Curse

TEB Elite · Aug 25, 2008, 08:44 AM // 08:44

[skill]Ebon Battle Standard Of Honor[/skill] vs [skill]Ebon Battle Standard Of Courage[/skill]

Im a newish para so go easy.

Why do most people recommend ebsoh over ebsoc? It seems more likely that I would be next to casters (not to mention heroes) because of the paras attack distance. Casters/rangers also tend to stay stationary while the melee players are running about cleaning up runners.

Maybe I am not looking at the entire picture.

Thanks.

Arkantos · Aug 25, 2008, 08:47 AM // 08:47

As a paragon, you're most likely running a SY gon. Since you have a skill that gives party members +100 armor, the extra armor from courage is rather pointless.

Even if you aren't running a SY gon, additional damage owns. Not only does honor make physical damage more, it makes direct damage skills deal more damage. The additional damage from honor stacked with someone with AoE skills = win.

TEB Elite · Aug 25, 2008, 08:50 AM // 08:50

No factions here so SY is no choice. Im running purification + tntf.

tmakinen · Aug 25, 2008, 09:00 AM // 09:00

As Arkantos says, there are other (better) ways to get the extra armor and EBSoH adds the extra damage to spells as well. Especially DoT AoE from eles (like the three heats) becomes sweet when boosted by it. Barrage/Volley/IA rangers will thank you as well. EBSoH has best synergy with skills that usually do little damage but to many targets (AoE) or very often (e.g., Sliver Armor).

Actually, the contest is much closer between EBSoH and the third Vanguard ward (Wisdom). If you have several casters loaded with spells that have long recharge times (like the three heats again), greatly reduced average recharge times are a big boon to hurt delivery business.

Of course nothing prevents you from having both EBSoH and EBSoW, but overall I'd prefer to see them on an ele or necro who can trivially afford the cost.

MercenaryKnight · Aug 25, 2008, 09:11 AM // 09:11

If you really want to be on caster's good side if you already got defense down bring the ward with increased recharge chance. Will help a lot whether it's heroes or pug players with pve skills recharging quicker. Of course if you have a few more paragons or physical ranged teammates the damage ward will be better.

romeus petrus · Aug 25, 2008, 02:51 PM // 14:51

[ebon battle standard of honor] owns if you are running a high aoe physical build like splinter barrage, Dervway, or whirlwind wars. Can't see a point of using [ebon battle standard of courage] on a Para even without [save yourselves].

Snow Bunny · Aug 25, 2008, 10:24 PM // 22:24

Damageeeeeeeeeeeee

isamu kurosawa · Aug 25, 2008, 10:37 PM // 22:37

Paras also have access to an alternative other than SY that doesn't take up a pve skill slot. [[stand your ground].

DarkGanni · Aug 25, 2008, 10:37 PM // 22:37

I don't see defensive wards in pve having much use and the idea of standing in a ward requires bulking, something monster aoe spells aren't very friendly with.

- Ganni

Arkantos · Aug 25, 2008, 10:43 PM // 22:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by isamu kurosawa

Paras also have access to an alternative other than SY that doesn't take up a pve skill slot. [[stand your ground].

SYG is a pretty shitty skill tbh. It can't be kept up indefinitely, you need to spec a lot into a less than useful line, and it promotes standing still, opposed to kiting.

isamu kurosawa · Aug 25, 2008, 10:50 PM // 22:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arkantos

SYG is a pretty shitty skill tbh. It can't be kept up indefinitely, you need to spec a lot into a less than useful line, and it promotes standing still, opposed to kiting.

I'd still take it over [[Ebon Battle Standard of Courage] (although neither is the better option) because of the limit of 3 pve skills coupled with the fact that other pve skills are just far superior. It may be useful in charr areas in HM but then you may as well use ele wards or just take SY.

[[Ebon Battle Standard of Wisdom] can be a nice skill but honour is the best of the lot IMO.

Racthoh · Aug 26, 2008, 09:11 AM // 09:11

The number of options available to boost damage are slimmer compared to those capable of reducing damage. In addition to +AL you have daze for casters, blind for physicals, weakness for physicals, kiting against physicals, kiting out of caster's AoE, interrupts, KDs, blocking, bodyblocking, and the list goes on.

Raising your damage is much tougher in a sense as it can often come at the cost of attribute points or even entire character slots. Order of Pain for example is a Blood Magic spell. The Blood Magic line is rather terrible outside of a few skills. Ensuring that you're getting the most out of it requires a fair uptime which comes at a cost of 10 energy every 6~ seconds. You also need a way to keep the energy flowing, with or without Soul Reaping available; remember if nothing is dying you're not getting the energy to cast Order of Pain making it more difficult to kill things.

Barbs works fairly well but in situations where you get a lot of mileage out of it (read: physical heavy party) you'll find you're killing stuff as quickly as it can recharge. Thankfully it falls into a strong line of spells: Curses. Your bar won't be too gimped.

Strength of Honor requires a spec into Smiting Prayers, another weak PvE line that like Order of Pain will limit your skill options.

Conjures on your physicals negates skills like Order of Pain, Barbs, Mark of Pain, restricts your secondary, consumes attribute points, restricts your weapon prefix, and for kicks doesn't ignore armor. That's per physical. Someone mashing Order of Pain gives armor ignoring damage to everyone.

+attribute skills like Glyph of Elemental Power tell me that you're trying to make an elementalist do big damage. That's confusing since Great Dwarf Weapon would be a much better choice; armor ignoring damage and KDs for your physicals. Sweet deal.

Ebon Battle Standard of Honor however has one drawback; the ward range. If the user of the ward doesn't know what they're doing this will become an issue. It benefits both caster and physical alike by adding armor ignoring damage to just about anything, for no attribute investment. It's a 10 energy cost every 20 seconds so it won't restrict the other 7 skills on your bar.

Ebon Battle Standard of Courage on the other hand is not very unique as a defensive tool. Enfeebling Blood will reduce physical damage by 66%, an Aegis gives everyone a 50% block rate, Broad Head Arrow negates whatever threat a caster posed. There are numerous ways to create a defensive web throughout every profession. Stacking damage effectively is limiting.

Kale Ironfist · Aug 26, 2008, 02:23 PM // 14:23

Quote:

and for kicks doesn't ignore armor.

I'm pretty sure conjures do ignore armor now since they got merged into the same packet as your weapon damage.