staff vs rod + focus

ade334

Pre-Searing Cadet

Join Date: May 2006

E/Rt

28 May 2006 at 17:46 - 1

Just wandering what people think is a better combination.

I'll provide a few details to help the analysis.

•I want a attribute + 1 (20%)
•I am considering this for death, curses and perhaps fire (although I have Rago's fire wand and the Kindlerock already), and healing prayers (with a view to the same principals on all casters)

Rod + Focus
Rod
•Energy + 5 (>50)
•20% fast recharge
Focus
•Energy + 12
•Attribute + 1 (20%)
•HP + 30

Staff
•Energy + 10
•20% fast recharge
•20% fast cast
•Attribute + 1 (20%)
•EITHER HP + 30/Energy + 5/Armor + 5

Differences
•Staff provides 20% faster cast at the expense of either (30 HP and 2 energy >50, gain 3 energy <50) or (7 energy >50, 2 energy <50)
•Staff is more flexible (choice of 3 heads)

I mainly wish to know if the trade-off for a faster cast is worth it for death/curses where soul reaping provides energy management anyway. For my ele, I have a slightly different combination that provides more faster recharge and slightly less faster cast, but no bonus energy or health, which I am fairly happy with as is.

My monk has the staff for healing, even though I have been told healing prayers +1 isn't the best mod for a heal monk - I went with insightful 20/20 heal staff of healing prayers for the faster cast on the (relatively) long cast of heal spells. Would you recommend anything else in this situation, perhaps a 20/20 icon with a holy rod giving 20+20/20 with 5 energy >50.

Any insight into this would be much appreciated. I'll also point out that I only PvE, if that has any relevance to the discussion - these weapons won't make it into the PvP environment so it doesn't matter if they aren't suitable there as long as for PvE they help me

thanks

Vermilion Okeanos

Forge Runner

Join Date: Feb 2005

28 May 2006 at 19:39 - 2

For the rod/wand, change it to a sword/axe +5 energy with 20% enchantment. Don't bother attacking with it btw.

As for the 20/20, I generally don't look for them. One really shouldn't rely on luck for their build, especially when it is only 20%. If I want one to recharge, I would get one wand with 20% recharge, and a focus with 20% recharge etc; although I doubt I would anyway. At this point, just go for look.

Another inhereit mod that you should look for is one that reduce condition duration. It can... help barely as well. (since you should have a monk that remove condition almost right away anyway, or at most under 10 sec, which means the 20% off never really get to help.)

healing cast time is more important than how much it heal. 'most' of the time

sunny dai

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Mar 2006

01 Jun 2006 at 17:28 - 3

A big plus for staves IMO is when you get the green staff with the double mod
e.g. +30/+30 health or the +5/+5 armor

besides those rarities they are mostly comprable

xiao1985

Wilds Pathfinder

Join Date: Nov 2005

01 Jul 2006 at 04:40 - 4

IMO, wand + focus is better than staves (yes feel free to critise me) but that's because i run a renewal DS spammer, and i need the 20/20 heal and 20 recharge heal. Additionally, foci gives +12 en at max while staves gives +10 (ok you can mod it with a +5, but that's 1 mod less for you)...

deluxe

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Feb 2006

Monkeyball Z

S.K.A.T. [Ban]

Mo/

01 Jul 2006 at 09:04 - 5

i allways prefer rod+offhand.
usually as a healing monk i use the following:

longsword of defense (+5 armor while enchanted) +5 armor
divine focus (+5 armor / +45 hp while enchanted)

and

+5 nrg^50 / 20% faster cast
20/20 healing focus

so i can switch between max armor and max fast cast

have my inv full with items, but these are what i use mostly.