Curse

Haxor · Oct 28, 2008, 07:41 AM // 07:41

Usually when something teleports to me (and I'm unable to kite for some reason), I just pre-patient myself, actually. It'll help me stay alive quite well - at least long enough to be able to WoH/Guardian/SB myself or someone else. The real key is usually just seeing what's coming at you. If you see an Ele teleporting at you, patient + SB yourself (the 15 energy is worth staying alive). If you see a melee char running at you, chain guardian/disciplined and laugh in their face. Pretty much the only thing that gives you trouble is Shattersins, (actually good) dom mesmers, and the occasional Spear Swipe paragon that dazes your ass (even though disciplined + dismiss/mending touch is enough for that usually).

My build:
[Patient Spirit][Word of Healing][Signet of Rejuvenation][Guardian][Dismiss Condition][Holy Veil][Spirit Bond][Disciplined Stance]

Also, real men run 9 tactics for the extra armor from your shield.

Super Igor · Oct 28, 2008, 11:48 AM // 11:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Haxor

Also, real men run 9 tactics for the extra armor from your shield.

Actually, real men run 8 tactics for their q8 tactics shield. :P

moriz · Oct 28, 2008, 02:43 PM // 14:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by Super Igor

Actually, real men run 8 tactics for their q8 tactics shield. :P

incorrect. LESSER real men use req7 15AL shields, so they use 7 tactics. of course, truly real men use return.

Quote:

Real men play Boon Prot instead.

weak and cowardly real men play boon prot. strong and superbrave real men (aka luxon men) use return.

-Lotus- · Oct 28, 2008, 03:25 PM // 15:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Haxor

[Patient Spirit][Word of Healing][Signet of Rejuvenation][Guardian][Dismiss Condition][Holy Veil][Spirit Bond][Disciplined Stance]

you don't have RoF. everything else you said will be ignored.

Trylo · Oct 28, 2008, 10:21 PM // 22:21

well the problem i see is no shield of abs. im pretty greedy with it and only use it on myself, its really quite perfect for the RA skirmishes. shielding hands is also a lot more useful than people think as you can easily pop it before a sin gets their first KD in.

and how exactly are you getting killed with BOTH SB and PS!? you said energy wasnt a big deal, but if you have either/both of those up you shouldnt be dropping that fast. not that you should have both on the same bar in RA... or anywhere PvP...

Faer · Oct 29, 2008, 08:21 AM // 08:21

I run Mo/A WoH in RA with dual shadowsteps and never die. Positioning and battlefield awareness is key, and he who understands this becomes the king of the Random Arenas.

ecirbaf · Oct 29, 2008, 02:21 PM // 14:21

Take it from a PvP newbie monk, I found something that worked great:

I saw a topic here with a guy joking how he made many consecutive wins in RA with a really stupid bar. I copied his bar. Basically 4 or 5 purely healing spells including Patient Spirit, Healer's Boon, Orison of Healing,.. and a rez signet.

This seems stupid to do of course. BUT... it forced me to RUN and pay really attention to where I stood. Before that I used to sit in place often. You need to run and think of where to go BEFORE the enemy is on your toes.

Surprisingly, I got my highest consec wins ever with this stupid build after the 2nd or 3rd try got 6 glad points so I think it was 15 wins O_O (granted there was 3 other awesome players, and believe it or not none of them complained about my build. There was another real monk, a rit and a ranger!)

Just ignore the comments from rude players and focus on playing your monk, knowing that it's a experiment.

I think a reason it works well is that it lets you focus on improving one thing at a time (in this case, positioning).

It's really stupid at times I thought my role was more of a bait, just running around, but if a meleer is busy trying to beat on you he's not beating on somebody else and you can still throw a heal left and right, while your mates eventually turn on your attacker.

I think I will continue with this adding just one skill at a time; like cond removel, then hex removal...

And this is RA right? One of the players said something along the lines "go back to pve if you need to learn" that's dumb. You learn PvP in PvP.

Frankly there aren't enough RANDOM battles with 5 or more per team like Fort Aspenwood, or the current Costume Brawl. And this is a shame. Takes way too much time and effort to get into organized teams with a guild. I want to hop on and learn to be better at pvp and large battles like 5vs5 gives you more breathing room for paying attention to what is going on without the frustration of being always target #1 on top of being insulted for being a bad monk.

PS: You can take a lot of beating with just Healer's Boon and Patient Spirit + Divine Favor bonuses... Divine Favor heal and 2 sec later it was +180 !! o_O

Avatar of Healing · Oct 29, 2008, 03:11 PM // 15:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by holymasamune

RA: Run Mo/W
TA/HA/GvG: Tell your team to stop sucking and actually kill something so you don't die.

that is a sad story indeed. Our guild monk also left for WoW, and life hasn't been the same. I'm not saying I'm a bad monk, I'm actually quite good, but our monk left for WoW when I was learning to be as good as I am now. Our guild hasn't looked at him the same after that day.

_Nihilist_ · Oct 30, 2008, 04:18 AM // 04:18

Mo/W's frustrate my Hammer Warrior. Thank Balthazar that for every Mo/W there is another AL 60 squishy who stands there to "take it like a man" instead of getting a clue, kiting, or calling for a linebacker.

Winterclaw · Oct 30, 2008, 06:41 AM // 06:41

Do most people in RA even know what a linebacker is?

Also, how do you call for one, 'need lb'?

faraaz · Oct 30, 2008, 10:04 AM // 10:04

Mo/W ftw...I had a winning streak of ~16 matches with my RA team on my monk last night, where I finally died to a mixture of VoR + Soul Bind

PS: Considering that they spread Soul Bind across your entire party (damn 5 sec recharge), how the hell dooes the WoH Mo/W counter it?

Xeng Suey · Oct 30, 2008, 02:20 PM // 14:20

When i play RA on my monk, i use to play return+dark escape. I hate to play M/W (pressing stances and sit ur arse is just no fun). woh+patient+guardian mending+dismiss condition+holy veil+return+dark escape is the main bar. Other times i just go Mo/E... i use usual GvG RC bar whith Aegis, altough people bitch at me i got 10 consects many times with it

oww yeah.... dont forget that weapon swaping helps you very very much!

Haxor · Oct 30, 2008, 09:16 PM // 21:16

Quote:

Originally Posted by faraaz

PS: Considering that they spread Soul Bind across your entire party (damn 5 sec recharge), how the hell dooes the WoH Mo/W counter it?

In most cases, with a lot of trouble. Efficient use of WoH is the best tool you have. For instance, it's better to wait a second or two to let your/their health drop under 50%, than heal yourself/them with it just before.

Efficiency is key, but pure pressure like that kills. The only thing that really works is having your team kill/incapacitate them as soon as they can.

Xeng Suey · Oct 31, 2008, 09:11 AM // 09:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Haxor

In most cases, with a lot of trouble. Efficient use of WoH is the best tool you have. For instance, it's better to wait a second or two to let your/their health drop under 50%, than heal yourself/them with it just before.

Efficiency is key, but pure pressure like that kills. The only thing that really works is having your team kill/incapacitate them as soon as they can.

I couldnt agree more with this answer. All said in there

faraaz · Oct 31, 2008, 09:42 AM // 09:42

I see. Well, considering that most of the victories we had were due to us pressuring the opponent more than them pressuring us (one of the time based annihilation matches on the RoF map went on till we were fighting for sudden death for 6 minutes), I can see how that's not going to happen.

Oh well, we held out against a good few TA teams before our streak ended.

xDusT II · Nov 01, 2008, 05:26 AM // 05:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by -Lotus-

you don't have RoF. everything else you said will be ignored.

RoF isn't necessary in RA. The times you'll need it in RA are rare as it's much easier to pre-prot and spikes aren't as commonplace as other forms of PvP. Another problem with RoF is that it usually takes the spot of Patient Spirit and if that's the case you may as well be running a ZB bar.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trylo

well the problem i see is no shield of abs. im pretty greedy with it and only use it on myself, its really quite perfect for the RA skirmishes. shielding hands is also a lot more useful than people think as you can easily pop it before a sin gets their first KD in.

IMO, Guardian is much more useful than SoA in 4 man arenas. Unlike SoA, Guardian can prevent conditions, KD's, interrupts and disrupt sin chains, all of which are very common threats in RA. It also recharges faster than SoA.

I can see SoA working if your being monk-stomped but outside of that, in a 4-man arena it's unlikely that there'll be enough concentrated packets of damage to really make SoA worthwhile.

Another general monking tip is that keeping your offence clean is a real priority when your the only monk on your team. Your going to take more pressure if your team can't do any damage. Just because your under pressure doesn't mean you should limit your skill usage to bar pushers. Keep veiling off hexes and removing conditions from your frontline and don't be afraid to cast into your high set if necessary.

DarkNecrid · Nov 01, 2008, 05:52 AM // 05:52

Guardian > SoA anywhere if you have to pick between the two and you don't need RoF. All RoF is for is cleaning up errors on a Monk bar. I think JR said it best, "In a perfect world, Reversal of Fortune would never see use." but alas, we aren't perfect, so it's handy for making sure mistakes don't happen.

MiraBlackhand · Nov 01, 2008, 07:28 AM // 07:28

Thing is, especially in RA, the melee hate is so unbelievably strong that its nearly impossible to keep veiling off hexes. Conditions are easy, draw conditions -> mending touch does wonders in RA, so does dismiss condition... but to remove hexes, the best source I found was holy veiling your primary damage dealer nearly full time (only canceling when you know you will need the energy regen) and using spotless mind to aid in removal of hexes / conditions.

Its nearly impossible to go a single game without a necro, mesmer, or elementalist who isn't constantly casting blurred vision, steam, VoR, empathy, spiteful spirit, etc. Even moreso, generally if there is a mesmer there is parts of their bar setup for disrupts / energy denial / anti-caster.

The above is the primary reason I don't use my two main characters in RA (my war and my sin). I can't go a single game without being a target of interest unless there is a monk in the group, and even then blinds / blurred vision, etc. is still pretty much unavoidable.

I suppose what you all said is right though. You can't win them all, even the 'perfect' team will fall eventually, everything has a counter.

_Nihilist_ · Nov 03, 2008, 02:53 AM // 02:53

I play my Warrior in RA all the time. Melee hate sucks, but it's part of the game.

MiraBlackhand · Nov 03, 2008, 05:39 AM // 05:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tyrael_Eveningsong

I play my Warrior in RA all the time. Melee hate sucks, but it's part of the game.

Far, far, far easier to get consecutive wins and consequently gladiator points when you're a monk. No matter the build, without a solid monk on my team my warrior and sin both get torn to shreds by melee hate. Half the time I am unable to do anything because I have SS, Empathy, Blurred Vision, Blind, etc. on me anyways. As a monk I feel I am doing my job while also reaping much larger benefits.