What is with Monks today?

Anyway, I suppose we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one. Agreed.

I have to disagree with you there 100%. Providing the ele skills you take are spammable AoR is fantastic. My brother, WHO DOES PLAY MONK...has commented how he rarely needs to heal me. Also, I'm not sure I like your suggestion for an ele build. Gale + Blinding Flash + Wards. So that's 13 in Energy Storage, 16 in Air and...how much in Earth? And frankly, who cares if I'm over healing myself...at least my health isn't going down and I am one caster the monks don't need to keep a constant eye on. Gale causes exhaustion. Not good. Blinding flash is ok but only works on one foe...so basically you spend 15 energy blinding one foe...wait until it recharges, spend another 15 energy blinding another foe....again..again... Waste of time. I only bring blinding flash if I know there will be fierce melee monsters who can inflict real pain... such as bosses. I spike. It's what I do. Thus I bring powerful air skills and spam the hell outta them and get a lot of health back off AoR.

Now this is not to say I don't take your views on board...from time to time I like to go earth. When I go earth I DO take wards and knockdowns...because that's what earth does...it's defensive. I don't take AoR with earth because it's not spammable enough to give me a good enough heal. So it's all completely dependent on the magic you run with. Earth lends itself to what you want...Air (my usual choice) does not. Sure gale knocks down but is far too spammable for it's own good, does not to any damage AND causes exhaustion...and ONLY works on one foe...unlick Dragon's Stomp. Sure, it also causes exhaustion...but it also deals damage and knocks down multiple foes. It isn't spammable enough to cause mass exhaustion. Ok, maybe I'm missing something.

AoR provides healing when you cast. That is to get a return out of it, you have to cast. To get anything decent out of it, you really have to spam cast.

If you are taking damage, you shouldn't be spamming, you should be dealing with what's causing it, the usual method is kiting. If you're taking extremely heavy damage you should be protted and kiting to mitigate the damage. You need healing, but spamming spells to get any mileage out of AoR means you're going to take even more damage.

If you aren't taking damage, you're probably spamming and getting plenty of numbers off AoR, but who cares, you're not taking damage.

It's a skill that gives healing when you don't need it and gives you nothing when you do.

The only time when it really shines is when you're fighting a mob which has a heavy degen component, which the AI is very good at getting onto everyone. But in that case you're better off using heal party. You do have heal party don't you?

My skills listed are all alternatives that work at splash attribute levels, that provide far more benefits to monks than AoR ever will.

Flash will cut out more damage than AoR will ever put out in healing.
Wards will do the same.
Gale exists to be spammed when necessary. It's a fantastic multi-situational skill that can be used either offensively or defensively. It's an interupt, warrior control and monk shutdown all in one. Yes it requires intelligent use but I'm assuming that you can do that. If you exhaust yourself down to eight energy don't blame the skill for it, blame yourself for mashing keys until you hit that point.

Ok, maybe I'm missing something.

AoR provides healing when you cast. That is to get a return out of it, you have to cast. To get anything decent out of it, you really have to spam cast.

If you are taking damage, you shouldn't be spamming, you should be dealing with what's causing it, the usual method is kiting. If you're taking extremely heavy damage you should be protted and kiting to mitigate the damage. You need healing, but spamming spells to get any mileage out of AoR means you're going to take even more damage.

If you aren't taking damage, you're probably spamming and getting plenty of numbers off AoR, but who cares, you're not taking damage.

It's a skill that gives healing when you don't need it and gives you nothing when you do.

The only time when it really shines is when you're fighting a mob which has a heavy degen component, which the AI is very good at getting onto everyone. But in that case you're better off using heal party. You do have heal party don't you?

My skills listed are all alternatives that work at splash attribute levels, that provide far more benefits to monks than AoR ever will.

Flash will cut out more damage than AoR will ever put out in healing.
Wards will do the same.
Gale exists to be spammed when necessary. It's a fantastic multi-situational skill that can be used either offensively or defensively. It's an interupt, warrior control and monk shutdown all in one. Yes it requires intelligent use but I'm assuming that you can do that. If you exhaust yourself down to eight energy don't blame the skill for it, blame yourself for mashing keys until you hit that point. You've still not persuaded me to take AoR off my air build skillbar.

Ok, so you say the usual method of dealing with something that's causing you damage is Kiting...and you say that to get enough health out of it I really have to spam cast.

So the usual method is kiting. My usual method is pummel the crap outta the thing that's killing me. This keeps me very well healed AND deals with the problem head on. If you don't believe me then fine but I can, unless I have an entire mob on me...finish the enemy before he finishes me. And yes, I spam cast...that's what air magic allows me to do. I'm not stupid...I know my limitations...if I have 5 enemies on me OF COURSE i'm going to leg it.

LOL @ spamming Gale! If you want an interrupt you take a mesmer...mesmers have skills which:
1. Interrupt.
2. Interrupt without causing exhaustion
3. Interrupt with a 1/4 second casting time

It seems to me that you have no idea...at all...I have shed loads of energy all the time...and now I don't even take dual attunements thanks to Glyph of Lesser Energy. If you think I could somehow "Manage" the, frankly, crippling amount of exhaustion Gale would give me if I spammed it as you describe then *shakes head*....all I can say is "oh dear".

The argument can be settled by running numbers, otherwise this is just Theory Wars. Go grab a Blade of Corruption or something and have him auto-attack you while you either a) kite (with wards or blinding flash) or b) stand in place and spam (with AoR), until you kill him.

My personal prediction is that Kiting > AoR.

In the case of ranged attacks, Kiting > AoR definitely, simply because kiting reduces damage to 0.

In the case of most direct damage spells, AoR > Kiting simply because you can't kite spell damage (well, unless you just flat-out run away from the caster). That all seems highly unfair.

I really don't know if I can be bothered to argue my point but oh well... You don't get the situation where it's 1 Ele with AoR vs 1 blade of corruption...there are other influences... Also I'm not saying AoR is a replacement for a monk... All I'm saying is AoR has saved my hide on several occaisons and instead of running away from a group I've stood there and finished the guy off while the rest of the team ignored the fact that some wammo had decided I was going to die.

When I went to map that rear area in Dunes of Dispair towards my Tyrian GMC title...everyone else left after they'd helped me get there without triggering the timer. I stuck on dual attunements and AoR and took out all the horrible little Jade Scarbs who popped up as I wandered around...I could not have done that without AoR. And yes, Blade of Corruption could OWN Scarabs 1v1...that's beside the point entirely... I'm not stupid, if I know I'm going to be overwhelmed I will run away because what's the point in needlessly dying? But I know my limitations and if I know I can take something out...why the hell not?

As for the whole Gale thing earlier I actually thought that was a joke the first time I read it.


Edit: Just to point out...I'm not having a go at anyone...I'm trying to have a reasonably constructive debate... I don't care if people don't like AoR for one reason or another...I'm just making my case in the most lighthearted way possible. The last thing I want is for this to turn into a major argument. Just felt I should add this in...I got a rather nasty PM recently from someone who doesn't agree and there is just no call for that sort of cruel behaviour. Anyways, I'm ending this here.

FAILURE right there. if you use Gale to INTERRUPT, your really doing something wrong. Gale is used to shutdown monks for a second so you can deal damage without them countering it. ive had eles keep spamming Gale and Shock on me before, i was nearly constantly down while they whiped my team; sure, they spammed themselves with exhaustion, but they won anyhoo. Gale is a good interrupt for key 2 sec plus cast time spells like res and aegis/HP.

Otherwise it is probably the best shutdown skill in the game.

Joe

As a side note, I'm surprised you're actually being PM'd about this ... it's hardly an intense or emotional argument. It was me, I've apolgised for it and it was uncalled for - a couple of factors came together to make me feel particularly spiteful at the time and it showed in the PM, not an excuse just a statement. As I say, I've apologised and that's all I can do - I'm bowing out of the discussion though.

i don't think anyone doesnt like monks anymore unless they dont do their job correctly A triple negative?

Channeling is a great spell but it's better suited to PvP than PvE. In PvE, you can draw aggro by being close to mobs, although it doesn't always happen if they are already bashing on something else. In PvP, you're likely to draw "aggro" no matter where you are, so you can count on at least a couple enemies being in the area.

I usually tell my PuGs at the beginning a few simple rules:
- You're not a ranger or warrior and you pull? I let you die
- You're not a warrior and taking major damage for more then 10 secs? I let you die
- You're rushing ahead of the group? I let you die
- You don't wait for my energy after a battle? I let you die Hey, that's great. Alternatively you could just tell the group that you aren't skilled enough to keep people taking disproportional amounts of damage alive, and that you're too apathetic about your shortcomings to even try. If you need to recharge after every single battle in order to heal a group properly, you're doing something wrong.

If people continually RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GO up, as in a caster rushing straight into mobs, then let them tank until you're uncomfortable with your energy situation, which should let you heal for a whole lot longer than 10 seconds. The difference between a ranger and a caster is 10AL. It is -not- impossible to keep them alive.

You're not a good monk if you can't make decisions about who, what and when to heal on the go. Adaptation is the most important thing for a monk to be able to do.