Curse

Daesu · Mar 16, 2012, 03:37 PM // 15:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gabs88

THIS! Fck yeah I've noticed this. And this is perhaps the biggest downside to bringing UA there is! I've often been completely shocked by how often my UA is targetted over other characters when I choose to bring it.

I think the HM monster AI gives a priority to killing monks and healers but that point has been argued over many times. Even if you change the elite to WoH I am sure your monk would be targeted.

Anyway if you do bring a res, you are not going to bring it on just one character.

Wenspire · Mar 16, 2012, 04:15 PM // 16:15

On my old group build, my monk and my oov necro had rez. They were always made into priority targets. On my new setup, my sos and same necro have rez and the enemies seem to ignore my monk and focus on the sos more than before.

Daesu · Mar 16, 2012, 04:23 PM // 16:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wenspire

On my old group build, my monk and my oov necro had rez. They were always made into priority targets. On my new setup, my sos and same necro have rez and the enemies seem to ignore my monk and focus on the sos more than before.

Check their armor and health relative to your other party members, especially those with sac skills. Monsters also prioritize targets based on those factors.

Wenspire · Mar 16, 2012, 06:44 PM // 18:44

All of my casters have the same ar rating with necro possibly having a bit more. Life, I know my monk has more life than my other casters as he only has a major rune vs superiors on the others.

Daesu · Mar 17, 2012, 02:07 AM // 02:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wenspire

All of my casters have the same ar rating with necro possibly having a bit more. Life, I know my monk has more life than my other casters as he only has a major rune vs superiors on the others.

They don't seem to be interested in my warrior even when he carries a res.

agrios · Mar 19, 2012, 12:23 PM // 12:23

This my current setup (my main is a warrior).

With this I clearead Gloom, Foundry and Veil [NM] this weekend. It was very effective and safe. My only problem was the tendrils of the dreadspawn mawn. The beast of AAAAaaaarrrgh fell before I could notice.

on the AI priority..

When I had Talkora setup as UA/Prot she was always the first to drop, despite having higher HP than other casters.

On the other hand, when I had Pyre in my group, set as Splinter Barrage, he was always the last to fall.

So, by my experience, the AI priority is something like that:

Healers > Mesmers > Other casters > Melee > Rangers.

Or maybe, AI is afraid of charr (j/k)

Krill · Mar 20, 2012, 09:05 PM // 21:05

This would be my favorite build for 98% of the game if there were not so many scenarios where three physical players and three melee in particular was a major disadvantage. You got barbs, SoH, and OoV. In theory +49 per hit. Also pretty simple to change the OoV necro to OoP + UA for better rezing.

As such I just play with this most of the time on war, knowing it's sub-optimal. Only thing I don't like is the spirits...kinda hard to cram something in there to heal off without SoS.

Gabs88 · Mar 21, 2012, 03:11 AM // 03:11

Lol, the first build is somewhat interesting. Actually liked it to some degree since I recently tested some JDF spammers vs master of damage and found them to deal about 80% of the damage a human player would, though they had this weird habit of dealing way less then a human the first seconds then stabilizing.

Buut, then comes the second. And I have to say straight out, I think it's craptastic. There isn't a single one of those bars I like for a physical player. In fact I think every single bar there is crap.

So IMO you should think about adding some proper hex removal on the first build (1 skill for 3 players is not near enough) and a soul twister and maybe you'll get some decent results.

Or just scrap it and play something with way less necros.

Krill · Mar 21, 2012, 04:47 AM // 04:47

Well I'm not the biggest fan of generic discord builds or SF, but there are a couple issues I see filling out any general build that focuses on offense. One, invoke heroes no longer work, two the problems with reliance on physical damage. If you want to load up on buffs it only makes sense to have multiple physicals. However, ranged physical heroes suck (let's be honest melee heroes are not the best either), and since melee heroes are usually adjacent, water, illusion, and other AoE effect anti-physical rapes your damage output. Nobody wants to micro hex removal for every single mob in areas with lots of water in particular.

The only goal for any general build should be to kill everything on the screen as quickly as possible and be ready to fb! to the next mob.

aspi · Mar 21, 2012, 11:37 AM // 11:37

The first build looks like lol, i'd change the (vampire)necro to an Orders necro though. And some more protting might be a good thing unless you think it is enough for 3 melees?
And I would also get rid of weapon of warding it "overwrites" splinter weapon.

I havent thought about getting some more melee in my war team so I'll go and try it out

Morte66 · Mar 21, 2012, 02:31 PM // 14:31

If you're going to use physicals with MoP, I've found AP/MoP quite usable on a hero since the AI update.

Pew · Mar 21, 2012, 05:21 PM // 17:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Krill

This would be my favorite build for 98% of the game if there were not so many scenarios where three physical players and three melee in particular was a major disadvantage. You got barbs, SoH, and OoV. In theory +49 per hit.

A man after my own heart!

I've started running this on my assassin personally, and it's very similar to your first build posted!

Slight differences are I've forgone the curses necro for a mesmer and the ST rit instead of a MM as I'm running squishier Assassins over the Warrior heros.

I ran Assassins purely because they could take extra copies of "FB!" to zoom around the map, and because I had already decided I'd use a ST rit, their lower AR didn't really matter.

A dedicated Curses hero didn't appeal to me, partly as you can easily fit the important skills (MoP, Enfeebling Blood, Weaken Armour) on the Resto Necro, albeit with a lower spec (12 compared to 16), and partly because their Elites are useless.
I found Barbs was too slow to take advantage of, as with the 2s cast, by the time it's on a target, it's already dead.

I don't have nearly as many problems with all of the anti-melee around thanks to the mesmer (who could also take Panic instead of PI) interrupting everything and taking another hex removal in Shatter Hex.
And on top of that, taking Ascan makes all (non-damaging) anti-melee purely fuel for Shatter Hex damage!

If there's no hexes in a particular area, a second copy of Ancestors' Rage can replace Shatter Hex on the Mesmer and Smite Hex is easily replaced on the OotV Necro.

I don't have MoP in my build as I wanted to keep a high spec in Soul Reaping for Icy Veins, and 10+1+2 Curses with an 8+1 SR would mean using PoD, which I think is awful, although I'm considering running it anyway.
I have stuck a second copy of Splinter Weapon in there though, which is definitely noticeable at the speed that Dagger Spam gets through them.

I've not had many problems with this build, and it's pretty much as general use as it gets. Been helping allies with random missions with it, VQing, so it's pretty reliable.

Krill · Mar 21, 2012, 09:56 PM // 21:56

^ That's a pretty solid improvement. I guess at some point with my PvE adventures, I'll have to accept that ST > minions. If I were more serious maybe something like this...