Curse

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 12:31 AM // 00:31

How do Protective Spirit and Stoneflesh Aura interact?

If the Protective Spirit benefit were to be applied first, there could be some interesting invincibuild possibilities ...

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 12:40 AM // 00:40

By the way, my first thought at a (farming) build is:

Ether Renewal (E)
Stoneflesh Aura
Protective Spirit
Aura of Restoration
Earth Attunement/Essence Bond
Stone Daggers
Aftershock
Crystal Wave (or utility, such as Ward of Stability)

No surprises there.

But writing that out, I see the first flaw in this build -- since it requires a Mo secondary, it can't include Mantra of Resolve like the classic Ether Renewal/Slivernewal builds can.

EDIT: Even without Kinetic Armor, it's useful to have Stone Daggers during Ether Renewal. Not absolutely necessary, but definitely useful.

Sasuke The Betrayer · Nov 16, 2006, 12:40 AM // 00:40

The long 2 second cast time doesn't seem very kind

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 12:43 AM // 00:43

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sasuke The Betrayer

The long 2 second cast time doesn't seem very kind

Without Mantra of Resolve available, interrupts could be a major issue.

I'd be rather nervous taking this build troll-hunting. (Similarly, I dumped Earth Attunement for Essence Bond against trolls, before I dumped them both for Sliver Armor.)

TheOneMephisto · Nov 16, 2006, 12:44 AM // 00:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

Without Mantra of Resolve available, interrupts could be a major issue.

I'd be rather nervous taking this build troll-hunting.

Glyph of concentration?

Apple · Nov 16, 2006, 12:47 AM // 00:47

1s cast also pretty interruptable

Kwisatz_Haderach · Nov 16, 2006, 12:48 AM // 00:48

darnet beat me to it

anyways, I have been playing with it a little and this what i have come up with

1. Prot Spirit
2. Stoneflesh Aura
3. Aura of Restoration
4. Glyph of Concentration
5. Essence Bond
6. {E} Shockwave
7. Crystal Wave
8. Aftershock

pretty basic

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 12:48 AM // 00:48

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOneMephisto

Glyph of concentration?

Duh! I've never used it.

But is that enough, given how many must-casts there would be per minute? (A lot of Protective Spirits, probably the Ether Renewals, and at least some of the rest of the Ether Renewal chain.)

Classic Ether Renewal/Sliverenewal used to work against trolls (and avicara, and vermin) without any anti-interrupts, and meleers hit you less often now than they used to, so that's encouraging -- still, one Distracting interrupt on Protective Spirit and you could be dead, and GoC isn't going to prevent that.

Maybe put in Armor of Earth/Kinetic Armor to slow the damage in the worst case?

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 12:51 AM // 00:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kwisatz_Haderach

darnet beat me to it

anyways, I have been playing with it a little and this what i have come up with

1. Prot Spirit
2. Stoneflesh Aura
3. Aura of Restoration
4. Glyph of Concentration
5. Essence Bond
6. {E} Shockwave
7. Crystal Wave
8. Aftershock

pretty basic

What runes? Sup Earth/Sup Energy Storage and nothing else, for HP a little under 300?

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 12:52 AM // 00:52

Oh, and we should name the concept.

How about "Stoneguard"? That combines the concepts of "Stone" and "Protection".

Thom Bangalter · Nov 16, 2006, 01:07 AM // 01:07

Superior energy storage is the second worst superior rune in the game after superior fast casting. 9 energy for 75 health? no thanks.

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 01:26 AM // 01:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thom Bangalter

Superior energy storage is the second worst superior rune in the game after superior fast casting. 9 energy for 75 health? no thanks.

You're forgetting a key point of Protective Spirit builds -- one PURPOSELY lowers one's health. E.g., 55 HP builds.

I'm thinking 300 HP might be low enough in this case, however, given Stoneflesh Aura. Hence the two sup runes to knock off 150 HP.

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 01:29 AM // 01:29

Yes! Stoneguard is DEFINITELY the name.

IIRC, the "Stoneguard" are solo fighters in the Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever series. When one dies, his corpse is tied to horse, and another one comes to take his place. Why only one? They give the answer "We suffice."

And they fight without weapons, too.

Although that's martial arts, not magic ...

Thom Bangalter · Nov 16, 2006, 11:28 AM // 11:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

You're forgetting a key point of Protective Spirit builds -- one PURPOSELY lowers one's health. E.g., 55 HP builds.

I'm thinking 300 HP might be low enough in this case, however, given Stoneflesh Aura. Hence the two sup runes to knock off 150 HP.

whoops. Just assuming you were being scrubby. I apologize.

Nechtan Thaumaturge · Nov 16, 2006, 11:47 AM // 11:47

Well, I gave this a try, and there's good news and bad news. The good news is that the combo does seem to work as one would hope, at least initially. The bad news is that it doesn't work indefinitely. It seems the effect wears off around the time that the first Stoneflesh Aura begins to expire. Then, you start taking whatever damage fits under Protective Spirit. The funny thing is that after a certain period of time or a certain number of spells cast, the whole thing reverts to its previous behavior, and you start taking zero damage again.

It's difficult to tell exactly what's going on, but I believe there is an order of evaluation issue at the core of the thing, i.e., if Protective Spirit gets evaluated first, there's no problem, but if Stoneflesh Aura gets evaluated first, you take damage. You can see this effect by casting Stoneflesh Aura at the very beginning of a battle, then Protective Spirit; you will get damaged. I had hoped that the problem might be solved by always following Protective Spirit with Stoneflesh Aura. However, some of the times when I took no damage Protective Spirit was the first enchantment on the effects bar and some of the time Stoneflesh Aura was, and vice versa.

This problem ought to be surmountable, I feel. Just playing around with it a bit, I found that if I made sure to re-cast Stoneflesh Aura at the earliest opportunity and then covered the next several seconds of attacks with Spirit Bond, I could tank indefinitely against the Minotaurs (I was using AL15 armor incidentally). Also, remember that unless you plan to fight very high level creatures, Stoneflesh Aura all by itself will negate most attack damage, so there's some freedom to manuever here.

Lastly, as suspected, interrupts really hurt the build. In particular, Stoneflesh Aura just hangs out there begging to be interrupted. Even with Glyph of Concentration, you're only trading a 2s activation for a 1s one, and the AI can regularly catch 3/4s spells. However, if you are fighting creatures that use Savage Slash (possibly Savage Shot as well), they tend to disregard Glyphs and Signets anyway, so you're probably fine there.

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 02:50 PM // 14:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thom Bangalter

whoops. Just assuming you were being scrubby. I apologize.

No problem.

And I was making a different elementary error anyhow. Two sup runes only get you down to a little under 400 HP. On the other hand, with Earth Magic maxed out, that's OK.

Francis Crawford · Nov 16, 2006, 02:52 PM // 14:52

Weird, Nechtan Thaumaturge. Just weird. Thanks for the research-heavy report!

A guy could go crazy thinking that such oddness couldn't be going on, and hence he was misreading something ...

kess · Nov 16, 2006, 11:41 PM // 23:41

For me, I tested the ps/stoneflesh combo on a few locations. Here's what I found out about the combo (I did explain in on the farming forum on this build).

If you have max 16 earth attrb, you can recash stoneflesh aura before it expires, so you always take 0 dmg. The dmg that Necthan saw is not that the effect wears off or something, it's because stoneflesh aura is an armor, so any armor penetrating attack e.g. sundering weapons and air spike spells will go through it. I did asked Gaile if this is a bug on the spell or it's meant to be this way. I suspect it's the later, or else you will be invinsible.

Now to counter the armor penetrating spells, you either throw in mending and HB or you can use Shield of Absorbsion and Watchful spirit for healing. For energy management, use balt spirit and for dmg dealing use silver armor and shockwave. Try it on scar eater and shatterstone farm, you can kill almost all kirin and dragon moss.

Besides, I used this build to do jade brotherhood farm too, just remember to bring glpyh of concentration, jade mesmer can't/won't interrupt the glyph.

Hyprodimus Prime · Nov 17, 2006, 02:16 AM // 02:16

Interesting kess....

hmm, but technically, ANet's description holds it as an enchantment. Well I dont know, I think they should clerify more. Still I didnt think of using PS with SFA, I was more on the mesmer side using stone striker and mantra of earth. CLever guys gj!

Mesmer in Need · Nov 17, 2006, 02:23 AM // 02:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by Thom Bangalter

Superior energy storage is the second worst superior rune in the game after superior fast casting. 9 energy for 75 health? no thanks.

what? i use sup fast casting on my nuker build.