Would like your advice on improving petway!

A few months ago my brother and I decided we wanted to try playing a more unique build than what we had constantly been running over the past year.
So in about an hour we threw together a quick team that consisted of every player having their own pet (bears, to be specific). I know its not exactly a new concept, but I actually found it was really successfull. We stormed through the entire factions campaign in a day with about four deaths throughout the entire thing.

However, a lot in the build is well, crap. But since its worked so well I was hoping you guys could offer me some advice on how to improve it! Bear in mind that i'm not aiming for a complete rebuild and add in three discord necroes or turn it into sabway. The whole point is that this build has turned out to be a fun alternative to the rest of the constantly played meta builds in PvE nowadays. So please dont just comment telling me to drop the pets because 'pets suck and waste a slot on your monks bar'.

Okay so here we go. Because of al lthe pets we have found that we're often splitting up when in explorable areas and functioning as effeciant teams on our own, so I'll list the builds by team.

My team:
Me, mesmer.
Skills: [Visions of regret], [Auspicious Incantation], [Empathy], [Cry of Pain], [Backfire], [Ebon vanguard Assassin support], [Summon Ruby Djin], [Charm animal].
Attributes: Fast fasting 9, Domination 12, Inspiration 5, Beast Mastery 8.

Olias, necromancer.
Skills: [Spoil victor], [Blood of the Master], [Death Nova], [Signet of Lost Souls], [Animate bone Minions], [charm animal], [Resurrection signet], [Comfort animal].
Attributes: Blood Magic 9, Death magic 12, Soul reaping 5, Beast mastery 8.

Kahmu, Dervish.
Skills: [Mystic Sweep], [Eremites attack], [Heart of Fury], [Zealous Renewal], [Avatar of Lyssa], [Comfort Animal], [Resurrection signet],[Charm animal].
Attributes: Beast Mastery 6, Scythe Mastery 12, Mysticism 11.

Dunkoro, Monk.
Skills: [Light of deliverance], [Signet of rejuvenation], [Dwaynas Kiss], [Dismiss condition], [Shield of absorption], [protective spirit], [Resurrection chant], [charm animal].
Attributes: Healing prayers 11, Protection prayers 13, Divine favor 9, Beast mastery 4.

__________________________________________________ _________

Brothers team:

Him, warrior.
Skills: [Eviscerate], [Disrupting chop], [Dismember], [revive animal], [Sprint], [Healing signet], [bonetti's Defense], [Charm animal]. (Yes there are no pve skills here, what would you suggest?)
Attributes: Strength 4, Axe mastery 12, Tactics 10.

Pyre Fierceshot, ranger.
Skills: [Barrage], [Dual shot], [determined shot], [Splinter weapon], [ancestors rage], [fertile season], [poison Tip signet], [Charm animal].
Attributes: Beast mastery 8, Marksmanship 10, Channeling magic 12.

Vekk, Elementalist.
Skills: [Star burst], [Fireball], [Meteor shower], [Rodgorts Invocation], [Searing heat], [Fire attunement], [resurrection signet], [Charm animal].
Attributes: Fire magic 11, energy storage 11, beast mastery 8.

Ogden Stonehealer, Monk.
Skills: [Word of healing], [blessed signet], [healing breeze], [Healing seed], [protective spirit], [orison of healing],[resurrection chant], [charm animal].
Attributes: Healing prayers 12, divine favor 10, beast mastery 8.




And that is that. So what advice would you give to help improve the efficiancy of our team?
I tend to find that in play it is my brothers team which could use the most work on it, though perhaps this is due to the lack of a minion master?

What skills could be switched in to imrpove the monks healing, the elementalists DPS?

I'd like to get this petway as good as it can be without having to drop the pets or its ability to split into two seperate teams. are there any skills that would encourage this?

Thanks very much.

Are we talking about Normal Mode? Because alot of crap works there and blitzes factions in a day. Heck I'd call sab/discord sub-optimal for these areas, far too much defense and set-up involved for NM mobs that explode when you just look at them.

SV -> Jagged, AotL, even Flesh Golem... all would be more useful. Barbs/MoP would be funny with pets, so it's a shame you don't just tack it onto sabway.

Dwyna's Kiss -> Patient spirit on dunk. I'd consider dwyna's sorrow to go with your MM.

Lyssa is OK but wounding strike seems much better, especially since heroes can't perma-avatar.

Get rid of star burst, go savvanah heat if you want to stick to mediocre fire ele, but personally I'd go earth. (Unsteady ground, churning earth, eruption, yada yada, owns HM.)

Pyre is crap, if you're going to bring a ranger hero I'd do BHA. Although they kindof play sunder/penetrating turrets alright. You could also do R/P ferocious strike build with tiger fury to set up the precondition.

Give one of the players [revive animal] so the ones without Comfort can get thier pets rezed. Either make Olias a full MM or a MM+Curse mix. As mentioned, [Barbs] and [mark of pain] would work well with all the physical damage around. Pyre has 12 in Channeling, but you need more than that to hit the 5 attack limit on Splinter. I'd drop it to 10 and boost Expertise. And if using Barrage, you don't need any other attacks except interrupts, so drop Dual, Determined, etc.

I have a pet way variant on my war, but i mainly use my pet for the benefits of [never ramapage alone] and battle rage, pets imo don't do much except serve as meatshields, especially w/o pet attacks, (their regular attacks are as weak as wanding and terribly slow) so I haven't really bothered putting much attributes into them.

Hey all, thanks for the help!

Heres how the builds looking now,
My team:

Me (same)


Olias:
Skills:[Aura of the lich], [Blood of the master], [Death nova], [Mark of Pain], [Barbs], [Taste of death], [revive animal], [charm animal].
Attributes: 13 death, 8 soul reaping, 9 curses, 8 beast mastery.


I decided to go for the MoP/Barbs combo since there wasnt anything extremely important in blood magic that I was using, and with aura of the lich I should have plenty of minions without investing in any other summoning skills. I think the bar is looking pretty good now, but give me feedback if you see somewhere (anywhere) you think it could be improved.


Dunkoro.
Skills: [Zealous benediction], [dwayna's sorrow], [patient spirit], [dismiss condition], [shield of absorption], [protective spirit], [resurrection chant], [charm animal].
Attributes: 13 healing prayers, 11 protection prayers, 9 divine favor, 4 beast mastery.


I decided to swap out Light of deliverance for zealous benediction because I think zealous helps us to split up into two seperate teams more than LoD does. To make up for the matress party healing, I took FoxBats advice and added in dwaynas sorrow, which hopefully should work just as well. (Though i have no idea how well heroes use the skill). Anywhere I can improve this?


Meloni,
Skills: [Wounding strike], [victorious sweep], [mystic sweep], [eremite's attack], [heart of fury], [zealous renewal], [faithful intervention], [charm animal].
Attributes: 6 beast mastery, 14 scythe mastery, 12 mysticism.


Again I took the advice posted here and swapped out lyssa's for wounding. How are my attack skills though? And enchantments, any better ones I could be using?
___________________________________________
Brothers team:

My brother (warrior),
Skills: [Dragon slash], [save yourselves (luxon)], [enraging charge], ["I am the strongest"], ["for great justice"], [never rampage alone], [revive animal], [charm animal].
Attributes: 10 strength, 14 swordsmanship, 8 beast mastery.

As you can see, completely revamped the warrior. The SY spammer is nice, helps his half of the team get the defense it was lacking - and while using 'i am the strongest' he packs a very nice amount of damage (especially with barbs/MoP). I was also pleased to get 'never rampage alone' in there too - to make and extra use of the pet. My only qualm with the build would be the long downtime of 'for great justice' - are there any better adrenal skills I could be using?


Pyre has been replaced. I appreciated that the build wasnt working and decided to bring in:
Xandra,
Skills: [Offering of spirit], [Splinter weapon], [Ancestors rage], [bloodsong], [boon of creation], [union], [shelter], [charm animal].
Attributes: beast mastery 7, 11 communing, 12 channeling magic, 10 spawning power.


I just got this straight off the wiki and adapted it to add a pet, who I just got to level twenty. I originaly decided to add xandra to the team before going for an SY spammer on my brother - so my question is, will this be too much defense? I'm totaly unfamiliar with ritualist skills, do any skills spring to your mind that would support the whole many pets thing we've got going on? Should I go for a more offensive ritualist?


Vekk,
Skills:[Savannah heat], [Teinai's heat], [Searing heat], [rodgort's invocation], [glyph of lesser energy], [meteor shower], [fire attunement], [charm animal].
Attributes, 14 fire magic, 11 energy storgae, 8 beast mastery.


I got vekk his better elite, and basically just took this build from pvx as well. But I'm not too sure about his damage and may replace him, or try an earth ele as was suggested earlier.
Thing is, I'm not entirely sure what else could be used to replace him that would push out a higher DPS. Perhaps another physical character, to make even more use of barbs/MoP? Or would going entirely physicals hinder me in block heavy areas?

Lastly i've got Ogden,
Skills: [Word of healing], [patient spirit], [dismiss condition], [shield of absorption], [protective spirit], [cure hex], [resurrection chant], [charm animal].
Attributes: 12 healing, 12 protection, 6 divine favor, 8 beast mastery.

I think this builds okay, but you never know.


Please give me any feedback you can on improving this, and thanks very much to those who've already posted!

If you decide against the Ele, consider a Paragon in his place.

You're running eight bears, and bears are the only pets that pack an attack skill, which can work with some Paragon skills like [go for the eyes] [anthem of envy] [anthem of weariness], etc. Your allies all have pretty low BM ranks, so anything that can boost the value of the pets is good.

if you want... you could maybe have xandra bring infuriating heat as a solution to the adrenaline problem, it is after all a 15 sec recharge elite spirit that can synergize well w/ her bar if you make her a restoration rit because it has a relatively long duration even w/ a low spec. You'll be sacrificing energy gain but you'll be able to maintain SY for longer periods of time.

Quote: Originally Posted by trankle

[anthem of envy] [anthem of weariness], etc. Your allies all have pretty low BM ranks, so anything that can boost the value of the pets is good. Do pet attack skills trigger anthems? (on the pet...)

barbs + death nova is problematic, because heroes like to spam both, and both take forever to cast. That's largely why the jobs are split up in sabway, not so much an attribute issue. You can just toss Mark onto an MM with good effect, but for barbs to be used much you'd probably need to lose death nova.

Hmm.

Trankle, I love this paragon idea. Only problem is that i'm not actually using black bears at the moment - they're all polar bears. I'd be inclined to swap them out and use the para, but i've heard that the very fact they use beastial mauling ''drastically' lowers their DPS (since the skill itself offers no bonus and takes a while to use), and I don't know whether using a paragon with [Anthem of Envy] would make up for that. And would it push out a significantly higher DPS than what I had with eight pets who didnt stop to use skills, and a fire elementalist?
Some how i'm not so sure.... which is a shame because I actually kinda like the concept. Makes good use of the pets.
Along those same lines though, what about [Burning refrain] for the pets, along with [Blazing finale] and ["Go for the eyes!"] spam? With ["They're on fire!"] they could become rather effective, possibly even give Vekk [Searing flames] instead of [Savannah heat].

[Infuriating heat] sounded good, but there seems to be an anomaly with that skill which means it doesnt double the adrenaline gained, but rather gives one extra strike of adrenaline per attack. So that wouldnt be helping with [Dragon Slash].

The [barbs]/[death nova] thing is pretty annoying, not sure how to get around that...

I'd particularly like to hear your thoughts on improving Vekk/Xandras DPS, I dont feel like they're doing as much for the party as they could be, at the moment. Perhaps some form of sare to keep them in [Savannah heat]? If I went for a paragon I can imagine [Crippling anthem] doing the trick wonderfully with all black bears, but again - would it be worth dropping xandra for?

Okay I'll shutup now :P

Vekk's first 3 skills all cause monsters to scatter. NM is a slower scatter than HM, but you don't want an Ele for damage in HM anyway. So either give him [Deep Freeze] which gives a 10 second snare even at 0 Water Magic, or provide some cripple. Meteor Shower will knock stuff down, but it takes 5 seconds to cast, and things may be out of range of the spells by the time they are knocked down.

Personally, I'd opt for a condition Ele using Air Magic, or another Necro with a split in Death and Curses between your 2 Necros.

Air Ele build I find to be effective on heroes:

[blinding surge][enervating charge][shell shock][shock arrow][epidemic][aura of restoration][air attunement][resurrection signet]

Or if you run 2 Necros, make one pure Death and one pure Curses. Toss in things like:

[animate shambling horror][animate bone minions][jagged bones]

which would replace your elite and 2 Curse spells. Heroes don't use Lich very well, as they wait for corpses to be had before using it, and if you only have Lich for getting minions, and they use it at the FIRST corpse, you will have to wait 45 seconds to get more, which means any other corpses will be gone unless you take forever to kill stuff.

I`d definitely slap [Aegis] on one of them heroes.

[Union] and [Bloodsong] are crap.
Take some Restoration Skills.

if you do decide to get a necro, [withering aura] + your sy could essentially kill all dmg mobs will throw at you.

I'd suggest keeping it REALLY simple.
Which means - add rangers as your main damage dealers.
This is what I normally run on my guys:
[build=OggjcxZcYQPGwGqG5WOGVgnSJXA]
[build=OgkjchZspOwmc7p0x8Yswh/LMA]
What you could do is dump a few skills and replace them with pets.
Which means you could run something like 9/14/11 - which means your pet would actually do something. That also opens up running [scavenger Strike] as your e-management skill to fuel Sundering/Penetrating.
Rangers also mean higher armour rating - which will be a help with to the sucky monks with pets. Plus you can add runes.
Xandra is looking interesting because of 14 in Channeling. So I'd go with Channeling and BM. Make her spam Splinter/Ancestors with Scavenger to fuel that. She is also the perfect hero to put Revive on.
Razzy could be used a Resto/BM guy. Let him spam his resto heals while Scavenger is used as e-management and a bit of damage.
The monks - I'd run a RoJ smiting (RoJ, Reversal, Smite Hex/Condition, Castigation, Smiter's Boon) build with pets. 9/14/10 should work also.



Keep in mind - I'd certainly suggest that one of you guys provides the conditions to meet Scavenger's condition for e-gain. Apply Poison sounds like one of the best options.
Edit:
You'd also need to be more supportive. Which means stuff like Ench removal is a MUST on your bar.

Woah, okay. Plenty of replies.

So what if I went:

[Dragon slash]["save yourselves!"]["I am the strongest!"][For great justice!][never rampage alone][revive animal][charm animal][enraging charge]
[word of healing][patient spirit][scavenger strike][shield of absorption][protective spirit][cure hex][resurrection chant][charm animal]
[spiteful spirit][mark of pain][barbs][suffering][plague sending][foul feast][charm animal][resurrection signet]
[offering of spirit][splinter weapon][ancestors rage][bloodsong][spirit rift][boon of creation][scavenger strike][charm animal]
On my brothers team. This way I have the necro getting rid of all conditions and putting them on the enemies, freeing up ogden from dismiss condition so he can use scavengers strike which keeps his energy up to heal more effeciantly.
Then xandra can use scavengers strike to spam up ancestors rage and spirit rift along with splinter weapon.
Vekk has been replaced for livia who is more physical support that deals out scatter-free DPS through the pets and minions.
Brother spams SY like mad.

Still a few problems though:

There will need to be another player in the other half of the team who can efficiantly spread conditions. Perhaps some kind of mandragorar esque mesmer bar?

Warrior has energy issues maintaining rampage as one. Can only keep SY up for 20 seconds out of every 45.

Xandras elite seems redundant if using scavengers strike, not sure if its still helping. Is it?

Damage seems pretty nice now though.

As I have said above - I'd focus on builds that work by investing into two attributes only. That way you can achieve the 10/10/11 or 8/10/12 spread which is a very decent spread because it allows you to near max 3 lines - thus being able to use your pet for more then just pretty.

That's why I'd look into:
2 Smiters:
[charm animal][scavenger strike][smiter's boon][reversal of damage][smite condition][smite hex][castigation signet][RoJ]
8+1/10/12+1+1 spread.
These guys will cause damage while protecting your party.

Resto rit:
[charm animal][scavenger strike][life][recuperation][Spirit Light][protective was kaolai][death pact signet][Weapon of Remedy]
12+1+1/12 spread.
You'd need to manually activate Recoup.
The reason why I'd go with him over a healing monk is:
1. Resto works without a second attribute. If you go healing, you need divine favor also, whereas resto works superbly with just investing into this line.
2. Nice ally-wide healing - heals your pets also.

Channeler:
[charm animal][scavenger strike][splinter weapon][ancestors' rage][death pact signet][Apply Poison][revive animal][Strike as One]
12+1+1/12/3 spread.
Give this guy a spear. He should spread poison and conditions, ensuring successful Scavengers.
(If you find yourself needing more healing - go for a 12+1+1/10+1+8 spread and bring [spirit light])

2 Rangers:
8+1/10+1/12+1+1
[charm animal][scavenger strike][Distracting shot][sundering attack][penetrating attack][prepared shot][savage shot] and then either [rip enchantment] or [death pact signet]


Players:
as a mesmer I'd focus on spreading the condition love.
Either through [extend conditions] or [fevered dreams] [cry of pain] [charm animal][scavenger strike] [drain ench] or [shatter ench] [finish him]

warrior:
SY spammer.