Necro primary isn't worth it

[Teufel Eldritch]

I have been playing a PvE N/Mo. I am at level 17. Last night I came to the sad realisation that Necro sux. I say sad because I originally loved the concept of the Necro profession. Necro spells help in the lower levels but once you get up to Lion's Arch & beyond they dont do diddly.

The time I spent playing this character I feel has been wasted. I was thinking that as I progressed thru the game that the Necro skills would get better. Well some Necro skils are cool but overall the Necro is a pretty weak & worthless class. Whenever I go out on a quest I invaribly end up taking more Monk skills than Necro skills because they are more useful to the team. I wanted to play as a Necro primary not as a Monk primary. If I had known that Necros were going to be this useless I would have taken Monk as my primary or chosen a diff profession all together. Now I know I can just start up another character but darnit! then all the time spent on this one was wasted... WASTED. I guess that is part of the game. Live & learn.

Mebbe I am not playing Necro correctly or something but for the life of me I don't see how someone with all Necro spells or mostly Necro spells is going to survive against Tengu or the Undead. The Undead seem to have a resistance to hex spells(or is it another spell caster protecting them?) which negates what little power a Necros has(many of the useful & offensive spells a Necro has are hex spells) and the Tengu are melee monsters that will chew up a Necro & spit him out in less than 5 seconds. Necro are liablity to a team as they take up a slot that could be used for a more useful class...such as Monk or a Warrior or even a Mesmer(Everybody says that Mesmers are the weakest class... I do not agree. Necros are imo. H E double L just the other night I was playing & my party was using a Mesmer as a tank! And we were sucessful in the quest).

Again... mebbe I am not playing Necro correctly... but I don't see how ANYONE can be effcient as a primary Necro once they get to & past Lion's Arch.

I am so disheartend, so dispirited by this that I don't even really want to play the game anymore.

[HyperK2]

Maybe you just use the wrong kind of necro skills. I have yet to decide to fully dedicate myself to either Blood or curses, but I know i dont like death magic. I lean a bit towards blood magic but like i said some of those curses help too. I don't use necro primary, but i think your talking about the skills really which i get. I like the AOE Degeneration plus lifedrain combo, but then again i still have a ways to go in getting skills

[The Fox]

Well i only got to play the first two early release days, since i've been at school and haven't been able to pick up my preorder. However, in those days I got past lions arch with my necro/monk and enjoyed it the whole way. Contrary to these posts, I remember being one of the semi-tank characters that usually killed faster than my allies. Maybe this was due to the fact that necros have access to some very useful spells early game while other classes might now; however, i really like the necro and think LOL don't flame me for this... i think my build is going to be great in pvp too.

[Forefall]

Often my most useful party member is a minion summoning necro. Wow do they ever add meat and damage to our team. And then with abilities like "taste of death" and "death nova" they're a powerful force.

I never clear down a lane as fast as I do with a minion summoning necro. I've actually been so impressed with necros that I'm considering playing my alt as a necro primary.

[TopGun]

A Necromancer/Monk? In RP terms, that's the most backwards thing I've ever heard. Since when do all-holy priests turn the dead into mindless abomonitations?

[Tanik]

A Necromancer/Monk? In RP terms, that's the most backwards thing I've ever heard. Since when do all-holy priests turn the dead into mindless abomonitations?

Ehrm it would be the other way around since he is a necro primary, and since when do all priests worship the gods of peace and serenity? now if you read into the lore of GW's it claims that the gods dont war amongst each other and all worked together to bring magic into the world then split it apart because the mortal races were becoming greedy... or something i cant remember precisly its getting kinda late here. Anyways in this babble ive tried to point out that in GW's the gods made it possible for any combination of classes, but i am kinda peeved that chars that worship only one god dont gain slighty more power from them... like a pure healing monk worships only Dwyana while a healer/smiter worships balthazar and Dwyana(sp on both those names?). You would think Dwyana would be abit more pleased at the monk who devoted himself to her... wouldnt you?

[Grimdar]

I've reached lvl 13 .. Necro/Elem only to realize that the vast majority of necro spells aren't great. At first, I held off thinking maybe later in the game there would be some good spells which is unfortunately not the case. I reached Lions Gate, and it becomes unbearably difficult for a necro after this point. I've found myself to rely on elementalist skills to survive for the time being, but tomorrow I'm starting a new character.

This comes from someone who defended the necro primary profession in the past!

[Amanita Device]

Well their main ability doesn't seem that special.

If I recall correctly they gain energy when an enemy dies near them.

Wow.

Compare that to some of the other professions main abilities.

[Argent]

they cant be that bad, my cousin has a level 18 necro/ele and is doing fine.

[ZennZero]

Well their main ability doesn't seem that special.

If I recall correctly they gain energy when an enemy dies near them.

Wow.

Compare that to some of the other professions main abilities.

To be more precise, they gain energy whenever anything dies. This includes minions which are key to using Soul Reaping to its maximum. If are constantly generating minions and have some points in soul reaping you should be pulling in energy fairly quickly in PvE. I admit that in PvP it is much less useful.

[Deagol]

I played a R/N Beast and Minion Master in the last beta, and I ruled in PvE. Sucked in PvP though.

I only used two R skills, and my beast was useless. I only kept it because!

Spend all my energy on my N skills. The key skill was Verata's Sacrifice, which allowed me to keep my minions alive for a long time, and build quite impressive armies. They didn't do that much damage, but swarmed the enemies so the rest of my team could kill them without problems.

The other way to play a minion master is to use your minions as suicide bombers with Death Nova. Takes a lot more timing skill, but is very efficient once you master it.

[Defafnyr]

If you want a character that will play well in PVP, I'd highly recommend playing first some of the pre-made ones and jump into pvp for a day, play around with making a custom made ones. See which primary and combo work best for you. THEN go and start a brand new newbie rp character and have fun nursing it to 20 knowing you're going to like it when you get there as you've already had a chance to test it out.

That way you won't feel you've wasted your time building a character that sucked when you got to 20.

Glad I did.

[Alcoy The Defiled]

I love my Nec/Ele because I am death and it is the best possible combo for this. This is because I can make my Bone Fiends cost 5 energy instead of 25 and when they die I gain some of my energy back. It is also very important to get Death skill as high as possible (Allows to keep minions alive longer with Blood of the Master), thus, you need Superior Runes. Lastly my character looks pretty cool, thanks 4 black dye, and I will never run out of a gold because of my Ele secondary. Stick with what you like and not what other people think, I was going to quit for a while and then I got Bone Fiends and I am much happier.

[Gbuslayer]

My buddys a 20 necro/rogue and he does fine and uses a wand not a bow, he said it was difficult to get his newer skills but he has em now and says it rocks(it took me and a friend an hour to get the same point across to him that you need to use what works for you) he'd simply grab spells that looked good when he should be concentrating on only 2 of the magicks per mission

as for a tanking mesmer i'm an elementalist and I tank half the time since my teams are never fast enough for my liking and I have to be taking hits in order to step things up

[Sam Katha]

Necro skills are for the most part "support skills" as such Necros make great secondaries. A primary Necro is always going to play in the background, you dont kill the enemies but you make it alot easier for your team to kill them. If your looking for glory Necro is not the way to go. If you are a team player your good to go. Everything in this game is balanced for team play so you need to look at the skills in that light.

[Fallen Rain]

I don't have a lot to add to Necro primary use in PVE because my PVE character is a War/Necro. I was Axe/Blood until about level 10 when I discovered the power of curses on a melee character. I have used those since and am now about 14.

However in PVP I keep going back to the Necro/War instead. The energy regen is great and the damage potential does not suffer, with proper selection and use of curses the extra energy and regen that the necro primary has can be used to even greater effect than the extra armor value the warrior has.

[Shadow_Avenger]

Lvl 18 (nearly 19 ) N/E and with the correct spell selection you are unstoppable in PvE.
The only enemies that cause any issues are undead skeletons and enemies that use corpse explosion as it limits your summons.
I never run out of enegy, I tend to think of minions as walking enegy batteries that do some damage before recharging me. With 10 in soul reaping, using the bone minion spell, it costs 25, but when either die I get 10 back,(20 back from both, so spell costs 5 enegy in the long run) they easily swarm enemies. Which is very very useful as it stops the enemies from targeting me, or the healer and can waste there spells on my minions.
Like all combos, the game is balanced for mixed teamplay, No class is capable of solo.
You may kill a few solo, but one false move and you are eating dirt.

[Shamblemonkee]

Mmm, my experience so far is that Necromancers excel at weakening targets. (correct me if you feel I'm wrong) They aren't damage sponges and aren't nukers either. What I expect to do is weaken an enemy so others can bring down a target quicker.

I'm currently built toward Blood / Curses and Intimidation magic. (N/Me (yes two supports!)) I view myself as a debuffer with minor heals :) Don't know about you but when fighting against necs / mezzers chunks come flying off my health and seeing the drain arrow on my health bar plus all the flashy status icons scares me - if that's not scawee intimidation i don't know what is :)

[SOT]

Teufel you did me a favor. I started a necro/fighter night before last. I have been kicking pre-searing ass and haven't died ONCE. But....now I have abandoned the character for the time being, to focus on my primary r/m.

Then again, I might try to build up the festerface anyway, so I can see for myself if lion's arch breaks the usefulness, but since I am not quite there yet on my main character, I won't delete the maggotfeeder just yet ;)

[Mountain Man]

I'm currently a level 8 Necro/Ranger, and I've enjoyed it quite a bit. No, he can't run into the thick of things and expect to survive, but as a ranged support character, he absolutely rocks.

[funbun]

How are your Attibute Points distributed? That's what made my character. I'm Monk/ME. Just focus on 3 attributes any more and your spells won't be powerful enough.

Necro are good for res. They have the best Res spell in the game. Pet creeps are great too as they provide more tanks.

[The Fox]

A Necromancer/Monk? In RP terms, that's the most backwards thing I've ever heard. Since when do all-holy priests turn the dead into mindless abomonitations?

One day she was a beautiful monk, who would hunt down the undead necros and slay them with her holy magic. However, she died to a necro and it cursed her into becoming one herself. Death after life resulted in supreme necro abilites, yet she retained some of the powers of her former self. Being a previous hunter of necros, she has excelled, because she knows what will try to kill her. :D lol just threw some b.s. out there to come up with a "RPG" type scenario where there could be a necro/monk. ? happy now ? :p

[Kordesh]

Here is my biggest issue with Necros. The majority of their spells seem to have no point, as there is another skill that does the same exact thing only it won't require you sacrifice your HP or it won't have some kind of negative effect to it. The functionality of their spells is very limited.

ATM I have a necro/mesmer

12 Death
10 Blood
7 Illusions
4 Soul Reaping

The soul reaping helps ALOT with high death. Things need to die for you to use most death abilities. The soul reaping bonus helps best when it gives you the 10 energy you need to detonate some persons corpse after they die.

I'm not sure if I'm doing the right thing splitting between death and blood. The returns for increasing death higher than it already is seems to not be worth it. To increase death by 1 I would need to lose 2 to 3 blood points.

Illusions is just sort of a backup. Phantom Pains or whatever it's called is a pretty decent DoT and quick casting. There are a few nifty abilities in that tree, although domination might be better overall. I personally would love to get Clumsiness at some point. Great spell.

Template I've been thinking of. I call it "Playing Dead"
Get as many touch spells/HP tap spells as you can get
Use illusion of weakness
Use something else on yourself like barbs or tainted flesh or whatever\

Basically the idea is to make yourself look like an easy target, and then pound them the second they get in melee range.

[Cakes]

I'm Necro/Mesmer... I only use one Mesmer skill and that is conjure phantasm, combined with life siphon it works a treat.

I'm not sure what you mean by not doing much damage.. I'm at level 20 with it and ive done a lot of travelling just with henchman... without my guild. After a couple of tries at getting to Temple of Ages, I think that is what it's called, I finally got there. I don't use curses at all, I've pretty much got my points split evenly between Blood, Death and Soul Reaping (which is fantastic by the way). I am thinking of getting rid of Death Magic though.

Either way.. when I'm in a group of henchmen my Necro does a hell of a lot of damage.. I managed to get from The Wilds and walk all the way past Ventari etc. back to bergen hot springs.. just with a group of henchmen, so they can't be THAT bad :P

[Kordesh]

Why would you get rid of death magic? Death magic has some of the best abilities. Curses does too, but nobody seems to do Curses *shrug*

I stopped using life siphon a long time ago. One big reason. The cast time. It took forever to cast and it did very little damage/return. I almost never used it. Eventually I replaced it with that spell that diseases the enemy for 24 seconds or whatever. A combination of the DoT skills and that mesmer skill which spreads the effect to other nearby creatures can be nice. Pets make nice meatshields for a while as well. Once you hit lvl 20ish you're lvl 14 bone minions don't do much in PvE, so bonefiends are generally better so you get the damage at a range. Also, putrid explosion. That's all I need to say. Ability is amazing under the right circumstances. I haven't done PvP in retail yet *been waiting to finish out most of the PvE* but corpse explosion+healer trying to rez somebody is always fun.

[Cakes]

I just don't seem to use my minions much... I'm usually in a group with atleast two warriors anyway so I don't really NEED to use it.

[Kordesh]

I just don't seem to use my minions much... I'm usually in a group with atleast two warriors anyway so I don't really NEED to use it.

it's not so much for "need" as it is the extra firepower it provides. Most of the time I opt for corpse explosion if there is a nice grouping around the body. In PvP having what is essentially an extra henchman running around for a little bit can be invaluable.

[BChan]

Here is my biggest issue with Necros. The majority of their spells seem to have no point, as there is another skill that does the same exact thing only it won't require you sacrifice your HP or it won't have some kind of negative effect to it. The functionality of their spells is very limited.

ATM I have a necro/mesmer

12 Death
10 Blood
7 Illusions
4 Soul Reaping

The soul reaping helps ALOT with high death. Things need to die for you to use most death abilities. The soul reaping bonus helps best when it gives you the 10 energy you need to detonate some persons corpse after they die.

I'm not sure if I'm doing the right thing splitting between death and blood. The returns for increasing death higher than it already is seems to not be worth it. To increase death by 1 I would need to lose 2 to 3 blood points.

Illusions is just sort of a backup. Phantom Pains or whatever it's called is a pretty decent DoT and quick casting. There are a few nifty abilities in that tree, although domination might be better overall. I personally would love to get Clumsiness at some point. Great spell.

Template I've been thinking of. I call it "Playing Dead"
Get as many touch spells/HP tap spells as you can get
Use illusion of weakness
Use something else on yourself like barbs or tainted flesh or whatever\

Basically the idea is to make yourself look like an easy target, and then pound them the second they get in melee range.

if you don't see the benefit of the sac spells you are not reading it right...the ones with a sac a 5 energy a piece for the most part. In addition their activation time is <=1s plus their recycle time is quick. This makes them spamable. Now if you do use them you have to invest in blood or monk so that you are getting hp back or you will kill yourself.

[Bamelin]

I am a Monk/Necro.

Heal Area is VERY handy when you have 6 or more Minions around you.

Other Monk/Necro combo's include such fun spells as
Infuse Vitality + Soul Reaping
Vengeance + Death Nova

[Kordesh]

if you don't see the benefit of the sac spells you are not reading it right...the ones with a sac a 5 energy a piece for the most part. In addition their activation time is <=1s plus their recycle time is quick. This makes them spamable. Now if you do use them you have to invest in blood or monk so that you are getting hp back or you will kill yourself.

I'm not saying all of them are bad or that all of the sacrifice abilities don't work well. The abilities just seem to overlap. I've checked the refresh and energy costs and cast timers and there doesn't seem to be a point to some of them. When I have time I might look thought and find some specifics.

[Epinephrine]

I'm not saying all of them are bad or that all of the sacrifice abilities don't work well. The abilities just seem to overlap. I've checked the refresh and energy costs and cast timers and there doesn't seem to be a point to some of them. When I have time I might look thought and find some specifics.

Well, one major point is to use them to activate Dark Aura. Dark Pact by itself is horrible - hurt yourself to hurt your opponent about the same amount, and spend energy doing it? That's backwards, it doesn't even make any sense - if I had a spell that took no time for me, dropped did equal damage to me and my opponent and dropped him 5 energy I'd use it; then at least it's an energy drain. Ah - but mix it with Dark Aura and you get the ability to spam a spell that does area of effect damage based on sacrificing - and a fair bit of it too! Yes, you need healing of some form to make it work, but you can spend energy fast and dump damage into a group.

[Kordesh]

Well, one major point is to use them to activate Dark Aura. Dark Pact by itself is horrible - hurt yourself to hurt your opponent about the same amount, and spend energy doing it? That's backwards, it doesn't even make any sense - if I had a spell that took no time for me, dropped did equal damage to me and my opponent and dropped him 5 energy I'd use it; then at least it's an energy drain. Ah - but mix it with Dark Aura and you get the ability to spam a spell that does area of effect damage based on sacrificing - and a fair bit of it too! Yes, you need healing of some form to make it work, but you can spend energy fast and dump damage into a group.

From my understanding of dark aura, it only did damage if an ally was sacrificeing health. So I thought you would need 2 necros to effectively use it.......I didn't even think about the fact you could cast it on yourself.

[Epinephrine]

From my understanding of dark aura, it only did damage if an ally was sacrificeing health. So I thought you would need 2 necros to effectively use it.......I didn't even think about the fact you could cast it on yourself.

Yes, "Ally" is anyone on your team; "Other ally" is used when it cannot be cast on self. You can thus deal large amounts of damage, and provided you have ways to heal you can do a very good job of it.

[Creed]

Necro can be good at P v P and P v E it simply depends on how tactical you are. Death magic is mostly for PvE in honesty, but i've made it work for p v p as i'll show you..

In both these builds suicide builds.. maxing blood is the key. Max it out, (this is considering you are going pure necro, i consider no other 2nd classes remember that.)

Blood is at 12 at that point... sounds fine.. now buy a superior rune of blood magic, and add it to your armour, making your blood magic 15. Now again get another supirior rune and add it to a diffren peice of armour. Making your blood magic 18. Ok so you're hp is suffering, balance both those runes out with sup- vigor runes. (I never said this would be cheap lol). And maybe add another +1 blood rune (minor) to the last armour slot.

so right now your necro has an astonishing 19 blood magic.

Skills like renewal of blood should never leave your skill list.

If you take curses and not death magic this is how the set up works in PvP.

1. Blood renewal.
2. Dark pact.
3. Demonic flesh. (optional)
4. Vampiric gaze.
5. Vampiric touch.
6. Unholy feast.
7. Well of power. (very oprional :p )
8. Elite skill... Grenths balance.

Either optional skills can be replaced by Awaken the blood for an extremly risky, high damage nuking necro.

As you may see from the skills above there's alot of hp sacrifice involved.

Open out with Blood renewal, followed by demonic flesh and then a dark pact, risky.. brings you down to less than half of your max hp.. but it's worth it.

The lower a necros hp is the stronger he becomes, as i'll show.. After casting the dark pact you will have just enough time to cast grenths balance, and take well over 150hp off your enemy. At this point blood renewal kicks in and boom your hp is roughly 640 (demonic flesh) and you are fully healed. Even if you use 'normal' tactics from now on any 1 person fighting you is likly to be a wlak over.

If you do decide to use death magic.. Alot of these tactics stay the same...

except for the elite skill, you can take aura of the lich, to heavily reduce the amount of hp sacrificed, and the amount of risk taken, using demonic flesh you can also make sure your hp is'nt as low as aura of the lich would want it to be :p . But with that you have to rely more so on vampiric spells to increase your hp if it's lost. Awaken the blood should be taken if you choose death magic as the hp sacrifices are halfed, meaning.. if they are doubled by having awaken the blood spell running, it only breaks even, and with the +2blood magic... you are going to cause alot of damage ;)

Well there you are folks. A necro (pure necro) build that works, ok it's risky, very risky, but it works.

People seem to think mesmer is the 'advanced' class. They're wrong, look at the combo i created for the necro, and there are hundreds of tactics like it usable from the necros skill list. Necro is simply a difficult class to use well.

I'd like to name this 'build' but in reality i'm simply showing what the necromancer can do by himself. This build... if you want to call it that is 'The necromancer'. Truth is a necros spells work best with... a necros spells, he really does'nt work well with other secoundary classes that i've seen, (for damage dealing effectivness) but i'll continue to look.

[The Fox]

Blood is at 12 at that point... sounds fine.. now buy a superior rune of blood magic, and add it to your armour, making your blood magic 15. Now again get another supirior rune and add it to a diffren peice of armour. Making your blood magic 18. Ok so you're hp is suffering, balance both those runes out with sup- vigor runes. (I never said this would be cheap lol). And maybe add another +1 blood rune (minor) to the last armour slot.


I believe that the game will only count the highest rune of the same attribute type. Therefore you can gain +3 with a superior rune and +1 with a scar, but you can't get to 18 by adding more runes of the same type. ;) Check out awaken the blood if you're willing to use another skill slot.

[1/2_Extreme]

Any way i can make a N/Mo build work in pvP?

[1/2_Extreme]

Well i only got to play the first two early release days, since i've been at school and haven't been able to pick up my preorder. However, in those days I got past lions arch with my necro/monk and enjoyed it the whole way. Contrary to these posts, I remember being one of the semi-tank characters that usually killed faster than my allies. Maybe this was due to the fact that necros have access to some very useful spells early game while other classes might now; however, i really like the necro and think LOL don't flame me for this... i think my build is going to be great in pvp too.


Really? I havent had much success with my N/Mo build. Please give us some details on your build?

EG: What did you put your skill points into?, What skills are you using?

[Creed]

Thanks fox, i thought that might be the case alright.

The tatcis i proposed will still work, based on the balance skill, allowing any damage done to you, to actually weaken your enemy in the long run.

As i already said Awaken the blood is risky, especially if you dont use your elite skill as being aura of the lich. 66% of your max hp from 1 skill, is simply insane. With Aura of the lich, you drop that back to 33% and since your hp is already 50% of what it should be, that is'nt all that bad. Making your max hp thta bit higher using demonic flesh allows for you to control the situation, only taking half damage from all sources, without having to keep looking at your hp.

Question: Why is it, you can gain the extra 1 from a scar, but if you add a minor rune to another peice of armour you cannot get that +1?

As, why could'nt you simply add a +3rune to the scar, overwritting its original +1.. aww well, the tactics i made dont specifically need for the necro to have really high blood magic but the higher the better. :p

[EvilWizard]

I went with a Necro/Ranger for PvE and I am entirely happy with it. I send my Ranger pet in and make bone minions as monsters die. I sit back away from the main fray and lay down suppressive fire with my bow and use ignite arrows for area damage. I seem to put out a great deal of damage and I self heal so the primary healer can focus in on the others in the group. I don't see a lot of this profession combo around and I have to wonder why?

[kxn]

lol wtf do you seriously think a necro is made to be a hardcore killer? no hes just there as a nuker, in fact, i believe necro/ele combo is one of the best in the game. you can nuke and as a lot of your skills, and you can heal while doing a good chunk of damage.
currently i am using the combo, my set up is set as:
deadly swarm
vamp touch
vamp gaze
then some other life stealer thing (Forgot name)
putrid explosion thing
glyph of lesser energy
then the last 2-3 are either usually frozen blast / ice spikes or firestorm
and always a ressurection signet.

with this i dont know what you guys are having trouble with the undead or tengu but it seems to work fine with me. all far distance i just use swarm and spikes first, then let my teammmates kill something from there and use putrid. the putrid explosion is one of the best skills in the game that a necro can have.
1) it has no cooldown
2) with 9 points on it, it does 82 damage to everything regardless of its level.
3) its splash damage
by the time you use putrid, your energy is around 20 so easily doing a good 160 damage to everything around.
sorry but if you are complaining about necro you must really suck with him/her


if you are playing a boss you can nuke the shizzle out of him hard. especially since most of your skills can work instantly after the other, currently im holding 45 energy and if i use the spells i have, thats a good 250 damage within 10 secs.

you can flame me if you want, but im fine with what i have.

[Odai]

I'm lvl 13 N/E and I like using death magic. Believe me I'm no tank and I don't have any intention of being a tank.
Let others get their hands dirty-- I want mine covered in slime and gore.

I haven't tested this theory vary much ( I ran outta time) but at least to me there seems to be a significant difference damage dealt, recovery times and survivability based on atribute distribution.

I am concentrating on death magic and curses along with fire maguic.
I put as many points in death magic, curses and fire magic as I could, with a few in soul reaping.
I had zero invested in blood of the other elemental magics since I'm not using any of those.
I also set up my skill bar for only death magic and fire magic and nothing else.

When I did this I managed to not only get my hat handed to me a lot faster but I also noticed that my recovery periods were noticably slower.
After a few battles with not very good results I added a couple points back into blood and at least 1 in all the other elemental magics.
My results were much more satisfying - I collected a bunch of hats with the heads still in them..

I have not had enoguh time to play around with different combinations of point distribution to verify that having a 0 in any of the skills really does make a difference.
but it seems to have some effect.

[blythe]

I just realized the same thing...at level 9...

The best part about the necro right now is the attitude...love the headbanging LOL!

I remember someone saying that death nova is a force to be reckoned with...sorry, but its AoE is terrible, and the damage really isnt that spectacular. I've tried using it in PvP...didn't do anything...tried 5 times in 2 different matches, and only hit one person once...and it hardly affected their health. Necro is dead.

I hope sometime they get a buff to it...for now I think I'm gonna go El/Mo...any other suggestions?

[igormak]

Why would you get rid of death magic? Death magic has some of the best abilities. Curses does too, but nobody seems to do Curses *shrug*
In the last 2 missions when there are lvl22+ mobs, my warrior teammates barely could do any dmg to them (all lvl20 of course), and they were saying "thanx" many times after i casted barbs on the enemy because that was the spell that killed every1.
Necro is very hard to play but if ya master it...

[NiGht_HaWk]

As i already said Awaken the blood is risky, especially if you dont use your elite skill as being aura of the lich. 66% of your max hp from 1 skill, is simply insane.

Awaken the Blood only increases the maximum health sacrificed by 50%, not 100%. Therefore, blood renewal would sacrifice about 50% of your health, not 66%.

[Rion]

Uhm, those who've been saying Necro is a nuker... That's pretty laughable, to be honest.

Necromancer is a support character - You're not going to outdamage an Elementalist.

You have potential to do some real damage, but I'd not class Necro as a nuker.

Oh, and um... The guy who's talking about stacking runes to get 19 blood magic or whatever... For a start that won't work and secondly the Vampiric Spells aren't that great, nevermind being 'nukes'.

Eh. I think all of the Necromancers' magic lines are very powerful if you use them right. I've been using Death Magic to great effect. My character isn't 100% finished... In fact, I just need one more skill. My Necro uses 6/8 or so Necro spells though usually.

Oh well. Regardless, I was a little disheartened on the road to level 20 with my Necromancer, even after playing them a lot in BWE's. But now I'm at level 20 and runed up, the damage he can deal is unreal (No he's not a nuker).

[kxn]

you must not understand what the term nuking means, but whatever we all have our own views then.

[gr0m]

havnt read all the posts but I can tell you, Necro primary is anything other than useless.
Combo Life Transfer, Life Siphon then a Vampiric gaze a Vamp Touch will bring any class down to dead or almost dead. Trust me.

Personally am N/W and find myself to be a valuable self-sustaining damage dealer in PvP. With Mark of subversion added in skills I am able to take out monks and W/mo with easy provided they arnt being healed by other monks.

As N/W I use swords and the only swordsmanship skill I use is final thrust, does average 100 damage to casters and around 70 to armor heavy types. But doesnt matter cos I got 45 energy max and still have enough left to take out that W/Mo no probs.

At 1v1 situations the only classes that may beat me if they areusing the right skills are Me due to the energy drainage and my rather weak standard attacks and his very nice self heals if I dont completely drain my energy and Rangers that are selfsustainable and often use the spell interrupting skill.

After you have ascended within story line there are quests which once completed allow you to change secondary profession. If you don't like your current one I suggest you look at what you think would suit you best.

Excuse the typos and blah blah cbf reading what I typed again.
GL

[gr0m]

ok, just read what Rion had to say.
If you believe necro damage is laughable and talk about death magic I do understand your point. Death is more support and enemy distraction rather than damage.

I believe I am able to outdamage any E if I spam my energy full on, ok unwise but it hurts them, a lot. Blood magic does cost a lot of energy to be outstanding but if used at the right moments it will make those people targetting Me, Mo, and E's first think again.

[Lim-Dul]

Oh boy - when I read the twentieth or so thread along the line of "Why does profession XXX suck so bad" one thing comes to my mind: don't the people realise that it's maybe not the profession that sucks, but they themselves? Or to put it another way: they don't know how to use the profession proplerly or their choice is completely out of step with their gaming style. Primary Necromancers aren't damage-dealing super-tanks, nor are they damage-dealing super-casters. Their main purpose is playing a support role. I think some people still don't realise the concept of GW - it's not about single characters - it's about parties. I would fear a party with a good primary Necromancer in it far more than the usual lame 3 tanks/3 healers/2 elems combo. I for my part LOVE to play supporting roles in a party - I love Mesmers, I love Monks, I love Necromancers (I've been playing a Necromancer/Monk for a long time during the alpha/beta) - if that's not the kind of thing you like, then choose a damage-dealing profession. Nevertheless it's not the damage-dealing professions that turn the tides of war during a fight, but the supporting characters. A good Necro can turn the enemies tanks into a gobbling pile of flesh - he probably won't kill them, but hell - this is the job of the other professions! Without a good Necro the other players would be prone to the tanks breaking through and owning them. Every profession and every combination has its own place in the GW-World - some are simply more straightforward, while others are less - there really ISN'T a *best* profession around - there are good and bad builds and good and bad players (and players who deem a whole profession useless belong to the latter sort - I can agree that one can ponder on the balance issues of certain skills - but not whole professions!)

[Apocalyptic Touch]

I have a N/E20 and i absolutely love it. To be honest, i never use ele skills...all necro. Im largly Death magic with a few into soul reaping and a few into curses. I don't know who is saying that necromancers don't do alot of damage, because alot of death magic skills deal pretty hefty damage (death nova, putrid explosion, etc.) Just thought id pop in for the defense of my good ol' necro ;)

[Skyro]

Really? I havent had much success with my N/Mo build. Please give us some details on your build?

EG: What did you put your skill points into?, What skills are you using?

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/showthread.php?p=102531#post102531

[Roken]

I have been playing a PvE N/Mo. I am at level 17. Last night I came to the sad realisation that Necro sux. I say sad because I originally loved the concept of the Necro profession. Necro spells help in the lower levels but once you get up to Lion's Arch & beyond they dont do diddly.

The time I spent playing this character I feel has been wasted. I was thinking that as I progressed thru the game that the Necro skills would get better. Well some Necro skils are cool but overall the Necro is a pretty weak & worthless class. Whenever I go out on a quest I invaribly end up taking more Monk skills than Necro skills because they are more useful to the team. I wanted to play as a Necro primary not as a Monk primary. If I had known that Necros were going to be this useless I would have taken Monk as my primary or chosen a diff profession all together. Now I know I can just start up another character but darnit! then all the time spent on this one was wasted... WASTED. I guess that is part of the game. Live & learn.

Mebbe I am not playing Necro correctly or something but for the life of me I don't see how someone with all Necro spells or mostly Necro spells is going to survive against Tengu or the Undead. The Undead seem to have a resistance to hex spells(or is it another spell caster protecting them?) which negates what little power a Necros has(many of the useful & offensive spells a Necro has are hex spells) and the Tengu are melee monsters that will chew up a Necro & spit him out in less than 5 seconds. Necro are liablity to a team as they take up a slot that could be used for a more useful class...such as Monk or a Warrior or even a Mesmer(Everybody says that Mesmers are the weakest class... I do not agree. Necros are imo. H E double L just the other night I was playing & my party was using a Mesmer as a tank! And we were sucessful in the quest).

Again... mebbe I am not playing Necro correctly... but I don't see how ANYONE can be effcient as a primary Necro once they get to & past Lion's Arch.

I am so disheartend, so dispirited by this that I don't even really want to play the game anymore.
I play a N/R, and Im regreting not going R/N, becuase I don't use Soul Reaping at all, and the armor is worse than Rangers. Necromancer is usually the most unbalnced class (In this case, profession) in every MMO I have played. Necromancers need a benefit over other classes, but not something that would turn everyone into Necro primaries. Necromancers, however, are sweet ass secondaries. Hex's combines with high Curse attribute is deadly with any primary in PVP.

Now, though, I turned my N/R into a Pin Down crowd control abuser, which gives me a need for Soul Reaping, seeing as these spells do not come with cheap energy costs. as soon as i start recieving trap spells, he will be pretty deadly in PVP. I have already tested out him out in PVP, and he is a very good Anti-Charger (Which is usually a War/Mo). I use Pindown, Mark of Subversion, and Defile Flesh. That way he cannot stay close to me, cannot heal himself, and is losing health pretty quickly. Im very satisfied with my character, although they should change their special Primary attribute to something more useful.

[PieXags]

I personally really enjoy the primary attribute, being a necro who specializes in death magic. Energy is needed, and every bit helps. Raising bone fiends is 25 energy, not cheap energy wise. This is also the reason I chose the mesmer as my secondary, to use the inspiration energy-stealing skills. And I must say that I don't hardly ever run out of energy, I've usually at least got 15 at all times. The only problem is corpses aren't always abundant when fighting things like elementals or the undead, but the few normal attack spells that are in dead magic get the job done, and when facing the undead you have spells that can make them your allies even if they're originally your enemies.

I think you're just trying to use the necro as a damage-dealer, someone who really gets noticed in the heat of battle as defeating a lot of enemies. Necros are meant as support-characters for the most part, and this is a game that involves a lot of parties, so it's teamwork that matters and how one works in a team. I personally do pretty damn good when I'm not working directly trying to deal a lot of damage. It sometimes take patience, restraint, and timing in order to work a necromancer (especially in my case trying to work with every corpse that drops and/or doing what I can to get them there in the first place). I usually play my character as a background character. I let the tanks go in while I sit there and work my magic with what's given to me, while my team goes and finishes them off.

Just not your style of character I'd suppose mate.

[Zeru]

Necro primary plays fine in pve. A death necro/monk is one of the best pve combos out there. Up until you start fighting the mursaat swarms of minions are very powerful and good at soaking up damage. When you do fight the mursaat and later on the titans your minions die too fast so it's best to just put death nova on them and inflict pretty heavy damage as suicide bombs. And SR helps sustain your mana over prolonged fights making them nearly as viable as monks for healing.

Curses are especially great late game vs powerful physical enemies (shadow of fear/enfeebling blood any?) but it's a line which really doesn't require primary necro and is best as a secondary really.

[1/2_Extreme]

Necro primary plays fine in pve. A death necro/monk is one of the best pve combos out there. Up until you start fighting the mursaat swarms of minions are very powerful and good at soaking up damage. When you do fight the mursaat and later on the titans your minions die too fast so it's best to just put death nova on them and inflict pretty heavy damage as suicide bombs. And SR helps sustain your mana over prolonged fights making them nearly as viable as monks for healing.

Curses are especially great late game vs powerful physical enemies (shadow of fear/enfeebling blood any?) but it's a line which really doesn't require primary necro and is best as a secondary really.


if you play your cards right, N/Mo can be a deadly combo in PvP as well :D

[Sadye X]

I would say that if you're not seeing the full benefit of being a necro primary then perhaps you just need to retune which skills you're using in different builds until you find a combination that works for they way you enjoy playing, or what you want to contribute. And it's always possible that what a necro is capable of isn't what interrests you in terms of what you add to a group.

In the lower levels I used horrors ... as many as I had corpses for the cast, and could move through areas with ease, the bigger the fight the easier it would be in a way as it just meant for each foe I'd have another horror once it fell, and an energy boost via soul reaping etc. But then you find missions like Gates of Kryta where there's simply too many undead which means no renewable supply of corpses ...

Ever since I've been using my base build as blood / curse , then swapping in a secondary skill or two depending on my team makeup. But skills you should never overlook that are where necros excell imo are in curses. Mark of Pain is a good example ... you can drop full groups easily in a melee heavy group simply by the area damage it does. Other extremely useful area curses are Shadow of Fear, which slows attack speed of your target and their allies in the area. I use both as standards in both pve and pvp, and believe me, with proper curse stacking there's a very good reason necros are quite typically high on the priority target list. ;)

With pve and missions I have to admit that each mission / area may require you to adjust your build to the situation, but once you've seen what you're up against from a first run, this comes as second nature. On some of the missions that I'd failed terribly with full teams of players, I've gone back in with henchies and beat, simply because I know how to cripple my foe's ability to damage my party so they can focus on taking them down, as well as helping your healers manage energy since they'll have to heal less often. I'd even completed the Ring of Fire with henchies after who knows how many fails prior, and most of them even had max dp before the end. Call it what you will, but casting Well of Blood for each corpse you see fall goes so much further than turning them into minions imo ;)

[toastgodsupreme]

So my primary is a N/Mo17 as of this posting.

I'm at Aurora Glade right now. I have to say, I feel like I'm one of the most versatile players in my group.

Let's say our group has a dedicated healer, and 2 warriors, and 2 mages. What do I bring to the table? FUN

During the first few fights, I heal my allies with Healing Breeze and throw out some single target smiting. Once I start raising my army though... I'm the first one in battle, and the only one left standing if shit hits the fan.

I survive better than most warriors. Why? My army takes the heat. If they don't have agro, then I'm negating damage to me with Dark Bond.


I may switch over the N/Ele once I acsend, just for more damage output.

Go. Pump death magic. Watch level 15 minions withstand awesome attacks. Throw death nova on ones with low heath. Use well of suffering in the middle of a juicy mob.

Sure minions are weak. But 10 of them become a problem for many groups. 15 of them is just insane. :cool:

[Nikron Ke Ra]

I play as a N/E, and basically am a zerger with 14 in Death Magic and 12 in Soul Reaping, it's amazingly fun... But I dunno if 10+ mobs actually help anything, it would be nice to see their damage.

[Axehilt]

Played all day today with a fresh N/Me alongside my friend's N/Mo. Really awesome combos we got going, though definitely PVE-centric.

My char is Death/SoulReaping focused. Vile Touch and Rotting Flesh make up my limited direct damage (and Disease) capabilities. Animate Bone Horror is currently my only summon spell and just about everything that dies gets animated ASAP. However in circumstances where lots of enemies crowd around a corpse I'll often Putrid Explosion it. Taste of Death is my self-heal and triggers the death of a minion, which means additional energy for both me and my bud. Currently I'm focusing on unlocking stuff so I usually have Rez and Capture Signets. Lastly, I take Dark Aura which I keep on my bud at all times.

His N/Mo is Blood/Healing/Soul Reaping specced. He keeps Mending on himself (maintained enchantments are far more doable with the influx from Soul Reaping),then jumps into the fray with Blood Renewal for additional regen. His main nukes are Dark Pact and Touch of Agony which do great damage by themselves but even better AOE damage because of my Dark Aura (adds AOE damage every time target sacrifices life). Resurrect and Capture Signet fill out his 'misc' skills. He also uses Heal Area situationally, usually to heal himself.

Lastly, he frequently puts Healing Seed on me - which works even when I take damage from Dark Aura. And since I know he'll be sac'ing health, I can stand right next to him, next to our other close range attackers and keep him healed with the AOE healing from that.

Overall this combo works pretty awesome and really flows well. Having so many minions around means something is always dying near us, which gives us both energy. If he needs energy badly (he does use constant nukes, Mending, and Healing Seed - all are fairly expensive) then I can simply sacrifice a minion for health to feed him some. Managed to get from Pre-Searing to Bloodstone Fen in about 10 hours of play.

I can definitely see what a previous poster stated about the Mursaat decisively screwing minion users over, but at least for now I'm able to dominate pretty much any group (undead groups cause us a bit of trouble since there are less corpses and they aren't affected by Rotting Flesh.)

[Epinephrine]

Soul Reaping is a great ability. Truly passive. If you are playing a Necromancer/Elementalist for example, try this. Put all your attributes over in elementalist, except for a pile in soul reaping (get it nice and high - heck, soul reaping runes are cheap). Now go adventuring with a minion master in the party.

[Rey Lentless]

I think it's one of those things that you'd notice if it wasn't available to you. Hard to appreciate it until you have energy problems that you wouldn't otherwise have.

It definitely works better with certain builds, but I still think it's pretty powerful.

[The Shrodekill]

i prefer elementalist primary because i DONT use minions therefor getting the benefit of soul reaping at its max. so i use energy storage and blood all the way. I am pretty much a damage dealer and a healer at the same time and never dies... excellent. i use vampiric gaze and touch against very high armor enemies because well... they ignore armor. well of blood allows me to heal teammates and myself. many other blood skills give me health such as strip enchantment and mark of subversion (these also give problems to enemy casters) i dont think this would be GREATLY affective in pvp but not terrible due to the vampiric skills ignoring armor. major problem in this build is u have to have a lot of energy to use all of these skills. i constantly find myself the last one alive in PvE and pull out a res. signet on our monk and they res everybody else.
i am currently in the desert and just recently found necros usefullness... quite opposite of what many people are saying. i think necro skills have gotten more useful over time. earlier i could just blow everybody up with a single phoenix wheras now i die to fast to get one off and when i do... very little damage due to high armor enemies.
NECRO SKILLS OWN!

[TheEntity]

I am going high death and blood magic with some soul reaping and curses thrown in. I find Death Magic to be a very effective damage dealing set. Deadly Swarm, Vile Touch, Putrid Explosion, Necrotic Transversal (a very underrated power) and minions are all very effective.

I am a corpse exploiter. I use corpses to heal, do damage, and raise minions. I then use minions to do damage, heal, and as energy batteries. I am currently only level 13 but find that I can do a very good amount of damage in teams. A couple comments on powers that I saw people post...

Soul Reaping - I find this to be a wonderful power for the minion master. I typically alternate between minions and non-minion power set ups. When I am using minions it is a wonderful thing. Bone minions + Death Nova + Taste of Death + Soul Reaping is a great combo. Keeps you healed and in Energy and damages your enemies.

Death Magic - I love Death Magic. It has a number of spells with decent damage (Deathly Swarm and Vile Touch come to mind) and all the corpse/minion powers are great. At my current level I can dish out large amounts of damage with Deathly Swarm, Necrotic Transversal, and Putrid Exlplosion.

Siphon Life (Life Siphon?) - I really like this power. Sure, it doens't do uber damage but it does have one awesome feature...it stacks on you. When fighting a number of enemies you can tab through them casting Siphon Life on each on and the healing properties stack per cast. With a good amounts of points in Blood Magic the spell lasts for a while. I have been able to pretty much tank some groups by keeping a few Siphon Lifes stacked on me at all times.

[Xight]

I use this:

Free Slot (usually Signet of Capture) (pvp I put in an enchantment stripper)
Soul Feast or Taste of Death
Putrid Exposion (pvp I put in vampiric gaze)
Summon Bone Horror
Heal Area (pvp Orison of healing)
Life Bond
Balthasar's Spirit
Resurrect

Put most of the skills into death, and split the rest between protection/soul reaping.

The Idea:
Bone Horror + Heal Area = Mana batteries for next battle. Can let your group kill things, and at the end of the battle your minions come around you to cast heal area. Gaining like 50 mana to heal during battles is nice.

vs Swarms. Kill one thing then spam Putrid Explosion. Can usually kill another which gives you mana (soul reap).

Balthasar's Sprit + Life Bond = If your familiar with the map/mission, and there's a lot of melee swarms then lifebond can save your group's healer a lot of hassle. You might suffer on mana/health a little, but your saving your main healer a ton. Life bond with high protection really keeps a tank or 2 alive as well as you. You still get the 1 point of energy even if you take -0 damage from the Life bond. If there's a lot of mes creatures then they'll shatter your enchantments. (which is kind of useful since your lifebond doesn't protect against life degen and lets you use your mana).

Res well. Always good to have repeatable rez on the mission. (with henchmen it's great since they so weak they're like corpses you bring along with you). (I solo'd Althea's ashes at 11 with just henchmen, and only died once)

Over all your balanced to do anything, heal or take out swarms. Just so long as it's not a swarm of giants. Then well hope you learn to borrow some of your minion's legs to run faster.

[pHobac]

Personally, I dont think that any one can say "This is the best way to play this class" or "This is what this class is used for" Because there are so many different things you can do with a class combo. My main character is a lvl 20 N/Mo that has beaten the game. I dont do any direct spells really, except for the occasional deathly swarm against enemies that dont leave corpses.

Instead I use all of my energy to summon and heal Bone Horrors and Bone Fiends. With a 16 in death I raise lvl 18's and heal them well with veratas sacrifice. Add to that the high Soul Reaping for energy, I only have 43 max so if I stack two summons I am basically out, but the soul reaping keeps me going.

And with Heal Area I can give my minions health back when not in combat to complement the Veratas Sacrifice. Although there are times when I have too many summons so some of them are too far away to get the area heal, but I can usually manuver myself into a position where I can get them all.

I may not have any big damage spells, or visible AoE spells like Firestorm, but you will defininetly notice me in a fight. 20-30 summons, split between horrors and fiends (i never use Bone Minions because they die too fast and dont do any real damage) is a very noticable thing.

So I would say that while necro's dont always do the most direct damage. A good summon nec is a definite head turner. The ability to run up to a mob of lvl 24+ enemies and not have to attack or use a single direct damage spell is cool and for me at least, the most fun aspect of being a necro.

[Schorny]

A good summon nec is a definite head turner. The ability to run up to a mob of lvl 24+ enemies and not have to attack or use a single direct damage spell is cool and for me at least, the most fun aspect of being a necro.

But for me as a healer it's so damn boring. My best friend is a necro and when we play he always has some of these bone-whatevers and then hardly anybody takes damage, because these bone-whatevers take all the damage.

So kind of boring for me to play together with a necro ;)

:p

[toastgodsupreme]

But for me as a healer it's so damn boring. My best friend is a necro and when we play he always has some of these bone-whatevers and then hardly anybody takes damage, because these bone-whatevers take all the damage.

So kind of boring for me to play together with a necro ;)

:p

Oh no! If there's ANYONE I want to partner with, it's a good healer.

I think my most IDEAL set up would be:

Me: N/Mo with my minion mastery
Friend: N/Mo with soul reaping, healing, and protection pumped.

If I could get this setup, I'd grab life bond and toss it on my friend (even though I won't put any in protection), and I'd have my friend put life bond on me (the point of this being that if my friend gets swarmed, they aren't going to be destroyed immediately. My taking half the damage will allow him/her to live long enough for us to regroup.).
After that, we both throw life bond on one bone horror each (not the same one though). This is just a starting tactic. Keeps the initial guys alive long enough to be useful until the army shows up.

This is where the fun would start... I keep raising the dead, friend throws heals on my boys as needed (but not overly, because hey, they are just meat shields). And I throw death nova out as much as possible.

We're in the back, heal area a few times, and the minions keep exploding causing sweet damage and poisoning.

The reason I like death nova over putrid explosion is because my minions will hone in on a bad guy and are almost always next to one. Smart bombs baby.

[pHobac]

But for me as a healer it's so damn boring. My best friend is a necro and when we play he always has some of these bone-whatevers and then hardly anybody takes damage, because these bone-whatevers take all the damage.

So kind of boring for me to play together with a necro ;)

It may be boring for you, but I like it! Even if all you do is cast orison on me every 30 seconds after I sacrifice 17% of my health.

[LegendsEnd]

After having played over a hundred hours with my N/Me, I can say that in PvE they own. I went with a Soul Reaping/Death Magic build and Putrid Explosion would just dominate. Deathly Swarm is great when there are no corpses and Vile Touch bypasses armor. The bone horrors weren't that great but bone fiends are nice. The minion/death nova combo isn't as awesome as I thought it would be. Late in the game when stuff stops having corpses, a Death/Blood build is nice, with deathly swarm and vile touch from death, lots of damage dealing spam skills.

In PvE however, while the blood magic is great and all, soul reaping is useless. With my N/Me I would much rather have had Me/N for fast casting, and the mesmer armor allows for some good balance between extra energy and armor.

So basically for those who didnt bother to read; Primary Necro PvE = Good
Primary Necro PvP = Ew

[buggsy]

After having weaken and faintheartedness cast on my warrior character, I became completely useless.

Well of blood is so effective, my monk character sometimes has nothing to do but watch the battle unfold.

Life stealing spells are the most mana efficient for any caster class. If your taking damage, you can not only heal yourself but you inflict damage on the enemy. Vampiric gaze. 60 life steal, 60 damage. Thats an capped orisin of healing, and a capped armor piercing lightening spell rolled up into a 1 second casting time. Not too shabby. My elite is life transfer. 8 health regen for 12 seconds. 16*12=192 life steal and damage for only a measly 10 mana. No other class can pull off healing and damage like that nomatter how much mana you use. (although sometimes, hexes can be prematurely removed)






I tried using death nova in conjunction with vengeance, but that just kept making my teammakes angry. :D I thought it was a good combo.

[Yukito Kunisaki]

N/Mo is 'backwards'? Wth?
W/Mo is backwards too then
E/Mo has his classes mixed up as well.

What many smart alecs fail to understand is that there IS NO bad class combo! muahahahahah.

One just has to figure out a build, that's all. The former favorite was the W/N but apparently, news has gotten out that they suck as being self sufficient come late game since HoT + DoT = bad energy management for a 20E warrior. I went curses W/N. Curses in terms of energy/effect ratio is quite good with some effects lasting 30seconds + [faintheartedness/shadow of fear] Preventing/slowing damage is a LOT better than healing it away.

E/Mo [omg this noob doesn't know how to make a good character] Sheesh I felt like slapping the person who said this at Hell's Precipice. Monk + Energy Storage + Earth anti-anything wards = [hah hah our party can't die!]

You said you made an N/Mo. Well. I've seen and heard quite a bit about them. [we'd rather have a Mo primary due to Divine Favor!!!] These people obviously haven't partied with my teammates. We had a Monk Primary and a N/Mo following as support. let me tell ya that Mo WILL run out of energy unless he gets it from either a Me secondary or Blood is Power. N/Mo have nearly infinite energy concerning deaths on the battlefield. Wanna protect your teammates and heal them too? Go Curses/Soul Reaping/Healing Prayers. Make the enemies deal less damage and your healing job should be easier [barbs and what not can make foes easier targets too]

[Yukito Kunisaki]

After having weaken and faintheartedness cast on my warrior character, I became completely useless.

Well of blood is so effective, my monk character sometimes has nothing to do but watch the battle unfold.

Life stealing spells are the most mana efficient for any caster class. If your taking damage, you can not only heal yourself but you inflict damage on the enemy. Vampiric gaze. 60 life steal, 60 damage. Thats an capped orisin of healing, and a capped armor piercing lightening spell rolled up into a 1 second casting time. Not too shabby. My elite is life transfer. 8 health regen for 12 seconds. 16*12=192 life steal and damage for only a measly 10 mana. No other class can pull off healing and damage like that nomatter how much mana you use. (although sometimes, hexes can be prematurely removed)






I tried using death nova in conjunction with vengeance, but that just kept making my teammakes angry. :D I thought it was a good combo.

Your teammates obviously don't have any respect for your elite coolness! ^_^ From what I read previously however, the health stealing powers of Blood magic are about 50-75% efficient due to their nature. Hurt enemy + heal yourself. What would heal better per mana usage? Healing Breeze or Life Siphon? [don't bring in Life transfer for it is an elite skill :p] If you are going to use life stealing skills, bring some sacrifice spells as well. I've never laughed sooo hard watching dark pact mulch someone into pieces at the same time Life Siphon PLUS Transfer was on them... :eek:

[Xellos]

Lately, alot of korean teams and a lot of PUG's started going mass bone fiends in tombs. I have no idea why, but maybe it's because of the lack of warriors and effectiveness of piercing attacks. It seemed to work somewhat against us when we were half asleep and there were two teams sandwiching us with that strategy.

[Okra]

lvl 20 N/Mo here

Necros rock.

two words: Grenth's Balance.

Taking away 1/2 of a boss's hitpoints with one spell is pretty cool.

and heal area + blood of master + bone minons = good time