Curse

Minus Sign · Jul 24, 2006, 04:51 AM // 04:51

There are a lot of farm teams running around in Vasburg Armory of late, and a lot of elitism to boot. A few nights ago I saw two separate groups spamming for experienced tanks, one of them telling newbs not to even bother asking for an invite. Since it pisses me off when people want to be greedy (and stupid; this type of attitude just promotes newbs to bluff/lie their way into the team, die, getting you killed in the process to which no1 gets a green!) I broke from my solo farms and spent a while in some random 4-man PuGs. They’re a lot easier, and quite fast, so I see the appeal. For those of you who want to break into the Armory farm, here’s a list of sample builds that I’ve used and found to work quite well, and a rundown of how to use them.

Monk/N (healer)

10 Blood
13 Healing (major rune)
14 DF (superior rune+headpiece)
1 Prot (why not?)

Heal Other
Ethereal Light
Dwayna’s Kiss
Healing Touch
Offering of Blood {E}
Holy Veil
Mend Ailment
Rebirth

Armor: all Aesthetic for added mana.

A standard spike heal build; try to find a place where you can obstruct arrow attacks, allowing you to spam Ethereal Light with safety. The high Divine Favor means you heal with every spell but your E manager, so even Holy Veil and Mend Ailment are packing a little punch. I prefer Holy Veil because of its quick recycle and synergy with Kiss, your second spam heal. Heal Other is for the first big blast as you run to help the tank (who should be alive and kicking for quite some time and able to wait while the other 3 members organize and sweep in) but TOUCH IS NOT JUST FOR SELF! Stick close to your necros through the fighting, and you have 4 spam heals that can be quickly applied once agro shifts to other players (it will here; gear farms are dead).

N/Mo (MM)

16 Death (super rune+headpiece)
10 Soul Reaping (minor rune)
9 healing Prayers
rest/prot

Vampiric Minions
Flesh Golem {E}
Malign Intervention
BotM
Death Nova/Deadly Swarm
Verata’s Gaze
Heal Area
Rebirth/Deadly Swarm

Factions Minion Armor and bloodstained boots…of course

I love what they’ve done with the Vampiric Minions. BoTM spams during combat are a non-issue, meaning your horde stays alive to keep YOU alive. Still, it’s nice to have Heal Area around to self-manage during the long walk from one fight to the next. Malign Intervention is useful in the early areas, keeping Krin from looting your corpses and setting up your next sneak attack.

Kick gaze on any Vampires you don’t control for a 5-10 mana minion from those pesky AI Corpse looters. Also a nice spell to have if the worst should happen and you need to retake your horde. I really don’t know why more MMs aren’t using this combo. Maybe they will soon

Since everyone else is relying on your minions to do the bulk of the damage, you can be excused your rez to bring a little more. I prefer Nova over Deadly Swarm and, since it has yet to come up, have not missed the rebirth. It’s your call: even MORE damage? Or a rez.

N/Me (SS)

16 Curses (superior rune+headpiece)
10 Soul Reaping (minor Rune)
10 Blood

Spiteful Spirit
Spinal Shivers
Weaken Armor
Barbs
Arcane Echo
Vampiric Gaze
Blood Ritual
Rez sig

I like the AL 70 armor with holy damage restriction. I find it works better than Scar armor since my SS will keep my mana up anyway.

If you’ve SS necroed, you know the drill. AEcho to Spiteful Spirit on anything that clumps together…aw heck, just spam the bugger on anything you can FIND! Weaken Armor, Spinal and Barbs are for Boss fights and while your two Elites are recycling. I prefer Barbs to Mark of Pain because it makes bosses drop to a good MM like

Wa/N/Mo(your perefference)

13 Strength (Major Rune
12 Sword (minor rune)
11 tactics (minor rune)

Auspicious Parry/Grenth’s Balance
Pure Strike
Sun and Moon Slash
Watch Yourself
Dorlak Signet
Heal Sig
Purge Conditions/Plague Touch
Rebirth/Rez Sig

Why 13 strength? Because the recommended farming armor for this hop is Sentinels. 100AL against anything+20 (Watch Yourself) and another 36 from Dorlak Sig makes you a 156 heavy armored agro machine! The two alts I’ve run here are Monk and Necro, both equally powerful due to the Elites I prefer.

With Alt monk, Auspicious parry makes an easy stance evade, allowing me to keep Watch up all the time. Since my stance is up and down on a regular basis, Pure Strike does plenty of unavoidable damage with Sun and Moon Strike fast behind.

I have no interrupt. Instead, I have an Icy Dragon Sword of Defense (eww; did I say 156? I should have said 161!) and trust to my SS to cast Spinal Shivers on the right target. This trust is not misplaced if you ask nicely that they bring it for your sword. Besides, they should be anyway. Between your quick slashes and the two necro wands, anything that needs to be kept quiet is shut up shut down and on the ground in 10 seconds.

With GB on the Wa/Necro build, you might think that damage suffers. Think again! Just ask the group to wait until your call, let the mob grind you flat and then call target: “I’m Casting Grenth’s Balance on %t!” Followed up by SS combos and the minion horde, your target will be on the pushing up daisies in no time. Also; bring a long or flatbow to assist pulls.

The run:

We start with the Scar Eater, but we’re not ending there. We’re hitting a buttload of bosses today, and the real first stop should be the Priest at the rez shrine. For 100g (easily made back by the end) you can have him buff you for a +25 HP boost and 3 pips of life regen. Nice? Very nice; so it’s in your favor (no pun intended) to be on his good side. Otherwise, it’s a 200g buff.

Your tank should run out while the team gets their buff, grab the agro of the mob on the hill and run back to the shrine. The mob will follow, allowing the rez NPCs to help you kill them off quickly (those Kurzicks; what a gang). That very quick and easy fight out of the way, your MM should have around four minions. If you see tigers, kill them too for a boost to the horde while he spasm Death Nova on his brood in preparation for the next assault. There is another group Dragon moss, Undergrowth and Kirin that can pose problems if you try to avoid them. Its easier to kill than avoid with a 4-man, so have your tank run in and agro, follwed by the MM and SS to blast this group into the ground. Doing this, you should have 10 minions with death nova ready to face your first boss. Now that you have the trick, do it again; tank first to agro, SS and MM following his target call followed by the Monk casting Heal Other right behind them. Lather Rinse repeat throughout the farm

And there’s really nothing hard about Scar when you hit him. With the Death Novas blasting as minions crash, corpses will be easy to come by. Thanks to Malign Intervention, any monk boss finds his heals severely dampened as your horde swells (just don’t forget to Gaze your new babies).

Save the boss for last, monk or not, with the Spinal/Barbs combo discussed above. His healing won’t be much issue with two castors cold damage wanding him and that IDS. My monk has a Rajazan’s Fervor so she can get in on the fun to.

With Scary on the ground, make your way West toward the Time Eater and Co., taking out groups as you pass. This helps keep your horde fresh, but supplies valuable kiting room for your castors too. Don’t skimp or try to skip. The horde will agro, you’ll face 2 groups and things can turn a little ugly because of it.

Before you reach the mesmer boss, you’ll encounter your first group of wardens. Contrary to popular opinion, the most dangerous warden is the Earth and Mind. Minds are bad for their interrupt, a dangerous weapon to face with 3 second cast summon spells at a slow recycle. Earth is just as bad, if not worse. The AoE they drop seems to favor your horde, so it behooves your team to make them say die before they can get off more than one. Because minions target the first enemy they see, they will probably be busy on warrior types for a while, leaving it up to your SS and tank to take out these deadly backline castors.

1 way to do this well: SS and monks seem to have an aversion to following a tank into the fray. Because trappers love to crip and you HAVE GOT TO KILL THOSE EARTH AND MIND WARDENS. It’s really up to you to save the day; that or hoep your Mm can re-up his horde is an unlucky AoE/interrupt shuts him down. Follow your tank in, mending his crip as he trail blazes through and hex like mad…then run for the hills. Thanks to that lovely cleaning sweep I suggested above, you can run to safety very quickly, allowing agro to shift back to your tank. If you run far enough, warrior types wills top chasing you in favor of the tank that has remained behind. Besides, if mellee Ai runs too far afield, it runs afoul of another nasty surprise. I never told you what the MM is doing. Well; he’s been spamming BoTM and Heal Area on self while you handle the early part of the fight. They want to chase? Let them chase you to HIM!

Doing this, most warden parties fall quickly, split as they are. This strat works best with the GB Warrior, for his superior self healing and long standing solo power; plopping his own crip on castors to keep them from kiting to the other wardens’ aid is nice too. Hmm, maybe that Whammo isn’t so great after all…

Dothis with time eater though, and he’ll probably pwn your face. Expect lost minions over time and in boss fights, but choose your ground. Using the flatbow, the Warrior should pull and try to bottleneck on your side of the bridge, with minions for support. Thanks to death Nova, you can clean house quickly and keep the rearguard castors safe.

Time Eater is, if not the hardest, the most annoying boss in the farm thanks to Diversion spams. Since its easier to leave him till last again, this means you’ll be seeing this annoying skill over your head on a regular basis. Watch your status bar and break cast when you do. The difference between a dead boss and a rezzing party is the skill he shuts down, so do your best not to let him shut down any.

He has no hex removal though, so your SS combo will hit him hard, and Spinal laid on him will guarantee a quick and easy kill.

Which leads us to Flower Spirit Garden. Running in on this boss makes a pile her friends drop from above, ready to fight. So? Why run to her? Use that flatbow again and the warrior can pull Flower to a safe area about halfway between where Time eater fell and where she’s chosen to roost. Once she is there, have the minions charge in for a quick and easy kill.

Head north to Jayne Forestlight.

While its possible to pull Jayne, this requires patience and time; two things your horde doesn’t have. Better to try the warden trick described above and pull most of her warden escort out of the area for you to pound without her help. While there is usually a ranger warden hiding in the back with her by the time you’re done, he falls quickly to your advancing horde and warrior, allowing you to shutdown Jayne and kill her (and him) with ease.

After that, the farm is an honest cake walk. Make your way to Bramble Everthorn, sweeping as you go to avoid bad agro issues during the fight, and he will usually fall halfway through the battle.

Continue west to Tembarr Treefall for a quick and easy war. Poised as he is in the little niche, its easiest to use the corner as a safe cast area, so wars should pull and make a wall at the bend. This obstructs those arrows I told you monks about, making Elight spams easy breezy.

Then it’s a quick run south to Spiritwood Mossbeard. If you haven’t figured out how to handle Kirin/Dragon moss/undergrowths by now, I can’t help you.

By and large, the farm is very easy and quick 4-man.

Play Fair and Good Gaming

“-“ Minus Sign