Curse

uby · May 21, 2008, 02:13 AM // 02:13

Please don't respond saying another build does the job better. The point is to try to find new ways of using skills that no one uses anymore (Prot. Bond). Thanks!

[build prof=Mo/D name="Zealous Bond" box wind=10 prot=10+1+2 scythe=9 divine=7+1 desc="Weapon #1: Zealous Scythe{br}Weapon #2: High energy swap set"][Zealous Vow][Protective Bond][Eremite's Attack][Zealous Sweep][Mending Touch][Whirling Charge][Blessed Signet][Optional][/build]

The idea is that you bring two Mo/D heros with the above build. Disable Protective Bond and click-cast on half the party for each hero. Use Blessed Signet to bring their energy back to maximum and then disable it (not sure if leaving it enabled is beneficial)

Monk heros will now have maximum energy and no regen. When attacking, the monks will activate zealous vow, giving them -4 regen overall. (3 energy loss per second while zealous vow is active) This is regained by hitting an average of about 1 target with their scythe each swing. [note, hitting more than 1 target with the scythe generates massive amounts of energy. so much so that this build is trivial to maintain. but, that's not always possible]

To help offset the -3 energy each time protective bond kicks in, increased attack speed is helpful. Unfortunately, the hero doesn't have much available to him (Heart of Fury requires investment in mysticism, and others are PvE only or not Mo/D). Whirling charge lasts 11 seconds and recharges in 20, so it helps about half the time (better than nothing). Zealous sweep also helps tremendously.

Be sure the monk has +energy on all armor and a +5 energy mod on the scythe. The higher the energy, the better the chance to regain it all with zealous vow before hitting zero.

Obviously, this build fails against enchantment removal.

Obviously, there are alternatives available which are more convenient (Imbagon, N/Mo Prot. Spirit spammers) but I'm trying to be creative here...

Any suggestions on tweaking this to make it more reliable? I'd love to find a way to make Prot. Bond useful again!

You just got tomahawked · May 21, 2008, 02:21 AM // 02:21

-4 degen from zealous vow+bond=total -1 degen=no bond

Destromath · May 21, 2008, 02:23 AM // 02:23

Honestly, -4 energy regeneration and losing 3 energy practically every second will overwhelm your monks even with Zealous Vow and Zealous Sweep. The most effective build in my opinion would be dual Signet Smiters to bypass Protective Bond's downside. Something like this maybe:

[Protective Bond][Blessed Signet][Mantra of Inscriptions][Signet of Judgment][Bane Signet][Castigation Signet][Signet of Distraction][Resurrection Signet]

Before the battle, you can auto-cast Blessed Signet on the Monks to make sure that they have enough energy to activate the Mantra before everyone takes damage. It's not the most creative idea, but it looks like it would work decently =D.

EDIT: When you said "Please don't respond saying another build does the job better", did you mean a different build entirely, or a non-scythe build? >_>

tehshadowninjar · May 21, 2008, 02:23 AM // 02:23

This build fails. Kthxbai. Joking

Well, I'm not PvE because PvE fails, but eh, looks okay to me. :/

uby · May 21, 2008, 02:44 AM // 02:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by You just got tomahawked

-4 degen from zealous vow+bond=total -1 degen=no bond

you can bond all day long with negative energy regen. you only lose the bonds when your energy hits zero.

Destromath · May 21, 2008, 02:46 AM // 02:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by tehshadowninjar

Can you not read? He doesn't want OTHER builds.

Yes, I noticed that if you'll see my edit >_<. I misread, thinking that he wanted a build to use Protective Bond as effectively as possible because he said he didn't want a build that did the "job better" (Protective Spirit instead of Bond, for example).

Quote:

Originally Posted by uby

Obviously, there are alternatives available which are more convenient (Imbagon, N/Mo Prot. Spirit spammers) but I'm trying to be creative here...

That also threw me off slightly.

Looking over the build again, I would say that you should ditch Eremite's Attack. It pretty much wastes the energy that the monk would be getting from a normal attack in return for a slight bit of damage. I'm not sure what to put in instead of it, though...

uby · May 21, 2008, 02:46 AM // 02:46

Quote:

Originally Posted by Destromath

Honestly, -4 energy regeneration and losing 3 energy practically every second will overwhelm your monks even with Zealous Vow and Zealous Sweep. The most effective build in my opinion would be dual Signet Smiters to bypass Protective Bond's downside. Something like this maybe:

[Protective Bond][Blessed Signet][Mantra of Inscriptions][Signet of Judgment][Bane Signet][Castigation Signet][Signet of Distraction][Resurrection Signet]

Before the battle, you can auto-cast Blessed Signet on the Monks to make sure that they have enough energy to activate the Mantra before everyone takes damage. It's not the most creative idea, but it looks like it would work decently =D.

EDIT: When you said "Please don't respond saying another build does the job better", did you mean a different build entirely, or a non-scythe build? >_>

thanks for the reply destro. i'm not sure that would do the job any better than with zealous vow. with that build, you only get back max 25 energy per 10 seconds, or 2.5 energy per second. zealous vow and zealous sweep together will net you more than that at a minimum, and up to six times that when hitting multiple foes with the scythe per swing.

Destromath · May 21, 2008, 02:48 AM // 02:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by uby

you can bond all day long with negative energy regen. you only lose the bonds when your energy hits zero.

The problem is that your heroes will hit 0 almost instantly if the party faces any AoE nukes, and due to the -4 energy regeneration from Zealous Vow, all of your bonds will be stripped immediately.

Quote:

Originally Posted by uby

thanks for the reply destro. i'm not sure that would do the job any better than with zealous vow. with that build, you only get back max 25 energy per 10 seconds, or 2.5 energy per second. zealous vow and zealous sweep together will net you more than that at a minimum, and up to six times that when hitting multiple foes with the scythe per swing.

Whoops, I just noticed that Protective Bond ends if you can't lose any more energy. I wasn't paying attention to the description and assumed it was like [Holy Wrath], which doesn't end after hitting 0 energy. Disregard my build >_<.

uby · May 21, 2008, 02:48 AM // 02:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by Destromath

Looking over the build again, I would say that you should ditch Eremite's Attack. It pretty much wastes the energy that the monk would be getting from a normal attack in return for a slight bit of damage. I'm not sure what to put in instead of it, though...

I think the AI has a built-in feature that will only use Eremite's when there is more than one foe to hit with the scythe adjacent to your target. Since that's exactly when you want to attack to get the most out of zealous vow, I figured that it would fit well in the build.

Maybe I'm just seeing things though.

uby · May 21, 2008, 02:54 AM // 02:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Destromath

The problem is that your heroes will hit 0 almost instantly if the party faces any AoE nukes, and due to the -4 energy regeneration from Zealous Vow, all of your bonds will be stripped immediately.

Let's assume a worst case scenario. Going against 4 AoE nukers who, for some reason, hit everyone in the group at the same time. Since each monk splits the group, that's four targets each getting hit four times in one second. That would be 16*3 = 48 energy lost. Indeed, that's quite a lot and unlikely to be maintainable.

So there's definitely an upper limit to how much pressure this can handle. But in a more reasonable scenario, perhaps only half that is lost. 24 energy can be regained under zealous vow with a zealous scythe using zealous sweep hitting three targets in one attack (3*(4+1+3)=+24 energy)! so, a reasonable upper limit for the build would be 8 triggers of prot. bond per second.

Destromath · May 21, 2008, 02:56 AM // 02:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by uby

I think the AI has a built-in feature that will only use Eremite's when there is more than one foe to hit with the scythe adjacent to your target. Since that's exactly when you want to attack to get the most out of zealous vow, I figured that it would fit well in the build.

Maybe I'm just seeing things though.

I'm not sure about it myself XD. Although when I used it on Melonni, she just seemed to spam it on recharge without regard to how many foes she'll hit. It'll probably need some testing.

Destromath · May 21, 2008, 03:06 AM // 03:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by uby

So there's definitely an upper limit to how much pressure this can handle. But in a more reasonable scenario, perhaps only half that is lost. 24 energy can be regained under zealous vow with a zealous scythe using zealous sweep hitting three targets in one attack (3*(4+1+3)=+24 energy)! so, a reasonable upper limit for the build would be 8 triggers of prot. bond per second.

You're also assuming best-case scenario right there XD. If 3 foes were balled up and your party had any form of nuking, they would most likely split apart very soon anyway. Let's assume that your monks are hitting 2 foes on average, which would be 8 energy every 1.5 seconds or so. Combine this with Zealous Sweep, which will net 1 energy every 10 seconds (due to the cost as well), you'll have about 6-7 energy per second. However, Protective Bond will be activating 1-2 times per second even against medium-damaging foes. So yeah, it might work, but energy will be constantly jumping up and down and probably won't stay at max for more than a split second (if it even reaches max in the first place).

Melody Cross · May 22, 2008, 11:10 PM // 23:10

Quote:

Originally Posted by uby

Let's assume a worst case scenario. Going against 4 AoE nukers who, for some reason, hit everyone in the group at the same time. Since each monk splits the group, that's four targets each getting hit four times in one second. That would be 16*3 = 48 energy lost. Indeed, that's quite a lot and unlikely to be maintainable.

So there's definitely an upper limit to how much pressure this can handle. But in a more reasonable scenario, perhaps only half that is lost. 24 energy can be regained under zealous vow with a zealous scythe using zealous sweep hitting three targets in one attack (3*(4+1+3)=+24 energy)! so, a reasonable upper limit for the build would be 8 triggers of prot. bond per second.

Thats not your worst case scenario. Your worst case scenario will be against a pressure group of melleers that pound on the monks with soft sword/axe attacks and crips while soft aoe taps from a backline even further and the group spreads from the scythes. Worse still: snare spells, block and miss skills from the midline keep one or both of your frontline from hitting anything. I can see a LOT of DP coming out of your frontline using this build, tbh. That may make PBond more effective, but it also limits your energy pool even further. heroes with tight energy=A Bad Thing.

Bond would be in considerable trouble then, oft needing reapplication on your squishies.

I can see this working in small areas with few monsters per mob. In 8vPvE, the mobs are just to many, the hits too often.

If you want this to work, swap to DeMons, imo, with some some uped armor. prot bond then becomes a "clash" defense, something you toss on at the start of a fight to blunt the initial surge of damage and get your backlines web firmly in place. With +energy scythe, +energy insigs, and an attune rune or two you'll have a plenty large pool to bounce up and down on...and an inherent 20 extra AL to play with at least.

GGs

zling · May 22, 2008, 11:16 PM // 23:16

why not use this build on a D/Mo instead? seems much better...

Bront · May 26, 2008, 12:25 AM // 00:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by uby

Use Blessed Signet to bring their energy back to maximum and then disable it (not sure if leaving it enabled is beneficial)

Why disable it? Heroes will use it effectively to increase their energy, which will make the build more reliable.

This is dangerous in areas with Energy drain/Enchantment stripping, and you don't have any hex removal.

TheLordOfBlah · May 26, 2008, 05:58 PM // 17:58

This build will not work for a few reasons.

1. anti melee hexes/snares are counters to your energy gain

2. enchantment strips, theres no way you will be able to recast while other party members are being hit and you're sitting w. -4 regen

3. if zealous doesnt end fast enough after your mob is dead, or its casted at an inopportune time, you will degen to 0 energy and all bonds will end.

System_Crush · May 26, 2008, 06:37 PM // 18:37

Maybe this is a bit to much different build, but anyway.

What about using [Ether Renewal]? with an E/Mo with a 33% enchanting mod instead?
It will have [[Protective Bond] and [[Ether Renewal] up on it'self add another 1 or 2 enchantments and something spammable and it should gain enough energy to be able to maintain everything pretty long.
If the fight lasts longer than 27 seconds you might have a problem, then again how much energy could they lose in the 5 seconds it takes to refresh...

Maybe add [[Glyph of Swiftness] to maintain renewal forever, but heroes would never be able to do that correctly.

And as it will have a lot in Energy storage it should be able to take an AoE nuke for 80 energy and perhaps get enough energy back to be ready when the foe's nuke recharges.