The Smiting Cleric -- Is there a point?

I'm still trying to decide if there is a point to attempting a monk build that focuses very strongly on smite. Elementalists seem to have better nukes overall .... Still the idea of a Battle Priest tossing around the wrath of the god's somehow attracts me.

Anyone else succeed in making a build that encorporates smite?

Bamelin

there are some good smiting skills such as shield of judgement and judge's insight, i'm sure there are other useful ones.

I was going to make a Monk elementalist focusing on Divine favor healing prayers and smiting prayers and just use the Glyphs of the elementalists. I want to see how smiting works on high levles

pretty much all of the smiting that does holy damage ignore armor... that means you will be doing far more damage than elementalists on ranger or warrior, and of course... undead and necro with tormentor armor too.

While being a monk primary, it is very easy to get people to gather around you... then have someone support you with healing... you will be slaughtering inexperienced warriors before they know what hit them.

(most smiting doesnt have big graphic effects, just some light here and there... so there are less chance for those guy to get out of the like of symbol of wrath range)

maybe along these lines?

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/content...ead-id1186.php

I'm looking for a smite build that will also work in PvP (if such a thing exists heh).

Bamelin

i think there is a reason they are so few

Unlike the other Monk lines, Smiting is a line you splash for a couple of skills, not one you build around. In particular it's a solid WaMo line, with Judge's Insight, Strength of Honor, and Balthazar's Spirit. There are also a couple nice skills to mess around with for a healing Monk, like Smite Hex or Zealot's Fire. But a pure Smiter? You're just asking to fail.

Peace,
-CxE

If you play anti-monk as a mes/mo. You can keep the drainage, backfire and interrupt skills, as well as have the scourge healing. That's the one and only smiting skill I currently use for my me/mo.

Well maybe not a PURE smiter ... what about a mix of healing prayers or Protection Prayers and smite .... Some of the smite enchantments are nice buffs for the group's tanks.

people gotta remember, holy damage from the smiting line makes a uber pve damage attribute as it deals alot of damage to the undead.
it also demolishes the necros wearing that certain armor.

Smiting is for secondaries. Divine Favor is pointless for a damage dealer.

If doing a Monk you do healing or Protection. Then you're not a damage dealer.

I have played a primary smiting monk and helped my team make first page of ladder by doing so.

There are many problems though running this type of build.

1 - you take massive amounts of damage, and can not heal yourself.(well)
2 - a lot of your better skills are PBAOE (requires you to engage those pesky warriors and such)
3 - a lot of the better skills are high energy requirement.
4 - a lot of the good other skills are either elite or have a slightly long recharge.
5 - your heavy enchantment based.

There are many benefits as well.

1 - You can deal more damage (if specced right) then almost any caster build.
2 - You are deceivingly harmless to your opponents.
3 - You do have the ability to spec to heal yourself.
4 - You can kill a group of warriors faster than any other class
5 - You have the best anti-healing spell in the game. (I believe)

A build I could reccommend you to try would be this:
11+1Smiting 10 Healing 10Divine Favor
Bathlazars Spirit (Energy regen)
Bathlazars Aura (PBAOE)
Shield of Judgement (Anti-attackers)
Zealots Fire (PBAOE)
Healing Touch (great self-heal)
Symbol of Wrath (PBAOE)
Scourge Healing (anti-self-heal)
Orison of Healing (spammable cheap heal)

i agree here, using smiting line on a warrior did me very well this weekend

I had a Pure Smiter that I used this weekend in the Crag(not a good example of PvP, but PvP non-the-less). It was a Mo/Me it did a really good job of taking out a target. I never tested it in the Tombs b/c it was more of an idea for PvE, and I didn't want to see it possibly fail misserably in PvP.

Not true. I made a great build with DF instead of healing, although i had points in healing too because I think i used one or two healing skills.

I soloed an entire 4 player level 20 team in the arena with the build, so it couldn't be too bad.

LOL, you're drawing strategy conclusions off Arena?

I believe this is the wrong ctahegory to talk about builds tho

I brought it up here not to talk so much about builds (although that's sorta where it lead) but just to talk about the feasability of the smiting monk. I did check the builds section and there were not alot of smite monk builds really. I was just curious if people think it can be done (succesfully) or not for PvP.

Bamelin

My Mo/W had 2 W spells, 2 smiting things and 2 healing things, worked well.