Curse

Barkeep · Mar 03, 2008, 08:11 AM // 08:11

That's because you run dual sin. The Sin and the Derv have a good synergie. The Derv does huge dmg and forces the monk to use prots. Shatter sin however does relatively low dmg (it's still decent because most teams combine it with SoH), but is unblockable and removes monk prots..

I'm still on 100% with balanced vs this crap. It's getting harder though. Even the nups are getting experience with this gimmick.

My tactic is still, interrupt the smiter's 1 sec casts castigation/smite condition/smite hex. Deb shot on the HC. Spread poison. The dual monk team usually gets two kills in before the pressure starts to get too much.

steel singer · Mar 03, 2008, 10:23 AM // 10:23

dervish+sin dual monk gimmick isn't even to hard to beat..
It's much harder to beat the dual warrior dual monk..

And RavagerOfDreams, how the RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GO did you loose to monk spike?
You have baltazars pendulum, so no spike goes through..

Teh Jace · Mar 03, 2008, 02:22 PM // 14:22

The current state of the game is that HC monk can be easily replaced with Dunkoro, smiter with maybe a little bit cleverer Tahlkora and this build will be still powerful.

Im on like 50% vs this maybe below. I think Im just bad at the game.

Anyways too tired of facing the same brainless monsters over and over again.

BTW take note that spotless skills (both used in this build) are still bugged. I dunno but if u grab 2 very exp warriors (I dont mean retards using bulls strike everytime their targets stops to cast smth but rly killing machines) and unleash them balanced build can pack it up cuz ur necro simply wont stop them considering he stands against bugged hex removal he cant get rid of. U have to play like superman to beat this.

C2K · Mar 03, 2008, 09:52 PM // 21:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Teh Jace

The current state of the game is that HC monk can be easily replaced with Dunkoro, smiter with maybe a little bit cleverer Tahlkora and this build will be still powerful.

I tried putting the HC build on Ogden, he sucked with it. But then again, it is Ogden, I'll have to try with Dunkoro.

samcobra · Mar 04, 2008, 06:29 AM // 06:29

Hi, what is this HC build you speak of?

RhanoctJocosa · Mar 04, 2008, 06:34 AM // 06:34

Healer's Covenant. Most use it with 3 hard guys with self heals so they only need to spam vig spirit and the occassional patient spirit. Kinda bad.

Dual monk isn't that hard to beat as well, you just need to know when to play defensively and when not to.

EDIT: played it on the weekend running cripslash, dev with warrors cunning/rend, r/p and a woh. cripslash trains one of the melee, r/p pressures random stuff and the dev hammer stays on the hc. once the smiter stuffed up BP i could get a kd lock on the hc and we blew them up.

lol @ people who run this who think they aren't mindless scrubs :>

urania · Mar 04, 2008, 07:52 AM // 07:52

with some of my regular team mates stopping with GW I only play a shutdown mesmer in RA lately, so i kinda lost contact with the current state of the TA.
however, what i can say is that old school expell-shame+diversion+bo (esp diversion+bo are sweet) messie still works wonders (aaah, good old times of boon prot balanced builds (= ), not only against HC spammer but against eda too, for example. Tho' taking mantra of conc is prolly a good choice due to interrupt-heavy shutdown that is (or was..?) frequent in TA.
Only problem is lack of damage and being forced to ditch ur ranger...or go in without any defense.

audioaxes · Mar 06, 2008, 05:35 PM // 17:35

2 healers are lame, and real men play TA with no healers

Aera · Mar 06, 2008, 07:39 PM // 19:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by audioaxes

2 healers are lame, and real men play TA with no healers

None healing at all?

I guess 'real men' don't have brains.

subNinja · Mar 06, 2008, 09:02 PM // 21:02

Ahem. To everyone who has decided that an HC monk is somehow a "gimmick".... it's just another type of monk. Right now, it is a very powerful type of monk. The power comes from the crazy amount of condition removal and hex removal that the build brings, as well as its ability to sustain healing for long periods of time.

However.... you want to beat it? Easy as hell:

1) Run a spike
OR
2) Run any form of kd (if they don't have balth's pendulum)
OR
3) Just do a buttload of damage to the HC (Patient spirit isn't enough to heal a LOT of damage, and continuously copping will kill their energy)
OR
4) Run a dom mez (a good one)
OR
5) Run a Shatter Sin (owned)

Seriously. HC's are as powerful as they are limited. As for everyone QQ'ing about "balanced" vs "gimmick" builds... you seem to all think that a "balanced" build is a warrior, a magebane, a crip anthem and a monk. That, or a CE necro changed in for the crip anthem.

News flash for you: That's one EXAMPLE of A balanced build. I'm tired of people thinking that the only way the can play "balanced" is by following the metagame herd.

the_deSKtructor · Mar 06, 2008, 09:29 PM // 21:29

the crazy amount of condition removal that bar has is uncounterable (spotless skills bugged, said that a lot of times before). Most of the balanced spikes relies on the kds, too bad that the dual monk gimmick as a blathazar pendulum monk so it's really hard to spike (unless u run another gimmick aswell). As u said the HC ability to sustain healing for long periods of time usually means that they will kill u before u can kill them. The dom mes point is fine, the shatter sin is meh.

No One Famous · Mar 06, 2008, 09:31 PM // 21:31

The recent buff to Reversal of Damage (lower recharge), was like a kick to the shin of those aiming to beat this.

The Unknown X · Mar 06, 2008, 11:05 PM // 23:05

I fully agree with Subninja.

It's great that people come up with these gimmicks, so people can come on here and discuss the best ways to counter them. Also for people coming on here and moaning about the Dual Monk build and then claiming they found it was easy to beat...that doesn't really make any sense to me.

SubNinja comments about balanced builds being made up of: Warrior, Magebane, Crip-Anth and a Monk or a CE Nec. I'm thinking...I'm so glad that Magebane got a nerf, because all this talk about how these kinds of balanced builds are played by the more skilled players makes me quesy. Basically stand next to your chosen spell-caster and spam as many interrupts as possible and hope that 2/3 interrupt something. Then after the first LUCKY kill you must tab through the players and rupt' everyones Rez Sigs and it's gg.

Ok so I'm sure I'm being overly harsh on Magebane players and I have seen a few good ones that disrupt their target with a certain level of skill.... but thats only in about 3% of teams I've seen.

I play TA frequently (probably not as often as most of you) but I do have experience there. I don't have much of a problem with gimmicks, in fact I have ran gimmicks myself. Don't try to staple me for this. I try to encourage my guild to try out lots of different builds or gimmicks as there known and we run balanced also.

Honestly I think some people need to come down of their high horses and stop trying to tell players which builds they can and can't run as voted by the majority gwGuru community. If you're all as skilled as what you claim to be then you really shouldn't have any worries, should you?

Oh and heres two skills to put in your bar: Rend Enchantments + Signet of Humility.

Sun Fired Blank · Mar 06, 2008, 11:11 PM // 23:11

In response to your brilliant points about "easy as hell":

1) Most spikes suck and lose to everything but HCway, which is why you don't run them.
2) Every HCteam runs Balt's Pendulum, you only get KDs if you time rends and the smiter's slow, and even then, most damage that comes off a KD is too low to kill the HC (or any target); unless you're syncing a physical spike with two frontliners, it's not going to kill anything.
3) Easier said than done, we've lost several times on Moebius and a double W frontline, they put out an egregious amount of pressure, when we should theoretically output more than they should cope with.
4) You pretty much can't run Dom mesmers in TA, they generally suck, and I certainly wouldn't do it just for a chance to beat HC.
5) Sins are really too fragile for general use; SA is overly powerful but not even adequate to punch through the layers of enchantments.

subNinja · Mar 07, 2008, 02:01 AM // 02:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sun Fired Blank

In response to your brilliant points about "easy as hell":

1) Most spikes suck and lose to everything but HCway, which is why you don't run them.
2) Every HCteam runs Balt's Pendulum, you only get KDs if you time rends and the smiter's slow, and even then, most damage that comes off a KD is too low to kill the HC (or any target); unless you're syncing a physical spike with two frontliners, it's not going to kill anything.
3) Easier said than done, we've lost several times on Moebius and a double W frontline, they put out an egregious amount of pressure, when we should theoretically output more than they should cope with.
4) You pretty much can't run Dom mesmers in TA, they generally suck, and I certainly wouldn't do it just for a chance to beat HC.
5) Sins are really too fragile for general use; SA is overly powerful but not even adequate to punch through the layers of enchantments.

1) Again, people have issues with terms. I'm not saying run a 321 obsidian flame or something, you can run a balanced build and still have a spike. Enough concentrated damage in one place will easily overpower an HC monk.
2) Ride the balth's guy with a hammer. He's only going to spam himself with it. Then you own the monk once he's cast it. That's IF they have balths. If they don't, any type of kd will OWN an HC monk, seeing as they need to cast just about 100% of the time. This point was mainly in response to the "ZOMG HC IS OVERPOWERD" people.
3) HC's cannot deal with a lot of damage, especially against themselves. Anyone who's played an HC will tell you this. Most HC's don't bring prot either (since it's a full heal/divine split). Do a lot of 100+ stuff (derv, fire, etc) or even just a lot of damage in general and they won't be able to keep up.
4) In the new metagame (ie now with HC) it's feasible to run dom mezzes. Before HC, you had to run melee hate, due to all the interrupts and daze going around... but it's no longer a requirement, possibly opening up your support slot for a dom mez. Hell, even just a rend will piss off an HC
5) Okay now I KNOW you haven't played HC. Shatter sins OWN HC monks. Period. You have a shatter sin riding the HC, and another melee pretty much anywhere.... that HC is going to burn his energy so fast (since he can't maintain his elite) and basically be an elite-less heal monk. SA takes off two enchants (dual attack), which is HC and vigorous. If the monk was lucky, and had those up PLUS patient spirit (very lucky) you'll get it in 8 seconds when your next SA is up.

I'm telling you. HC is not monk spike. HC is just a lot different from WoH, in its playstyle and counter.

valence · Mar 07, 2008, 02:06 AM // 02:06

Wait, HC monks are alone?

subNinja · Mar 07, 2008, 02:21 AM // 02:21

Does any team run without a support character anymore?

...but yeah you can run HC alone. The only reason there's so many smiters is that someone realized that HC's biggest weakness is KD.... really you could probably get by with aura of stability, but it's just easier/lazier to bring a smiter.

TheOneMephisto · Mar 07, 2008, 02:22 AM // 02:22

HC monks are pretty much never used alone in TA, countering half your points.

And SA sins gets absolutely destroyed by linebacking, making them extremely easy to counter. When your melee can be easily forced to kite then it's not exactly useful.

Sun Fired Blank · Mar 07, 2008, 03:00 AM // 03:00

1) A balanced spike isn't going to fit enough damage into a "spike" unless you make some very exceptional sacrifices for it. You can fit a Sloth Hunter's on the Magebane and maybe an extra damage option besides a Spear of Lightning on your paragon, but if your spike doesn't pump out enough damage to drop the target, you have no reason to spike. The ability to concentrate the damage is everything or nothing versus HCway; if you can't beat patient's delay, it gets neatly cleaned up like any other type of damage.

2) The HC setup very rarely, if ever, sacrifices the Balthazar's Pendulum; outside of the augmented Reversal of Damage, it's the best way to spam heals under divine favor / smiter's boon and completely stop KDs. So you're riding the monk. So what? Outside of a rend (which any observant monk is going to catch, and either place back up or prepare to catch a spike), you just place it back up every 20 seconds.

3) Prot is a non-factor, about sixty thousand things can rip through even layers of prot in TA. HC is rather surprisingly robust as a solo template; people say that HC is fragile, but in reality, patient spam alone is enough to answer the damage of an axe chaining in perma frenzy on a squishie, and that's quite frankly unrealistic. Vig Spirit neatly cleans up unfocused damage, and if they bring any means to drop damage to manageable points (e.g. the smiter, cripanthem), you're going to have a real problem shunting that kind of damage on the other team, even on the HC.

4) Okay, whatever. You run a dom, you lose, that's the ghist of it. The tactical value of a dom these days is nothing compared to, you know, surviving. Or beating faces in.

5) Okay, I know you haven't faced or played a decent HC. You just spam Patient over Vigorous covering Healer's Covenant, and if the smiter has your back, it's likely already covered by the pendulum and the augmented reversal of damage. Big deal.

urania · Mar 07, 2008, 06:26 AM // 06:26

not only they buffed RoD, they also gave the derv a boost too. . .

for all u petty smartasses defending the HC template...NO.
go play...minesweeper or sth.

I wont even bother repeatnig myself as to why the template is so, so very broken and retarded.

also, HC monks are used alone frequently too - in a 2 melee + ranger builds. they take stances like disciplined there, so yeah, gl with ur all-so-mighty knockdowns.

to be honset, atm i dont feel like playing TA anymore. at all -___-.
reminds me of a/mo "meta", as some not-so-smart poster here chose calling overpowered gimmicks that get out of hand.
and since izzy only gets advice on how to fix gvg, we are stuck with such crap for the next few months..or years.