Monks, most valuable classes?

My big problem with henchies is that Alesia/Mhenlo tends to be selective in a very strange way. When I'm playing my monk as a smiter, I always need to bring along a good hefty dose of healing. Otherwise, while I'm at 100/540, Alesia instead heals Claude with his measly three-quarters health.

see..this why i'm glad i chose a monk as my first character..it helped me understand that they can't heal forever..so unless a monk in the team is not healing at ALL i let it pass if 1-2 members of the party die...too many times have i lost all my energy to a so called "tank"...i was also happy with the monks being selected the most..simply because i got through the story a lot faster then say..a mesmer or necro would who'd have to wait for a nice group or something to carry them through.....

I think the time we most fully recognise the value of monks is when we're in a mission such as Thirsty River, Thunderhead Keep or other later missions. Firstly, we take half an hour to find them. Secondly, when we've found them, who knows how good they're gonna be?
Pardon me but some monks can be pretty crap cos they keep healing themselves too much. On Thunderhead, the monks have to keep the King alive, and on Thirsty River I've noticed especially on the three times I've done it that the monks we've had have not been so good and it's a wonder we made it. Probably cos we kept ressing.
I have lvl 20 monk at Thunderhead meself and I think he's pretty valuable
i guess most monks have experienced some kind of grovelling from various parties that are hopelessly in need of a monk
Can't win without a good monk I say, so if you've got one and they're good, consider them valuable.

I disagree. How about you try all these without monks? Orozar? Ring of Fire? Or Nolani Academy (without twinked armor/skills/weapons?). How about Magumma Jungle, with the endless Mesmer mobs and the extremely irritating poison-using spiders? Or the Mahgo Hydras outside Ember Light Camp?

Skill can go a long way in reducing the amount of healing needed, I'll agree. But there'll always be a need for healing, and as it stands right now, only Monks are capable of providing that amount, for better or for worse.

I did Ring Of Fire with two secondary healers (Both e/mo)..I solo'd Nolani with my monk and did it with a Warrior and an Ele on my ranger.

Why not take your mesmer along with you(or OMG bring TWO mesmers) and have the two of them play "Battle of the interupters" it'll keep the mesmer mobs occupied long enough for you to kill them without them doing any major damage to the rest of your team.

Antidote Signet, Plague Sending, Plague Signet, Infuse Condition, Plague Touch, Melandru's Resiliance, I Will Survive!, Martyr, Purge Conditions, Purge Signet, Draw Conditions, Mend Ailment, Mend Condition, Restore Condition...none of those skills require you to be a Monk Primary(or a primary healer for that matter) to counter conditions.

let your tank do his job. stack up on defensive stances and coral the hydras around him use Doylak Signet, Bonnetis, Balance Stance, Endure Pain, Watch Yourself, Defensive Stance...etc etc etc then allow the damage dealers to take them out.



I shouldn't have to mention that all classes have an ample way to heal themselves without the NEED of a monk...it's simply easier to let someone else worry about your health than to do it yourself.

These stats will have been bent out of all recognition by the thousands of farming monks that haunt Augury Rock at night.

no profession is more valuable than any other. The only thing more valuable is a PLAYER who knows how to play. They are far more valuable than anyone who doesn't know how to play their character anyday. 8 knowledgeable warriors would probably beat a mission far more easily than 8 random, idiot monks.

That being said, I love having lots of monks in my team Doesn't make it any easier, but gives that feeling of security, leaving me more confident that I can, and will, beat the mission/group/enemy.

...I'm a warrior and I barely PvP although I do PvE alot. I can't really agree to this because I am a warrior(tanker to be specific) and I heal myself most of the time... so mind you, not all warriors have this kind of attitude.

Quoted for truth.
I stopped playing healer in PvE for that exact reason.

To all you retarded level 15 "uber l33t" warriors who paid your passage in advanced parties to get to higher level areas: you mean nothing to me unless you can prove your use.
To all you ignorant non-monks who believe that you should never drop below 75% health with a monk on your team, pay attention and stop aggroing the entire army of Forgotten at once!
To all you animal-loving rangers: your pet is a piece of shit and I'm only going to heal it if 1) you're a beastmaster and your entire strat is based on it (in which case you can likely res it anyways... and should be able to heal it yourself) 2) nothing else is taking damage.
To anybody who still has starter armour in the desert: stop saving up to buy a useless omgshiney!1!!!11one storm bow and spend your money on something useful.



I could go on, but now you see why I stopped playing PvE unless it's with my guild.

monks. i have one, and she gets spammed with invites every time she enters a mission area. i, however, could stand there all day with my mesmer, even as early as ft. ranik...and never get an invite, unless i start a pug. i havent finished the game with my ele, simply because everyone needs monks at that level(as an e/mo, i dont get invited too much.LF ECHO NUKER!1!1!11...i am an echo nuker(renwal glyph)..but without a mesmer secondary they always kick me. my monk is going to pass my ele in the storyline..even though she was started way after my ele. sad really...i, for one, realize the efficiency of other classes when played properly, and always accept rangers and mesmers into my parties. and, as has been said many times before, people are soooo anxious to find a monk, and when someone dies, or drops below 75% health, they start ragging on the monk, HEAL ME NOOB!!1. or something to that effect. i am not a neverending pool of mana. so get over yourself, you mob aggroing ele, you lvl 15warrior who got ran to droks. i honestly cannot believe you can stand there forever waiting for a monk to join your party, and then the moment one little thing goes wrong...BAM its the monks fault.

I have a character for each profession going, the last being a monk I have just started and she will only be a smiting monk as I am no good at healing. I have never depended on a monk for healing me ( if they heal me through a mission I am really grateful) with any of my characters, I always bring a Res Signet and my self healing skills whatever they might be for that particular profession.
My secondary profession is always a ranger as I love having my pet with me. My pet is my tank and I always do my best at healing him/her. I have a Necromancer with a pet Bird and I use a lot of wells during combat if possible, I have been told off for using too many wells but I use them to also heal the party and my pet as they are at the front of the fight and I am in the rear.
I appreciate the job monks have to do but like it has been said if you can't find a monk for a mission use the henchie monks they are good.
I have 2 characters (Necro & Mesmer) that are stuck at Thunderhead Keep at the moment, (my poor mesmer has been there now for a few weeks) trying to get through the mission. People will not take the henchie monks for that mission I have no idea why?

Too many enemies that have a level > 20.
Only monks do good holy damage that doesnt care for your lower level.

get smiting monks!

I don't think it's new that henchies work just as fine as human monks. Though you'd have a problem with Mhenlo as your healer in the RoF missions: sometimes he's suicidal and walks in the lava. Someone put it aptly: henchmen stupidity is predictable, human stupidity isn't. You are warned.

For those of you infrequently seen mesmer, rangers, necros in PvE who complain about not being able to form a party for missions/quests, you're just waiting for people to invite YOU into THIER party. Honestly, my first character ever was a mesmer, and I never ever ever had a problem with finding a party for anything in PvE. Hell, she even had a wacked-up build: geomesmer one time, fast casting pyro another. (She was a Me/E.)

You people just need to take the initiative and create your own parties rather than waiting around and advertising for "Mesmer LFG" Because then, yeah, no one's gonna want you. Rangers are known for being able to pull mobs, necros for being a powerhouse/minion master - I daresay mesmers have no true defined role in PvP, maybe except in the later mission where monk bosses are just annoying. Or Glint, anyone? Hah.

/rant. :P

Suprisingly, I've had almost no problems getting into groups with my new mesmer. The times I had problems, everyone else had problems finding groups as well, so I just started one. Seems a suprising amount of people now accept mesmers into their group

As for Glint.. she's never been this easy to kill, I'm loving the fact that we see what she's casting/using

LOL true. I love getting into a PvP team and asking who has some sort of self-heal and they call me a noob. because I'm a monk so I'm supposed to heal them. just like that.

What you don't hear too often is that Monks and Mesmers are the primary tanks. That's right - they're the ones that are taking the primary damage majority of the time (ok so necros and eles come second). Unless a warrior's hammering your monk into a state of disability the warriors may as well go pick flowers.

monks?! pfsssh henchmen monks are all you need

try doing hells precipice with 2 warriors 1 ele 1 ranger 1 mesmer 1 necro, and hench monks

hench monks are good enough to do any mission, so i don't get why people spend hours saying GLF MONKS!!!!

example..
i went to precipice with 2 hench monks, everyone in town was like hahahha your gonna die so fast
about an hour and a half later i warped back to hells from droks after winning the mission AND the bonus, then saw the same people who were like haha you won't win, and they were still "GLF MONK"ing

i agree with u man i completed all missions with hench with any character i had. All u really need is to think things through, be a greater target and lead correctly. hench are dumb u got to think for them

My answer is Yes. Monk is more valuable than other classes.

Reasons:
1.) Monk on a GOOD team will make the team EVEN BETTER. A Healing/Protection monk is the best defense in the game.

2.) Monk on a BAD team will make the team AVERAGE. Healing/Protection monks can cover up so many mistakes. If a stupid warrior stands under meteor shower for whole 10s, let it be. In most cases, Monks can cover that mistake but is it a smart thing? Probably not.

I am not saying Monk is "superior". I am just saying Monk is more valuable because monk is the only class that allows people to make mistakes regardless on a good/bad team. Of course other classes have their uniqueness but chances are a good healing/protection monk can save your ARSE on any given day. That's how valuable they are.

I dont have the mind capacity to be a monk, i try and try but i can throw out the healing skillz out fast enough, I am a good tank though--- click the button when the adrenaline is full LoL

I can see why there are so few healing monks doing missions. It gets kinda boring just clicking the name and clicking heal over and over. I also notice that I get a lot less drops compaired to my warrior. Im happy I got my monk to ember light so I have access to all the skills. I dont plan on finishing ring of fire.

i just deleted my monk after i unlocked all the normal skills and a few elites, because there is no point in playing it pve because of the amount of people and problems i would have to deal with

Unless they've improved the AI since I last played with them, then no, no they aren't.
Human monks know not to use Word of Healing on one person taking 2 damage every 5 seconds when another is already below 50% hp.
Human monks don't have pathing problems.
Human monks know when to get out of the way when idiot warriors in the party run crying from the fray because they got cut (leading the monsters chasing them right towards the healer).
Human monks can tell the party warrior that he, as well, can @#$% off and that HE'S a crappy player.

Every time I play with Alesia I want to defragment her and spit on her virtual grave. She is incompetent and runs when being attacked by faster enemies (as opposed to facing them and NOT opening herself to critical attacks while healing herself).
And don't get me started about her retarded pathing problems that left her behind at a teleporter while the rest of my party appeared in the middle of an entire tribe (20 or 30) centaurs. We died, of course, because henchies in general are incompetent team members, but we were also stuck because she couldn't join us.

Bottom line: join a guild with a healer who is willing to party with you (mine has two highly active ones, if you don't know where to start ), it will solve a lot of problems.

Henchmen aren't really that bad.. ANet just needs to upgrade the looting ratio and their AI.

Yeah, monks are really valuable. I learn this when my monk is left all alone in the damn underworld with six other people to heal.

However. You only need one monk for anything UW-difficulty or less... if you have a decent tank.

In fact, I'd argue that a good tank is just about as valuable as a decent monk, because they will reduce the amount of healing necessary by an insane amount.

Yes, I had fun once in a Wilds group with two necros, two warriors, Alesia, and a ranger. Then it was just two warriors, my necro, and Alesia. Then Alesia dropped on us and we were out of res sigs. We actually nearly finished the mission...

My weird way of looking at Anet design regarding monks:

Monks:

Pros: Effective healing/protecting

Cons: Less attractive playstyle

So, I think Anet makes monks more effective than average to make up for their monotonous playstyles.

If monks are just average in healing and protecting, very minimal amount of players will be bothered to play them. They might as well play their favourite classes with decent self heal/prot. :P

i honestly don't see whats wrong with hench besides the fact that they don't talk to you

pros:
you won't have to spend hours "GLF MONK"ing
you won't lose the mission because the monk dropped
and biggest of all!

HENCHMEN DON'T COMPLAIN



what makes them so unattrative, i mean, no complaining compared to constant complaining? just that alone is worth the AI's "stupidity".

I helped 2 Guildies beat Hell's Precipice with 5 henchies, so yes, it's possible. And we were all W/Mo's! Imagine that! But, we knew how to TAKE CARE OF OURSELVES enough to not be overly dependent on the Monks. Too many people think that Stupidity is a condition that a Monk can remove. It ain't.

All day yesterday and last night I worked on Ascending my newly-made Monk. Dunes of Despair, by far the easiest of the 3 missions, was a total pain with 4 dummies on the team. The only ones of use who had any sense were the 2 Monks. Sheesh. 4 idiots run off trying to do the bonus (which would've gotten them killed quickly had they made it there), leaving 2 Monks and the Hero, then the Forgotten and Armors start coming. They finally all get back, not focusing on 1 target at a time, getting raped. Got Bows hitting me with Concussion Shot, running around trying to heal while I'm dazed. The freaking Ranger dies, then starts spamming "rez plz". Ooookay, like I got 16 seconds to stop and stand around trying to raise your stupid ass when people are dropping like flies left and right. I had to find a safe corner to stand in just to cast heals without getting interrupted until I could get rid of Dazed (it was too frentic to prioritize myself). Believe it or not, we managed to recover and beat the mission. I conversed with the other Monk afterwards for a while, and told her we didn't even deserve to win. She told me I did a hella job pulling everyone through. Yeah, but it never should have been that hard in the first place.

I won't even comment on my Thirsty River nightmares last night. Not until I had 4 other Guild members on my team did I finally pass that so I could ascend. Ugh.

And yes, I'm building my Monk for farming. But I'm keeping my Desert armor with Minor Runes so I can still help the Guild with healing when necessary. Monking for random PUG's is a pain. Much more stressful than farming by myself.

Thirsty seems always ez to me i use it to help guild members lvl with a slayers scroll and i always take hench whenever i can.

I think it's a shame that most monks are pretty much forced to take healing when smiting is so fun, it's like that side of the class is only used for farming as it's the only time you can take it without people moaning.

I play as a healing monk most of the time, but h ebest mission i have every had was thirsty river with a all monk team, everyone takes self heals and the rest smiting and nothing survived for long if they got near us.

well i wasnt forced i just wanted to be nice to ppl and help them in their stuff...... but once i found invici monk it showed a light to a divine happiness, where a monk could not be screamed at by ppl with "no heals?" and i was doing tons of dmg. So monks are fun to play in all but i started as a prot monk hence the name i chose.

PUG's are bad sometimes u cant trust them. i rather a mindless fool with no action (hench) or a mindless fool with action(u know who)

now look.

take a good team. they have no monks. as long as nothing goes wrong, they can win comfortably. if however a patrol comes along and one group member is crippled (can't get out of aggro range) then they will likely have quite a bit of trouble. Add Alesia and this group can now withstand that patrol. but what if the ranger accidentaly tabs onto ANOTHER mob?

more serious trouble.

Add a good human monk to it and they may be able to deal with THAT situation efficiently.

Monks are there to deal with mistakes. they cover your back in the case of something unexpected happening. they enlarge the comfort zone of the group.

those of you who say that they always take henchy (or none at all) monks. well done for finding a competant group, but if you had a competant healer you must admit that it makes it easier. a lot easier.

its all about gambling. if you are prepared to gamble on a group making it through Thirsty River without a monk then fine. but you are know that you have less of a chance without a onk than with. if you want to save the time by skipping the monk then fine. but you must be prepared for the increased likelyhood of having to do the mission again.

if you want to play safe; bring a monk.

for example. my characters up untill my monk had massive problems with some missions. my monk never did any mission more than twice. ascension and TK where first timers.

PUGs have to take into account the chance of error. with 6-8 random variables (the people) you want to add some margin for error. that margin is a monk. choose the number and type according to how daring you feel.

The fact that you see "looking for monk" everywhere doesn't mean that monks are the most important class - It just means they're scarce....

If nobody liked to play Warriors then you'd see "looking for warriors" all over the place.

well i know a real monk is needed to do the bonus of Divinity Coast, cause hench can't heal them. but it could still be done with hench.

The Answer to your question is so obvious........

Any moron can play a warrior.

It takes real skill to be a good monk.

Sorry, dont mean to insult all the good warriors i have played with, just trying to make a point.

Having played 4 PVE char to the end of this dumb game, my all time favorite is my monk. The char that demanded the most skill and patience on my part to develop was the monk. My warrior is my second favorite char.

I now haunt the pvp areana with my monk. The skill level needed to dodge two warriors at the same time, heal others, and stay alive is incredible. Compare that to a warrior who yells shields up and pounds away.

Thats why there r so few monks at end game. The dumb ones gave up.

no.... the ones that where smart but didn't like the playstyle gave up. the dumb ones keep going and call everyone n00b and give the rest of us a bad name.

Well in my opinion not everyone can play a warrior since there are aKa "Lerroy" type warrior will rush in with abandon and leave the rest of the party vunerable and then end up dying when they realise their party is half way across the map due to them single mindedly chasing one target while their party is fighting two patrols...

But I digress from the point of this thread.
I think most good monks have moved on and only play as monks to help guildies,friends or newbies once in a while.
I think most monks are sick and tired of PUGs.

But in my opinions monks aren't a more valuable class above other classes. They are nice to have but not that important if everyone actually looks at their HP bars.

Note: All my comments are based around PvE.

EDIT: Fixing up bad incoherent post

After some time now playing a Monk as my 4th character (having played out all the missions in GW with the first 3) I can add some new comments:

1) Most people that complain that they need a lot of monks on a team or that they need monks at all just don't play correctly. Case in point: Doing Thunderkeep with my Monk in a team with another monk, the team played miserably as a team, and several party members died even before we got to the fort. And what was the chat amongst the party members? "We need 3 monks" was part of it. Now, I have done this mission successfully about 12 times already (with my other chars and helping friends) and I know that it isn't the number of monks that was the problem. It was the poor team play and technique of the group. The problem is, these people just don't realize that!

2) A lot of people still don't realize that henchy monks are perfectly adequate as a substitute for human monks for all missions and quests where henchies are allowed. My answer to anyone who thinks that henchies play badly is that henchies' performance is a mirror of ourselves. They suck if we suck. If we play carefully and with correct strategy, henchy monks are adequate. Case in point: playing with my necro and only henchies I decided to do some tanking using some of the necro skills that require that you touch the enemy. Well, when doing this I noticed that Alesia died very often. But that is because the henchy monks are programmed to follow the human players and as long as I was tanking, Alesia was always in the danger zone. After I realized this I started letting my warrior henchmen tank and I casted spells in the background. Alesia stayed behind me, and no longer died. What most people probably forget when playing with henchies is that you need to consider henchies also when positioning in a battle. That means also the team needs to stick together. A human monk may know which of two widely spread ally groups most needs healing, but a henchy doesn't.

3) I still believe that in most cases many missions and quests can be done with only one or even no monks. It is a matter of preparation (everyone taking some skills for self healing, and maybe secondary monks taking some healing breeze or whatever) and careful playing tactics. I think a big problem with most players (warriors but not only them) is that they more or less expect the constant resupply of HP and do not know how to adjust their playing style otherwise.

BTW: I am rapidly getting tired of playing a Monk, and probably when I get through the game I will put my Monk on the shelf and take it out only when needed by friends. On the other hand, I will gladly play any of my other characters any time. I find the role of pure healer, which seems to be expected by party members, too stressing and too boring. In fact, when I play monk now, I take always at least two necro skills (my secondary) and I use them as much as I can. My party simply has to live (or die) with that.

That goes back to my point that alot of warriors will not even join a group that doesn't have alot of monks.

They do not realize sticking in another Monk only lowers the damage output and that bogs down the mission even more (higher chance someone will get tired and run ahead too).

If you want a happy monk, go to a primarily undead enemy mission - and ask for Smiting Monks in the outpost

I got bored yesterday so i decided to do one of my favorite missions with my ranger, hells, and other ppl who wanted to join me. i was waiting like 30 min. waiting for a second monk. and i kept saying we can hench it. they are smart and reliable. ppl need to realize that henchies are as good as the one who leads them. they are more realible than ppl and come on u dont need to be wasting ur time waiting for 30 min for 1 or 2 monks, get half of the team afk, have some ppl say sry i gtg took to long, wait for more ppl, have the monks leave and join a group rdy to go, and basically start back to having no monks. So y wait? y dony u just go and do missions with monk hench and maybe when u comeback if u failed then u can get monks if there are any.

I haven't read this whole thread through but get the gist of it and i would say yes as to real monk have way more skills to choose from and don't forget that is what it all about unlocking those skills no need for other classes.It is unfornutate tat the part size can't be bigger.alesia can do you fine in certian missions but not in all and can be a liability when her DP is -60 as she is the first one targeted.i would never disscount the work of a good mesmer or a necro that can assit in helping out the monk and a ranger to do the pulling.there are certian missions where two monks are needed.