Monk Skill Problems

Besides the fact that the monk doesnt have, in my opinion, enough skills that actually help out the job of healing, i would say that in fact the monk has more skills in its proffession that are useless then any other class, this may be that soem skills are so good that the rest just dont compare, but really when you look at it most skills simply do not do what is needed of a healing spell. So ive compiled a list of skills that I dont feel completely show what there supposed to do :


Aura Of Faith - Elite
The problem with this spell is its elite, its sub par compared to even the common spells available to the monk lineup, to even make this worthwhile I suggest lowering the Recharge to 10 seconds, and if you want to keep it elite lower the recharge to 5 seconds.

Blessed Aura - Common
other then specific combos this is useless, increase its duration of effect to 50% and your starting to make a little sense with this skill.

Divine Spirit - Common
Increase the duration or lower the recharge rate to make it useful.

Peace And Harmony - Elite
The recent nerfing of this spell stops anyone who may have used it sometimes, to never use it again. Change should be made to make sure that peace and harmony only ends if you do anything besides casting a Divine, Healing or protection attribute skill. Other then that as an alite 1 energy regen really doesnt fit this skill, take off its elite status or give it more power.

Watchful Spirit - Common
This spell would benfit greatly from losing the Energy degneration and adding a duration of effect instead.

Heal Area - Common
A larger Radiaus of effect for a neutral heal spell

Healing Hands - Elite
This spell seems less powerful then healing seed, a common spell, certainly has less uses, however increasing duration of effect to 15 seconds, or lowering recharge to 20 seconds would be a good start at making this useful.

Infuse Health - Common
This spell slowly is getting more popular, increasing its effect to 150% would make it a formidable asset to monks.

Live Vicariously - Common
As a maintained spell its effect doesnt match its cost, increase the hp healed or turn the energy regen into a duration of effect enchanment.

restore Life - Common
Nowhere in Guild wars does this res spell come in handy, its 8 second cast time for a half hp ally is redundant. Res at Full hp and Energy, or lower cast time from 8 to 4.

Holy Veil - Common
Almost becomes a goog spell but just doesnt finish the job, holy veil seems to have a differant effect in my mind :
While you maintain Holy veil Any Enchantment, Condition, or Hex on targeted ally are Negated.

Light of Dwanya - Common
The area of effect is ridiculous, make it at least the size of the players radar and youve got a good skill.

Remove Hex - Common
This skill would be so great if it had a lower recharge, from 7 to 3.

Amity - Elite
This shouldnt have a negative condition attached to this, foes who take damage should still be unable to attack for the 18 seconds.

Convert hex's - Common
Should be changed to give Armor bonus for any hex not just Necro.

Mark of Protection - Elite
Change the disabled skills from a hard 10, to a range of effect, 10 to 7 seconds for instance.

Protective Spirit - Common
Change wording to Protect from a Single Source, instead of a specific spell or attack.

Shield of Deflection - Elite
15 Energy makes it unusable, lower the cost to 10.

Shielding Hands - Common
this spell is only usable upto post searing, after that damage greatly increases. Increase its effects dramatically.
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Obviously recent updating has shown that the team has the ability to dramatically alter the skills. I love Guild wars and this is not a flame, merely a listing of every single issue I find with choosing how to play my monk, to the guild wars dev team please at least think about it!

Watchful spirit is used plentifully. Heal area has its useful for certain arena and HOH builds, healing hands get used a lot, live vicariously as well, protective spirit is great as it is, and shielding hands too. You just have to think about a lot of skills to find out how they are useful.

Quote: Originally Posted by lynxxClan Holy Veil - Common
Almost becomes a goog spell but just doesnt finish the job, holy veil seems to have a differant effect in my mind :
While you maintain Holy veil Any Enchantment, Condition, or Hex on targeted ally are Negated. Quote: Originally Posted by lynxxClan Amity - Elite
This shouldnt have a negative condition attached to this, foes who take damage should still be unable to attack for the 18 seconds. Quote: Originally Posted by lynxxClan Light of Dwanya - Common
The area of effect is ridiculous, make it at least the size of the players radar and youve got a good skill. Upgrades you're recommending are a bit extreme here...

For the record, I've been having monks take only Restore Life or Vengeance as resurrects along for Defend North Kryta Province-- anything else, except of course a rez sig, is useless as a resurrect in that situation.

Anyway, think about how hard it must be to create Monk skills. I have a lot of experience creating skill lists for classes, and trust me, thinking of spells for classes like the Monk is difficult. For straight healing, the only obvious spells are something like Orison (healing some hit points) and something like Healing Breeze (health regen), plus party-wide or area-effect moves of that sort (Heal Party, Heal Area, Divine Healing). You could throw in status removal, and because it's Guild Wars, hex removal-- after that it becomes more difficult to think of spells. For protection, the only really obvious ones would be Shielding Hands (damage reduction) and maybe Protective Spirit (preventing excessive damage from a single move) or Guardian (chance to block all damage), and then the party-wide or area-effect equivalents (Aegis, for instance). Perhaps moves that negate a future status effect, or simply block x damage, possibly defending vs. a specific damage type (fire, holy, physical, magical, etc.). Then you have a couple resurrection spells, and, well, you're stuck.

Generally what I do is create moves of varying power that have basically the same effect-- say, a "Cure" move that heals 10 HP and costs 5 MP and then a "Heal" move that heals 25 HP and costs 15 MP. However, they clearly didn't want that in Guild Wars. There are extremely few, if any, examples of moves that have the same effect but in a varying magnitude. Ice Spikes and Deep Freeze come close, the only difference being that Deep Freeze always has 10 seconds of slowdown, whereas Ice Spikes's slowdown is affected by your attribute level. Troll Unguent and Healing Breeze are similar; so are Heal Other and Orison of Healing. However, there are targeting differences. I'm not sure there are any two spells that have the same basic effect but at different magnitudes in the entire game; that makes it considerably more difficult than it already is to think of healing or protection moves. (Smiting, of course, you can just have fun with.)

Therefore, it can't come as a huge surprise if there are a few "useless" monk skills, if it's difficult to think of them anyway and they all have a different effect, which makes it even tougher to come up with them.

Aura of Faith is only kept in line because of enchant strips. It's a great elite otherwise paired with signet of devotion. If I didn't have to worry about rend or lingering this would be as much of a staple as edrain.

Restore Life is the best hard res in the game. Mesmos get it off without huge difficulty.

Prot spirit is fine.

Shielding hands is a prot monk staple. Very energy efficient and a strong effect.

Heal Area has its uses, most notably in healing balls.

The problem with remove hex is the cast time not the recharge. The recharge is awesome anyway.

Healing Hands really shouldn't be elite but whatever.

Infuse Health is not energy efficient but it's excellent anti-spike.

Shield of Deflection is not great both because of cast time (2s is lonnng) and energy cost. Putting it back at 10 energy will make it spammable and therefore back in the very good category that it used to be.

Some of those are right, like with Divine Spirit. But please don't jump to uninformed conclusions. Buffing some of those skills would not be wise or they'll turn into the next Ether Renewal.

Oh, another thing-- Glyph of Sacrifice + Restore Life = instant rez of someone with nearly full energy and decent health. As Zeru said, Fast Casting makes it work too.

Dont get me wrong, eveything has its eventual use, even a dead log on teh side of the street decomposes and brings nutrients to the earth, everything can be used, what Im saying is that the majority of monk spells are very bad compared to what the other proffessions have available. Think about it logically in the game of guildwars how many types of monks are there? Prot monk, straight healer, healing ball, smite monk.... There are various differant strategies that people use to make there own monks unique but youll notice that every monk over rank 3 starts to have more common skill setups, and as you get higher in the ranks I garuntee every monk starts to have identical skillsets, even gear sets.
In my personal opinion the Monk class should have an Equal response to every effect in the game, if theres a spell that deals 400dmg there should be a heal that heals 400dmg... there is ways to do this but Im just makign an example here.


For sabo the Hobo, I agree some of the things I said where pherhaps to the extreme with changes but there just examples of ways to bring the monk spells to improve them.

ya I agree some skills need to revamped forthe monk but then what class doesn't have skills that are worthless.

I think my biggest issue right now with the rescent changes is the fact that Healing Seed, Healing Hands, and Mark of Protection are basically the same damn skill now. Why, Why did seed need to be changed with all of the enchant removal out there there is no reason it cant last 21 seconds like it used to be able to.

Quote: Originally Posted by Evisicator

Quote: Originally Posted by lynxxClan

Evisicator, your comment on the new update making skills the same is very valid, as a primary monk player for my guild I use to never use healing hands, after the update the skill has gotten much better, not because its effect is so great itself, but because you can combine it with multiple skills that have basically the same effect, like you said, in this way I could have a stable predictable outcome to taking damage which even if it wasnt the greatest strategy it was a good one because i knew what would would happen and could prepare for the outcomes.

Zeru, Infuse Health is very energy efficient, consider this situation, 2 monks in team arenas both cast life attunement, vital blessing, and aura of faith on themselves, at this point HP is roughly 600hp on average, using infuse health to target each other would allow the monks to be able to heal eachother for 10 energy at roughly 450hp. In my opinion Infuse health is the only breakable monk spell for this exact reason, and using this tactic in teams and a good guild with some sort of vent or teamspeak you should make tons of faction.

Seron Dalar, your experienced with creating class list, but you didnt say with what, Im sure for just about every game the monk class is very unique in certain areas but in most areas the monk is generally the same, personally my reference of poitn is Massachusetts, The Wizards Duel, Ive been around gaming of all sorts my entire life, and have volunteered at this store for the majority of my life, in my time of playing vids Ive almost always gravitated towards the monk class, and in my expereince of creating games theres a few very important things, Complete Balance, Easily Expandable, Player interaction, and player customization. Meaning that when a new player comes to the game they have to be able to look at everything and know right off the bat that everything is balanced, otherwise everyone will do the same thing making a very boring game, the game needs to be able to be expandable, something guildwars is actually, probably better then most games available.
As far as creating monks go, it being hard, its not, once you create one thing you should be able to create an equal opposite to that, every idea you have for a skill should in fact spawn two additional ideas, one for being opposite, and one to bridge the gap between the two spells. As far as the anet dev team dropping the ball on balancing the monk part of the game, oh well I guess it sucks and the most I can do is whine, I still love guild wars and I still love the community, including my guild and sometimes to large of a friends list for me to stay sane in one day, however how tough is it for anet to just look at these skills and change them? a weekend update maybe? probably could just stream it in and change it randomly at 2am in the morning or whenever the least people are on, I guess in the end the only reason I gripe so much is because I like the game so much and it most likely will be the game Ill be playing for months and months, for sure ive already dedicated myself to buying the next chapter!

Another random thing that someone in my guild pointed out to me, whats up with Divine Intervention Triggering from Vengeance and Unyielding aura?
In my personaly opinion if these spells trigger divine intervention and divine intervention says damage, then if you have shielding hands on you that should also keep you alive, albiet at roughly 18hp, but still alive none the less.

Also why does Unyielding aur and vengeance work while under frozen soil? frozen soil says specifically no more ressing where as both these spells say res ally, whats the deal with being selective here?

Well Vengance and Unyielding Aura arn't resses their enchants that only work on dead people. Their working under frozen soil makes sense. DI combined with either one is broken though IMO.

Light of Dwanya isn't ment for a monk primary. Use it with an E/Mo and glyph of sacrifice. In HoH on the altar I ressed my whole team instantly with that combo and it isn't that rare to res at least 2-3 people. At 3 people it is costing 8 energy per person ressed. At 7 people it is costing less than 3 energy per person ressed so... it isn't that expensive for what it does.

Restore Life is the staple hard res for PvP as being ressed without energy screws most casters.

Infuse Health is so broken with the right build so as to not even be funny anymore. Run 4 monks with Infuse+Vital Blessing+Life attunement+Aura of faith and have each monk grab a fellow monk and 1 other person as healing buddys. The monks can keep eachother alive indeffinatly (Over 600 point heals if done right)

I'll do the rest later as I have to go do some other stuff.

They are many skills that don't "deserve elite status" but they got for some reason. One dude said in another topic - some elites are elites just for the reason you should not use them with another elites - a perfect example is the ranger skill practiced stance. Other skills are elite just because as secondary skills they can be very overwhelming (not primary) - take in mind there are skills that are MENT to be as second class skills (I mean as primary they got some disadvantages as long recharge, high mana cost - skills that are not made to be spammed)

Blessed aura can be quite powerfull used with Warped staff upgrade (+20% duration). It wil lbe around 50-55% longer duration and as protecting monk this can have big effect. Shielding hands for 15 secs, Shield of regen for 15 secs... even your healing spells will remain 15 - healing hads? Seed?

Every spell has effect (some in varry narow situation, but still have) but people often too flat thinking. For example one officer from my guild forbid me to take more than 5 mana cost skills when playing with them (except seed). Wtf? I understand I need to have at least 4-5 5 mana skills for quickshots, but why ALL? He said Heal other is stupid? Like 3/4 cast and 180+ (discluding D.Favor) HP !!??!? It is 10 mana skill and it is not Spamable as Orison, but in certan situations it saves. We are still at argue. This officer claimed 60% of the skills stupid...this is another theme. Yet I still thinkg most of the skills you listed can have a bit of upgrade (especially the elites) to encourage people using them in combos.

I did a test with a guildie of mine in team arenas, leyona garrett, grabbed a random spirit spammer and tried to see how much I could get infuse health to heal for, now Im not taking credit for what someone else did because Ive seen a post here a week or so ago that showed someone with a 2992hp heal, but using fertile season and symbiosis with the afformentioned healing spells and only using one superior rune (healing)
+450hp
+125hp x 5 = 625
+175
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1250 + 500 hp = 1750/2 = 875 x 1.4 = 1225 x 2 = 2450 hp healing

this is from a 3 skill combo, that two monks use, and like mentioned above multiple monks can do this, even if this got rended to all hell and eveything got ruined even for just a few seconds, it would only have to recast everythign and heal once with 10 energy in order to gain max HP again, starting off at 1750hp makes it so you can take alot of damage and not even have to worry about things like enemies.

And as far as Vengeance and unyielding aura being an enchantment that targets specifically dead allies, I suppose you have a argument there, but either way you look at it your still ressing your ally and frozen soil should still stop you, in my opinion anyways both these skills have the benefit to res at full health and full energy, fairly quickly and relatively cheaply considering the other spells you compare it to. When you get de enchanted it shouldnt be damage that is doen to you to kill you, because that suggests that you can manipulate that damage with anything, shielding hands, divine intervention, healing hands, healing seed, mark of protection, aura of lich, life barrier.

On the topic of brokeness that some monk spells cause, Aura of lich + Life barrier is Broken, I personally run 2 necro suiciders that sac life with dark aura and use aura of lich, let the necros run ahead and kill all they like, have fun kids! While myself and another monk will set way back and keep life barrier on the necros, causing a nice net effect of this :

Touch of agony - 100dmg to foe -- 0 dmg to self

In fact the only way to stop this build is if you run against de enchanter or rend enchanter, if by chance the opposing team has none you automatically win, no questions asked, the reason is simple, each monk casting life barrier and life bond on eachother as well as casting the life barrier on the monks. The monks pretty much can just chillout and relax, use blessed signet a few times, signet of devotion, just relax and have a good conversation. If you lose from facing a de enchanter then oh well try again, but the majority of teams in arenas dont bring these startegies. Ive gotten 10,20,30,40,50,60,70,80 in a row, average 8-10k faction a day, tell me thats not broken for a monk spell!

My guilds Team Arena Suicide Necro ---
Vincent Draculov, Val, LynxxClan, Leyona Garret

Touch Of Agony
Dark Aura
Blood Renewel
Demonic Flesh
Dark Aura
Death Nova
Aura Of Lich
Res Sig

Combined with Life barrier you should be able to see that this build is broken without the presence of de enchantment.

Another Combo that is Getting slightly broken is the grenths Infuse Health combo, my guild uses spirit spammers to raise the Max HP of all players in the area, the point to get everyone above 1000hp at least, then we use whatever build we have currently, the only difference is that monks carry grenths balance and infuse health, the infuse health is to heal a mass amount of hp everytime, 750+hp while the opposing team isnt prepared to heal as much as our monks can its a advantage right of the bat, secondly when the infuse health kicks in to get the monks down to stilll a safe 200hp they grenths a target with fullhp hitting for on average 400dmg, even funnier 2 monks usually infuse all the way down to 1hp before the match starts and waits, the very first foe to come in range gets grenthed twice bring him down to 25% hp instantly! imagine the monks suprise when they use there most powerful healing spells only to find out that there ally is only at 35% hp now, and there still frantically trying to heal because of it.
Anyways just another mistake being made with the monk class, certain spells are broken, while most everything is unusable!

Quote: Originally Posted by Llyarra I agree with you totally on this one. I carry this a good bit but often have problems with it. The area of effect seems to be about the same as Heal Area (which makes it pretty useless) and I have noticed that elevation of the corpse DOES matter. I can be right next to a corpse that is on a hill and it won't res them. I FULLY agree that it should be out with the distance of the player's radar and disagree with the post above that said that was extreme - it's not, because you are looking at a skill with a cost of 25 and it only resses people with 1/4 health (so you need enough pts to cast something like Divine Healing - 10). That's at least 30 energy you need before you even start casting Light of Dwayna and the odds are if that many of your party is dead you are gonna be low on energy anyway. This one is very UNDERpowered for the cost... Say you resurrect two people. You just spent 5 more energy and 12 less seconds than it would have taken with more conventional resurrects. It's about where you stand when you activate it.

Situational? Yes.
Useless without a change? Hardly.

Quote:

Originally Posted by lynxxClan For sabo the Hobo, I agree some of the things I said where pherhaps to the extreme with changes but there just examples of ways to bring the monk spells to improve them. Gotcha .

lol!!