Necromancer



The Necromancer is a class that focuses on manipulation of performance, health and energy of foes and allies, as well as their unique ability to exploit corpses for various uses, including animation of undead minions and creation of defensive and offensive wells. Many of the powerful Necromancer skills require a health sacrifice, which is uncommon between the other professions and requires special attention to their health, but is sometimes used to the player's advantage.

Blood Magic is powerful at manipulating health of both the player and his/her allies and enemies through sacrificing, life stealing, wells and redistribution of health. A Blood Magic Necromancer is also highly competent at keeping up allies' energy supply by use of Blood Ritual, Blood is Power or Well of Power.

Curses are considered the most insidious of the Necromancer's attributes, with the ability to punish, weaken, remove enchantments, and otherwise hinder the foes' performance. Much of a Necromancer's Curses arsenal is centered around the use of hexes and conditions, and often requires direct health sacrifice or inflicts degeneration and other conditions on the caster in exchange for a powerful blow to the opponent.

A focus on Death Magic will give the player the skills to disease and deal direct damage to foes, as well as the ability to exploit corpses to consume and explode them, summon undead minions and create wells.

The Necromancer's primary attribute is Soul Reaping, which provides energy whenever nearby creatures die. Very few skills are available from this attribute, but its inherent effect gives the Necromancer one of the most powerful ways to recover energy when they need it most, in the heat of battle.

The patron god of Necromancers is Grenth.

The primary Necromancer's base armor provides 60 armor, +10 energy, and +2 energy recovery. A starting primary Necromancer begins with 30 base energy and 4 energy recovery.

Given their low armor rating, Necromancers are usually found in the back lines, along with other casters. They may be more difficult to handle for the party's healers due to their sacrifices paired with powerful self healing. However, their abilities can be irreplaceable in any team, which makes the Necromancer often sought after.

Batteries
Energy-support Necromancers, often called "batteries" or "BiPs", use the skill Blood is Power to supply their allies with additional energy recovery. For casters such as the Elementalist and the Monk, this is extremely beneficial as it allows them to continue using their skills without running out of energy. Batteries are very popular for supporting bonder Monks and nuker Elementalists in areas like the Fissure of Woe.

Spiteful Spirits
A common Necromancer build that uses Curses to drain an enemy's health or inflict damage whenever any enemy attempts to attack or use skills. This build is centered around the elite hex spell Spiteful Spirit. This skill, as well as the build itself, is usually referred to as "SS." SS Necros can quickly cause high amounts of armor-ignoring damage to any group of enemies, be it spellcasters or attacking classes. SS Necromancers are often seen with 55 Monks: the 55 holds enemy aggro while the SS deals massive damage to the attacking foes.

Minion Masters
Often referred to as "MM", a minion master uses Death Magic to animate a small army of undead creatures from the corpses of fallen victims and allies. An army of these undead minions helps to alleviate the damage received by the party and inflict a large amount of damage back towards the opposition. When the corpse supply runs low, the minion master must rely on minion healing skills, like Blood of the Master, which require high health sacrifice. This may be dangerous to inexperienced players if they don't watch their health closely, because the death of their master will turn the entire army against the creator's allies. Certain skills, such as Barbs from the Curses line or Death Nova from the native Death Magic attribute, are sometimes used to increase the effectiveness of the army. MMs are particularly popular in PvE, due to the large number of corpses available. However, certain areas have very few "fleshy" creatures, usually rendering the Minion Master useless. Only the most skillful MMs may keep up their trade here by use of Jagged Bones.

Attributes

 * Soul Reaping (primary attribute): For each rank in Soul Reaping, you gain 1 energy whenever a non-Spirit creature (friend, foe, or neutral) near you dies, maximum of three times for every fifteen seconds.
 * Soul Reaping skills
 * Blood Magic: With a flexible skill set, Blood Magic increases the effectiveness of spells dealing with damaging and stealing health from foes.
 * Blood Magic skills
 * Curses: With a punishing skill set, Curses increases the effectiveness of hexes that reduce foes' effectiveness in battle.
 * Curses skills
 * Death Magic: With a skill set dealing with mastery of Death, this attribute increases the effectiveness of spells which animate undead servants, manipulate corpses and deal cold damage. With zero Death Magic you can control no more than two minions, plus an additional minion for every two ranks in Death Magic, for a maximum of ten minions at Death Magic rank 16.
 * Death Magic skills
 * Unlinked Necromancer Skills

Profession combinations

 * Secondary professions for a Necromancer

Related articles

 * Necromancer skills quick reference
 * Necromancer skills by category
 * Necromancer armor
 * Necromancer armor crafting quick reference
 * Necromancer collector armor
 * Necromancer collector weapons
 * Necromancer unique items quick reference
 * Effective necromancer guide
 * General minion mastery guide
 * Necromancer elite skill locations
 * Necromancer dance information
 * Necromancer quick references (category)