The necromancer was released at GamesCom 2010 together with the demo. So far it has not been released on the official Website. Since we expect this info to show up shortly after GamesCom and since loads of people will be playing the necromancer at PAX, we felt that all the information we gathered on this profession so far was of less value for our third issue, but it still has some news value in the days to come. Hence this blog post in the form of an ‘unofficial release’ of the Necromancer.

Necromancer (Scholar):

“Conditions, Blood, and Minion’s. I am death with all of them”

The necromancer uses all that is related with death or the road towards it, and that which comes thereafter. What the necromancer lacks in physical toughness, she makes up for her ability to weaken her opponents. She can heal and attack at the same time using the blood of her foes. Yet, while she can rely upon herself and the world beyond, being able to control those that already passed away long ago, makes her a true necromancer.

Along the lines of the old saying: “death has many faces”; the necromancer can swap out her weapons to deal with new situations. When the necromancer switches weapons this makes the first 5 skills on the skill bar change, mostly leading to another way for her foes to die.

With Conditions, necromancers can poison, weaken or otherwise debuff foes. Her abilities go beyond this though and if there wasn’t more to the necromancer, you would think she was the plague itself … then again the way the necromancer manipulates conditions, she might be just that. Also, a special condition for the necromancer is ‘Fear’, which will cause your enemy to turn around and run away from you for a small amount of time out of fear.

The necromancer’s ability to manipulate blood is formidable in its own right, either sucking her foes dry like the vampires from the myths, or creating wells of blood to heal her allies. Blood is the force of life, and the necromancer giveth or taketh away..

Tyria is a place that has seen war for many centuries, so it shouldn’t be surprising that, at each step you take, there lay the bones of those that passed away long ago. The necromancer utilizes these to create minions to do her bidding. After creating a minion, she gains an ability to manipulate the minion she just summoned.

No longer needing fresh corpses for her minions does not mean that death nearby isn’t utilized. The Necromancer just uses it for a far sinister purpose. At each death nearby she drains the life force to feed her special ability, using the skill Death Shroud, which gives access to the necromancer’s downed skills while in active combat, not using them to fight for her life but to bring death to her opponents. When downed the necromancer will be in the same Death Shroud until her life power drains which brings her in the defeated state.

Weapons

– Main hand: Axe, Dagger, Scepter

– Offhand: Dagger, Focus, Warhorn

– Two hand: Staff

It looked like the ranges on the weapons were pretty much in line with the ranges the elementalist has associated with its weapons, though from the demo experience it was harder to determine exact ranges. The Necromancer also comes with some special spell types, like marks for example, but since the demo only featured a limited spell experience it was hard to determine all the exact ‘groups’.

For those necromancer players in GW1 that did not like minions (for which ever reason), don’t fear, the necromancer in GW2 has more than enough play styles to avoid minions altogether. In fact, after I found out how to switch skills (clicking on the small area in between the choice skills and the energy bar) I found a few skills in the demo that made it possible to run a fun blood build, with knife and war horn (in the charr experience). And from the looks of it, there will be other play styles and skill types available as well.

To be honest I had my fears about how the necromancer would turn out, and after playing the demo these fears have all disappeared. One last bit of info I managed to pick up, seeing the necromancer was the latest addition that got fully integrated in the game before the demo, not all features and skills have gone to as much iteration and reflection as the other professions, which could mean that some skills or functions will get tweaked, but then, we all know this is a demo and as said by ArenaNet at the very start of the release of all the info:

“We won’t release things until they are in the game, and all things released are open to change until (and after) release, if we find it necessary to change them.”

Victory AND Death!!

Arghore

Also be sure to check out the videos over at our mention of the official necromancer release!