Life bonding priorities

I generally bond the tank, where applicable. Its always useful to slap Balthazar's Spirit on a tank and let him gain you energy. Then on people who like to Leroy, or have a relatively front line job without too high of an AL. Sins for example. I generally only single bond classes that tend to sacrifice a lot of health, OoV for example, mostly because it makes things more flexible not to have to constantly heal the same person lest your bonds fade.

If you have a competent second healer in the party who understands how bonding works its useful aswell. Really outside of battle you can't maintain enough to double bond more than a six man team, and you can't have more than fourteen enchantments simultaneously, so bonding for priority isn't as big a deal. I agree with you up until the outside of battle. I can maintain 14 enchantments outside of a battle. I double bond everyone, except myself. I have to try using Balthazar's spirit one of these days.

Using Blessed Signet, you can have good energy always.

Its always useful to slap Balthazar's Spirit on a tank and let him gain you energy. [card]Balthazar's Spirit[/card]
If I'm not mistaken the tank would get the energy and adrenalin not the bonder. However by putting it on yourself you would get energy through the transference by lifebond.

Back when I used to bond, in general, I would maintain around 10 enchantments.

For 5 man parties, that meant every ally gets Life Barrier and Life Bond and I get Balthazar's Spirit.

For 8 man parties, if I brought Life Barrier and Life Bond, every ally gets Life Bond, I get Balthazar's Spirit, and the two people that take the most damage get Life Barrier. If the 2 people taking the damage are always the same, Life Barrier goes first, then Life Bond to reduce the amount of damage I take. If it's an unpredictable party, Life Bond stays up followed by Life Barrier. I take more damage, but I don't have to reapply Life Bond. I haven't tried it recently with Shield of Absorption, but I suspect it would nearly negate the extra damage taken.

I have been known to use only Life Bond and take Blessed Light as my elite. Life Bond would go on all allies with Balthazar's Spirit on myself. Attack damage would get reduced, I get a lot of energy, and can use that energy for Blessed Light which means I have more skill slots free because I have a strong heal, condition removal, and hex removal all in one skill.

I also have used only Life Barrier without Life Bond. In that case, everyone gets Life Barrier, the tank or two gets Essence Bond. The advantage of this situation is that everyone gets full damage reduction (unlike only attack damage with Life Bond) except myself.

Edit: Blessed Signet and Mantra of Inscriptions should be able to keep around 10 enchantments up in between battle. Essence Bond/Balthazar's Spirit gets energy flowing in the middle of battle allowing you to cast other spells in battle.
their some good ideas! thanks for the usefull tips mate

Back when I used to bond, in general, I would maintain around 10 enchantments.

For 5 man parties, that meant every ally gets Life Barrier and Life Bond and I get Balthazar's Spirit.

For 8 man parties, if I brought Life Barrier and Life Bond, every ally gets Life Bond, I get Balthazar's Spirit, and the two people that take the most damage get Life Barrier. If the 2 people taking the damage are always the same, Life Barrier goes first, then Life Bond to reduce the amount of damage I take. If it's an unpredictable party, Life Bond stays up followed by Life Barrier. I take more damage, but I don't have to reapply Life Bond. I haven't tried it recently with Shield of Absorption, but I suspect it would nearly negate the extra damage taken.

I have been known to use only Life Bond and take Blessed Light as my elite. Life Bond would go on all allies with Balthazar's Spirit on myself. Attack damage would get reduced, I get a lot of energy, and can use that energy for Blessed Light which means I have more skill slots free because I have a strong heal, condition removal, and hex removal all in one skill.

I also have used only Life Barrier without Life Bond. In that case, everyone gets Life Barrier, the tank or two gets Essence Bond. The advantage of this situation is that everyone gets full damage reduction (unlike only attack damage with Life Bond) except myself.

Edit: Blessed Signet and Mantra of Inscriptions should be able to keep around 10 enchantments up in between battle. Essence Bond/Balthazar's Spirit gets energy flowing in the middle of battle allowing you to cast other spells in battle.
their some good ideas! thanks for the usefull tips mate

Back when I used to bond, in general, I would maintain around 10 enchantments.

For 5 man parties, that meant every ally gets Life Barrier and Life Bond and I get Balthazar's Spirit.

For 8 man parties, if I brought Life Barrier and Life Bond, every ally gets Life Bond, I get Balthazar's Spirit, and the two people that take the most damage get Life Barrier. If the 2 people taking the damage are always the same, Life Barrier goes first, then Life Bond to reduce the amount of damage I take. If it's an unpredictable party, Life Bond stays up followed by Life Barrier. I take more damage, but I don't have to reapply Life Bond. I haven't tried it recently with Shield of Absorption, but I suspect it would nearly negate the extra damage taken.

I have been known to use only Life Bond and take Blessed Light as my elite. Life Bond would go on all allies with Balthazar's Spirit on myself. Attack damage would get reduced, I get a lot of energy, and can use that energy for Blessed Light which means I have more skill slots free because I have a strong heal, condition removal, and hex removal all in one skill.

I also have used only Life Barrier without Life Bond. In that case, everyone gets Life Barrier, the tank or two gets Essence Bond. The advantage of this situation is that everyone gets full damage reduction (unlike only attack damage with Life Bond) except myself.

Edit: Blessed Signet and Mantra of Inscriptions should be able to keep around 10 enchantments up in between battle. Essence Bond/Balthazar's Spirit gets energy flowing in the middle of battle allowing you to cast other spells in battle. With the exception of Blessed Light, this has been the barrier/bond build since the wee early days of the Prophecies campaign. I've used the Barrier/Bond/Mantra/Sig build in both "god" instances. When you amp the prot attribute and have a good energy armor set you can keep around 10 enchantments going outside of battle using Mantra of Inscriptions and Blessed Signet. And when you're (I'm) in battle and are using Balth's/Mantra/Sig I can easily maintain about 16 enchantments or more with enough energy to pump out some high powered prot spells to boot.

(note: A necro with Blood Ritual can also help a great deal if you're just starting out with a Barr/Bond monk, just until you get the rhythm of your mantra/sig combo)

The only bane to this build is myriad high density enchantment stripping (and/or you running out of energy or dropping below 50%).

Regardless of how you use it, I typically adjust bonds on the fly, on who seems to be aggroing the most in a party. Most times it's the Warrior or Dervish, however on occasion it can be the Ele as well, and when this is the case I find I need to shift a Barrier to the ele instead. Most times I end up barriering/bonding everyone in a 8 man group during combat, and drop the unneeded enchants when out of combat. It may take a bit more time pre-combat for you to set up, but when no one in your party dies or gets below 50%, most skeptical groups will see the light .

{/end rant of old school GW player}