Mage vs necro; my experience

[Raev]

I definitely agree that Magicians are underrated here. I would guess that a BIS mage (epic, velketor boots) beats a BIS rogue for damage as long as resists aren't too bad!

Your 'in a balanced group, necromancers aren't that great' is somewhat tautological, though. After all, the same argument holds for Warriors or Clerics. For a necro to be effective, they have to be either charming, pulling, or healing. In my experience my Necromancer is surprisingly effective in undead dungeons in a kind of bard style charm/split/pull pseudo soloing role. You can kind of imagine how it works. It takes a bit of time for groups to figure it out, as practically no one plays this way.

That being said, going LFG on a Necromancer is brutal. The only tells I get are people saying they'd rather keep LFG than play with me! In the end Necros really need Luclin: Mind Wrack, Zevfeer's Theft, dot stacking, focus items, etc. It will never happen, but I think back porting the focus effects and adding the Blessed Coldain Prayer Shawl would really help balance late Velious.