Curse

Sergio Leone · Jul 20, 2005, 04:20 AM // 04:20

What should I do to make my Necro/Ranger a good trapper while taking advantage of the necro side. I need to know skills and where to place attributes. Thanks in advance.

Sergio Leone

Glasswalker · Jul 20, 2005, 07:51 PM // 19:51

There are 5 traps in this game: Barbed Trap, Dust Trap, Flame Trap, Spike Trap, and Healing Spring. All of them are in Wilderness Survival. Chances are you don't want all of them, but I could be wrong. Barbed and Flame are my favorites (I also play a N/R, and I love degen conditions) but they are also high in energy. Spike is an Elite and you get knockdown instead of the bleed you get with Barbed, damage about the same. If you have other skills (or a teambuild) that take advantage of the knockdown then go for it, otherwise use a better elite. Here's one suggestion:

Curses 9+2, Wilderness Survival 11, Soul Reaping 8+1 (for Energy), Death Magic 8

Faintheartedness (attack speed reduced, and Health Degen)
Malaise (Energy Degen (You suffer Health Degen))
Wither {Elite} (Health and Energy Degen!) (almost spammable)
Rotting Flesh (more Health Degen)
Apply Poison
Barbed Trap
Flame Trap
Dryder's Defense

Carry a cudgel or other 1-handed weapon and a Grim Cesta +max Energy. Scar Pattern Armor might be great too.

Get into position, lay your Traps and Apply Poison. Tab-Space through the enemies and spread some love. Your energy will slowly charge as you are poisoning. If an enemy has been called, start laying hexes. Faintheartedness for Warriors or Rangers, Malaise for anyone else. Stack on Wither and Rotting Flesh. Keep Poisoning. Someone will attempt to remove conditions on your victim, but they will just remove poison, and your next shot will put it back on. Your victim has Health degen of at least 10 (13 for the warriors, so Healing Breeze or something will have negligable effect) and 2 - 4 energy degen as well. You will become a target.

You will have health degen of 2 for as long as your (Ne/Mo/Me/El) target has energy, so watch for Spike Teams (Dryder's Defense will give you some help here, but no one will set off your traps -- don't even lay them. Sorry). If a Warrior comes after you, he can add bleeding and on fire to his list of woes (That's another 10 degen) and he's crippled, so you can run. It will take you 4 seconds to re-lay the traps, and you are easily interupted. This is where D's D really comes in. 75% chance to avoid being interupted.

A few alternatives: Switch out RF for Weaken Armor, remove Death and bump Curses and SR up to 10 each. You can also switch Flame Trap for Dust Trap, then just ignore the Warrior coming at you Blind and Crippled. The extra 15 energy will hurt though.

Now, I don't know why you are going for traps, it might just be because you think they are cool, but I don't know that I would recommend them. They are purely defensive and reactionary, and they rely on the enemy charging blindly into melee. I've also built this with PvP in mind, but I guess it would work in PvE. Traps in the Underworld are very popular at the moment, and you would probably want to switch out one skill for another trap while there.

Epinephrine · Jul 20, 2005, 08:11 PM // 20:11

Trappers can be useful anywhere really, it's just that it can be hard to convince people to let you lay traps for 60 seconds before engaging

In the UW people are much more likely to want to have the killing power of 3-4 full sets of traps per ranger.

Honestly, I think that you want a Ranger if you are running traps; the necromancer doesn't have that much more energy than a ranger does (provided the ranger takes a secondary with a wand/focus available) and pays more than twice the cost per trap (at 12 or so expertise you've basically cut the cost in half); in addition, the necromancer doesn't get access to the runes to boost trap performance. It would be hard to be anything but a primary Ranger to use traps effectively - granted, you can use a trap on your skill bar as a secondary ranger just fine, but paying 25 to lay a dust trap and another 15 to lay a spiked trap and 10 each for flame/spiked traps is pricey; laying a few sets of them quickly is expensive - 60 energy for a set of 4 traps, and 35 more to have 2 of each but dust - that can be done pretty fast, with serpent's quickness running you can have the whole thing set up in under 30 seconds, spending 95! energy; a mere 43 energy for a ranger with 13 expertise.

You haven't said whether it's in PvE or PvP; the necromancer primary ability is great for some builds, particulary in PvE, but it is lousy for use setting up traps - after all, the best trapping is done before any deaths are occurring; you can trap once the fight is on (that's how most trappers end up having to in PUBs), but it is harder, more likely to be interrupted and doesn't allow for the big initial spike of damage.

Glasswalker · Jul 20, 2005, 10:58 PM // 22:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Epinephrine

Trappers can be useful anywhere really, it's just that it can be hard to convince people to let you lay traps for 60 seconds before engaging In the UW people are much more likely to want to have the killing power of 3-4 full sets of traps per ranger.

Precisely my point(s). But I have seen them effectively placed on the steps of the dias after you have won a round. Too bad you can't switch skills in between rounds, eh? Have an offensive build and a defensive build...

But to play Devil's Advocate -- with the proper weapon, armor and focus, you can get 80+ energy. True, everytime you switch to bow, you will lose some of that, but Necros regen energy faster than Rangers, and you are spending none while poisoning people.

And as Epinephrine pointed out, this build is no damage dealer. You will require teammates. Of course, it is satisfying, and it does let the rest of the team do damage, so they are happy too. You just need a healing monk, and no one else needs to play support. Okay, maybe an interupter...