RoJ Feels Meh

Bash UA if you want, but I will defend UA as one of the best Monk elites out there. That's the thing though, the whole monk is kinda underpowered. I would probably also rank UA as the no1 monk elite skill. But there are so many better mesmer, ele, necro or ritualist elites to bring instead. Imo there's no reason to bring a monk for anything 7hero.

The only reason to have UA in a serious team build (i.e. one that minimizes deaths) is to have it on a profession that doesn't need an elite or secondary to be effective and that a Healing Burst monk (or other, worse monk build) can use Arcane Mimicry to steal. In this case it is indeed very effective (~280 single target heals and ~70 party heal on HB).

Using it on a monk bar to actually heal with is just silly, and sacrificing healing power to resurrect is even more silly. Lol @ example. Healing Burst Monks are generally flat out worse than UA Monks. Why you would use both of them is beyond me.

As for the second paragraph, allow me to finish that sentence for you: because if you die, you can always use res scrolls.

UA allowed me to do stuff like Raisu HM in < 8 minutes. I do not think there's another skill out there that allows me that amount of power without wiping. If you argue like Maya does that there are often better elites out there to use, I agree you have a credible case. But if you say UA is "overrated" or not fit for a "serious team build" then I'll say you are wrong.

Funny how fixated people are on the balling up aspect of using roj. What build doesn't benefit from enemies being balled up tightly or even just 2 or 3 of them?

There are tons of support skills that work great with roj. Snares, KD, shouts, spirits and anything that slows or stops moving targets. That includes you, evas, minions, spirits and maybe a microd physical hero to jump into the ball (x's fingers). AP builds will naturally work with EVAS and YMLD for aggro/kd/interrupt.

IT'S ALL IN THE EXECUTION. And when executed properly, it's fast, easy, and has a pretty Jesus Beam taking up the middle of the screen. During cleanup they may miss, but it's pretty much over if you call the right target and kill a few on the 1st RoJ. If you can tank a mob, all you have to do is flag team back, body block mob, release flag and call. 2+ RoJs will decimate most balled up mobs.

I enjoy using RoJ, but if it's not fun or taking too long, use discord, elems, mesmers, rits, etc.

Plz watch EFGJacks videos if you want to see very nice hero spikes. For the amount of effort, there isn't a much faster way to blow up a mob with heros imo. The thing though is that without a proper ball, RoJ is pretty weak mainly due to the fact that it is DoTAoE. Compare that to, for example, Fireball which will still do pretty good damage even if only two targets are hit due to the fact that it is instant 110~ damage on each target.

Also, if a group of mobs are balled you've pretty much won the fight already. At that point it doesn't really matter if you use RoJs, Mesmers, Elementalists or MoP. Either way they are going to die. Personally I feel it is better to take a skill that has a decent average rather then a high best-case.

The thing though is that without a proper ball, RoJ is pretty weak mainly due to the fact that it is DoTAoE. Compare that to, for example, Fireball which will still do pretty good damage even if only two targets are hit due to the fact that it is instant 110~ damage on each target.

Also, if a group of mobs are balled you've pretty much won the fight already. At that point it doesn't really matter if you use RoJs, Mesmers, Elementalists or MoP. Either way they are going to die. Personally I feel it is better to take a skill that has a decent average rather then a high best-case. Did you ever consider RoJ does armor ignoring holy damage, which is doubled vs undead, and causes burning?

RoJ is the gold nugget in a pile of horse shit called the smiting line. Even though its gold, the fact you found it in a steaming pile makes it feel meh.

RoJ alone is fairly poor. SoH is godly though, and smite hex + smite condition for a melee is a great combination, they are in the area range (which is 10x better than adjacent). Judge's Intervention is also particularly good for Dervs, combined with SoH you are looking at about +35-40 damage per swing. Agree with this. Smite condition/hex are very efficient, and SoH/JI are insane. Take that 35-40 and multiply by every target you hit with the scythe, throw in a 25% IAS, and you're getting 100+ dps from 2 skills. Per melee in the party.

40 damage per swing per target hit per melee easily outstrips 99% of the other spell based damage in the game (and the other 1% 99% of the time) if you're set up to use it to the fullest.

Did you ever consider RoJ does armor ignoring holy damage, which is doubled vs undead, and causes burning?

RoJ is the gold nugget in a pile of horse shit called the smiting line. Even though its gold, the fact you found it in a steaming pile makes it feel meh. Doesn't matter much if it does 40-50~ armour-ignoring damage per second plus burning if everything just scatters instantly. A skill such as Fireball will do about the same damage over time as a perfect RoJ. The difference is that a) Fireballs doesn't cause foes to instantly scatter, b) RoJs damage is concentrated which means it does more "burst" if everything hits but is considerably worse if it doesn't and c) Fireball isn't an elite. The same comparison can be made for several other AoE skills as well.

But you are right, RoJ is pretty godly against undeads. Same goes for Judge's Insight which you'll get pretty much free if you take RoJ. That just cements what I've said earlier, RoJ is situational. In the right conditions it is great but on average it is fairly lacklustre.

Also Smiting isn't that awful as a whole, assuming you have someone that can benefit from SoH. On top of SoH (which is godly), it has JI (situationally amazing, otherwise good), Castigation Signet (solid E-management in the primary line, some free damage as well), Smite Hex (good overall) and Smite Condition (good overall). There are a couple of useful skills beyond that but those are the main ones. Personally I think that Smiting would be great if they tweaked Smite a bit (manacost and cooldown mainly) and maybe added a new elite or two or simply reworked one or two of the less used ones. Although I would prefer if they reworked a lot of the more gimmicky Smiting skills I think that would solve most of the problems.

My 2c.