Curse

SisterMercy · Jul 04, 2006, 03:40 AM // 03:40

Okay, it looks like I have to expose one of my builds so that everyone else can try it out and discover that it works. Really well, in fact. Easily in league with SS when you're using it right, I've found. I'm honestly surprised that this didn't get notice sooner. But until people realize that it works, I'll still be getting the "Poison? Epidemic? Pah. That's useless" tripe from everyone while I'm looking for group.

So here you go. And keep in mind that this is something I'll use in a situation where I'm up against bleeders. If your mission is mostly Temple Guardians, Skeles, Azures and assorted undead, then yes, it's going to be a wasted skillbar. But against bleeders (most of the game), it's excellent. Against onezies like Shiro, #s 3 and 4 might be useless, but 1 and 2 will still fit nicely with other skillbars.

And this is tested in PvE. Whether it would be effective in PvP would depend on how often your opponents group or near each other, how good you are at timing #3, and how smart they are when it comes to #4.

1. Rotting Flesh (Prophecies-only). This is a 2-second cast, the longest of the whole string, but in a PvE situation, you get away with it easily at first aggro -- you don't alert them until the cast hits. And at 2 seconds, you'll land it more often than not in combat. Any longer would be bad.

The point of it is to throw poison onto your opponent. If you're with a Ranger using Apply Poison, it's easier to rely on him for this, but you can't always do so.

2. Virulence (E, Prophecies-only). No, it's not a wasted Elite. This adds disease and weakness onto your poisoned foe, compounding the degen considerably. This is a 1-second cast, rarely interrupted, and a recast of 10 seconds isn't bad.

3. Epidemic (core skill). You've got one person managing the aggro, right? Good, because you nail your opponent with this, and it transfers the poison, disease and weakness (equal durations to your current foe) to every opponent adjacent to him. This is a 1/4 second cast, virtually impossible to interrupt, but the longest recharge of the skillbar (15 sec, which is not at all that bad).

By now, a couple of hits from your truncheon plus all that degen will probably bring down your first foe. That's when you throw down a

4. Well of Suffering (Prophecies-only). This is beautiful AoE that doesn't scatter the enemies like hyperactive weasels. Don't tell Anet. They'll nerf it.

When you select your nearby opponent, he'll probably be nearly down from all the degen. If not, if his health is regenerating, hit him with Virulence once it's recharged, and that will reset the duration, and give you enough time to use Epidemic to spread it again. If an enemy monk manages to remove the conditions, just cycle to the next nearby foe and hit Epidemic again, and you'll throw it all back on him.

If your opponents are not contained in aggro, cycle through and look for an enemy suffering some kind of condition. It doesn't have to be poison, any condition will work (not hexes), and then use the Virulence / Epidemic combo. If there's no conditions about, it's back to Rotting Flesh to generate some. Additional scattered Wells can also be a beautiful complement.

Now, you do this with a maxed out Death Magic attribute (Epidemic uses no base attribute, so you don't even need any points in the Mesmer side... although I prefer to bring some Inspiration Magic skills). You can round out your skillbar as you like. I bring Rez Signet, a powerful heal in Soul Feast (there'll be plenty of corpses, unless you have an MM onside, in which case you can swap out for Ether Feast), Blood Ritual and Leech Signet (awful recharge time, but quick cast and interrupts anything, including Healing Signet). You could probably bring a minion skill if you wanted, but you won't have the time to tend to them and keep them effectively healed.

Okay. Go now. Play. Come back and tell me it doesn't work.

Bet you can't.

Hollerith · Jul 04, 2006, 09:03 AM // 09:03

Couple things (the build obviously would work [Epidemic is a nasty skill for spreading conditions around], but seems ineffecient):

Why not use Phantom Pain + Shatter Delusions to satisfy the Virulence requirement (and bring Enfeeble as a backup).

Why use Well of Suffering when foes are already at -8 degen? I'd take something like Putrid Explosion to spike damage instead of adding another -2 degen from Suffering.

Yanman.be · Jul 04, 2006, 09:13 AM // 09:13

Rotting flesh is disease, check your skills before you post them.

Virulence adds poison and weakness

Why not Barbed Signet + plague sending ?

Pick Me · Jul 04, 2006, 05:26 PM // 17:26

First off, you idea is nothing new. Granted, it may not have been mentioned, but it doesn't mean that no one ever thought about it.

Second, strip enchantment may hurt you, that and the fact that you and your party can be diseased.

No Fragility?

Does this work in PvE, yes, against low level foes.

As you already stated, those who don't bleed won't feel the health degen as much as those who do (no poison, no disease, no bleeding, etc.) so you will be almost useless against those foes (lets say 90% do bleed, but certain areas have foes that don't).

Please note a health degen build from Xenoranger is also there, just no Epidemic, which can be used.

SisterMercy · Jul 05, 2006, 12:27 AM // 00:27

I never meant to pretend that it was new, only that it's a reasonable and effective enough build that it can be a valuable asset on a team, rather than standard MM or SS builds. Necros are not two-trick ponies, like the masses seem to think. I don't know if this particular permutation has been tried before, but I've never seen one emphasizing what you can do with your Mesmer secondary.

Quote:

Rotting flesh is disease

You're correct. My mistake. The display is similar to when poison is applied and I mixed the two.

Quote:

Why not Barbed Signet + plague sending ?

I'm guessing you mean Signet of Agony, which puts a condition on you (bleeding) and then Plague Sending transfers it to a nearby foe (Barbed Signet is just a sacrifice + lifesteal). Not a bad idea, it's 1 3/4 sec cast combined versus 2 sec for Rotting Flesh, and adds a different flavor of degen to the mix for possibly even quicker results, not to mention the initial blast of damage to foes near you. Would help to put some attribute points in Blood Magic for this approach, but that 15 sec recharge on Signet of Agony vs. 3 sec on Rotting Flesh lends a bit less versatility.

Quote:

Why not use Phantom Pain + Shatter Delusions to satisfy the Virulence requirement (and bring Enfeeble as a backup).

This gives you a combined 2 1/4 cast time versus 1 sec, and means spreading attributes among Domination and Illusion Magics. The two are a nice power combo, but part of the punch comes from maxing out one attribute. Could work, would have to test it.

Quote:

Why use Well of Suffering when foes are already at -8 degen? I'd take something like Putrid Explosion to spike damage instead of adding another -2 degen from Suffering.

Fair enough too, I just find that WoS covers off any misses, and Putrid destroys any corpses that might be useful for other things, while WoS uses only one.

Quote:

No Fragility?

Hm. Fragility looks interesting, and would be excellent in a no-Epidemic build versus a solo enemy (Shiro, Kuongshang, etc). Will have to play.

edit: In practical situations, even in higher-level areas, I'm finding that with the added damage from playing with a team or henchies, the foes rarely outlive the period of degen (aside from bosses), so Fragility becomes a wasted cast. Worse, casting it could lengthen out the string enough to not be able to hit them with Epidemic, and the whole point of the build is to spread it liberally and quickly.

Quote:

Does this work in PvE, yes, against low level foes.

I found that in Kurzick areas, places like Unwaking Waters (explorable and mission both) and far more, it was quite useful against higher-level ones, although there were some tweaks to the build in places. Against Kuongshang, I skipped Epidemic, but kept renewing Virulence every time it recharged, threw down a WoS anytime he spiked a team member to death and we just poured it on. (Did Masters in the UW mission, but a lot of that credit also goes to an excellent interrupt Ranger and other elements on the team.)

Hollerith · Jul 05, 2006, 05:18 PM // 17:18

Quote:

Originally Posted by SisterMercy

This gives you a combined 2 1/4 cast time versus 1 sec, and means spreading attributes among Domination and Illusion Magics. The two are a nice power combo, but part of the punch comes from maxing out one attribute. Could work, would have to test it.

Fair enough too, I just find that WoS covers off any misses, and Putrid destroys any corpses that might be useful for other things, while WoS uses only one.

2 1/4 cast time vs 2 seconds from Rotting Flesh, you mean? The extra ~3/4 second gives potentially gives deep wound across all foes, instead of a condition that will already be present from Virulence. Also, you don't need to put any points into Domination; the primary effect you want from Shatter Delusions is to remove Phantom Pain. Points spread between max Death and decent Illusion/SR is a pretty balanced spread.

Epidemic has a very short recast, so if a misfire happens, it's conceivable to fire another one off. Also, Putrid uses the same amount of corpses as Suffering, so they're very interchangable.

SisterMercy · Jul 06, 2006, 12:49 AM // 00:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hollerith

2 1/4 cast time vs 2 seconds from Rotting Flesh, you mean?

He was comparing Phantom Pain / Shatter Delusions to Virulence (1 second cast). It wouldn't work as a replacement for Rotting Flesh, since you need one condition to be present for Virulence to have an effect, and these two are hexes, not qualifying conditions.

Hollerith · Jul 06, 2006, 12:59 AM // 00:59

Ohh (that was me that suggested it). I was comparing Pain/Shatter to Rotting Flesh, because those are the spells used to satisfy Virulence's requirements (foe suffering from a condition). Shatter Delusions isn't a hex, it actually removes a mesmer hex from a foe.

Phantom Pain + Shatter Delusion = Deep wound on target foe. Then cast Virulence and Epidemic.

Don't mind me, I'm just living vicariously through you, since I love Epidemic as a Mes, and Virulence as a W, but don't have a Necro for PVE (just have a Mes).

Katari · Jul 06, 2006, 01:08 AM // 01:08

How about Caltrops for triggering Virulence?

azunder · Jul 06, 2006, 01:09 AM // 01:09

If you really want to compare it with SS:
Note that you do 20 (area of effect) DPS maximum due to the degen cap. SS is usually echoed and and obviously does more than 20 aoe DPS. Also, if your team is careless, the disease can backfire on you and infect your team.

On the other hand, there are a few advantages like: it's not vulnerable to hex removal and (if you use the phantom pain + shatter delusions) you get an aoe deep wound which could be useful. (A downside to the aoe deepwound is that you need to kill the mobs before deepwound ends or it would make nearly no difference). The aoe weakness is also nice because it helps keep some pressure off your monks.

In situations when you can just use SS, it's not exactly optimal damagewise but it's good enough and that's what matters in PvE. And, nothing stops you from getting another necro with SS so you can do both builds at the same time because they usually dont overlap (unless you accidentally shatter the SS!).

Toxic RD · Jul 06, 2006, 03:13 AM // 03:13

I like your ideas, and condition characters are definatley flexible, i'm trying to make a condition ranger using epidemic, but its not working so well, mainly because epidemic only transfers to adjacent foes, which stinks

SisterMercy · Jul 06, 2006, 03:50 AM // 03:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hollerith

Ohh (that was me that suggested it). I was comparing Pain/Shatter to Rotting Flesh... Shatter Delusions isn't a hex, it actually removes a mesmer hex from a foe....

Ok, my bads. I really should stop replying while LFGing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Toxic RD

I like your ideas, and condition characters are definatley flexible, i'm trying to make a condition ranger using epidemic, but its not working so well, mainly because epidemic only transfers to adjacent foes, which stinks

Poison Arrows can be quite useful on a Ranger without needing Epidemic, simply by cycling through the enemies once an arrow hits and you see green on the health bar. That's one common thing rangers do, is prep Poison Arrows, and then keep on one target. It renews the poison duration, sure, but you can do that by cycling back, and still spread it around to multiple foes (or if there's a called target you want to keep on, you can hit T every third arrow or so).

OTOH, Dust trap + Epidemic might help keep clustered warriors' damage off your party, keeping your enemies blinded. It's a thought, but tougher to effectively stage.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Katari

How about Caltrops for triggering Virulence?

I haven't tried the assassin skills much yet. Quicker cast time, longer recharge, by the looks of it. But the trouble is, Caltops is an Assassin skill, Virulence is Necro and Epidemic is Mesmer, so one part of the chain would have to go.

Quote:

Originally Posted by azunder

If you really want to compare it with SS:
Note that you do 20 (area of effect) DPS maximum due to the degen cap. SS is usually echoed and and obviously does more than 20 aoe DPS. Also, if your team is careless, the disease can backfire on you and infect your team.

I hadn't really thought about the cap. However, the speed in which enemies fall seems very much comparable to echoed SS, unless they spread right out. Never had it infect my team though, but then I've used it primarily in PvE.

Dark Tykane · Jul 06, 2006, 04:42 AM // 04:42

I've always been mad when somebody brings disease to pvp even if its on the other team. If i'm opposing them i just walk up to them and use it to kill them and if its a team mate I make sure he knows its killing everyone on his team too by spreading it to him.
Of course it still works and people on your team dont get as much degen as the opposing party.
disease is only -4 out of the -8 the others have from virulence and the additional -3 if you add on bleeding.

teh blink · Jul 07, 2006, 03:11 AM // 03:11

I have used this build on my necro all through the Flameseeker Prophicies. It seems to be flawless in 1v1.

Necromancer/Mesmer

Blood Magic 12+3+1
Soul Reaping 3+1
Curses 12+1

Vampiric Gaze
Shadow Strike
Life Siphon
Life Transfer
Barbed Signet
Malise (or Res. Signet)
Desecrate Enchantments
Insidious Parasite

Im aware I didnt spell some of those skill correctly. I am currently away from my computer that can run GuildWars or I would have done a better job. Tell me what you think.