Curse

HotPocket · Apr 14, 2009, 01:16 AM // 01:16

So... after feeling like I have experienced most of what RA and other "noob" PvP areas. I am getting more interested in things like, especially as a transition from RA, TA teams and eventually HA. Sense I am a mediocre war and a worse monk (the two classes almost universally found in TA), I have decided that I want to learn to interrupt better. I am planning on playing a PB mes (especially sense my guild is going into GvG) and maybe an MB ranger in TA. So, my question is, what advice to you have on interrupting? I want to get to the point where I can easily interrupt 1+ second cast times and interrupt 3/4s cast times frequently enough. I have trouble getting anything that is 1 or below, and the way I usually interrupt is wait for something with a slower cast time than the rest of that person's bar (like cure hex or deny hexes) and click one of the binded keys on my mouse (I have a gaming mouse with many extra buttons). However, 40/40 sets screw me up a bit as, sense I know what skills are easy to interrupt, a lot of the times I will click too late for the halved activation time.

In conclusion:

What are some tips that you find useful for interruptions?

Is there any where that I can practice this for a PvP-only char besides something like RA?

lewis91 · Apr 14, 2009, 01:35 AM // 01:35

A bar dedicated to full interrupting like Powerblock is seriously unadvised, becasue the only person worth interrupting is always the monk, which in most cases every skill a monk carries is from 1/4th to 1second, WoH being 3/4. These skills are hard to interrupt due to your personal reaction times, which generally cannot be improved unless you decided to poor sugar into a glass and drink it. And even if you do have the reaction times, its then down to your ping, if your averaging 100ms thats 1/10th of a second lost already.

Best thing to play if your serious about interruption, is a ranger, because you can spam savage and hope to get a good interrupt in. Or pray to get dist shot in on WoH. Even this can be hard because monks tend use alot of stances to block.

So either way interrupt chars are very hard to play. And i don't really know a good place to test interrupts, rather than having a friend 1v1 you, and he just sits there healing himself. But even that is biast becasue Pressing 1 2 3 4 is predictable and you'l be able to work out a pattern and then interrupt. In practice is very hard, you need to watch enemy party health, and then predict when the monk is going to use a healing skill and then summon the reaction time to take him down.

All in all, im sure theres more annoying/powerful uses for a mes to play.

Although cure hex i find is an okish one to interrupt and ive had it a few times, so if your a mes carry a hex annoying build like VoR Backfire, slap a cover hex on the monk, and then wait for "cure hex" then use cry of frustration or powerspike.

God_Hand · Apr 14, 2009, 01:37 AM // 01:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by HotPocket

However, 40/40 sets screw me up a bit as, sense I know what skills are easy to interrupt, a lot of the times I will click too late for the halved activation time.

In conclusion:

What are some tips that you find useful for interruptions?

Is there any where that I can practice this for a PvP-only char besides something like RA?

1st off, that the whole point of 40/40 sets.

2nd, you're not going to just "get good" overnight. Practice. As you keep playing, your reflexes will improve bit by bit. If you're a Ranger interrupter, picking a Recurve bow will work best to decrease the flight time of your arrows. Mesmer ints are almost instant with fast casting. 3/4 second casts are usually the breaking point when it comes to reliable interrupts, as anything faster is just too much for human reflex. Just keep plugging away at it, and you'll get the hang of it.

3rd, know WHAT to interrupt. Interrupting a Necromancer's "Faintheartedness" is going to impact you much more than interrupting, say, Parasitic Bond, or Vampiric Gaze. Of course, you should try to interrupt healers if at all possible. Interrupting Flare spam won't do you any good if enemy monks are erasing all the damage you're doing.

Power Block Word of Healing, and you're golden.

EDIT: Love your avatar, HotPocket.

HotPocket · Apr 14, 2009, 01:39 AM // 01:39

My ping -should- get better (just upgraded my internet... we'll see if it makes a difference)

I've tried ranger as well, but mesmers were really my first love but I guess I'll practice some more and try to be more attentive to what's surrounding me in the match.

Icy The Mage · Apr 14, 2009, 01:39 AM // 01:39

RA is there for an awesome reason; to test anything and everything. It is probably the best place that you can go to test, although the master of healing as well as the other masters on the isle of the nameless have pretty generic bars that you would find (at least cast times). Try going up against those

Nature Wraith · Apr 14, 2009, 01:43 AM // 01:43

http://www.teamquitter.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=3797

helpful guide (read it all)

Lux Aeterna · Apr 14, 2009, 01:45 AM // 01:45

Just play a pretty standard but personalized meta dom mesmer with [power spike] and another interrupt or two, mesmer has a long line of good ones that cast virtually instantly. My reactions are about 1/3 of a second on the reaction time test, so unless you're really slow it should be easy to get 1sec casts or even 5/4ths with a 1/4sec interrupt.

5/4ths second spells are surprisingly easy to interrupt, additionally you can use nasty hexes (diversion, backfire, wastrel's worry). Lots of other important spells are in the 1-2 sec range, and once you get good at it 1sec spells are surprisingly easy to interrupt (I can use a 1/2 second attack with surprising ease).

A big part of it is not so much reaction time, but prefiring your interrupt when you know they'll cast, and simply getting whatever you get. Dismiss conditions seems to be the favorite upon getting up from a devastating hammer for example... if you see a war knock down a monk wait to interrupt as soon as he gets up (assuming the war doesn't Q knock him with another attack), or wait for the other monk to heal the one under attack from your war and pblock his word of healing.

Practice interrupting on someone from your guild / alliance or the Master of Whatever NPCs on the Isle of the nameless.

Interrupting is one of the more skilled / hard / likely to make a big difference things in GW.
The one time I killed a monk in 2 KDs it was a [savage slash] to his [guardian] cast that finished it (sword is almost as cool as hammer).

Or play ranger and don't get owned as a squishie...

turbo234 · Apr 14, 2009, 02:08 AM // 02:08

Interupting isn't always about reflexes, though. Alot of times when people infuse after a spike they will throw up patient spirits to regain health knowing an interrupt is waiting so timing some interrupts is important as well. Also, with interrupting know what to interrupt to give your team the best advantage.
For instance if the physicals are getting blocked alot try to interrupt guardian to give the monks more pressure. However, if your monk is having some trouble redbarring and the team is taking too much damage, then play defensively and interrupt spells to take off pressure.

Krill · Apr 14, 2009, 03:29 AM // 03:29

TA is largely ping dependent for reflexing 1 and 3/4s skills. I'd say under 150ms you should be able to hit 1s skills from medium to close range and 3/4s skills at close range, over 200 can be hit or miss. It helps to have 2 or 3 keys that you can instinctively hit for interruption skills that you use for all classes with interrupts.

Predicting interrupts is largely based on memorizing skill recharges and having the experience to know when someone is likely to be using a skill. The most common example is watching when your frontline knocks a player down and timing an interrupt to land right when they get up. It is also good to use the timer for keeping track of skills with longer recharges, in particular other rangers preps which is often a game within itself. Learning this will help a great deal if you ever move on to GvG and need to break up Aegis chains too. Keeping your own target pinged can also help a lot so you can quickly get to someone or ninja camp them while you're auto attacking someone else.

Last tip, don't tab at first if you're using poison, manually click on the players. This will give you much better field awareness and allow you to catch longer casting skills that you would otherwise miss. This is really good when using Melandru's Shot too so you actually look if someone is moving before hitting the buton and as mentioned above, paying attention to when your frontline has players knocked down. If you ever want to be a reliable ranger for HA I feel this is critical since there tends to be a lot builds in HA that clutter the field in tight quarters (e.g. IWAY, Lich spikes and 3-ways).

jaximus · Apr 14, 2009, 04:10 AM // 04:10

in addition to what everyone else has said, from my experience, (i play ranger/mesmer/prot monk) so i watch the field quite a bit and have quick reflexes, it is best to not use mouse buttons for interrupts.

your pointer finger and thumb are quite dexterous, but fail to be quick. the best fingers for interruption are your middle finger and ring finger. they are not as dexterous, so they tend to twitch more quickly.

interface is also a large part of interrupting. it helps to bind keys to a well suited format for your hand. personally i use a 4x2 box for my skill bar and qwerasdf for skills. i keep my hand on asdf, and my ints are sd. this way your fingers are there and ready to fire off that interrupt and dont have to move and waste more precious time. along with key binds comes your screen interface. i find it very helpful to stretch the skill monitor (targets skill activation) to be half the length of my screen. this longer bar gives the illusion of a slower cast so it becomes easier to interrupt. you want to also know that stretching it too far can make you lose focus on the field so you can find the skill symbol (far right side of the skill activation). you want to be looking for things like glyph of lesser (orangish ring above the head) to catch key skills or keep monks low on energy.

watching the field is huge also. you notice skill activations from characters even before the skill monitor registers them. the character stops and begins a cast pattern so you have additional time to int that skill.

with that said, inting is great and all, but dont spam. make sure to hit the important skills, and not waste interrupts on skills that wont tip the balance of a match at that time.

Neo-LD · Apr 14, 2009, 04:50 AM // 04:50

There are two things I always tell to people learning how to ranger.

1) Anticipate. Count recharges, notice patterns, be aware of your surroundings and the state of the battle. Throwing interrupts at times that you think it would make sense for the enemy to cast will let you achieve things that purely reflexive interrupting just cant.

2) Be fearless. You can't be afraid to look foolish by interrupting people that weren't doing anything because you guessed wrong while pursuing suggestion 1.

Makkert · Apr 14, 2009, 06:47 AM // 06:47

for a ranger:
make a well based assumption on the rechargetimer wether it is better to dshot or savage if you have both options open.
to dshot an Attunement is not that much of a plus over savage shot. The recharge is already long.
A dshot on WoH however creates a (small) window of opportunity for the team.

kedde · Apr 14, 2009, 07:26 AM // 07:26

With little practice, anyone with a reliable ping staying below 200 ms should be able to interrupt 3/4 casts pretty reliably.
If you can't do that, you're better off playing another role on your team as that a large part of your contribution against teams that aren't bad.

Anticipation, skirmishing and general overview and foresight are golden feats as well.
They come with time from practicing and getting instinctive with things.

Massive Impulsa · Apr 14, 2009, 07:56 AM // 07:56

Usually to warmup before gvg's sometimes, i go to Temple of Balthzar, and go to the Master of Air? Atleast he has Bflash which is 3/4 activation

I one day decided to get good at ranger

I read guides, played it ALL the time, in RA and TA. I know have feel i have fairly good exp from rangering in the guild [sKy]

Btw with Diversions sometimes i simply just have to count to 12. Many times the mesmers tends to hide so i cant see the monks and mesmer at the same time, and then i tend to count

Just my tip is, read guides, play it A L O T and eventually you will get good.

Also bout the ping, im pretty sure someone mentioned that buying a better connection doesnt mather.

But you have to "move" closer to the Ncsoft servers, or your tele-company.

distilledwill · Apr 14, 2009, 09:21 AM // 09:21

For Ranger (can't say I'm a very good mesmer): Learn to predict when a monk will cast his most important spells. This obviously means learning what each spell does. For example, WoH heals more when under 50% health therefore a monk will most likely use it as a big heal when they are nearing the 50% health mark. See a warrior charging towards a monk? Wait and see when he throws up guardian. Hit them with poison/bleeding - most monks will mendtouch shortly after. This is all fairly basic, but I'm just getting it out of the way.

There are other times you can predict a spell - just after a knockdown from a hammer warrior is a good one. Hit off a d-shot just before they are on their feet and you should hit their 1/4 cast save spell. Similarly, if you know they have been hit with a 4s blackout you can be damn sure that after that 4s they're going to cast - be ready.

Linked to knowing what spells do is knowing the recharge of those important spells. Most monk spells have short recharges, which is why hitting them with a d-shot is so important. Guardian, WoH, Mending Touch (on a split monk, at least - and in most forms of pvp barr stand monks in GvG and HA - its important to hit this in HB, RA etc.) are all good d-shot fodder. Things like Aegis can be Savage shotted, as its recharge is fairly high anyway.

A lot of ranger interupting is feeling and intuition. You get to know when someone is going to pop off a guardian or mendtouch. You get to know the cast range so when you see a monk approach a player who has over-extended you know the minimum range they need to make before casting and you can be ready when they reach it.

Thats all my pearls of wisdom, all I can say now is keep practising and it'll come to you!

Will

edit: Oh! Also, practical advise: stretch your skill activation bar out. Its strange but its well reported that it helps in interupting.

matthew5276 · Apr 14, 2009, 11:22 AM // 11:22

If you want to circumvent the problem of fast casts, try to interrupt by looking at your targets movements. For example, the difference between a 1 second cast skill and a 1/2 cast skill is clearly noticeable; get to know these and P-blocks will become much more manageable. There is, of course the danger of attempting to p-block skills such as glyph, or holy veil. Glyphs are generally recognisable due to the large symbol above the casters head, try to get to know these as well.

Apart from that, I can't think of anything that hasn't already been said in this thread, just remember to learn common skill animations, attempt to learn monk cast patterns (especially if you wish to play ranger), and just keep practising.

Lux Aeterna · Apr 14, 2009, 08:00 PM // 20:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Massive Impulsa

Usually to warmup before gvg's sometimes, i go to Temple of Balthzar, and go to the Master of Air? Atleast he has Bflash which is 3/4 activation

Master of Air and Master of Enchantment are probably the hardest to kill, though I had trouble with the master of hammer too because GRR COUNTER BLOW GRRRRRR GRRR GRRRRR. I had adrenaline built before the master of hexes though, and interrupted faintheartedness.

Also the bit about using your ring/middle finger for interrupts is interesting I'll have to try it.

HotPocket · Apr 16, 2009, 10:41 PM // 22:41

Thanks guys, I appreciate all the tips

Been doing it in RA now and I am doing (I think) fairly well