imbagon advice

Thanks for the links, Calista. I hadn't seen the first one and thats what I was looking for. I've been running a focused scythe build and I just loved it, thought I'd try something new.

I slapped together a build of my own, but the damage was lacking entirely, plus there was a lull in Adrenaline build-up.

I had this as my bar;

SY
TNtF
Anthem of Flame (for energy and to synergize ToF)
"They're on Fire"
Aggressive Refrain
Focused Anger

Self heal and res

As I said, it worked well but the damage was horrid (not too concerned about that) and there was a lull in adrenaline recharge. It was the adrenaline that had me concerned.

Here's what I use for an Imbagon:

Holy Spear, Wild Throw, Aggressive Refrain, Focused Anger, "Save Yourselves!", "There's Nothing To Fear!", "Watch Yourself!", Sunspear Rebirth Signet

The 1st 2 skills are not important to the build - I just have them in case a situation might use them. I don't concern myself with doing damage as an Imbagon.

The main idea is to keep SY up as much as possible to give the rest of the party +100 armor. AR and FA are used to accomplish that, by generating lots of Adrenaline. THtF is also used as a general party buff when energy permits.
WY is used to give yourself an armor boost (since SY doesn't) and to help maintain AR by having an additional shout. (WY does not stack with SY - so no one gets +124 armor )

I use a Furious Spear of Defence with an "I Have the Power" inscription (+5 energy) and a focus for an extra +6 energy, but a shield works also.

The general idea is to use AR and FA and keep blasting away at the nearest target.
EDIT: Note - this is assuming that you're not the 'caller' or doing a 'solo' party.
Edit #2 - I don't play my Paragon, except to do things like holiday quests. So, this 'build' (to use the term loosely ) is definitely not optimized in any sense. (nor, does it need to be 99% of the time )

You're main goal is to maintain SY as much as possible, so it's not important what type of target you attack. You also want to monitor your skills and keep doing the shouts to keep AR up.

akelarumi said it very well for the conventional paragon. "Having said that, the paragon is still a bit underpowered and limited. if thats not a thing you want, it's better to give it up now......" Why? Because party protection is not everything. Damage helps a lot.

Catch is, your party has +100 armor. You do not. Have to watch out for that. Side by side comparisons with identical parties of Paragon and Ranger Beast Master has shown the Ranger BM to be more effective and survivable in many situations. With Asuran Scan, the BM does not miss and with Otyugh's Cry up, the beast does not either.

Then too, armor ignoring skills go right through your Save Yourselves as if it were not there. All that being said, I still love my paragon. it does not have to be a boring character.

http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/User:Khomet/Sandbox is a valuable set of Paragon builds by Khomet. Almost none of them are boring.

Just remember, heroes sometimes prioritize the target you attack. So blindly picking a target to attack sometimes causes issues. I have had instances where I called a target and then switched to a closer one (so I wouldn't drag the imba into the frontline) and the heroes switched targets with me. In harder areas you have to pull enemies very carefully to make certain that the imba doesn't get dragged into mellee. Imba is fun for awhile, just remeber if you are doing it right, you are the weakest person on your team.

I don't really see what there is to "miss" if you go via the pvx build, as that basically the most optimal version for PvE. For the attack skills use Vicious Attack and Spear of Lightning (without orders) or swift javelin (with orders). SY gives you the energy to maintain TNtF (which maintains AR), EBSoH and adrenaline building skills perfectly fine. You can hit off an attack skill when you have the energy (you'll get to know after a while when the right time is).

Looking at your attempt you posted, the reason for you adrenaline lull was the lack of "For Great Justice!". I'd also drop anthem of flame and ToF as they don't contribute much at all (total damage reduction from SY+TNtF is something like 90%). Then you're basically at the pvx build again (which also stops your damage being bad as well as buffing teammates damage too)...

Personally, I run this build, but I have 6 second SY and it just isn't needed 99% of the time in my experience. This gives the ability to quickly switch to SY spam if needed for an encounter, while still having plenty of damage/utility for the other encounters in a zone.

Enfeebling blood | Spear of Lightning | Cruel Spear | TNtF | SY | EBSoH | Aggressive Refrain| Fall back!

Paragons can do decent single-target damage, and since you don't need to invest heavily in any other attribute to abuse the PvE-only skills, you might as well stick those attribute points into spear mastery and get some damage out of your attacks.

Here is the core of the imbagon build:
Focused Anger
Aggressive Refrain
Save Yourselves
There's nothing to fear

There are other varients of the core but this is the best as it doesn't gimp your damage or suck up all your energy like the other varients do. Note that Tntf can be used to maintain AR (its easier with a sup leadership headpiece that you swap to when casting AR), but you can also bring anthem of weariness or anthem of flame for maintaining AR if you don't mind stopping to cast them every 10-15 seconds. I don't recommend They're on fire unless you have other sources of burning in your party.

Finally, this leaves you with several free skill slots and a lot of free attribute points, since so far, all you have used is 4 (or 5) skill slots and full attribute investment in leadership. My advice from here would be to stick 2 energy-based spear attacks in your build. Adrenaline skills are not recommended as they will slow down your ability to spam SY. Plus, the SY spam will give you all the energy you need to use these energy-based spear attacks. I think that I use Spear of Fury and Spear of lightning in my build. Also don't forget to add spear mastery attribute points. My attribute spread, with runes, is 15 spear, 9 command, and 12 leadership. Your final skills are really up to personal preference. I would, however, recommend using cheap energy skills, as adding adrenal skills slows down the SY spam.

EDIT: forgot about FGJ. This skill should be stapled to your bar as it is required to maintain SY when FA is on down and still recharging

I appreciate all the ideas, this is exactly what I was hoping for in this thread.

I've played around with it a bit. What I've been running is;

SY
TNtF
FA
AR
For Great Justice
Watch Yourself (not sure about this one)

It's working terrific and has solved the delay in adrenal charge, however, I'm having some issue keeping the Refrain echo rolling between battles, which is why I enjoyed AoF. Any tips to solve this would be appreciated. Other than that I think I just need to adjust too the timing and maybe tweak it using all the information gathered here.

You guys are great, thanks for all the help.

I use fall back! on my para and for great justice! FGJ! helps keep adrenaline up and keeps Refrain rolling. Fall back on myself and a few heros (where I can squeeze it in, ie. warriors) helps make it easier. Also makes running around much faster.