Looking for a resilient reaper build for wvw

[Al Masone.1274]

Hi, I'd like to play reaper in wvw without going 100% offensive (zerk, marauder) but trying to incorporate defensive stats if they make sense. 

I'm kinda looking at knight stats, as necro already has a high base health pool but lacks toughness, and doesn't gain additional stats from bonus vitality anyway. It's true that I lose ferocity, but if I take death's perception and reaper's onslaught that shouldn't be a problem?

Reddit says that everything is viable so maybe there is a way to make it work?

[ZeftheWicked.3076]

I'm not a dedicated wvw necro...but still - bad idea.
reapers are extremely vulnerable to kiting in wvw. Rangers and Deadeyes will make you hate your life.

If you want power build that sustains, try core necro. Much more tanky and better when facing ranged opponents.
If it has to be a reaper i would suggest going condi. Both condi weapons are ranged, making it much harder to fight you at range that is not 1200+, and condi builds have much more room for defensive gear stats than power ones (need only 2 stats to deal damage not 3). Additionally condi naturally synergizes well with your projectile block (CPC) and Death Magic carapace staking with Corrupter's fervor, further strenthening your defense!

[misterman.1530]

2 hours ago, ZeftheWicked.3076 said:

I'm not a dedicated wvw necro...but still - bad idea.
reapers are extremely vulnerable to kiting in wvw. Rangers and Deadeyes will make you hate your life.

If you want power build that sustains, try core necro. Much more tanky and better when facing ranged opponents.
If it has to be a reaper i would suggest going condi. Both condi weapons are ranged, making it much harder to fight you at range that is not 1200+, and condi builds have much more room for defensive gear stats than power ones (need only 2 stats to deal damage not 3). Additionally condi naturally synergizes well with your projectile block (CPC) and Death Magic carapace staking with Corrupter's fervor, further strenthening your defense!

 

Am in agreement. Rangers and Deadeyes will make your life miserable. Reapers are GREAT at clearing camps, taking on a tower Lord. That sort of thing. Not bad in small roaming groups as long as you have one or two people keeping the condis cleansed (edit: and stability/blocks up). But roaming...nah. I love seeing a solo Reaper or solo Scourge when I'm on my Core Necro. Free bags. Even better is a solo Minion Mancer (either Reaper or Scourge) - very squishy.

Edited August 24, 2021 by misterman.1530
Adding in bit about stability and blocks

[Shroud.2307]

17 hours ago, Al Masone.1274 said:

Hi, I'd like to play reaper in wvw without going 100% offensive (zerk, marauder) but trying to incorporate defensive stats if they make sense. 

I'm kinda looking at knight stats, as necro already has a high base health pool but lacks toughness, and doesn't gain additional stats from bonus vitality anyway. It's true that I lose ferocity, but if I take death's perception and reaper's onslaught that shouldn't be a problem?

Reddit says that everything is viable so maybe there is a way to make it work?

Been using this for 3+ years. Works fine for me. High damage while still having enough durability to trade hits. I built it inspired by the stats of Demolisher Amulet in PvP.
Note that for this build to work you need Pack Runes to have a reasonable amount of Crit Chance. Otherwise, you'll need to drop some Cavalier or go Curses over Spite. Curses is also a good choice though.

[KrHome.1920]

Knights gear is trash in WvW. Don't use it! Soldier is superior in every possible way.

 

Reasons:

- Soldier has power as main stat, which is something you should aim for on any power reaper build.

- Toughness as main stat is useless compared to toughness as secondary stat (the toughness scaling at 3k armor becomes bad)

- At the end of the day you deal as much damage with a soldier build as with a knights build (less crits but higher base damage), while soldier has a lot better sustain.

 

I tested both attribute combinations in WvW for a long time.

[HowlKamui.5120]

11 hours ago, ZeftheWicked.3076 said:

I'm not a dedicated wvw necro...but still - bad idea.
reapers are extremely vulnerable to kiting in wvw. Rangers and Deadeyes will make you hate your life.

If you want power build that sustains, try core necro. Much more tanky and better when facing ranged opponents.
If it has to be a reaper i would suggest going condi. Both condi weapons are ranged, making it much harder to fight you at range that is not 1200+, and condi builds have much more room for defensive gear stats than power ones (need only 2 stats to deal damage not 3). Additionally condi naturally synergizes well with your projectile block (CPC) and Death Magic carapace staking with Corrupter's fervor, further strenthening your defense!

It's true that reapers are extremely kite-able. Core necro (condi or power) is the best spec for solo roaming. 

It's very easy to kill deadeyes or longbow rangers with core necros. But then again, if the thief wanted to disengage and he knows how to manage his cooldowns and initiative, he can, because he is a thief, so if thieves run away, take it as a W.

If you really want to play as a Reaper, then there is a boon corrupt build that's running full celestial (so both power and condi damage) in youtube by Vallun that you can use as a guide. He does admit though that it's better for group play over solo roaming tho.

[SummonMinion.7306]

I've been roaming on reaper for years and it's incredibly easy to stomp down rangers (esp. those who are way too reliant on longbow/shortbow) as long as you have Corrosive Poison Cloud (CPC) on your utility bar. I never roam without this because it's an 8 sec middle finger to all pew pew builds. Learn how to chain your CC skills and how to dance around CPC and being kited won't be an issue.

CPC is always the first skill I drop in combat since most ranged builds nowadays are lazy/predictable and blow their burst within the first few seconds of a fight.  

[ASP.8093]

Are you asking for a roaming build?

 

You can take some Cavalier and Knight's gear for extra Toughness, but you might want to consider your runes first. Rune of Durability is very popular with roamers because it combines Toughness, +15% boon duration, a modest health multiplier, and Protection. Some reapers really like Rune of Speed because it makes it much easier to escape bad fights or run down people trying to kite you (take it alongside Speed of Shadows and Spectral Walk).

 

If you're looking for full facetank mode, some kind of condi tank build may be more your style. It's not great at focusing down targets quickly, though.

[Al Masone.1274]

I'm actually looking for a group oriented build. I don't really like roaming, especially with reaper

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

FWIW. Shroud, protection, peppercorn food, frost aura, and infusing terror all stack additively. You can get 100% damage reduction in shroud that way. I was literally taking  0 damage  while roaming tonight. A memebeast using Rapid Fire is useless if you have 100% damage reduction. You can build it to also take 0 condition damage while in shroud at the same time. Bear in mind that this would only be while in shroud, once it drops if you have any significant condi stacks on you, then you'll drop fast. It's also boon reliant so if protection gets stolen/stripped you'll have some issues.

 

But  if  you want to take  some defensive stats anyway then mix some Valkyrie gear in. Go get some Karka potions. Easy +150 toughness.

[The Boz.2038]

Your access to swiftness, cripple and chill, combined with GS5, Shroud2, Spectral Grasp would lead you to think you have your chase game down. Nope. GS5 and SG will be evaded casually, walked out of, blocked, or reflected. Your one gap close will not prove fruitful most of the time. Sticking to a larger team (5 and up) will work much better. Small-squad roaming, etc.

For that, Marauder stats with a few other pieces of more survival-friendly gear works wonders. Valkyrie works great with free crit chance. Commander or Vigilant also work. Crusader, too, theoretically. 

[Klowdy.3126]

If I might ask, without derailing the thread too much, how does reaper do in low end ranked? I'd like to play around a bit, but I wasn't sure if they were just useless to the team. Reaper is kinda the only spec I enjoy, so I was hoping to be somewhat competitive. Sorry for the off topic question. I just didn't think it needed a whole thread when this was pretty close.

[Redpawa.4108]

Once the bug is fixed the build I use is http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSwAEdjlJw8YKsFWJW2WltcA-zRJYiRNfhEYCURFUSIYyBIg9wXR/A-e. The constant boon denial is enough to make basically all boonbeasts run, and the weakness spam doesn't make thieves particularly happy either.
That said I haven't run the build in a while so try it at your own risk.

Alternatively you can run http://gw2skills.net/editor/?PSwAEdjlJw8YcMFWJeeXptcA-zxIY6omvMCMFqoCs+QIkeUPQGBE-e but ever since the DM rework it lost pretty much all of it's pressure. Still unlikely to die.

[pcgamefreak.5208]

On 8/24/2021 at 5:55 AM, Al Masone.1274 said:

Hi, I'd like to play reaper in wvw without going 100% offensive (zerk, marauder) but trying to incorporate defensive stats if they make sense. 

I'm kinda looking at knight stats, as necro already has a high base health pool but lacks toughness, and doesn't gain additional stats from bonus vitality anyway. It's true that I lose ferocity, but if I take death's perception and reaper's onslaught that shouldn't be a problem?

Reddit says that everything is viable so maybe there is a way to make it work?

 

As it stands in 2023, Necro has no defense...no matter how much toughness, vit or carapace you stack, you're always going to take damage like paper even 'tho' Necro isn't a paper class like thief, 'eles' and mesmer.  In fact, those paper classes have more sustain than the Necro (with hacking or ArenaNet Babying).  The "Devs" some how concluded the ridiculous theory that Necro's shroud is enough defense, when you're spending more time out of shroud than you are in shroud, especially since you can't instantly fill Life Force when it drains.  Necro is the worst class concept of all the classes.  In order to get any real boons, you have to run Scourge and steal them.  Here's the issue with that...  Too many players are running around immune to the Necro or they cast 'invul.'  They may not have many boons to steal or ones that are not as helpful to the Necro.  Necro boons come and go super fast, so there's no sustain from them anyway.  If you want the most boons, you wanna steal from a larger group like a Zerg but the thing is, you're going to die trying to run through a Zerg to steal boons.

 

If you want sustain, get on a Willbender, end of story....  The Necro class is dead.

 

Funny thing....  I was playing around on my Mesmer in WvW and I don't play Mesmer well at all.  A Reaper attacked me and I ended up killing the Reaper without really knowing what to do on the Mesmer and sure didn't do much at all.  Yeah....  THAT'S HOW DEAD THE NECRO CLASS IS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

I know this is the necro forums, but common it's a year old thread...