After numerous attendees got to play as the profession at Gamescom last week, ArenaNet finally made the official reveal of the necromancer for Guild Wars 2 today. The class is the fourth of the games’ eight professions to be announced and joins the elementalist, warrior, and ranger.
"A necromancer is a practitioner of the dark arts who summons the dead, wields the power of lost souls, and literally sucks the lifeblood of the enemy," reads the profession description. "A necromancer feeds on life force, which he can use to cheat death or bring allies back from the brink."
Unlike all other professions in Guild Wars 2, the necromancer will not go into a downed state when their health depletes. Instead, the player will change into a Death Shroud form that will allow him/her to attack and use special skills until the form’s life force runs out or the player gets a kill.
"In Death Shroud, a necromancer has a number of special skills," reads the description. "For example, a necromancer can summon a shadow fiend, a special minion unique to this form. With the ability to tap into Death Shroud, necromancers are certainly one of the most durable professions in Guild Wars 2."
The Death Shroud can also be activated at any time when the necromancer’s special life force energy meter fills. This energy can be accumulated by the necromancer merely being in the area when kills occur or by using skills designed to increase the life force.
Necromancers will have four different types of skills. Wells will affect enemies and allies in the area of the necromancer, minions will allow necromancers to summon undead creatures and then exploit them with a secondary skill, marks are skills placed somewhere on the ground that will activate over time or if commanded by the player, and fear skills will inflict the necromancer-only condition of fear that will cause enemies to run away from the player in terror for a set period of time.
Weapons accessible to the necromancer are the axe, dagger, scepter, focus, warhorn, and staff. For more information on the profession, follow the link below for the full description.
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