Hello fellow AoC-Players. In this thread I'm going to explain as good as I can how a Necromancer plays, what the main skills are, feats, strategies, and lots lots more!
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Feats
Necromancers have 3 feat-trees
Reanimation
Nightfall
General (This is for all mage-types)
Reanimation
I'm going to start with Reanimation.
Reanimation is the feat-tree which improves the necromancers pets and give some very nice ulitily spells(Unholy Hands).
Reanimation Necromancers are able to summon 3 more pets (above the base limit of 8 pets). This spell calls "One with the Death", each time they press this spell they gain 1 pet point more (Maximum is 3 aditional pet points) but this spell makes them ALOT weaker, it reduces their invurnablity.
First time they use the spell (1 point) they get their invurnablity's reduced by 50
Second time by 100
Third time by 150
-> 3 Stacks make the necromancer VERY easy 1 shot-able
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Reanimation Necro's also get the Unholy Hand spell, it is a channeled slow+aoe damage spell. Its compareable with blizzard, you target a place and all targets within that circle get a movement reduction and damage. But you have to channel this spell.
This spell is VERY nice and just incredible good in group pvp (All the melee's moving slower = win)
Thought in 1V1 it isn't that awesome because the targets can still reach you very fast.
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Reanimation necro's also have Army of the death(Hope its right), it keeps summoning minions while channeling this spell, thought I heard alot of people find this spell very weak both in pvp and pve because you have to keep channeling, once you stop it all the pets die.
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Spell : "Void"
This spell temporary(12 or 20 sec if I can remember it correctly) let your pets drain stamina and mana.
This spell works on all pets, so not only blighted ones. ALL Pets.
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Nightfall
This tree improves the Necromancers spells, which makes him a very strong caster (Demo-like).
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First very important spell is "Despoil the Soul".
Its a look-alike to "One with the death", but this spell REDUCES your pet points and gives you alot, i really mean ALOT of magic damage!
You can use this spell untill all your pet points are gone.
(I also found an exploit for this spell, look it up at the exploit and bug section)
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Another very strong spell is "Grip of the Death"
Its a channeled spell which deals amazing damage to the target. But also deals damage to enemy's that are near the main target.
Example :
You cast grip of the death on "Target 1", this target will get like 600 damage/2sec (Numbers are not correct, just to create an image)
There are 2 other targets near target 1, we call them "Target 2" and "Target 3"
Target 2 and target 3 will get 400 damage/2sec
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There are still alot of other spells in the tree but they kinda explain themself, like Death Eather kills one of your pets but let you gain X amount of health and X amount of health regen
Example:
Your HP increases with 400 and you get a heal effect that heals around 80 damage/sec. Something like a pot, just that this spell also increases your hp.
________________________________________________________________ General Tree
The general tree is a tree which is for every mage class (Demo ,HoX and Necro)
This tree is in my opinion more a tree for Nightfall Necro's (Thought Reanimations can use this tree to, but this tree actually increases the Necromancers spells, not pets, so reanimations don't really have use of this spells. But thats my opinion)
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Archmagus Talent (5 Points, Tier 2)
This talent does not really increase the power of your Vile Insight and Dark Knowledge.
BUT, this talent let this buff give magic rating to both Frost and Unholy.
Example (Because I can't really explain it nice)
Your Vile Insight gives you 33 Magic Rating (Frost)
You spend 5 point in archmagus talent.
Your vileinsight wil give 33 magic rating(frost) ----AND--- 33 magic rating(Unholy).
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Purge
This spells removes all snares and roots from you, this spell is AWESOME for the both feat trees. Since all melee's will snare/root you, and your mission is to hold distance, so this spell is really really really awesome.
Necromancers have also alot of pets.There are 2 kind of pets:
You have Melee pets (which always require 1 pet point to control)
You have Mage pets (Which require 2 pet points to control)
((And you have Archmage Pets which require 4 points to control))
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So I'm only going to discuss the 2 main PvP pets, you will most of the time meet them.
Blighted Ones :
Blighted ones are pets which drain mana AND STAMINA from their enemy(But the necromancer does not get any drained mana).
This pets are very strong if you go into the reanimation tree and put pets into improved blighted ones and if you get the spell "Void" you can easily drain any enemy to 0 % mana/stamina in a few seconds
This pets rule PvP, thought I haven't tested them after the Void nerf.
Thought their damage is 1/3 to 1/2 of the Corruptor's/Life-Stealer pets. So you better don't use this one while grinding
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Life-Stealers.
Life-stealers pets do what the name says, they steal the life of their target and give it to you.
This pets are very strong in grinding (This allows you to take multiply mobs, the heal is as strong as a pot)
And they are actually also a very strong pvp pet.
Their damage is 3/4 of the corruptors damage, which means very high.
This pets are awesome if you are on a pvp server, this allows you to grind, but still have the pets ready if some person attacks you
Necromancers have alot of spells but I'm just going to say the CC ones, since those are the most important.
-Freeze
This is a spell which Stuns the target for up to 10 seconds, thought it breaks very fast on damage, specially if your pets are hitting the target you better don't count on the spell, it probably doesn't even stays active for a second
- Frostblast
This is a "Cone of Cold" - like spell. Just that this spell roots your target, this also breaks very fast on damage
- The spell-with-the-worms (slowing spell, forgot name)
This is a ranged spell which decreases the targets movement speed
Tactics to beat other classes (You are playing Necro)
Reanimation specced:
Some people find this spec a "easy-mode-spec" because there are various extremely good but easy tactics.
Tactic vs a Melee : This is quite easy, lets say a melee attacks is out of stealth.
We instantly use our fear and get some range, use slow when fear is done, and just keep running (while your pets hit the target)
You hold this on for a 10-15 sec and your target is death
(This is a theori, ofc some classes can slow you to, but most of the time they can't really reach you, and if they do, you still have 2 CC spells left!)
Tactic vs a Caster : This is also quite easy, send pets and run away so they can't cast spells... Thats mainly it :P
Tactic vs caster + melee : Get 8 blighted ones (+specced for them), use void, send your pets, see them loosing all mana + stamina
???
LAUGH AT THEM :P
Nightfall specced:
Well this is a bit harder, I can't really explain a tactic since it all depends what your enemy does. So can't really say any good tactic except "CC them if they go close/heal, the rest of the time nuke them"
Necromancers are mages which use cloth, this makes them a very easy target for melee's (Specially ranger, they 1 shot you anyway so don't bother)
We also have a quite low HP from nature, so keep this in mind.
Necromancers weaknesses are their pets, and still it are their strong part, let me explain.
For some people their pc goes totally mad if they send pets, it creates lagfests, both for the Necromancer as the enemy. So please, never do a 8VS8 pets fight, you just will run away at the end because you will only have 1 FPS ((I normally have 60 FPS on all settings max, 8V8 pets = 1-5 FPS))
Also, Necromancers pets are hard to kill, so don't really try to kill them unless you are very sure you can dish out some nice AoE damage (Like nightfall necro's, I kill reanimation necro's their pets in like 5 sec, ofc, the necro is as good as dead then )
But for all other classes specially melee's : do NOT try to kill the pets, its waist of time since if you kill them to slow this happens :
1 Or they keep summoning new onew
2 Or they just kill you while you are trying to kill them.
Also, necromancers (nightfalls) are mainly based on dots, so trying to LoS kite them (if you are ToS/PoM/Demo) is not really smart, since the dots will kill you while you can't hit them. Nuking nightfall necro's is the best tactic =)
More information will come soon, now I'm taking a little break.
And sorry for the grammar mistakes + the very bad build-guide :P. I just try to give people a little information about Necromancer class =) (and I only have a 63 necro yet so my xp is limited to this, none of this information is from a level 80 point of view!)
If there are no stupid questions, then what kind of questions do stupid people ask? Do they get smart just in time to ask questions?
-=Class Guide=- Facing a Necromancer
