Curse

Sausaletus Rex · Feb 15, 2005, 07:02 AM // 07:02

GWGurus is proud to unveil the latest in our ongoing series of articles, essays, and sundry game knowledge : Build Reviews. Proudly because it's by yours truly. It's the first in my ongoing series of looks at people's builds and just what they do right and just what they do wrong as well as the dillemas and choices made in the simple act of making a build. If you'd like to have your own build featured in a future article, please contact me or leave your build in this thread. Otherwise, enjoy my examination of Scaphism's Necromancer/Warrior in my first outing right here.

Scaphism · Feb 15, 2005, 09:54 AM // 09:54

First I'd like to say thanks to Rex for giving my build such a thorough look and critique. It's easily the most knowledgable review of a support character and the function of that role in Guild Wars that I've seen to date.

On to the build. I think it's crucial to point out how heavy the cost is from using Order of the Vampire. When I first came up with the idea it was 5 energy and 16-67 health. The latest available info puts the energy cost at 10 and the health sacrifice remains the same.

You have to consider those costs over the duration of a fight. OoV only lasts 5 seconds, and you'll want to recast as often as possible, but you simply cannot. You can theoretically cast OoV 4 times every 30 seconds, but that would give you no energy to do anything else (assuming you're just living off of energy regen.) I'd anticipate casting it 2-3 times every 30 seconds, costing you 20/30 energy and 126/189 health. Healing Signet is better than just about any other heal because it costs 0 energy. The only other 0 energy heal is Signet of Devotion, and you need to be a Monk Primary to use it. I prefer a necro/warrior because it gives you the added defense of a shield and a few good skills to use it with. Outside of signet of devotion, Divine Favor is pretty much trash, and on top of that, being a monk you pretty much walk around with a big target on your chest. Sacrificing health + looking like a monk = fast way to die. Healing Signet is bad when you're the one getting focused on, but then, that's what your stances are for.

Stances: There are only 3 stances I'd consider using- Deflect Arrows, Shield Stance, and Disciplined Stance. Disciplined Stance is probably the worst of the 3, with the shortest duration and highest energy cost, but it does give + armor.

There is room for something like Enfeeble in the build in case you need to buy time against their melee units. I'd hesitate to bring enfeebling blood, since you really need it to hit 3 attackers to pay off on the extra energy and life, as well as being a 2 second cast instead of 1 second. Enfeeble is quicker, cheaper, and lets you be specific about your target, in addition to not costing extra life. Essentially I don't want to sacrifice any more life than I need to on this build.

I completely passed over Malaise when coming up with the idea for that very reason- I don't want to lose any more health than I'm already giving up. But Malaise could be really useful if they are casting too many hexes or blinds on your warriors and rangers or if their monk is throwing out too many guardians/shield of deflections. So while I'd say my general policy would be to stay away from giving away your own life, if you're facing a heavy defensive team where you aren't at risk for taking a lot of damage yourself, you can throw out one or even two Malaises and more than make up the damage with Healing Signet. Even better would be standing in a well of blood.

Also, at 11 blood you can forget life siphon, as it only gives +2/-2. If you pump blood to 12, then consider bringing it for +3/-3, otherwise, it's left at home.

I'd also add that Frenzy+Wand is a decent way to contribute to the damage on any target that has weaken armor/barbs/mark of pain on it. Order of the Vampire should work with any weapon attack, so Warriors and Rangers, as well as casters using wands benefit.

Regarding energy costs:
Oov: 10 energy, 5 second recharge.
Enfeeble: 5 energy, 5 second recharge.
Malaise: 5 energy, 2 second recharge.
Barbs/Mark of Pain/Weaken Armor: 10 energy, 30 second recharge.
Rend Enchantments: 10 energy, 30 second recharge.

In a 30 second timeframe you have 40 energy (4 pips) to work with. That's something like 2 OoV, 1 Barbs/etc..., and 2 Enfeeble/Malaise. That doesn't include your starting energy pool, which you will probably use punching through enchantments or using to activate a stance if you get targeted early. Any corpses dropping will give you a spike of energy, enough to get off another of your quick recharging spells- OoV, Enfeeble, or Malaise, whatever the situation calls for.

Greentongue · Feb 15, 2005, 01:34 PM // 13:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scaphism

Also, at 11 blood you can forget life siphon, as it only gives +2/-2. If you pump blood to 12, then consider bringing it for +3/-3, otherwise, it's left at home.

I wouldn't discount Life Siphon quite so quickly. With a 2 second cooldown and up to 22 second duration. There is no reason this can't be cast on multiple targets. It may not threaten each target but, it adds up to a nice regen rate.
If you dump OoV for OoP you might consider the Elite Offering of Blood as an energy source.

( Personally I would go Mesmer secondary and use Ether Feast with Offering of Blood to power up. But that's just me. )

Sausaletus Rex · Feb 15, 2005, 04:01 PM // 16:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scaphism

First I'd like to say thanks to Rex for giving my build such a thorough look and critique.

Happy to do it, Scaphism.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scaphism

On to the build. I think it's crucial to point out how heavy the cost is from using Order of the Vampire. When I first came up with the idea it was 5 energy and 16-67 health. The latest available info puts the energy cost at 10 and the health sacrifice remains the same.

Right. I's a very costly skill especially given its recycle period. You are capable of casting it that 4 times in 30 seconds but as Chuckles would say that's a pretty hefty energy duty to incur as well as the additon of what I'll call the sacrificial skill's health duty as well. 250 odd health is nothing to scoff at, certainly. And 40 energy is all the energy a 4 pip Necro will regenerate during that time.

However, I don't think it's as bad as you make it out to be or at least consider it. Firstly, your energy outflow would be matching up with your regeneration, you'd be breaking even just recasting OoV. It's only when you try and do more that you actually lose energy but considering you have at least 30 energy and a focus and all the rest to start with you don't have to worry about it that much to preclude you from casting that Barbs or Rend or whatever else your team needs to win *better* and still chain cast OoV. You can keep up OoV with the occasional other spell (barring getting sapped by something like Energy Drain or Power Leak) for several minutes. Put it this way, you start off with 40 odd energy, you regenerate 40 energy every 30 seconds, it's going to take 2 minutes to run dry if you spend 50 energy in those 30 seconds. How long do you expect a battle to last? A match is decided not over the span of 2 or 3 minutes but in the space of a 30, 20, 15 seconds. What you want to be doing is controlling those few second by packing as much action into them as possible (well, first you need to recognize that a window of opportunity exists) you need to cast your spells and run at an energy deficit during that time in order to give yourself the best chance of winning. You're planning for a monkless team, what's likely oging to decide the battle is whether or not your team can win the damage race before the other side can. If one of you drops first then you've probably lost because you're that much weaker and the same goes for the other team. You need to make sure that first punch is as strong as possible in order to knock the other side out. The point being, it's not managing your energy poorly to spend it all when it actually matters, not spending it when there's a need is akin to finishing a StarCraft match when you've piled up 10000 crystals - that's nice, good resource gathering, but you've just lost because your opponent was actually *spending* his money and you were hoarding it - the key is to pick your moments. If your team can't finish off a few targets in 30 seconds then you're in trouble in the first place, pack as many spells in there as possible and then rest and regenerate to do it all over again the next time an opportunity arises. Don't forget that you also have Soul Reaping which, while not a sure thing, will occasionally be dropping 8 energy in your lap, too. You're an energy hog but you're a hog that's a lot better than someone who's decided to spend 30 seconds blasting away with Flare.

As for health, remember, it's the last health point that matters. Everything else is just padding. Yes, you're going to chop away your health at a furious rate. But that's why you have your healsig and your well of blood and the stances to make you less vulnerable. Just as with energy you're trading a resource - your life's blood, in this case - to actually *do* something. As long as you're not actually killing yourself or tryiing to spam OoP, Rend, Malaise, Demonic Flesh, BiP and whatever else costs you health when you're taking a pounding it's managable. As long as you still have 1 health, you can still act and make a difference. You shouldn't be in the middle of the fray, anyway, so your health duty isn't that much of a burden. And, as you say, when you start to dip too low, you stand in a well or you healsig up.

So, you can tolerate casting OoV as many times as you can, at least for a short burst, and short bursts are really what battles hinge on, therefore, don't do it all the time but don't be afraid of it, either. You might think about adding Well of Power or replacing Well of Blood with it if you're really worried about energy. It's a longer casting time and longer recharge but it's not that much worse of a heal that both lasts longer and adds 2 pips of energy regeneration. Also consider Demonic Flesh if you're really worried about losing too much health. It'll last a long time and it'll make your sacrificial spells work as far less of a percent of your overall health.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scaphism

Healing Signet is bad when you're the one getting focused on, but then, that's what your stances are for.

Stances: There are only 3 stances I'd consider using- Deflect Arrows, Shield Stance, and Disciplined Stance. Disciplined Stance is probably the worst of the 3, with the shortest duration and highest energy cost, but it does give + armor.

I'd go with Shield or Disciplined unless you really expect to face a lot of Rangers. None of the stances really thrill me, though, because of their short durations and long recharge times. You'll only be protected about 1/6th the time (although it's devilishly hard to remove a stance one it's up) and that's not something I like but it's what you've got to work with so try and find the best of a bad lot. I like the idea of a defensive stance, don't get me wrong, it's just looking over them I can't find a single one thats I'd really want to use except in spot duty. Personally, I'm not planning on getting focused except when most of the rest of my party is dead, and that's really the only time when getting 50~75% protection really makes sense to me...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scaphism

So while I'd say my general policy would be to stay away from giving away your own life, if you're facing a heavy defensive team where you aren't at risk for taking a lot of damage yourself, you can throw out one or even two Malaises and more than make up the damage with Healing Signet. Even better would be standing in a well of blood.

Right, you don't need to have a skill you'll be casting all the time like OoV. What you need is a skill or two that's going to be useful when you need it to be and you can just ignore the rest of the time. And what you really want is for that skill to aid you when everything else is going wrong. Malaise fits well I think. I'd take it if you were planning a Tombs run or something because odds are you'll run into a defensive or caster-heavy team eventually and when you dn't you can just not cast it. Whatever you find, you just need to find some skill along the lines of Mailaise. You've got your main role covered, you've got the skills to keep you busy most of the time, and you still have room on your bar. Time to stick in some more situational or conditional stuff that you might not need every match but can tip things your way in the right match.

Narcism · Feb 15, 2005, 06:47 PM // 18:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Greentongue

I wouldn't discount Life Siphon quite so quickly. With a 2 second cooldown and up to 22 second duration. There is no reason this can't be cast on multiple targets. It may not threaten each target but, it adds up to a nice regen rate.
If you dump OoV for OoP you might consider the Elite Offering of Blood as an energy source.

( Personally I would go Mesmer secondary and use Ether Feast with Offering of Blood to power up. But that's just me. )

As well, a Mesmer secondary also comes to mind and can be used to alleviate your Energy Problems. Mantra of Recall would also do nicely if you dumped OoV for OoP, as well, Power Drain is still a beast of an Energy gaining skill.

Not to forget, all those points in Inspiration will give you a nice self-heal (Ether Feast, Greentongue mentionned it).

Weezer_Blue · Feb 15, 2005, 09:07 PM // 21:07

I'd love it if you reviewed mine. Having pages of insite is great...

"Warrior's Bane" R/E

Marksmaship 13 (11 +1 rune +1 mask)
Expertise 12 (10 +2 rune)
Air Magic 11 (11 +1rune)

Hunter's Shot
Barrage[E]
Power Shot
Favourable Winds
Pin Down
Distracting Shot
Enervating Charge
Conjure Lightning

Thanks for considering my build

Lamaros · Feb 16, 2005, 03:23 AM // 03:23

It strikes me that a support player would want to have the most flexible build of all. A healer/protector can do their stuff regardless, and a damage dealer wants to maximise their output too; the support players role is to make sure those members of the party get to do what they're built to do.

In that sense I would think that a support player would probably be only using 5 skills in a match, depending what they come up against, while the more focused ones would be hoping to make use of their whole bar.

I'd break it down to 2 universal skills which you will probably get going every round, and then two clumps of 3 or three clumps of 2 that get a workout when the need arises. As Rex said in his article, if you focus too much on the one path you leave yourself open to getting countered to the point of uselessness... but if you stretch yourself too far then you wont be able to do anything significant either way.

The problem I think you get with OoV as a _build_ is that it doesn't allow this flexibility, it basicly makes you an extension of the damage dealers in your party. Working the rest of the build around OoV, how to make it work better, how to keep it useful when you get countered, is the one mentioned several times already; you stretch yourself too thin. OoV and a few healing skills will make your melee damage work wonders, but when you run up against a group running anti-melee you have to stop thinking about how to make OoV work and concentrate instead on makeing melee damage work; you don't have enough time/energy/health to try and counter their counter and still pull out OoV. It wont really matter either, the battle will be determined by whether the melee hits or misses.

So instead of trying to make the other half of the build skills that will let you work with OoV when it gets countered I'd say this: OoV is your strategy, it'll work well unless you get countered, put a couple of skills in there that work around it, something to keep you healed, something to whip out in the downtime which doesn't cut further into your energy reserves. Then work out what would counter your plan and spend the rest of your skills on counters for that. Then if they run anti-melee then you'll have the skills to hit them back, and if they dont you'll have the power to rip through them as per the original plan.

There's always a lot of focus on what your team is going to do, how it's going to do it, and how the other teams could stop you. There's a tendancy to look at counters and think "how can we still excute out plan if they do that?", I think it's just as important to ask yourself "If they can counter us painfuly, what kind of builds will they be running, and what's the best way to counter those kinds of builds?". Stop looking at the individal skills you're using, and focus on the team philosophy that guides their selection/counters.

Then again, having said all this rubbish, I havn't played in a while so I'm prepared to be wrong.

Scaphism · Feb 16, 2005, 03:59 AM // 03:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by Greentongue

I wouldn't discount Life Siphon quite so quickly. With a 2 second cooldown and up to 22 second duration.

I would, and I'll explain why:

With 12 in Blood, it gives +3/-3, and at 11 Blood it's +2/-2.
Both spells cost 10 energy.

The attribute level directly affects the skill's performance. A level 12 Life Siphon lasts 22 seconds, whereas a level 11 Life Siphon last 21 seconds. That's a somewhat trivial difference compared to the pip effectiveness.

Comparing 1 life siphon:
12: +6 health per second/-6 health per second. Over 22 seconds that nets you 132 health and costs your target 132 health for 10 energy. That's 13.2 health per point of energy spent.
11: +4 health per second/-4 health per second. Over 21 seconds that nets you 84 health and costs your target 84 health. That's 8.4 health per point of energy spent.

That's a difference of +48/-48 health for the same energy.

The problem becomes even more clear when you start casting multiple life siphons, as you advise doing.
Your positive health regen is capped at +10. You can achieve +9 regen with 3 life siphons spread over 3 targets at a cost of 30 energy. To get a similar net effect you have to cast 4 or 5 life siphons, all on different targets, to almost match a level 12 life siphon. You're spending 33% or 66% more energy, and you have to spend extra time switching targets.

As it stands, life siphon, even at level 12, is one of the most marginal skills on the list (for this build). You simply don't have the energy to throw around 3 life siphons in a 30 second period, let alone 4 or 5.

Personally, I would never bring a 2 pip life siphon along. Especially when you can switch your helm to give an extra +1 to blood at the cost of 1 curses. (12 blood, 10 curses instead of 11 blood 11 curses), especially when the only thing that really gets effected in your curses is the duration. I don't really care if enfeeble or malaise lasts 15 or 17 seconds, the first 10 seconds it's up an running are a lot more valuable to me than the last 2 or 3.

So if I did bring life siphon, it would only be when I shifted my attributes around to have 12 in blood.

As for Offering of Blood:
It's a bad elite. The energy gain isn't bad, it's the secondary costs that kill it. A 3 second cast time is brutal, and on top of that I have to sacrifice 43 health just to use it.

Mesmer as a second profession:
If energy management becomes a big problem for this character, I probably would look at the mesmer. But as it stands, I can cast my hexes and buffs without too much of a strain on my energy, and Soul Reaping kicks in without any attention put into using it. (Don't have to time an interrupt or spend time casting Energy Tap, etc...). Tactics addresses a lot of the secondary needs of this character: Extra defense (a good tactics shield), a free heal, and a "Panic button" option if I become a target for the other team.
Mesmer doesn't address my defense enough, and since my primary skill requires me to give up my own health, that remains a bigger concern than energy, which I currently have enough of to operate.

Also, I should reiterate that I have every intention of using Order of the Vampire, not Order of Pain, unless a really spectacular elite is found. OoV is a supplemental source of healing that is difficult to counter with traditional healing disruption. Normally you'd remove an enchantment that is healing the target, but in this case everyone on my team gets an enchantment on them- there is simply no way to remove them all. The proper way to deal with it, as Rex pointed out, is to make the attackers from my team miss. A spell like Guardian or Shield of Deflection is anathema to my strategy- I probably want a mesmer on my team with Diversion and Signet of Humility specifically to counter those two skills.

*Edited to address Lamaros' post*
I'd agree that the focus of this character is narrow, but I'd argue that it's effective at what it does. It adds damage and healing to your entire team, without them having to devote their resources. I think the question is really whether this build or not does a good job doing what it's designed to do- stack the tables further in favor of a team loaded with phyiscal attackers. And it does that. If your TEAM is not prepared to address another team built to counter them, then this character is screwed just like everyone else on your team. I wouldn't put the burden of having all the anti-counter skills on this character. My rangers need concussion shot and choking gas and my sword warriors need to bring savage slash. That's part of doing their job efficiently.

Don't get me wrong, I think your points have a lot of merit. I think that you're looking at this from a different build philosophy however.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lamaros

Stop looking at the individal skills you're using, and focus on the team philosophy that guides their selection/counters.

You want me to plan a counter punch to their counter punch. This necromancer just isn't equipped to do that, and in the end it may be a big shortcoming for any melee-heavy build if anti-melee is too powerful. Enchantment removal is included in the build for a reason- if they throw a big buff like Shield of Deflection, Healing Hands, Shielding Hands, etc... on my team's called target, that's there to punch through it. Shield of Deflection earned it's nickname as "Shield of Abuse" because it can be recast every four seconds. If it's so powerful that it renders every melee heavy team obsolete, then it's overpowered. Whether or not I bring Order of the Vampire is irrelevant at that point. My team needs to either quickly switch targets or stop them from casting in the first place. I've added Malaise to the list of skills I'd probably bring to help counter casters. Beyond that, the good necromancer skills are built mainly to deal with threats from opposing warriors. The Blood/Curses/Tactics list doesn't have much beyond that for caster shutdown- I need to rely on other team members for that.
But that's getting into team design, which as I said is a valid point, but isn't the essense of this individual build.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lamaros

The problem I think you get with OoV as a _build_ is that...it basicly makes you an extension of the damage dealers in your party.

You say that as if it's a bad thing. The point is that this character an extension of everyone swinging a weapon on the team. If a character using OoV contributes less than another person swinging a weapon would (and note that he can use a wand from a safe distance), then I would scrap the build and simply make another warrior or ranger. But as long as there are 3 people on my team already attacking, OoV is like adding an extra attacker onto that, since it's adding 12 or 13 damage per hit, AND giving health to the attacker passively. And if my team has, say 5 attackers, that's adding 60 or more damage when they attack.

Lamaros · Feb 16, 2005, 05:50 AM // 05:50

I have to agree with basicly everything you say, I guess I was responding to some of the suggestions on what to do with it rather than the original build.

Except for the perhaps the last point. As you said, the necro skills are most powerful when focused in a certain way, but given the limitations placed on you in a team battle, the need to make the best use of your energy in a limited time and the like, it does seem that you could make an effective individual build where the focus is based off OoV but equaly split with another viable strategy (preferably one that works in a very different manner to the original one), allowing you to choose which to use depending on the battle, or switching from one to the other as the battle changes over it's length. This individual flexibility would then translate into team flexibility, while still being able to be harnessed in to direct pre-prepared strategies.

Anyway, I think I'll hold off contributing more to this topic untill after I have the upcomming BWE under my belt.

Greentongue · Feb 16, 2005, 01:03 PM // 13:03

If you do find that you run down on health and/or energy too fast, you may still want to consider OoP and a different Elite. Not to say your selection of OoV is not good, I certainly think it is, as would the physical damage dealers in your party.

Since you will be depending on physical damage dealers hitting their targets anyway, there should be a lot of conditions being generated. That may make "Victory is Mine!" a great skill to have for recovery.

"Victory is Mine!" ELITE (Shout) You gain 10..56 Health and 5 Energy for Each Condition suffered by adjacent foes.

filter · Feb 24, 2005, 07:12 AM // 07:12

Will this OoV,OoP spamming build here from TGH work as the poster suggests?

Sausaletus Rex · Feb 24, 2005, 05:18 PM // 17:18

For people who are lazy to link here's the build :

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rystom at TGH

Necromancer/Ranger

Soul Reaping 10+1 (lesser ruin)
Blood Magic 10+1+2+2 (scar pattern)(+2 ruin)(Awaken Blood)
Beast Mastery 10

Awaken Blood
{E} Order of the Vampire
Order of Pain
Life Siphon
Call of Ferocity
Revive Animal
Sybiosis
Animal Companion

It will work to offset the blood cost of spamming sacrificial skills, sure. The Orders are enchantments, enchantments trigger Symbiosis when they're cast, so since you'll be getting rougly the same amount from Symbiosis as you'll be losing from the Orders, you won't feel it. Not right away, at least. I haven't checked this out personally and I couldn't tell you if I had now, anyway, but the danger here is if Symbiosis acts like Endure Pain. That similarly boosts your health temporarily but when it ends that health goes away. If you get +100/+100 to your current and maximum health you'll get -100/-100 to both when it ends. It doesn't increase your actual health at all, just provides a bit more temporary padding so you hopefully don't go below 0. If you have 250/480 Health and use Endure Pain to get 350/580 and take 30 damage to be 320 when Endure ends you'll drop not back to 250 but to 220/580. That 30 damage comes out of your actual hitpoints, not the bonus ones, it's only when you drop below 0 that they actually matter. And the problem here is that the Orders *end*, too. Symbiosis increases your hp while enchanted but what does it do when those enchantments end? That's right, it also ends, taking away that bonus hp. So rather than ping-ponging back and forth, dropping 130hp then raising 120, then dropping 130, then raising 120, to go from 480/480 to casting Order of Whatever to get to 350/480 to the Order tirggering Symbiosis to get to 480/600 to the Order ending and being recast to get to 340/480 to Symbiosis triggering to get 470/600 (There's a bit of loss built in already, the post at TGH has the exact figures, if it worked this way, you'd be better off dropping 1 on Blood to make sure Symbiosis healed you completely) what will happen looks more like 480/480 to cast OoW for 350/480 to Symbiosis going off for 480/600 to OoW ending to fall to 350/480 to cast OoW again for 220/480 to that triggering Symbiosis again for 340/600 and so on. Even if you could figure out a way to tweak the recharge of the Orders so that you could cast them before then ended you'd run into the same problem, what you're doign then is just lengthening the duration on an existing enchantment, there's no new enchantment so there's no new Symbiosis boost. Either way, the effect should be the same, you're just taking slices out of a slightly bigger pie.

In other words it's not cycling back and forth with some entropic loss like this :

Start 480/480

OoW : -130/0
Total :350/480

Sym : +120/+120
Total : 470/600

End : 0/-120
Total : 470/480

OoW : -130/0
Total : 340/480

Sym : +120/+120
Total : 460/600

End : 0/-120
Total : 460/480

Where you can repeat it nearly indefinitely. It's a steady decrease because you're not going up 120 and going down 130 you're going down 130 and gaining a bonus 120. End - or when the Order ends and Symbiosis fades - isn't 0/-120, it's -120/-120 just as Sym - or when the bonus from Symbiosis triggers - is +120/+120.

Start 480/480

OoW : -130/0
Total :350/480

Sym : +120/+120
Total : 470/600

End : -120/-120
Total : 350/480

OoW : -130/0
Total : 220/480

Sym : +120/+120
Total : 440/600

End : -120/-120
Total : 220/480

Where with another few iterations and you've just comitted suicide. That's if I'm right, which I'll freely admit I might not be, but even if Rystom is right and you don't have to worry about the enchantment ending with Symbiosis the same way you have to worry about the duration ending with Endure Pain ther's still a big problem. Energy. Forget the blood cost, you've managed to solve that, fine. The Orders are 10 energy and will recycle in about 7 seconds (2 second cast times with 5 second recharges). Cast both of them and that's 20 energy in 9 seconds or the equivalent of 6 2/3rds pips of energy flowing out of your character. With 4 pips to start with, that's a deficit of nearly a full 3 pips or Ranger *de*generation. Before you cast anything else. You're planning on running AtB so you're spending yet more energy. Rystom says that Soul Reaping will make up the cost but if that's so with SR 11 he's counting on someone dying - and his being within range, something you don't want to do - about once every 10 seconds. That's extremely ambitious even when you're buffing everyone with OoV and OoP. And when you want to cast other things like the call for the pet or Life Siphon then you're further in the hole and will need more deaths to stay afloat.

And, yes, the Orders shouldn't affect the pet. It's not technically a party member so it doesn't benefit from things like that anymore than an NPC like Rurik or the archers in your guild hall would. Since you'll pump up Beastmastery for Symbiosis there's worse things you can do, I guess, but a pet is pretty useless, it's just goign to be cannon fodder because its damage is pitiful and a competant opponent is just going to side-step it and head for a target that actually matters.

That's the next problem here. Okay, so, let's take it for granted that SR will pull off the miracle and keep you in energy, your next problem is that you have absolutely no defense whatesoever with this build. Your only healing is Symbiosis - dependant on you spamming your Orders which involves standing still and losing your health - and Life Siphon - which involves you losing yet more energy for a lousy 3 health pips a cast, that's 6 HPS when your opponents are going to be doing upwards of 30 DPS, you'll need a lot of energy and a lot of targets to break even there - so you're incredibly vulnerable to being attacked. For SR to work you'll need to be poking around the battle where you teammates will be using your Orders to kill something, hopefully, and that means you're within striking reach of the other team, especially as you'll likely be by yourself, trying to stay at a point in a triangle with your offensive teammates who you need for energy and your healers and other high priority target's who are goign to draw enemies like flies as the other points. If I'm a target caller and I see a lone caster that's a pretty good target of opportunity. Especially if I notice they're a nec and the other sides spamming OoW. At that point Symbiosis is meaningless. Doesn't matter if you have 600 hp or 200 hp, the other team will chop away at that in a flash if they focus you. You're going to need your healer to bail you out at that point because a focused target is going to go through a swing of thousands of hit points before they're out of danger or dead and this character has no defensive buffs or effective self-healing to make things better. At least you can use Necrotic armor.

Oh, and I didn't mention this but casting Symbiosis yourself is really kicking yourself in the teeth if you're in trouble. 5% DP isn't much but it's certainly not helping you in that case. It's less health and less energy, that's a recipe for trouble when you care as much about both as an Order spammer does. But, I think rituals are underused mostly because the DP cost puts people off and far be it from me to disuade people further. I'd stick Symbiosis on another character on my team and stack up low-cost efficient defenses on the Nec/Ran to survive better.

I suspect this is something put together on paper without actually testing how it works. There are a few key assumptions which, if wrong, absolutely torpedo things. So, as I can't exactly say whether or not things are okay, I'll just have to fall back on an old maxim of mine, "Never trust a build that uses a pet. Pets suck. People who want to use a pet have probably missed something somewhere."

Shrapnel_Magnet · Feb 24, 2005, 09:50 PM // 21:50

lol, I hate when I see team members attacking pets in the arena... especially if we're the only 2 people alive and he's worrying about the pet... :P it's pretty awesome (sucks)

Sausaletus Rex · Feb 28, 2005, 12:24 AM // 00:24

The second build review can now be viewed here. This time around I take a look at Kui's excellent Illusionary Weaponry Mesmer/Warrior, which you can see for yourself right here. It's a long read and you can put the blame squarely on Kui's shoulders, if in fact that bothers you, for not bothering to tell me about his BWE experiences for so long. That gave me plenty of time to pad things out. :P

NewUser · Feb 28, 2005, 03:41 AM // 03:41

Wild Blow
Description: Lose all adrenaline. If it hits, this attack will be a critical hit. If Wild Blow is blocked or evaded, any stance being used by your target ends.
Energy Cost: 5
Activation Time: None.
Recharge Time: 5 Seconds.
Linked Attribute: None.
Skill Type: Melee Attack.

If Gash works like you said in your article, wouldn't using the above skill also work? A critical hit with 14 Illusion magic will cause 76 damage everytime no? With a recharge time of 5, Wild Blow would be a better substitute for Hundred Blades 8 sec recharge.

Sausaletus Rex · Feb 28, 2005, 03:48 AM // 03:48

An Illusionary Weaponry hit will not be a critical hit under any circumstances. If IW says you do 30 damage you do 30 damage each and every swing, no exceptions, no changes due to armor, no critical hits. Using Wild Blow you'd get the same damage as if you'd just taken a normal swing. As I'm also pretty sure an IW hit can't be blocked or avoided using Wild Blow is spending 5 energy to make a normal attack. As such, it has no place in an IW build.

Freyas · Feb 28, 2005, 03:49 AM // 03:49

Wild Blow won't work with Illusionary Weaponry, as your attack will not "hit". Attacks with Illusionary Weaponry can't deal critical hits, as your weapon isn't hitting the target- you'll always get the same damage, which is the listed amount on Illusionary Weaponry.

-bah, Saus beat me to it

bobert · Feb 28, 2005, 04:38 AM // 04:38

Wow I love how you go into so much depth. Just gotta find the time to read it all ROFL

Scaphism · Feb 28, 2005, 05:59 AM // 05:59

I think that article is your wordiest to date.

I like the changes you made to armor and how you highlighted what roles this IW character is supposed to play- it's a caster hater. However I disagree with some of the tweaks you made- you say you're not worrying about the damage you're taking as you're a secondary warrior and therefore have to suffer with poor armor. That's where a stance comes in- it's a "Panic" button you hit when you're getting wailed on to buy yourself a little extra time. I prefer Shield Stance because of the lower energy cost and longer duration. Disciplined Stance has some advantages over Shield Stance- +24 armor and no movement penalty- but it also costs 5 extra energy, and there are a lot of times when you're scraping for every last bit of energy, just to get to 5, let alone 10. My point is, when you need to hit PANIC, you really need to, and Disciplined is going to leave you out to dry sometimes. The speed debuff on shield may look bad on paper, but you're not trying to run away- you're trying to buy time for your healer to arrive and save your butt. If you really want to run, then hit Sprint.

Also, I just don't see the need for a 3rd interrupt. Power Leak is still a very good skill, even though its effect has been lowered. I have no objection to using it, but you're devoting 3 slots to interrupts, and your defense has really taken a hit by ditching your stance AND by using Frenzy instead of Flurry. While I agree in principle that there isn't too much you can do to save yourself, I think using Frenzy is just helping your enemies kill you even faster.

You can keep Power Leak but drop one of the other two interrupts- they do roughly the same thing, so you're just getting 1 extra interrupt every 10 seconds if you can afford the energy cost. Use that slot to bolster your defense or to use a buffer enchantment like you mentioned. Illusion of Weakness and Illusion of Haste come to mind.

Power Leak is solid- it's roughly the equivalent of making a caster lose 3 pips of energy at peak usefulness- i.e. hitting them for 19 energy when they have 19 or more energy to lose. That will be devastating. But if they only have 5 energy and you Leak 5, you're stuck waiting for it to recharge again.

In the end, I think you made changes, but they're not always the best changes. To reiterate, just because an IW character has less armor than a warrior doesn't mean you have to hasten your own death. You have high Tactics, find a way to use it. Healing signet while protected by a stance can get you at or near full health very quickly. Use your interrupts, but 3 is overboard (for my taste.) And yes, look for a way to buffer your IW enchantment so that single enchantment removal- Strip, Shatter, Inspired- hit the fluff rather than IW. There's not much you can do about Rend- except interrupt them while they're casting.

A 3s cast time, doubled to 6 by Conundrum means that if IW is removed you weren't doing your job well enough.

Sarus · Feb 28, 2005, 06:27 AM // 06:27

Hi Rex,
First of all Thank you for taking the time to write up a great article explaining the IW Build. I must say it was quite a read and took me a while to get through. I'd like to present my thoughts and opinion on the IW build. I've been playing an IW mesmer exclusively for the last two BWEs in both PvP and PvE alongside my MDK guildmates so I think I can offer a very "realistic" view of how IW mesmers perform.

The first thing I noticed is that your IW build is stacked heavily towards caster interruption. There is no doubt in my mind that the presented IW build would take a caster down with minimal effort (assuming of course nobody strips your echantment but lets just assume that for the rest of the discussion). Where I see problems though are in matchups against warriors. The ability to interrupt casters comes as the cost of survivability which I would consider a huge trade off.

Increasing your characters survivability not only keeps yourself alive but it allows your monks to focus their healing on other targets. The current build has 10 tactics but doesn't use any skills linked to tactics. I think this is somewhat of a waste.

Without further ado here were the skills I chose.

100 Blades
Flurry
Shield Stance
Healing Signet
Conjure Phantasm
Phantom Pain
Sprint
IW

14 Illusion
12 tactics
3 or so fast casting
(The attributes are off the top of my head so I apologize if that doesn't add up)

100 Blades and Flurry:
100 blades and Flurry are a must to any IW build. I went with flurry over frenzy because I didn't like the idea of taking additional damage while in the stance. As you can see I erred on the side of survivability with this build. Also, you will almost always be in either the flurry or frenzy stance as an IW mesmer so you should pretty much consider the damage penalty from frenzy as something that will apply to every hit.

Shield Stance:
For 8-18 seconds, while wielding a shield, you have a 75% chance to block incoming attacks, but you move 33% slower.
Shield stance was what made it very difficult for warriors to kill me (I am not discounting the possibility that I only fought crappy warriors). There were plenty of times when I could handle 2 warriors at a time without a problem. Shield stance lasts a long time, only costs 5 energy and has an instant casting time. If you're going to take any stance with your IW mesmer make it sheild stance. I tried all the other stances and shield stance was by and large the best for my play style. Many people dislike the 33% movement hindrance but the way I see it "If you're running you ain't damaging". Finally, if you need to run for some reason or chase somebody either cast conjure on the fleeing victim or use flurry. Since flurry is a stance is will turn off shield stance and let you run at full speed.

Healing Signet:
Make life easier on your monks. Bring healing signet. With 12 tactics it heals nearly 130 hitpoints (that's off the top of my head), costs no energy and has a fast recharge. The big downside to healing signet is that while you're casting you take double damage. That's where shield stance comes into play. Use healing signet to heal up while in shield stance and you aren't taking hits very often so the penalty is neglible.

Conjure Phantasm/Phantom Pain:
With 14 illusion conjure is a great spell. I usually cast it when the warriors take off running. Stacked with Pantom Pain most people drop dead before they can get off their healing. It also lets you be useful while you're IW is down. Just throw conjure around the battlefield liberally. Conjure+Phantom usually prevents you from having to run down opponents to get that last hit in.

Sprint:
I threw this in there because it's just so much fun. Is good for when you need to run, chase people down, or carry flags.

Of the 8 skills I chose I would be most willing to part with Sprint and Phantom Pain. I can't see myself leaving home without the others. I think next BWE I'll have to give some of those interrupts a shot though.

Thanks for reading.