Curse

Lishy · Jul 21, 2009, 08:38 AM // 08:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by YunSooJin

Back in the thread? Did you learn how basic monk skills worked now? I could give you a quiz if you'd like.

Yes. `1234567890-/*

Necromas · Jul 21, 2009, 08:42 AM // 08:42

Most votes on PvX don't come from someone who goes... "I have used this build thoroughly in the intended manner, analyzed it's effectiveness in various situations, and compared it to alternatives."

About the comments on hex removal in PvE, I like cure hex because it's a good filler heal and the decision "Is this hex worth 5e to remove?" is a lot easier to make when you're also getting a very efficient heal out of it as well.

As for condition removal, blind alone is probably more common than 10% of PvE, and some of the more important conditions may be more common than most people think, for example, afflicted rangers cause both blind and daze, kournans like to cripple, quite a few EotN warriors cause deep wound, etc....

And just because bleeding and poison won't kill anyone on their own doesn't mean they're never worth removing, they still generally last long enough that removing it will be worth it for the long term damage prevention assuming your removal skill also meets it's healing requirement so you can get some immediate benefit too. Though obviously removing them should never be a high priority.

paranon · Jul 21, 2009, 08:50 AM // 08:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Necromas

Most votes on PvX don't come from someone who goes... "I have used this build thoroughly in the intended manner, analyzed it's effectiveness in various situations, and compared it to alternatives."

So, if what you say is true, then it is mostly down to the person who posts the build to assess it's affectiveness and decide if it's posting will aid the community or not. Which goes back to my original point, we just need to post better builds?

and Kain, welcome back to the discussion

glacialphoenix · Jul 21, 2009, 09:04 AM // 09:04

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So, if what you say is true, then it is mostly down to the person who posts the build to assess it's affectiveness and decide if it's posting will aid the community or not.

Actually, might it also depend on when the build was posted?

HB/HP was used very frequently during Ursan, and it would have been a lot more effective then than now - ursans had higher health, higher armour, and took care of damage mitigation all on their own. A team of Ursans could more or less KD-lock an entire mob, provided they didn't overaggro. Add to the mix consets - and you suddenly kind of see why most teams didn't really feel the need for prot.

It's since lost its effectiveness, and people have gone back to being significantly squishier, but the mindset hasn't changed.

Necromas · Jul 21, 2009, 09:09 AM // 09:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by paranon

So, if what you say is true, then it is mostly down to the person who posts the build to assess it's affectiveness and decide if it's posting will aid the community or not. Which goes back to my original point, we just need to post better builds?

and Kain, welcome back to the discussion

Better builds do get posted, but are very susceptible to getting bad votes from pre-conceived notions (heavily influenced by what is currently popular and just general elitism) rather than actual testing.

Also, if it has an elite skill in common with an existing build, it has a 50% chance of getting instantly thrown away with the excuse that the existing build makes it pointless, even if the two builds have completely different purposes.

paranon · Jul 21, 2009, 09:47 AM // 09:47

Quote:

Better builds do get posted, but are very susceptible to getting bad votes from pre-conceived notions (heavily influenced by what is currently popular and just general elitism) rather than actual testing.

Also, if it has an elite skill in common with an existing build, it has a 50% chance of getting instantly thrown away with the excuse that the existing build makes it pointless, even if the two builds have completely different purposes.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Necromas

Better builds do get posted, but are very susceptible to getting bad votes from pre-conceived notions (heavily influenced by what is currently popular and just general elitism) rather than actual testing.

Also, if it has an elite skill in common with an existing build, it has a 50% chance of getting instantly thrown away with the excuse that the existing build makes it pointless, even if the two builds have completely different purposes.

So some of the builds on pvx need updating. Is this possible?

makosi · Jul 21, 2009, 10:00 AM // 10:00

The problem I have with monks in PvE using Prots is that there is a high prevalence of enchantment removal - especially in EotN- resulting in a lot of wasted energy and time using skills. I'd rather stick Prots on a necro who has the resources to spam.

A Destroyer of Thoughts uses Shatter Enchantment, Hex Eater Vortex and Mirror of Disenchantment. Why even bother using well-placed Prot Spirits and Spirit Bonds?

I think Healer's Boon is OK but the accompanying skills that people bring are often too red-barrish and they don't remove conditions and hexes.

paranon · Jul 21, 2009, 10:06 AM // 10:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by makosi

I think Healer's Boon is OK but the accompanying skills that people bring are often too red-barrish and they don't remove conditions and hexes.

ah, but are conditions and hexes worth removing? are you saying that the best thing that a monk can do with 5 energy is remove poison, or bleeding?

hexes are more complicated, some are worth removing, some aren't. But in most cases, there are much better things to use your energy on than removing hexes and conditions.

Jeydra · Jul 21, 2009, 11:15 AM // 11:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by I Angra I

Pure superpowered healing in pve isn't actually that bad though, you have to consider how the rest of the game is now. There's a ton of party-wide damage reducing things like Save Yourselves and that one paragon pve skill that reduces damage that I forget the name of. There's also N/Rt heroes and N/Mo MM's with prot spirit/aegis etc. in extra slots who use weapon spells and big prots amazingly efficiently for reducing damage. There's honestly no need to bring extra spot protting on a monk's bar when you have all that stuff. Sometimes not even a need for super powered healing, either (RoJ is rly good) but it depends.

Agree, I'll add:

The only really essential Protection Prayers skill is Prot Spirit. You CAN go without it if you've got a replacement (eg. Shelter), but I would hardly advise going without it entirely unless you are sure you will not be facing monsters than hit >200 / hit (which can be the case).

After Prot Spirit the next most powerful Protection Prayers skill is Aegis. Party wide 50% block is great. Aegis isn't essential, but it's still really powerful and can be a lifesaver if you're against multiple hard-hitting physicals (eg. the Charr in Rragar's HM). It's good to have.

After Prot Spirit and Aegis the rest of the Protection Prayers skills aren't necessary at all. SoA is good and can prevent a lot of damage, but not enough so to make it spectacular. I'd put it under luxury. Spirit Bond is also good, but again not necessary. What else is there? RoF can be substituted for by pure heals. Guardian is good but Aegis works even better. Dismiss Condition is condition removal but you can work around it with Mend Body and Soul. And so on.

So what's wrong with HB? Prot Spirit and Aegis are both usable on a HB bar. HB + Heal Party is extremely strong. HB provides you strong spot heals, including for example Dwayna's Kiss on attuned Elementalists / MMs with Aura of the Lich / etc. , Patient Spirit that heals for 171 health, fast-casting spells, etc. HB + Heal Party cannot be duplicated by other skills as well, although you should of course avoid like the plague any situation where you need to spam party heals.

@Condition and hex removal - I find they are largely not necessary. Only conditions worth removing are Blind, Dazed and Deep Wound. Blind is no matter since I play largely with casterballs, while Dazed is quite rare. So only a little condition removal is good enough, although elites like RC are still extremely strong.

As for hexes, the only place I can think of with really dangerous hexes is DoA. Other places, like Frostmaw's HM, can be metamanaged without having to alter builds.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

I agree in principle though I'm more reluctant to say it like that than I used to be. What needs to be made clear, because there is a disconnect, is that this applies to *everyone*; that drawing a line between good and bad is really just an exercise in ego stroking.

This is key, because I don't feel there is any lack of talent in players, but a lack of will, and a lack of attitude. There are tons of people who will hit a level of ability and go into ego mode; they draw the line where they are 'good', worse players are 'bad', and that's what there is to that; and will argue vehemently about anything that affects this paradigm of them being good. The people who are trainable, and stay trainable as they get better? That continue to want to get better, whatever their level, that also have the resolve to keep pushing, practicing to get better? That's exceptional, regardless of their ability at a given instant.

Agree, although I should add that there does come a time when you can reasonably call yourself "good". I'd call myself "good" in (large areas of) PvE without a second thought. It might be an ego matter, but I can certainly go out there and get results - everything I've attempted with H/H for example I've succeeded, and some places like Vloxen's HM (which is hard enough for some people to start threads on) are really very simple for me.

Still my experience is built on H/H, so if there're more than ~3 real players, or if it's an area I can't H/H (like DoA), I'm happy to call myself "bad".

Malician · Jul 21, 2009, 04:14 PM // 16:14

I understand where the OP is coming from. I preferred it back when there were more different builds, and people rolling their own; I'm not good enough to H/H stuff like Jeydra does, and the HB builds often make it hard to tell a terrible monk from a.. almost-decent one in the outpost. That said, Ensign's point is right on target. On a community level, everyone telling newbie/bad/failure monks to go get HB brings better average results. The monks may never improve themselves very far, but they'll do better than if they cast prots on random team members not being attacked.

That said, my Ether Renewal ele is tons of fun and works pretty well for any area that isn't DOA Foundry.

I go back and do the same Zaishen bounty/missions with my necro running a Mark of Pain AP build, and the dual HB monks collapse instantly unless there's SY! and cons. Sometimes they throw up and die WITH it. I'm getting the idea that teams just try repeatedly until they randomly get lucky with an SY! paragon in their PUG, since none of them actually check to see whether any of the party's physicals have SY!.

IronSheik · Jul 21, 2009, 06:56 PM // 18:56

As for conditions in PvE, there was a nice article explaining why most of them are useless to take off.

Along the lines of blind it explained there were two types, spammable, and long duration.

Spammable as in B-Surge, Long duration as in throw dirt.
If you were to remove it from surge, costing 5 energy, it gets reapplied instantly, you just lost your precious e for your frontline to get 1 auto attack off and have no adrenaline

Throw dirt, if the rangers so nicely come and throw it on you at once, can be easily interrupted, and if they don't put it on you at once, see B-Surge.

paranon · Jul 21, 2009, 08:53 PM // 20:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by IronSheik

As for conditions in PvE, there was a nice article explaining why most of them are useless to take off.

Along the lines of blind it explained there were two types, spammable, and long duration.

Spammable as in B-Surge, Long duration as in throw dirt.
If you were to remove it from surge, costing 5 energy, it gets reapplied instantly, you just lost your precious e for your frontline to get 1 auto attack off and have no adrenaline

Throw dirt, if the rangers so nicely come and throw it on you at once, can be easily interrupted, and if they don't put it on you at once, see B-Surge.

This. In pve, especially in nightfall and eye of the north, a lot of hexes and conditions are just spammed (see Skelk Corrupter for details).

So yes, in some cases, hexes (Spiteful Spirit, Empathy, Migraine, etc) and conditions (Long duration Blind, Daze) are worth removing, but alot of areas don't even have these hexes and conditions, so taking spot removals as staple in a hybrid bar is a waste of time. So have a bar without removals in, do a little research before you start something, if you see a nasty hex or condition, put in a removal, it takes minimal effort, and in 90% of cases will save you 1 or even 2 skill slots that can be put to far better use.

Improvavel · Jul 22, 2009, 12:03 AM // 00:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by paranon

This. In pve, especially in nightfall and eye of the north, a lot of hexes and conditions are just spammed (see Skelk Corrupter for details).

So yes, in some cases, hexes (Spiteful Spirit, Empathy, Migraine, etc) and conditions (Long duration Blind, Daze) are worth removing, but alot of areas don't even have these hexes and conditions, so taking spot removals as staple in a hybrid bar is a waste of time. So have a bar without removals in, do a little research before you start something, if you see a nasty hex or condition, put in a removal, it takes minimal effort, and in 90% of cases will save you 1 or even 2 skill slots that can be put to far better use.

If we are talking about monk slots, you guys might be right. But there is loads of stuff that can fight those spams outside monks bar.

Additionally all this talk about limits, drawing lines, boosted egos or not, truth is PS is a very efficient skill for late NM and HM.

If a monk cant "sacrifice" a few attributes and a slot for it, chances is that he/she doesn't know much about the game or only plays with invincible tanks.

And that is why HB+HP are all the rage - tanks+nukers are the fastest in the TOP DOGS areas of the game. Sometimes the Tanks are the "nukers".

Much more interesting question would be "Why the hell every single RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing female warrior armor combo relies on the top elite gladiator and the vabbian leggings?".

I would very much like to know how that interesting trend originated. Is it because "pixel breasts"+ "ability to see panties when running" is prevalent on the GW community?

And if our community is interested in "pixel breasts and pixel panties" is that hard to understand the bad monk skill bars, that aren't played because of any consistency, but because they were the staples during the ursan period?

Avarre · Jul 22, 2009, 12:38 AM // 00:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Improvavel

And that is why HB+HP are all the rage - tanks+nukers are the fastest in the TOP DOGS areas of the game. Sometimes the Tanks are the "nukers".

Tanks and nukers are top for the same reason people like HB+HP. Simplification of a character to a single role that is easier to play.

Quote:

Originally Posted by paranon

but alot of areas don't even have these hexes and conditions

You don't bring removal in areas that don't merit it, of course.

Improvavel · Jul 22, 2009, 01:00 AM // 01:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Avarre

Tanks and nukers are top for the same reason people like HB+HP. Simplification of a character to a single role that is easier to play.

That is true if you can provide a build that don't use tanks+nukers that can finish DOA HM and UW HM faster than a tank+nuker build.

Bashing tanks+nukers is all fine, when you can provide a build that uses the game mechanics to finish it faster.

When the best you can run to finish a certain area is a tank+nuke build something is wrong.

And even if SF goes away, DOA HM will be fun without tank+nuker.

If the fastest mechanic is tank+nuke, we can't really bash it. And who needs protection if you have an invincible guy absorbing all the damage?

Burst Cancel · Jul 22, 2009, 02:31 AM // 02:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

What the best players do and what skills they use are only personally useful in as much as they give you ideas for where you can improve, how you can elevate your game.

Improvement is a process. You, as a player, are somewhere along the path of getting better; it is hard to know how far you are from the top, and impossible to know how far you are from the peak.

I agree with the above; however, the rest of your post does not follow.

You are suggesting that given two options, A and B, where:
1) A will work most of the time, and is easy to use; and
2) B is a superior option, but only if one is able to use it correctly;
that you would actually advise someone, whom you assume not to be able to use B correctly, to just use A.

In the context of improvement, such advice is not merely worthless, it's outright harmful. Not only are you not actually teaching anyone anything, you are actively creating or reinforcing the idea that a strictly inferior option is the superior one. Beginners already have to contend with bad players giving unintentionally bad advice; they certainly don't need good players "helping" them with misinformation, however well-intentioned.

You actually make this point yourself, in a way:

Quote:

They're bad because it's a management decision to play people at their level and not expect more than is practical.

Exactly.

Quote:

There are tons of people who will hit a level of ability and go into ego mode; they draw the line where they are 'good', worse players are 'bad', and that's what there is to that; and will argue vehemently about anything that affects this paradigm of them being good. The people who are trainable, and stay trainable as they get better? That continue to want to get better, whatever their level, that also have the resolve to keep pushing, practicing to get better? That's exceptional, regardless of their ability at a given instant.

First, I'm not sure why you take issue with the use of "good" and "bad" as labels. What does it mean for something to be hot or cold? What does it mean for someone to be smart or stupid? These sorts of labels are merely a convenience of language, and the fact that one can't credibly devise some bright-line test to separate two classes doesn't mean those classes don't exist.

Second, you are conflating two unrelated issues. It is perfectly possible - and indeed, common - for someone to think that they are "good" and still strive for improvement. In fact, anyone who isn't the "best" acknowledges, by definition, that they are in need of improvement.

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This is where your BiP / Heal Party backlines come from; both characters are ridiculously easy to play, and as long as you can train some monkeys to do it you'll get what you need to complete the area.

Except that they're failing - that's kind of the problem in the first place.

glacialphoenix · Jul 22, 2009, 03:06 AM // 03:06

Quote:

Except that they're failing - that's kind of the problem in the first place.

That's as much a player problem as a bar problem, though. If someone keeps spamming Heal Party, he's likely to run out of energy disgustingly fast. It doesn't matter if there's a BiP near him, really, because he'll just expend it at top speed.

Quote:

And who needs protection if you have an invincible guy absorbing all the damage?

We had a whole party full of that in the past. That's why nobody bothered with PS.

The problem is that now, people need those prots because they're squishier, and the people who ran HB/HP don't realise it - or don't care.

YunSooJin · Jul 22, 2009, 03:15 AM // 03:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by glacialphoenix

That's as much a player problem as a bar problem, though. If someone keeps spamming Heal Party, he's likely to run out of energy disgustingly fast. It doesn't matter if there's a BiP near him, really, because he'll just expend it at top speed.

We had a whole party full of that in the past. That's why nobody bothered with PS.

The problem is that now, people need those prots because they're squishier, and the people who ran HB/HP don't realise it - or don't care.

Ensign made the point earlier that there's a HP/BiP backline, but that's not even true for any of the PUG PvE I've seen so far. Furthermore, people are flat out dying in these pugs under any real pressure. Normally in an 8man situation, there is a minion master to resolve any tanking issues. Also, warriors take the damage up front for the most part, so monks dont have to worry about prot all the time. But at any given moment where there's one or two HM frontliners on our backline, or we begin to receive any pressure, the monk runs out of energy and people begin to die.

It's not even a case of HP/GoLE/HB really even WORKING. It doesn't really work. All of the vaunted amazing efficiency you see when the combo goes off is worthless against continuous damage on one target, and is spent after two heal parties.. great.

To make it worse, players compound the problem with low efficiency skills, like Orison, Healing Breeze, etc. It doesnt make sense.

edit: Dont let me forget about Seed of Life. Shitty 25 second recharge skill. Who brings this and thinks its a good idea?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Malician

I understand where the OP is coming from. I preferred it back when there were more different builds, and people rolling their own; I'm not good enough to H/H stuff like Jeydra does, and the HB builds often make it hard to tell a terrible monk from a.. almost-decent one in the outpost. That said, Ensign's point is right on target. On a community level, everyone telling newbie/bad/failure monks to go get HB brings better average results. The monks may never improve themselves very far, but they'll do better than if they cast prots on random team members not being attacked.

I have yet to see people tell monks what to bring on their bar, or provide alternate suggestions, other than me (ie this mission has no hexes, we dont need hex removal). I don't think the community inside GW itself is telling players what to bring. Something else is driving it.

Burst Cancel · Jul 22, 2009, 03:19 AM // 03:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by glacialphoenix

That's as much a player problem as a bar problem, though. If someone keeps spamming Heal Party, he's likely to run out of energy disgustingly fast. It doesn't matter if there's a BiP near him, really, because he'll just expend it at top speed.

Ensign's point is that teams are built for absolutely minimum skill necessary - meaning, skill bars that will allow teams to complete missions even if they suck. You'll note that he specifically states, "both characters are ridiculously easy to play, and as long as you can train some monkeys to do it" (emphasis added).

My point is that even this isn't really working. Thus, the threshold necessary for success in GW actually lies somewhere above the level of terrible-people-with-terrible-bars. Admittedly, it might not be at the level where everyone needs to learn to play hybrid bars with some proficiency.

In any case, this wasn't really a serious point; I just picked it out to be irritating.

glacialphoenix · Jul 22, 2009, 03:41 AM // 03:41

Quote:

Ensign made the point earlier that there's a HP/BiP backline, but that's not even true for any of the PUG PvE I've seen so far.

This is true. I've never seen a BiP backline. I'm merely saying that even if you did have one, it still wouldn't mitigate the bad players.

Quote:

Thus, the threshold necessary for success in GW actually lies somewhere above the level of terrible-people-with-terrible-bars. Admittedly, it might not be at the level where everyone needs to learn to play hybrid bars with some proficiency.

Well, yes, I thought the threshold was to be an 'average' player. It's minimum-skill, not no-skill. It's true that those builds are preferred because they're theoretically the most foolproof, but fools are so ingenious.

Quote:

Furthermore, people are flat out dying in these pugs under any real pressure. Normally in an 8man situation, there is a minion master to resolve any tanking issues. Also, warriors take the damage up front for the most part, so monks dont have to worry about prot all the time. But at any given moment where there's one or two HM frontliners on our backline, or we begin to receive any pressure, the monk runs out of energy and people begin to die.

The monks weren't used to receiving pressure, period. Most of them couldn't monk for Ursans without demanding consets. That's +30 armour difference - not to mention the 50% immunity to crit hits, etc. - which amounts to quite a lot. Most things could be KDlocked (Ursan Rage) and many of the monks still couldn't cope with it.

In other words, they're good enough to play once you give them 'luxuries'. Most PUG teams today don't have that kind of luxury. So the monks collapse.

That being said: I don't like the bar either - I think there are far more effective bars out there. I just don't think it's entirely the bar's fault that the monks are failing.