Optimising My 7 Hero Builds

I wanted to make an updated version of discordway and came to this:















The player himself runs the standard assassin's promise build.
Feel free to insult and offer suggestions.

if anyone wants exact skill templates or to talk to me directly, you can whisper me in-game: Gladiator Secrecy

the top 3 pictars are blocked for me :<.

I'd probably use splinter weapon instead of ancestors rage @ 16 channeling it rocks socks.( i run it in my casterway + mm + primary assassin party)

How do you find SoS with a hero? I find the heros never have all the spirits up at once, or take way too long to do so. so the high dps never really kicks in.( unless i micro manage ewwwww)

Crippling Anguish is not that great as it only affects one foe, a better alternative similar to it is Shared Burden (http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Shared_Burden), but Ineptitude (http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Ineptitude) is also a very good illusion magic choice.

Also, you have a good amount of healing between all 4 of your discords, I would say to use monk prots on one the fourth one instead. Like protective spirit, aegis and shield of absorption.

@ Bleh: Fixed Pictures
I've noticed that almost all ritualist heroes that have to do with spirits (BESIDES ST!) are slow to put up spirits thus proving unreliable the vast majority of the time.

@Ultimak: I thought it would be better than Shared Burden since Discord deals with single target damage and Crippling Anguish is a low cost, single target, good spamability, skill that compliments Discordway.

*EDIT* Changed fourth necromancer to prot rather than heal

Discord is meh, it narrows your own build to very few choices and only shinned during the 3 hero era of GWs. If you want to give yourself greater versatility in your own builds I would run a FoC necro, Necro rit healer, AoTL/support MM(I use hex removal on my MM), SoS resto hybrid and switch out crippling anguish and conjur phantasm with Ineptitude and Arcane Conundrum. Ineptitude is great damage with anti melee and arcane conundrum offers some anti caster/e management. Also switch Razah back to a rit and make him ST shelter. With a constant shelter rit all HM areas become piss ant easy.

Quote: Originally Posted by Swingline

Discord is meh, it narrows your own build to very few choices and only shinned during the 3 hero era of GWs. If you want to give yourself greater versatility in your own builds I would run a FoC necro, Necro rit healer, AoTL/support MM(I use hex removal on my MM), SoS resto hybrid and switch out crippling anguish and conjur phantasm with Ineptitude and Arcane Conundrum. Ineptitude is great damage with anti melee and arcane conundrum offers some anti caster/e management. Also switch Razah back to a rit and make him ST shelter. With a constant shelter rit all HM areas become piss ant easy. Tried this sort of set-up:
SoS rit
ST rit
AoTL MM
FoC/resto necro
Necro rit healer/curses
2 mesmer backline (Panic+Inept)

It proved to be inferior to Discord even though discord does single target damage.

I don't get the same results nor stability therefore I made the switch over to Discordway.

Quote: Originally Posted by Gladiator Steven

To each his own then I guess. I never had a problem with that setup and I got one of my Gwamms with it. Although it looks to be a bit different than mine. Resto on the FoC doesnt sound quite right. My FoC is a N/P with STY and FB. He can use STY in the middle of a spike to support the party. You want the FoC necro to fully use his spike skills one after the other and the shouts allowed him to do that. The AI may stop in the middle to heal allies.

I also ran a full Necro Rit healer with preservation since all the other resto elites are crap, no point in Xinrae's weapon with shelter up all the time.

Other than the general descriptions you gave me, I am afraid I cant help much more.

I'm satisfied and will stick with Discordway, stubborn of me, I know. I'm moreover looking for suggestions to optimize the build in my first post.

Razah will ahve energy issues. His attributes are also split too much specially for a well which has anti-synergy with your single corpse exploititative minion skills.

Xandra has a communing spirit, yet no points in communing. At the very minimum use the 6 unused. Tbh i would just swap out that spirit for splinter weapon.

Livia is split between too many things... death..communing...resto...curses...soul reaping...Drop the communing and up your curses, since the majority of skills on the bar are curses.

Olias...drop communing attribute points and up something else.

Norgu..like others have said drop crippling anguish...there are much better options.

Quote: Originally Posted by Gladiator Steven

@Ultimak: I thought it would be better than Shared Burden since Discord deals with single target damage and Crippling Anguish is a low cost, single target, good spamability, skill that compliments Discordway. You are running the A/P build, so there should be no problem getting spammable hexes, and if you do mess up an AP cast, your discord heroes still have curses. Much better to get another aoe shut-down/crowd control.

These are just suggestions. You don't have to do them if you don't want to.

Take FoMF out on MoW. Put in Rejuvenation spirit to help against degen and fuel healing spells even more.

Take out Ether feast on Norgu for another FoMF for 2 rezzes. Also replace Crippling Anguish and Conjure Phantasm like most people said. Replace Power Drain for Waste not Want Not. Heroes don't prioritize rupts nor do they use them for e management.

Only suggestion I have for Gwen is to replace CoF for Wastrels Worry. WW and Panic go great together. Get a Superior Dom rune on Gwen.

Switch Olias to paragon secondary. Take out Taste of pain, put in Stand Your Ground and fall back. Put 10 into command.

Take Vital weapon out on Livia for Rip enchantment. Put the communing points into Curses/SR or Resto. get a minor curse rune for Livia. TBH I never liked MoP in my discord build when I was running it a year ago. It needs to be controlled by a human player to utilize it for decent potential and I doubt your micro managing Livia. Also with a full 16 channeling splinter weapon it becomes overkill. Replace MoP for Barbs.

On Razah get rid of the wells. Put the points from blood into death magic and SR. Put in Masochism and a skill of your choice that doesn't exploit corpses.

Switch Xandra to a Channeling Resto Hybrid...

SoS
Bloodsong
Painful Bond
Splinter Weapon
Spirit Siphon
MBaS
Spirit Light
PwK

Attributes include runes...
16 channeling
12 resto
7 spawning power

Quote: Tried this sort of set-up:
SoS rit (ok)
ST rit (Okish)
AoTL MM (ok)
FoC/resto necro (messy + slow)
Necro rit healer/curses (messy slow and AI doesn't understand SS very well)
2 mesmer backline (Panic+Inept)
"Proved inferior" What and how did you mamage that?

Drop one of the Rits and one Mes (keep Panic), use a Jagged MM/Helaer , take a Water hero, a RoJ Mo and take a quick look at some of the hero builds on PvX.
Keystone Mes for instance.

Disco was outdated the minute the AotL update came out!

Use Fall Back for Olias instead of that Resto skill

Your builds have many problems not easy to fix. The following assumes you are a caster.

Master of Whispers: drop Soothing Memories, use Animate Shambling Horror. Go for 16 Death. Sacrifice Restoration.
Olias: put your Protection Prayers spells (Aegis, Prot Spirit) onto this bar. Take out Taste of Death, Spirit Light.
Livia: All your damage ignores armour, making Weaken Armour useless. Vital Weapon is bad skill, Mark of Pain is weak when you have no physicals + are running Discordway, Shadow of Fear and Enfeebling Blood are completely compensated for by Aegis. Simply make this another N/Rt healer with Discord (i.e. copy Master of Whispers's bar, using different spirit, and using Death Pact Signet).
Razah: Wells conflict with minion spells and that's what Discordway is for. I would drop the entire hero for a different primary but if you really want to use Discord then make this another N/Rt healer with Discord (copy Master of Whispers's bar, use a different spirit though).
Xandra: Pain with 0 Communing is bad. Spirit's Gift isn't needed you've got Discordway. There are plenty of good Channeling skills so use them instead (Agony, Splinter Weapon, even Spirit Rift or Spirit Burn or whatever direct damage nukes).
Gwen: You've got plenty of hard resses already so drop Flesh of my Flesh and bring in more damage / energy management / whatever. Panic sucks use ESurge. Domination Magic has plenty of good skills too.
Norgu: Crippling Anguish is bad, Conjure Phantasm is also bad, Ether Feast is absolutely not needed with so much healing elsewhere. Illusion Magic as a whole is bad. I say drop the entire attribute and go with Domination. Duplicating Gwen's bar should be good, albeit with Shatter Enchant over Shatter Hex for the enchantment removal (you've got none of them in the team atm). Definitely do not run two Panics.

If you are melee then drop a Discord Nec for a RoJ Monk with Smiter's Boon + various Smite skills and Strength of Honour. Be sure to have Splinter Weapon on SoS, and go back to Panic on Gwen.

gl hf.

Updated bars in my first place, almost completley reformatting every single bar using the suggestions posted above.

Can't wait to hear what you guys say about the updated bars

Changes that I am considering:

-Replacing the Invoking Lightning Elementalist with a a third Mesmer or a SoGM.

- Replacing Spirit Rift on the SoS Ritualist.

2 Esurgers might be a bitt overkill. Foes can run out of energy, does not stop them from casting spells and skills but limits your damage.

Quote: Originally Posted by aspi

2 Esurgers might be a bitt overkill. Foes can run out of energy, does not stop them from casting spells and skills but limits your damage. Two copies of E-surge won't ever completely drain a foes energy. Infact, as high as four copies can take a while to fully deplete them.

Quote: Originally Posted by Outerworld

Two copies of E-surge won't ever completely drain a foes energy. Infact, as high as four copies can take a while to fully deplete them. So you say, but Me and a friend are doing Vq and HM missions on all continents. Since we are both mesmers we both run esurge. And much to our annoyance we waste our elite on even HM eles because they are completly drained. So I am not sure where you got that info...

Quote: Originally Posted by aspi

So you say, but Me and a friend are doing Vq and HM missions on all continents. Since we are both mesmers we both run esurge. And much to our annoyance we waste our elite on even HM eles because they are completly drained. So I am not sure where you got that info... Like you, from personal experience. For a HM ele to be drained from E-surge it must have either been lengthy battle or been spamming expensive skills. And besides; the damage is AoE, so even if it were problem you could just switch targets.