Curse

Div · Jan 26, 2008, 02:57 AM // 02:57

Chthon is just too amazing at monk we don't comprehend his logic. To everyone arguing against him: you guys are all bad at monk and he is the only one that is good. I mean, he was able to BEAT THE GAME. That's pretty damn hard.

P.S. Of course the earth is flat

LightningHell · Jan 26, 2008, 05:26 AM // 05:26

Post #43:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

Personally, I tend to prefer the big numbers

Then why wouldn't you like hybridizing? Using an extremely simplified model...Even assuming that your monks really, really fail at using a hybrid bar and somehow is good at using a monodimensional bar, and does the job of both "heal" and "prot" categories and their relative roles at 70% out of 100% potential (which is abysmal), two bad hybrids together would make 140% of both categories while heal/prot would make 100% of both.

You can pull on that as unrealistic, but I won't cover that as it's covered before why a heal/prot setup is unrealistic.

Mr Pink57 · Jan 26, 2008, 08:23 AM // 08:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by JoeKnowMo

Monk 2 - Healing 11 + 2, DF 10 + 1, Prot 10 + 1

[skill]Word of Healing[/skill][skill]Reversal of Fortune[/skill][skill]Dismiss Condition[/skill][skill]Protective Spirit[/skill]OR[skill]Spirit Bond[/skill][skill]Shield of Absorption[/skill]OR[skill]Shielding Hands[/skill][skill]Aegis[/skill] Pick any two:[wiki]Cure Hex[/wiki][skill]Glyph of Lesser Energy[/skill][skill]Guardian[/skill][skill]Dwayna's Kiss[/skill][skill]Healing Seed[/skill][skill]Signet of Rejuvenation[/skill]

You are sacrificing 7 HP a spell due to not having max DF. You are sacrificing 1s off of Aegis, 1s of SoA or 3s of Shielding Hands, and a few seconds off of PS or 12 HP each time SBond triggers In return, you get access to WoH and other healing spells.

The reason this bar trumps a pure prot is because Monk 2's bar is far more energy efficient simply due to the presence of WoH. ZB is nowhere near as good as WoH because it will often cost you 10e thanks to the HBoon monk getting spells in before you and also because you won't use it on targets in the 55-75% HP range because it's terribly inefficient to do so.

I think ZB is still very viable option and I still run it quite often over this bar posted. Reason being is yes I do get that one extra second of Aegis (with 20% enchant), it also allows me to stick to my 40/20 set and not any weapon swapping to WoH. However in fairness Cure Hex does do a lot for me but Remove Hex is just fine with DF bonus and with a straight prot on that bar Dismiss becomes quite the heal if conditions are met.

And if you have a HB on your team there really is no reason for WoH that person has healing covered as it is I would look at RC or even SoD at that point, there always gonna beat you on a heal with such a fast cast as it is.

pink

Ensign · Jan 26, 2008, 08:58 AM // 08:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr Pink57

I think ZB is still very viable option and I still run it quite often over this bar posted.

You don't find that you miss with it too often when playing alongside another Monk with a power heal? It's an outstanding skill when you're the only Monk, for sure, but you only have to miss the energy a couple times for it to become sketchy.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr Pink57

However in fairness Cure Hex does do a lot for me but Remove Hex is just fine with DF bonus

Do you think Remove Hex is better than a 4 spec (54 Heal) Cure Hex?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mr Pink57

And if you have a HB on your team there really is no reason for WoH that person has healing covered as it is I would look at RC or even SoD at that point

Yeah you don't need more than a Gift if one of the Monks is running Healer's Boon; the Dismiss or Mend is good enough as a secondary heal. For most endgame areas I've felt that the best elite to pair with Healer's Boon is Divert Hexes.

Something like:

Healer's Boon, Dwayna's Kiss, Ethereal Light, Heal Party, Cure Hex, Dismiss Condition, Aegis, Glyph of Lesser Energy, 14 Heal 11 Divine 9 Prot

Divert Hexes, Protective Spirit, Reversal of Fortune, Dismiss Condition, Shield of Absorption, Gift of Health, Aegis, Glyph of Lesser Energy, 14 Prot 11 Divine 9 Heal

JoeKnowMo · Jan 26, 2008, 07:38 PM // 19:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

Now, a funny thing has happened. Despite all our bickering, our builds look very similar; I don't think your builds are terrible; and I don't expect you to be too unhappy with my variants either. How the hell did that happen?

All this time you've been advocating for maxing out two attributes on each monk, and suddenly you're fine with builds that don't do so? Whatever happened to sticking to your arguments? Or at least admitting that you've changed your mind?

Quote:

Who ever said I was out to fill a pure heal bar? Haven't I been saying "dedicated healer" all along? I've never questioned the idiocy of bringing a bunch of redundant heals; it's the wisdom of making damage-mitigation, and the accompanying sacrifice to your attributes, your immediate, automatic first choice to fill the remaining spaces, despite the other 4 remaining monking functions that don't need a prot spec, that I doubt.

Take a look at the OP. It says that a pure heal/prot can do just as well as any other setup. Many of us disagreed. You entered the discussion and insisted that maxing 2 attributes is energy efficient and compared not doing so to using a major rune. You also said that there were attribute-agnostic skills that could be used instead of having to put points into a third attribute.

Yet, in the end, you don't seem to have any issue with going against your own points and posting builds that spec into 3 attributes?

Quote:

If you want to define "hybrid" in that way, then I would agree that "'hybrid' > all," and "all" is a pretty narrow subset of really sucky builds.

"Hybrid" is generally understood as having the ability to push red bars up and to mitigate damage/remove conditions. That's how the community defines it. Oftentimes it requires speccing into 3 attributes.

The non-hybrid builds (or "all") are those that are pure heal or pure prot. You know, the kind of build that uses only two attributes, and maxes them out. You know, the kind of build that you said was more energy efficient that a hybrid.

And weren't you saying that people who said that "hybrid > all" were blindly adhereing to dogma?

Quote:

It's also pretty meaningless to define a term that encompasses pretty much every non-sucky build, therefore I try to give "hybrid" a narrow enough meaning that the term is actually useful. But, like I said, if you want to call every build that uses a skill from the heal line and a skill from the prot line a "hybrid," then you can, and I'll agree they're better than anything else. Let's just make sure we're clear in our terminology first.

So, you're essentially saying that pure prot and pure heal are sucky builds? But wasn't it exactly those kinds of builds that the OP and you were defending?

And now you're trying to chalk it up to a terminology confusion because you don't understand what the rest of us mean by hybrid?

I'm calling flip-flop.

I hope that after your admission that "hybrid > all", the issue has been put to rest. Can we quote you from now on and say, "Even Chthon thinks that hybrid > all, and non-hybrid builds are sucky."?

Quote:

Originally Posted by holymasamune

Chthon is just too amazing at monk we don't comprehend his logic.

You're right. Count me as one of those that doesn't comprehend his logic.

Quote:

To everyone arguing against him: you guys are all bad at monk and he is the only one that is good. I mean, he was able to BEAT THE GAME. That's pretty damn hard.

He's now saying that hybrid > all. I used to have a hard time running dual hybrids, but now that Chthon says that hybrids rule, the monsters die in one hit.

Gogogo Chthon!

Burst Cancel · Jan 26, 2008, 07:48 PM // 19:48

Cthon, the bars you ended up with are hybrids.

Further, if you look at what skills you have available between the two monks and how they're distributed, there are certain holes that 'standard' hybrids won't have. For instance, you're only running one Aegis, you have one copy of either PS or SB but not both, etc. Some of these have consequences that are not immediately obvious (e.g., not having Aegis up all of the time means Kiss and Dismiss are weaker).

The primary advantage I see to running your first bar is access to a strong and fast Heal Party - but there's no reason why a HB bar can't drop a point or two of divine favor for a low prot spec and damage mitigation. Sig of Rejuv falls into the same general category as Sig of Devo, in that it doesn't really do anything of its own - it's a weak heal for no energy. It makes even less sense on that bar as it doesn't benefit from HB, and your stronger Heal Party makes bar-topping incidental in a fashion similar to LoD.

Res doesn't make sense even on an HB bar, because there are so many other places on the team where the res could go, especially in the Sabway era. Speaking of Sabway, something else to consider: can a pure heal monk even stack up against the restoration necro, who can throw around 100+ point heals on essentially limitless energy? I don't believe so.

I don't think the second bar needs to be discussed, as it's close to or identical to commonly run hybrid bars: prot-heavy with WoH. Res on the prot bar makes even less sense, as you don't even have HB to cut the cast time.

Chthon · Jan 27, 2008, 12:52 AM // 00:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by JoeKnowMo

All this time you've been advocating for maxing out two attributes on each monk, and suddenly you're fine with builds that don't do so?

1. Since WoH got buffed, I've always agreed that the prot bar is best off shifting a bunch of points into heal for WoH.

2. I'm fine with builds that don't sacrifice too much off the attributes for what they get in return.

3. What I'm not fine with is immediately jumping to make a big attribute sacrifice without even being aware that you're making one.

ie Going from 12+Heal/12+DF/3+Prot to 12+Heal/10+DF/8+Prot to get a decent Aegis or PS isn't objectionable. You are sacrificing some of your healing power, but what you get is worth the loss.
Going from 12+Heal/12+DF/3+Prot to the 10+/10+/10+ you suggested earlier in the thread is generally not going to be.

Quote:

Take a look at the OP. It says that a pure heal/prot can do just as well as any other setup.

Even the OP mentions Dismiss on the heal bar and Gift on the prot bar. If we're going to take the broad meaning of "hybrid" that a skill from each line makes a hybrid, then OP suggested hybrids from the get go. But sense everyone seemed to attack poor Kwan Xi despite posting "hybrids" in the broad sense, certainly they must have had a narrower definition in mind?

Quote:

You entered the discussion and insisted that maxing 2 attributes is energy efficient and compared not doing so to using a major rune.

It is. But I'm not opposed to major or superior runes. As long as you're aware you're making a non-trivial trade-off, and make sure to get at least as much out of the trade-off as you put in, fine. The problem is that so many of the "hybrid > all" camp are not even remotely aware of what they're trading away, so they give up their healing power far, far too easily.

Quote:

You also said that there were attribute-agnostic skills that could be used instead of having to put points into a third attribute.

And there were.

Dismiss clears the condition even at 0 spec.
Cure hex clears the hex even at 0 spec. (Being healing linked is a bonus.)
A rez can revive someone even at 0 spec. (Being healing linked is a bonus.)
Heal Party is heal-linked, so it goes best on the heal bar, and your party really should have 1 copy.
Sig of Rejuv is heal-linked, so it goes best on the heal bar, and your party really should have 1 copy.

If you look at my first variant on the heal bar, you'll see that it's 12/12/3 and the only skill from the prot line is dismiss. While that's still "hybrid" in the broadest sense, it's about as "unhybridized" a hybrid as you can get.

Now, you have to start hybridizing it more if you decide that (1) I don't like rez/heal party/sig of rejuv/etc and I don't want it in my build, OR (2) I like PS/Aegis/SoA/etc better than rez/heal party/sig of rejuv/etc.

Quote:

So, you're essentially saying that pure prot and pure heal are sucky builds? But wasn't it exactly those kinds of builds that the OP and you were defending?

If you define "pure" as having 0 skills from the other line, then "pure" healing builds are going to suck because, at a minimum, they will all lack condition removal. "Pure" prot builds need not suck, but only because ZB is a great big spot heal in the prot line.
Neither the OP nor myself advocates this sort of "pure" build. I don't think anyone ever has.

Quote:

I'm calling flip-flop.

I haven't changed my position. You've finally started hearing what I'm saying instead of hearing the idiot with 6 spot heals on the same bar that you wanted me to be. Like they say, you find what you're looking to see. Apparently, you needed someone representing the 6-spot-heals-on-the-same-bar school of thought so that you'd have someone to refute and defeat. I was close enough, so everything I said got read with that mindset. Now that you've finally noticed that I'm not said idiot, maybe you should re-read this thread with a more open mindset?

Quote:

Can we quote you from now on and say, "Even Chthon thinks that hybrid > all, and non-hybrid builds are sucky."?

So long as you make clear that "hybrid" is used in the sense that's so broad as to be meaningless, go ahead.

Quote:

I used to have a hard time running dual hybrids, but now that Chthon says that hybrids rule, the monsters die in one hit.

I'm so very glad I could help you with that.

----------------------------------

Quote:

Originally Posted by Burst Cancel

The primary advantage I see to running your first bar is access to a strong and fast Heal Party - but there's no reason why a HB bar can't drop a point or two of divine favor for a low prot spec and damage mitigation.

The reason would be preference for stronger heals and the skills that are already in those spaces. If you think.. say.. a second Aegis is worth more than... say... a rez plus the lost healing power, go for it. If you don't, don't.

Quote:

Sig of Rejuv falls into the same general category as Sig of Devo, in that it doesn't really do anything of its own - it's a weak heal for no energy. It makes even less sense on that bar as it doesn't benefit from HB, and your stronger Heal Party makes bar-topping incidental in a fashion similar to LoD.

The skill is not worse for HBoon being there, merely not better. (Which is a shame, but there's nothing I can do about it.) Incidental bar-topping with a 15e spell is not really practical... at all. You'd need to stick GoLE back in to make it work, and that would mean that you didn't gain any skillslots for the trade -- you just traded Sig of Rejuv for GoLE. As between using Sig of Rejuv to bar-top and using GoLE so that I can afford to bar-top with Heal Party, I prefer Sig of Rejuv, but that's probably heading off-topic. We can discuss it elsewhere if you like.

Quote:

Res doesn't make sense even on an HB bar, because there are so many other places on the team where the res could go, especially in the Sabway era.

Aside from the "everyone in a PUG needs rez because you never know who's stupid" rationale, the only reason to bring rez on the HBoon monk is the fact that they are fast enough now that you can be ballsy with battle rezzing and reap a big payoff. That can't be outsourced off the HBoon monk. If you're too risk-adverse to care for battle rezzing with a monk (or if your counterpart isn't able to hold the team together for 2 or 3 sec) then rez really holds nothing for you.

Quote:

Speaking of Sabway, something else to consider: can a pure heal monk even stack up against the restoration necro, who can throw around 100+ point heals on essentially limitless energy? I don't believe so.

Nor can a hybrid. There's hardly a caster build out there that can't be improved by giving it to a necro. (OK, that's a slight exaggeration.) If you really want to get out from under the "necromancer taking our jobs spectre," you've got to use your primary attribute heavily, use a sup rune, or use skills from two non-necro classes. Boon-prot is just about the only thing monks have that's truly safe from the necromancer scourge.
(Apropos of Sabway: Sabway is designed for 4-man teams. It's pretty lackluster in an 8-man setting. If you want to abuse SR in an 8-man setting, go borrow some builds from Moloch instead.)

Ensign · Jan 27, 2008, 04:01 AM // 04:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Burst Cancel

Speaking of Sabway, something else to consider: can a pure heal monk even stack up against the restoration necro, who can throw around 100+ point heals on essentially limitless energy? I don't believe so.

Depends on what you want. Necro/Rits with Soul Reaping going bonkers can chaincast their skills, but their heals tend to be a bit sluggish and a uniform, moderate size. A heal Monk (which means Healer's Boon in my mind) won't keep up with it in raw HP, it can't because of energy limitations, but it heals much more quickly when it does heal. Which is better is going to depend on how well you can time and place your skills.

Sab · Jan 27, 2008, 04:52 AM // 04:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

(Apropos of Sabway: Sabway is designed for 4-man teams. It's pretty lackluster in an 8-man setting. If you want to abuse SR in an 8-man setting, go borrow some builds from Moloch instead.)

His 8-man builds doesn't really add anything to the ones I've posted. They're just builds which would be better if they were their respective primary professions.

LightningHell · Jan 27, 2008, 06:30 AM // 06:30

Quote:

Going from 12+Heal/12+DF/3+Prot to the 10+/10+/10+ you suggested earlier in the thread is generally not going to be.

In my opinion the 11/10/10 split is worth it. Let us establish a few points:

Assuming there is a linear progession in skills (i.e. the numbers in the skills) as attribute levels go up, which there normally is, lower level skills benefit more from attribute levels, as their effectiveness is upped more than it would at a higher level (i.e. a 5 point increase in a heal is more significant when at it's an increase from 20 to 25, than from 60 to 65).

The attribute point system in GW also makes leveling lower level attributes easier than comparatively higher attributes, so a decrease in a level from a "high" attribute already means a two level (or more) increase from a comparatively low attribute (from 8 to 10, for example).

So you're basically sacrificing a small amount of levels, at the stage where level increments already are at a point of diminishing returns, for a comparatively large amount of levels, where level increments are actually significant.

Of course, this has to do with your skill bar. A mostly heal bar with Protective Spirit and Dismiss on it wouldn't really benefit too much from putting 12heal/8 prot to 11heal/10prot; however, it is significant for prot monks with WoH.

The 12/10/8 split and 11/10/10 split are both usable. However, I very much so disagree with using 12/12/3.

JoeKnowMo · Jan 27, 2008, 07:23 AM // 07:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chthon

If you look at my first variant on the heal bar, you'll see that it's 12/12/3 and the only skill from the prot line is dismiss. While that's still "hybrid" in the broadest sense, it's about as "unhybridized" a hybrid as you can get.

As you might expect, I have an issue with your HBoon build which is pretty much a pure heal build.

12/12/3 is not as good as 12/10/8. By going 12/12/3 you lose out on the ability to have Aegis which is one of the most energy efficient skills out there and as Burst Cancel pointed out helps to power DKiss and Dismiss Condition.

Gaining 7 HP more per heal due to having higher DF is just not worth it. Since you're so concerned with energy efficiency, this should be apparent to you.

- Aegis results in a +50 HP increase each time you use Dkiss.
- At 8 Prot, instead of 3 Prot, Dismiss heals for 20 HP more.
- Aegis also results in a +51 HP increase in healing each time you use Dismiss Condition.

Factor in the health saved by 11s of Aegis and the 12/10/8 hybrid leaves the 12/12/3 pure heal build in the dust.

Looking at the numbers, it's obvious that the 7 HP gain per heal due to max DF is weaksauce compared to the benefits of speccing 8 in Prot.

Amy Awien · Jan 27, 2008, 09:06 AM // 09:06

But Aegis is only useful against attacks, not spells, and two 12/10/8 hybrids can have it up 16 seconds out of 30, versus 11 for the prot-specialist in a healer+protter duo. That is not such a big difference though it may be worthwhile in a melee heavy area.

Div · Jan 27, 2008, 10:17 AM // 10:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amy Awien

But Aegis is only useful against attacks, not spells, and two 12/10/8 hybrids can have it up 16 seconds out of 30, versus 11 for the prot-specialist in a healer+protter duo. That is not such a big difference though it may be worthwhile in a melee heavy area.

Two hybrids (14/11/9) can keep it up for 18+4=22 seconds. Some hybrids are 12/12/11, and they're able to keep it up for 20+4=24 seconds. One lone protter can keep it up for 11+2=13 seconds. That's a 70-85% increase in uptime, a big difference. Just about every zone has enough physicals to make this useful. If nothing, wands from casters in HM hit for like 20-50, and blocking some of them would be nice.

Amy Awien · Jan 27, 2008, 01:48 PM // 13:48

Staff and wand are 15-30 coming from a level 26 and against 60AL. Every bit, even 50% of that, helps off course, but there's only 8 skills on a bar and I'd probably tailor more towards the more difficult foes rather then the average mob.

Joe's comparison was based on a 12/10/8, 8 prot (9 plus rune) for the ease of the equal Healing Prayers effect of a 12/12/3. If you change the attribute distribution, the effects change. He also did not take the second monk into account, you'd normally take two hybrids or one protection and one healer.

What it comes down to, in the end, is how well do the protection skills actually prevent damage and thus reduce the need for healing, and that will vary with situation and players. There's no hard data on how much HP-loss a skill like Aegis will actually prevent so you can't really play with hard numbers, it's guesswork, intuition and experience. It's more useful to discuss and optimize the three types of bars, when someone makes a suggestion.

neoflame · Jan 27, 2008, 02:08 PM // 14:08

I'm confused. Is Chthon's argument now that a 12+1+1/10+1/8+1 spec isn't a hybrid?

JoeKnowMo · Jan 27, 2008, 04:06 PM // 16:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amy Awien

Joe's comparison was based on a 12/10/8, 8 prot (9 plus rune) for the ease of the equal Healing Prayers effect of a 12/12/3. If you change the attribute distribution, the effects change. He also did not take the second monk into account, you'd normally take two hybrids or one protection and one healer.

I posted an example of a duo hybrid build earlier in the thread. The attributes on the first build have been changed a little from 14/9/11 to 14/11/9 because of the breakpoints of the skills in discussion. See here.

Quote:

There's no hard data on how much HP-loss a skill like Aegis will actually prevent so you can't really play with hard numbers, it's guesswork, intuition and experience.

Aegis isn't great against all mobs. But that goes for almost all skills. The beauty of Aegis is that its effectiveness scales with the size of the mob being faced. If you happen to overaggro or are surprised by popups when fighting one mob, Aegis becomes twice as effective. Aegis also buffs staples on monk bars like Dkiss and Dismiss condition.

Quote:

Originally Posted by neoflame

I'm confused.

Join the club.

Quote:

Is Chthon's argument now that a 12+1+1/10+1/8+1 spec isn't a hybrid?

I think his argument is that a 14/13/4 is more energy efficient than a 14/11/8 due to healing 7 HP more per spell from increased Divine Favor.

Chthon · Jan 27, 2008, 06:48 PM // 18:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by JoeKnowMo

As you might expect, I have an issue with your HBoon build which is pretty much a pure heal build.

12/12/3 is not as good as 12/10/8. By going 12/12/3 you lose out on the ability to have Aegis which is one of the most energy efficient skills out there and as Burst Cancel pointed out helps to power DKiss and Dismiss Condition.

Gaining 7 HP more per heal due to having higher DF is just not worth it. Since you're so concerned with energy efficiency, this should be apparent to you.

- Aegis results in a +50 HP increase each time you use Dkiss.
- At 8 Prot, instead of 3 Prot, Dismiss heals for 20 HP more.
- Aegis also results in a +51 HP increase in healing each time you use Dismiss Condition.

Factor in the health saved by 11s of Aegis and the 12/10/8 hybrid leaves the 12/12/3 pure heal build in the dust.

Looking at the numbers, it's obvious that the 7 HP gain per heal due to max DF is weaksauce compared to the benefits of speccing 8 in Prot.

Now, THIS is the sort of argument I've been trying to get out of the "hybrid > all" camp for the whole dang thread!
That's a pretty convincing case for why the 12/10/8/aegis variant of that build gains more healing power than it trades away. Good job.
Now decide what skill to throw away to make room for aegis (the rez?) and make the case that you'd gain more from aegis than the healing power you trade away, plus the skill you lose, and you've finally justified your position.

Now, I would still say, looking at your two builds, that you have one lightly-hybridized healer and one lightly-hybridized prot, but that's the sort of semantic argument that draws stupid crap like "I'm confused. Is Chthon's argument now that X isn't a hybrid?" so I'm not going to go there.

Amy Awien · Jan 27, 2008, 10:11 PM // 22:11

Maybe it's more of a continuum with biases towards specialized or hybrid.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JoeKnowMo

The beauty of Aegis is that its effectiveness scales with the size of the mob being faced.

Which would be when there's big trouble and you'd really need it to get through, good enough reason to invest something in prot for it.

Age · Jan 27, 2008, 11:09 PM // 23:09

Quote:

Something like:

Healer's Boon, Dwayna's Kiss, Ethereal Light, Heal Party, Cure Hex, Dismiss Condition, Aegis, Glyph of Lesser Energy, 14 Heal 11 Divine 9 Prot

Divert Hexes, Protective Spirit, Reversal of Fortune, Dismiss Condition, Shield of Absorption, Gift of Health, Aegis, Glyph of Lesser Energy, 14 Prot 11 Divine 9 Heal

These are nice Ensign other than GoLE what would you recommend as non /E?

I do remember using the old Mo/E WoH premade and made it into a Hybrid as I was been beaten on in RA and TA back in 05.

LightningHell · Jan 28, 2008, 12:25 AM // 00:25

Quote:

Maybe it's more of a continuum with biases towards specialized or hybrid.

It is.

Note, however, that "pure" specialized monks are not runnable, while "pure" hybrid monks are. At least in terms of effectiveness anyway.