Curse

Francis Crawford · May 22, 2006, 09:26 PM // 21:26

OK. This may not be the fastest farming build, but it works very well, and is usuable against lots of farming targets. I've used it against mountain trolls, avicara, grawl, ettins, minotaurs, dune burrowers, sand elementals, desert griffons, hydras, stone summit gnashers, mixed stone summit mobs, white mantle, yetis, and probably some other monster types I'm forgetting for the moment as well.

The core build, which I got in this very forum, is

Ether Renewal (Elite)
Aura of Restoration
Kinetic Armor
Armor of Earth
Earth Attunement
Stone Daggers
Aftershock
Crystal Wave

Earth 16 (12 + 3 +1)
Energy Storage 13 (12 + 1)

Weapon: Galigord's Stone Staff
Armor: Ideally, Tempest (which has a when-enchanted bonus), but any top-level armor will do.

Key playing points

1. Ideally, all four of the other enchantments should be up when you cast Ether Renewal. And you should cast five spells while Ether Renewal is up (typically 3-4 with 1 second casting times, such as Stone Daggers, and 1-2 with 3/4 second casting times, such as Aftershock or Aura of Restoration). If you meet this goal, Ether Renewal will give you 75 gross energy and 425-440 health each time you cast it, before counting the additional benefits from Earth Attunement and Aura of Restoration. Usually, that's enough to fully refill both your health and energy bars.

2. When in battle, always cast something fast enough to keep Kinetic Armor up. Even if you have to totally "waste" a spell, cast something. Stone Daggers and Aura of Restoration both come back quickly, if you need to cast SOMETHING.

3. If you are taking tons of damage even through your 152 points of AL bonus -- well, first of all, check that both Kinetic Armor and Armor of Earth are really up! Beyond that, you often can afford to spam wasted spells for the measly Aura of Restoration bonus, to tide you over until the next Ether Renewal comes around.

4. The AL bonus doesn't protect you against smiting, vampiric harm, degeneration (whether from hexes or conditions), life-stealing (vampric harm), or dark/chaos/shadow damage (favored by mesmers and necros). Against those, you have to rely on the health gain from Ether Renewal and Aura of Restoration to get you through.

These four tips are pretty much all you need unless you run up against interrupts, degeneration, and/or enchantment stripping, or too much healing. Here's how to deal with those.

5. If somebody in the enemy mob strips enchantments, kill the stripper first. If somebody in the mob casts Well of the Profane, run away IMMEDIATELY when somebody dies near you, before the well can form. If something about a mixed mob keeps you from following this rule, you probably can't handle the mob at all (and there certainly are such mobs that you can't farm with this build).

There is no skillbar tweak to protect you against enchantment stripping. Each spell you cast puts Kinetic Armor at the top of the to-be-stripped stack, and it has a 60 second recharge time. If it's stripped, recast, and stripped again vs. a high-level mob, you'll probably die soon thereafter.

6. Against heavy knockdown, either modify your skillbar (see below) or be very careful. Note that there's usually a moment when you're pretty immune to knockdown, namely when you're getting up from the last knockdown. Ether Renewal and Armor of Earth are the most important skills to DEFINITELY get off (and Aura of Restoration, but it's less difficult).

7. Against heavy interrupton, modify your skillbar. Also, note that if Stone Daggers is disabled for a 20 second period, you'll probably have to "wastefully" spam other skills, such as Aura of Restoration, for the sakes both of Kinetic Armor and Aura of Restoration.

8. There's nothing special about this build to allow you to deal with (self-)healing, other than outdamaging it and if necessary patiently waiting until the enemy seems low on energy. However, see below about how to deal with Healing Signet.

Francis Crawford · May 22, 2006, 09:29 PM // 21:29

Here are some things to look out for when playing this build.

1. Make sure you actually are firing Stone Daggers at a target who's still alive.
2. Make sure you cast something to keep Kinetic Armor up. Or, if you let it expire while traveling from place to place, don't start the next battle until it's recharged.
3. Make sure to recast Armor of Earth and Aura of Restoration promptly. Ditto Earth Attunement, although that's less crucial.

Francis Crawford · May 22, 2006, 09:52 PM // 21:52

0. If you need to add a skill, Crystal Wave is probably the one to replace.

1. Dropping Energy Storage from 13 to 12 hurts very little. However, dropping it from 12 to 11 removes 1/3 of the energy bonus you get from Ether Renewal. So generally, if you need a third attribute it should be no higher than level 6, or 7 if it's an elemental attribute and you have a minor rune for it.

2. Trolls interrupt a lot, and also cluster around you in great numbers. Against them, therefore, I replace Earth Attunement with Essence Bond. Essence Bond is always up, so it can't be intterupted at all. And since I don't ever NEED to recast it, it's perfect for spamming emergencies when Stone Daggers is disabled. Balthy's Spirit of course works as well or better than Essence Bond. Some people also favor Channeling.

3. Ettins use Healing Signet, so I replace Crystal Wave with Rust. Hitting them with Aftershock while Healing Signet is activating usually kills them on the spot. Naturally, I take Energy Storage down to 12, and put the spare points in Water Magic.

4. The ettin run from Beetletun offers a classic example of how to fight enchantment strippers. When coming up against a Caromi Tengu Wild/Caromi Tengu Scout pair, I let some or all of my enchantments lapse. Then I charge straight for the Wild, firing Stone Daggers as fast as I can. Once he's dead, I put Aura of Restoration back up, quickly get my armor spells up, then Ether Renewal. Then I blast away at the Scout (a ranger) until he's dead.

5. If you use Balanced Stance as your anti-knockdown skill, time it so that it protects Armor of Earth, Ether Renewal, and (every 60 seconds) Earth Attunement and Aura of Restoration as well. At Tactics 6, it lasts long enough to do that.

Ward of Stability is probably the better choice for anti-knockdown, but be careful to get it back up promptly (it expires before it recharges, so there's an issue with that).

6. Mantra of Resolve is an option against interrupt. I tested it once in Grenth's Footprint, and it seemed to work OK.

7. Sliver Armor is a fun alternative to Crystal Wave. It's probably a downgrade in damage against most mobs, but it's also a 6th enchantment to add yet more oomph to Ether Renewal. But Crystal Wave is fun too.

8. As has been pointed out in these forums, -2 received damage when enchanted shields work really well with the earth armor bonuses. I commonly use one of those (with +45 health when enchanted) and a Fiery Flame Spitter with a 19% enchantment extension mod, even more than I use Galigord's staff.

9. For greater damage, you might replace Stone Daggers with Tenai's Crystals (Crystal Wave clone). But this is harder to play, might be more fragile against interrupts, and would work well against pure melee mobs only, so I don't bother.

10. Against some mobs, it might be OK to replace one of the enchantments with another damage spell (maybe even Sliver Armor). But I haven't bothered figuring out where this might actually be true.

*lemming* · May 23, 2006, 04:00 AM // 04:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

5. If you use Balanced Stance as your anti-knockdown skill, time it so that it protects Armor of Earth, Ether Renewal, and (every 60 seconds) Earth Attunement and Aura of Restoration as well. At Tactics 6, it lasts long enough to do that.

Er, what?

Enchants aren't covered by stances.

Mercury Angel · May 23, 2006, 04:07 AM // 04:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by tehlemming

Er, what?

Enchants aren't covered by stances.

One of the biggest weaknesses of an Ether Renewal build is knockdowns. If you're knocked down, you lose precious time during Ether Renewal, or worse, become interrupted while trying to cast key spells needed to fuel the build.

I'd imagine that's what was meant to be implied, particularly after the reference to Ward of Stability.

Francis Crawford · May 25, 2006, 01:51 AM // 01:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mercury Angel

One of the biggest weaknesses of an Ether Renewal build is knockdowns. If you're knocked down, you lose precious time during Ether Renewal, or worse, become interrupted while trying to cast key spells needed to fuel the build.

I'd imagine that's what was meant to be implied, particularly after the reference to Ward of Stability.

Exactly. See Point #6 in my first post in this thread. Knockdown is an issue vs. hydras, sand elementals, grawl, and wurms (although a bigger problem with the classic wurm run out of Dunes of Despair is that I can't figure out how to beat the Enchanted Bows' Concussion Shot in this build).

My wife has just started using this build, and she reports liking Balanced Stance better than Ward of Stability. I lean slightly the same way. The reason is that you can get knocked down while casting Ward of Stability, but you can always put up Balanced Stance to protect your Ether Renewal spamfest (including any enchantment refreshing that you need to do, i.e. Armor of Earth, sometimes Aura of Restoration, and sometimes Earth Attunement or Channeling).

One thing my wife has innovated is Well of Suffering in the optional Crystal Wave skill slot. She reports good success with it, although the numbers don't look compelling enough to me to obviously make up for its conditional nature (gotta kill the first victim before you can use it).

Francis Crawford · May 25, 2006, 02:35 AM // 02:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mercury Angel

One of the biggest weaknesses of an Ether Renewal build is knockdowns. If you're knocked down, you lose precious time during Ether Renewal, or worse, become interrupted while trying to cast key spells needed to fuel the build.

I'd imagine that's what was meant to be implied, particularly after the reference to Ward of Stability.

Exactly. See Point #6 in my first post in this thread. Knockdown is an issue vs. hydras, sand elementals, grawl, and wurms (although a bigger problem with the classic wurm run out of Dunes of Despair is that I can't figure out how to beat the Enchanted Bows' Concussion Shot in this build).

My wife has just started using this build, and she reports liking Balanced Stance better than Ward of Stability. I lean slightly the same way. The reason is that you can get knocked down while casting Ward of Stability, but you can always put up Balanced Stance to protect your Ether Renewal spamfest (including any enchantment refreshing that you need to do, i.e. Armor of Earth, sometimes Aura of Restoration, and sometimes Earth Attunement or Channeling).

One thing my wife has innovated is Well of Suffering in the optional Crystal Wave skill slot. She reports good success with it, although the numbers don't look compelling enough to me to obviously make up for its conditional nature (gotta kill the first victim before you can use it).

Ilya Khan · May 25, 2006, 03:45 AM // 03:45

Use Sliver armor for insane damage. With JUST Sliver armor and arcane echo, you can utilize this build to destroy just about any group.

Francis Crawford · May 25, 2006, 11:41 AM // 11:41

I just tested this build against Titans (in North Kryta Province), and the early results are that it works, but is slow. In both cases I subbed Mantra of Resolve in for Crystal Wave, because of the Maelstroms from the Water Born Titans. In one of the two cases I also subbed in Power Drain for Aftershock, which helped against Maelstroms and might have helped against the Rotting Titans' Lingering Curse had I had the guts to try.

Why is it slow? Well, the Earth Born Titans have Ward Against Elements, and when that's dup Stone Daggers only does 26 damage. Even when it's not present, Stone Daggers only does 38. Also, when Maelstrom's up you want to cast as little as possible, as each spell costs you 8 extra energy due to Mantra of Resolve.

With too small a sample size to prove anything, the drops felt like armor wasn't much better than the ettins', but other drops were 2-2.5X in value.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ilya Khan

Use Sliver armor for insane damage. With JUST Sliver armor and arcane echo, you can utilize this build to destroy just about any group.

Arcane Echo + Sliver Armor = Sliver Armor about 3X/minute. I think it lasts 13 seconds or so, with Galigord's?

By way of comparison, Arcane Echo + Aftershock = Aftershock about 8X/minute (more, actually).

So the comparison is Aftershock vs. about 5 seconds of Sliver Armor. Sliver Armor does NOT win, unless the difference between "nearby" and "adjacent" is really important.

But either one is pretty effective. And Aftershock + Sliver Armor certainly seems better than Aftershock + Arcane Echo.

pegasux · May 25, 2006, 12:22 PM // 12:22

I find that a better energy management skill is Balthazars Spirit or Channeling in this build. IMO the only time Earth Attunement is better is when you are are duofarming and don't have as many on you. Also a much better weapon setup is a sword or axe with a +5NRG with a 20% enchant pommel and a -2 DMG while enchanted shield. These make all the difference in the world.

Lord Cooper · May 25, 2006, 12:56 PM // 12:56

you could always swap ether renewal for obsidian flesh so that you cant be targetted for stripping and hexes i guess

Francis Crawford · May 25, 2006, 01:02 PM // 13:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lord Cooper

you could always swap ether renewal for obsidian flesh so that you cant be targetted for stripping and hexes i guess

That's a totally different build.

For one thing, Obsidian Flesh doesn't stay permanently up unless you go Ele/R and use Serpent's quickness, or unless you can get everything dead in the 70ish seconds of semi-permanence Arcane Echo gives you.

For another thing, Ether Renewal gives a ton of both health and energy, neither of which are supplied by Obsidian Flesh.

Quote:

Originally Posted by pegasux

I find that a better energy management skill is Balthazars Spirit or Channeling in this build. IMO the only time Earth Attunement is better is when you are are duofarming and don't have as many on you. Also a much better weapon setup is a sword or axe with a +5NRG with a 20% enchant pommel and a -2 DMG while enchanted shield. These make all the difference in the world.

Maybe I aggro fewer things at a time than you do, or maybe I just get into more shootouts with spellcasting enemies outside of Channeling range, but my experience isn't the same as yours.

I think Balthazar's Spirit is better pretty much everywhere I've tried this build in the Shiverpeaks. But in warmer climates, Earth Attunement is often more effective.

Lord Cooper · May 25, 2006, 01:15 PM // 13:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

That's a totally different build.

For one thing, Obsidian Flesh doesn't stay permanently up unless you go Ele/R and use Serpent's quickness, or unless you can get everything dead in the 70ish seconds of semi-permanence Arcane Echo gives you.

For another thing, Ether Renewal gives a ton of both health and energy, neither of which are supplied by Obsidian Flesh.

i know thats a different build i was just attempting to adress the inherent weakness in all geo tank builds ie their reliance on enchantments and vulnerability to strippers. by sacrificing a damage spell, lets say crystal wave, and introducing serpents quickness you can make yourself virtually immune to all direct damage spells and you get an additional 20 armour as well (assuming im reading the skill description correctly). energy management will be partially taken care of by earth attunement and the limited healing you will require is handled by aura of restoration. as this build is constantly casting thats around 20 health every second or so spamming stone daggers.

its more a prevention philosophy than cure. as long as you dont bottom out your energy pool in the middle of a fight i dont see why it shouldnt work

Francis Crawford · May 25, 2006, 02:25 PM // 14:25

The best example of what you're talking about is the Mr. Frosty build -- http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...d.php?t=118850 -- which apparently works great against Ice Imps due to the energy management trick of Storm Chaser. However, I've tried the same build against other elementalist mobs, and energy management was a real issue.

Anyhow, what I love about the build in this thread is its versatility and robustness. If you make a mistake or something gets interrupted or stripped, you can often prevail. I've faced 9 trolls with 2 or 3 skills Disrupting Chopped, and killed them all. Ward of Stability lost to knockdown on a recasting? You'll probably live too. But get your timing off even by a couple of seconds in the Obsidian Flesh/Serpent's Quickness build, and you're dead.

Actually, you don't need extra energy management at all.

I just went out boosting my Skill Hunter score with a cap sig in the place of Earth Attunement and Sliver Armor in place of Crystal Wave, so I still had five enchantments. I cleared the troll cave twice (once killing 9 trolls at once), killed the warrior boss twice, killed the ranger boss once, ran around outside (on the second run), killed more trolls, killed some avicara, killed one lonely grawl, opened a chest, got a Sup Death, got a second Sup Death from one of the next avicara I killed, and generally had a fine ol' time.

I did die a few times, however -- once when I ran out too far and let a Tundra Giant fluster me while I was dealing with the ranger boss (ending the first run), once at the start of the second run when too many Savage Slashes and/or careless errors did me in, and finally to a mob of many avicara mesmers that I couldn't beat.

When you can make errors solo skill capping and get away with it, that's a very robust build ...

EDIT: I should add that energy DID run badly low a few times, and I wished I had one or two +15/-1 regen items in one of the weapon slots. But I just was patient until my energy built far enough back up to do the Ether Renewal chain, and all was good.

easyg · May 25, 2006, 05:15 PM // 17:15

I use a similar build....

Ether Renewal
Stone Daggers
Crystal Wave
Teinai's Crystals
Aura of Restoration
Kinetic Armour
Armour of Earth
Essence Bond

Earch Magic: 16 (12+1+3_
Energy Storage: 15 (12+3)

Essence Bond is always on obviously. Against hydras, I put up all the enchantments and aggro about 4-7 hydras. Energy stream from Essence Bond is very nice.

I time Ether Renewal so that I kill the last hydra with it on and so have near full energy for the next mob. Usually there's another mob nearby which I can get to pretty fast. If Kinetic Armour starts to fade while I am getting to the other mob, I cast Aura of Restoration.

At the very least I have Essence Bond, Aura of Restoration and Kinetic Armour up all the time.

Effective but a little slow. Too bad the drops in Skyward are so terrible now

pork soldier · May 25, 2006, 11:51 PM // 23:51

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

So the comparison is Aftershock vs. about 5 seconds of Sliver Armor. Sliver Armor does NOT win, unless the difference between "nearby" and "adjacent" is really important.

But either one is pretty effective. And Aftershock + Sliver Armor certainly seems better than Aftershock + Arcane Echo.

Sliver armor doesn't cause a mob to scatter the way that spamming aftershock + crystal wave will.

Francis Crawford · May 26, 2006, 08:28 PM // 20:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by easyg

I use a similar build....

Ether Renewal
Stone Daggers
Crystal Wave
Teinai's Crystals
Aura of Restoration
Kinetic Armour
Armour of Earth
Essence Bond

Earch Magic: 16 (12+1+3_
Energy Storage: 15 (12+3)

Since one of the main substitutions in the original build is Essence Bond (or Balthazar's Spirit, better in a few cases and never worse than Essence Bond, but in most cases the same), the main differences are:

1. Tenai's Crystals instead of Aftershock
2. Sup rune of Energy Storage.

With the Sup rune you get:

A. 470 instead of 425 health each time you cast Ether Renewal, plus the Aura of Restoration benefit. I don't see where that gains you anything if you've taken your max health down by having a second Sup Rune.

B. A few more energy each time you cast a spell between Ether Renewals.

C. 6 incremental max energy. Since Ether Renewal often fills you back up to max energy, that's energy you can keep reusing.

D. 0 incremental energy per casting of Ether Renewal.

Hmm. I'll have to rethink that one.

As for Tenai's Crystals (clone of Crystal Wave) vs. Aftershock -- I'm pretty sure that vs. hydras two Aftershocks do more damage than one Crystal Wave. So I don't see the point of that one. What am I missing?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Francis Crawford

Actually, you don't need extra energy management at all.

I just went out boosting my Skill Hunter score with a cap sig in the place of Earth Attunement and Sliver Armor in place of Crystal Wave, so I still had five enchantments. I cleared the troll cave twice (once killing 9 trolls at once), killed the warrior boss twice, killed the ranger boss once, ran around outside (on the second run), killed more trolls, killed some avicara, killed one lonely grawl, opened a chest, got a Sup Death, got a second Sup Death from one of the next avicara I killed, and generally had a fine ol' time.

I did die a few times, however -- once when I ran out too far and let a Tundra Giant fluster me while I was dealing with the ranger boss (ending the first run), once at the start of the second run when too many Savage Slashes and/or careless errors did me in, and finally to a mob of many avicara mesmers that I couldn't beat.

When you can make errors solo skill capping and get away with it, that's a very robust build ...

EDIT: I should add that energy DID run badly low a few times, and I wished I had one or two +15/-1 regen items in one of the weapon slots. But I just was patient until my energy built far enough back up to do the Ether Renewal chain, and all was good.

So based on this, I tested something one might call Slivernewal. My wife also tested something similar. Her's was slightly different from mine, in that she doesn't have Crystal Wave (and I'm not sure what she used in its place), but anyhow the results of the test were similar -- it worked, but the time spent hanging on from running out of energy until it came back meant the whole thing was no faster, even with the extra damage. I suspect it could be faster if properly played, but probably would like to take along a weapon set with 27 or more energy/-1 or more regeneration just in case Ether Renewal is ever disrupted.

Everything in Slivernewal is like the original build of this thread, except that the skillset is now:

Ether Renewal (E)
Aura of Restoration
Kinetic Armor
Armor of Earth
Sliver Armor
Stone Daggers
Aftershock
Crystal Wave

One key playing point is this -- while in the original build you can just spam way with Stone Daggers, in this build you can't. Use Stone Daggers mainly to power Ether Renewal or to keep Kinetic Armor up, or to finish a near-dead enemy. Only spam it when healing or enchantment stripping comes into play.

Also, I wouldn't suggest trying this build against Ettins (Irrestible Blow vs. Sliver Armor's blocking = knockdown) or in any case where energy is particularly stressed (e.g., if you're running Mantra of Resolve against Maelstrom, take one of the energy management enchantments).

easyg · May 29, 2006, 07:39 AM // 07:39

Re: aftershock.

Well, I use aftershock sometimes, and what I noticed is that big monsters (like hydras) have to be pressed up right next to me for them to take any damage from this skill.

With Crystal Wave and Tenai's Crystal, they don't have to be right next to me (despite what the skill description says). I wonder if anyone else has noticed this?

jagwire · May 29, 2006, 09:00 PM // 21:00

I normally use the following:
whirlwind
aftershock
stone daggers
armor of earth
kinetic armor
channeling
aura of restoration
ether renewal
or i sub whirlwind / aftershock with silver armor and crystaline wave, depending on what i am fighting.

NOTE: the silver armor crystaline wave build can actually solo a guild lords bodyguards and the guild lord in less than a minute. The dual firestorms kill the first bguard in less than the time that silver armor lasts. It's fun

Francis Crawford · May 30, 2006, 11:01 AM // 11:01

I tested Slivernewal on vermin (Cantha) and minotaurs. It works quite well (6000 gold/hour is a conservative estimate in each case, I think).

For the vermin I subbed in Balanced Stance for Crystal Wave. There wasn't any need to be cautious on aggro or anything. I just waded in, and at the end there were 19-20 drops around me. I've done this a few times now.

The +45 health from the collector's shield really helps with the vermin, so discipline about energy usage is wise. When I get too sloppy, I do tend to die.

Against the minotaurs, you can go crazy on the energy usage, almost. Then just zone out and don't worry about the slow recharge.