Is core necro an option?

[Lynx.9058]

I'm not a fan of the death shroud replacements that we get with reaper or scourge, kinda got used to the standard death shroud abilities while leveling. Am I limiting myself by sticking to core?

[Taril.8619]

For PvP/WvW? Core is fine. In many cases Core Necro can be the strongest build.

For PvE? Core sucks. Reaper out performs Core by a significant amount for both Power and Condi builds. While Scourge provides Necro's only support build.

[Fueki.4753]

Core Necro certainly is an option.But it'll be far inferior to Reaper in terms of the raw, numerical value of damage.It also will have less potential for group utility than Scourge does.

[Anchoku.8142]

Core still has very poor dps against large hit boxes.

At minimum, main hand dagger should cleave 3 targets but core Necro also does not scale up well. Spite, Curses and Soul Reaping do not have enough common multipliers, Death Magic is only for Minionmancer, competitive turtling and Blood Magic is support so core is stuck. It has no dps weapons that use hybrid power/condi damage either.

Core Necro has an instanced dps problem that is exceedingly difficult to solve... after 8 years.

p.s.If it were up to me, I would add inflicting bleeds to critical hits on Quickening Thirst, make MH dagger cleave 3 as baseline, and add some condi damage to Life Blast and elsewhere in Death Shroud while maintaining the split between PvE and WvW/PvP.

[XECOR.2814]

What gamemode u want to play. Core is fine everywhere except raids and fractals.

[Lily.1935]

In terms of utility skills, weapons and traits core necromancer has excellent access to some great combinations of traits. The benefits of Core traits over elite traits do have quite a number of advantages. However this is where the good part ends. Core necromancer's primary problem is the overall clunkiness of death shroud. Because of how reliant necromancer is on the shroud mechanic, which is true for reaper and scourge, all 3 options are expected to preform while their shroud is active. In PvP where the low dedication to effective strikes matter less as life blast is one of the hardest hitting ranged attacks in the game it offers enough pressure in combination with its natural bulk to be quite threatening. Outside of competitive modes though, what would be less reliable, such as soul spiral or desert shroud damage is far more reliable due to their better scaling.

Nothing about Death shroud offers a damage boost over just auto attacking and since the projectile has a long cast and long after cast delay, its damage, although substantial, doesn't have the ability to apply enough pressure in comparison to your other options. Reaper's auto does more even if the initial hit is lower as well as both Executioner scythe and soul spiral both being DPS boosts in comparison to the auto making the kit worth it. Scourge has lower damage overall from Shades, however the shades are used in conjunction with your other skills such as Axe or Scepter to stack more smaller packets of damage to combine for greater DPS overall. The second strongest skill Life Transfer offers little in terms of damage boost more used to sustain shroud. Although its quite effective in PvP and WvW, its not what you really want to be doing in PvE. All of Core shroud skills are slow to use, even Doom which was nerfed to no longer be instant cast which means you can't use it while striking with life blast.

More problems show up when combining traits. like Reaper's Might or Dhuumfire. Although these traits are great on reaper and scourge, they're underwhelming on core necromancer being tied to the slow auto attack projectile. Core necromancer could be made into something threatening in PvE if we use the same skill modification philosophy of lingering curse. For example if Dhuumfire changed Life blast into a new skill and not just an identical skill except with burning we could see some interesting interactions. So, Lets say we got a new skill replacing life bast with Dhuumfire. Now it doesn't pierce but rather explodes. So you cast this new Dhuumfire skill, and it strikes the target once, causing burning then it explodes on contact striking foes adjacent to the target causing extra burning, making it a 2 strike skill instead of 1. This change literally doesn't need to impact the Elite specs at all, just the core.

Other options would be to replace specific moves such as Doom with Wave of Fear, giving them a better means to strike multiple foes. I'd probably also fuze Life Transfer with Tainted shackles causing Torment and a blast of short immobilize on its completion and replace Tainted shackles with Gathering Plague and add the bonus that the necromancer's next few attacks transfer conditions.

My suggested changes would make core necromancer far more usable in PvE, if not necessarily viable, but could be a bit much in PvP and WvW. Although i'm not sure on that. Overall, Core necromancer just isn't there yet.

PS: I'd also make it so Utility skills functioned in Death shroud and Reaper's shroud. Because, come on! We don't need the healing in shroud, but having access to utility would be pretty big.

[draxynnic.3719]

Depends on what you want to do, really. Necromancer is one of the professions where all the trait lines are good enough that you usually genuinely do feel like you're giving something up by taking an elite specialisation. Core necro sees play in competitive modes, and it serves well in open world and solo content as well.

It's overshadowed by reaper and scourge in high-end instanced group PvE, but let's be bluntly honest here - Necromancer as a while is overshadowed by other professions in high-end instanced group PvE. Generally speaking it's brought for Epidemic and maybe barriering up against certain mechanics and that's about it.

[Dadnir.5038]

@"Lynx.9058" said:Am I limiting myself by sticking to core?

I would say "Yes" and "No".

• Yes, because like everyone tell you, death shroud isn't exactly the best tool in game. It work sure but in PvE (if we talk about PvE at all) it will slow down your time to kill significantly compared to reaper and be less efficient than scourge in taging multiple foes.
• No, because you're less limited in your traitline choices and that can really matter. Beside, core is not as bad as it used to be, a lot of the changes since HoT gave him more sustained damage while he unfortunately lost quite a bit of burst damage (which wasn't great outside of PvP/WvW).

The real factor that limit you in PvE is the fact that you take the necromancer, because it's impact within a group is inferior to other profession's impact. This is due to the necromancer's tools (conditions and boon corruption) being significantly weaken by PvE design (mobs don't dodge, don't have CD, don't heal themself, run like Ussain Bolt even when crippled... etc. While breakbar and their high stats basically nullify their need for boons). In short PvE design naturally counter the Necromancer and ANet, while they tried to soothe the issue before HoT, seem to have given up on the the idea, focusing mainly on just giving damage to the necromancer and it's e-specs in the gamemode (because that's what players identify as the issue).

[KrHome.1920]

Core necro has something around 15k dps at the golem (reaper has 34k and every other class has between 35 and 40k). I think that sums up how pathetic it is for any PvE content. Even killing trash mobs in open world is painfully slow.

The spec is a waste of time in pve and easily outplayed in pvp and wvw. It can only shine in the competitive modes, if you have a team protecting you against any focus. Core is designed to be ridiculously tanky but immobile and low in damage. Something you don't need in pve and your encounters can easily play around in the competitive modes.

It's fair to say that core necro has the worst class design in the whole game. Reaper is quite the opposite. It has one of the best designs in the game and can work in any environment (even as dps support hybrid). Scourge is limited by its barrier-, might-, and condi cleanse support and aoe - it can not deal good damage, because its support and coverage is too good.

[Anchoku.8142]

@Lily.1935 said:PS: I'd also make it so Utility skills functioned in Death shroud and Reaper's shroud. Because, come on! We don't need the healing in shroud, but having access to utility would be pretty big.

This is pure speculation but because Death Shroud and Reaper Shroud are transformations, the empty slots may be due to not having skills available for the transform instead of Arenanet having to mask (block) the utilities that are there when untransformed. What I mean by that is we all assume shroud is kind of a visual effect and skill swap but what if it is a transformation into a different creature that really has no skills besides the ones shown and utilities are not hidden but non-existent?

[Taril.8619]

@Anchoku.8142 said:

@Lily.1935 said:PS: I'd also make it so Utility skills functioned in Death shroud and Reaper's shroud. Because, come on! We don't need the healing in shroud, but having access to utility would be pretty big.

This is pure speculation but because Death Shroud and Reaper Shroud are transformations, the empty slots may be due to not having skills available for the transform instead of Arenanet having to mask (block) the utilities that are there when untransformed. What I mean by that is we all assume shroud is kind of a visual effect and skill swap but what if it is a transformation into a different creature that really has no skills besides the ones shown and utilities are not hidden but non-existent?

It's literally the same mechanic as Holosmith. But Holosmith still gets to have its utility skills and even its toolbelt skills available while using the Holoforge.

On a side note, a similar thing happens when using Lich Form as Scourge, you still have access to your F skills during it (Though, Desert Shroud still counts as a transformation and will take you out of Lich Form... Which also highlights again, that having access to utility skills while in Shroud is possible)

[Lily.1935]

@Taril.8619 said:

@Anchoku.8142 said:

@Lily.1935 said:PS: I'd also make it so Utility skills functioned in Death shroud and Reaper's shroud. Because, come on! We don't need the healing in shroud, but having access to utility would be pretty big.

This is pure speculation but because Death Shroud and Reaper Shroud are transformations, the empty slots may be due to not having skills available for the transform instead of Arenanet having to mask (block) the utilities that are there when untransformed. What I mean by that is we all assume shroud is kind of a visual effect and skill swap but what if it is a transformation into a different creature that really has no skills besides the ones shown and utilities are not hidden but non-existent?

It's literally the same mechanic as Holosmith. But Holosmith still gets to have its utility skills and even its toolbelt skills available while using the Holoforge.

On a side note, a similar thing happens when using Lich Form as Scourge, you still have access to your F skills during it (Though, Desert Shroud still counts as a transformation and will take you out of Lich Form... Which also highlights again, that having access to utility skills while in Shroud is possible)

Desert shroud does not take you out of Lich form. I've used it as a DPS boost in Lich form to get the bonus crit.

[Xxnecroxx.4039]

@Lynx.9058 said:I'm not a fan of the death shroud replacements that we get with reaper or scourge, kinda got used to the standard death shroud abilities while leveling. Am I limiting myself by sticking to core?

option yes, is it viable/good option for competitive stuff? mostly no

[Anchoku.8142]

@Taril.8619 said:

@Anchoku.8142 said:

@"Lily.1935" said:PS: I'd also make it so Utility skills functioned in Death shroud and Reaper's shroud. Because, come on! We don't need the healing in shroud, but having access to utility would be pretty big.

This is pure speculation but because Death Shroud and Reaper Shroud are transformations, the empty slots may be due to not having skills available for the transform instead of Arenanet having to mask (block) the utilities that are there when untransformed. What I mean by that is we all assume shroud is kind of a visual effect and skill swap but what if it is a transformation into a different creature that really has no skills besides the ones shown and utilities are not hidden but non-existent?

It's literally the same mechanic as Holosmith. But Holosmith still gets to have its utility skills and even its toolbelt skills available while using the Holoforge.

On a side note, a similar thing happens when using Lich Form as Scourge, you still have access to your F skills during it (Though, Desert Shroud still counts as a transformation and will take you out of Lich Form... Which also highlights again, that having access to utility skills while in Shroud is possible)

The modern "transforms" may not work the same as old ones. Desert Shroud is a decoration and I think Holo-mode is, too. Death and Reaper Shroud are old-school. I wonder if there was a switch between how things were handled for transforms. There are a pile of older examples from Lich and Signet of Humility, activities like crab toss, that event phase at the Temple of Melandru where we are all changed into lizards... Did PoF mark a change in how programmers handles transformations?

[Asum.4960]

@KrHome.1920 said:Core necro has something around 15k dps at the golem (reaper has 34k and every other class has between 35 and 40k). I think that sums up how pathetic it is for any PvE content. Even killing trash mobs in open world is painfully slow.

The spec is a waste of time in pve and easily outplayed in pvp and wvw. It can only shine in the competitive modes, if you have a team protecting you against any focus. Core is designed to be ridiculously tanky but immobile and low in damage. Something you don't need in pve and your encounters can easily play around in the competitive modes.

It's fair to say that core necro has the worst class design in the whole game. Reaper is quite the opposite. It has one of the best designs in the game and can work in any environment (even as dps support hybrid). Scourge is limited by its barrier-, might-, and condi cleanse support and aoe - it can not deal good damage, because its support and coverage is too good.

Agree with everything except a hard disagree with

Reaper is quite the opposite. It has one of the best designs in the game

Reaper is just awful core with a ridiculously strong Shroud as band aid slapped on it to cover up Necros fatal design flaws. Scourge and Shades aren't much different, we have seen this many times with either Shades getting buffed and Scourge being OP in competitive, or Shades getting nerfed and Scourge being unuseably bad in competitive.Just the whole thing is completely unable to stand on it's own as a profession, save for that one button power mode desperately trying to make it relevant by covering up all the bad design.Reaper, rather than being an exception to that design flaw is the prime example for it.

And sure, core Necro works in a competitive environment in which enemies have ~15k HP which about anything can whittle down, similar to a bunker core guard, while being fairly hard to kill themselves with Shroud, but that's about the only environment it can somewhat shine in.

So yes, you are limiting yourself drastically by sticking with Core, more so on Necro than with any other profession, especially in PvE where I would argue for it to be by far the weakest spec in all of GW2 by quite a bit.Necro is almost entirely carried by it's profession mechanic, of which in PvE only Reaper's and Scourge's are worthwhile (to some extend).

Using the exact same gear and build, swapping a core line out for Reaper will about double to triple your damage output (to levels somewhat competitive with other professions), just on the merit of the better band aid that is Reaper Shroud.

I feel you though, Blasting things as core Necro is.. well, a blast. But it's woefully ineffective - no matter how you try to build it.

If your question about limiting yourself is just about whether you will be able to clear Open World and the Story though and nothing beyond, then no. If you don't mind being super slow, about anything can get through that content, even a Ranger Pet.

[Dadnir.5038]

@"Asum.4960"Well, it all stem from that, the rather "lackluster" out of shroud necromancer. Unfortunately, there are players that are happy with the shroud being the alpha and omega of the necromancer, a design that ANet enforced more and more since HoT.

[KrHome.1920]

@Asum.4960 said:Reaper is just awful core with a ridiculously strong Shroud as band aid slapped on it to cover up Necros fatal design flaws.I would not call a design intention a flaw.

You are meant to be in shroud at least 50% of the time on core and reaper. This is how the class is meant to be played. Core is just too simple because the shroud skills are badly designed. You basically can just use shroud to soak up damage on core necro. Instead of reworking that ANet went the easy route and increased to sustain of core shroud which pisses off every encounter that is not a glass canon so that core becomes favored against bruisers that overextend and don't disengage when they are about to lose. It's a bit like fighting a thief, when you picked a build without mobility and range. You won't have much fun.

Reaper is designed to transform into the horror monster you just want to get away from, which is also its intended counter (cc it to slow down its movement while you walk away and let the shroud degenerate or kite it with disengages or range right from the start).

When you craft a viable reaper build, you want to minimize kiting potential of your encounter and you want to maximize life force generation and shroud uptime. Then you become competitive, but in general the counters remain the same. That's not a flaw. That's a clear design philosophy (strong in shroud, weak outside) and it is better than most other spec's design. The only exception is warrior which is also well structured in its design.

The worst design you can find on ranger, which is simply a jack of all trades class: burst, aoe, soft cc, stealth, mobility, range, blocks, invulnerabilities, protection, stability... you never know what you will have to deal with before it starts to use skills.

Side Note: I am not talking about whether reaper, ranger or warrior is currently balanced or not! I am talking about how ANet wants the specs to be played.

[Asum.4960]

@KrHome.1920 said:

@"Asum.4960" said:Reaper is just awful core with a ridiculously strong Shroud as band aid slapped on it to cover up Necros fatal design flaws.I would not call a design intention a flaw.

You are meant to be in shroud at least 50% of the time on core and reaper. This is how the class is meant to be played. Core is just too simple because the shroud skills are badly designed. You basically can just use shroud to soak up damage on core necro. Instead of reworking that ANet went the easy route and increased to sustain of core shroud which pisses off every encounter that is not a glass canon so that core becomes favored against bruisers that overextend and don't disengage when they are about to lose. It's a bit like fighting a thief, when you picked a build without mobility and range. You won't have much fun.

Reaper is designed to transform into the horror monster you just want to get away from, which is also its intended counter (cc it to slow down its movement while you walk away and let the shroud degenerate or kite it with disengages or range right from the start).

When you craft a viable reaper build, you want to minimize kiting potential of your encounter and you want to maximize life force generation and shroud uptime. Then you become competitive, but in general the counters remain the same. That's not a flaw. That's a clear design philosophy (strong in shroud, weak outside) and it is better than most other spec's design. The only exception is warrior which is also well structured in its design.

The worst design you can find on ranger, which is simply a jack of all trades class: burst, aoe, soft cc, stealth, mobility, range, blocks, invulnerabilities, protection, stability... you never know what you will have to deal with before it starts to use skills.

Side Note: I am not talking about whether reaper, ranger or warrior is currently balanced or not! I am talking about how ANet wants the specs to be played.

One of the three main reasons I consider it flawed design is because it's proven to be a nightmare to balance, especially across gamemodes.While it's somewhat workable in PvP, in 8+ years since launch Necromancer was meta in PvE for what, 2 weeks? with Scourge when PoF launched? While at the same time being, well a Scourge on WvW for years.With it's profession mechanic constantly accurately cited as reason why Necro can't have x, y and z to make it a more well rounded and over all balanced profession.

The second might be more down to personal preference, but I just think it's a horrendous design decision to put both almost all offensive and defensive capabilities of a profession behind a single cooldown/mechanic, while leaving the entirety of the Profession essentially as bad and boring filler in between that cooldown/mechanic.

As I've expressed on the forums many times, I do think the Shroud mechanic could work if Necromancer was at 80% power out of Shroud and 120% in Shroud, if not less, but a at least 60% - 140% power mix imo is a terrible idea, pretty much across all gamemodes.

I just don't think it's a very engaging gameplay loop to >50% of the time feel like slowly swinging around a foam noodle or running/kiting for your life, and <50% of the time nuking everything from orbit way to fast, if not getting shut down immidiately ofc.

Thirdly, it also just limits the breadth of experience the spec can provide drastically. When I think Firebrand for example, there are so many different experiences to be had with that Spec, from a condition DPS, a condi/boon support Hybrid, a power/boon support Hybrid, a Healer, Support, Symbol Builds and many, many more niche builds, all utilizing different weapons, different Trait lines etc., that's good design.

Reaper is.. well Reaper Shroud. You press 4 to spin and autoattack within that very limited move set and then try to stay alive/build LF in a not very engaging way in the downtime, to then press 4 to spin again. That's Reaper in all gamemodes, really.

Necromancer isn't adaptable. You can't opt into more damage sacrificing sustain, selfish support vs group Utility etc, not really - because it's all just the static always same Shroud.That's again less of an issue in competitive modes or for solo/roaming purposes, because generally you both want some tankyness as well as decent damage there, but especially for PvE endgame it's just been a death sentence for the profession to not be able to specialise in anything.

Now I know my opinion of Shroud is also heavily influenced by the fact that I fell in love with the concept and theme of Necromancer in GW1, in which Shroud was not a thing and the Profession was vastly more thematic, diverse and interesting, with proper curses, proper life leeching, proper minion armies and so on.Going from that to GW2 where Necromancer is nothing but a filler for this Shroud thing still disappoints me as design decision to this day 8 years later, but I suppose that design downgrade is likely not as apparent for non GW1 vets who only know Necro as Shroud vehicle - although I do think it is objectively bad design still.

Such a design might work well for a very limited and controlled setting like a Moba/arena game, but for something as complex and diverse as an MMO I just don't think "here is your power mode with 5 skills and that's about all you are good for" is very satisfying.

@Dadnir.5038 said:@"Asum.4960"Well, it all stem from that, the rather "lackluster" out of shroud necromancer. Unfortunately, there are players that are happy with the shroud being the alpha and omega of the necromancer, a design that ANet enforced more and more since HoT.

Indeed.As mentioned above, I do think Shroud could be fine-ish if it wasn't such a drastic imbalance between in and out of Shroud. Have it be a power mode, sure, but not the be all and end all of the Profession.

Holosmith on the other hand, even though it also has the "Power Mode design" still feels like a playable profession out of it's mode CD.The Power mode supplements the Engineer profession, rather than essentially replacing it as is the case for Necromancer.

As you say, unfortunately Anet went more and more in the opposite direction and just kept piling power into Shroud while stripping down what little the actual profession outside of this one mechanic had.

Reaper especially doesn't feel like I'm playing Necromancer, it feels like I'm playing (a too strong) Reaper Shroud with some inconvenient downtime in between, in which I have to content with Necromancer before getting to actually play again.

[misterman.1530]

In WvW, I am roaming exclusively with Core Necro now. The build I have can usually handle 1v2 quite easily depending on the 2 I am facing - there are, of course, exceptions. DeadEyes are a particular problem if played well, as are Daredevils - their mobility makes them especially difficult. At times, I've faced well-played Dragon Hunters that have given me issues. But those are rare exceptions. Other necros - especially the strangely-used roaming Scourge - are simply free bags. Reapers can be more problematic, but ones that rely on minions are easily defeated. I wouldn't, however, attempt to use Core Necro in high-end PVE anymore. Reaper is a much better option there.

[Dadnir.5038]

@Asum.4960 said:Reaper especially doesn't feel like I'm playing Necromancer, it feels like I'm playing (a too strong) Reaper Shroud with some inconvenient downtime in between, in which I have to content with Necromancer before getting to actually play again.

Honestly, I said it elsewhere already but the shroud itself just feel like endure pain in GW1. For me GW2's necromancer is a gw1 warrior that tried it's hand at being a necromancer and is failing hard at it. The funniest part is that blood bank the new blood magic trait confort me even more in my opinion.

The fact that in GW1 Warrior and Necromancer have never been an especially great combination of professions for a character make an evolution of the necromancer toward what it has become in GW2 completely absurd. I'm always amazed to see that the profession that desperatly tried to have the least possible amount of health ended up with the highest health pool in GW2. I'm always amazed that the profession whose main strength was in support ended up being almost barren in term of support in GW2. I'm always amazed to see haw badly tied to the profession minion still are in gw2 when they were a cornerstone of the GW's necromancer. GW2's necromancer is an impossible evolution of gw's necromancer, no profession should become worse and forsake their greatest strength as time pass yet it happen for gw2's necromancer. I mean it's your strengths, you draw on them, you enhance them, you don't just cast them away and keep all the poorly performing tools instead.

[Anchoku.8142]

@Asum.4960Core Necromancer is the original design flaw. It was so strong in pre-release testing it was nerfed hard before the game launched in 2012. The original concept field Necro was as a debuff profession. That is a legitimate and powerful role to fill. For that reason, Necro was saddled with some trade-offs for that potency; very low cleave capability, horrid mobility and a reliance on Death Shroud for almost all sustain. DS is somewhat complicated in that it needs charging, it was the only block so it is not as if another block was available if shroud was on cool down, and it intentionally locked out skills 5 through 0.

Shortly after release, players and developers realized they had a problem. Bosses had no immunity to control effects or conditions. Introduction of Indomitable to make bosses immune to non-damaging conditions and, combined with low condition caps, lack of any boons to corrupt, no cleave on anything but staff and off-hand weapons effectively ignoring large hit boxes, and burning dps far outweighing other condi, Necro was a disaster in all game modes, even WvW because Necro constantly needed minders in zerging.

Reaper is not a band-aid. Reaper is what Necro should have been in 2012. Core Necro is the pile of bandages Arenanet could never find a purpose for or make work properly. In a way, you are correct about Reaper but my perspective is different. Reaper has intentional limitations but it is very good at what it does. Core has been buffed many, many times and still feels nerfed by a game that thought it needed a debuff profession but did not adequately plan for or execute it in PvE.

[Asum.4960]

@Dadnir.5038 said:I'm always amazed to see haw badly tied to the profession minion still are in gw2 when they were a cornerstone of the GW's necromancer. GW2's necromancer is an impossible evolution of gw's necromancer, no profession should become worse and forsake their greatest strength as time pass yet it happen for gw2's necromancer. I mean it's your strengths, you draw on them, you enhance them, you don't just cast them away and keep all the poorly performing tools instead.

It's not just Minions, but about everything Necro was about in GW1 kind of got outsourced to other professions.From Revenants Battle Scars being a better and stronger Life Leeching mechanic than all of Blood Magic (which could have really used a rework like that, rather than whatever Blood Bank is for), to Chrono/Mesmer Phantasm spam builds feeling a lot more minionmancery than anything on Necro in GW2 ever did, spamming out expendable Minions which then are actually responsible for a majority of your damage, meanwhile even sacrificing all your Utility Skills on Necro for minions (and having 0 minion interactions on weapon skills), they are still just a tiny footnote of whatever you are doing, even in conjunction with all minion supporting Traits, and even looking at the Curses -> Master of Conditions aspect of the Spec, Revenant with Mallyx and the Corruption line just blows Necro and Curses out of the water, with most classes (Mesmer, Warrior, Engineer, Elementalist, Guardian, Ranger, Revenant) having drastically more powerful condition build options than Necro.

The only unique theme and mechanic/line Necro really kept from the original was Soul Reaping, which if anything just proved to be problematic in terms of balancing due to the variability of how much resources Necro has access to in different situations.Outside of the resource that power's Necro, there is then just nothing unique it can actually do with it.The three Necro archetypes of either massively debilitating enemies with unique Curses, leeching Life with Blood Magic or commanding and sustaining a minion horde with Death Magic are just not present in GW2 other than in name for lacklustre Trait lines, each of which just not enabling that playstyle.Neither the Utility Minion skills for DM, Dagger 2 and Vampiric Presence as BM or Scepter and some Torment on Scourge for Curses really feel like they dig deep enough and fully utilitize what made Necromancer Necro.

Condi Scourge probably comes closest to one of the Archetypes in what a Curse Necro should have been, but was once again held back by the Shade design.For Blood Magic and Death Magic there is just no support on the profession though, and Core and Reaper ended up just being Shroud vehicles, rather than enabling any of the Necro's thematic and mechanical core tenets.

@Anchoku.8142 said:Core Necromancer is the original design flaw. It was so strong in pre-release testing it was nerfed hard before the game launched in 2012.

Wasn't that the same story with every Necro spec? Reaper launched too strong in HoT as well and then was drastically overnerfed for years to come, same with Scourge in PoF, pretty much proving every single time that the Core just doesn't work, and fixing it by slapping a new F mechanic on it as band-aid being a balancing nightmare since it has to carry all the burden. If the profession mechanic is slightly too strong, Necro is OP, if it's slightly to weak, Necro is useless.Imo the correct way to design Necro and it's Specialisation would be to completely remove the Profession mechanic out of the picture, then design a fun and competitive Profession, and to then layer the profession mechanic back on top while tuning down the core accordingly to it's strength.What Anet instead did is just focus entirely on the profession mechanic, trying to tune it over and over to make sense with the lacklustre core without addressing any of it's issues - which is why I consider the whole Shroud thing a band-aid.

The original concept field Necro was as a debuff profession. That is a legitimate and powerful role to fill. For that reason, Necro was saddled with some trade-offs for that potency; very low cleave capability, horrid mobility and a reliance on Death Shroud for almost all sustain. DS is somewhat complicated in that it needs charging, it was the only block so it is not as if another block was available if shroud was on cool down, and it intentionally locked out skills 5 through 0.

Shortly after release, players and developers realized they had a problem. Bosses had no immunity to control effects or conditions. Introduction of Indomitable to make bosses immune to non-damaging conditions and, combined with low condition caps, lack of any boons to corrupt, no cleave on anything but staff and off-hand weapons effectively ignoring large hit boxes, and burning dps far outweighing other condi, Necro was a disaster in all game modes, even WvW because Necro constantly needed minders in zerging.

Exactly, Necro was essentially the sole Profession more or less designed for a different game. Thief suffered somewhat from that as well, with it's Blinds not working against anything where it actually matters as one of it's main defenses at the time, but generally everything else had different options of contributing.Necro just ended up being a debuffer in a game (PvE) where debuffs don't exist/work.

Reaper is not a band-aid. Reaper is what Necro should have been in 2012. Core Necro is the pile of bandages Arenanet could never find a purpose for or make work properly. In a way, you are correct about Reaper but my perspective is different. Reaper has intentional limitations but it is very good at what it does. Core has been buffed many, many times and still feels nerfed by a game that thought it needed a debuff profession but did not adequately plan for or execute it in PvE.

Don't get me wrong, when I call Reaper Shroud a band-aid (which it is) to make Necro viable by slapping that on top of it (together with utterly uninspiring creeped Traits like Death Perception and Reaper's Onslaught), I'm not saying I inherently disagree with the existence and concept of Reaper.I do think Necromancer has a space for that Death Knight brawler concept, absolutely.My problem rather is that instead of it being available as an option and deviation from the Blood Magic caster/brawler, the Curses debuffer/caster and the Minion Master, that Shroud Brawler is all we got in GW2, outside of later on Scourge somewhat filling that curses role.

In a way I suppose I almost wish they would keep Reaper as the Shroud brawler and make that unique to it, Scourge as the Curses Caster, and then completely rework Core Necro to be Shroudless, with it's Fx skills either being all about Blood Magic and life leeching or summoning various minions, with the next and probably last Elite Specialisation filling the other Archetype.

That way, all the Archtypes would be represented in a way, Soul Reaping being emphasised in Reaper, Curses in Scourge, and Blood Magic and Death Magic either in core or the new End of Dragons Spec.

Right now it just feels bad to have one bad Shroud Spec, one good Shroud Spec and one problematically designed Shade spec, non of which really caters to the Blood Magic, Death Magic or even just slightly the Curse Magic aspects that defined Necromancer in the original.

[waxx.3619]

For PvE ? No. But for PvP and WvWvW ? Oh yes! I think Necro is one of the few classes whose Core specs are still viable if not better than elite for PvP.

[Tukaram.8256]

I play PvE only, mostly solo. My core necro is by far my favorite avatar. I run him as a minion master with a staff, dropping marks everywhere.

[Shroud.2307]

Not answering the OP's question, but it has been an interesting read through these comments.

I just want to say as I've said numerous times on this forum, core Necro is my singular favorite spec to play and the only one I'm passionate about. As a WvW main, I was roaming with core condi all the way up to PoF. It was shortly after the release that I needed a few months break because I was unable to handle most encounters no matter how well I played and it felt exhausting. When I returned to Necro again I instead went with power and put together a build I called "Dreadmancer" that was themed around the Dread and Fear Of Death traits. And since then I've stuck with core power builds rather than condi, though I do still play condi sometimes.

Other than a few months after PoF, I've never felt core was weak and I've always found it fun. I understand that's entirely subjective, and that objectively it has numerous design flaws, but regardless of how it was crafted I think a lot of people enjoy it as is with myself being one of the passionate ones. It may be generally simple, but it's strong if played well and rewarding to succeed with - something I don't find in many other professions/elites.

It would be nice for core to get some changes that benefit it in PvE without ruining it in WvW/PvP, but I think that would be a difficult balance to achieve. And to me, even if it doesn't, at least it's viable in other areas of the game. I think it's fine for some specs to be mostly irrelevant in some areas while being strong in others because it's difficult to make everything strong in every area of the game.