My necromancer experience

I have recently built a necromancer alt for fun and I have noted down the interesting, good and bad sides of this new class. So this post will be more like a journal entry than a guide (with info I think can be worth sharing). Here we go!

First of all, I wasn't totally sure about how their skills work, even when I kept reading the Crypt necromancer's guide, they seem to have stats split everywhere so I decided to stick to a high wizard approach. I couldn't really afford all those expensive gears and high matk xtals so I took basic-cheap gears, starting with:

- Black Mage's Staff/Seele Zauga 1, which I upgraded to Dagger of Reflection/Seele Zauga 1
- Struggler/Iniliba (from my enchanters' sets) or Dark Priest Robe/Moldus
- Snow Ear Muff/Ulshilt (from my enchanters' set) or Sofy's Glasses/Seele Zauga 1
- Seahorse Bangle ns for hp at low level, then I switched to Catura Talisman/Seele Zauga 2

And if you're really poor/or your first char will be a necromancer, any gears with MATK/MDEF will be good, such as:
- Dark book, Dielita, any other rods
- Mage Garb, Tunic up...
- Bunny ears (for hp), Tri Tail, Fourchette, Sorciere...
- Seahorse bangle (for hp)

So far, my necro's level is 181, I'm trying to level my apos a bit before continuing MQ. Here's what I really love so far with my baby necro :3

1. MQs are easily soloable.
It can be a bit tricky when you don't have a summon yet but once you can get Skeleton or the Bone Knight, it's really amazing. Raton was a piece of cake with tanky Knight and Cemetery. I had quite some trouble with my assassin back then, at Raton MQ but it was surprisingly easy with necro. The only bosses I needed help with were the hard hitters (Gerust, Guevol, Xeltysis)

2. The gameplay is more interacting.
What I mean by that you need to be active and have a kind of strategy depending on which boss. For example, my enchanter is a less-interacting gameplay, all I'm doing is spamming Magic Blade, sometimes Drain and Stone Skin. While with necro, I had to run around, summon and re-summon my skeletons, have a good timing for the Soul Return, etc. Playing necro kept me more entertained and that's the really fun part xD

3. More solos!
Some people dislike or find it annoying that current necro's skills are unsatisfying/or not OP enough. I find it awesome because at such a low level, my 170+ necro could easily solo almost all MQ boss, while it was a bit more annoying for my bishop xD average DPS, average survability, this is a dream *^*

However, one problem which was mentionned somewhere in this forum is the need of a bit of tankiness. As we necro have discovered (or for future necromancer), you need to attack the boss and then summon your skeleton-bone knight so they can take your hate away. That is the tricky part because sometimes, boss can hit you too hard and kill you before you even get to summon your tank (it takes a few seconds between the moment you cast and the moment the skeleton appears). Which is why I suggest this "tanky" set for necros. You can edit the set in phrases and use it until your skeleton has been officially summoned or always play with it, up to you xD Here's my favorite set:

- Dagger of reflection: MATK +7% MDEF +25% MaxHP +800 Reflect +12% Autoskills +7% Rate cut +10%, slot with Seele Zauga 1
- Struggler up: Spell burst +10%, Magic pierce +17% INT +5 Magic R +13% MATK +3% or DPR up: MATK +5% MDEF +20%, Magic R +5%, Magic counter chance by defense, Autoskill +5%, slot with Iniliba (it will take away DPR's auto but Iniliba's is more interesting since it can "eat" away a bit of damage)
- Tri tail up: INT +4 MATK +6% MDEF +15% Skill delay -0.2 sec, slot with Seele Zauga 1
- Catura Talisman: Ailment R +5% Range cut +5% Rate cut +5% Melee and Magic R +5%, slow

This set is focused on getting high MDEF/any other defensive stats, while the xtals are for max MP (your max mp is linked to your summons' hp). It can be used for the few seconds when you summon your skeleton and when he really appears. This set helped me a lot for my MQs, but don't expect high damage if you always keep it on you.

For leveling, I love using a small counter set at Neknotts or Shiki-Oni, which consists of my Reflection Dagger, DPR or Struggler, Snow Ear Muffs and a D.newt bangle/Sofys. It's based from my experience with my counter set on enchanter, made by Tyranull. All you need to do is to drain a mob, then select another mob and drain, etc. However, the sad part here is that you don't have stone skin and when you target multiple mobs with your Bone Knight, they all target you, so you'll need to add a bit of vit if you want to use this set for leveling. So far, it works well with my INT/VIT/DEX build.

One of the cons people may dislike is that they're "slow killers", with dark javelin not really being spammable... In my journey, as enchanter since the start of the game, I got used to soloing and slow killing, so it didn't really bother me a lot xD. You kinda need to be patient with them, but hey, remember the skills are only up to 200, wait for the 220-240+ skills and I bet necros will be awesome :3

So if you already have a necro, enjoy making those skeletons dance

And if you haven't made one yet, try it, it's really fun!

As a random side note, I wish Asobimo would let us re-name our summons so it will be more cool xD

For more infos about necromancer skills/builds, visit here: irunaonline.boards.net/thread/25357/crypt-necromacer-guide