The Other Monk Basics

I'm kind of disappointed that the "(profession) Basics" threads are essentially just free for all versions of the build submission stickies, because what I'm looking for are tips on effectively playing my class. The things OUTSIDE of good skill and attribute selection, that is. For example, I'm thinking rolling a monk, but my chief concern is trying to effectively remove conditions and, moreover, hexes. How can I tell when my ally is afflicted? Bleeding and poison/disease show up in their health bar by changing its color, but what about other conditions and hexes? Do you folks just go by the little down arrow next to the player's name in the party display, casting smite hex whenever you see that? I really miss the way most MMOs display your target's buffs/debuffs.

you can tell conditions/hexes by looking at their health bar (pink = hex, discolored=condition). Most good players will call out when they need a hex removed ASAP also so that makes it easier.

My boon heal build is very effective at countering either hexes or conditions (as there would most likely be more than one monk on the team have the other fill in either hex or condition removal..basicly which ever you're not carrying).

boon heal build: http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...21&postcount=8

blind however is very annoying. Just hope your teammates are smart enough to call that out.

Here are a few things to look out for:

(hex's/conditions applied to specified teammate):

Spiteful Spirit - Always have it called/removed ASAP.

Empathy - Warriors (If you're going into an area where mesmers cast empathy, be SURE to tell your warrior to call if he has empathy on him), Assassins

Blind - All (wears out pretty fast so I don't bother as much, unless the warrior calls it)

Backfire - Casters (you can tell this is backfire when every time the caster casts, they recieve damage...call probably not needed as you will notice it).




meh maybe I should make a "good monking" guide or something....I'll do that later.

Also have your casters call Dazed... often times they will simply keep trying to cast and get interupted every time until they die... don't ask me why

Allways remember that you are just another part of the team. You have no more right trying to charge for your services than Necros charging for minions or warriors charging to tank.

While we are part of the team, monks hold themselves to a higher standard. When that warrior calls you a N00b for letting his Frenzied butt die, just rez him after the battle and say "sorry." If he keeps it up, just remind him that he would have lived if he killed things faster. That usually confuses them enough to shut them up.

Don't try to do everything. You can't heal, remove hexes and conditions, deal damage, protect and rez. There's not enough time or energy in the world. If you are the only monk in the party, tell your team what you can do and what you can't. Pick something and do it well instead of half-assing everything.

Find time to smite. When forming a party and you see you have 3 monks, "volunteer" to smite. You don't get many chances.

Experiment with builds. There are plenty of grest builds to be found here and all over the Net. Try them out, but also try to improve on them or modify them to suit different areas. There are no magic builds that "pwn" everything.

Quote: Originally Posted by Parson Brown

Monk basics from my perspective:

*Energy management and kiting both have their place in PvE as well. They are not just PvP concepts. Learn effective methods for both. Don't rely on a "battery necro".

*Bring at least one condition and one hex removal, especially if you are the only monk.

*Rebirth is a good res in PvE and sometimes the only way to save the mission is to run and rebirth the party when it's safe.

*Bring at least one heal you can use on yourself. I like Healing Touch.

I could probably write a lot more, but that's a good start.

Thank you, everyone. These are excellent suggestions, and I'll try to keep them in mind as I play.

I do have one question about skills so far... is Divine Boon worth using for a healer? I'm thinking about going Healing/Divine Favor, but I don't see too many builds using this skill. Why not? It seems like it'd be very useful with high Divine Favor, even on top of good healing skills. Or is it just not energy efficient versus heal spells with a good Healing Prayers level?

Divine Boon, used with healing spells, makes it very easy to overheal and waste energy. Since using Boon at all tends to make energy pretty tight, that inefficiency can be really bad.

Also, it doesn't work very well with Word of Healing, which most healing monks like to take.

Boon healing is a terrible Idea. It is very inefficient and overheals is what causes this.

One of the things about boon proting - (different) is that you get a divine boon bonus when you remove conditions and hexes. When you prot a target you rediuce or negate the damage which is in its own way healing.

Even this is inefficient - its just so damn powerful to be able to deal with hexes/conditions and protect someone while healing them at the same time.

Sam

i'll have to object to this claim. with a bit of know-how and practice you can play a boon-heal monk just as well as any other monk healing build. The main thing that you have to keep in mind is not to spam heals. When you're a boon-heal monk you dont need to do so. Also, the fact of energy management can easily be countered as long as you keep an eye on your energy bar and use your energy management skills at the right time (for me about 1/2-2/3 of the energy bar).


now I'm not sure if the quality of monks has gone down DRAMATICLY but I'm able to outheal at least 4/5 of the other monks I encounter (the other 1/5 being haxthoh).

--edit--
I mean Racthoh

The quality of monks HAS been going down.

I recently started playing as a monk and I noticed that I'm a better healer than most of the others.
In fact, my lvl 17 monk did better than the lvl20s in Cantha.

The other guys constantly keep spamming that they have 1 energy left, use smiting skills even when they say they're a healer monk, etc..
They put heal breeze on people who have like 10hp left (dunno if that is good but I think it's bad, I'd rather use word of healing or heal other)

I've seen a depressing amount of monks depending on healing breeze lately. Many of them have it as their main heal. Well, PvPers shun this skill for a few reasons, and not suprisingly, it's bad for exactly the same reasons in PvE as it is in PvP.

As far as boon-healing goes, I was under the impression that the healing from boon took effect before word, making it even harder to get the bonus for WoH. Boon-healing seems about as efficent as bringing a bar full of Heal Others. At any rate, using boon without (elite) energy-managment (MoR, OoB, E-Drain, etc)is a bad idea (No, six insp e-tap dosen't count).

I just don't see how a boon-healing build, or any boon-build with such little e-managment could survive any extended encounter, or last against any real sort of pressure. I find boon-prot more effect because it over-heals less, while not being less effective. Skills like RoF and Guardian are great, because they heal (thanks to boon) and protect.

Another monk build I've been using lately is a sort of powered-healing monk:
Orision, (spare heal), Heal Other, MoR, Heal Party, Inspired Hex, Drain Enchant, Resurection Chant.
Heal party is a great spell, and with MoR for e-managment, I can throw around heal parties more than I could on a WoH build. Heal Other isn't as bad if you have active e-managment along.

In defence of "low quality" monks i would say factions has an awful lot of new players, not everyone knows what they should be doing, what spells are most efficient and that they cannot reliably heal and smite at the same time.

Being new to the monk myself i can say it is a damned hard class to play, especially in comparison to my warrior of some 6 months. I have thus far spent many hours poring over my skill set, guru forums, wiki item database and all manner of other things trying to think of builds, weapon combinations and efficient energy managment.

I haven't yet had any complaints, but having just thrown my hat into the PvP scene with competitive missions and team arenas i often find myself frustrated, with group members dying when i know they shouldn't be.

I say let the new people learn about this complicated and fun class and maybe help them along as best you can.

On the topic of boon healing builds I am finding these incredibly hard to play. I have the correct skill sets, and i think I am using the skills correctly, but i just can't seem to get the hang of the energy management thing. I'm thinking maybe some kind of inspiration recharge/casting time weapon combination to help with E-Drain maybe..... i don't know, needs some more thought and forum dredging. Any tips appreciated though, especially in the team/random/competitive scene.

Boon-healing is definatly less efficent than boon-proting. Also, you really need that e-managment elite to run a boon-monk. The most common choices are:

Mantra of Recall
Offering of Blood
Energy Drain

See the pinned thread for info about them.

Quote: Originally Posted by Katari

Quote: Originally Posted by LightningHell

Yes indeed, i have read the Energy Management thread, and i tend to use E-Drain, i like the reliability of it as opposed to MoR. Its not the skills i am having troubles with it is the practicalities of applying it in the PvP setting, i.e healing and protecting efficiently, without overhealing, and still keeping energy up. I would guess it's a bit of a practice thing.

As an explanation i have been using RoF as my bread and butter for the healing side, guardan if someone is being pestered by warrior/sin/ranger, mend condition for the obvious which also gives a nice lil heal bonus, prot spirit on someone being spiked, or to keep myself alive when i am the target. Boon on me at all times.

Then kiting, keeping these various skills going, keeping the group alive, myself alive and being concious enough about my E-Management to stop and hit E-drain on a likely target is quite stressful. Equally i found MoR easier to use in that regard, but the long delay and weakeness to stripping by necro/mesmer frustrating.

I will keep at it, it's just a little more difficult than spam healing, and seems to require more dedication and concentration to get to the point where you are truly benefitting the group more than if you went straight up healer build.

- Monk's quality has never gone down, Monks have just become harder to play because of the many changes to Monk skills.
- Boon Healing is very effective in PvE, but not in PvP. That you overheal too much is nonsense, although Boon Healing with WoH or Infuse Health is overkill. In PvP, I wouldn't recommend Boon Healing, as you'll only have 1 casting time skills, which get easily interupted, and can't be cast during Hammer spikes for example.
- Energy Management is very important. Keep in mind NOT to rely on Inspired Hex or Shatter Enchantment EVER, as these are conditional, and if there are no hexes or enchantments, you cant rely on them.
- I recommend using Mantra of Recall over Energy Drain. The Energy gain is better, and it's great combined with Contemplation of Purity.
- I recommend using Holy Veil in a Divine Boon build, as you don't get any healing from Inspired Hex, which makes Holy Veil more useful in my opinion.
- I recommend using Mend Condition over Mend Ailment, since 5 seconds recharge is alot.

as from my experience monking is:
10% the skills on your bar
90% how you use them.

a monk could be using the exact same skillbar as you, exast same EQ and exact same attribute set, and yet suck immeasurably, while you remain effective.
while this us true for any class, i think its most true for monks, mesmers and eles...the three classes with the most difficulty in the energy department, monks and mesmers being near tied for the most energy-strapped.
but i still think its mostly subjective.
ive seen some monks who will call their energy at 5, after the first engagement with a party that knows how to operate...and others can deal with a bunch of aggro-tards who never allow them a moments rest; and yet keep the entire party alive, so long as noone overextends.
it all depends on how you use your skills.
now, the skills you bring do have some bearing, for instance, if your bar is filled up with nothing bu 10-15 energy skills its pretty difficult to manage energy effectivly and keep everyone up and running.
a good monk should have some skills with 10, some with 5, and maybee 1 with no energy cost, or 1 with a 15 energy cost...and use them accordingly. but even then, the monk thats spamming healing breeze on people who are at 95% HP is not going to last very long as an effective monk.

i know this seems contrary to every bit of advice people will give you for monking; but may i suggest you first try a build with no energy management skills. why the hell would anyone in their right mind suggest this?
i think far too many monks rely on their energy management to keep themselves effective; and contrary to popular belief, you can operate without it...its just far more difficult.
which do you think would fare better, a monk who is used to monking effectivly with no energy management, who is then forced to use a build that has it. or, a monk who has always relied on energy management, and is then forced to use a build that does not have it?
almost certainly the latter, a monk that first learns how to use their skills, and THEN incorporate energy management will be far more effective in the long-run than one that has never had to learn how to use their skills propperly, simply because they've always had their energy management skill to fall back on for their lack of ability.