Curse

ashes · Nov 19, 2010, 09:08 PM // 21:08

Aura of Faith seems like a pretty good choice when messing around with the prot line - help me fill the bar!

I thought something like this; PvX Link

Prot Spirit / Spirit Bond?

Divine Boon?

Signet of Devotion?

Also...

Is Selfless Spirit really worth it on the bar?

Sethellington · Nov 19, 2010, 09:43 PM // 21:43

Quote:

The healing bonus is applied before Divine Favor, but not before Divine Boon

Not that I guess ^_^

The effects really aren't good enough for a single target spell imo, unless you happen to be with few people in the party (i.e. Ascalon VQ's). Also, even though it has the potential to completely destroy spikes, your reflexes have to be pretty good!

Wenspire · Nov 19, 2010, 11:02 PM // 23:02

Aura of Faith is pretty good since it reduces even armor ignoring damage which something like SY won't do. I always run this bar when I monk in HM areas.

Restore Life (or Rebirth)
Divine Boon (or Blessed Aura)
Seed of Life
Aura of Faith
Shield of Absorbtion
Reversal of Fortune
Selfless Spirit
Protective Spirit

14 prot
15 div fav
4 healing

With a 20% enchant mod, you get an 8 second Seed of Life and 5 second Aura of Faith when used with Blessed Aura.

Lanier · Nov 19, 2010, 11:07 PM // 23:07

I use Aura of Faith in a hybrid build with Gift of Heath. GoH and dismiss can both function as effective spike heals when used with AoF.

Prot Spirit is pretty much a must in HM, so definitely include it.

For the last skill, I would use either Aegis or Reversal of Fortune. RoF synergizes well with AoF but Aegis is more powerful in areas with lots of physicals. Its your choice really.

I typically find Sig of Devotion too clunky outside of gimmicks where the free heal is actually necessary.

Divine Boon is an ok choice i guess but i would probably use a different elite if using a boon-prot build. My boon-prot build uses LS instead for the extra bar compression.

I strongly urge you not to take a rez. Ressurecting is not the monk's job, and it takes away from valuable space on your skill bar.

Selfless spirit is really up to you and how well you can manage energy as a monk. Monk is the one profession where energy-management can be completely unnecessary, and this is dependent on how well you time and place your prots. If you can monk efficiently without selfless, then go for it. Personally, I typically include Selfless so that I have that safety net to fall back on if I find that I have mismanaged my protting, and so that I can cope better in areas with enegy denial before having to fall back on my high energy set. It really all comes down to how effective you are with your prots.

Hope that helped!

ashes · Nov 20, 2010, 07:35 AM // 07:35

Divine Boon's healing always takes effect first, before any healing skill, and even before Divine Favor. For example, Aura of Faith will not increase this healing, and it will also occur before Zealous Benediction checks its target's health.

Guess thats out of the picture then, altho it's still doubled up after AoF is applied (108hp).

Prot Spirit: When u got both ps and AoF on u, AoF is completely ignoret (no matter which order they are applied)

Spirit Bond: Spirit Bond and AoF both reduce the dmg and enchances the healing (no matter which order they are applied)

So i guess Spirit Bond is a better choice for this bar (heroes are PS-Gods anyway

)

I agree on no ress on a monk, heroes are fine ressers and im always carrying resscrolls

Signet of Devotion is pretty nice with AoF aswell, double healing on a spammable sig - altho i do agree that free heals isnt rly needed (especially not with Selfless Spirit)

I hope my english isnt all too bad - just woke up! ;P

Wenspire · Nov 20, 2010, 10:38 AM // 10:38

You are correct regarding AoF and Prot Spirit. However, if the damage packets you receive are below 10% of your total life (in most cases around 45 or so for casters) where Prot Spirit does nothing, then you should still get the % damage reduction from AoF, which is still very useful.

My understanding is, if a target that has 450 life, Prot Spirit will cover any damage from 45+ received. You will get an effect from AoF when damage received is 88 or below (with 15 in prot). Granted, the reduction is minor the closer the damage gets to that mark. Either way, the added healing effect from AoF is still a nice benefit.

I am not a fan of Signet of Devotion mainly because the activation time is horribly slow.

ashes · Nov 20, 2010, 11:18 AM // 11:18

I agree on Signet of Devotions horrible activation time :/

Xenomortis · Nov 20, 2010, 12:34 PM // 12:34

Ok...
Aura of Faith has to compete with Word of Healing and Zealous Benediction (as well as RC to an extent).

Any Monk bar is going to need a good heal - this is typically taken up by Word of Healing or Zealous Benediction, but Gift of Health is the fallback if you want to keep your elite slot open.
I'll assume Gift of Health is the healing skill you'll take with this elite. There really isn't anything better.

Now, AoF plus Gift can heal for a lot - over 300 I would think. The downside is that this combo takes 1.75 seconds to get and 10 energy. It's also a combination you can only use every 8 seconds.
The duration on AoF is a killer for this heal boost since it's not something you can make really strong use of - you're limited to one heal really (but that's all you need).

The damage reduction function looks more promising, but it's again limited by the 3 second duration. This means that it can only be briefly used to delay someone's death (at low health) before you need to heal them - which is fine. You use this skill on someone soon about to die whilst your main heal is recharging and the boost to the heal will push their bar to safe levels.
However this is something that Reversal of Fortune does too (minus the boost) and Word of Healing is more powerful than Gift of Health.

So really, is Aura of Faith + Gift of Health better than Word of Healing + Reversal of Fortune?

Anyway, if I was pushed to construct a bar on this:

Gift of Health
Aura of Faith
Dismiss Condition/Mend Condition/GoLE
Cure Hex/GoLE
Shield of Absorption
Prot Spirit
Aegis
Seed of Life

If you want to argue against Gift of Health then consider the alternatives - Signet of Devotion is rubbish and you can't depend on Dismiss alone.
The rest of Healing Prayers isn't worth the effort.

ashes · Nov 20, 2010, 02:01 PM // 14:01

ZB is kinda meh in PvE as u rarely gets energy back (heroes tend to have pretty good reflexes) and WoH is simply too boring to play for xxx hours, imho.

I wanted to see if i/we could come up with a useful AoF build, since its an interesting Elite - not the most used or abused.

Xenomortis · Nov 20, 2010, 02:24 PM // 14:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by ashes

ZB is kinda meh in PvE as u rarely gets energy back (heroes tend to have pretty good reflexes) and WoH is simply too boring to play for xxx hours, imho.

You should only use ZB if you're the only player with heals. As a solo monk it's ok, but I still prefer WoH since it's nicer as your only heal.

ashes · Nov 20, 2010, 02:49 PM // 14:49

I kinda wanted to let the heroes handle the redbar'ing

Lanier · Nov 20, 2010, 03:01 PM // 15:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Xenomortis

So really, is Aura of Faith + Gift of Health better than Word of Healing + Reversal of Fortune?

The thing about monks is that, unlike the dmg professions, they dont have clear cut "best" builds. While HB/UA/WoH may be meta, they arnt the "best" builds available to monks because the effectiveness of a monk build is entirely situational based on the place you are monking and the allies you have. Even with a WoH being a (probably the most) hybrid-friendly healing elite, if I were running a WoH monk, I would want a more prot-based monk as my second backliner. AoF fills this role nicely (though my go-to prot build, when combined with a WoH hybrid, would probably be a ZB hybrid). Gift of Health is just so good, with or without AoF. Plus, AoF's duration is not really all that short when you take into account the +20% bonus from the of enchanting mod on your prot staff. Its about 4 seconds, which is enough to get more than one heal off. While it is essentially a 10 energy skill, you have to remember that its not only a massive heal but a massive damage reduction for that duration. Its pretty worth it imo on if you are choosing to run a prot-based hybrid.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ashes

ZB is kinda meh in PvE as u rarely gets energy back (heroes tend to have pretty good reflexes)

Hm, i never really have this problem and I run ZB all the time, and the energy return is really nice when you are under pressure.

ashes · Nov 20, 2010, 03:10 PM // 15:10

Indeed it is, but most of the time i just end up wasting 10energy on a target which heroes just barely got over the 50% mark

and AoF is 5e, or am i misreading ur post?

Lanier · Nov 20, 2010, 03:38 PM // 15:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by ashes

Indeed it is, but most of the time i just end up wasting 10energy on a target which heroes just barely got over the 50% mark

and AoF is 5e, or am i misreading ur post?

Ah, no, i say that its essentially a 10 energy skill because you need to cast another spell (gift of health or dismiss condition) to reach the full potential of AoF. That said, AoF is a great elite and worthy of the slightly high energy cost necessary to reach the potential.

ashes · Nov 20, 2010, 03:57 PM // 15:57

Well it also boost the healing from ur heroes (most likely Livia spamming Restoration heals abusing her reaping of souls hehe

)

Wenspire · Nov 20, 2010, 08:27 PM // 20:27

If you are running a dedicated prot build, you will most likely not be the one to follow up on the heal after AoF is cast. That would come from your partner monk/rit/or whoever is healing. The prot-line of skills benefit greatly from their short 1/4sec cast times (which includes AoF/RoF/PS/etc) which I find can make or break a situation where someone is spiked in HM. Chances are, you will get AoF onto your target before your partner monk administers the heal which should result in a huge heal. That is, unless you are pretty slow on your reaction times.

As Lanier had mentioned earlier, the 20% enchant mod gives you the extra 1 second with AoF. It doesnt sound like much, but I find every second counts in a high pressure situation.

Regarding Gift of Health, I never saw the need to run that on a prot build, as redbarring is really the job for the healer. Your job is to make the healers job less stressful. Also, the killer to GoF is that the recharge is pretty long. Although, I should add that for my hero prot build I give them that. This is because I find that heroes are pretty bad with protting and just spam whatever skill is available. I mean, the first thing Tahlkora does is Prot Spirits me when I am being attacked by a rat in dungeons!

I should also mention that AoF followed by Seed of Life is just lovely!

ashes · Nov 20, 2010, 08:58 PM // 20:58

I totally agree

Guess im gonna give this a try

Iron Monkey · Nov 21, 2010, 02:09 AM // 02:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wenspire

Regarding Gift of Health, I never saw the need to run that on a prot build, as redbarring is really the job for the healer. Your job is to make the healers job less stressful. Also, the killer to GoF is that the recharge is pretty long. Although, I should add that for my hero prot build I give them that. This is because I find that heroes are pretty bad with protting and just spam whatever skill is available. I mean, the first thing Tahlkora does is Prot Spirits me when I am being attacked by a rat in dungeons!

I should also mention that AoF followed by Seed of Life is just lovely!

Hero proters suck balls. I've find they're only comfortable with spamming 5 energy spells. Although they are OK with heal party, even though they tend to cast it just to top up a few red bars.

But a bit of inspiration magic helps them when they exhaust themselves (power drain, and the interrupt signet, cant remember the name

).

Gift of Health is good if you're running as sole monk. Usually combined with zealous benediction, rather than RC.

AndroBubbles · Nov 21, 2010, 03:25 AM // 03:25

Aura of faith is really the only prot I run in PvE anymore. If you use it effectively, it's hard to go wrong with it in almost any situation.

I usually use something like this..

12+1+1 Prot
12+1 DF
Aura of Faith
Seed of Life
Protective Spirit
Shield of Absorption
Aegis
(Insert condition removal of choice)
Optional
Optional

The last two really depend on what I'm going to be facing, but I can usually group with any pug healer and still flawless missions/boss bounties because the build is so flexible. The synergy between Spirit Bond and AoF is beautiful and all, but I prefer to preprot more allies at a time, so I'll pop prot spirit on two squishies and have a nice window of time in which I don't have to worry as much when I know my team doesn't know how to position.

ashes · Nov 21, 2010, 06:11 PM // 18:11

My builds works pretty well when you team up with some red bartenders (discord in my case)