Talk:Necromancer

The description of Blood Magic

Blood Magic is described as "skills that steal health from enemies and gives it to you". I feel that this is not enough. Blood Magic skills also let the user sacrifice his health to deal damage to others.--195.112.92.10 09:10, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Feel free to expand it a little, bearing in mind that it's just meant as a very short summary of what Blood Magic encompasses. -- ab.er.rant 09:18, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

wel ive combined my necro with a ranger to make it up to my blood los theres a skill that lets ya regen faster and i love the extra attacker ok might be weird combination but im doing good so far :) from reav curse

I know a good necro melee build it owns most melee builds I like to use barbarous slice with gash and life transfer along with a few life stealing skills Ive done alot of RA with it and I can say it does fine but is vulnerable to interrups daze and some hexes but in general it owns most builds this build can be really good since it self heals really good and has the capacity of finishing a target in less than 20 sec's.

Or, you cud just use the best melee blood build in the world: the touch ranger.Crimmastermind 07:26, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

An analysis

Should also be noted that although the necromancer class looks promising on paper, but still fails in comparision to other classes in specific roles such as: mesmer hexes will still always be more powerful than necromancer hexes (although a few necromancer hexes can afflict multiple foes) elementalist, assasins, and ritualists will always provide a higher spike damage (even if life stealing and shadow damage bypasses through protection spells and armor), a interrupt ranger will be a more affective choice than a blood is power necromancer due to the fact that the monks will not be wasting power if the enemies most powerful skills are constantly interrupted, a mobile ritualist spirit spammer can out due the damage of a full ten minion army due to the fact that spirit damage by passes through armor when compared to the low base damage of minions and their constant degeneration, and as far as supportive roles the paragon, earth elementalist, and ritaulist will still provide a broader range of group support than any order, well, or power support necromancer. The profession itself does have some useful elites, but are overshadow when in comparison to other classes elite skills (due to the fact that the majority of necromancer skills have been nerfed considerably and the majority of nerfs were due to the fact that it looks like they can be exploited on paper, but during game play the elite skills could hardly ever be exploited due to the mechanics of the game and also nothing ever stays the same in the necromancer profession line due to skills constantly being nerfed from "presumed" exploits on paper {one other factor about the necromancer is that the soul reaping attribute line has been changed at least fourteen times while some were necessary nerfs, but overall the majority of nerfs made the soul reaping attriute to be less effective than it previously was}. The class itself provides a challenge to players who are new to the game, but should not be recommend as a starter class for new players. One other thing to keep in mind, name calling is not an effective way to debate; if you disagree with what I posted, feel free to post your side of view but keep in mind when comparing it to the other classes in terms of usefulness to the group.William Wallace 06:58, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

Added a section header for your post. -- ab.er.rant 07:56, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I think Williams analysis is based on GvG, RA, TA. The comparison with Ritualists is already where it becomes subjective and too general. Necromancers have their place in HA, albeit mostly to Soul Reaping, and ABs. There is the Icy Veins build, and there were blood magic spiking builds. But the sheer power of Necromancers in PvE NM and HM should also not be forgotten. Vanquishing as SS Necro with a MM or only one of them makes harder missions a lot easier, especially Cantha with its many foes in small areas setup basically is a Necro Heaven. I think I can agree on the hard for new players part, the game mechanics and way to play a Necro might be harder to get. But then we would have to add disclaimers to Assassins, Mesmers and Ritualists as well, and big red warning signs that Paragons are good, yet still amazingly hated by the general PvE population. I started out with a warrior, and started a Necro in Factions and totally fell in love with curses, minions and later blood magic, too. I think the big problem with any suggestion for new players on this page is that we would influence them a lot and confuse them with game mechanic discussions they are not up to. And I do not really want to recommend or not recommend ANY class as "not good for new players" with some sort of statement why on a class page here. I do not think it would do much good, new players already ask friends or just do what they want before consulting the wiki. We would only create a talk page discussion why this or that professions sucks and who should play it or not, which would be rather futile in the end. --Longasc 15:50, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

I deffinitely agree with longasc, and i see that this was posted more than a year ago, so you should re- check your opinion on inferior skills. Here is where i disagree with some of the points made- I use my rit and necro quite often, and i often find myself still casting spirits on my ritualist after the minions have killed the majority of the mob (I'm not saying that the minions did all the work, but a great deal). On the argument that "mesmer hexes will still always be more powerful than necromancer hexes," many hexes on a mesmer take longer to cast, and can drain energy if not used with expert timing and energy balance. Those who want to speed up the casting find themselves sacrificing points of an attribute to put into fast casting, reducing the effectiveness of the hex, unless they use some runes that will cost money, HP etc. Also, assassins can provide an astonishing spike, but if even one skill of the spike is thwarted, most assassins find themselves at a dead end, and on your statement of elementalists having higher spike damage, look down below, i posted a counter statement to the necromancers not doing any damage. And in favor of necromancer, they will always have the best energy management of all the classes, without having to sacrifice skill slots like a mesmer, assassin, elementalist, or monk would. by the way, when a necromancer primary is coupled with one of the superior professions, it has the potential to become even more powerful than the primary ele, assassin, monk etc. once again, i understand that this was said over a year ago, and im just updating the opinion's newly found flaws. Valion Sentis 12:27, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

Secondary Profession

Those sections look REALLY poor. Some of them don't even make sense to me, like the warrior one, or "minion master to the extreme" wtf? SystemisFlawed

wel i got ranger for second pro like i try to have ass many attackers on the field as possible and it has a nice skil to regen a lot faster it saved my life lots of times it makes up for my blood los maybe its not best 2 pro for it on pvp but it helps me a lot on the field :) grtz reav curse --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:91.86.113.181 (talk).

Undead

Aren't necromancers technically undead? There are a lot of references to them having died once already...I can't remember all of them, but one example I just read was on Hayda's page..."people who come back from the dead don't have the same value system." I think there's more than that...I KNOW the game doesn't treat them as undead (unless they use that insignia that increases holy damage against them), but technically, I think they are undead. Silver40596

Where in the world did you get that idea? I think you need to try to recall at least some of the "a lot of references", because I don't remember even seeing any such thing. Necromancy traditionally refers to a form of divination that deals with the dead. But in most fantasy literature, it is often translated or expanded to include black magic and demonology as well, this making it seem like it's a mostly an evil form of magic. A "Necromancer" is someone who is a practitioner of necromancy, i.e. a magic user, and his/her magic is the magic of necromancy. Just like elementalists - do you consider them elementals too? What about mesmers and enchanters? Are they fairies? If you're thinking of undead, you've probably confused necromancers with liches instead. As for Hayda's quote, she was not implying that all necromancers have died, she's referring to the minions that the necromancer animates. -- ab.er.rant 05:27, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Here's one of the quotes I was thinking of: "Working here in the catacombs protects me from the prying eyes of the living." --Oberan the Reviled

And The Necromancer's Path: "This is how the mortal powers seek to usurp your will and make you shirk what must be done." Silver40596

When I say I want to hide from the living, there's nothing in there that implies I'm dead - I just want to hide from the living, I don't bother hiding from the undead. The dialogue for the Necromancer's Path is a spoken by a ghost... and again, the ghost is referring to mortal entities because he's not referring to undead entities - it's those that are mortal who will try to stop you, not those who are dead that are trying to stop you. -- ab.er.rant 17:14, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

But why would you shun the living unless you were undead? Also, I would argue that Tormentor's Insignia can give you the same vulnerabilities as the undead have. Silver40596

He conducts necromantic experiments with the dead. If you were living in Ascalon City then, say if you are a normal peasant, would you find Oberan's experiments with corpses and the undead something to be disgusted about? It's likely why his name is "the Reviled", that sort of gives you an idea how much people hate him. If you avoid criminals, does that mean you are a law enforcer, or does it just mean you don't want to associate with criminals? Tormentor's insignia is just an insignia... it's like runes. I think putting an insignia on your armor does not turn you into something else. What you're suggesting would be like if I claimed that using assassin insignias or elementalist insignias would change your flesh and skin because you suddenly become more resistant to certain types of damage. We have vampiric mods too, but that doesn't mean that all those characters who use vampiric weapons are now vampires. It's just magic :) -- ab.er.rant 01:27, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

^^ lol. Lets say you are in ascalon city, and, like you said, you do not hang with the criminals. It doesn't make you a law-enforcer, but lets consider you being somebody who hangs and works alot and helps those law eforcers. you could easily be considered a law enforcer this way.Necromancers work very well with the undead, and help them very much. There is some good possibility Necromancers are undead.

This is true...but consider that the insignias and runes seem to draw out one's latent abilities. For example, a Ranger has an inherent potential of becoming a Scout, and a Paragon could become a Centurion. Therefore, the Tormentor's insignia draws out the Necromancer's undead-ness. Silver40596

I disagree. The names used for the insignia (as well as the attributes) just indicate the archetypes of the profession, not any latent abilities. Even if we go by your reasoning, being undead is a condition or state, it's not an ability. -- ab.er.rant 02:19, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Could really care less about the names of the insignia's but a lot of necromancer primary attribute insignia's are quite horrible when compared to elementalist, warrior, and ranger insignias.William Wallace 06:46, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

wel a necromancer is not undead its a proffesion there stil human ya can compare them to satanist people in real life they avoid the living too they only come toghether with other satanist to perform rituals and black magic they wanne hurt the living people who are normal and believe for example in the gods and yes they go to grave yards because death is the only thing they think about humans like to walk in a park the necro loves to be in a grave yard theyve sold there soul to perform black magic because there filt with hate against the living and it consumes them thats why their body is like wrinkeld and full a scars they offer their own blood to their gods to increase their power wel about the insignia everything about a necro is almost sacrifice it just gives ya extra armor but it makes ya weaker against holy and of all evil holy is the oppiside side of evil so thats really normal its just another sacrefice ya have to take for that that exra armor i begun my first proffesion as necro and sub ranger and im liking it a lot i wouldnt trade my necro for nothing and i like the sub ranger for his pet it is a extra attacker and it has the skil to regen so my sacrificing blood whould be regen and i would limit the damage wel thats my oppinion of all that

grtz :) have fun from reav curse

Olias at Abaddon's Gate: "I feel the power of Grenth rushing through my veins, as strong as the day I died"... just sayin lol Magamdy 09:35, 5 September 2010 (UTC)

I don't think all necromancers being undead is true, but if quite a few are undead it would make sense. You can look all across the game and find hints that some necromancers are indeed undead creatures. As the guy above said, Olias does mention "I feel the power of Grenth rushing through my veins, as strong as the day I died." Let me quote those last few words again "as strong as the day I died." As I stated before though, not all necromancers would be undead. You can look at Livia for example as a human. EvianaMist 0640, 15 November 2011.

Goren says "Your wave of evil crashes on the shores of Goren!". Does that mean he's a beach? No. It's just colorful language. Manifold 16:11, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

olias dies a lot whenever I take him with me :/ 24.130.140.36 17:45, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Olias' quote on dying is a reference to Gain Olias, in which he describes how he was nearly pulled into the Realm of Torment - a land of the dead - but was saved by Grenth.

Necromancers are not undead, but many (powerful) undead will turn out to be necromancers. Necromancy is just the magic of death, it doesn't require being killed. The lines of the necromancers dying is more than likely metaphorical, because they're not undead (either by mechanics or known lore). Konig/talk 21:57, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

List of Necromancer quest?

I was searching for a list of quest that are for Necromancers only. Is there such a list available?--Worldly Tutor 19:41, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, doesn't look like there is. We currently only have quests by campaign and type only. -- ab.er.rant 13:58, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

Here you are [1]

I'm a little late, but that's a skills reference - Maskeus

Love??

It is nice seeing that necromancers are starting to recieve some 'love' from arenanet after having almost all of their elite skills changed, majoirty of the skills nerfed due to "possible exploits" (which can never happen in game as one of the posters posted on this page), and having their primary attribute changed sixteen times so far to the point where it's basically useless. Now a lot of the elite skills need to be worked on to where all of them can be useful in pve and pvp and not just five for pve and four for pvp.Highway Man 21:34, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

With the recent skill changes, necromancers are a lot more valuable in pve than they ever were. Most of the time while playing on my characters, always avoid inviting necromancers into pve groups due to their low damage potential, mediocore elites, and how worthless minions are in hard mode. But now they are a significant improvement in pve not because of their damage, but because of their support skills that debuff the enemies and makes it so much easier in hard mode.William Wallace 04:25, 12 March 2008 (UTC)

MM's useless in hard mode, lol. People from 2008 are so cute.67.182.24.195 19:19, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

My mm excells in HM Minion bomber ftw!Yumiko ^,~ 05:22, 19 May 2011 (UTC)

N/Rt

Just added that section. Feel free to comment upon it here. --'ÑöẊĭƑý 21:19, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand what's so good about N/Rt healers. Is it just for Soul Reaping or just to confuse enemys of what? — ク Eloc 貢 02:04, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

Soul Reaping is the best passive energy management in the game, and Rit heals tend to be more energy efficient (more stuff done than monk skills for the same energy spent; look at ones like MBS. 5e for more healpower than a monk spell like orison or dwaynas, and you remove a condition for every spirit in earshot; not too shabby). -Auron 10:51, 19 February 2008 (UTC)

More imba imo (i realise that monks also get a DF bonus on prots and prots are a better concept and blablabla but anything that doesnt require skill to be omfg powerfull is a gimmick and if it isnt imba it is gimmicky wich is enough to get it nerfed ) Lilondra 19:00, 26 August 2008 (UTC)

N/Rt are generally one of the better healers because for one, they have soul reaping, secondly, they have the better self- supportive skills every player needs. this healer build is not used on players too often, but when used on heroes the hero and its party members can handle much more pressure than the typical HB monk. Valion Sentis 12:34, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

I never understood why this is soooo popular for 3 hero-necro teams but pretty much unheard of elsewhere. It always seemed like it was gimmicky for gimmick's sake, all necro heroes rather than a rit or monk healer. 76.84.34.210 22:37, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

Are Necromancers Not allowed to do damage??

I was curious why every time necromancers get a spike skill or a team uses the same elite they always get nerf (Icy Veins for one), but elementalist never get nerf if they all use the same spike skill (ex.Searing Flames and Shockwave). We all know that necromancers are an inferior class in this game because their damage is to low in pve and pvp, long recharge and the majority of skills can not even do over eighty damage, and the majority of players who play them are terrible at the class (just look over at pvxwiki and see how many good necromancers builds there are compared to elementalist and other classes). Is there any particular reason why all of their high damage skills have ridiculous casting and long recharge times (please don't use that shadow damage ignores protection prayers argument because one word of healing can easily overcome a shadow damage spike)?William Wallace 00:34, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Casters are supposed to be supporting, not dealing damage. Also NECROMANCERS FOR LIFE! Dark Morphon(contribs) 10:42, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

I think it's more appropriate to say that "Necromancers and mesmers are supposed to be supporting, not dealing damage". Elementalists and monks are not support professions. -- ab.er.rant 10:04, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Elementalists are in PvP at least. Monks not support? Lolwut? What are they supposed to do then, smiting? Dark Morphon(contribs) 08:30, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

We probably have a different understanding of the meaning of the term "support role". A "support role" is one that enhances the performance of other roles, either by direct buffs or indirect impediments to the enemy. Monks primarily fall into the "healer" role. The classic role of "healer" is not a "support" role but one-third of the classic trinity. -- ab.er.rant 02:07, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

If you really want your PvE Necromancer to be a damage dealer comparable to the Elementalist, try out Discord and Necrosis. If you play Hardmode or simply in areas later in a campaigns story you will notice them being stronger and faster (mostly less casting time, recharge and more damage to high armor because an AL 140 warrior will reduce Liquid Flame to mere 30 damage whereas the before-mentioned skills can hit 90+ yet missing AoE.). Noctarch 02:34, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

Aside from all the nerfs Necromancers have always been and always will still be a high damage class in the hands of the right person. For both PvE and PvP. 72.196.31.143 02:53, 30 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree about the direct damage part. But remember in Pve and OoU mm can do quite a bit of indirect damage thru his minions. Not to mention ss.Psychiatric Consultant 19:14, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I agree too. Necromancy can easily deal massive amounts of damage, if used well. One special build is the anti-melee lich build. All you do is combine dark aura with a couple of touch skill health sacrifice, like wallow's bite and touch of agony, and you can deal 80+ shadow damage every 1.5 seconds. If you use it with rapid health regeneration, like vampiric spirit, or blood renewal, you can keep on bombing until all you see is dead.

For one thing. Necromancy is not inferior. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:Naufrageur (talk).

That's gonna get you killed very swiftly, as you can't use Aura of the Lich with that anymore. Anyway, just wanted to say no profession is inferior, they've all got their uses (well, except the assassin in PvE..) — Why 20:01, 7 January 2009 (UTC)

ORLY?XD 89.134.135.215 21:39, 15 January 2009 (UTC)

Okay, on the subject of "We all know that necromancers are an inferior class in this game because their damage is to low in pve and pvp, long recharge and the majority of skills can not even do over eighty damage, and the majority of players who play them are terrible at the class (just look over at pvxwiki and see how many good necromancers builds there are compared to elementalist and other classes).", ive used my elementalist many times, and he fails against warriors, rangers, dervishes, and paragons, where as necromancers have many armor- ignoring damage skills. Where my elementalist would do about 30 damage with searing flames, my necromancer would do around 115 with discord. And icy veins works very well. it's one of my main skills I use. and by the way, how many elementalist builds do you see being able to vanquish an area of 270 enemies in 45 minutes? I do that with discord as well, which, by the way, has a recharge time of 2 seconds. Valion Sentis 12:07, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

As far as PvE is concerned Necromancers have always been a top-tier class owing to summons, soul reaping and curses. I remember they were banned from Hard Mode balance testing because they made it too easy, which is easy to sympathise with when you see a curse-augmented army of robots steamrolling everything with Barbs and Mark of Pain. My personal "Holy Trinity" of PvE classes reads more like an Unholy Trinity... Necromancer, Ritualist and Ranger. Those three complement each other so formidably it's frightening... for the mobs. Minions and spirits galore, splinter barrage, expertise communers, blanket buffing and healing, massive debuffing and armour-ignoring damage galore, yadda yadda. For PvP I agree it's totally different... because it is totally different. Different scenario, different objectives, different balance concerns etc. etc. Cirian 21:49, 20 December 2009 (UTC)

Undead Minions

Why can't a necromancer actually revive corpeses and use them as undead minions instead of just exploiting them to create minions? for instance if you kill a giant wouldn't it be better to revive him as an undead giant instead of exploiting his corpse to create a little minion (flesh golem, bone horror, bone fiend etc)? The word Necromancer means someone who bring the dead "back to life" (or their spirits) --Soulforged 17:30, 20 January 2009 (UTC)

You're either influenced by other games or some other popular literature or media. The actual meaning of necromancy is simply either black magic or divination through communication with the dead.

As for why necromancers in GW just exploit corpses, it's because that's how they're designed - no summon-once undead army. It's trickier to balance multiple "pets". Also, if you want to see different abilities depending on the corpse... well, that would make things even harder to balance and much more development work, don't you agree? -- ab.er.rant 02:33, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

If a necromancer always revived the actual corpses of the foe he just killed, sometimes you could end up with an undead dwarf. I'd much rather have a giant golem made out of bones and muscle tissues that is taller than i am. Valion Sentis 12:38, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

I like the first idea, but then you could have an Undead army of...oh hell I don't know minotaurs. In addition, those minotaurs could gain the heal from Blood of the Master, while the non-Undead minotaurs don't receive such a gift. That's probably why they did that. Than 03:57, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

One of the biggest problems with this idea that I can see: using the corpses of your teammates. What happens when you try to res a zombified teammate? What about an enemy player in PvP? --Wormwood 03:39, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Necromancers for PVE?

Hi there, I'm looking for a new class to play through all campaigns/expansions with, is necro a strong class when it comes to PVE? I am thinking MMer but I need more opinions. Thanks.

Spiteful Spirit, Spoil Victor. Feast of Corruption is sometimes used in specific teams. ---Chaos?- (moo!) -- 15:56, 1 March 2010 (UTC)

A Net please fix the necros elites

Chest Running? Is it still possible to do effective chest running after the change to SF? I understand running with heroes and henchmen, but when picking up the lot from the chest, is there any skill that can replace SF? At the moment the best I can figure is just to have a bonder in the heroes to try and keep me alive :/

Assuming you mean DF (demonic flesh), you could always do your chest running with another character. It is account-based now, as I recall, so you'll get the same credit regardless of the class that does it. Guildwarsrunner 22:40, 14 February 2011 (UTC)

Curses Build?

Can someone plz give me a good curses build quick? Plz reply ASAP! Carleen96 03:17, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

This wiki isn't really a good place to look for builds. Try the PvX wiki, or a fan forum such as GWGuru, or just asking around ingame. And include what you're using the build for in your request next time -- builds vary a lot between PvE and PvP. --Wormwood 03:22, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Health Sacrifice

Has Necromancer functionality changed recently? Right now Livia is in my party with the following build: OANDUshvSLVVBbhoBWE1DBEVVA . Any skill she uses is sacrificing a portion of her health: Full health = 546hp following the casting of aegis = 524hp, a loss of 22hp or -4.03% total health. None of the skills in the build are listed as health sacrificing but health loss is occuring even with the monk skills. Appologies if I've missed anything glaringly obvious : / Spax 21:41, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

See Masochism, that might be the cause. 88.152.25.23 22:03, 25 July 2011 (UTC)

Ahaaaa! I don't know how I missed it in the skill description but I did. Thanks, it's been a long day : S Spax 22:41, 25 July 2011 (UTC)