17 replies to this topic

[Brass Lion]

So, I've finally gone back to trying the Necro after not having touched it since Beta.  I've got a decent sense of the builds and such from the sticky, but I'm having trouble figuring out how to use Death Shroud.  It's very different from all the other class main mechanics.  Am I supposed to use it defensively, as another health pool?  Just for the CC, and hop out again?  What does it do for me if I haven't traited it?

I'm pretty lost.

[Desild]

I'm currently using a Support build on my Necro, and Death Shroud is an important pivot in my ability to support my party. This of course varies from build to build.

For me at least, I use Death Shroud for the following:

1) Burst healing with Life Transfer: when traited right, your 4th skill can be used to heal your party with each tick. Averages between 900 to 1200 party heal at level 80.

2) A quick Fear to control a single foe.

3) Good damage: your first Death Shroud skill gives more damage if your Death Shroud meter is filled, and decreases as it empties. A full DS meter can give twice the damage as if it were half-full.

4) An emergency button for when you can't dodge AoE's: a second life bar that you can use to mitigate damage.

Obviously, you get more out of Death Shroud the more you invest in it.

[Symbiont]

this is probably nothing new for someone who main a necromancer, anyhow...

i mostly use fear/Doom defensively, but i was tinkering to utilize fear more offensively when playing with a condition-necromancer by applying dots and maximizing dot-damage through the use of fear.

to do this, you apply a massive amounts of dots on your opponent and quickly cast fear, but before fear runs out chain it with another fear if you desire. there is nothing that can break fear, so nothing your opponent can do about the dots on him.

combo example:
cast Signet of Spite followed by
Death Shroud > Doom > Dark Path for the chill effect
and before fear ends apply Life Transfer.

also Dark Path seems underutilized by necro's. i like what the skill does, not just to catch-up with opponents but applying Chill and a stack of 3 Bleeds, it's pretty awesome.

Spoiler

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Edited by Symbiont, 05 December 2012 - 07:58 PM.

[Commander Boreale]

Symbiont, on 05 December 2012 - 07:06 PM, said:

also Dark Path seems underutilized by necro's. i like what the skill does, not just to catch-up with opponents but applying Chill and a stack of 3 Bleeds, it's pretty awesome.

It's pretty decent when it actually works. Back when I played a necro it was more unreliable than epidemic/corrupt boons. I'm not sure if they fixed that but I hope so.

[Skyro]

Commander Boreale, on 05 December 2012 - 07:26 PM, said:

It's pretty decent when it actually works. Back when I played a necro it was more unreliable than epidemic/corrupt boons. I'm not sure if they fixed that but I hope so.

A lot of that has to do with it being a slow moving projectile that can be juked very easily. It gets more reliable at closer ranges. I like to use it to teleport into meele range and then swap weapons with sigil of superior geomancy.

[Quietnine]

Brass Lion, on 05 December 2012 - 06:36 PM, said:

So, I've finally gone back to trying the Necro after not having touched it since Beta.  I've got a decent sense of the builds and such from the sticky, but I'm having trouble figuring out how to use Death Shroud.  It's very different from all the other class main mechanics.  Am I supposed to use it defensively, as another health pool?  Just for the CC, and hop out again?  What does it do for me if I haven't traited it?

I'm pretty lost.

https://www.youtube....user/RaggokOozo

this guy has a bunch of necro WvW vids showing good use of deathshroud in just about every situation.

yes its a second healthbar and you should learn to use it to eat burst. also keep in mind that you gen life force as a fight goes on (especially if you pick up traits/utilities that make it easier to get life force), so starting a fight with a full bar and sitting on it till you are almost dead is a huge waste.

from a damage perspective, if you are condition spec'd it may be useless to pop into deathshroud, but for a power spec lifeblast can hit very hard if you are over 50% life force (after that the damage drops dramatically).

[Symbiont]

^ and thnx for that, i never utilized deathshroud stomp, didn't know it was possible. i was using a gimmicky pet blind to stomp, this seems much better.

Edited by Symbiont, 05 December 2012 - 11:21 PM.

[Brass Lion]

Thanks everyone, I will look at what you posted.  It looks like I've got a lot to learn.

[Merril]

I don't think you can stomp in deathshroud anymore, just tried several times to do so in the mist.

[kendro1200]

Pretty sure you can't stomp anymore as well, haven't been able to do so for over a week.

Desild, on 05 December 2012 - 06:46 PM, said:

I'm currently using a Support build on my Necro, and Death Shroud is an important pivot in my ability to support my party. This of course varies from build to build.

For me at least, I use Death Shroud for the following:

1) Burst healing with Life Transfer: when traited right, your 4th skill can be used to heal your party with each tick. Averages between 900 to 1200 party heal at level 80.

2) A quick Fear to control a single foe.

3) Good damage: your first Death Shroud skill gives more damage if your Death Shroud meter is filled, and decreases as it empties. A full DS meter can give twice the damage as if it were half-full.

4) An emergency button for when you can't dodge AoE's: a second life bar that you can use to mitigate damage.

Obviously, you get more out of Death Shroud the more you invest in it.

^ This is a pretty solid frame to work with on Death Shroud use.
Another thing to take on is life transfer is a good way to take out mesmer clones.

[Skyro]

Well DS usage really depends on your build/traits and what you are facing so it hard to have a specific rule of thumb for every situation. For example most Necs are conditionmancers and thus pick up the 5s Fury on DS trait. This allows even conditionmancers to use it to get an on demand Fury buff and gives you more incentive to use it as extra offense. This is probably the #1 thing that separates good necros with the average ones.

A simple example is Necro vs Necro engagements. Since Necros can't burst you don't have to worry about saving DS to eat or interrupt their spikes so cycling Dark Path and Doom into your rotation early is a good idea.

You also have to know the damage #s. For conditionmancers Life Blast is fairly useless, only time you really should use it is if you need to stay in DS to eat damage and can't use any of the other skills. Also for conditionmancers Life Siphon is really only useful vs multiple targets.

[Quietnine]

Merril, on 26 December 2012 - 03:59 AM, said:

I don't think you can stomp in deathshroud anymore, just tried several times to do so in the mist.

i was able to DS-Stomp every attempt against the mist "guardian" sparring partner (5 of 5) this morning.

[Takato]

Quietnine, on 31 December 2012 - 04:45 PM, said:

i was able to DS-Stomp every attempt against the mist "guardian" sparring partner (5 of 5) this morning.

Iv'e tried myself, everytime I enter DS, it cancels my stomp.
Not sure if I'm doing it right though.

[Quietnine]

Takato, on 31 December 2012 - 04:58 PM, said:

Iv'e tried myself, everytime I enter DS, it cancels my stomp.
Not sure if I'm doing it right though.

I have DS set to secondary keybind F5 and interact set to secondary keybind F6, this way the binds to mess up my other characters and their utility skills.

Down something. walk up to it, F5 an instant before slamming F6, works everytime. also good for rezzing.

[Takato]

Quietnine, on 31 December 2012 - 05:48 PM, said:

I have DS set to secondary keybind F5 and interact set to secondary keybind F6, this way the binds to mess up my other characters and their utility skills.

Down something. walk up to it, F5 an instant before slamming F6, works everytime. also good for rezzing.

So, use it super fast basically ? and before the stomp.

[Skyro]

Takato, on 01 January 2013 - 02:28 AM, said:

So, use it super fast basically ? and before the stomp.

Just hit the death shroud and stomp keys at the same time.

[Falfyrel]

The timing's a bit tricky, yeah, but it's definitely possible. I occasionally shroudstomp to look fancy/so that my DS can eat the damage while I secure the stomp.

Death Shroud is definitely more useful for a power build but it shouldn't be disregarded for a condition build either. You can cast Doom even when you're stunned, so it often serves as an impromptu stunbreak - if you get stunned just enter into DS and fear. Dark Path can be good for pursuing fleeing foes (a nice tactic I've found to secure Dark Path is to cast it, then Doom a second or so before it hits to screw up any attempted dodges). And even without speccing for power Life Transfer is a very hard-hitting spell that can stack Hemophilia ticks like crazy. Death Shroud's utility is definitely more limited without traiting for it or speccing into Power so that Life Blast becomes useful, though.

If you're running a condition build, in PvP environments you should probably get into the habit of switching to Death Shroud on impulse whenever you're fearing a burst, or are getting bursted. I see way too many people spending most of the fight getting hit really hard and then only going into Death Shroud when they're about to die anyways.

But don't discount the damage that Death Shroud deals on a power spec. DS was the main reason I switched to a powermancer build to begin with because if you trait for it, Death Shroud is ridiculously bulky and Life Blast can easily crit for over 4k on glassier opponents (though 2-3k is more common).

[Skyro]

A lot of people underestimate Death Shroud as a conditionmancer:

-If you have a meele train on you, you can fear one of them off and use Dark Path on them to teleport out of the scrum.
-You can dodge/LOS as your Dark Path hits to avoid/mitigate the teleport, thus enabling you to use Dark Path as a pure DPS skill as a conditionmancer.
-Popping in and out of Death Shroud quickly just for the 5s fury is free DPS (and with the near death trait keep up fury permanently).
-Life Blast DPS is not great, but it is still useful if you get stuck in staff as it is much stronger than staff auto-attack.
-You actually do more direct damage with a 0/30/0/0/30 with rabid ammy than 30/30/0/0/0 build with carrior ammy due to high crit and crit chance. Although with the +20% damage when opponent under 50% health GM trait this evens out more or less, the point is you your direct damage is still decent without power if you have high crit and crit dmg.