Curse

Kurokishi · Sep 03, 2007, 01:18 PM // 13:18

Hiya!
I've finally leveled up my necro. (It's my second serious GW char)
I've tried several builds with him, but right now I'm kind of stuck.
I usually play MM:
[skill]Animate Bone Horror[/skill][skill]Animate Bone Fiend[/skill][skill]Blood of the Master[/skill][skill]Reaper's Mark[/skill][skill]Necrosis[/skill][skill]Dark Bond[/skill][skill]Taste of Death[/skill][skill]Ressurection Signet[/skill]

This build works quite well for missions.
12+1+3 = Death
10+1 = Soul Reaping
4+1 = Blood

Reaper's Mark is for Energy Management.
And it works well with Necrosis as a 1 s recharge spike.
(Haven't done the Att-quests.)
(Will probably change to [skill]Aura of the Lich[/skill] and [skill]Signet of Lost Souls[/skill])

Some missions just don't drop enough corpses for this build to be efficient.
Alas, due to the hero setup I use, I usually get by through a mission with only Reaper's and Necrosis.
(I use Tahlkora;Healing - Acolyte Souske;SF/Interrupter - Zhed Shadowhoof;SF/Interrupter - Henches are: Cynn/Orion, Mhenlo/Alesia, Lisa, Little Thom.)

I'm trying to find a neat SS-build for mission PvE. But all the builds I see are either based on Reckless Haste or a solo 55-build. (I haven't got factions, only proph and nightfall.)
So far I've decided to scetch up this;

[skill]Spiteful Spirit[/skill][skill]Insidious Parasite[/skill][skill]Life Siphon[/skill][skill]Necrosis[/skill][skill]Enfeebling Blood[/skill][skill]Leech Signet[/skill][skill]Power Drain[/skill][skill]Ressurection Signet[/skill]

I'm not sure if this builds works well though.
I'm thinking of maybe trying for a bloodspiker necro too.
Any ideas for that?
Is there anything in particular that works well with my dual-SF setup?
I refuse to play BiP for my heroes and henchies. They've got enough energy management with interrupts. Even the healer. ^^

If it helps, I'm at the second last mission in the prophecies campaign.
No corspes, so the MM setup is kind of useless.
The occasional Mursaat corpse is either taken by another enemy necromancer, or the minions just die when close to an Ether Seal.

cyberjanet · Sep 03, 2007, 04:59 PM // 16:59

I've done all three campaigns with variants on this build, and sorry, I have no idea how to do the pictures:

N/E

Awaken the Blood
Glyph of Lesser Energy
Spiteful Spirit
Desecrate Enchantments/Insidious Parasite
Reckless Haste [good against melee characters, they take more damage from SS for fighting faster]
Parasitic Bond (essential for self-heal, always keep this spell in)
Price of Failure/Spinal Shivers with cold weapons/Necrosis
Rez signet

Play around with that and adapt it to your playing style with skills you have picked up. It's fairly versatile.

There's another common build with N/Me using Arcane Echo to replicate Spiteful Spirit. If you use that consider using also Auspicious Incantation to keep your energy up.Otherwise I would say the skills above are a pretty core build.

Pick Me · Sep 04, 2007, 03:22 PM // 15:22

My N/Me has beaten Factions and Prophecies, and is at the Bone Palace in Night Fall.

This is what I used (without Factions or Night Fall) to beat Prophecies:

[skill]Spiteful Spirit[/skill][skill]Parasitic Bond[/skill][skill]empathy[/skill][skill]cry of frustration[/skill][skill]wastrel's worry[/skill][skill]soul barbs[/skill][skill]enfeebling blood[/skill][skill]resurrection signet[/skill]

you can sub any mesmer skill for necrosis, and signet of lost souls. I like WW with PB and SB for nice damage.

You can go Curse/Inspiration I suppose, but enjoy the passive curses better. Insidious parasite is good, but I find that enemies die too quickly for me to gain the full benefit.

And to Cyberjanet:

Type [skill]name of skill[/skill] to get the pics. Yes, you must have the square brackets and they word skill or /skill in them to get the pic.

Moloch Vein · Sep 04, 2007, 04:52 PM // 16:52

Well, since nobody seems to have, I am going to give you the so-called "baseline" MM and SS builds for the campaigns that you own.

Reckless Haste has been nerfed to hell anyhow, don't bother with that skill.

SS:

N/Me

Arcane Echo - SS - Insidious Parasite - Parasitic Bond - Signet of Lost Souls - [3 Optional - Should most likely include Enfeebling Blood]

C 12+1+3 SR 12+1

MM:

N/D

Dark Bond - Infuse Condition - Mystic Regeneration - Order of Undeath - Animate Bone Fiend - Animate Bone Horror - Signet of Lost Souls - Blood of the Master

Alternative: Replace Order of Undeath with Aura of the Lich

DM 12+3+1, EP 8, SR Rest+1

Re: Other posters in thread;

Auspicious Incantation is a very good skill for a mesmer or a PvP necro. For general PvE use it's suboptimal for a necromancer. It begs for points invested in a third spell school solely for energy management, when passive Soul Reaping itself does a better job with that. Signet of Lost Souls is far superior.

Empathy is a poor-man's-SS and I see no real reason to pack it and waste points in Domination Magic, again sacrificing Soul Reaping. IF you put points into Domination I'd be far more tempted to use Backfire; unfortunately it has a heinous casting time and the duration isn't much to brag about either.

Cry of Frustration is a very nice skill for some instances but it works just as well at Domination 0. The damage output is an afterthought.

While Soul Barbs can be a useful skill for pressuring single resistant enemies I am reluctant to add it as a "baseline" build and if it needs to be triggered, Parasitic Bond does just as fine a job of it - yes, you'll have two fast-casting hexes to use, that's the only difference.

That's about it, kindly, Moloch.

Pick Me · Sep 04, 2007, 05:35 PM // 17:35

I don't like using [skill]arcane echo[/skill] because of the cost of casting it and SS and SS copy. With the cost of SS back to its original cost, its just too much for me to use.

Empathy is a poor man's SS, but when the hand and fist split up it's nice to cast SS on 1 and Empathy on the other.

True on the Soul Reaping vs Domination, so drop Empathy if you wish and put only 3 points into Domination. WW is for Soul Barbs anyway.

Backfire is for casters only, so the only casters you'll face are the Lich, Sparks and Ashen Hulks. Lich is more deadlier with melee than with spells; Ashens die very quickly regardless; Sparks are better targetted first and interupted often, thus Backfire is utterly useless IMHO.

At any rate, make sure your party has interupts, sparks are the worst by far.

Soul Barbs isn't a "baseline" spell, it just works well with quick casting and quick recharing spells (like WW).

Moloch Vein · Sep 04, 2007, 10:48 PM // 22:48

I use the build above mentioned as a bread-and-butter type running a max energy of 53. That's full radiant, double HSR/HCT wand set, one superior vigor, one minor soul reaping, and rest attunements. The combined cost of the SS cycle is 55. After this is concluded I look for a <50% target for Signet of Lost Souls, and put Insidious + Parabond on a melee target. I rarely have problem with energy, especially having a minion master on my team (using Olias.)

I didn't recommend running Backfire. Insidious Parasite, however, is better than Empathy, especially considering we aren't carrying any miss-ratio spells. The damage from Insidious is also not subject to shielding spells since it is life stealing.

If we're talking the final Proph missions I have found that a water Ele henchman running Ward against Harm is very nice.