canceled out by passive healing procs.

Can you post your build? Thanks.

This is what i'm currently running.

http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSDFcsFa4YFmnZZTKBP+rz2NA-z1gY7wIBbiK4EpwhkpUoXFQPjAJfQCk9wbpIxN-w

It's actually not optimized yet with the DM update, but the build still works (and actually performs better) But as you can tell, the build gives you 600 toughness on top of the 1700 toughness already there. So i might plan on just changing the gear around to lose some toughness, so that i can max out crit without soul reaping, and then take whatever trait line i want...whether it be Spite, Curses, Blood Magic, who knows.

Also if your wondering about summon bone minions, i incorporate it into my build strictly for building life force. Technically you don't need this utility in wvw as much as you would in spvp, but it's also useful just to keep it on your bar in wvw (normally you'd swap it out for some other utility before going into an engagement). If you desire to keep it on your build, you use it by setting it to autoattack so that the minions instakill themselves upon summon, giving you 15% LF per minion if you have Soul Reaping and DM. It's a reliable 30% LF every 16 seconds it's really not bad to have it on your bar during a fight.

Also, Spectral Walk can be changed for Spectral Armor (or Spectral Grasp) if you would like more life force more often. Spectral Walk is very nice, but you will only be using it for it's teleport abilities since this build already has massive condi cleanse potential.

That's pretty impressive amount of toughness if you can get the ferocity in gear alone to replace the loss.

If you can 1600 toughness is very impressive I gotta say.

[Redpawa.4108]

A couple of notes about Death Magic Reapers.

• SR/DM works out a lot better than S/DM. Yes you lose damage but if you are taking DM you aren't going to be the burstiest cannon on the block. Unyielding blast on it's own provides one of the largest benefits to carapace uptime out of all traits (+2 Carapace On shroud autoattack)
• To cover your might loss Well of power can be slotted, It also gives you stability so you aren't wasting your protection on being a ball for the other team and some extra condi-clear to proc Shrouded Removal
• For sustaining your protection you will need a source of increased boon duration. Something like Commanders or Diviners is best, or you can run a runeset to provide boon duration. The breakpoint is ~30% increased duration as it allows you to stack up on protection to last across your shroud downtime.

[Nimon.7840]

The problem is how deaths carapace works.You will get max. 2 procs of protection from corrupters fervor ( 3 in very rare cases), if you manage to hit above 25 stacks kinda fast (from rs4 for example)But the problem is maintaining those stacks. It seems like you can't overwrite them.So if you are at 30. And your first stack has 1 second left, but you would apply a new stack to yourself, you simply loose the new stack and after one second, you drop the first stack as well.

That's what my impression was, playing with deathmagic.Overall it requires a huge change of playstyle using deathmagic on a power reaper and in my opinion, the effort isn't anywhere near the value.Revs can still burst you to death, Weaver's still outsustain you, mesmers burst you, thiefs outmove you, warriors still stunlock you, guards still burst you (especially those Condi guards), rangers outrange you. The only matchup that is better now seems Holo to me. But that's mainly due to holo nerfs and not to deathmagic.

Overall deathmagic is still lackluster for power builds in my opinion. Didn't try a Condi build yet. Only played one in pve endgame.

[Redpawa.4108]

From my play experience the niche of a SR/DM Power Reaper is definitely in group plays. While your sustain is lacking while soloing you can be a relatively effective cleave/frontline if you have any healers. As someone who has been running DM since before the patch the main change that it actually made was freeing up the raw stat bonuses (600 toughness, 300 power) up while you are out of shroud, and allowing permanent protection uptime with some building.

[KrHome.1920]

Some thoughts after intensive testing against some legendary division players (Dragonhunter (the best DH I've ever seen - don't ever say DH is underpowered!!!), Soulbeast, Weaver, Spellbreaker, Holosmith):

DM's sustain capability is still worse than Soul Eater was when it could heal in shroud.DM is still worse than picking Curses, change the amount of crit chance (180 Precision+Fury) that Curses grants you to Toughness in your gear and benefit from (almost) permanent Weakness and frequent Corruptions.

DM forces you to build up your defense which opens easy counters for your targets. A simple hit and run playstyle results in the whole traitline becoming useless.

With Spite/DM/Reaper and Marauder gear I lost every encounter to the examples above. With Spite/Curses/Reaper and Paladin gear I won every one by just changing one or two utility skills between the encounters.

TL;DR: Don't waste your time on DM unless you are a PvE Minion Master.

edit: I did not test condi builds. I might come to a different result there.

[JusticeRetroHunter.7684]

I think the major issue with the rework is the buff itself. 20 toughness per stack is nice and all, but it’s simply not intriguing enough. There needs to be something more unique than just 20 toughness.

Straight damage reduction, condition damage reduction...a mixture of the two or some other more unique mechanic is needed if we really want this spec to be taken to a serious level where investing in it makes sense.

I think anet is on the right track with the new rework, but they need to either diversify the buff, make it stronger or allow the buff to be shared with allies to increase its actual usefulness.

[XECOR.2814]

After a lot of testing on all specs core, reaper and scg both power and condi i came to conclusion that DM is not good as defense line to replace blood magic as it provides no way to resustain, defenses it does provides are not enough to replace the utility from soul reaping and the stat increase is nowhere near justifiable to replace offensive traitlines like spite and curses. In short you lose too much and your build is almost non functional in some parts if you take dm and not any other trait lines.

My suggestion: remove the passive ticks of heal from unholy sanctuary. Make it so that we get heal everytime we gain a carapace stack so that the trait relies more on the traitline mechanic and is reliable resustain.

Imo DM should be the goto for condi builds and blood magic for power just because of lifesteal ticks scale with power and the fact that vampiric heals based on number of hits which power has more than condi. As of now we are stuck with blood magic for both condi and power builds.