Curse

Johnny Madhouse · Oct 20, 2007, 10:48 PM // 22:48

The recent nerf of AR has left many paras feeling sad and bereft of something dear to them. However, this is only because of a severe lack of imagination on the part of these paras, who for whatever reason base the entire viability of a class around one skill. To prove that the skill is now even MORE viable in some ways, I bring to you: The Atom Bomb Paragon. The premise is simple. Using the rapid reapplication of the cracked armor status and the sacrificial skills of a necro, a fun, risky build can be used as an aggro-holding bomb tank, preferably in a party of real people with the reflexes to save your sorry rear.

Attributes:
Leadership – 10+4
Command – 8+1
Death Magic – 12

Skills:
1. Contagion
2. Dark Aura
3. Aggressive Refrain
4. “Help Me!”
5. Various shouts to trigger AR
6. Various shouts to trigger AR
7. Various shouts to trigger AR
8. Various shouts to trigger AR or rez skill

The premise is simple. With Aggressive Refrain, Contagion, and Dark Aura applied, draw aggro firmly onto yourself and begin to spam your shouts. Everytime a shout ends, all nearby enemies will be slapped with cracked armor, and all adjacent enemies will be further slapped with 41 damage. Naturally, this state of affairs is fairly risky (but fun!), which is why “Help Me!” is on the bar. Healers can always use a little extra speed boost when keeping you alive.

Ideally, the Dark Aura could be applied by a hero with more ranks in death magic, to both increase the damage dealt and to spread around the damage felt. This could also lead to interesting areas of development, such as a 55 Paragon due to the saccer not having to suffer 17 damage every time Dark Aura triggers.

However, assuming full health at about 500, it is entirely possible to survive while being the source of both enchantments.

Oblivious Moose · Oct 20, 2007, 11:45 PM // 23:45

you could go motivation shouts, and put less into leadership,, just enough for energy management, the shouts wont last more than 20 seconds, and easily trigger way before then ><

i would also bring mending refrain, the hp regen is nice when taking constant dmg

Omniclasm · Oct 20, 2007, 11:50 PM // 23:50

So....one skill gets nerfed so you turn your Paragon into a really weird gimmick with hardly any use? Confused....

Cherng Butter · Oct 20, 2007, 11:50 PM // 23:50

Not sure how this compares to the N/D Contagion bomber w/ Wearying Strike and Barbed Signet...nice concept though

Darkpower Alchemist · Oct 21, 2007, 12:03 AM // 00:03

[skill=big]Contagion[/skill]

Why in the world would you do this to a paragon? It's doable, but no reason to do it. back to the drawing board is my opinion on it.

Though I feel the constant reapplication of a condition is abit much, it still essentially is as useful as ever. It just pushes the hero/henchie AI to keep cleaning you up, hence messing with energy reserves for team setups without say a battery necro.

Concepts are nice, but this seems a way left thought. Too left for me.

distilledwill · Oct 21, 2007, 12:11 AM // 00:11

Doesn't the fact that Contagion requires you to be suffering from a NEW condition each time throw this out the window?

Although, if you added [card]Purifying Finale[/card], thereby curing you of it before reapplying it as a NEW condition, it might be a nice concept.

Johnny Madhouse · Oct 21, 2007, 01:08 AM // 01:08

In response to Darkpower Alchemist, why the hell WOULDN'T I do this toa paragon? It's fun to mess around with builds, including specialized ones like this.

And distilledwill, you are correct about the use of purifying finale. I tested that on the Isle of the Nameless, and it is indeed necessary for the triggering effect.

Also, I have tested this build in a vanquish setting, and have found that it works best with multiple paragons as source of shouts. It's extremely useful in areas with lots of corners to catch enemies on (dungeons), but much less so when in open areas.

At any rate, it's fun to play with!

Darkpower Alchemist · Oct 21, 2007, 01:46 AM // 01:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Johnny Madhouse

In response to Darkpower Alchemist, why the hell WOULDN'T I do this to a paragon? It's fun to mess around with builds, including specialized ones like this.

I don't honestly see the fun in it. You can't kill anything with this condition alone. Leave the necro condition spreading to the pros. Also, as you are using your elite space for a necro enchantment, you are hampering the overall paragon effectiveness. Yet, if you just want to have fun, by all means do so.

This is what every PvP guy talks about. You can do anything and run anything in PvE. It doesn't have to make sense or be logical. As long as you're enjoying your time ingame, I'm all for it, just don't expect me to always agree. I'll take my Cruel Spear with a ton of heket,tyvm.

Johnny Madhouse · Oct 21, 2007, 02:19 AM // 02:19

Of course you can't kill anything with the condition alone. The condition just expedites the killing process a bit more. The attitude of every class has its place, every class in its place is a stupid one as I see it. Not every elementalist is a nuker, not every monk is a healer, not every para is fully devoted to party support/spear damage.

There is plenty of room for passive defense skills in this build, such as TOF or TNTF. It just provides a new way of doing more dps than you might get with just a spear, and ensures that the other seven party members can do even more damage. I tried out using two SF eles with this build, and SF did even more ridiculous amounts of damage, a plus in EOTN, where most enemies are designed to make spiking difficult.

The keyword here is "synergy". Some builds aren't all that effective on their own, but are extremely effective with teamwork. If you can't recognize that, then okay. Enjoy playing your dull, straightforward nuker.

Darkpower Alchemist · Oct 21, 2007, 02:57 AM // 02:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by Johnny Madhouse

Of course you can't kill anything with the condition alone. The condition just expedites the killing process a bit more. The attitude of every class has its place, every class in its place is a stupid one as I see it. Not every elementalist is a nuker, not every monk is a healer, not every para is fully devoted to party support/spear damage.

There is plenty of room for passive defense skills in this build, such as TOF or TNTF. It just provides a new way of doing more dps than you might get with just a spear, and ensures that the other seven party members can do even more damage. I tried out using two SF eles with this build, and SF did even more ridiculous amounts of damage, a plus in EOTN, where most enemies are designed to make spiking difficult.

The keyword here is "synergy". Some builds aren't all that effective on their own, but are extremely effective with teamwork. If you can't recognize that, then okay. Enjoy playing your dull, straightforward nuker.

Hehe, you seem to fail to realize that you are playing a poor support role. Just because it works doesn't mean it's to the best effect. Your thought of "Synergy" seems convoluted. Just because your 2 SF eles do insane damage, which they can do without your contagion fits, doesn't make it a great build. 2 SF eles have enough synergy on their own to make a train wreck look great. Spiking monsters is relatively easy everywhere except Asuran lands where everything enchants itself to avoid attacks. Then you bring a necro with something to strip them. Pick a skill, any skill.

Either way, contagion on a paragon is a step towards mediocrity,imo. Synergy is your excuse for being mediocre...ok.

Oblivious Moose · Oct 21, 2007, 04:34 AM // 04:34

as said before, PvE is for FUN, w/e floats you boat, if u must have 100% efficency at everything, even in pve, GTFO go talk on a pvp forum, give ur negative input there. here, we welcome creative ideas. effective or not, if it works, and its fun, you have accomplished what most cannot.

as for the contagion working well with sf plain sf nukers, yes it synergizes with it very well, lowering your enemies armor, through aggressive refrain giving you the condition cracked armor, and contagion spreading this condition to NEARBY enemies, usually warriors, which have high armor.thus making SF do MORE dmg, and improving your lame hero sf MORE useful.

why complain about making your party do more dmg, when the basic pvp/pve para isnt capable of increasing the overall party dmg output to this degree.

sure GftE! , AoE, and other party wide dmg shouts/chants help, but they are not by any means spammable.

with multiple shouts/chants ending soon, it triggers your AR to refresh, which(if clensed of cracked armor)will cause the spread of cracked armor, and more dmg from DA, at a constant pace, to all adjacent(DA)/Nearby(contagion)

next time u guys wanna bash a good idea, make sure its in a pvp forum, where bashing builds is thje only way to create an effective one.

Darkpower Alchemist · Oct 21, 2007, 05:10 AM // 05:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oblivious Moose

as said before, PvE is for FUN, w/e floats you boat, if u must have 100% efficency at everything, even in pve, GTFO go talk on a pvp forum, give ur negative input there. here, we welcome creative ideas. effective or not, if it works, and its fun, you have accomplished what most cannot.

as for the contagion working well with sf plain sf nukers, yes it synergizes with it very well, lowering your enemies armor, through aggressive refrain giving you the condition cracked armor, and contagion spreading this condition to NEARBY enemies, usually warriors, which have high armor.thus making SF do MORE dmg, and improving your lame hero sf MORE useful.

why complain about making your party do more dmg, when the basic pvp/pve para isnt capable of increasing the overall party dmg output to this degree.

sure GftE! , AoE, and other party wide dmg shouts/chants help, but they are not by any means spammable.

with multiple shouts/chants ending soon, it triggers your AR to refresh, which(if clensed of cracked armor)will cause the spread of cracked armor, and more dmg from DA, at a constant pace, to all adjacent(DA)/Nearby(contagion)

next time u guys wanna bash a good idea, make sure its in a pvp forum, where bashing builds is thje only way to create an effective one.

So, you think the paragon doesn't do well at damage buffing within his own profession enough so that he needs to use a spec of 12 in Death to do something he shouldn't be close enough to do in the first place if not using a melee weapon? Ok,you can stir the mediocre pot,too. I never said it doesn't work, I just said he isn't being efficeint. Yet, of course, if it's "fun" do as you please. I just prefer being overall more effective. Knock yourselves out. Put daze on yourselves and contagion that to casters. Cause yourselves to bleed and contagion that,too...oh, wait a minute, the NECROMANCER does it better than you do...oh,my bad!

distilledwill · Oct 21, 2007, 11:57 AM // 11:57

just incase you havent noticed, the use of this build is not REALLY the spreading of cracked armour. (although that will be useful), it is the damage done by [card]Dark Aura[/card]. It essentially means that everytime a shout or chant ends on you, all enemies around you take 41 damage, add in [card]Mending Refrain[/card], [card]Blazing Finale[/card] and a couple of damage reducing shouts, such as [card]"They're On Fire!"[/card] and TNTF! and youd have quite a nice frontline DPS with a fair amount of defense.

Im not sure how you would cope with the life sacrifice, so youd need a good healer in there.

Maybe a bar like this:

[card]Contagion[/card][card]Dark Aura[/card][card]Aggressive Refrain[/card][card]"Help Me!"[/card][card]Mending Refrain[/card][card]Blazing Finale[/card][card]"They're On Fire!"[/card]"There's Nothing To Fear!"

It would work best with a couple more shouters in the party, but its a nice idea.

EDIT: Just saw your above post where you recognise the Dark Aura effect, my bad. Ill leave this up anyway.

Trx · Oct 21, 2007, 02:19 PM // 14:19

Creative build, I like it. Good to see people thinking outside the box when it comes to paragon pve builds.

Not sure I would put in "Help Me" though, [skill]Finale of Restoration[/skill] on a hero para might work better.

And to the people who like to stick to their current build that is 235% more effective, we get it, this is not the most effective build out there. Just let the good people here have fun with experimental builds, nobody cares about how the cookie cutter ones are more effective.

Darkpower Alchemist · Oct 21, 2007, 03:19 PM // 15:19

Cookie cutter? That phrase is so overused it's accepted as the response to every disagreement now. I'm well aware of Dark Aura being his damage skill, yet effectiveness was my problem with the build from the beginning. Creativity is not the issue, but shouldn't maximum effectiveness be considered as well? I've created many builds that 'work', but even I sometimes question overall effectiveness.

Johnny Madhouse · Oct 21, 2007, 04:53 PM // 16:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by Trx

Not sure I would put in "Help Me" though, [skill]Finale of Restoration[/skill] on a hero para might work better.

You're definitely right on that one. I tried using that myself witha motivation hero, and the sacrifice is more than offset by the Finale. Using a motivation hero is the way to go on this build, the extra shouts and bonus finale skills make running the build a lot easier and a lot more effective. Thanks!

CHunterX · Oct 21, 2007, 05:03 PM // 17:03

Heroes will still spam condition removal on the Paragon, causing them to waste their energy.

iridescentfyre · Oct 21, 2007, 06:50 PM // 18:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Darkpower Alchemist

Cookie cutter? That phrase is so overused it's accepted as the response to every disagreement now. I'm well aware of Dark Aura being his damage skill, yet effectiveness was my problem with the build from the beginning. Creativity is not the issue, but shouldn't maximum effectiveness be considered as well? I've created many builds that 'work', but even I sometimes question overall effectiveness.

I don't know why you'd single out this build on these grounds.. you could say these things about any build, aside from the 2 or 3 builds for each profession that are considered "truly effective." His may not seem to be particularly effective or practical by comparison, but at least its a creative way to look at the new mechanics of Aggressive Refrain.

Oblivious Moose · Oct 22, 2007, 04:58 AM // 04:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Darkpower Alchemist

So, you think the paragon doesn't do well at damage buffing within his own profession enough so that he needs to use a spec of 12 in Death to do something he shouldn't be close enough to do in the first place if not using a melee weapon? Ok,you can stir the mediocre pot,too. I never said it doesn't work, I just said he isn't being efficeint. Yet, of course, if it's "fun" do as you please. I just prefer being overall more effective. Knock yourselves out. Put daze on yourselves and contagion that to casters. Cause yourselves to bleed and contagion that,too...oh, wait a minute, the NECROMANCER does it better than you do...oh,my bad!

read my above post, i never said, nor think the paragon doesn't have great buffing capabilities. i said it is by no means spammable, go to wiki or GtoB and read the dmg buffing chants/shouts, its their long recharge that makes them NOT spammable, not ineffective.

sure ide rather use those chants/shouts if i was in a team full of physical dmg dealers. like minion masters, barrage rangers, ect... in this case we are thinking about you run of the mill pve hh team. this is just a different build overall. just because it uses death magic, doesnt mean i should go play a necro. same as if i was using fire magic on my mesmer, why would i go ele? to improve dmg, but to stay as mesmer, using fast casting, improves the ability to spam fire spells with long recharge. so, its a compromise of wtf you want to do. as a paragon, using death magic, and the ar "nerf" to an advantage as a better skill, is to spread cracked armor, and cause dmg in the front line.

ok so ill just say i went necro for the same build, oops! my aggressive refrain only lasts only 5 seconds and costs 25 energy! now i choose not to use such a wase on my skillbar, and put other things that cause conditions, now im turning my build into nothing but a condition spammer with dmg on the side to all melee enemies, oh wait, i forgot to mention that the necro has only 60 armor, thus taking more dmg from monsters and having your life threatened every time u cast another spell that gives you a condition.

so now ive decided to say paragon, good enough leadership to k\eep aggressive refrain up, without having to recast. and with these 2 NECRO skills. the point of the build is tocause dmg, and not less dmg than lets say a necro using the same skills. cracked armor, lets see what this condition does.. it reduced armor by 20, not below 60. so, if thats on all of the melee attacking me, when i have 90+ armor, mine and the monsters armor ets lowered, im still well above 60, and they are at 60, so now the warriors will take the full 40 sumthin dmg from DA, instead of less.

sure your monks might waste energy getting rid of cracked armor, but all it does is improve your effectiveness, once they remove the condition, when it applies itself agian, it will trigger DA, causing more dmg. now when ur a tank, ide much rather have that 70+ armor than a measly 60.

throw in some other healing/condition removal skills on your hh group, and you have less to worry about, since the monks will have alot of the healing load taken off. so, add in more skilsl to reduce dmg, such as TntF! ToF, and blazing finale, now your talking like a tank. not a caster that wants to kill stuff with conditions.

also, the point of being a hiigh armored tank, its to prevent the group from being overrun easily, and die. taking the fronal load of the dmg and surviving is a great tool in all of pve, being used in dongeons, DoA, Urgoz, Deep. ect...

i believe this AR "nerf" to be nothing but an improvement on the skill, giving the advantage of easily spreading cracked armor, making some of the other paragon skills that involve the condition to be more useful.

so by all means lets trash creative builds on the basis that they arent 200% more effective than your over used cookie-cutter builds. if you want it to be more effective, help shed some more creative light on the matter, give us more things to think and ponder to increase the overall effectiveness. everyone likes to be effective, but naturally in pve, its not the top priority.

anyway, i dont want to make u feel unwanted in this thread, just don't stop the creative process here, by stomping the idea for various reasons.

i agree with putting in [card]Finale of Restoration[/card] instead of [card]"Help me!"[/card]

another suggestion would to have u, or a party member bring [card]Chorus of Restoration[/card] it would help with the workload of healing, on you and the other party members bringing shouts/chants along. too bad they had to pout a recharge time on all the adrenaline based chants/shouts

Trx · Oct 22, 2007, 07:51 AM // 07:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Oblivious Moose

cracked armor, lets see what this condition does.. it reduced armor by 20, not below 60. so, if thats on all of the melee attacking me, when i have 90+ armor, mine and the monsters armor ets lowered, im still well above 60, and they are at 60, so now the warriors will take the full 40 sumthin dmg from DA, instead of less.

I think alot of pve monsters, especially tanks and mobs in HM have more then 80 AL so they might still be above 60AL. DA does shadow damage though so it should be armor ignoring (havent tested but all shadow damge is armor ignoring afaik). The cracked armor would ofcourse still increase other AL dependant dmg from your team.