WoC is driving me nuts.

So with the new quests being out I decided to try and finally catch up. My problem? Zen Daijun took me 30 more tries today (after the at least 50 times since they've released it) before I finally gave up and had to buy consets. I've bought 3 of them (one for each quest I couldn't do, the other one was where I had to go kill the last Am Fah guy) and right now I'm stuck at What Waits in Shadows. Even after buying one conset for that quest, after it ran it out I immediately had a party wipe. I know some of it has to do with me not knowing how to play a fire ele effectively anymore, I typically just farm feathers/granite with an Earth+Mending solo build, and have been doing so for the past year so basically everything I use to know about playing a fire ele is gone. I have checked out Wiki and have been keeping that up as I do the quests so I know where to go, blah blah blah, but I'm just seriously fed up with having to spend money to do quests basically. And I know I'm not getting my money back when I spend the money to get through the quests.

But, to be clear I know I'm part of the problem. What I don't understand is why these quests seem ridiculously hard, even the ones I didn't have to use consets for.
And as much as I'd like help or to have someone run the whole of WoC for me for free I know that's not going to happen, so I'd like to understand what I'm doing wrong so I can try to fix it before I look for a group/run.
I do know that most of the following skills were meant to be used by players, but I've had some success with them on the heroes.
My typical parties for any quest/mission includes the following:
Xandra 16 Communing, 15 Channeling, 6 Spawning Power:
-Bloodsong
-Pain
-Dulled Weapon
-Signet of Spirits
-Anguish
-Disenchantment
-Shadow Song
-Ressurection Chant (so no health has to be sacrificed.)

Merc Monk 16 Healing Prayers, 15 Divine Favor:
-Patient Spirit
-Dwayna's Kiss
-Watchful Healing
-Cure Hex
-Ressurection Chant
-Heal Party
-Healer's Boon
-Arcane Mimicry

Ogden 16 Healing, 15 Divine Favor, 3 Prot:
-Patient Spirit
-Dwayna's Kiss
-Watchful Healing
-Dismiss Condition
-Spotless Mind
-Healing Seed
-Heal Party
-Unyielding Aura

Merc Mesmer/Mo 16 Domination, 12 Inspiration, 9 Fast Casting, 3 Prot:
-Panic
-Mistrust
-Unnatural Signet
-Overload
-Mantra of Frost
-Convert Hexes
-Wastrel's Worry
-Ressurection Chant

Merc Rit 16 Channeling, 12 Inspiration, 3 Spawning
-Arcane Echo
-Destructive Was Glaive
-Spirit Rift
-Ancestor's Rage
-Channeled Strike
-Power Drain
-Flesh of my Flesh
-Mantra of Frost

Gwen 11 Illusion, 11 Inspiration, 8 Fast Casting, 2 Curses
-Signet of Illusions
-Fragility
-Mark of Pain
-Barbed Signet
-Oppressive Gaze
-Arcane Conundrum
-Ether Feast
-Drain Enchantment

And then either

Acoloyte Sousuke 16 Fire, 15 Energy:
-Glyph of Elemental Power
-Searing Flames
-Meteor Shower
-Liquid Flame
-Fireball
-Searing Heat
-Aura of Restoration
-Firestorm

Olias 10 Blood, 10 Soul Reaping, 12 Death Magic, 4 Healing Prayers:
-Animate Shambling Horror
-Animate Vampiric Horror
-Animate Bone Fiend
-Animate Bone Horror
-Animate Bone Minions
-Unholy Feast
-Aura of the Lich
-Ressurection Chant


TL: DR. WoC is too difficult for me, I'm tired of spending my money to not get it back for doing the quests, what can I do/change to make it easier for me?

And if the mods feel this needs to be moved, then go ahead and do so that way next time I have a question like this I won't end up putting it in the wrong place.

Sorry to be blunt but those hero builds are terrible.

You should try looking for hero builds on PvX wiki to get yourself started, it's no wonder you're struggling if you have a necro using nothing but summon skills for example or a fire ele with no fire attunment.

I'm assuming you're a new player, so using PvX builds is the best to get you started until you understand how to put your own team build together.

Some may go through each of your builds, but there too many changes to suggest and would take an age, so cut n paste some popular ones for now.

Hi, these are just a few fairly general points that might help.

think about losing the superior runes on certain chars (do you have two on the rit?) - the extra health can be a life saver - maybe limit sup runes to the damage dealers and use minor elsewhere

check insignias etc - many people (me included) rate going for extra armor over health + energy etc

Party looks too defensive to me - and not enough damage dealing - you can get by with, for example, just one of those monks and one restoration based ritualist no problem. so i would suggest:

take out a monk and try a curses necro instead (feast of corruption, hexes, whatever etc)

make xandra a restoration based defensive/healer - use stuff like shelter, union, recuperation +armor of unfeeling (for the spirits) + spirit light (healing), perhaps with a soul twisting elite


maybe sacrifice the minion master for an earth ele with more aoe skills - although you could get by with anything here really


more direct, armor ignoring party-wide damage on the mesmers - e.g. - shatter hex, mistrust, energy surge, cry of frustration + party wide interrupts

Chullster - No, I'm not a new player, I got those builds FROM PVX Wiki. Minus a little tweaking because some skills were PVE Player only.

Johno77 - Yes, I try to invest in superior runes because I'm not exactly afraid to spend money on Superior Vigor runes if I need to.

I meant it might be a good idea not to use ALL sup (e.g. sup healing) etc as the -75 health can be a killer

Quote: Originally Posted by Cecedarling

Chullster - No, I'm not a new player, I got those builds FROM PVX Wiki. Minus a little tweaking because some skills were PVE Player only. I doubt there's a build on pvx posted with a minion master with 6, yes 6, summons and the fire ele with no fire attunment......

If you're not a new player then what's up with those builds? If they were hero builds then why did ANY of them have PvE only skills at all? you were obviously looking in the wrong area of PvX. Have a lok in PvE section, hero builds, Great catagory.

Hopefully others can help you out in detail, I assumed you were new only as they were so bad, but if you haven't noticed trends in PvE hero builds or why they're put together in the way they are then......

well, Superior Vigor isnt nothing wrong with, but superior skill runes are unecessary, they take too much health. I only use minor runes on mine, allways used, health are important for heroes. The other thing is your heroes might need some more energy menagment, cuz heroes tend to use too much skills and drain their energy rly fast. 1 good energy skill I use for casters is Power Drain. Hope it helped.
/Jonas

edit: Didn't see u had Power Drain on your mesmer, make ur casters sec. mesmer and make it on them too, with around 9 insp.

edit2:
Quote: Originally Posted by chullster

I doubt there's a build on pvx posted with a minion master with 6, yes 6, summons and the fire ele with no fire attunment......

If you're not a new player then what's up with those builds? If they were hero builds then why did ANY of them have PvE only skills at all? you were obviously looking in the wrong area of PvX. Have a lok in PvE section, hero builds, Great catagory.

Hopefully others can help you out in detail, I assumed you were new only as they were so bad, but if you haven't noticed trends in PvE hero builds or why they're put together in the way they are then...... You'r not realy helping yelling on him about his builds, if u dont have anything supporting or helpful to say, consider not saying anything at all.

If I make them all /Me how would I go about the whole ressurection thing? Just add a signet to the classes who don't have a primary ressurection, or don't and hope that I don't die/have a party wipe?

death pact signet is a really good rez to have (rit) - stick a few in, no need to go /me on everything

Would Spirit's Gift be an okay spell if I were going to turn one of the Rits into a resto/damage to take one of the monks out?

Hi there depending on the wiki you was using to get your builds from depends as 1 is a troll site the other is fine to get the jist of things try these

http://www.gwpvx.com/Category:Meta_w...vE_team_builds
http://www.gwpvx.com/Category:Great_...vE_team_builds
http://www.gwpvx.com/Category:Good_w...vE_team_builds

and last of all create your own team using these if you must of course

http://www.gwpvx.com/Category:All_working_hero_builds

WoC is ment to be frustrating to a point but as many have said your MM switch to monk second bring prots drop xandra for a ST shelter rit then bring a hybrid monk for healing and added defence then ramp up the damage with what you have left

Good luck

Aaaand bookmarked. I will definitely be searching through that site.

PM me in-game: Venganza Espirito

Be glad to help you with a few of the quests and help in any way I can my friend, free of course.

One thing like has been said get rid of the 2 Superior skill runes on almost all your hero set ups -150hp is just not funny unless its specialized builds, for your main attribute stick a major rune then minors else where and obviously if able then a sup vigor but I just had to shake my head when I noticed the 2 sups on each hero plus also refine the builds a little that MM one is terrible there is never any need for 5 minions skills.

To be honest some of the builds made me think they were posted as a joke when you said you aren't new to the game but good luck and I hope you get done what you need.

PS just notice Aura Of The Lich on the MM as well I take it you never read what it does? for you to load up a further 5 minion skills on top.

Okay, the reason why I did that with Olias is because I always wanted to make sure he'd have at least one kind of minion ready if one of the minion(s) died and other skills were recharging. Even with Aura of the Lich, they always seemed kind of a safe back up if that was still recharging and there were exploitable corpses around for him to use.
It seems that I'm the only one who really thought that a good idea, and can be wrong (I am only human afterall). I've been playing/learning this whole game practically by myself and anytime I try and seek out help I get screwed/trolled or told to "wiki" after hours of looking. And please don't think I'm trying to sound like I'm complaining or being "victimized" because I apparently had bad builds I just realize it.

Is it safe to assume that the Major runes would be the skills that are least on the bar? That's basically why I use all Superior is because most of the skill type is evenly distributed amongst the bar.

And what would/do you guys have Olias' build as? I'm genuinely interested since this has now been brought up twice.

Quote: Originally Posted by Cecedarling Chullster - No, I'm not a new player, I got those builds FROM PVX Wiki. Minus a little tweaking because some skills were PVE Player only. Quote: In October 2010, a copy (or fork) of this wiki was established at www.gwpvx.com. Since then, most of the community has moved over there and [email protected] is now receiving little to no attention from active editors.
As a consequence, the information presented on this site is getting more and more outdated. The ongoing changes in the game and in the metagame require continuous maintenance regarding both our skill descriptions and the design, description and categorisation of the builds presented here. Moreover, experienced editors are missing who could help new contributors with the formatting of their submissions in order to make them accessible and useful for interested readers.
In this situation, information found on [email protected] should be taken with caution. Are you sure about that?

It was Cleansing Zen Daijun, part of the WoC content.

Okay, THIS was the site I got my info from.
http://pvx.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

I haven't even heard of the other site until today. I didn't even realize the other one was hardly attended to because I mainly farmed. I go through the starter area just fine, but when they're level 26's and I have a six man group that apparently has a crappy build set up, I'm OBVIOUSLY going to have trouble. So stating that it's the "starter island" is completely irrelavent.

Quote: Originally Posted by Cecedarling

Which I what I'm going to start doing. I've already stated it's bookmarked. That wasn't just for show.
What I don't get, is why there's people saying "it's such a terrible bar" and then not giving any examples as to what COULD be done. You're just telling me something that's already been said.

Quote: Originally Posted by Venganza

PM me in-game: Venganza Espirito

Be glad to help you with a few of the quests and help in any way I can my friend, free of course. If you need help, you can PM me in-game too: Jeydra Evenstar