Elrathan

I've recently managed to get both my mesmer and my necro up to 80 and I'm trying to choose one as my main (i.e. choose which one to gear first). I want my character to be an arcane blademaster, so his primary weapon must be ether a dagger or sword as GS feels too bulky for me. As much as liking the theme of the guy is important, I want him to be competent in dungeons/fractals and open world exploration. WvWvW and sPvP aren't a great concern for me.

From what I've found the relative strengths and weaknesses are as follows:

Dagger Necromancer:
http://gw2skills.net...XXRKO2woesO2hOA

Pros:

• Great sustained singe target damage (greater then an equally geared mesmer from tests in the mists)
  
• High passive survivability and good active damage avoidance through death shroud.
  
• High run speed through ether permanent swiftness (high investment) or locust signet (low investment)
  
• Good burst AoE with life transfer, well of suffering and marks

Cons:

• Decent ranged dps with death shroud but bad sustained dps with staff
  
• no real sustained ranged dps
  
• little single target burst outside of wells
  
• low combat mobility and mediocre stun breakers

Sword Mesmer
http://gw2skills.net...7 OSKatUrkCe7CB
Pros

• Good sustained cleaving damage and great burst
  
• Damage can be insane in fights that allow for three phantasms
  
• High active survivability through stub breaks, invisibility and mobility
  
• respectable sustained ranged damage with GS

Cons:

• No reliable speed increase outside of centaur runes+focus (this is a big negative for me as it makes exploration a pain)
  
• Damage can drop greatly on certain fights that don't allow for illusions to survive long
  
• Lack of large radius or sustained AoE
  
• Low passive survivability (unfortunately I'm not yet at the level where I can avoid all damage)

Does anyone who has more experience with ether class have anything to add?

Note: I realize that there is already a necro vs mesmer thread but I didn't want to hijack it. Plus I feel that my question is unique in a way as most people only seem to consider conditionmancers in it.

I've recently hit 80 so I'm looking to invest the tokens that I've gathered in some gear. I've been using a power based build utilizing dagger/focus, staff and death shroud http://gw2skills.net...H944hZm6x6sjOA. I love the theme of the build and I've had moderate success in dungeons with it but I'm not sure if it'll hold up in fractals.

I don't mind scepter condition or hybrid builds too much but I worry about its effectiveness in PuG's with the bleed stack and I'm not sure if I'll be able to stay alive in fractals with the relatively low survivability of most decent hybrid builds.

What's everyones experiences with power builds in facials, condition builds in PuG's, and hybrid builds with general survivability?

Note: WvWvW and PvP are not huge concerns with me.

After reading an excellent guide and build by Reverse Ghost, I've been wondering if condition damage, sigils of earth and 100% bleed duration (2 sigils of each Krait, Centaur and Afflicted, hemophelia and pizza) would be a good substitute for crit damage in a fairly standard dagger/staff build? Initially I was thinking of running mostly knights with a touch of zerker or a mix of P/V/T and  zerker but perhaps rabid gear would actually provide more damage then the zerkers. In the mists I've managed to keep up 5-ish stacks of bleed with a knights amulet and the appropriate ruins/traits (although not the pizza so I didn't have 100% for the extra barbed prec tick) due to the daggers fast attack speed and it may make running a dagger OH/Blood is Power combo instead of Well of Corruption and focus OH like I was planning.

Hi all. I've recently made a necro to play with my ranger friend and I'm looking into builds for him. Wells seemed a natural choice as the'll help my friend both directly through their effects and indirectly through combos. As such, I've decided to go with what is mostly a power build since wells seem to synergies well with them, as well as both death shroud and lich form, which I'm quite fond of. As for the weapons, staff was an obvious choice and daggers feel much better to me then axes so I wend with d/d and staff. So far my build looks like: http://gw2skills.net...Xj9kisHP6xxDzMA

I picked dagger as an offhand since my experience with my guardian has taught me how valuable blind can be, and enfeebling blood gives me a little extra aoe when using my daggers as well as allowing me to maintain almost an 100% uptime of weakness. The aoe is bleed damage though, but hopefully the condition damage I get from the curses trait line will be sufficient in making it, and mark of blood on the staff, worth casting.

I'm not too sure about some of the traits though. I'd like to have greater marks but I'm not sure if it'd be worth swapping out ritual of protection or staff mastery for it. I'm also not 100% sold on the last 10pts in curses.

I remember reading that it was going to in some leaked patch notes but I don't see it in the new tooltip.