Curse

Mesmer in Need · Dec 04, 2006, 11:25 PM // 23:25

is it just me, or do these skills seem exactally the same? one you get from the tyrian presearing (shielding hands) and the other you get from nightfall. cant they be interchanged?

Racthoh · Dec 04, 2006, 11:57 PM // 23:57

Not quite the same, think the description gets people.

You're hit once, Shield of Absorption will reduce it by 5 damage. Hit again, reduced by 10, third time 15 damage reduced... usually gets to the point where you are taking 0 damage if under heavy fire. The amount of damage reduced on subsequent hits increases everytime you take damage.

Gigashadow · Dec 05, 2006, 12:00 AM // 00:00

Shield of Absorption is almost strictly a better spell, negates more damage if you're hit more than 3 or so times during its duration, and has a much shorter recharge time. Expect it to get nerfed in the next skill rebalance.

Etrik · Dec 05, 2006, 05:42 AM // 05:42

Shield of Absorption can be maintained all the time. It's especially powerful in HA, specifically Halls. Slap it on a Ghostly Hero and the only thing that can kill him is degen/a whole lotta vamp

Sab · Dec 05, 2006, 01:27 PM // 13:27

If you're a Prot monk without Shield of Absorption, you'd better have a damn good reason.

Poison Ivy · Dec 05, 2006, 02:56 PM // 14:56

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sab

If you're a Prot monk without Shield of Absorption, you'd better have a damn good reason.

I'm nub.

Good enough?

Random note, Blighters out there, drop your Prot Spirit/Spirit Bond for Shield of Absorption, it's totally worth it.

Flopjack · Dec 05, 2006, 03:59 PM // 15:59

I hope they don't nerf Shield of Absorbtion, but rather make Shielding hands a little better. I can never understand that long recharge the spell has.

Carth` · Dec 05, 2006, 04:27 PM // 16:27

I love Shield of Absorption. I can't see any reason you'd use Shielding Hands now that it exists.

crucifix · Dec 05, 2006, 05:08 PM // 17:08

SH was unuseable because of the recharge time, SoA i fear may be broken, although I hope not. I personally love the skill, its interesting when you can actrually see a ghostly get beat down to 50% hp and then just stop taking damage. But yeah, SoA is far better than shielding hands, due to the linear reduction increase.

Thomas.knbk · Dec 05, 2006, 05:55 PM // 17:55

Shielding Hands wasn't usable even before Shield of Absorbtion. It was the only direct absorbtion spell there was, so it was seeing some play (not much though). Shielding hands is not a good spell, but that has little to do with Shield of Absorbtion.

Darkpower Alchemist · Dec 05, 2006, 06:04 PM // 18:04

[skill=big]Shielding Hands[/skill]

This skill is Pre Searing,and it shows. It was nice when I came from Green Grass Ascalon. Protected me well in the Shiverpeaks against encroaching dwarves and yakslapping Yak riders. Those were good memories.

[skill=big]Shield of Absorption[/skill]

This can make things very interesting under proper physical pressure and with a good cover like Protective Spirit, you are nearly unstoppable...for the duration of the spells.

By the descriptions alone, the drastic differences are obvious. SH reduces the amount of damage taken by result of subtraction on a base hit. I.E. If hit for 50 Hp dmg, SH reduces by a max of 19 at 16 att in Protection Prayers. Meaning that, plus armor rating will make the sum of damage taken.

SoA, on the other hand, reduces by 5 points of damage each hit for its duration. Meaning if the same damage is done,50 Hp, then the reduction is -5 for each hit afterwards for the duration of the spell. 50hp-5hp=45hp. The next hit,if doing equal or greater damage will be decreased by 5hp once again.

So,the next hit will inccur only 45hp if it is calculated as being equal to said previous hit,due to the continuation of the spells duration.

In the Neo monk farming build based on the 55Hp monk premise, this is best shown. With 55 hp, and using Protective Spirit, the monk is only hit for a maximum of 5 hp per hit. With SoA as its cover enchantment, the dmg done decrease to 0hp per hit upon the 2nd attack for the next 5 seconds at Protection 16.

My numbers may be a bit rushed,but I believe I have explained it well enough to show the great difference in the 2 enchantments.

Drewfense · Dec 05, 2006, 06:27 PM // 18:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Poison Ivy

Random note, Blighters out there, drop your Prot Spirit/Spirit Bond for Shield of Absorption, it's totally worth it.

!!!!!

whoa, SoA is anti pressure, PS/SB is anti spike. They simply cannot be considered equivalent like that. Even though SoA is a great skill that should be in any backline, dropping PS/SB for SoA is silly and will only insure death

SoA can be effective versus spike, but it is very much a support role. It applies after PS/SB so it can eliminate an after spike, can act as a cover enchant versus shatters, and it negates shadow damage versus bspikes.

I have never really thought of it as imbalanced though. Their are a ton of counters in the game with the increased amount of enchant stripping in Nightfall including Grenths dervishes.

Vermilion Okeanos · Dec 05, 2006, 09:45 PM // 21:45

SoA and PS are practically the same thing on different job.

Both of them render tactic of out pressure/spike against 1 target fail miserably. (godly)

Also, I don't think the duration on that card is right. 7 sec should be the max duration they have right now.

Former Ruling · Dec 05, 2006, 10:11 PM // 22:11

Yea, It gets to 7 duration at like...14 Prot I think.

Anyway, SoA is one of the best Prot Spells right now. Which might not mean much since Prot has basically all of the Monks best spells :\

Arcador · Dec 06, 2006, 11:01 AM // 11:01

SoA is the uber version of SH. Some NF skills tend to have such overuse over some old ones, but hopefully will be tuned down a bit (or the old buffed a bit) to maintain balance and variety.