Curse

zwitterion · Oct 20, 2006, 06:59 PM // 18:59

I'm kinda new to PvP, HA especially. I take a monk there cos I think pvp monking is probly the hardest and funnest (shh it's a word) thing you can do in this game, but I've been kinda amazed to see the firey anger with which other HA players answer you when you tell them you haven't packed a boon prot, rc prot or woh bag... At first I thought it was just a dumb attitude problem, people looking to farm HA with canned teams and minimal thought, but eventually the scorn overwhelmed me and I started thinking well I guess I really *don't* know the pvp game that well maybe they're right...

So what's the deal, is it just hopelessly 'nub' (hate that bloody word) to pack any elite other than WoH, RC or if you're feeling frisky, Blessed Light for a HA fight? What about Shield of Deflection? What about Shield of Regen, which I took a team through three fights with... Life Sheath? Never used it in pvp but it seems like it could kick ass. What are people's thoughts on monk elites in pvp I find it hard to believe that only three or four are worth anything but it seems to be the attitude in Ascent.

On a related note, why are wards so taboo now? I haven't really played much since this time last year, used to lay down a bunch of wards (admittedly mainly in PvE.. some RT PvP..), used to be good I thought. Got kicked out of a team the other night for even mentioning the word... any opinions much appreciated.

Tainek · Oct 20, 2006, 07:05 PM // 19:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by zwitterion

I'm kinda new to PvP, HA especially. I take a monk there cos I think pvp monking is probly the hardest and funnest (shh it's a word) thing you can do in this game, but I've been kinda amazed to see the firey anger with which other HA players answer you when you tell them you haven't packed a boon prot, rc prot or woh bag... At first I thought it was just a dumb attitude problem, people looking to farm HA with canned teams and minimal thought, but eventually the scorn overwhelmed me and I started thinking well I guess I really *don't* know the pvp game that well maybe they're right...

So what's the deal, is it just hopelessly 'nub' (hate that bloody word) to pack any elite other than WoH, RC or if you're feeling frisky, Blessed Light for a HA fight? What about Shield of Deflection? What about Shield of Regen, which I took a team through three fights with... Life Sheath? Never used it in pvp but it seems like it could kick ass. What are people's thoughts on monk elites in pvp I find it hard to believe that only three or four are worth anything but it seems to be the attitude in Ascent.

On a related note, why are wards so taboo now? I haven't really played much since this time last year, used to lay down a bunch of wards (admittedly mainly in PvE.. some RT PvP..), used to be good I thought. Got kicked out of a team the other night for even mentioning the word... any opinions much appreciated.

Let me put it this way, Woh= Energy management (its super efficient) m so is Blight, Rc is massivly useful utility, Sheild of regen, deflection, and Life sheath are not

Regen= A nono for healing , period, its utture crap and there is plenty of advice as to why (Search it)
Enchants for protection are also a nono , a shatter enchant will 100% negate a life sheath, Sheild of defection will Massacre your energy, Sheild of regen is expensive, heals via regen (See above) , and all 3 of these spells do Jack all vs a degen team (Hex's or Conditions) , even if the meta wasnt loaded with degen, they are still utter crap

zwitterion · Oct 20, 2006, 07:08 PM // 19:08

well, that's a good answer i spose.

why are wards crap?

cerb · Oct 20, 2006, 07:15 PM // 19:15

who said wards were crap?

Alazare · Oct 20, 2006, 08:02 PM // 20:02

Words are not crap, they are very usefull. Many teams cary them, but if you were thinking of carying ward in your monk bar, now thats a no-no.

One thing you have to understand about HA monks: in 8v8 there were 3 monk builds that were used in 99% of balanced teams. There was a 3 monk backile: WoH, RC/prot and SB/infuse. These 3 monk builds were the same in all balanced teams (very rarely did someone change their monk build, and if they did it was only 1 skill or so...). The reason they did not change is because these builds were perfected to the limit. The skill combinations in all 3 builds were "perfect", and very effective. Today, there is mostly a 2 monk backline in balanced teams, and from what I saw and know most teams use a WoH and a RC/prot but the builds are mostly modded a bit.

Nurse With Wound · Oct 21, 2006, 12:37 AM // 00:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alazare

One thing you have to understand about HA monks: in 8v8 there were 3 monk builds that were used in 99% of balanced teams. There was a 3 monk backile: WoH, RC/prot and SB/infuse. These 3 monk builds were the same in all balanced teams (very rarely did someone change their monk build, and if they did it was only 1 skill or so...). The reason they did not change is because these builds were perfected to the limit. The skill combinations in all 3 builds were "perfect", and very effective.

I miss it so much

......

To add what the others have said. You should always take the bar the team leader asks you to take. Simply because GW is a team game, and the team leader (usually) knows what bar you should have to perform your role in the team hes forming. Rest was pretty much said already...

Mental Leteci · Oct 21, 2006, 09:32 AM // 09:32

Who said Life Sheath is crap? Shatter ench also removes seed,prot spirit,etc. Should we drop them as well? Only problem now is that you can't fit Life Sheath into your bar cause you need other skills and you're limited to only 2 monks. You could bring 3 but then you need to play limited (probably spike) builds.

ZenRgy · Oct 21, 2006, 09:36 AM // 09:36

Because RC owns the pants off Life Sheath, and doesn't stop THAT much damage. Prot Spirit is much more efficient.

Tainek · Oct 21, 2006, 09:38 AM // 09:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mental Leteci

Who said Life Sheath is crap? Shatter ench also removes seed,prot spirit,etc. Should we drop them as well? Only problem now is that you can't fit Life Sheath into your bar cause you need other skills and you're limited to only 2 monks. You could bring 3 but then you need to play limited (probably spike) builds.

Seed isnt an elite, and sheath does absolutly NOTHING verses degen and life stealing, it is worthless, Period

Mental Leteci · Oct 21, 2006, 10:43 AM // 10:43

Look, Life Sheath is a great skill, I don't know what you're talking about. Like I said,only reason people don't use it is because HA is predictable. You know you'll meet VIMWAY and degen builds so you're not taking LS, you take RC. Period. Don't try to spit over a skill. I've used LS once and we held halls without a problem. It saved ghostly when he was low on health and monks didn't have energy to heal him. Life Sheath + RoF = gg
If it's to judge by you only good skills are the ones other people use. This guy tried to use something new,if he can fit LS in his skillbar and use draw instead of rc why not? For some people it's easier to play with draw.

Tainek · Oct 21, 2006, 10:52 AM // 10:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mental Leteci

Look, Life Sheath is a great skill, I don't know what you're talking about. Like I said,only reason people don't use it is because HA is predictable. You know you'll meet VIMWAY and degen builds so you're not taking LS, you take RC. Period. Don't try to spit over a skill. I've used LS once and we held halls without a problem. It saved ghostly when he was low on health and monks didn't have energy to heal him. Life Sheath + RoF = gg
If it's to judge by you only good skills are the ones other people use. This guy tried to use something new,if he can fit LS in his skillbar and use draw instead of rc why not? For some people it's easier to play with draw.

Because if you meet a Team heavy with conditions, heavy with hex, or lifesteal , your elite becomes 100% worthless, just because you used it once and did ok doesnt make it a good skill, i'll give you a hint why:

HA is full of teams of idiots, and there is a huge vareity of situations, i could give you a situation where outoughs cry worked well its like me going into RA with a Smite Assassin, its sucks, but i could probably scrape a win with it.

I dont judge by what people use, i could care less, i judge a skill by its merit, Sheath is nice, but its just not dependable

dgb · Oct 21, 2006, 10:55 AM // 10:55

Life Sheath is garbage IMO. It's a healing spell disguised as a protection spell. It caps out at preventing 158 damage every seven seconds. It doesn't reduce the damage, it just gives you an auto-heal over time on that character.

Quite frankly I can think of better things to do with an elite than auto heal 158 damage every seven seconds.

Thomas.knbk · Oct 21, 2006, 02:16 PM // 14:16

The reason everyone uses these 4 builds, is because they're the most effective. They simply are.

zwitterion · Oct 23, 2006, 07:12 PM // 19:12

I'm starting to get the picture; enchants are bad cos people can splode them. And most monk elites are enchants. I've done pretty well with SoRegen and SoDeflection but I spose that's as much luck as anything, not running into players who'll exploit them.

And you're right, wards are expensive, cool as they are. Maybe i'll try and make some intense inspiration build for prot warding.

To hijack the thread a bit - I see people asking for infuse on a WoH build all the time, which seems like insanity to me. As a word monk you have like 1 maybe 2 self heals, so against an attentive team, without real good support from your prot colleague (ha ha) it's just a liability. Do people really manage to pull it off? how?

hyro yamaguchi · Oct 23, 2006, 07:39 PM // 19:39

I dont completely get your last paragraph.

But naturally you shouldn't use infuse if you are under fire yourself.
And i rarely self heal, except for a quick healing touch after infuse. This is because you should kite away from damage, which is pretty effective, and you should always be as far away from the enemie as possible, so that you don't get attacked yourself.

And I love infuse, heavy duty heal, 1/4s cast, no recharge. And WoH infuse is probably the most easy build to pull of since it only requires brainless healing+hex removal.

Aejorii · Oct 23, 2006, 07:39 PM // 19:39

By being a leet mf... that's how.

Alazare · Oct 23, 2006, 08:05 PM // 20:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by hyro yamaguchi

And WoH infuse is probably the most easy build to pull of since it only requires brainless healing+hex removal.

Plz dont write moronic posts. I see you play a ranger, or at least tht is what it says under your avatar so i guess you dont know the first thing about monking. WoH + inf is the most easy buildt to pull off? Then why was infuse on a totally seperate monk in the 8v8 and not on the WoH? IMO infuse on the WoH is just stupid. Either you actively heal or you watch for spikes, you cannot do both efectively (considered you play vs a decent team). Imagine a pressure/spike, what will you do? You must actively heal (WoH) and so you cannot infuse because if you wish to save a spike with inf you must watch who they may spike and infuse imidiately which you cannot do if you are healing the pressure because of the .75 aftercast. And if you do infuse you loose half of your health wich will be hard to heal because you do not have another heal monk in your party anymore, you have one less skill in your bar because you have infuse. So if you are fighting a decent adren spike and you indeed use infuse you will very likely die because you have half your health, the prot used prot spirit on the spiked party member, you only have 60 armor and everyone wishes to dispose of the monks as soon as they can.

Brainless healing + hex removall? rofl gg. Plz do not post on things you know nothing about.

hyro yamaguchi · Oct 24, 2006, 01:47 PM // 13:47

Geez I'lll guess I'll have to update my played prof, this was like half a year ago...I've been playing monk a long time, before I was ranger, during ranger and now after ranger.
Anyway, during my monk times I've played like 80% WoH/WoH infuse, and I find it way more easy to pull of than any prot based builds.

By the way it's 6v6 now. Spiking usually requires at least 3 people. You usually need at least 2 monks on a team, so you will end up having to face either spikes or pressure very often. But anyway, what will I do against spiking+pressure teams? What you are saying is that having to pay a lot of attention is the same as having a difficult to play build. That is not true. It's still easy, you just need to pay attention to the skill bars. With difficult I mean lots of energy management, having to think about which skill you will use. With WoH/infuse, more pressure only means paying more attention.

And as I've pointed out before, you should'n't use infuse if you are under attack yourself.

I don't see why it wouldn't be very easy to pull off. You look at health bars, if health goes down you use a healing spell, if someone gets spiked you use infuse. If someone gets a hex you use hex removal.

And: having one skill less? Have you ever ran infuse? It's a great skill to have. It's not a skill less, it's a skill. You can self heal with touch, which I don't consider one skill less either.

crucifix · Oct 24, 2006, 02:31 PM // 14:31

this is really easy.... and the conversation is ridiculoulsy loaded with crap.

a) the premade blight and premade aoe are 2 solid monk builds.
b) if you have a character that utilizes a full bar of prot skill (rc prot for instance), put gift of health on the bar.
c) if you bring SoD, SoR, SG, breeze, Sheath, mending, any bond for that matter (unless you actually are bonding in ha... for whatever reason that would be...) then i will hunt you down. well not so much sheath, my guild was trying to figure out how to use it in a pvp aspect, not 100% sure on a viable build yet but its getting there. anywho, as far as secondaries go.

if you are in a non gimmick build, mo/a (DS), mo/me(hex, channel), and mo/e(windborn) are really some of the only secondaries a monk should play. i can see mo/w for shields up, but i usually see mesmers (in rangerless/ warrior less) parties carry it.

for a backup, woh infuse is very easy to play. the only reason that sb/infuse was ever devoted to one character is because woh is an elite, so is sb. having 3 monks is better than having 2 monks.... there ya go. the entire idea of sb infuse was to counter spike builds....rspike and b spike. (ob flame kinda died). the sb was for infuser protection and ghostly protection during altar caps.

so in short:

BAD:
-regen of any type
-spamming high energy heals
-overusing spells (dont waste a woh or orison when someone is a 80% hp)
-most prot elites that arent aoe (smiters only) or rc
-a lot of healing skills, surprisingly. just wait till nightfall
-not having emanagement/ anti spike skills (mo/me or mo/a)
-SUPERIOR RUNES. dont use them. you really dont need the -75 hp.

GOOD:
-straight heals
-low energy heals
-rof, ps, sb, RC
-hex removal
-condition removal
-energy management (channeling= god)
-KITE KITE KITE

thats about all for now, feel free to criticize/ flame, whatever.

hyro yamaguchi · Oct 24, 2006, 02:40 PM // 14:40

If you don't mind, I'll just agree