Curse

Ensign · Mar 09, 2007, 12:12 PM // 12:12

When you're getting hit for any meaningful amount of damage as an ele you're not standing there casting, you're kiting your soft little ass off.

If you want a one sentence answer for why Aura of Restoration is such a pile, there it is.

Peace,
-CxE

Dr Strangelove · Mar 09, 2007, 08:34 PM // 20:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by bungusmaximus

This piece of math makes perfect sense when you're always casting. If I use it in AB that's not the case. I run often, especially when I take damage. When I take damage I need to be healed up, and when I take damage I run and don't cast.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

When you're getting hit for any meaningful amount of damage as an ele you're not standing there casting, you're kiting your soft little ass off.

If you want a one sentence answer for why Aura of Restoration is such a pile, there it is.

Peace,
-CxE

Dammit, you're both right. I think I've even said the same thing in the past. That'll teach me to come on guru at 3 in the morning with a calculator.

frojack · Mar 09, 2007, 08:49 PM // 20:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ensign

When you're getting hit for any meaningful amount of damage as an ele you're not standing there casting, you're kiting your soft little ass off.

If you want a one sentence answer for why Aura of Restoration is such a pile, there it is.

Peace,
-CxE

Aura is a cover enchantment. Simple as that. I'd like to think most people don't assume it's a primary healing skill... Though I'm probably wrong.

LightningHell · Mar 10, 2007, 10:19 AM // 10:19

If you want to run a cover enchantment, please run something that's more constructive that's something more than just a cover enchantment.

Grammar · Mar 10, 2007, 07:57 PM // 19:57

I use Arua of Restoration in my SF build, primarily as a cover enchantment. Having Fire Attunement stripped can be devastating if you're trying to do some serious SF spamming.
None of my other Ele builds use it however, because they aren't spam builds and therefore can survive without an attunement up for a while.

As far as the skill's healing ability.....
Against serious damage, it's absolutely pointless (because you're not casting at that point). But can't that be said for pretty much EVERY self-heal in the game (excluding a primary monk of course)?
That's why I don't understand all the Aura of Restoration hate.
If you think about it, it's really no different than every other self-heal in the game (Healing Sig, Troll Unguent, Healing Breeze on a X/Mo, Vital Boon+Signet of Pius Light, Glyph of Restoration, etc. etc.). Like Aura of Restoration, none of them will save you from serious damage. When playing my monk, I actually find it annoying when teammates stop attacking or kiting to cast some pointless little self-heal whenever they start taking serous damage.

What these self-heals will do is patch up minor damage when your monk is busy healing major damage on other team members, and I would argue that Aura of Restoration does this in spades. You don't even need to stop to cast/recast it like other self-heals; you just always make sure it's up covering your attunement, and the minor patch-up/top-off heals just keep coming all by themselves. If you're using a spam build like SF, this allows the monk to completely ignore you until you start taking major damage.
So yeah, it's mostly a cover enchantment, but I would argue that it's on par with any other non-monk self-heal in the game.

LightningHell · Mar 10, 2007, 08:38 PM // 20:38

Unlike Healing Signet, Troll Unguent, or Healing Breeze, Aura of Restoration will not keep you alive in a skirmish.

If you're playing PvE, screw selfheals.

Ensign · Mar 10, 2007, 09:25 PM // 21:25

"Top off" self-heals do something, sure, but they're not that valuable. The place you see that be most valuable is on characters that overextend frequently, it lets them extend further and longer by letting them ignore incidental damage. Casters don't get to overextend though.

Where self heals are more valuable is in skirmish, where you often need to retreat and recover - the heal lets you recover and stabilize faster, letting you get back on the offensive. Aura is an in-combat only heal for the most part, out of combat it's worthless, so once you start taking fire and have to retreat your heal becomes worthless. That's pretty weak.

It has a little value in 1v1 slugfests, where the extra healing can be enough to prevent you from needing to retreat first...but those situations are few and far between in competitive GvG. Usually skirmishes occur when one person needs to accomplish something and the other is trying to prevent it, and Aura isn't going to tip any of those scales.

Peace,
-CxE

frojack · Mar 10, 2007, 11:36 PM // 23:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by LightningHell

If you want to run a cover enchantment, please run something that's more constructive that's something more than just a cover enchantment.

That's very true. Nobody wants a skill on their bar that doesn't do much. However taking a more important cover would imply it has a use I require or find advantageous. Thus would I not want to protect it from being stripped also? you see the catch 22?
There are better options than Aura for cover but Aura is relatively cheap, has the fastest cast available, lasts longer than anything you could possibly want to protect, and most importantly, recharges relatively fast. it also lives in a 'local' line so there's no need to pigeon hole your secondary for a cover enchantment.
Fine it's a piss-poor choice of skills if you want self-healing, but it functions pretty well as forgettable cover doesn't it..?