PvE Boon/Prot Questions

Well, the title says it all, so I'll get right down to it:

1.) What single/combo of energy management skills should I be using? (I currently use MoR but am having thoughts of adding Power Drain)

2.) Are there certain skills I should/should not be running as a PvE boon/prot? (my build is posted below)

3.) What would the optimum weapon set to use? (I'll post my weapon set combo that I'm considering with my build)

My Build

Mo/Me

Divine Favor: 12 + 1 + 3
Protection Prayers: 8 + 1
Inspiration Magic: 10

My considered weapon set: +5e Katana of Fortitude (+30) and a 20% +1 Divine Favor offhand (to get +1 DF on boon), once I have +1 on boon I'll switch to a 20/20 prot offhand.

Skills:

RoF
Guardian
Mend Condition
Signet of Devotion
MoR
Holy Veil
Rebirth
Boon

I carry a res because I believe anything that can go wrong, eventually WILL go wrong. I'm not sure if I should keep Signet of Devotion on my bar or swap it for another skill such as Protective Spirit or Power Drain. I use Holy Veil just because it's a faster recharging hex removal than Inspired Hex and there are lots of hexes in PvE.

Energy Management skills that I am considering (elite and non-elite, the powers that are non-elite would be added to existing elite e management):

MoR, E Drain, OoB, Power Drain, Drain Enchantment, and (at a stretch) Spirit of Failure (I want to experiment with the skill for a mission).

Possible replacements for Signet of Devotion: non-elite energy management, Protective Spirit, Shield Guardian, Aegis, Reverse Hex, Shielding Hands, Spirit Bond, Divine Intervention, Release Enchantments.

I realize that Release Enchantments sounds odd, but it would be a party heal for over 40 per monk enchantment I lose. This means that RoF + Guardian + Divine Boon + Holy Veil all removed = 160+ party heal in the span of only 2-3 seconds total. On an 8 man team, I don't see that as that bad (it would be an emergency heal or used as a party wide quick 40-120pt heal).

Divine Intervention would also be an emergency skill, i.e. a caster is getting spiked by spells, in which case all you can do is prolong their existence until they die...or hopefully until the mobs are killed.

I have experimented with Aegis in the past and found that it gave me an immense amount of breathing room for the time that it is active (generally approx. 10 seconds). I used it on THK and it did a world of good.

I like Reverse Hex (on paper), and may even decide to simply replace Holy Veil with it since it removes a hex *and* adds a temporary Reversal of Fortune to the target. It also recharges faster than Veil and the 2 second cast time will unlikely make a difference in PvE. It does, however, cost an additional 5e.

Spirit Bond was just an idea born of the fact that sometimes you just can't keep a low-armor character alive because the damage is coming in far too fast. With Spirit Bond, the first 60-80 or so dmg pts of any attack are effectively negated as long as the damage of the attack is above 60 pts.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

BB

That looks fairly normal, however, one thing about rebirth, i dont like to use because it empties your energy and so you cant heal or do anything once you cast it, having said that it does have its uses.

If you are having energy management issuse swap holy veil for revealed/inspired hex, you gain energy for removing the hex and you get to throw it back at the opposistion

EDIT: spelling

I agree with Istari. I prefer Inspired Hex, as it is part hex removal, part energy management.

For missions/areas with very hard hitting mobs (Ele bosses in particular), you can swap Sig of Devotion for Prot Spirit.

I run with these attributes.
Divine Favor: 15 (DF scalp with sup rune)
Protection Prayers:11 (Minor Rune)
Inspiration Magic: 10

Meh... I think rebirth is a must for pve monks. You're not supposed to res during fights, that's up to your team members. You want to res only when the fight is over, so being able to res without aggroing is what you really want. You can just rest a little after using rebirth.

I think prot spirit is a must for PvE. You should never be targeted, but players tend to always pull enemies towards you, and prot spirit is a life saver (for you and squishy players). Rebirth is for the R/Mo, or the W/Mo in your party. If no one else has a viable rez skill then I would make room for Rebirth on my skill bar.

My Boon Prot Build
Divine 14 Prot 12 Insp 10

Mend Conditions
Holy Veil
Inspired Hex
RoF
Protective Spirit
Signet of Devotion
MoR
Divine Boon

-As you stated in your original post, there are alot of hexes in PvE that's why you want two hex removals. In addition IH is energy management skill.
-MoR isn't just E-Management it is also acts as a cover enchant.
-Signet of Devotion should stay on your skill bar, it acts as emanagement as well.

With the above build I never run out of energy and can solo monk for any party out there. Well, a squishy Leroy Jenkins player can cause problems.

^^
2 VERY important things: I am keeping rebirth no matter what, that's not contestable. Secondly, if I'm starting to use Inspired Hex as energy management, I would rather use Holy Veil. Using HV means that I remove the hexes that need removing once I see that they affect the group in a negative way. I found myself too often removing any hex at all with Inspired Hex.

I have recently tried out using Power Drain and found myself focusing a lot on the enemy casters...I guess I still need to learn to better use P Drain if I want to put it on my bar to stay.

I now have a 20/20 prot wand and a 20% +1 Divine Favor +30hp offhand. I've found where I can get a +20% rech +5e ^50 prot wand, and I know where to get the +5e katana.

I haven't done the second 15 attribute pt quest and currently run something like:

15 Divine Favor (13 + 2)
10 Prot (9 + 1, might be 8 + 1 and 9 prot)
10 insp

I've found it really hard recently to keep some assassins alive (I experimented with bringing a henchie assassin for practice...didn't go so well), but have found in Cantha that I can almost monk for the entire team with just Protective Spirit.

I have heard that OoB is great for energy management, but I'm not sure about the 20% hp sac, and MoR suits my e management needs just fine.

Is Channeling any good for e management/cover enchantment for MoR? I find that in Cantha the necromancers all use Strip Enchantment.

I use

Reversal of Fortune
Mend Condition
Signet of Devotion
Protective Spirit
Inspired Hex
Divine Boon
Rebirth
Mantra of Recall

Divine Favour 15 (11+1+3)
Protection Prayers 11 (10+1)
Inspiration Magic 10

Spam MoR. As soon as its recharged hit it again (obviously dont do it if you've just got a morale boost). Save Protective Spirit for times when someone is taking heavy damage and their damage is out weighing your healing. PS is a very effective skill but needs to be used only when needed, the 10+2 energy it uses can be drastic. Mend Condition is also a great skill for healing. Like all the healing here don't heal too early. Let their health degen a bit then heal as you'll be doing 150+ healing with Mend Condition. Spam Signet of Devotion for 100 health a time. Inspired Hex is another energy boosting skill try to save it for times when you can gain a benefit from it.

Boon Prot is a very strong build. You get the benefits of Healing and Protection. I used 12 divine favour for a long time and found I couldn't heal good enough people who are 30% health. I could only heal them back upto about 60%. The 15 Divine Favour makes a big difference. If you dont like using the Sup Runes just switch scalps after you've casted Divine Boon. In PvE though its normally no problem.

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s....php?t=3041277

This is a good boon prot guide. He knows what he is talking about. My monk runs his build and it seems to work. Also has discussions on energy management

^^
There's just 1 major problem with Maxiemonster's guide...It's geared towards PvP. Today I got a 20/20 prot wand and a 20/20 offhand, and I've started running Protective Spirit. I've decided that Prot Spirit is probably my staple skill when I'm playing boon/prot (in cantha), but the most likely reason for that is I teamed with some assassins today who didn't have teleports (and we didn't have warriors, so they had to tank. I think one of them died once in the mission, maybe twice at the most). There aren't enough spellcasters in cantha to warrant me bringing power drain (so far, at least...the only thing I would have a chance of interrupting with it would be the occassional earth elly with Dragon Stomp). I really liked Signet of Devotion when I had it, but I REALLY don't want to drop protective spirit.

I guess now I'm running-

15 divine
10 prot (9+1)
10 inspiration

RoF
Guardian
Mend Condition
Prot Spirit
MoR
Holy Veil
Rebirth
Boon

main wep set is currently the two 20/20 items (wand and offhand). I'm gonna experiment with switching Holy Veil for Inspired Hex to see if it makes a difference. So far there haven't been many hexes that have needed removing.

I just had one MAJOR problem today though. The boss Argo in the first luxxon mission spikes for INSANE amounts of damage and if I don't immediately catch his target/get lucky, they're dead 1/2 a second later (Argo's Cry doesn't show up as a hex and the only warning I get is that I see him casting meteor...meteor hits and the guy dies from 2 mass spikes).

Thankfully we finished the mission, so I don't have to worry about him. Other than Protective Spirit though, does a boon/prot have any defenses against spike from an elementalist npc? Worst case scenario is that my next mission I'm gonna do a run to fight Zarnas Stonereaper and he uses a ~300-500 dmg Shockwave and Stone Daggers that hit for 60 each (120 per cast).

Would it actually be smart to have the healer bring Infuse Health in case of this? I really would prefer to have something else in my hands that I could use against stuff like this.

I find myself more and more bringing a PvP quality character to Cantha (because of longer battles and less resting for energy), so there is nothing wrong with looking to PvP for ideas. For me, I used the following most of Cantha, but your skill bar looks fine. Basically, use whatever skills you are most comfortable with. For example, I don't bring Protective Spirit because I usually take the Ritualist henchman who uses Shelter and I think I can heal through it otherwise.

1) Reversal of Fortune
2) Guardian
3) Mend Condition
4) Inspired Hex
5) Signet of Capture
6) Divine Boon
7) Mantra of Recall
8) Rebirth

Quote: Originally Posted by Istari

Quote: Originally Posted by SnipiousMax

Quote: Originally Posted by Katari

Quote: Originally Posted by SnipiousMax

ok first off ive seen a few things wrong in several posts that have been posted here and ill adress them from a pvp/pve players point of view and this should help give you a good idea of the build, equipment, and strats for running a good boon prot. (if done right you can solo boon prot thunderhead keep with this easily if you want a challenge)

Attributes:
Divine Favor - 15 (10 +1 +3) to cast boon
- 12 (10+1+1) only using minor after boon
Protection prayers - 11 (10+1)
Inspiration - 10

Skills: (PVP)

Mend condition
Reversal of fortune
Gaurdian
Prot Spirit
Contimplation of purity
Inspired Hex
Energy Drain
Divine Boon

Skills: (PVE)

same except swap Contimplation of Purity for rebirth and move rebirth to end of bar so its out of the way. Sometimes i will swap mend condition for mend ailment so i have a self condition removal, but since the recharge update, i normally only run mend condition and just reversal myself for a quick heal.

Armor: (pve and pvp)

Head - sup and minor rune'd divine scalp
Chest and legs - Armor while enchanted. This cuts the need for the armor vs physical and ar vs elemental sets completely. Since factions released this is the only armor ill run when playing a boonprot as im running so many enchants and having 70 ar can save your ass.
Hands and feet - astetics to give you a little bit more energy. i have 47 base and with a 10% morale boost, its over 50 (thats using a en+3, 10 all skills holy rod i have, with a wayward wand or the +5 sword it will be more)

Equipment: (pvp and pve)

slot 1 - en+5 sword with hp+30, green Straw effigy 20 recharge insp, hp+30 (can be swapped out for the 20/20 collectors offhand in insp.)
slot 2 - green garbocks cane (20/20) or wayward wand in inspiration (en+5, 20 recharge), and same offhand as above (personal preference i liek the skin of the holy rod so i use the 10% all skill recharge wand with en+3>50 that you get from the Shiverpeaks Stragglers quest in yaks bend) (and yes i do run that rod in top 50 gvg although i will use garbocks cane just as frequently)
slot 3 - -5 energy sword with hp+30, -5 energy scroll from old Cities of Ascalon quest (use for using rebirth in pve)
slot 4 - 15/-1 wand and 15/-1, hp+30 offhand both in divine (used only in extreme emergencies

Strategy : Use your +5 sword w/ +30hp and offhand for your main casting when not needing to use edrain. then weaponswitch to your 20/20 wand and 20 recharge offhand for casting edrain as the fast recharge is keen here. you can get away with not using the sword and using both the wand and offhand, its just personal preference, but i keep both equiped and use both regularly.

When getting edrained/surged remember to switch to your -energy set. with this setup i have, i can effectively hide 24 energy which can help if you have a pesky mesmer camping your ass or if you have to rebirth in pve.

DO NOT overuse your 15/-1 regen stuff. i find that i have only switched to that on a rare occasion as withboon im down to 1 en regen. the only time i switch to these is if i and out of energy and its Victory or Death in gvg, or i need that quick gaurdian and reversal to heal someone who is about to kill the boss or use on the ghostly with 5 seconds left in Halls. Remember the energy that you use with your 15/-1 set you have to regen that before you regen your normal energy pool.

Gaurdian is your friend. against rangers, warriors, assassins, youll come to appreciate gaurdian. NO DONT bring sig of devotion in its place. worst idea possible.

Prot Spirit is very good when fighting enemies that do a lot of damage in attacks. use prot spirit frequently, yet sparingly. Basically use it on anyone taking massive amounts of damage against an elemental attack, as gaurdian will nullify the physical attacks.

as soon as you see someone taking a little bit of damage, dont instantly start to heal. they will be just fine at 80% health before you heal them.

Make sure that you have 2 headgear pieces, one with a sup divine, one with a minor divine. cast boon with the superior, then switch to the minor. it can save your ass and if it gets stripped, just recast with minor for healing until you can swap out headgear again.

NEVER USE a 20/20 prot wand and offhand. Your casts as far as your prot skills are a 1/4 sec cast with like a 2-5 second recharge. you really do not need the faster casting on a 1/4 second cast and they recharge fast enough to spam them efficiently. Use the inspiration offhands and wands and youll find that edrain is actually a spammable energy management and can be more controlable than Mantra.

LASTLY practice makes perfect. a boon prot can be very tricky to manage your energy management efficiently, but basically cast edrain as much as possible when its recharged, and only inspired hex thngs like mindwrack, diversion, blurred vision, etc... basically the hexes that can slow down your damage or can stop your casters. a movement hex can be inspired if you need a quick energy boost. youll find its much better to have a caster that dont have backfire, than a mesmer who is moving slower for 5 seconds.

Please, please, please learn to kite efficiently. kiting = monks lifesaver. do not stand there and think that you can tank whatevers comming for you. you cant. run and break aggro/avoid orbs/arrows/etc.. to get into a better position to heal. also learn to kite toward the rear of the party. aka the backline. a monk should NEVER be in front. ideally you want to be far enoug hbehind the party to just keep them on the top edge of your aggro bubble. with hench, just run in circles and the mobs will break aggro and lock on to the next closest target.

This all will help you a lot in both pvp and pve, granted there are other thigns that you will still need in pvp and other tactics that you need to learn, butthis will help get you started and runnign these things, i never have any problems in pve at all if i choose too boon prot.

gl and have fun monking.