Life Bond/Essence Bond question

If you have 2 mo/w for example, and they life bond and essence bond each other with 0 points in protection. If one of them took 100 damage, if would be split to 50 and 47 damage. But would the damage "echo between" them as well? Would the 47 damage then turn into 24 and 21, and then 11 and 8 ect ect? I'm fuzzy on how it works, but if that was the case they would gain energy each time the damage echo'd between them. As far as I know it doesn't quite work like that, but has anyone really tested how this skill works?

No, the damage from life bond won't bounce, but it will trigger any other "on-damage" enchanments or hexes you have, like healing seed or essence bond.

Will life bond damage trigger other life bonds? Can you chain them?

Life Bonds do not chain off of each other - you just get one hop.

Peace,
-CxE

You can still stack them on one target to get 25% or less damage right? 3 on one target, the target takes 12% damage, and the life bond casters each take their portion minus 3-25 damage. Is that correct?

Also, does your armor effect the damage you take via life bond?

No, only one enchantment of a given name will actually function.

If you have two Life Bonds on the same target, that target will still suffer half damage from all attacks, but *both* Life Bonders will take redirected damage. So it's pointless and you shouldn't do it.

Peace,
-CxE

I asked the same questions below in the Campfire's "top ten skills" thread, but it is more apporpriate here:

A leading favorite skill is life bond.

Is the idea to use LIFO (last in first out) so you cast Essence Bond first and then Life Bond? In that, you redirct damage (life bond) and then recharge energy (essence bond).

Is it possible to cast Essence Bond, then Life Bond, and then Life Barrier?

Lastly, would a RA/Mo be capable of using this combo given its energy limitations?

Thanks to Ensign on the LIFO information.

The order of stacking does not matter - Essence Bond will trigger regardless off of the Life Bond redirect.

You can stack Life Bond and Life Barrier to reduce all damage on a target to 25%.

A R/Mo can use this sort of combo, but that's perhaps ill-advised because the start up cost is high - you want to maintain multiple Life Bonds, plus Balthazar's Spirit, then spread around more Bonds as your energy permits. Given that the Ranger is already rather energy tight this probably isn't the best idea. But if you can't put it elsewhere, sure, put it on the Ranger. Once you get the ball rolling you're going to go infinite anyway.

Peace,
-CxE

Ok, the skill isn't as hideously broken as I thought. You can still run a trio of monks that would abuse it nicely though.

I'd assumed that you could keep mooching off of life bond's damage for essence bond and that you could chain life bonds. Then you could simply layer life bond 5 times over on your party and be effectively invincible. You can still layer life bond one time over on your party and have near infinite energy however.