Curse

suiraCLAW · May 01, 2006, 10:46 AM // 10:46

There are some degen builds in ta, but do they actually work at all?

In theory, degen builds should work much better because the lack of heal party spammers and/or the lack of passive prots with RC...

I'll start with giving some examples of degen builds:
-condition degen: http://gwshack.us/a1937 , my favorite, tested it couple of times.
-hex degen: http://gwshack.us/ed16b , should keep the other team at 10 degen... (still untested)

Anyway: this thread is about if degen builds can be more succesfull then the balance builds (the metagame atm is mostly 2 melee dudes, 1 mesmer (or necro) and 1 boon prot)? Or do you find degen builds bad in ta because you can only use 3 characters? Give me your opinion

Xellos · May 01, 2006, 05:35 PM // 17:35

Before factions, I can honestly say degen builds without warrior support are gimp to the max, now I'm not sure. The concept of degen is weak, since your mana income is not infinite. If degen is your main damage, then all the other team has to do is play defensively the entire game until you run low, then they pound you to death. Most teams don't understand that when your warrior is getting mass degened, it's not so bad since he heal sigs + your heals. Sure, you don't get to go offensive, but the other team effectively did nothing unless they have another warrior.

audioaxes · May 01, 2006, 05:41 PM // 17:41

even before the update degen is pretty difficult in 4v4
most teams only heal is a boon prot which does very poorly against degen

suiraCLAW · May 01, 2006, 06:03 PM // 18:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xellos

Before factions, I can honestly say degen builds without warrior support are gimp to the max, now I'm not sure. The concept of degen is weak, since your mana income is not infinite. If degen is your main damage, then all the other team has to do is play defensively the entire game until you run low, then they pound you to death. Most teams don't understand that when your warrior is getting mass degened, it's not so bad since he heal sigs + your heals. Sure, you don't get to go offensive, but the other team effectively did nothing unless they have another warrior.

Idd, self heal skills are always a good counter against degen teams, but I hope that you can understand that degen builds are always made to survive longer then the other team. (high defenses, some e-mangement and shutdown skills)

In my opinion: the best thing to do against a degen build is to kill (or shutdown) one of their characters that causes degen as fast as possible...

BTW: I completely agree audioaxes, most teams only have a boon prot that would need to spend like 7 energy each 3/2 sec if the degen is maxed out on everybody.

Xellos · May 01, 2006, 06:33 PM // 18:33

Key concept is that energy is limited, adrenaline and weapon damage is not. Any team with warriors in mind should build their team so that they can outlast any caster offense/mitigation such as blind spam, hex spam, etc. Because in the end, you can only hold out for so long vs a warrior or two before running out and having to die.

Theory is pointless if you don't at least show a build. Point out your 4 characters, and I can easily make 4 that show how weak degen is without even having to resort to using 2 monks.

suiraCLAW · May 02, 2006, 02:59 PM // 14:59

Check my first post, I gave you guys 2 examples (one condition and one hex).

I did the condition several times, always consuctives till we met a 2 monk bacline with a passive prot (happened once) or somebody had to leave.

The hex build is based on degen teams I encountered.

I'm looking forward to see how you, using a simple balance team (2 warriors, caster hate, monk), will counter the condition one

.

BTW: to see the build you need to click on the link

JR · May 02, 2006, 04:00 PM // 16:00

I've seen a couple of Mantra of Persistance Conjure Nightmare spammers in RA today, was definately fairly effective.

Divineshadows · May 02, 2006, 08:14 PM // 20:14

I had this build work quite well for my teams in TA after the march 2nd update which made the HoD helm much weaker. The anti-melee consists of only faintheartedness and a very long imagined burden. Not sure if the OP would call this a degen build as it is nearly impossible to get 10 degen on everyone all the time with it, but it certainly does have quite a bit of its damage coming from degen. Have not tried it out since the release of Factions.

Hammer Warrior

Backbreaker {E}
Crushing Blow
Irresistable Blow
Frenzy
Rush
Healing Signet
Rez Signet
Utility Skill (such as plague touch, hex breaker, bull's strike, etc.)

Hammer - 16
Tactics - 11
Strength - 9

Migraine Mesmer

Migraine {E}
Conjure Phantasm
Imagined Burden
Mantra of Persistence
Drain Enchantment
Inspired Hex
Power Drain
Rez Signet

Illusion - 12
Inspiration - 15
Fast Casting - 9
spare points in other hex lines dom/curses/blood

Blood/Curse Necro

Offering of Blood {E}
Life Siphon
Faintheartedness
Parasitic Bond
Soul Barbs/Desecrate Enchants/Shadow of Fear
Draw Conditions
Heal Other
Rez Signet

Blood Magic - 15
Curses - 12
Healing - 8
Soul Reaping - 4
Protection - 2

Boon Prot Monk

Energy Drain {E}
Drain Enchantment
Holy Veil
Contemplation of Purity
Guardian
Reversal of Fortune
Divine Boon
Mend Condition or Mend Ailment

Divine Favor - 16
Protection - 10
Inspiration - 9

RandomEngy · May 05, 2006, 06:02 PM // 18:02

Heal Other on the necro? Ick.

Anyway we came across a degen team that did rather well. I was the sole hammer warrior on our team and they put Faintheartedness, Reckless Haste, Spirit of Failure, Price of Failure, Spiteful Spirit and Parasitic Bond on me. I think they had a Migrane guy sticking it to one of our casters as well. Not sure about the rest. I didn't attack much that round and they eventually won because we couldn't kill anything.

rii · May 05, 2006, 09:42 PM // 21:42

While degen is not ineffective in 4v4 it is of course weaker than in 8v8. Maxing degen is surprisingly not that hard... in theory. At this point, in 4v4, the degen cap of -10 pips limits the max degen to 80dps... in 8v8 the cap is 160dps. It just isnt as much damage, and in TA defensive skills would be run on several characters (monk+1/2others).
As for your builds, i would suggest making the first ranger a basic cripshot, and the second monk a melandrus/interrupt. Then, get a shock warrior and a boonprot. Poison/Bleed is -7, the cripshot hates warriors and the melandrus can ff on their boonprot for some decent DPM. The shock warrior is required - like i said there is a damage cap and at some point a spike is handy. Technically in your average TA/RA match you can run three monks as long as you have a good Eviscerate on the team.

For the second team, I would suggest going with a migraine mesmer, domination mesmer, and a hammer. A migraine with conjure and images of remorse can cover a lot of ground as well as pissing off the enemy monk/casters. The domination mesmer not only hexes it up, but can aid with blackout for the hammer to go to town. In terms of basic DPM, hammers outpace the other weapons marginally, but irresistible blow is the big attraction... hammering through their distortions or guardians like a big hammer would. Boonprot again to finish.

The major advantage of conditioal degen is the frontload of rangers which are on the whole tougher than casters, and the interrupts, which while predominantly defensive (need to take out spammable condition removal) can also be used offensively to deny energy/whatever. Hex builds fuse shutdown with their damage, and rely on the fact that most people bring grossly unacceptable hex removal abilities.

NatalieD · May 06, 2006, 05:29 AM // 05:29

Quote:

Originally Posted by suiraCLAW

I'm looking forward to see how you, using a simple balance team (2 warriors, caster hate, monk), will counter the condition one

.

Even if nobody ever ran degen teams, running a two-warrior build without Draw Conditions or the like would be a terrible idea. Mend Ailment also poses a big problem if your plan is to stack conditions and degen people to death.

Quote:

Originally Posted by rii

While degen is not ineffective in 4v4 it is of course weaker than in 8v8. Maxing degen is surprisingly not that hard... in theory. At this point, in 4v4, the degen cap of -10 pips limits the max degen to 80dps... in 8v8 the cap is 160dps. It just isnt as much damage, and in TA defensive skills would be run on several characters (monk+1/2others).

But in 8v8, people frequently take Heal Party, which is the worst thing a degen strategy can go up against. Sometimes they have healing monks, who perform better against degen than the boon prots that are ubiquitous in TA.

You can't just say that it's not as much damage in 4v4 and therefore weaker. 8v8 teams also have more defense, and typically better defenses for dealing with degen.

suiraCLAW · May 06, 2006, 08:52 AM // 08:52

About the first build: I keep using it to get my glad title, gathered 4 with it till now. It's extremely solid against somewhat all teams without draw conditions (= against 99% of the teams atm).

About mend ailment: mend condition is much worse for us. Yes, mend ailment heals for more but the 5 sec recharge isn't enough to get rid of their healing.

Quote:

As for your builds, i would suggest making the first ranger a basic cripshot, and the second monk a melandrus/interrupt. Then, get a shock warrior and a boonprot. Poison/Bleed is -7, the cripshot hates warriors and the melandrus can ff on their boonprot for some decent DPM. The shock warrior is required - like i said there is a damage cap and at some point a spike is handy. Technically in your average TA/RA match you can run three monks as long as you have a good Eviscerate on the team.

that's a whole different build, looks prett good but I don't think it would have the defenses that the trapper build has.

BTW: I don't care how you want to change the hex one

rii · May 06, 2006, 11:27 AM // 11:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by NatalieD

But in 8v8, people frequently take Heal Party, which is the worst thing a degen strategy can go up against. Sometimes they have healing monks, who perform better against degen than the boon prots that are ubiquitous in TA.

You can't just say that it's not as much damage in 4v4 and therefore weaker. 8v8 teams also have more defense, and typically better defenses for dealing with degen.

I took that into consideration... but it still boils downt to damage caps (when the difference is so huge). Whatsmore, as I mentioned in 8v8 you need a mix of conditional degeneration and hex-based offence, for several reasons:
- Conditional degen is much harder to deal with in some ways, i.e. when there is no martyr (or RC) and boonprots are wasting an awful lot of energy removing crap, especially if you dont have draw, since then your cripshot just goes to town on their warriors. So to streamline that, if they dont have draw(on a non-monk)/martyr/RC you punish them heavily.

- Rangers provide disruption, i.e. savage shot and distracting shot (maybe concussion on a melandrus, their energy levels are usually high). These are the skills that are there more or less for the sole purpose of heal party, outside of the three skills listed above (although you arent going to stop draw). If they make their heal party bot (usually a flagger) spend the whole battle outside of distract range, you console yourself they are denying a whole character, for a skill that doesnt actually outpace degen cap anymore(most HP run at 8 heaing - 50hp every 4 seconds, 12.5HPS, against degen cap which is 20dps). If they consume any more characters to HP spamming, that is what adrenal spikes are there for - to punish them for retarding characters over your degen abilities.

Quote:

that's a whole different build, looks prett good but I don't think it would have the defenses that the trapper build has.

Better defense? Probably. Constant whirling and throw dirt with a 20s cooldown is often awesome against unprepared teams.
Cripshot offers better snare than barbed trap, and also can be used offensively with extreme ease, compared to trappers which are basically a pain in the arse to use offensively against someone with a quick tab button. Cripshots are just as durable as trappers, they have distortion and troll (which i notice your trappers dont have). Also, dual poison is totally unrequired. What more, moving to cripshot, and therefore getting some interrupts, means you can proactively defend against Eles, and disable some of the more frustrating skills you say above are a problem.
As for the traps, the proposed melandrus will have high WS, and so can easily take some traps. In 4v4... you dont need a stance... just lay them defensively and dont be a fool.
What more, in terms of degen trappers are things that only work against nubs. If i were to play them, either send in a pet (if you have one) or send in one character to break all the traps and then send in the heavy artillery. Even then, getting -7 degen on their whole team (which is compared to a cripshot/melandrus) is much more unlikely, since you arent likely to be hitting more than one person (as long as they arent idiots).
The best defence generally triumphs over the best offence, but there is a difference between a great defence and an overloaded defence.

Quote:

BTW: I don't care how you want to change the hex one

-.-... if thats the attitude whats the point in posting it?

suiraCLAW · May 06, 2006, 12:02 PM // 12:02

Quote:

Better defense? Probably. Constant whirling and throw dirt with a 20s cooldown is often awesome against unprepared teams.

that's why I use this build in ta...

Quote:

Cripshot offers better snare than barbed trap, and also can be used offensively with extreme ease, compared to trappers which are basically a pain in the arse to use offensively against someone with a quick tab button. Cripshots are just as durable as trappers, they have distortion and troll (which i notice your trappers dont have).

For some reason, people like to kite. I don't know if you ever used a trapper, but you should know that traps will get triggered by casters if you place them at the right places.

BTW: i never need troll when the monk is alive...

Quote:

Also, dual poison is totally unrequired.

Running dual poison gives us the ability to cover all the other conditions that are harder to spread + we have more time to trap.

Quote:

What more, moving to cripshot, and therefore getting some interrupts, means you can proactively defend against Eles, and disable some of the more frustrating skills you say above are a problem.

How do you want to disable draw condition with a ranger? Draw is the only skill that gives us great problems...

Quote:

What more, in terms of degen trappers are things that only work against nubs. If i were to play them, either send in a pet (if you have one) or send in one character to break all the traps and then send in the heavy artillery.

Thrust me: it's impossible to do that. We can trap a lot faster then you could trigger them when using 1 person + traps deal damage + we spread our traps (don't forget that your triggering warrior/pet will be crippled)

Quote:

Even then, getting -7 degen on their whole team (which is compared to a cripshot/melandrus) is much more unlikely, since you arent likely to be hitting more than one person (as long as they arent idiots).

Those traps do more then degen alone, flame trap hurts a lot, dust trap forces somebody to move and barbed prevents them from moving. In other words: those trappers do more then spending their time at keeping everybody at -7 degen.

The whole match there's at least 2 people that are bleeding and one that is burning, poison is always spreaded on everybody = degen.

Quote:

-.-... if thats the attitude whats the point in posting it?

like i said in my first post: they are example builds, nothing more...

Anyway, the build you're talking about is pretty good, but I can't stand if people say that a build that works extremely well for me is crap...

rii · May 06, 2006, 03:04 PM // 15:04

- Ive played a trapper, but more importantly Ive played against a trapper (lots of them in fact), and it isnt that hard to navigate around them. They werent very good... but the fact remains.

- Troll isnt really required, but its always nice to be able to aleviate pressure with a basic self heal... this is sometimes more true in 4v4... when solo monks can get the hell kicked out of them

- I mentioned disabling draw is impractical...i was more referencing mend condition

- Triggering all the traps is generally impossible, but it still works against stackers, and as a good way to clear the air (ground).

- Flame trap is almost all degen. It does about 60 damage (fire), and then muchos burning. Ive never been that much of a fan of it tbh.

- I didnt say its crap... its a question of maximum efficiency and adaptability. Maybe Im wrong... I suppose its preference.

Blow Up Doll · May 06, 2006, 08:02 PM // 20:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by rii

- Ive played a trapper, but more importantly Ive played against a trapper (lots of them in fact), and it isnt that hard to navigate around them. They werent very good... but the fact remains.

So how do we explain that a huge number of the top balenced builds in hoh run a trapper?

rii · May 06, 2006, 10:02 PM // 22:02

Because HoH contains a massive number of unaviodable chokepoints. The stairs, ramps, dais, etc. Whatsmore, if you run something like ViMway, avioding 8 trappers is in no way comparable to avioding two.

Blow Up Doll · May 07, 2006, 09:42 AM // 09:42

Trappers are good. Yes, it is true that there are maybe less chokepoints in Ta but there are still some. In Ta your boon prot isn't going to be able to seed someone to trigger them and he will probably have an energy management elite rather than restore. A single trappers may not kill someone on thier own but they can cause massive problems for the whole enemy team.
Even if people don't run strait into traps in Ta - you can spam them - no-one will remember where all of them are and your team-mates can just kite around luring all mellee character onto them and if they are decently placed, any casters can run on them also.
[N.B. When i talk about top balenced builds often running a trapper - i mean one or two - not VIMway.]

suiraCLAW · May 07, 2006, 11:07 AM // 11:07

I agree with Blow up doll, it's impossible to remember where all those traps are (except if they keep stacking them :S ). It's always fun to see a monk kiting away from the thumper while trying to stay away from those traps: it never works

.

rii · May 07, 2006, 11:11 AM // 11:11

I just have to disagree. Maybe in 8v8, with 3(+) trappers, it becomes difficult. In TA, with two trappers (or one)... as long as there is some sort of organisation it isnt a problem. As a warrior of course its impossible to avoid... but as a mesmer, ele, or monk it takes a level of cunning beyond TA levels to make me run into any significant number of traps I didn't know about, and if I do run into any, its because its a flame trap I'm only going to experience 1 burst of it before being long gone.... If they dont stack them, run through the flames and dusts, not the barbs (as a non-warrior/ranger/assasin). If they stack them, leave them and run around in your own private circle.