Curse

Dzan · Apr 29, 2007, 11:29 PM // 23:29

My best advice about using a Blessed Light monk is not to use one. They are inefficient and you would be well advised to learn to use a good bar.

erk · Apr 30, 2007, 12:33 AM // 00:33

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dzan

My best advice about using a Blessed Light monk is not to use one. They are inefficient and you would be well advised to learn to use a good bar.

Lol I knew someone would say that!

I realize that most of the people in this thread have moved on to TA where a Monks bar can be structured as part of the whole strategy. I am in a good PvE guild where TA is lucky to be played once a month so RA is it for me. Also I don't want to embarrass myself as a n00b monk in a TA PUG.

What I noticed in most of the TA Prot. builds, was they favor spike prevention/condition removal, and are weak on hexes, with holy veil usually being the only such tool in the bar. In RA spikes are rare, the foe usually don't call for a spike, or if they do the call is ignored by their team mates. Lately, at the hours I have to play the American Districts (GMT+10), there seems to be a lot of Necro's, Mes's, and Ele's, and not so many Monks and Melee chars. with the exception of Assassins. It's not unusual to come up against a random team that you would loosely term as Hexway with a dose of poision, cripple, bleeding from the Sin.

I play a Curses Necro a lot and I know I can usually have the whole opposition covered by some sort of a hex so their bars are pink for most of the game, if there is another hexer in our team then it takes a good Monk on the other side to keep their players clean, most RA players "forget" to call to their Monk if the hex is shutting them down or just a cover hex, until it's usually too late.

I looked at the Monk elites and figured that BL was the best compromise, especially now that ZB + a condition and a hex remove costs more energy and takes more time than BL. The downside of BL is that I need some other skill to make up the heal gap, and for the occasions where there are no hexes and conditions to remove, that's what I am stuck on.

Of course I am happy to try and learn any bar that you suggest is suitable as long as you keep in mind that RA and TA are different beasts with RA needing the greater flexibility rather than just outright efficiency.

Patrick Smit · Apr 30, 2007, 05:42 AM // 05:42

ZB is still better, it heals for 200 at 3 cost. BL heals for a lot less costs 10 and then also removes 1 condition and one hex. I ran hexbreaker veil monks, so usually they stop bothering you, as they waste hexes. they will bother others, but i just use sig and ZB on them, free heals, considering the activation and aftercast imes.

Essentially u cant do a lot against hexes unless u run divert hexes, which is/was ok in TA due the metagame. IN RA u cant count on it.
The energymanagement on BL is just horrible, and if u played necro u know always to cover your hexes, wasting BL on parasitic bond is not ganna help anywone. The best counter against hexes is skill, spike when needed, or if u aint spiking now when to use healing signet or skills like that. As a monk u cant compensate for bad players, and well u just have to live with that.

Paddatoochie · Apr 30, 2007, 05:45 AM // 05:45

Maybe an idea for BL is to use Glyph of Lesser energy, and take Gift of Health, and Signet of Devotion for some good heals, also take dismiss condition, and holy veil for pre cast hax.

moko · Apr 30, 2007, 11:02 AM // 11:02

Blight would be in okay choice imo.

a fine Blight bar for RA would look something like this;

[skill]Blessed Light[/skill][skill]Reversal of Fortune[/skill][skill]Gift of Health[/skill][skill]Signet of Devotion[/skill][skill]Deny Hexes[/skill][skill]Spirit Bond[/skill][skill]Dismiss Condition[/skill][skill]Glyph of Lesser Energy[/skill]

Dzan · Apr 30, 2007, 09:35 PM // 21:35

That's a decent bar, but I'd need an explanation of why it's better than ZB. I mean, let's say you have a guy on your team who hits 30 home runs a year. Thats good. But if you had the choice of having a guy who hits 40, why wouldn't you take the 40?

urania · Apr 30, 2007, 10:10 PM // 22:10

at moko...that bar has no defense at all. ><

LifesRestorer · Apr 30, 2007, 10:20 PM // 22:20

i'd drop the GoH or RoF for a guardian. to answer Dzan's question, BL provides a more compressed bar to fit room for other skills. sure it doesnt have as much healing as the ZB, but look at it. it can remove hexes and conditions from a target while healing all at the same time, meaning you are more prepared for reapers necros and condition spammers. it also has decent enough heals to keep the party alive. if you are comfortable with the energy i'd take return or dark escape instead of the glyph.

Divineshadows · Apr 30, 2007, 11:26 PM // 23:26

Quote:

Originally Posted by LifesRestorer

i'd drop the GoH or RoF for a guardian

Guardian is inferior when directly compared to gift and RoF.

erk · May 01, 2007, 12:01 AM // 00:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by LifesRestorer

i'd drop the GoH or RoF for a guardian. to answer Dzan's question, BL provides a more compressed bar to fit room for other skills. sure it doesnt have as much healing as the ZB, but look at it. it can remove hexes and conditions from a target while healing all at the same time, meaning you are more prepared for reapers necros and condition spammers. it also has decent enough heals to keep the party alive. if you are comfortable with the energy i'd take return or dark escape instead of the glyph.

I will try Mokone BL bar tonight when I get home from work. I can see it doubles up in some areas with BL, but that is a good thing, eg. for striping a remaining hex and condition after using BL, so you remove the cover hex as well. I do like to have a defense in the bar, shield bash being the favorite, but GLoE is tempting, never tried Guardian myself. Any of the Ele armors useful for a Monk?

BTW. Last night I tried Mokone's Divert Hexes TA build from earlier in this thread, it worked quite well in RA. There was a cry of "Divert Hexes ftw" when the PUG I was in hit 5 hex teams(two hex spammers in each team!) in a row and we finally got the glad point. Though I can see DH would sit idle if there weren't many hexes to get heals from, hence my interest in BL.

Paddatoochie · May 01, 2007, 03:39 AM // 03:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mokone

Blight would be in okay choice imo.

a fine Blight bar for RA would look something like this;

[skill]Blessed Light[/skill][skill]Reversal of Fortune[/skill][skill]Gift of Health[/skill][skill]Signet of Devotion[/skill][skill]Deny Hexes[/skill][skill]Spirit Bond[/skill][skill]Dismiss Condition[/skill][skill]Glyph of Lesser Energy[/skill]

Surely you would want something to stop Diversion in here?

Zuranthium · May 01, 2007, 04:44 AM // 04:44

The hex removal on that bar doesn't work like you want it to either. To get 3 removes out of Deny you HAVE to use BL, SoD, and then Deny back/to back/to back with absolutely no pauses...and locking yourself in for 5 seconds like that usually just isn't viable.

Dismiss is also very questionable, as Spirit Bond is the only enchantment you've got.

Blessed Light is useless these days.

~Z

Patrick Smit · May 01, 2007, 05:07 AM // 05:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by urania

at moko...that bar has no defense at all. ><

With this bar u really dont need defense, u have spiritbond, RoF and kiteskills in the fingers

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paddatouchie

Surely you would want something to stop Diversion in here?

A valid argument, 6 secs no action could seriously impair the ability to survive while kiting

The bar is reasonably good at dehexing and healing but stopping hexes is another thing, i just love hexbreaker and veil.

erk · May 01, 2007, 05:11 AM // 05:11

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paddatoochie

Surely you would want something to stop Diversion in here?

Does a hex removal skill eg. Deny Hexes get disabled by Diversion like other skills do? If so then you would need to have Holy Veil in the bar and up all the time just in case, that's expensive in terms of energy.

Patrick Smit · May 01, 2007, 05:25 AM // 05:25

Nah if there are no nasty hexes being dropped u loose it, if there is diversion however u keep it up. But the mesmer needs to be spamming it to make diversion work, he will not be doing much else, especially not with veil up. Hex breaker veil is even worse, often they loose incentive to cast diversion on you, and they will use i ton others, unless they are smart and break with a fast casting hex the hexbreaker after u just activated it. Any way it will make using diversion on the monk so much less effective then no proper hex prevention.

Paddatoochie · May 01, 2007, 08:12 AM // 08:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by erk

Does a hex removal skill eg. Deny Hexes get disabled by Diversion like other skills do? If so then you would need to have Holy Veil in the bar and up all the time just in case, that's expensive in terms of energy.

Yes to the first part, that's why Holy Veil is so good for a Monk, and as it has been said, if no hexes are around you can get rid of it. You may get caught unawares by getting a diversion on you if you don't expect it, but generally after that first time you'll cast holy veil and you'll be sweet.

sir lockt · May 01, 2007, 09:07 AM // 09:07

Why do you want to remove/stop Diversion? unless there are multiple copies around against you it won't cause serious problems... SoD ftw (before flaming think first why SoD shines when Diversion is on you...)

BL is ok in TA/RA, ZB is ok in TA/RA... its a basic discussion. With the use of GoH and SoD your elite is effectively free to choice. ZB provide huge healing output, which is cool in a pressure oriented environment. BL provides you with excellent utility. I dont think it is expensive, yes ofc you are less effective in healing then ZB, but you have all stuff compressed in one skill and one cast.

So in essence BL is more utility.. use it only with a team build around it (in TA we often took a guild team with support, like a flashbot with heal party). When you go in RA or with PUG ZB is a solid choice. (remember that you are the bitch, everything is unleashed on you... so the self-heal of ZB comes in handy)

Ofc there is no right and wrong in this discussion, play what you like most, dont be down when you lose... when 3 sins jump on you, your bar wont save you, only your skill will... and you will only improve if you have seen it all...

moko · May 01, 2007, 09:22 AM // 09:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dzan

That's a decent bar, but I'd need an explanation of why it's better than ZB. I mean, let's say you have a guy on your team who hits 30 home runs a year. Thats good. But if you had the choice of having a guy who hits 40, why wouldn't you take the 40?

i never really said it was better than ZB for arenas -- but i don't really like ZB because it's utter crap, i'd go with SoD or SoR over it anyday.

Quote:

at moko...that bar has no defense at all. ><

Quote:

With this bar u really dont need defense, u have spiritbond, RoF and kiteskills in the fingers

kinda, but she means a stance to remove a dazed -- can't have all.

Quote:

Guardian is inferior when directly compared to gift and RoF.

indeed, especially in RA on a BLight bar.

Quote:

Surely you would want something to stop Diversion in here?

can't have all. :P i'd much rather have a deny that has the *possibility* to remove up to 3 hexes (although it will mostly be 2). personally, i have fallen in love with deny hexes. and anyways, what mesmer does not run shatter or drain enchantment to remove veil?

Quote:

BTW. Last night I tried Mokone's Divert Hexes TA build from earlier in this thread, it worked quite well in RA. There was a cry of "Divert Hexes ftw" when the PUG I was in hit 5 hex teams(two hex spammers in each team!) in a row and we finally got the glad point. Though I can see DH would sit idle if there weren't many hexes to get heals from, hence my interest in BL.

yey. i don't dare to use it in RA anymore, i always face melee heavy teams and kill all my nerves with it. :P but then, i always face hexes as SoD, ZB or SoR, so i kill my nerves with that also..so i don't monk in RA anymore at all. ^_^

Quote:

The hex removal on that bar doesn't work like you want it to either. To get 3 removes out of Deny you HAVE to use BL, SoD, and then Deny back/to back/to back with absolutely no pauses...and locking yourself in for 5 seconds like that usually just isn't viable.

most i want out of it is actually 2 hexes, but in a hex heavy game, you DO have the time to sacrifice all the time to remove up to 3. and we all know how much people in RA like to hit through spoil victor, don't we.

Quote:

Dismiss is also very questionable, as Spirit Bond is the only enchantment you've got.

Dismiss is basically the only condition removal you can take into consideration. mend condition might work, but it would be energy heavy if you always rely on BLight to remove a condition on you -- ailment sucks, and there's no space for Draw+Touch, so uh huh!

another thing about Deny is assassins in RA. we all know it's assassin heaven. i've been doing this in AB for fun, and it's just evil. you encounter timers too often, one having 1 hexes (siphon with moebius) while the other has sp with expose. so what does a smart (but rare) Blight do? blight's the siphon and denies both sp and expose for the other sin. seeing how both sins are dumb and didn't expect it, they'll button smash their combo and let your party hit them happily. you could also do the same with preveiling, but this is just as good with less work included. :P (i'm lazy.)

Dzan · May 01, 2007, 10:42 AM // 10:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by LifesRestorer

...to answer Dzan's question, BL provides a more compressed bar to fit room for other skills. sure it doesnt have as much healing as the ZB, but look at it. it can remove hexes and conditions from a target while healing all at the same time, meaning you are more prepared for reapers necros and condition spammers.

I don't think you understand that ZB is far better against hex spammers than Blessed Light.

Sabe · May 01, 2007, 11:31 AM // 11:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by sir lockt

Why do you want to remove/stop Diversion? unless there are multiple copies around against you it won't cause serious problems... SoD ftw (before flaming think first why SoD shines when Diversion is on you...)

Please tell me why SoD shines when diversion is on you?