Reaper: Guide to Necrotic Warrior Build in Dragon Age – The Veil Guard

Key Takeaways:

1. Master the Necrotic Power – With shield toss abilities and necrosis stacks, turn your warrior into an undead menace, obliterating enemies with necrotic damage.
2. Strategic Skill Choices – Each ability in this build is selected to optimize rage generation, control, and crowd damage.
3. Optimal Gear and Runes – Specific gear and runes amplify your warrior’s abilities, ensuring maximum damage output while maintaining flexibility and defensive power.

Dragon Age’s The Veil Guard expansion introduces new challenges for players, and warriors can excel with a powerful necrotic Reaper build that leverages both melee prowess and dark, undead energies. In this guide, we’ll cover every detail of building the ultimate Reaper warrior, from the essential skills to must-have gear and runes. Embrace the art of necrosis and undead dominance with this one-of-a-kind, shield-wielding powerhouse.

Why Choose the Reaper Build?

The Reaper build in The Veil Guard transforms your warrior into a devastating force that uses shield-based attacks to inflict necrotic damage, which decimates enemies over time. Stacked necrosis effects and rage management allow you to overwhelm opponents while maintaining a strong defensive stance. While most warrior builds focus on brute melee strength, this build is unique think of it as a cross between a necromancer and Captain America, blending strategy, ranged attack, and overwhelming power.

Skills Overview: Building the Reaper Warrior Step by Step

At level 40, you’ll have access to every skill in the Reaper specialization, creating the foundation for this powerful build. Starting from core shield abilities to necrotic boosts, let’s break down each skill and how it contributes to your effectiveness in battle.

Core Abilities and Passives

1. Shield Volley – Shield toss becomes a ranged, multi-target attack, ricocheting between up to three enemies. This is essential for clearing clusters of foes.
2. Rancor – A passive that delays the decay of your rage bar, crucial for sustaining high energy and maximizing your necrotic abilities.
3. Spectral Bulwark – Useful during early progression, this defensive ability helps you withstand powerful attacks.
4. Enraged – Boosts rage generation by 10%, helping maintain rage during combat.
5. Explosive Toss – Transforms your shield toss into a charged AoE attack, dealing area damage and interrupting enemies ideal for disrupting formations.
6. Insidious Rot – Your first skill for building necrotic stacks, increasing necrotic damage over time.
7. Deadly Ground – Creates a necrotic damage field around you, enhancing your damage output and controlling the area around you.
8. Death’s Blessing – Provides a straightforward 10% boost to necrotic damage.

Enhancing Shield Toss for Maximum Damage

This build heavily relies on shield toss abilities, turning your shield into a versatile weapon that can bounce, explode, and deal necrotic damage.

1. Seething Pitch – Adds rage generation to shield toss, with bonus rage if you hit a weak spot.
2. Mortal Wounds – Increases weak spot damage, perfect for maximizing shield toss effectiveness.
3. Bloody Advance – A projectile that pins enemies in place. Follow it up with a charged shield throw to trigger an explosive effect, dealing extra AoE damage.
4. Master Throw – Adds an additional charge to shield toss, increasing its damage and versatility.
5. Ricochet Shot – Allows shield toss to bounce an extra time, hitting more targets with each throw.
6. Ignition – Adds a fiery effect to your shield after a weak-point kill, increasing shield damage by 25%.
7. Perfect Throw – Adds a minigame-like challenge, rewarding perfect throws with greater impact.
8. Shattering Throw – Boosts shield toss damage and bounce potential, making each throw more powerful.

Supporting Skills: Rage and Necrotic Damage

Managing rage and necrotic stacks is key to this build’s success. The more you keep your rage up, the more damage and affliction you inflict.

1. Providence and Ensuing Rage – Help with rage management, ensuring your reserves stay high.
2. Enervation – Increases damage against enemy barriers, useful for necrotic enemies with shield defenses.
3. Eclectic Armor – Encourages you to mix armor types for bonuses to shield toss range, bounces, and weak spot damage.
4. Desolate Malady – Further boosts necrotic damage by 10%.
5. Staggering Toss – Converts some rage into stagger with shield toss, adding crowd control.
6. Return to Sender – Lets you reflect projectiles with perfect defense timing.

Ultimate and Special Abilities

Once you’ve invested in the core skills, the Reaper specialization’s abilities turn your warrior into an unstoppable force.

1. Spirit Storm – A devastating ultimate that pulls enemies into a necrotic vortex while healing you, essential for crowd control and sustain.
2. Reaper – Summons a spectral scythe to apply necrotic damage to close-range enemies, detonating primed targets while healing.
3. Living Decay – Adds a 50% penetration bonus to necrotic attacks and restores health, making you nearly indestructible against large groups.
4. Death’s Touch – Enhances charge attacks by adding necrosis effects whenever Reaper and Bloody Advance are active.

Recommended Gear for the Reaper Warrior Build

Main Weapon: Wood Song Cleaver

While not your primary damage source, this weapon enhances rage generation, allowing you to use abilities more frequently. Its bonus damage to barriers and armor complements shield toss, which can otherwise struggle against defensive enemies.

Shield: Necropolis Defender

As your shield is crucial to this build, choosing one that amplifies necrotic effects and adds bounces is ideal. Necropolis Defender fits perfectly, increasing the power of shield toss while aligning with necrotic themes.

Armor and Gear Considerations

1. Rage Generation – Gear that boosts rage generation lets you unleash necrotic abilities without pause.
2. Necrotic Damage – Increasing necrotic damage is a priority, as it drives the majority of your build’s effectiveness.
3. Shield Toss Enhancements – Look for anything that improves shield toss, from bounces to affliction application.

Runes

Runes add both passive and active boosts that fit seamlessly into this build’s style:

1. Toss – Enhances shield toss by adding an extra bounce passively and removing its cooldown when activated.
2. Scourge – Boosts necrotic damage passively and turns all your weapons necrotic temporarily.
3. Upend – Adds 5% to resistances passively. When activated, it transforms your defensive resistances into offensive boosts, perfect for a defensive yet powerful build.

Playing the Reaper Warrior: Strategy and Tactics

The Reaper warrior’s playstyle combines elements of a damage-dealer, crowd-controller, and battlefield tactician. Before any engagement, prepare by charging your shield and positioning yourself to unleash the first volley. Use Deadly Ground to create a damaging field and start applying necrosis stacks to your enemies.

As the fight progresses, maintain high necrotic stacks by continuously tossing your shield, charging it whenever possible for explosive effects. If a few stragglers remain after a shield barrage, your melee weapon can finish the job.

With such high necrotic penetration, you’ll slice through most barriers, making short work of heavily armoured enemies. And for any last-resort situations, your Spirit Storm ultimate will clear the field, pull in stragglers, and even replenish your health.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q1: Is the Reaper build viable for solo play? Absolutely! This build is versatile and excels in both solo and team settings. The combination of self-healing, necrotic damage, and shield toss provides strong defenses and high output.

Q2: How do I handle enemies with high necrotic resistance? Against necrotic-resistant foes, leverage the rage and affliction options of your shield and supporting abilities, which provide strong physical damage as well. Abilities like Explosive Toss and Bloody Advance can supplement your primary attacks.

Q3: Which runes work best with this build? The Toss, Scourge, and Upend runes are ideal for maximizing shield damage, necrotic stacks, and resistances. Together, they enhance both offensive and defensive aspects of the build.

Q4: Can I tweak this build to work with a different specialization? While possible, the Reaper specialization’s unique necrotic abilities are what make this build shine. Without it, you may lose the necrotic synergy that drives most of your damage.