Curse

Stoella · May 21, 2009, 08:58 PM // 20:58

My opinion : Power block wins. Psychic distraction is useful, and all, but still ... PB wins.

Discuss

Gift3d · May 21, 2009, 09:29 PM // 21:29

Seems like you have a very one-dimensional mind when it comes to HA. Don't worry, it's more common than you may think. You do, though, have many things to look forward to. Such as: understanding the balance of skills between an 8-player party, offense/defense balancing, and teamwork!

BTW since IWAY is the meta in HA, 9 times out of 10 PD would be better. Ouch, that just happened.

Hang in there, champ.

Betrayer of Wind · May 21, 2009, 09:30 PM // 21:30

Powerblock is usually more powerful,since you can shutdown a caster for about 15sec and still use your other skills meanwhile.
PD is more versatile since it can interrupt just any skill and is used to interrupt claim resource on HA.
I prefer PB since you can pretty much keep a target constantly shutdown and other targets with diversion and stuff adding even more pressure.

edit:How come PD is better against IWAY since u can keep one of the healers completely shutdown and the other with shame/diversion etc using PB?

wingknight · May 21, 2009, 09:48 PM // 21:48

Quote:

edit:How come PD is better against IWAY since u can keep one of the healers completely shutdown and the other with shame/diversion etc using PB?

The name is Ranger. Spirit ranger.

And for the record, there is really no reason to compare these two skills. They are simply used based upon what you want to achive. If as for an example the current GvG meta would be using VoR mesmers or another slow caster, PD would not be the first skill i would think of as a counter. Then again, Its all up to you what you want to achive.

Betrayer of Wind · May 21, 2009, 09:52 PM // 21:52

one of the frontliners can and should take care of it.you can still interrupt some spirits with CoF

wingknight · May 21, 2009, 09:54 PM // 21:54

I bet that you make many IWAYs happy by removing your frontline preassure.

tyrant rex · May 21, 2009, 09:54 PM // 21:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by wingknight

The name is Ranger. Spirit ranger.

the name is ele.fire ele.?Oo

wingknight · May 21, 2009, 09:59 PM // 21:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by tyrant rex

the name is ele.fire ele.?Oo

We were speaking about why PD is more useful against Iway then PB. Not many Iways use fire eles as far as im concerned

tyrant rex · May 21, 2009, 10:01 PM // 22:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by wingknight

We were speaking about why PD is more useful against Iway then PB. Not many Iways use fire eles as far as im concerned

most balanced teams that run a mes also run a fire ele , let the ele take care of the spirits its not like the ele dmng is going to do shit to wars and will prolly be counterproductive and kill there pets

what pd has been primarily used for is ghost rupting/hardress but the fact is every team has 1 if not 2 songs and you basically get once chance to cap so a cof is just as effective and can get hardreses as well pblock is just overall much more devastating then pd

Betrayer of Wind · May 21, 2009, 10:16 PM // 22:16

imo PB>PD against iway,lets say the spirit ranger can keep the spirits up.
The mesmer will PB one of the ele healers,thus disabling all the healing and spirits.with QZ up PB will recharge in 10 seconds and so will power-drain etc for energy management purposes.Its counter-productive to powerblock the other ele because the one who was first pb'd has full energy and will make sure to spam everything he can meanwhile.If you powerblock it for a second time,the other ele will have a hard time managing energy healing everyone especially himself and the PnH monk.
Shame can still be cast with nature's renewal up if you get a halved casting time,otherwise it'll prob be disrupted so its really lucky.

As for PD,ok you disabled the ranger,but the eles are still very resilient with EP and their own spirits which will burn you alot of energy to interrupt.

Both have their pros and cons,but i'd still go with PB.

Killed u man · May 21, 2009, 11:11 PM // 23:11

1) There is no better skill.

2) It all depends on the situation.

For example:

Against IWAY, I'll agree that Acrane Echo PB on both Ele's will shut them down long enough for you... Well for you to easily get 3+ kills, and thus giving you a nice edge.

In HoH, however, a PB can't interrupt a Ghostly the way a PD can. I've seen more than enough matches where a team won because their PD managed to Cry the song, and then PD the enemy ghostly (There only was 1 left) for 8+ times, untill theirs rezzed again.

A PB simply can't do that, at all.

In HoH, PD is better, hands down. On the way to HoH, PB is "easier", but everything that can be achieved through PB can also be achieved through PD. (It's just harder)

A diversion on an E/Rt pretty much counts as a 6 second disable on all skills, and he can then PD the other E/Rt. Thus giving you more than enough windows to kill.

Anyways, as I said, No skill is really better, but in HoH, you'll definatly be glad you brought PD instead of PB...

Krill · May 21, 2009, 11:15 PM // 23:15

It's pretty sad how much consideration you have to put into a build for how it will perform against iway. Indeed the #1 reason for not taking p-block over PD is that you'll end up having to devote an offensive character to spirit hunting if you can't interrupt oath shot and prevent spirits from going up. For most groups this means that over the course of 5-15 minutes the iway group will d-chop enough skills to pressure you out while you can't kill anything. However, if you're playing with a regular group that has a strategy against iway, p-blocking a prism can make dropping them easy.

Against non-iway groups p-block and PD are equally good with pluses and minuses. The big thing with p-block is having the confidence to interrupt key skills like wards without getting faked out and not needing to interrupt claim multiple times since you only have one shot to interrupt and cap.

Another possibility that has been out of meta for a long time is glyph of renewal dom. Against iways and on relic runs you can glyph CoF to keep spirits / wards down and against other groups you can glyph shame or diversion to shit on monks all day. The trade off is losing your secondary and the possibility of glyph being interrupted.

dr love · May 21, 2009, 11:39 PM // 23:39

i think killed you man summed it up well. PB is great for winning kill matches, but PD is great for altar cap and relic runs

Phe Belladona · May 22, 2009, 06:35 AM // 06:35

PD is better throughout HA, with a fast recharge you can interupt faked wards, lots of spirits to hit, hard reses and res sigs, ghostly interupting, always having an interupt rdy for w/e needs doing (such as changing targets to get several important individual skills) and its got great synergy with channeling ^^

PBlock might let bad teams still kill easier on kill maps but thats not a reason to take it over the versatility and strength of PD

Destiny2097 · May 22, 2009, 08:35 AM // 08:35

PB is a very useful skill, but I can't begin to tell you the number of times that a PD has helped me win alter maps...sometimes one cof simply isn't enough. Also, PD is useful for interrupting other stuff like hard res i.e. dps.

Against IWAY the weapons are the main thing you want to shut down, and since it's a 1sec cast its not that hard for a PD or PB to do unless the ele gets fast cast. PB is definately good for shutting down the ele's, preferably the one with two weapons. PD can easily shut down the ranger if thats the tactic...PD spirits then PD oath. In my usual teams we have the PD on the ele with two weapons, and if we are using a ranger then he goes on the other ele.

As Betrayer of Wind said, using a frontline is more reliable for taking down spirits than an ele. If the weapons on eles are interrupted/down you should get kills eventually even with just one frontline.

In summary, if you want to farm the first few maps then use PB. If you want to hold halls use PD.

jana_the_stranger · May 22, 2009, 09:49 AM // 09:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by tyrant rex

the name is ele.fire ele.?Oo

dchop dshot no comment

Krill · May 22, 2009, 03:07 PM // 15:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Destiny2097

In summary, if you want to farm the first few maps then use PB. If you want to hold halls use PD.

Wouldn't really relegate p-block to farming, in almost every scenario where PD is good p-block is also good. For instance, koth PD is the best skill available for claim but p-blocking a prot can make dropping a ghost hilariously easy. Relic runs if you block earth the first time that disables WaF and grasping at the same time and doesn't disable diversion which is very useful at times. Cap points in HoH, same thing as koth almost, p-blocking a prot makes killing ghosts easy so you can cap middle.

There's no rule against running a mesmer and ranger either

Ec]-[oMaN · May 22, 2009, 03:07 PM // 15:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by dbulger

i think killed you man summed it up well. PB is great for winning kill matches, but PD is great for altar cap and relic runs

This.

My view though is in the long run, PD is probably going to make your life easier on Alter/Relic runs which is further down the road within HA and can be more problematic trying to control the abundance of skills popping off.
Kill matches are usually pretty easy, all PB is going to do is maybe speed up the process. Also depends on build too and the players, you can probably do the same amount of dmg with PB instead of the PD, just PB a key player that will force a kill on another key player, you can always KD/d chop a ghost or song, and slot a cry on the PB block and still do well except you're going to kill a whole lot faster.

sarra june · May 22, 2009, 07:59 PM // 19:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by dbulger

i think killed you man summed it up well. PB is great for winning kill matches, but PD is great for altar cap and relic runs

i also second that.

but what it comes down to for my own personal choice is that mesmering is not about just general shut down - it's about realizing what is most important to be shut down at any moment in time, and shutting that down with whichever appropriate method on your bar. You can of course have a well timed pblock but you will only be shutting down one characer, when with pd you can hit the key skills of the whole team all match long.

If you wanted to just disable skill bars you could take echo, arcane echo, blackout, arcane larceny, arcane thievery, etc etc. There's a reason we don't just take two blackout characters to perma shut down monks...

I would only bring powerblock if the build synergized particularly well with it... like if we had a ranger so the build had more hard rupts.

Ec]-[oMaN · May 22, 2009, 10:06 PM // 22:06

Quote:

Originally Posted by sarra june

There's a reason we don't just take two blackout characters to perma shut down monks...

Yeah you just PB one of them and diversion/shame shit stomp the other while your frontline kills something and the mes still has 2x interrupts just after or during that sequence..... 3 secs all you need. Think you've already missed the point where power block disables a skill bar with only one skill, at cast range instant interupt and doesnt black the mesmers bar out.