Curse

Ender Ward · Oct 19, 2005, 09:38 PM // 21:38

Well this thread certainly shines a light on why so many PvE Monks are absolutely horrible. Never seen so many people making excuses for not doing what their profession is designed to do.

It's like seing a thread full of Warriors making excuses for not dealing any real damage.

Simply put, a Monk without at the very least Mend Ailment and Holy Veil on their skillbar are not good players. If I wanted simple, mindless restoration of hitpoints and nothing else, I'd take Alesia.

Ruvaen · Oct 19, 2005, 09:52 PM // 21:52

I was the only monk for Titan's Source and "mindless" healing did the job. =X

Rusty Deth · Oct 19, 2005, 09:57 PM // 21:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ruvaen

I was the only monk for Titan's Source and "mindless" healing did the job. =X

Same and word...

I was the only monk on our infuse run and we made it threw it as well with me just healing the whole time. That is after we stopped running it.

Fantus · Oct 19, 2005, 10:21 PM // 22:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

Well this thread certainly shines a light on why so many PvE Monks are absolutely horrible. Never seen so many people making excuses for not doing what their profession is designed to do.

Monks are designed to keep other players alive and in fighting condition. There is more then one possible way to do it, and believe it or not, you can keep a party of 8 alive without any hex/condition removal. I am getting the feeling that most people here shouting that all monks having no hex/condition removal are n00bs have actually never played a monk for more then 5 minutes. I am not saying that hex removing is not a good idea, I am only saying that not all good monk builds do include or have to include those skills.

If I'd take all skills on my monk which anyone thinks to be "absolutely necessary", I'd need 16 skill slots and not only 8...

Pandora's box · Oct 19, 2005, 10:21 PM // 22:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

Well this thread certainly shines a light on why so many PvE Monks are absolutely horrible. Never seen so many people making excuses for not doing what their profession is designed to do.

It's like seing a thread full of Warriors making excuses for not dealing any real damage.

Simply put, a Monk without at the very least Mend Ailment and Holy Veil on their skillbar are not good players. If I wanted simple, mindless restoration of hitpoints and nothing else, I'd take Alesia.

Nah, only Protection monks should do so. But healers? no. Smiters? Certainly not! Divine? Hmmm that's the only skilltree I would never specialize in without any other skilltree, so yes, protection/divine is an option. Sure there are monks with healing/protection, but if they concentrate on remove conditions they will be very poor healers. Remember, this threat is about pve parties!

Ender Ward · Oct 19, 2005, 10:38 PM // 22:38

Asking Warriors and Rangers to handle their own condition and hex removal is akin to asking Monks to handle their own damage output by investing into smiting, or going with a R or W secondary and grabbing a weapon.

"What do you mean you're a W/N and you expect us Monks to handle condion and hex removal for you?! Go switch to W/Mo and get Mend Ailment and Holy Veil you fool!"

Is as idiotic as;

"What do you mean you expect us Warriors and Rangers to deal damage? Invest into smiting you fool, we're tired of carrying your no damage arse!"

Warrior and Rangers are inefficient at condition and hex removal. They are efficient at doing damage.
Monks are inefficient at dealing damage (even smiters), yet are efficient at condition and hex removal.
So in a team game, which roles do you think should be adopted by what classes in order to maximise the team's effectiveness?
How well is a team fairing when none of it's characters are capable of removing Blindness, Weakness, attack speed debuffs and other hexes from Warriors? How about removing the likes of Backfire or Daze from casters? Do you seriously expect a Warrior on his 2 pips of regen to blow his entire energy pool on removing conditions? Or would you rather have said warrior use that energy to, oh I don't know, do more damage?
Simply restoring hitpoints over and over again is the mindless way of playing a Monk. We have Alesia for that. A good Monk with a brain has to be able to do more than just that.

Another sad thing is that apparently some people never heard of Heal/Prot hybrids. Apparently they never heard of a simple 15DF/12H/9P build that handles everything well (Word of Healing, Signet of Devotion, Shielding Hands, Healing Touch, Prot Spirit, Restore Life, Holy Veil). Here's a concept, you don't need 4 healing spells if yo're using the two you do have efficiently. You do have space for Mend Ailment and Holy Veil on your skill bar.

This thread is nothing but a bunch of excuses from some poor Monk players.
When I played my PvE Monk through the game, as soon as I had condition and hex removal, those skills never left my bar. And in PvP, being that Monk is my second most played profession (after Rangers), I'd never be caught dead without condition and hex removal, especially in the current metagame.
There should be no excuses. As Monk you are the most efficient at condition and hex removal, by not doing so you are reducing the team's effectiveness. That is all.

Ender Ward · Oct 19, 2005, 10:41 PM // 22:41

Bah, forum crashes on me when I attempt to edit. The build listed above should be:

(Word of Healing, Signet of Devotion, Shielding Hands, Mend Ailment, Healing Touch, Prot Spirit, Restore Life, Holy Veil)

Sofonisba · Oct 19, 2005, 10:44 PM // 22:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

This thread is nothing but a bunch of excuses from some poor Monk players.

You may very well be correct on that point.

What I am taking from this thread is not that there is a certain formula to be the perfect monk.

What I am taking from this thread is that people STILL do not communicate properly ahead of time in their PUGs, and wish to complain bitterly later on.

Goonter · Oct 19, 2005, 11:19 PM // 23:19

I guess there is only so much you can say about it. We all have our own ideas on what works best and probably have experances of success to back our claims.

In monks defence, though I do believe it is thier juristiction, I dont believe it is thier job.

Healing and/or protecting can come in lots of different suitable flavors. E/Mos most notably, they can protect just as good as a monk and even drop lifesaving wards to boot. Necros can protect against disease or deny corpses if the area calls for it.
There really is a large amout of flexablity between the classes that go unexplored due to stereotypes.

Ive been pushing for team finding/planning menus since day one for GW. True people that bump into each other for help STILL do not communicate properly. But Im thinking there can be tools designed in the games interface to remedy some of that.

Once we realize how flexable we all are and what we are contributing to the team, monks may lose some pressure misplaced on them and any odd combonations that get shutout now may start to take more notice amoungst the general public.

IxChel · Oct 19, 2005, 11:47 PM // 23:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rico Carridan

Please, if you play a monk in PvE (especially anywhere from crystal desert on) or PvP (anywhere), controlling conditions and hexes are your jurisdiction. It's time to drop the healing breeze for mend ailment, and vigorous spirit for holy veil. Your team will thank you for it.

Let me play devil's advocate for a minute here.

Vigorous Sprit is an excellent skill; especially in PvE where the team's warrior is often the primary target. Vigorous Spirit is a very good skill because you can cast it as the warrior is going into combat -- making it essentially free regeneration -- you'll recover the energy spent before any damage is even taken. Even if it is only active 20 minutes and the warrior only hits 10 times during that time, you're talking about a minimum of 100 points of healing for that 5en; that's 66% more healing than Orson. At 15 healing on your more dedicated warrior, it's going to net you around 250 health for that 5 energy. That's a deal if I've ever seen one. Vigorous spirit is like a good deodorant -- it keeps on working as hard as you do.

Let us talk about Holy Veil; a 5en maintained enchantment, which I assume you imply that one would cast and then immediately cancel. My primary objection to this one is easy -- there is no way to cancel the enchantment w/o using a mouse; and I don't use a mouse. My primary reason for playing guild wars is enjoyment -- not making my carpel tunnel worse by trying to get a mouse pointer over a 1cm target. But, even if there was an easy way to cancel it.... you have to compare this with the amount of healing it "saves" you. Assume that you're countering one of the worst hexes: Conjure Phantasm. Since it'll take you 3-4 seconds to react and cast, the difference is 8*5*3 or 120 HP. A heal other or healing breeze can quite easily cover this cost, and then some. Sure, you'll spend 10en, instead of perhaps 6 to 8 en (it will take you time and mental energy to cancel the holy veil). But most hexes you run into are not as damaging bad as Conjure, and Healing Breeze or Heal Other are far more general. I'd even consider using Vigorous Spirit to counter a Conjure Phantasm: over a 10 second period, Vigorous will trigger about 7 times, for 70 healing... and in the next 10 seconds for another 70. I'm not convinced.

Let's talk about Mend Ailment some. Certainly there is the case where your PvE will "blind" your warrior, and in this case; the warrior should either be bringing some condition removal -- or asking you explicitly for help. But, in your average case, the most problematic thing you're going to fix with Mend Ailment is bleeding or poison. In those cases, you'd once again be better with Vigorous Sprit on a warrior or healing breeze. I'd rather have a build with 15 healing rather than a 13 healing and 9 protection. That said, if you're a boon protector -- this is a staple. If I'm going to take healing breeze off my skill bar, it isn't going to be replaced with mend ailment.

I'm not going to defend healing breeze; it's a moderately acceptable skill for a 15 healing monk (I don't know where the +9 break is). There are better skills -- like healing seed that I'd put on my bar before breeze.

Regardless... your entire thread seems to imply that the monk should be the first-line of defense. It shouldn't. Warriors and rangers should be using at least one form of defensive stance, as well as a good self-heal or something like endure-pain, and finally, something like disrupting chop to help prevent damage in the first place. I'm not so keen on Elementalists taking Aura of Restoration, but they could do worse things. However, an elementalist should be thinking rather hard about what skills they can take that will reduce overall party damage: malestrom, blinding flash, etc. A mesmer should be considering mantras and/or ether feast, a necromancer has a number of good health recovery options including parasitic bond and life siphon. Too often I'm in a PUG and see _zero_ attempt at defense or self-healing. Your warrior want to make me a happy healer? Throw up Doldak Signet once you've been surrounded and are being hammered on by 3-5 monsters.

Ender Ward · Oct 20, 2005, 12:07 AM // 00:07

The issue in this thread is not about Healing and Protection, the latter of which can indeed be done almost as effectively by a E/Mo as by a Mo/E. The issue is condition and hex removal. At this, Monk primaries are the most efficient. When a Monk is asked to take care of those, the pressure is not misplaced, it couldn't be better placed.

Yes, other classes have some decent to mediocre ways of dealing with either conditions (Necro, Ranger) or Hexes (Mesmer), but they can never be as effective as a Monk who simply took Mend Ailment and Holy Veil on his skillbar. Nor will they offer the side benefit of Divine Favour healing (and additional healing from Mend if multiple conditions were on the target).

Speaking of the E/Mo ... in PvE, using one as a protector is a waste (not so in PvP). He'd better serve the team as a E/Me who can echo his nukes and put down wards. If he dilutes his effectiveness by investing into Protection Prayers, he loses the ability to echo, loses attribute points better invested elsewhere.
Who's going to make up for that loss in damage capability? The Monks? *laugh*
The Monks can more efficiently, thanks to runes, handle protection. But they cannot exactly replicate an echoed Fireball (example).

IxChel · Oct 20, 2005, 12:14 AM // 00:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

The issue in this thread is not about Healing and Protection, the latter of which can indeed be done almost as effectively by a E/Mo as by a Mo/E. The issue is condition and hex removal. At this, Monk primaries are the most efficient. When a Monk is asked to take care of those, the pressure is not misplaced, it couldn't be better placed.

Anyone with a monk secondary can use remove hex. That holy veil is now a better remove hex than remove hex is a bug -- and one that should be fixed. Certainly, you give up the divine favor bonus; but removing a hex is not necessarily a responsibility that should always fall on the monk's lap.

unienaule · Oct 20, 2005, 12:20 AM // 00:20

I'd like to know why you consider Holy Veil so much better now. Remove hex removes hexes more often. Yes, Holy Veil is good, but I dont know why you'd say its better. Remove hex every 9 seconds, Holy veil every 11.

jules · Oct 20, 2005, 12:21 AM // 00:21

Speaking from the perspective of a pure healer, I feel there's a case against being specced out for hex removal in PvE.

I find that 95% of the time I can outheal hexes and conditions pretty well with cheap spammable heals. In the other 5% you can argue that hexes and conditions will cause teammates to die but if you use skill slots for removal you're less well equipped to heal the damage caused by eles, rangers and warriors which in most cases are more likely to be the main cause of death. Furthermore hex removal is tough when several of your party are hit with multiple hexes. There is simply no way of removing all those hexes. Of course condition removal is more realistic especially with attributes in protection prayers but what I'm saying is that it is possible to get through 95% of the PvE areas by just outhealing the damage. If possible you should have a good prot monk but they are rarer in PvE and harder to master than a good healing monk.

IMO in PvE almost every character should bring a defensive skill. You can't use all those damage skills you brought if you're lying facedown in the dirt so all players should think a little defensively especially given the variability of monks you get in PUGs.

I think one of the things to learn in PvE is not to overheal. You don't have to keep everyone's health bar at 100% and this varies according to your teammates AL and hp, ie I'd be more worried if my ele was at 75% compared to my warrior being at 75%. Another thing I've found that really helps is to stretch out that party window horizontally so it takes up at least 1/4 of your screen width. That way you can tell with greater sensitivity the rate of damage your teammate is experiencing and react accordingly. (ie. Do I cast seed 1st or dwayna's?)

Just my 2 cents. Flame away...

Goonter · Oct 20, 2005, 12:32 AM // 00:32

Ender your right.
But if this is pve we are talking about then, as most people agree, its not that hard..95% of the time.
And like someone was saying earlier. A lot of people make it to the end using henches and they dont remove conditions or hexes. So suddenly, why do we need more from human players?...for pve?

Expecting monks to cure conditions and such is reasonable but not the only solution. Probably, the better, easier, and faster solution but not the only one to achive your desired goal.
Thats all I was saying.

Ender Ward · Oct 20, 2005, 12:47 AM // 00:47

Vigorous Spirit in PvE is normally a good health recovery option. How well does it do, though, when the warrior enchanted by it is blind? Is that warrior also doing as much damage he could be if he's weakened? A weakened Warrior takes longer to kill, thus prolonging a fight, thus leading to more healing required over time. When a character has multiple conditions on him, and you use Mend Ailment, this character not only benefits from Divine Favour from your Monk, but gets healing from the remaining conditions. With one 5 energy spell you can remove a detrimental condition and heal a significant amount of damage done to said character.

If the conditions are indeed degens like poison, desease or bleeding, they work so slowly that a good Monk can afford to simply let the target drop to below 50% health and then take care of all that damage with a simple Word of Healing (which heals for 198 at 15DF/12H).
The same appplies to degen hexes like Conjure Phantasm, Phantom Pain, etc. They don't inhibit the performance of the character, unlike say Spiteful Spirit, Empathy, Backfire or Soul Leech, etc, which need to be actually removed.

Holy Breeze, is horrible in comparison to Word of Healing. At +9 regen over 10 seconds it heals for 180 over time + 48 immidiately from Divine Favour for a total of 228 for for 10 energy. Word of Healing, when you actually need to heal the target (below 50% health) heals for more, for 5 energy. This happens immidiately, which is often better than healing over time. There is basically never a good reason to use Healing Breeze or to take it on one's skillbar. Bad Monks and stupid Paladin premades use Healing Breeze, both in PvE and PvP.

The "lack of a mouse" argument is a complete joke and thus can be ignored. Since Holy Veil is a monk spell, it benefits from Divine Favour. Whatever damage has been done in the 1 second it takes you to cast the spell, is more than made up by Divine Favour. Cancelling the spell takes all of one second, and is incredibly easy if you put Holy Veil as your #8 skill.
As for it being better than Remove Hex being a "bug" I really don't understand this claim. The reason why Holy Veil is better even with a 10 second recycle time is because of it's 1 second cast time, being less easily interrupted. Where exactly is the bug part?

Anyway, in order for offensive warriors, rangers and caster to be at their peak effectiveness, they cannot (and often aren't even able to) take condition and hex removal. The Monks must pick up these tasks because they are the only ones, due to divine favour and runes, who benefit the team, instead of weakening it, by taking these skills.

Rico Carridan · Oct 20, 2005, 12:49 AM // 00:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by IxChel

Let me play devil's advocate for a minute here.

Let us talk about Holy Veil; a 5en maintained enchantment, which I assume you imply that one would cast and then immediately cancel. My primary objection to this one is easy -- there is no way to cancel the enchantment w/o using a mouse; and I don't use a mouse. My primary reason for playing guild wars is enjoyment -- not making my carpel tunnel worse by trying to get a mouse pointer over a 1cm target. But, even if there was an easy way to cancel it.... you have to compare this with the amount of healing it "saves" you. Assume that you're countering one of the worst hexes: Conjure Phantasm. Since it'll take you 3-4 seconds to react and cast, the difference is 8*5*3 or 120 HP.

You're completely missing the point. Breeze can only heal degen conditions, which are, by and large, the more harmless conditions. Breeze isn't efficient enough to stop a backfire, and won't do anything against something like panic, spiteful spirit, migraine, etc. These are the hexes that you need to be worried about, not only as a warrior, but almost every classes has hexes (and conditions!) to be concerned about. If you're only focussing on spell that will keep people alive, you're missing the big picture. I can understand if you don't have a mouse, then you can't use spells like holy veil particularly well (try smite hex, maybe), but let's be honest, the majority of people are not in your situation, so that is hardly an excuse for the average player not to bring it.

Rico

Rico Carridan · Oct 20, 2005, 12:53 AM // 00:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by IxChel

Ah; I had assumed the recharge had stayed at 0, but it is 10. My very bad. In this case, I have no clue why you'd take Holy Veil over Remove Hex in PvE; my previous commentary on Holy Veil makes no sense at all. Is the OP assuming someone would cast Holy Veil before combat, and then start canceling them as soon as combat starts? I just don't get it -- is there any reason to use Holy Veil in PvE?

People complain about the long casting time on remove hex. Holy veil has a 1/4 second casting time, plus however long it takes you to double-click the icon (you can be casting another spell while doing this though, so that doesn't really matter). The slightly longer recharge time is the tradeoff for a significantly shorter casting time. Basically, you use it the same way you do in PvP...

Rico

IxChel · Oct 20, 2005, 01:07 AM // 01:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

Vigorous Spirit in PvE is normally a good health recovery option. How well does it do, though, when the warrior enchanted by it is blind? Is that warrior also doing as much damage he could be if he's weakened?

The argument was to replace Vigorous Spirit /w either Mend Ailment or Holy Veil. For a PvE healing monk, I think that's a poor replacement. I'm not disagreeing with your arguments, only that in most PvE contexts, the conditions you mention blind or weakness are either entirely missing in the given mission, or a rather minor part of the quest. Above all, especially in Pick Up Groups, the monk must be a generalist. In a PUG, unless there is something unusual about the mission, usually don't leave home without Vigorous Spirit.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

Holy Breeze, is horrible in comparison to Word of Healing.

As I said, I'm not defending Healing Breeze. It has its uses (55 monks, for example), but I don't usually have it on my bar.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

The "lack of a mouse" argument is a complete joke and thus can be ignored.

Well, this PvE monk isn't using Holy Veil unless this problem is fixed; its not a joke to me. Trade you wrists?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ender Ward

As for it being better than Remove Hex being a "bug" I really don't understand this claim. The reason why Holy Veil is better even with a 10 second recycle time is because of it's 1 second cast time, being less easily interrupted. Where exactly is the bug part?

It can be used for the same effect (and other effects) for essentially the same energy and recharge -- yet it has 1/3 the cast time. That's a serious skill imbalance. It's a bug.

Quote:

Anyway, in order for offensive warriors, rangers and caster to be at their peak effectiveness, they cannot (and often aren't even able to) take condition and hex removal. The Monks must pick up these tasks because they are the only ones, due to divine favour and runes, who benefit the team, instead of weakening it, by taking these skills.

Ok. This is a fantastic role for a protection monk to play; and, yes, every end-game PvE group needs a protection monk doing these sorts of things. However, the OP was talking about _replacing_ healing skills, especially very good ones like Vigorous Spirit, with hex removal. That's not the same as advocating that one of the two monks in a group be a boon protector. Even so, it'd be a deal if more warriors, rangers, and casters took some defensive skills as well, so that you didn't have to run-down your bar trying to keep them alive. But they don't.

smurfhunter · Oct 20, 2005, 01:20 AM // 01:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by IxChel

Well, this PvE monk isn't using Holy Veil unless this problem is fixed; its not a joke to me. Trade you wrists?

wait isnt the whole carpel tunnel thing when you type on the keyboard without that thing at the base of the keyboard to prop up your wrists?

i didnt know mousing caused it o.O

my hand config is always left hand covering asdw + 1-8 hotkeys while the righthand steers/looks with the mouse.