Curse

Hannibel · Oct 30, 2005, 05:00 AM // 05:00

iway is pretty much spike build, you call target everyone attack.

ranger spike

mesmer shatter delusion spike

soul barbs spike

the thing i've never seen on guru forums are people coming up with useful builds that will actually win hoh, no balanced builds am i the only one whom thinks that most of these builds are trash? or do other people think so aswell.

NightOwl · Oct 30, 2005, 05:04 AM // 05:04

Spike is there to kill quicker than the monks can save the target. Slow even damage throughout the group isn't as difficult to outheal as a player that goes from full health to dead in ~1 second.

I'm not sure I'd consider Iway to be a true spike build, however. Only so many people can get to the target due to collision.

Saba The Hobo · Oct 30, 2005, 06:18 AM // 06:18

Because, if a monk's not on their toes, they won't get a quick heal off to beat a spike. Lower, persistent damage is easier to heal, via self heals, or a monks intervention.

rii · Oct 30, 2005, 02:44 PM // 14:44

DPS teams generally end up with about 4 warriors spamming cleave.... if you get into about 200dps+ then that works, and may well work better than spike... but it limits your options. A spike can be put together in 3 characters, allowing room for things like support and shutdown. Either works.

entropy · Oct 30, 2005, 02:48 PM // 14:48

wait so ranger spike doesn't win HoH? Spike kills DPS for the most part doesn't That just how it works.

smurfhunter · Oct 30, 2005, 03:36 PM // 15:36

iway is not spike, iway is a good example of a dps build

Patrograd · Oct 30, 2005, 06:13 PM // 18:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Saba The Hobo

Because, if a monk's not on their toes, they won't get a quick heal off to beat a spike. Lower, persistent damage is easier to heal, via self heals, or a monks intervention.

There isnt anything a monk can do against a good spike, not really. The target goes down typically in less than the casting time of any useful skill. sometimes you can anticipate the spike, but such spikes arent the ones which are well done :-)

A good spike typically involves a target switch at the last moment with rend or lingering or rigor going on at exactly the same moment as the spike. Sometimes you can guess who the target is going to be, usually you cant though. Pure luck if you manage it.

To beat spikes you have to kill the damage from the other team faster than they are killing you, so typically the best counter spike is a spike of your own....which is why everyone is running spikes. Of course the thing about spikes are that they are bloody difficult to do properly, so very few people are running them effectively

AtomicMew · Oct 30, 2005, 06:43 PM // 18:43

Ranger spike is IMO the most dangerous spike build out there. It is the fastest to pull off and has the slowest recharge time. And it's immune to normal spike prevention skills (namely, protective spirit). The best counter IMO is not a spike of your own, (because you will NEVER outspike a ranger team with a balanced team). But stacking anti-ranger mesmer hexes, mass blinding, weakness and disabling their martyr monk (if they have one).

heist23 · Oct 30, 2005, 07:17 PM // 19:17

ranger spike can, for the most part, be beaten by the same way IWAY can be beaten. blind, weakness, aegis, guardian, and the like.

spike teams are the most popular because the popular opinion is that spike teams can win halls easy. they also kill the fastest, which attracts most people. it all started with air spike.....now look at where we are now.

dont feel no pain · Oct 30, 2005, 07:30 PM // 19:30

i came up with a infinte fast spike, Quickshot+read the wind+serpentsquickness and a lot of expertise and 4 of these ranger = nice nice nice

TheCrusader · Oct 30, 2005, 07:41 PM // 19:41

"You" didn't come up with it.

Everyone runs Spike because again you kill faster than they can spike.

Ranger spike imho is easy to counter for one simple spell. RoF. Use RoF just once and the targets health will jump up preventing the spike. That 1 RoF will give your healing monk enough time to spike the health back up again.

Patrograd · Oct 30, 2005, 08:28 PM // 20:28

Aegis and guardian will not stop a ranger spike as they use rigor mortis to get around it. The damage comes under prot spirit, so thats no good either.

You cant remove the rigor because if its done properly the rigor goes on as the spike begins and is over in less than a second, certainly before you can cast anything to stop it, and that includes reversal of fortune. Put simply, if you have the time to put for example reversal of fortune onto the target then it isnt a good spike. When the spike is done well the target is just dead instantly.

Yukito Kunisaki · Oct 30, 2005, 09:09 PM // 21:09

Eviscerate {E}, Executioner's Strike

With just these two skills and luck for crits on your side, you can chop a foe down to 33% hp from full in 2 seconds...

I think that's fine for a spike and what's more, you can use other skills in your bar to harm other aspects of your enemies... [Fear Me!! muahahah!]

Knido · Oct 30, 2005, 09:25 PM // 21:25

necro spikes can be fricking amazing as well, cause they bypass armor

aka, couple days ago was fighing pure N/MO team with an iway team, but we couldnt kill them cause half were using shield of deflection and half using word of healing.

think they had 3 use Shadow Strike to get the full 80-100 damage (based on there blood magic level) then 5 used vamp gaze to kill us in the 2 seconds it takes them to cast.

and they never ran out of steam, so....

we got decimated

entropy · Oct 30, 2005, 09:44 PM // 21:44

Blood spiking FTW? Its IWAY against necro's. Of cousre you won't win. Necro's are the anti ranger/warrior in general while mesmers are the bane of casters. Of course all of these are generalized and arcan echo+FoC works much much better.

Esuna · Oct 30, 2005, 09:54 PM // 21:54

Spike builds are just easier to create, period. You're looking at your DPS and not so much of the various other aspects in the metagame. A truely balanced team is thus harder to organize because you really need cooperative members with the proper skill set to make it possible. You have to think about hex removal, damage prevention, sufficient healing, condition removal, etc. Not saying spike builds are bad or anything, as truely good ones are tough to beat. If they have good coordination, you'll be on your damn toes a lot.

smurfhunter · Oct 30, 2005, 10:42 PM // 22:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by dont feel no pain

i came up with a infinte fast spike, Quickshot+read the wind+serpentsquickness and a lot of expertise and 4 of these ranger = nice nice nice

this is bs. serpents wont lower the recharge on qs, it stays at 1 second. thats like trying to echo mending

Hippie Crack · Oct 30, 2005, 10:51 PM // 22:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by smurfhunter

this is bs. serpents wont lower the recharge on qs, it stays at 1 second. thats like trying to echo mending

Are you trying to tell me i'm not allowed to echo mending?

Banebow · Oct 31, 2005, 12:36 AM // 00:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by dont feel no pain

i came up with a infinte fast spike, Quickshot+read the wind+serpentsquickness and a lot of expertise and 4 of these ranger = nice nice nice

I hate to break it to you, but that is nothing new. A few months ago you could use quickening zephyr and get QS to recharge instantly. It was in fact not so great, as you burned through your energy in a few seconds, but I had great fun with it non the less. Now, QS cannot get below a 1 second recharge, so using serpents quickness to try and lower the recharge is about as effective, as smurfhunter says, as echoing mending.

smurfhunter · Oct 31, 2005, 01:20 AM // 01:20

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hippie Crack

Are you trying to tell me i'm not allowed to echo mending?

yes. only i am allowed to echo mending. you can arcane echo it however