ToME: the Tales of Maj'Eyal

Given all the fun of the new Necro, I thought I'd offer up some thoughts on facing one, particularly Celia and The Master.

1. Beware the skeletons. They can dish out some serious damage. While they're not especially dangerous one-on-one, if you let yourself get surrounded or in range of spells while fighting one, you're in for a rough ride. Target the Lord of Skulls first! Every version of it can dish out brutal damage (600+ on Normal from time to time).

2. Cleanse status effects! Rigor Mortis will absolutely demolish you if you let status effects pile up, even the minor ones.

3. Area effect abilities are a godsend if you're dealing with minions. Make 'em count.

4. Close the gap and get out! It has so many damage over time abilities that you'll get brutalized trying to close the gap or escape, even on Normal difficulty. Use your movement abilities wisely and don't linger.

5. Use torques or other items and skills that can mitigate flat physical, cold, and darkness damage. That'll neutralize the damage over time abilities, leaving you solely to deal with the burst damage.

6. Beware any of the multi-turn damage skills like river of souls (I think that's the name). You might shrug off one or two turns but they'll pile up in a hurry.

7. Silence if you have it. Silence the hell out of the Necro if you can. Manaclash as a backup but it's way less effective. Get some way to inflict silence!!

8. Do not think you can trade blows with it. If you can't kill it fast, disable and snipe. No matter what class you are (unless you can completely mitigate damage), you will not hold up over the long-run.

9. Pay attention to its life... if it's close to 0, beware of Across the Veil because it'll do solid damage and reduce a random cooldown but it can also trigger multiple times in quick succession so you might suffer a very unpleasant counter attack. Get it close to zero and then prepare to dish out burst damage, otherwise retreat. Bad luck with Across the Veil can reset powerful skills and you can find yourself dead in a hurry.

10. Do NOT stand in the Putrescent Liquefaction. It does okay damage but almost always comes with Spikes of Decrepitude and even some ghoulish vomit... you'll lose a lot of life in a hurry. Whenever its up, there's probably more damage over time piled up and you might not notice it all.

11. Knock out the sustains by any means necessary. Get that Rune of Dissipation if possible but find some way to knock out those sustains because all of them will make your life miserable.

12. Bone Yard... the cooldown penalty of this skill is savage, particularly if then find yourself surrounded by minions. When this goes up, consider it a sign that it's time to retreat.

Good luck!

Thanks mate!