Hey Monks...who can take it and who can't?

could you burn me a copy?

Ive started a monk character up to see what its like, and i must admit, its a lot more fun that my W/N. Actually contributing to the team rather than just being the post that everything wacks is actually damn good fun. I havent had much experience (only up to LA with my monk atm) and used henchies all the way up to now but last night, running d'allesio (SP?) with a PUG i got seriously hacked off.

it was a Me/R, quite high level for this, 17 i believe (i was only 13 monk), and this guy just couldnt understand that if i try and keep him alive while he aggros mob after mob of skele rangers that we are all gonna die. I think i used up ALL my nrg once just trying to keep this guy alive in 1 fight cos he wouldnt move away from the group that was attacking him. He then proceeded to turn round and tell me that i need to put more points into my healing spells. So the next time he died, he stayed there (as i was the only one with rez)

As a monk, i love my warriors getting stuck into the group and taking all the aggro. They are so much easier to keep alive than paper thin Me's and E's. The odd W/Mo in any PUG is a god send, as long as they know how to get and keep aggro. Suicidal spellcasters wont get much of my attention

I use a PvP healer... A lot...

W/Mo's don't know how to keep themselves alive worth crap, but usually last long cause they aren't the focus of attacks.
All primary monk classes get hit hard.
All mesmers and necros get hit hard.
Rangers last the longest, for the most part, even when under fire.

If I had to guess, the order of "GET HIM!" would be...

monks
spike damage elementalists, if there
mesmers
good but not spike damage eles
necromancers
crappy build elementalists
rangers
warriors

In my expierience, And I currently earned 131 fame in the tombs, It's usually the elementalists who I keep an eye on.

War/Monks and secondary monks usually can hold out for long.

Hope this helps.

Regards, Ashleigh.

I hate the monks who listen to those dead whiners, knowing that the mission will fail if they rez, but do it anyway to proove their point.

Actually come to think of it E/Mo is a very good combination, as the Monks unique attribute is nto as good as the ele's that extra energy boost from Energy Storage is far more useful that the Divine Favor which IMO is crappy becasue as soon as you run out of energy it's useless, no other Profession has a unique ability tied to their energy limits. It's like saying expertese shoudl get less effective the less energy you have.

I would have to say the E/Mo sounds very promising, max out energy storage and healing prayers and you can heal untill the cows come home.

Damn I wish I thought of that last week, but I started my Monk now.

Divine favor isn't a crappy attribute. Sure, you can "heal untill the cows come home." with an e/mo, but you sure can't get the burst healing that divine favor offers(which is a must in pvp). Also, divine favor gives you more hp per point of energy, increasing your healing efficiency.

As a primary Monk, my prefered PvE group is one with only one tank, where everyone else knows to stay well back. Adding extra tanks to the group doesn't make it easier, it just forces you to divide your resources. If a mob or two makes a run past your tank(s), then having extra tanks does nothing, because it still won't be a tank who is getting beat on.

I'd much rather have an extra monk to keep the non-tank alive, an extra ele to help take down the threat fast, or a mes, nec or ranger who can disable the threat until it can be dealt with.

Anything but a warrior basically.

The worse thing in PvE is anyone who thinks that using a ranged attack to pull then running back into the caster group is a good idea. When a Bladed Aatxe is standing in the middle of 6 casters and I've no idea which he's going to hit, the chances of me getting Protective Spirit off in time are very, very slim.

I read that some "guild of the month" had a rule that all members had to play a monk at one time. That's a great idea.

The worst players to heal are probably those that have never played a monk.

--zola

Over the course of playing the game I have wasted more energy keeping elementalists alive than anything else. Second would be warriors, but normally they're okay unless you get a particularly reckless one. I just cannot believe the amount of ele's that will just stand there and let themselves get hit. I do my best to keep them healed, but after about the 4th fight with repeat behavior I'm really getting tired of spamming healing on them the entire time. If the fights are tough and it's really a problem I will ask them to stop. If anyone else in the team gets in trouble I'll just let the ele die though. They just seem to have this mindset that since they do so much damage they should just stand there and keep dishing it out or something.

Rangers and necros seem to require the least attention. Necros especially. I haven't played with many mesmers but the ones I have played with knew what they were doing. If there is another monk in team they usually stay back or heal themselves.

So in order of energy used - least to most:

Mesmer / Necro / Second monk on team
Ranger
Warrior
Elementalist

Regarding the posts that say "people need to move if they're getting hit." I fully agree with this. I think it's also important to remember this point: in other games the motto for casters usually is "if you run around, you only die tired." . . . and then casters are told to stand in one place and wait for the warrior to peel agro off of the caster. It's just not that way in this game from what I've seen. Warriors in other games seem to have special taunt stances or taunt abilities to peel agro off of over zealous casters, etc. It may just be that they are new (the game is only a few months old after all) and need some education of how Guild Wars works vs. how some other games work.

Sometimes pausing for a discussion on the game in PvE will not only vastly improve your party, but also may actually help someone understand what it is that's making things difficult.

I have to heal Necromancers alot, because they sacrifice health on top of taking damage, so I always see damage spikes in Necro's.

And Elementalists get a lot of target damage, so mass healing to them.

I hate it when players who are half health spam "monk heal" or just "heal", it's like they have some superiority complex and think they can order monks around. Chances are the monk knows what he/she is doing and just doesn't think energy should be expended yet or there is no energy.

Then there are players who hold CTRL and click a hex or condition, i.e., "I have Blind on me" or "I have Poison on me". I know when you have a hex or condition on you since I stare at health bars a good percentage of the time, the dark green and purple down arrow indicates that. If you still have it, chances are I don't have the spell to fix that hex or condition. And if they've been poisoned once or hexed once, chances are it will happen again so it's not worth the energy. But, they don't get that.

Don't forget 'the other' monk who has designated himself as leader/puller/target caller 'coz he dun the mission 3 times'. And then tells you (me) to 'heal more ok?'. [Or to 'heal the king (Thunderhead Keep) while he's 'attacking Dolyak Master' (suffering from bleeding + Conjure Phantasm].

I actually don't mind when players Ctrl-condition click. It lets me prioritize my mending and removal. Blindness on a caster.. no big deal, blindness on a warrior or ranger.. get it off asap. Same for hexes. Empathy can just destroy a warrior (and thereby suck my nrg out the door), Empathy on a necromancer... pfft.


I read it in another post here, but I've really enjoyed doing this. The first time you get a player spamming "rez me!!" during a battle, you return the favor by starting to spam "axe charr!!", "nuke imp", and other stuff like that. If the humor doesn't get the message across, at least you and the rest of the party can enjoy it. More often then not, the dead learn to stay dead and quiet. I've only ever left one person dead on purpose .... 60dp before the first warp spot en route to Galrath while rest of the party was in the positive.

"rez please" = rez me last.

Warriors and Rangers are typically the people that can take hits the most. Earth Eles and a few necros types are close seconds. But basically those who tend to live longer are those that know they can take the hits and those that know they cant (and decide to move).

I absolutely HATE the pbaoe eles that decide to tank 3-4 jades or UW/Fissure warriors while getting completely and utterly obliterated. "Mana Sinks" the lot of em.

Don't get me started on people that like to stand in location based AoEs.

Edit: Something else that I remember that I found hilarious are those people that will stand and tank a warrior/ranger mob, but run around like chickens with their heads cut off when attacked by a caster.

its not the team-builds that need healing, its the players that suicide.

I love and hate being party healer.
On the plus side, when the n00bs scream "Heal me heal me" after they've agrod 3 mobs and are taking them on simultaneously I can say "No" with an evil grin.
On the negative side, everybody expects me to keep them at full HP throughout the fight, and if somebody ever dies its all my fault.
Right, all my fault they ran into the cave of 300 ice trolls without the rest of the group. All my fault they've been standing in the poison swamp for the last five minutes. All my fault that they haven't gotten new armour since presearing.

Back on the positive side, I never have trouble finding a group.

I most always manage to keep everyone above 75% HP. I pride myself on that. Everyone does not include the idiots explained in the examples above.
Let me tell share something to non-monks: if you can heal yourself, do it once in a while. It makes a monk's life alot easier.
Another something: screaming 'res me res me' in the middle of a fight is not about to make me even consider abandoning the rest of the team to resurrect you. You who died first because you're a caster primary who ran into the mob of minotaurs thinking I would make you immortal because I have divine favour.
Divine favour makes me immortal
None of the skills on my bar are 'target other ally', because if the rest of the team dies I am fully capable of taking out the surviving enemies myself.
THEN rezing the people who are STILL spamming "res me res me". (Or not)

I want to come to the defense of the E/W. (I'm a monk BTW). There is a lot of hate for this class in this thread, but I don't think they are that bad. I've met a few random players using earth magic with warrior skills, and they prove to be quite versatile. They typically fill the role of a warrior very well, and if their buffs get stripped, the smart ones just back up. They then reapply or resort to nuking.

They are certainly far better than a stright fire elementalist who wants to do nothing but get aggro so he can area effect nuke. Those guys are the worst.

Either way, I think the E/W class requires a bit more intelligence to play successfully, and as such, they are welcome in my groups.

Kongar

I agree, whoever it was that said that */W can never be tanks never saw an E/W specced for earth or water. A Mo/W has many options in this case, and if specced for prot/smiting, can be an incredible damage dealer. Even a Me/W has options for protection of this sort.

Using runes an E/W can approach 200 AL (with reduced movement speed), and a smart one packs obs. Flesh so he can't get stripped. A W/E cant hope to achieve that kind of AL.

In my opinion any PBAOE fire ele should always be specced for Fire/Earth, so he/ she can protect themselves (and possibly others) while nuking.

On the subject of moving out of aoe spells, I see alot of people use "i was trying to stay in the ward" as an excuse, but wards are slightly larger than any aoe (except for maybe searing heat), and if you move to the very edge of the ward, right where the sparkly ring is, chances are good that meteor shower won't be hitting you.

A lil off topic but I hate when warriors yell at me to "get back" when I run up to a group of enemies they are attacking. My armor of earth (which is + 60 armor) and my Magnetic Aura(enemies have 75% miss chance for 11 seconds) keeps me out of trouble. Allows me to earthquake+aftershock+crystal wave after casting eruption first. I'm dealing way more damage to a group using those skills than two or 3 warriors and much more protected.

Yeaa.... This is a bit of an issue. Nothing like grouping with another monk primary, only to learn partway into the mission that they are a "smitey" monk. Well hot darn, that means I have to heal the whole party *PLUS* you. Mmmmm, joy.

There isn't anything wrong with being a smitey/protection monk, just let everyone know (up front) what the score is.

I have healing enough for everyone, I just may have to res you to give it out.

I used to play my E/W quite a bit, doing that exact strategy, though people with the mindset "elementalists are for nuking only" generally removed me from the party at first available oppertunity even though I'd take very little damage (enemies seem to target whatever has the lowest armour, which in this case is the warriors :P)

But anyway, back to the original topic..

I recently got my necromancer to the desert, and after the slight mention that I was a blood necromancer, I basically became an extention of the monk's energy bar, with the odd well of blood thrown in whenever I wasn't repeatedly spamming Blood is Power. Though it was a pain (literally, with all the sacrificing *and* the 10 second timer on it) to keep it up for effectively the entire mission that is Dunes of Despair, the monk seemed to be in some kind of ecstatic bliss with 10 energy regeneration the entire time (and who wouldn't?), though I didn't get to spread it around a bit like I hoped I would have, on the other casters, like elementalists. Maybe one day I'll find a necromancer who'll do that for my monk and I'll get to see what it's like.

I think it's the divine aura... maybe it's actually good for something other than making some emotes useless ("rock, paper, scissors! I have glowing orb of doooom!"). I think some extensive testing is in order. *imagines GW sales go through the roof when it becomes proven that collector's edition filters out all the 'less desirable' people*

Indeed.

I joined a group in abbadons mouth for fun the other day. The healer monk dropped, followed a few minutes later by a warrior.

I managed to keep the whole team alive using protection prayers, Divine Boon and Peace and Harmony.

We actually finished the mission and i felt so rewarded and proud for doing so well. If only i was as immature as them, i would have whispered them to tell them of our victory!

Divine favor rocks. Healing for 70 points when you cast a protective spell on a member is an amazing bonus to have in the group.

Amen and pass the butter.

I think that it is one of the most overlooked parts of a healers "bag-o-goodies". With my current healing and devine favor I can take people from the brink of death to all good with one cast (230+) and further with a couple that are quick-fired (500ish). -Yummy- If I have a good protection monk working with me no one is realy ever in danger (unless we want them to be ).

I have healing enough for everyone, I just may have to res you to give it out.

iv started a mo/n, and it seems to me, that the people who dont know there class are the ones that need the healing.

it's just annoying, or when i spam that im 0 out of 49 energy, and the whole party just keeps running in, i just go "---- it" and sit there till all my energy is regened, they die, there fault, and btw, every class has at least 1 healing spell, bring it, w/mo who dont have 1 healing spell are tools and annoying.

That's what I noticed all classes have at least 1 healing spell.

Don't you love spamers I HAVE xxxxx ON ME. While you think to yourself, if you would of brought xxx spell. Especially war/mo it seams that they use monk for the res skill if they remember.

I remember once in a Kryta mission, one of the members, got on my case for letting him die. (while we had 3 groups of spiders) Let's just say that the other members said ---- he kept all of us alive when we had 3 groups of spiders.

Once for the dragon mission lets just say the monks and some others revolted to the runners that where not letting our energy recharge after each battle. A death later they got the point. We have only xx energy.

Don't you love when you finish a mission with only 3 plp.

Even though all the classes do have 1+ healing spells, aura of restoration is not very good at all for healing, and ether renewel is an elite, so my elementalist/ranger has absolutely no healing, as I do not want to spend points on wilderness just to have healing. Although the monks I party with are usually very good at healing.

When I play a monk the key to sturdy healing is CONSISTENCY. I have 4 skills set for pure healing (orison, touch, kiss, word) the others are usually something like seed, hex breaker, channeling, and drain enchantment or something. A good healer can spam 2 or 3 heals in less than 4 seconds when a team mate is being target while keeping an eye out for backfire 24/7. The other thing to be careful of is word of healing. For now your divine bonus is added BEFORE it calculates wether your team mate is below 50% health. So if your divine bonus is giving them 42 hp or something make sure they'll low enough so that they're still below 50% after the divine bonus is added so that they get an extra 100 hp. I know it sounds complicated but being a good monk ain't easy guys.
Remember all you wannabe healers, it's the consistency that keeps people alive, not just your 16 healing prayers.