Reaper - Procmancer

The community gave this build a rating, making it top-tier: Great

Focused on: Condition damage and Control

Designed for: PvP Conquest

Expansions required:

Difficulty:

Normal

This build was last updated on June 07, 2024 and is up to date for the October 8, 2024 patch.

Overview

Procmancer is a PvP condition Reaper build that's all about pressuring targets in teamfights with the help of various trait procs, making its burst sudden and unexpected. In this build even a simple Blind could apply 3 other conditions to a target, and no Necromancer build has better Chill uptime than this one.

The build shines at constantly maintaining a wide variety of conditions on enemies while also pressuring them with AoE boon corruption at the start of burst chains. High damage, low sustain.

Skill Bar

Staff

Pistol/Dagger

Utility

Skill Variants

Utility

For the optional slot:

• Spectral Ring - area denial that can save your life and the Fear has great synergy with various traits.

• Summon Flesh Wurm - a potentially life-saving positioning tool.

• Spectral Armor - stunbreak, defense against direct damage, and great Life Force generation.

• "Suffer!" - condition cleansing and frequent AoE Chill application.

• "Nothing Can Save You!" - great skill to use against opponents who rely on blocking skills to survive like Dragonhunters or Virtuosos, but also works well against the many projectile-reflects of Tempests.

• Corrupt Boon - great burst CD, especially useful against targets that rely on Stability. Can be used both defensively and offensively.

Weapons

• Scepter over Pistol - Scepter remains a viable option especially for people who don't own the Secrets of the Obscure expansion. You lose a CC but gain a boon corrupt, however Scepter is a slower weapon and the damage requires some setup which makes it less ideal under pressure.

There are plenty of strong options for the off-hand slot:

• Torch over Dagger - while Torch is a strong weapon, it comes with several tradeoffs in this build. Torch increases your condition diversity, improves Life Force generation and adds a CC (single target), however it's going to cost you a condition transfer, Blind synergy (several traits in the build are centered around this condition) and AoE Weakness. Torch offers more damage but lowers your survivability and trades AoE soft-CC ( Blind, Chill, Weakness) for single target hard-CC (a knockdown).

• Focus over Dagger - adds more boon removal, burst damage and Life Force management tools to the build while retaining the Chill synergy. It offers no survivability tools however.

• Off-hand Sword over Dagger - ranged CC, life steal and Weakness application. Solid choice both for defense and offense but offers very little condition pressure. It's more of a utility weapon.

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Specializations

Variants

• Plague Sending improves your survivability and could even translate into more damage sometimes, but you have to give up some valuable Chill-related trait synergy by dropping Chilling Darkness. This becomes a more attractive option when NOT playing with off-hand Dagger - losing a Blind application by taking a different weapon would weaken Chilling Darkness while Plague Sending could compensate for the loss of Dagger's condi transfer.

Variants

• Decimate Defenses makes it a bit harder to build Life Force but increases your burst damage, especially in shroud.

• Augury of Death adds a bit of life stealing to the build for slightly higher sustain.

Equipment

Staff

Sigil

Sigil

Pistol

Dagger

Sigil

Sigil

Rune

Amulet

Relic

Equipment Variants

Amulets

• - better defense against Power-based burst damage.

Sigils

• Sigil of Escape over Sigil of Intelligence - improves your condition cleansing. Getting rid of several non-damaging conditions on weapon swap also increases your chances of transferring damaging conditions with Putrid Mark.

Runes

• Rune of Necromancer - offers more damage if you don't need the passive movement speed boost from Lynx.

Relics

• Relic of the Sunless - creates an AoE field beneath the target of your elite. Compared to Cerus it has the benefit of always spawning the pool under an enemy so you don't have to worry too much about positioning. The best thing about this relic isn't even the conditions but rather the strike damage it deals over just a few seconds. Fury can make this proc stronger.

• Relic of Cerus - adds a strong offensive proc whenever you use an elite skill. Enemies under the eye can get hit multiple times, so the value of this relic goes up significantly if you can stun them right under the eye with "Chilled to the Bone!".

• Relic of the Reaper - adds a Chill proc to every shout. Worth considering due to trait synergy especially when playing with at least one utility shout.

• Relic of the Adventurer - restores half a dodge roll's worth of endurance whenever you heal, improving your survivability. It's like a second Energy sigil.

Usage

General

• Fear and Blind both apply Chill, and Chill applies Vulnerability + Bleeding.

• Chill is the most important condition in the build. Not only because it gets your condi procs rolling but also because of the sustain tied to Chilling Victory.

• Use "Your Soul Is Mine!" as often as possible, even out of combat. This is crucial for building Life Force (LF).

• On top of the Stability and AoE stun "Chilled to the Bone!" also applies Quickness when it strikes an enemy target in melee range. Using this right before entering Reaper's Shroud creates the perfect setup for your hard hitting shroud skills.

• "Chilled to the Bone!" has a very distinct animation which makes it easy to avoid, if you feel like that's going to happen then stow your weapon to cancel the channeling. This is also great for fake casting - you can use the skill, cancel it immediately with weapon stow (the whole animation's still going to finish, potentially baiting out dodges or other defensive CDs), and send it only on a CD of 5 seconds.

• Entering shroud procs Spiteful Spirit and Weakening Shroud, these are both defensive and offensive by nature. Being able to rip boons and apply Weakness even when you're sitting in a CC could save your life, and these are great instant offensive procs as well which could kickstart your burst chain.
  • Quickly following up with Death's Charge to apply Blind and corrupt more boons through Path of Corruption is basically a 2 button burst combo that puts heavy pressure on every enemy around you.
  • Entering shroud counts as a weapon swap and as such could proc Sigil of Doom and Sigil of Exposure while on Pistol/Dagger (if the sigils aren't on CD) which are instantly applied to the enemy target via Spiteful Spirit for increased burst and condition variety.

• Ideally try to use Death's Charge inside the field left behind by Executioner's Scythe to combo Frost Aura.

• Cleansing on this build is rather limited and often tied to offensive skills such as Putrid Mark and Deathly Swarm, skill #4 on both weapons. Other than that you've got Spectral Walk but depending on what 3rd utility you took this may or may not be the only stunbreak in the build so use it wisely.

• There's more to Spectral Walk (SW) than just being a stun breaker with a bit of LF management, this skill allows for quite a bit of creativity. For example:
  • Activate SW ⇒ jump off a cliff while being chased ⇒ Spectral Recall when your enemies jump after you.
  • Activate SW ⇒ break line of sight ⇒ cast "Chilled to the Bone!" ⇒ teleport back at the very end of the channeling (this makes it harder to avoid and reduces the chance of getting interrupted, although the outcome is going to be a bit luck based).
  • Activate SW ⇒ Necrotic Traversal (if using Flesh Wurm) ⇒ Spectral Recall when they catch up to you. This works for stomping downed enemies as well, the channeling isn't interrupted by either of these teleports!

• When playing with Scepter, Feast of Corruption is best used on targets that already have several conditions on them to maximize damage and LF generation.
  • "Suffer!" is a great setup for this skill, allowing you to deliver burst damage in an instant.

• Well of Darkness is one of the strongest skills in the build due to its synergy with various traits. It's valuable in any situation from surviving enemy focus to pressuring multiple targets.

• For mobility use the following sequence:

1. Reaper's Shroud
2. Death's Charge
3. Exit Reaper's Shroud just before Death's Charge finishes (the ending of DC brings your character to a halt, which can be cancelled by dropping out of shroud early)

• Vile Blast is a great skill for quickly setting up other skills like Weeping Shots, "Chilled to the Bone!" or a shroud burst.

• On Staff try to use Putrid Mark AFTER Chillblains for a free AoE Weakness combo.

• Putrid Mark and Death's Charge are the best skills to use with Sigil of Intelligence.

Shroud burst rotation example

1. Infusing Terror
2. Death's Charge to your target
3. Terrify
4. Executioner's Scythe
5. Soul Spiral

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