Soul Reaping

Soul Reaping is the Necromancer primary attribute through which the character gains energy from the deaths of living creatures.

Guild Wars description

 * For each point of Soul Reaping, you gain 1 Energy whenever a non-Spirit creature near you dies. You may only gain Energy in this way 3 times every 15 seconds.

General description
Soul Reaping provides Necromancers with one of the best tools in PvE for managing energy, since most areas provide an ample supply of souls to reap. Players have found that investing 8–10 points is sufficient for most builds. Soul Reaping is not very useful in areas without a high density of corpses to use, specifically PvE areas that have lots of elementals or ghostly creatures and small-group PvP.

There are a number of Necromancer builds that make use of Soul Reaping to provide energy to power secondary skills. These builds generally try to hit 15 points in the attribute (12 ranks invested through attribute points plus the use of a Superior Rune of Necromancy). This includes the Ne/Rt and Ne/Mo heroes from a Discordway team.

Mechanics
For each point in Soul Reaping, the caster gains 1 point of energy when a nearby creature dies.
 * The amount of gain is limited only by the caster's maximum.
 * Souls may be reaped only 3 times every 15s.
 * SR is triggered by the deaths of pets, NPCs, heroes & henchmen, and other players.
 * The death of minions also generates energy, making this an invaluable skill for minion masters.
 * Since it is a primary attribute, it is only available to Necromancers.

Other

 * Area of Effect: Soul reaping will work on corpses roughly within spirit range (see image, to the right).
 * Notification: This symbol to the right appears above the caster while casting some Soul Reaping spells. (For details see: Skill animation)

Associated skills
Soul Reaping has fewer associated skills than any other attribute: a total of 8, including 3 elite (Prophecies-only characters will not have access to any skills in this attribute). Two Soul Reaping skills are related to energy management, two inflict direct damage, two inflict degeneration or delayed damage, and four relate to death, corpses, or low Health.

Trivia

 * ArenaNet has commented on community forums that it had deliberately avoided linking skills to Soul Reaping because they felt its effect was stronger than that of other caster primary attributes (though this was stated before the 15 second delay was introduced).
 * Soul Reaping still takes place in towns or outposts, even though there is no particular use for the energy:
 * In Luxon or Kurzick towns or outposts, when the warrior NPCs fight around the exits.
 * In Pre-Searing Ascalon, from the battle taking place outside the stairs (near Prince Rurik).
 * An exception to this is in D'Alessio Seaboard; no energy is gained from White Mantle Savants killed by Grasping Ghouls (perhaps because of their distance).
 * In town deaths during special events also trigger Soul Reaping
 * When players die due to the action of Grentches (Wintersday) or Mad King Thorn (Halloween).
 * Deaths from summoning objects can also trigger it: after using a Snowman Summoner or Ghost-in-the-Box