Skills - Shield Of Deflection

Guild Wars Guru

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: May 2005

You can view this database entry at: http://www.guildwarsguru.com/skill/1...of-deflection/.
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Porkchop Sandwhiches

Porkchop Sandwhiches

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Jun 2005

Fishing Village in Wizard's Folly

R/

Grun Galesurge - Ring Of Fire - Breeze Keeper

Dunhart

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Jun 2005

The Marquis Alliance

Me/N

One of the most annoying skills to get. According to http://www.xennon.co.uk/eliteskills/ the boss can spawn in front of the Mursaat fortress but I've never seen it there. It has always spawned in the northwestern corner of the island, past the lava spider cave, past the swams of lava imps. I did, after two failed attempts, manage to get it with NPCs.

Is it any good for PvP? It's quite expensive for its duration and you can keep it on two targets at the same time only.

Mercury Angel

Mercury Angel

Avatar of Gwen

Join Date: Apr 2005

Wandering my own road.

Current skill icon-

roofle

roofle

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: May 2005

I Sometimes Make Kites

N/Mo

this reminds me of guardian, only it costs 3 times as much mana, takes much longer to cast and recharge, and is elite :P

that answer your question, dunhart?

Mercury Angel

Mercury Angel

Avatar of Gwen

Join Date: Apr 2005

Wandering my own road.

Quote:
Originally Posted by roofle
this reminds me of guardian, only it costs 3 times as much mana, takes much longer to cast and recharge, and is elite :P

that answer your question, dunhart? The effect lasts a little over twice as long (up to 11 [+2 with 20% mod] seconds] as guardian, which warrants a 10 cost.

Tack on 25% more frequency, a bonus to AL, and then 5 more energy and 1 second casting time and you've got Shield of Deflection.

Is it worth it? I don't know really.

Scaled with guardian, it's definitely balanced. That much is true. It enables you to avoid attacks as effectively as a stance, and recycles fast enough to recast it indefinitely.

However, it works against Divine Favour. You don't spam it, and Divine Favour was definitely made to work well with spam spells, turning every 2 spells into an extra orison of healing for no extra cost.

With such a high cost, and the long duration, it's not quite as easily interchangeable as Guardian. With Guardian, you simply switch allies and recast every 5 seconds on whoever needs the attack blocking. With this, cast it on yourself and they'll probably switch targets and waste your protection enchantment, something just as bad as over-healing.

Shield of Deflection is probably a spell intended for a secondary monk enchanter.

Edit: Let's take the idea of scaled spells to the extreme for a moment-
Uber Guardian
Enchantment
Cost: 25
Casting time: 3
Recharge: 25

For 25 seconds, target ally has a 50% chance to block attacks.

The effect is nice, sure, but the enchantment is costly, difficult to recast when removed or needed elsewhere, and more easily interrupted.

It simply doesn't have the quick interchangeability people desire in monk spells.

And in the end, I think that Shield of Deflection is hazardously close to being the same way. It's certainly not the extreme my hypothetical skill is, but you get the point.

GWplayer745

Academy Page

Join Date: Sep 2005

I believe that there's much more to spells than just the numerical calculations. I have used this spell in combination with others, and have found it to be mroe useful than people have made this skill out to be. This wouldn't be an elite skill if, well, it didn't have any practical use...

Other than that, I've got a question for all you gurus out there. Both this skill and Shield of Regeneration are elite protection spells, and I can't decide which one to go with. I find Shield of Deflection an extremely useful skill against warriors and rangers. In a scenario where I've got two or three warriors or rangers ganging up on me, I cast this and I find I don't have to worry about healing myself for X amount of seconds. Unfortunately, where this spell fails is against casters.

However, with Shield of Regeneration, I basically get half damage from almost all sources, and I get 10 health regeneration (at 16 protection) thus I gain protection against casters. Unfortunately, against several warriors and/or rangers, this skill is no match to Shield of Deflection.

So my question is which would be a more viable choice? But let's say that they both have the same duration. Other than the pure satisfaction of seeing warriors repeatedly miss, does Shield of Deflection have anything over Shield of Regeneration? (or vice versa?)

Edit: I suppose it's also important to remember that Shield of Deflection is not entirely useless against casters, as it does give you an extra 25 armor.

Inureface

Inureface

Banned

Join Date: Nov 2005

Asian in Lousiana

The Endbringers

R/Me

To me, shield of deflection was a very good concept until....I saw the 1 second casting time. To me, the only practical use for this skill is to soften or completely neutralize a spike. Even if it may seem overpowered, theres stuff like rigor mortis, lingering curse, etc. The least they could've done with this skill was made it 1/4 second casting time. Then I would acutally use this skill.

Mercury Angel

Mercury Angel

Avatar of Gwen

Join Date: Apr 2005

Wandering my own road.

Quote:
Originally Posted by GWplayer745
I believe that there's much more to spells than just the numerical calculations. I have used this spell in combination with others, and have found it to be mroe useful than people have made this skill out to be. This wouldn't be an elite skill if, well, it didn't have any practical use... Bear in mind that the skill used in the comparison was slightly different. It was written back when Shield of Deflection had a scaling duration, cost 15, and took 2 seconds to cast.

Poison Ivy

Poison Ivy

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jan 2006

Toronto

Hopping

Mo/A

It's there alright, I got it from there. Personally, I don't think that skill is usefull at all unless it's 4 vs 4 in PvP (Bloody warriors roming around like ants).

Anyways, good luck getting it XD.

Thomas.knbk

Thomas.knbk

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jul 2006

I am not the first to say this, but still:
If you cast SoD on someone you do it to protect them...right?
If you cast it and your enemies switch targets aferwards you succeeded in protecting your target...right?
I like this skill for the 75% chance to block and the added AL. I definitely think it's worth an elite