Curse

zoozoc · May 13, 2005, 02:29 AM // 02:29

I was planning on being a mo/e, but i was wondering if e/mo was better. Could someone help me maybe giving the pros and cons. i dont have this game yet to i dont know very much. thanks

Zilm · May 13, 2005, 04:38 PM // 16:38

Right now I'm a Mo/E. As a PvE character all those who see me expect to be healed and rez'd, period! The poor players also think you're a bottomless well of energy able to run from figh to fight non-stop. I presently dont have a single skill point in my secondary, but I may change that tonight. Elemntalist have great area of effect damage.

Mo/E Pros
-Huge damage against undead especially if Smite has a few points allocated.
-You have to be quick during battles to determine who needs help, who is beyond help and when you can contribute in attacking.
-People always looking for Monks to join their parties, easy to get missions/quest done with people instead of henches.

Mo/E Cons
-As stated, people expect you to be pure healer.
-Typically the Warrior class during parties runs ahead at breakneck spead leaving part or most of the party alone and vulnerable. Later maps will have monsters that appear behind the party. Then you get to listen to crap like "Well, why weren't you keeping up...etc"
-Great deal of all battles are rarely seen as you must watch the parties lives constantly and heal as required. There have been a few encounters that I do not even witness as I am running spells as fast as possible from 6-8 characters.
-Slow magic recharge. You will usually see parties fight large groups then immediately run to the next group and start melee. Then they die, then they bitch you didn't do your job. I'm just plain tired of asking parties to wait 10-20 seconds between larger battles(sigh)....

Sounds like a lot of negative, but believe it or not I enjoy the character in PvE. Good quality players (even W/Mo's!) do respect a good monk. Few and far between are the good monks. Just remember the primary is what people come to expect in PvE. PvP on the other hand is a whole different game and plenty written on that elsewhere.

Otherwise, my next character just may be a E/Mo or Me/Mo. Plenty already written about these classes as well. Later

Ishamael Sedai · May 13, 2005, 05:32 PM // 17:32

ty for being a good monk. one reason i am a pally (w/mo) is so that hopefully I can restore at least a good deal of my health. watching over people is tough (my second character is a healing monk). i try to keep myself as healthy as possible to make it one less person to have to watch carefully

zoozoc · May 13, 2005, 10:37 PM // 22:37

i was planning on mostly being a support caracter.

Another question, whats the advantage to having a proffesion promary? I've looked around, but I can't find the answer. Thats why i had the question on which was better either a mo/e or e/mo.

Thanks for your time helping a noob like me.

zoozoc · May 13, 2005, 10:40 PM // 22:40

I was actualy planning to be a full time healer/buffer. I mean the advantages to having Ele as primary compared to having Mo as primary.

Kamatsu · May 13, 2005, 10:44 PM // 22:44

the advantage you get is the class-only Attribute. This is an attribute you ONLY get as a primary of the class, you don't get the main attribute of your secondary class.

like Monk has Divine Favor, which increases the amount/% that healing spells do while Elementalists have Energy Storage, which increases the amount of energy you have.

so a Mo/E would have Divine Favor as it's "primary" attribute, so any and all healing spells would get buffed up if you put points into DF. While a E/Mo would have Energy Storage as it's "primary" attribute, so would have a bigger pool of mana to use to cast spells if you put points into it.

zoozoc · May 13, 2005, 10:48 PM // 22:48

I see, thanks kamatsu!

I'll most lilely be a mo/e than.

Kamatsu · May 13, 2005, 10:52 PM // 22:52

Advantages of E primary vs M primary?

Energy Storage - you'll have a whole lot more mana to cast spells with, even tho your healing spells won't be as beefy as a Mo primary, you'll be able to cast more of them!

Armor - can get higher AL vs an individual element than monk armor's (based off a guide posted here in GWG) (and excludes the use of spells to beef up armor)

PvP targetting - ppl might not go for you 1st because they think your just a dorky elementalist and not a monk, so they go looking for a W/Mo or Mo/?? b4 deciding to kill you

M advantages..

PvP targetting - if you like the pain, go monk primary and watch everything go for you

(this also works in PvE as well, since they will all go for you as well hehehe)

Divine Favor - beefier healing spells, even tho can cast less due to lower energy.

Armor - can get higher AL vs Physical attacks than E primary (this excludes possible use of spells)

errr.. there's prilly a whole lot more to either as primary. I'll let someone else answer more in-depth. hehehe

[email protected] · May 14, 2005, 12:45 AM // 00:45

Simply put, In my opinion, the solution to your concern is as follows:

If you go monk primary, then pick the Ranger or Mesmer as your secondary.
If however you are drawn to the Elementalist class for its AoE damage, then stick with E/MO.

Read through the skills to find out what sounds good for how you wish to play. I'll tell you about my E/MO.

E/MO is a very versatile character able to work well within any group. Because of 60+ energy at Lvl 12, you can take full advantage of both Healing and Elemental abilities without running out of energy quickly which will get you killed. But when you need to dump too much energy into constant healing, then your ability to damage is very slow to nonexistent. Often enemies have healers too don't forget, and if you can't kill their healer then you're dead. That's why I'd try something else.

I still play the E/MO, and plan to Lvl it to 20. E/MO is a good PvE support unit for any questing party. The main advantages of an E/MO are Energy storage and AoE spells, which is not the best PvP option I'm afraid. Another pro is their ability to heal is limited only to the skill of the gamer using it. A level 12 E/MO can easily have a heal area spell for +100, a heal party spell for +40, a shielding hands spell for -10, and a +4 health regeneration spell. These heal spells can keep a single target alive through anything while they're in effect but there is a lag of 3-5 seconds in recharge and their effective duration. Also you can run out of energy if you need to constantly cast them.

The elementalist specializes in blinding clusters of foes, slowing them with ice, or area damaging them. This character can offensively tank better than a non-smiting Monk, but both are weak offensive tanks. An E/MO can single handedly tank the mid level mission attackers for about 2 rounds of casting using eruption, ice burst, shielding hands, and heal spells. You'll be a great help with eruption and healing spells with any offensive party. Theres also the standard fire magic Elementalists. Watch this for an example of an AOE damage elementalist in action.

If you find AoE too weak for your taste try a mesmer instead. I would go with an MO/ME for single target damage with heal support, or perhaps be creative with a MO/R. An E/MO simply can't singlehandedly kill a majority of groups of enemies quickly, if at all. And if you're facing a single enemy, then you're still relying on your AoE spells to kill it which is grossly inefficient and slow.

So the biggest cons of an E/MO are they're slow and perhaps ineffective alone.

r0tc0d · May 14, 2005, 03:27 AM // 03:27

It depends on what type of monk you want to be...

As a pure healing monk, elementalist is good as a secondary, because of gylph of lesser energy, and I find Ice Prison to be useful, to get people off of me.

I normally use 6-7 Monk skills, and maybe 1-2 ele skills, though.

Inacurate · May 14, 2005, 04:33 AM // 04:33

I have been debating this question for a while now myself.

I play a MonkEl and am wondering just how much greener the grass is on the other side.

I think that a very capable person could pull off being a Primary Healer as an ElMonk with some practice, and understanding of the teammates.

My MonkEl right now, has like 4 into Divine Favor, maybe I am missing something but I don't really see the point of that attribute. I can't tell you all how often I get complimented on my healing in PvE and 4v4 PvP battles, along with Guild invites...heh. Am thinking of dropping Divine Favor entirely and seeing what happens and putting points back into Smiting so I can do some damage again.

Any further suggestions / comments would still be appreciated, as maybe I am just missing the benefit of Divine Favor or something and I shouldn't try that...lol.

Inac

zoozoc · May 14, 2005, 05:26 AM // 05:26

wow! A lot of people are posting! thanks for all the info. After further consideration i might just be an e/mo. Mostly for the fact that i wont get pawned as quickly as if i were a mo/e.

Im really suprised that this many people posted. I tyhought that i might get like 1 maybe 2 posts. Thanks for all the help again

Kamatsu · May 14, 2005, 08:05 AM // 08:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by zoozoc

Im really suprised that this many people posted. I tyhought that i might get like 1 maybe 2 posts. Thanks for all the help again

Well ain't you the lucky one. I think I have 3, or is it only 2?, threads in these forums of builds i've been contemplating.. and not one useful reply. I replied to one of my own and basically the only responses I ever got was "did you just reply to yourself" and a *very* useful "look at the skills and decide for yourself" comment /end-sarcasm

Heck, I posted my own thread about a E/Mo just yesterday... and it got no responses at all. Got a fair number of views.. I guess ppl either refuse to respond/post/help-out cuz it's me.. or they don't like/want to help ppl focus'ing mainly on PvE like me...

zoozoc · May 14, 2005, 04:11 PM // 16:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by kamatsu

Well ain't you the lucky one. I think I have 3, or is it only 2?, threads in these forums of builds i've been contemplating.. and not one useful reply. I replied to one of my own and basically the only responses I ever got was "did you just reply to yourself" and a *very* useful "look at the skills and decide for yourself" comment /end-sarcasm

Heck, I posted my own thread about a E/Mo just yesterday... and it got no responses at all. Got a fair number of views.. I guess ppl either refuse to respond/post/help-out cuz it's me.. or they don't like/want to help ppl focus'ing mainly on PvE like me...

Well I guess im just lucky.

zoozoc · May 15, 2005, 05:39 PM // 17:39

I just wanted to tell everyone that I have guild wars and I'm a level 7 e/mo and its working out great. Though I will have to wai till i gae further in the game to really find out.

Red Locust · May 16, 2005, 06:59 AM // 06:59

Don't forget runes. A superior healing rune can add a LOT to your healing spells, definitely worth considering.

Majken · May 16, 2005, 11:53 AM // 11:53

I've been lurking around the forum for the last week while playing and I thought I could register and share my build so far. I started out with a N/E thinking I made the best choice ever. Heh, PvP'ing in the arena quickly proved me wrong

So I started over with an E/Mo build thinking I could do some damage and heal myself to tank a few monsters. Works very well so far actually, both for PvE and PvP. Then again I'm only lvl 12 so I'm guessing things might change.

PvP:
So far I've managed to stay in the background in PvP and throw damaging spells while keeping the teammembers alive. I've also noticed that lower level warriors have a hard time killing me thanks to the healing and aura of restoration combined with damaging spells. It's pretty fun seeing them bashing a tiny elementalist while dying from Flares. There are two types of characters that easily kill me though, higher level Warriors that hit real hard and Mesmers combos that disable my spellcasting.

PvE:
I haven't really tried playing in a party and the henchmen just steal XP so I actually play solo 95% of the time. Works fine though, biggest problem so far is the Charr. I can usually take them out if there are only 4 or 5 of them hitting me, any more and I'm dead

Right now I use Fire, Energy Storage and Healing. I'm planning on trying out Air once I get some better spells.

Hot tip for leveling and getting some decent drops at lvl 9-12 is Pockmark Flats hunting storm eyes. They usually come in pairs which make them an easy kill and the xp is quite good thanks to them being lvl 7.

/Majken

Straegen · May 16, 2005, 12:20 PM // 12:20

A E/Mo will likely never be as good a support character as a Mo/E due to divine favor and the ability to rune up your healing abilities, but a E/Mo is at least in theory more diverse. You can be a good support class with the ability to cast more monk spells than a pure monk and when your party needs you can refit as a nuker class. All in all the E/Mo is a compromise for diversity since they can't nuke as well as a E/Me or Me/E and can't heal as well as a Mo/?, but the fact that you are at least 90% nuker and 90% healer is a nice place to be. Plus aura of restoration is one of the best spells in the game IMO.

PvP note, you aren't likely to be targetted out of the gate in PvP like monk primaries (you will likely be a secondary target). The fact that another team may mistake what you are doing on a battlefield could easily turn a battle.

john little · May 16, 2005, 04:17 PM // 16:17

my E/Mo has three healing spells in my current build, they can make the difference in a party between people dying or surviving. Not to mention that primary monks are pretty rare even now in the later missions.

Current build: Flare, Meteor Shower, Fire Rain, Ward against Melee, Dwayna's Kiss (been trying hard to get HH), Healing Breeze, Vigorous Spirit, Rebirth. Lvl 20.

nub · May 17, 2005, 04:17 PM // 16:17

i myself have a Mo/E. i hardly party with human players, only with my close friends, so i seldomly play a healing build. but i HAVE tried it once or twice before. how divine healing helps so much is that, it even turns non healing spells into very good healing+bonus spells. a good example would be reversal of fortune. you cast it on your tanker, he gets healed, and also gets healed for more the next time he receives damage. i used to use mending+healing breeze together as my major heal; didn't like orison of healing so much, and it worked wonderfully. each cast of the 2 spells restored some health, and it also gave 2+5 health regen.

right now i'm at gates of kryta, and i'm taking my sweet time farming for equips before going on with the missions. i'm a full smiting build now, and symbol of wrath does 68 damage per-second(doubled) against the undead monsters. my main combo, however, is to use Holy Strike on downed enemies. for that, i have bane signet, and a blank whirlwind(with 0 in air magic). i might push my air magic to 5 so that i can use hale without chances of failure.