Curse

cookiehoarder · Sep 02, 2005, 11:06 AM // 11:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yamat

Yesterday I ran an air/earth ele that was doing about 270 dmg in 4 seconds...

RoF+Divine Boon stops most damage. Only damage this build has a problem with is low damage fast damage...Smite on a warrior for example.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zeru

In random arena/possibly team energy drain is not that good, I'd rather take offering for the for sure/stronger energy gain as random arena is more about keeping your (crappy) teammates alive than edenying the crappy enemy casters. As a lone monk keeping yourself alive is the hardest part though and AoF is the best at doing that. Energy conservation with sig devo is actually pretty good unless there's some ranger who keeps distracting shot active. With 2 monks in team arena drain is a much better choice though.

I've always thought AoF has a place, since it can be applied to all 3 monks and works very nicely with sig devo. It's a pos right now in tombs because everyone is running smite and hence a lot of teams are running more enchant strips than usual. In a metagame with few enchant strips AoF would be a solid choice.

Well. Mo/n would NOT be good for this because-Only 1 way to gain energy back.

With mo/me I've always seen a w/mo running mending. Or other monks running divine boon.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keure

I made a mistake in assuming that the definition of spiker I had in mind was the commonly accepted definition of spiker.

I define a spike as a huge burst of damage that kills a(n) (unenchanted) target before the enemy monks can react *at all* (timeframe - a second or two). Spikers are the damage dealers that participate in dealing out this spike.

I am not talking about air spell spammers or Melandru's Arrows rangers that throw heavy-hitting attacks everywhere that allow you to react by throwing up prot spirit/RoF.
I am not talking about hammer warriors that use knockdown lock to solo kill a caster over a span of several seconds where a friendly monk would be able to react to the caster being knocklocked to negate the damage.

I am talking about a group of damage dealers who, in a very short span of time (a second or two) can deal enough damage to one target to kill it before the enemy monks can react *at all*.

An example of that spike I talk about is Air Spike (can't do effectively in 4v4 though without gimping your team). You get your necro to rend while your spikers time their casts so that the lightning orbs/chain lights hit right after the rend strips them of any protective enchantments. Boom, dead target.

Now under that definition of spiker, prot spirit does *nothing* to hinder a good spiker because a) if you prot spirit the target before the spike it gets hit by the Rend and b) once the spike hits the target should be dead.

Anyway, if I adopt the other definition of spiker (air elementalists, hammer wars, whatever deals massive damage/hit) I still question the worth of prot spirit - I find DB RoF adequate to handle the frequency of heavy hits (lower in team arena than in 8v8). Prot spirit also doesn't do crap to smiters or QS rangers (hence my recommendation to fit Shielding Hands in there).

Spikers? Don't make me laugh :P Spikers are the one thing I don't worry about on this build. Only thing I really do is a smite group (1-2 warriors 1 smiter) Anyway, the last tiem I died to a smite group is because they fit a backfire and mark of subversion on me when my hex breaker was down.

JYX · Sep 02, 2005, 11:44 AM // 11:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keure

An example of that spike I talk about is Air Spike (can't do effectively in 4v4 though without gimping your team). You get your necro to rend while your spikers time their casts so that the lightning orbs/chain lights hit right after the rend strips them of any protective enchantments. Boom, dead target.

Definition aside...I was answering in the context of 4v4...because erm...

"Free monk build for 4v4 arenas-Boon/Prot"

Also...its easier to shout "I got rend..." thus prompting an immediate cast/recast than it is to co-ordinate many many spikes in 1 second a milisecond after the rend took place. I agree, this build has nothing to worry about from spike.

Keure · Sep 02, 2005, 11:51 AM // 11:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Everous

Definition aside...I was answering in the context of 4v4...because erm...

"Free monk build for 4v4 arenas-Boon/Prot"

Also...its easier to shout "I got rend..." thus prompting an immediate cast/recast than it is to co-ordinate many many spikes in 1 second a milisecond after the rend took place. I agree, this build has nothing to worry about from spike.

...I'm sorry, but you really need to re-read my post so you grasp the full meaning. Your current response has no relevance to what I just said.

Neo-LD · Sep 02, 2005, 11:54 AM // 11:54

Hex Breaker -> Contemplation of Purity
Mend Ailemt -> Prot Spirit

Otherwise its great.

JYX · Sep 02, 2005, 12:42 PM // 12:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keure

...I'm sorry, but you really need to re-read my post so you grasp the full meaning. Your current response has no relevance to what I just said.

I grasp the full meaning. A window of 1-2 seconds is enough to respond to. I was attempting to point out the fact that this convo about spiking isn't going to put much into the debate...in a subtle way...but hey...its easy to not read what you don't want to online

About your other points, QS rangers and smiting...very valid, I always take shielding hands when playing with Protect monk.

About RoF...I lost faith in that thing a long time ago. I find the choice of energy drain a strange one in a 4v4 arena battle...the choice of people to drain isn't exactly great...in Tombs you could always drain the enemy ghostly hero at a pinch...but here, you're stuck. Offering just seems a much more reliable source of energy especially in 4v4.

rii · Sep 02, 2005, 01:25 PM // 13:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keure

I made a mistake in assuming that the definition of spiker I had in mind was the commonly accepted definition of spiker.

I define a spike as a huge burst of damage that kills a(n) (unenchanted) target before the enemy monks can react *at all* (timeframe - a second or two). Spikers are the damage dealers that participate in dealing out this spike.

I am not talking about air spell spammers or Melandru's Arrows rangers that throw heavy-hitting attacks everywhere that allow you to react by throwing up prot spirit/RoF.
I am not talking about hammer warriors that use knockdown lock to solo kill a caster over a span of several seconds where a friendly monk would be able to react to the caster being knocklocked to negate the damage.

I am talking about a group of damage dealers who, in a very short span of time (a second or two) can deal enough damage to one target to kill it before the enemy monks can react *at all*.

An example of that spike I talk about is Air Spike (can't do effectively in 4v4 though without gimping your team). You get your necro to rend while your spikers time their casts so that the lightning orbs/chain lights hit right after the rend strips them of any protective enchantments. Boom, dead target.

Now under that definition of spiker, prot spirit does *nothing* to hinder a good spiker because a) if you prot spirit the target before the spike it gets hit by the Rend and b) once the spike hits the target should be dead.

Anyway, if I adopt the other definition of spiker (air elementalists, hammer wars, whatever deals massive damage/hit) I still question the worth of prot spirit - I find DB RoF adequate to handle the frequency of heavy hits (lower in team arena than in 8v8). Prot spirit also doesn't do crap to smiters or QS rangers (hence my recommendation to fit Shielding Hands in there).

This is just not true.
ok, first, lets assume you have a spike that can kill in one. e.g. ye old chain lightening x 5 (btw thats a 5 ele 3 monk team -.-) thats a one hit kill. you rend my teammate, i notice the severe lack of prot on him, so i react.
failing prot on him before this, i see *five* eles casting chain lightening (3 sec casting time) and react on the person who just lost all enchants (its not that long a cast time). chants always fly around on teams im on, so its not hard to tell.
Your post indicates the kind of theory paper spike that in theory paper settings works. Ingame, there is a little more too it. or, rof... just one rof and it wont be a big enough spike. only if all three spikes came at the EXACT same time, would that work. and due to momentary lag, delay over vent, and human clumsiness there is almost always a reaction time allowed.

Without going into even more than that, there you go.

Nash · Sep 02, 2005, 01:55 PM // 13:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neo-LD

Hex Breaker -> Contemplation of Purity
Mend Ailemt -> Prot Spirit

Contemplation of Purity... Whenever I see that skill in a build it feels like a crime as been commited.

Remove condition removal, on a Monk that will probably be the only monk in most battles? Great... :/

MuKen · Sep 02, 2005, 04:54 PM // 16:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keure

...I'm sorry, but you really need to re-read my post so you grasp the full meaning. Your current response has no relevance to what I just said.

That would be because the majority of what you just said has no relevance to the thread topic (which was what he pointed out). He then responded to the portion of your post that is on topic (not that I agree with his response, but you have no call to be criticizing his reading).

Neo-LD · Sep 02, 2005, 06:56 PM // 18:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nash

Contemplation of Purity... Whenever I see that skill in a build it feels like a crime as been commited.

Remove condition removal, on a Monk that will probably be the only monk in most battles? Great... :/

Contemplation has all the condition and hex removal an arena monk will ever need.

Yamat · Sep 02, 2005, 09:50 PM // 21:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Neo-LD

Contemplation has all the condition and hex removal an arena monk will ever need.

yeah, sure, if they're only ever cast on you...

dumb spell for arena.

Keure · Sep 03, 2005, 12:47 AM // 00:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Everous

I grasp the full meaning. A window of 1-2 seconds is enough to respond to. I was attempting to point out the fact that this convo about spiking isn't going to put much into the debate...in a subtle way...but hey...its easy to not read what you don't want to online

Quote:

Originally Posted by muken

That would be because the majority of what you just said has no relevance to the thread topic (which was what he pointed out). He then responded to the portion of your post that is on topic (not that I agree with his response, but you have no call to be criticizing his reading).

First, I agree that my discussion about spiking doesn't directly help the OP with his decision.

However, I wasn't directly addressing the OP anyway; this was a side argument that stemmed initially from the point that someone else made that prot spirit helps against spikers (which I, under the definition of spiking that I was thinking about at the time, went to refute).

In the defense of my point (prot spirit does nothing to prevent a good spike), I wrote about my definition of spiking and I picked an example of a spike that wasn't good under 4v4 (air spike is the most popular type of spike so I thought my definition of what a spike was would be best elucidated with this example).

To say that my example is not 4v4 oriented doesn't nullify or even address my point (prot spirit does nothing to prevent what I define as a good spike), hence my accusation of irrelevance.

*edit* I promise the thread hijack will end soon...

Quote:

Originally Posted by rii

you rend my teammate, i notice the severe lack of prot on him, so i react.
failing prot on him before this, i see *five* eles casting chain lightening (3 sec casting time) and react on the person who just lost all enchants (its not that long a cast time). chants always fly around on teams im on, so its not hard to tell.

You don't understand the timing of the rend.

It goes: *start casting Rend* *start casting Chains* --------> *Rend hits* *Chains hit*.

If you just react to the rend you lose because a good team makes the rend and the chains hit at about the same time.

Quote:

Originally Posted by rii

Your post indicates the kind of theory paper spike that in theory paper settings works. Ingame, there is a little more too it. or, rof... just one rof and it wont be a big enough spike. only if all three spikes came at the EXACT same time, would that work. and due to momentary lag, delay over vent, and human clumsiness there is almost always a reaction time allowed.

Yes, it won't be perfect. But neither will the defending monks be. You, as a defender, also have lag and human clumsiness involved, but you also have an additional component - reaction time, something the attackers don't necessarily need (attackers only need timing).

If you expect to purely react to an air spike team expect to fail at doing so.

cookiehoarder · Sep 03, 2005, 03:54 AM // 03:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Nash

Contemplation of Purity... Whenever I see that skill in a build it feels like a crime as been commited.

Remove condition removal, on a Monk that will probably be the only monk in most battles? Great... :/

Remove condition removal? Dude...

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keure

First, I agree that my discussion about spiking doesn't directly help the OP with his decision.

However, I wasn't directly addressing the OP anyway; this was a side argument that stemmed initially from the point that someone else made that prot spirit helps against spikers (which I, under the definition of spiking that I was thinking about at the time, went to refute).

In the defense of my point (prot spirit does nothing to prevent a good spike), I wrote about my definition of spiking and I picked an example of a spike that wasn't good under 4v4 (air spike is the most popular type of spike so I thought my definition of what a spike was would be best elucidated with this example).

To say that my example is not 4v4 oriented doesn't nullify or even address my point (prot spirit does nothing to prevent what I define as a good spike), hence my accusation of irrelevance.

*edit* I promise the thread hijack will end soon...

You don't understand the timing of the rend.

It goes: *start casting Rend* *start casting Chains* --------> *Rend hits* *Chains hit*.

If you just react to the rend you lose because a good team makes the rend and the chains hit at about the same time.

Yes, it won't be perfect. But neither will the defending monks be. You, as a defender, also have lag and human clumsiness involved, but you also have an additional component - reaction time, something the attackers don't necessarily need (attackers only need timing).

If you expect to purely react to an air spike team expect to fail at doing so.

I've said it before, spikers suck. The only build this has a problem with is SMITE. THAT'S ALL.

Keure · Sep 03, 2005, 04:11 AM // 04:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiehoarder

I've said it before, spikers suck. The only build this has a problem with is SMITE. THAT'S ALL.

I wasn't posting my crap directed at you, heh. In particular I was discussing the details of a standard 8v8 Air Spike execution. I'll stop hijacking your thread now.

I also agree that you shouldn't worry much about spikers (any type) in 4v4 with your build.

I would pump DF to 15. Protection is still fine with 11 points in it, and you get more efficiency out of divine boon that way (your concrete heals).

Yamat · Sep 03, 2005, 06:17 AM // 06:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zhou Feng

1. Reversal of Fortune
2. Signet of Devotion
3. Mend Ailment
4. Energy Drain {E}
5. Guardian (because after checking and analyzing it its darn cheap)
6. Inspired Hex
7. Hex Breaker (For when you're near a pesky Me or N)
8. Divine Boon

This is a great build for arena.

cookiehoarder · Sep 03, 2005, 08:45 AM // 08:45

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keure

I wasn't posting my crap directed at you, heh. In particular I was discussing the details of a standard 8v8 Air Spike execution. I'll stop hijacking your thread now.

I also agree that you shouldn't worry much about spikers (any type) in 4v4 with your build.

I would pump DF to 15. Protection is still fine with 11 points in it, and you get more efficiency out of divine boon that way (your concrete heals).

12 prot and 14 boon heal the exact same as 11 prot 15 boon. except for the 3 difference.

Keure · Sep 03, 2005, 11:20 AM // 11:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiehoarder

12 prot and 14 boon heal the exact same as 11 prot 15 boon. except for the 3 difference.

You get +3 for the DF innate bonus and +3 from boon for a total of an additonal 6 HP healed per cast of anything monk. Health amounts healed from a DB prot spell are small enough that overhealing isn't really much of a concern (unlike, say, with a DB heal monk).

I ask this: What's that additional point you lose from Prot worth, really?

Mend Ailment, when removing a condition from someone with 2 or less conditions, is flat-out better under 15 DF 11 prot than 14 DF 12 prot (15 11 vs 14 12, you get +6 HP when healing 1 condition, +2 HP when healing 2). Heck, even when Mend Ailment is used with someone that has 3 conditions on, the 14 DF 12 prot only heals for +2 HP more than tha 15 DF 11 prot.

At what frequency with RoF are you going to block that hit for more than 63 points of damage (from prot 11)? When your RoF blocks something for more than 63 (and more than 67), prot 12 gives you (4 prevented + 4 healed) = +8 HP over prot 11. However, the prot 11 RoF has the +6 HP attached to it, meaning that the +8 HP advantage shrinks to +2 HP. To break even with prot 12 DF 14 RoF (vs prot 11 DF 15 RoF), three-quarters of the hits you block with RoF must deal 67 damage or more. I find this unlikely.

Guardian blocks an additional 2% of the time from 11 to 12 prot - so an additional 1/50th of the attack damage thrown at a target is prevented by that additional point. In 4v4 arena, under a very generous estimate of 2 attackers on a target dealing 60 attack DPS over the entire 6 second duration, that extra point in prot will allow Guardian to prevent 120*6/50 = 14.4 HP of damage, on average. However, understand that Guardian only blocks attacks, not nukes/smite/degen/Kindle damage, while the +6 additional HP you heal from 15 DF 11 prot applies to all types of damage taken.

I would definitely get the 15 DF 11 prot instead due to the information above.

I also think I have a case to reduce prot further (and insp, maybe) to get 16 DF but I'm feeling too lazy to do more numbers right now.

cookiehoarder · Sep 03, 2005, 08:33 PM // 20:33

You don't need 15

you can just run a +1 DF mod. Ooor youcan get 17 DF.

Switch to 16. switch back :/

MuKen · Sep 04, 2005, 04:06 AM // 04:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by cookiehoarder

You don't need 15

you can just run a +1 DF mod. Ooor youcan get 17 DF.

Switch to 16. switch back :/

A +1 DF mod affects both cases equally, and hence has no relevance to this comparison.

Zhou Feng · Sep 04, 2005, 10:40 PM // 22:40

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yamat

This is a great build for arena.

Now Id need one for my major: healing. I love prot now. Smiting Monk is so so. But a monk truly shines with Heal or Prot.

Still I love to heal more then I love to go prot. Kind of like a wierd relationship as Ive been playing healer type characters since Dungeons and Dragons (priests/clerics).