Fort Aspenwood (Kurzick Side) Air of Enchantment Prot-Infuser

One of the worst things about being a monk healer/protter/hybrid is e-management. IMO, monks have the worst e-management in Guild Wars. When playing a Ritualist or (lol) Necromancer/Ritualist healer/protter, I never feel as if I'm constantly starving, or about to starve for energy. Even when I'm not starving for energy, there's still this energy-paranoia that I don't feel when playing non-monk healers.

Of course I have a Zealous Benediction and Word of Healing bar (or two, or three), but then, every monk does. ;) However, Zealous Benediction encourages you to wait until your target's almost dead for optimal use, and for reasons of latency, poor reaction time, bad luck, or a combination of all three, this often results in either a target that's too dead for optimal use, or not dead enough.

Word of Healing bars, which tend to be hybrid bars, lack a certain synergy within the bars themselves. They try to cover all bases, which they do to some extent, but at the same time end up covering none of them particularly well.

All that, and I just like tinkering. So - enter the Air of Enchantment Prot-Infuser.

An almost pure Protection build based around Air of Enchantment, it lets you spam Reversal of Fortune as often as you like on a single target, for only 1e per cast. Use Infuse Health to catch spikes / when your target is below 25% hp, then Watchful Healing on yourself to regain the hp lost. The +3 regen from Watchful Healing lets you continue to spam-prot your target, and if it gets stripped early by a siege turtle, no worries - you get healed for +90hp - win/win situation. Mighty Was Vorizun in tandem with correctly used Air of Enchantment and Reversal of Fortune means you should always have the energy to Infuse Health, all while giving you a passive +15 armor. What's more, the recharge for Air of Enchantment is shorter than the duration - meaning you can renew Air of Enchantment on a target for only 1e. Plus, if you have any other healers with you at all who use enchants, they'll love you. Even if they don't realise why. ;)

And to top it all off, this build, used wisely, can hold a gate against a siege turtle by itself.

Fort Aspenwood (Kurzick) Air of Enchantment Prot-Infuser

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Skills
Air of Enchantment {Elite}
Reversal of Fortune
Guardian
Infuse Health
Mighty Was Vorizun
Deny Hexes
Dismiss Condition
Watchful Healing

Stats
Protection Prayers [11] + [4]
Divine Favour [10] + [1]
Communing [10]

Gear

  • Superior Protection Prayers Rune
  • Minor Divine Favour Rune
  • Survivor Insignia
  • Superior vigor rune
  • Vitae runes to finish off
  • Any sword/spear/axe + shield with hp or energy mods

Campaigns Needed
Prophecies, Factions, Nightfall

How to Use

  • Cast Mighty Was Vorizun, renew it before it runs out. This build should not have energy problems - what Mighty Was Vorizun does is give you just that little extra energy pool to use infuse as and when you need it. If facing e-denial, switch to low-e set, and do NOT use Mighty Was Vorizun. You can also cast Mighty Was Vorizun when you need an extra hit of energy.
  • Reversal of Fortune as mini-prot for minor damage
  • Guardian on targets taking consistent physical damage
  • Infuse Health to catch spikes, then Watchful Healing on yourself to recover hp. Watchful Healing has the additional benefit of healing you for +90hp if a siege turtle strips it from you before it's done.
  • Deny Hexes to remove hexes from yourself, or target. Deny hexes is great against hex stacks - it counts *itself* as a recharging Divine Favour spell, which means it removes at least 2 hexes, 3 if you have Watchful Healing on cooldown
  • Dismiss Condition to dismiss pesky conditions - also packs a decent heal, because it's a prot build
  • Air of Enchantment on any target you'll be protting consistently. Air of Enchantment allows you to spam Reversal of Fortune for just 1e. Additionally, Air of Enchantment recharges faster than its duration - meaning that if you overwrite an old Air of Enchantment with a new one, it costs only 1e. Stack Guardian on top (i.e. Air of Enchantment > Reversal of Fortune > Guardian) if a turtle is around - this should allow you to continue spamming Reversal of Fortune to your heart's content, while being able to renew Air of Enchantment as and when you need to renew it

Variants

  • None There's nothing on this bar I would drop or change. I've tried this with Patient Spirit instead of Infuse Health, but that requires too much investment in Healing Prayers, which the stat point spread doesn't allow for. Mighty was Vorizun is there so that when the time comes to use Infuse Health, you have the energy to do so. One of the original versions of this build had 10 Healing Prayers, no Communing, and Patient Spirit in place of Infuse Health, and Healing Breeze in place of Watchful Healing. The result was much more inefficient.. Healing Breeze is ONLY efficient if Air of Enchantment goes on first - and very often, I'd find myself using it even alone out of desperation, and then having low energy. Patient Spirit heals for a good bit, but it isn't fast enough to reverse a spike, and shouldn't *be* used to reverse a spike, anyway.

Counters

  • General Caster Hate
  • Not stacking enchants on top of Air of Enchantment
  • Party-wide damage - this build is strictly single-target protting. If for some bizarre reason you have huge party-wide damage in FA, this build will not be able to handle it
  • Heavy pressure on you - Air of Enchantment cannot target self - this means that you are more defenceless than those you are protting, because it costs you more to defend yourself. You'll need to be able to kite smart and try to stay out of trouble - not always possible

Additional notes

Where have you tested this?
Fort Aspenwood, Kurzick side. That's what I wrote it for. I might test it in other places, but this is essentially a Fort Aspenwood, Kurzick build.

I Laugh in the Face of Spike Damage: Aura of Faith Single-Target Spike Reversal Protter - PvE Only

One of the questions I get sometimes is - Nuggeet! For a monk main, why do you share so few monk buildz?

Weeeeelll...

Like every monk in Guild Wars, I have builds for each of these four elites:
Healer's Boon
Zealous Benediction
Word of Healing
Unyielding Aura

...but to be honest, while these are 'safe' staples, at least two of them are overrated (UA and HB), and for the other two (ZB, WoH), well, it gets BORING playing them all the time. WoH bars, especially IMO, whether hybrid or otherwise, lack a certain synergy and utility.

As a result, I play around a lot with monk bars - I tend to rope in Alliance/Guild members as guineapigs, or test in FA/JQ.

Now, the problem with testing in FA/JQ is that the damage patterns are very different in PvE and PvP. PvP bars do tend to be easier to adapt to PvE than the other way around. However, you need to remember one basic difference between PvP & PvE (yes, there are masses of differences, but I find while running a heal, prot, or hybrid bar, that this is the greatest one): PvE tends to have way more party-wide damage than PvP.

This particular Protection bar was something I wrote more as a joke than anything, but when I went out and tested it, I found that it absolutely kicked ass. I have tested this extensively in Hard Mode - vqs, missions, whatever. Disclaimer though, it only works in Hard Mode - Normal Mode mobs don't hit hard enough to trigger Spirit Bond.

It is my favourite Protection Prayers build for PvE now. It has the most amazing spike reversal I have ever seen. It can save someone with 5% hp remaining - basically as long as you reach them in time to cast just two spells - Spirit Bond and Aura of Faith - their HP will leap back to full. And due to the nature of the build, it even works in areas with enchant removal (yes, even against mountains of Roaring Ethers with added boss ether]. It is fully meant to be used in conjunction with another healer - monk, rit, dervish, it doesn't matter - but it does depend on someone else to be the redbar provider.

On the down-side, this is not a faceroll bar. It takes a little while to learn and get used to, and if you prefer 'redbar spam' instead of judicious application, this is not the bar for you - you will run out of energy incredibly quickly. Arguably, if you prefer redbar spam, Protection Prayers is not the line for you, but I've written one Protection Prayers build that maximises on that, so, who knows?

Aura of Faith Single-Target Spike Reversal Protter - PvE Only

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Skills
Spirit Bond
Aura of Faith {Elite}
Guardian
Seed of Life
Aegis
Cure Hex
Dismiss Condition
Selfless Spirit

Stats
Protection Prayers [12] + [4]
Divine Favour [12] + [1]
Healing Prayers [3]

Gear

  • Superior Protection Prayers Rune
  • Survivor or Radiant Insignia (I prefer Survivors on monks, but this is totally a personal preference)
  • Major or Superior vigor rune
  • Vitae or Attunement runes to finish off (I prefer Vitae, but again, personal preference rules here)
  • Any staff / wand / spear / melee weapon + shield combo with hct/hsr Protection Prayers, and +20% Enchanting. I prefer a staff for this (Kephket's Refuge is a good one), but as long as you have the +20% Enchanting, anything goes.

Campaigns Needed
Prophecies, Factions, Nightfall

How to Use

  • Judiciously. No, really. XD
  • Precast Aegis - well-timed Aegis precasting reduces party-wide damage from all physical attacks by more than 50%. The best time to precast Aegis is when the mob of mobs is just a little bit outside of the your party's aggro bubble (that white circle on your radar), and moving towards you. Of course, Aegis should be recast (against physical attackers) whenever it's available, but precasting it always saves everyone pain against physical attackers.
  • Seed of Life on anyone taking consistent, consecutive damage packets - helps to even out party HP as a whole, taking a little pressure off your healing partner
  • Cure Hex and Dismiss Conditions to... cure hexes and dismiss conditions. -_- Who'da thunk. Hex removal - be circumspect about it. Remove it if they call it, it's something on you you need to remove, or if you're bored. Don't spam hex removal. Especially in PvE, it's just not worth it. All it does is eat your energy, and do you really care if a caster has Empathy?
  • Selfless Spirit - Whenever you think the shit is about to hit the fan.
  • Guardian - Mini prot, use it on anyone taking consistent physical damage
  • Spirit Bond - this is your big prot, toss it on anyone taking consistent damage that redbarring obviously isn't able to keep up with
  • Spirit Bond THEN Aura of Faith - this is your 'big gun', and the entire basis of this build. One thing you must remember when using Aura of Faith is that unlike Protective Spirit and the like, Aura of Faith cares when you cast it. To get the full bang for your buck out of Aura of Faith, you must cast Spirit Bond BEFORE you cast Aura of Faith. If you cast Spirit Bond, then Aura of Faith, and your target is hit, Spirit Bond will heal them for 200+ hp per hit, assuming the initial base damage of 60hp is met. If you cast Aura of Faith, then Spirit Bond, Spirit Bond will only heal for 104hp per hit, assuming base damage is met (which in turn is very difficult, because Spirit Bond doesn't count the damage that would have been done before Aura of Faith reduces it by 50%). Because Aura of Faith decreases all damage taken by the target by 50%, while increasing all healing done to the target by 103%, it synergises amazingly with a fellow healer. Not only do you cut spike damage in half with Aura of Faith, and provide a buffer with Spirit Bond, you make all THEIR spells heal for twice the amount as well. Not only that, it affects the Divine Favour healing bonus as well, so if your partner healer is another monk... yippee! It does, however, mean that you have to anticipate spikes, to get the full use out of this build. Please note that Spirit Light Weapon does not benefit from this Aura of Faith, though. :(

Variants

  • Deny Hexes instead of Cure Hex Deny Hexes removes at least 2 hexes, as it counts itself as a recharging Divine Favour skill. While it doesn't have the healing power of Cure Hex (which wasn't very much, anyway, for 3 points), removing more hexes can be better than just removing one,a nd getting an extra heal.
  • Other than that... there's nothing on this bar I would drop or change. When things get hairy, you will need Selfless Spirit. If you're running with a group that absolutely insists that you bring a rez, then you shouldn't be running a build like this anyway. Bring rez scrolls, or run something conventional to make them feel safe, even if it is less powerful. Failing that, leave the group altogether.

Counters

  • General Caster Hate
  • Injudicious facerolling - you'll run out of e and be useless

Additional notes

Where have you tested this?
Just about everywhere. Vanquishes, HM missions, Elite areas, you name it. Do not use this in normal mode though. If the damage requirement for Spirit Bond isn't met, your protted target will die. It's also weak against mountains of minions. Minions don't hit hard enough in general to trigger Spirit Bond, so it'll be Death By a Thousand Cuts for your protted target.

Can heroes use this?
No. Heroes think Aura of Faith is Reversal of Fortune.

OMG! A Prot build without Protective Spirit? NOOB!
You don't Protective Spirit with this build. No, really. NO ONE in your party needs Protective Spirit, if you use this build right.

Ray of Judgement Nuker + Ice Spike Snare

Template Code
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The Concept
  • Snare, nuke, and burninate till dead.
  • No e-problems.

Skills
Glyph of Lesser Energy
Ice Spikes
Ray of Judgement [Elite]
Snow Storm [Optional]
Reversal of Damage
Pain Inverter
You Move Like a Dwarf!
[Optional Slot]

Stats
Water Magic [12]
Smiting Prayers [12 + 1 + 3]

Gear

  • Survivor's or Radiant Insignia, according to your preference.
  • Any smiting staff or wand/offhand.
  • Superior Smiting Rune.
  • Minor Divine Favour (Optional).
  • Vitae / Vigor runes (optional). 

Campaigns Needed
Eye of the North
Factions
Nightfall

How To Use

  • Target a mob, preferably in the centre of a nice big pack.
  • Cast Glyph of Lesser Energy (GoLE), Ice Spikes, Ray of Judgement, Snow Storm. They should all be dead or dying by now. If not, your team can pick off the stragglers.
  • Cast Reversal of Damage on party members taking damage, when there are no clumps of mobs to burninate. This is your main damage when not aoe-nuking.
  • Pain Inverter for numbergasms on bosses and elementalists.
  • You Move Like a Dwarf! for single target snare (this is what I use on bosses, rather than Ice Spikes), then Pain Inverter, GoLE, RoJ, Snow Storm. Also use it in place of Snow Storm as a finisher, where appropriate.
  • In HM, Snow Storm causes mobs to scatter very fast. Use this to your advantage, as 'scatter-on-demand' if someone is being mobbed.Snow Storm can be replaced with something else, but it's the optional spell that I found worked best for me.

Optional Slots

  • Smite Hex - Remove pesky hexes. Blow things up! BOOM!
  • Smite Condition [Requires Eye of the North] - Remove pesky conditions. Blow moar things up! BOOM!!
  • Castigation Signet [Requires Eye of the North] - If you're feeling tight on E, despite GoLE, take this instead of Snow Storm or Rebirth
  • Holy Wrath [Requires Prophecies] - Use together with Reversal of Damage for lots of fun. If you do not have Nightfall, use this instead of Reversal of Damage.
  • Judge's Insight - Toss this on physical damage dealers to make them wuv you. <3 <3 <3
  • Great Dwarf Weapon [Requires Eye of the North, replaces Snow Storm] - Again, Physical Damage dealers will love you. Give particular love to AoE types (Scythes, Barragers, Hammer Warriors, Moebius Sins)
  • Maelstrom - Use in place of Snow Storm in caster heavy areas. You're not looking for the damage (which is a bonus), you're looking for the caster shutdown.
  • Technobabble [Requires Eye of the North, replaces Snow Storm] - Use in place of Snow Storm in caster heavy areas. The daze is short, and the shutdown isn't as effective as Maelstrom - but it doesn't cause exhaustion. If you are having trouble managing your E when using Maelstrom, try Technobabble instead. If you target a mob beside a boss, the boss will be dazed.
  • Summon Ice Imp [Requires Eye of the North, replaces Snow Storm] - Extra set of snares via the Imp's Ice Spikes. Asuran caster summons are also very useful for pulling, should you be using H/H. They tend to stop halfway and fight the pack you just pulled, leaving you free to run back to your group, and your group to run up unmolested while the mobs focus on the summons.
  • Ebon vanguard Assassin Support [Requires Eye of the North, replaces Snow Storm] - Good for spiking down squishy targets, as well as pulling.
  • Breath of the Great Dwarf [Requires Eye of the North, replaces Snow Storm] - Good for areas with lots of burning - help your poor healers.
  • Selfless Spirit [Requires Factions] - Use this during the time you're spamming Reversal of Damage or Holy Wrath
  • Rebirth - Always good to have.

Optional slots that DID NOT work for me

  • Zealot's Fire - This looked so good on paper... but left me short on energy all the time. Not only that, the scatter it caused was unpredictable / not controllable, and much of the time, the effect itself went to waste.

Counters

  • General caster hate.
  • Not using GoLE before Ice Spikes/RoJ/Snow Storm chain.

Additional notes

Hahahaha NUB! Monk/Mesmer with Arcane Echo works SO MUCH BETTER THAN THIS! HAHAHAHAHA.
Since RoJ now scatters things as well, I find that Arcane Echoing RoJ is not only very energy intensive, it also doesn't get the full duration of burninating love from my RoJs. If you have a Blood Is Power/Blood Ritual in the group constantly pumping you with E, then Mo/Me RoJ Arcane Echo is indeed superior. If not - this bar leaves you with no energy problems - and very decent nukage.

This is so heavy on PvE skills, it's hardly even a monk bar!
=/ Yes, I'm afraid that's so. No arguments there.

Why not use Deep Freeze instead of Ice Spikes? Better damage, and the snare is longer.
Deep Freeze is expensive, and RoJ only lasts for 5 seconds anyway. If your timing is good, you hold the mobs in the beam for 3 seconds, then they start being able to move away, at least 1s is spent moving away even after the snare wears off, leaving only 1s of RoJ 'wasted'.

Using Deep Freeze means GoLE > Deep Freeze > RoJ > Snow Storm = 5e + 15e + 0e + 10e = 30e. Using Ice Spikes means GoLE > Ice Spikes > RoJ > Snow Storm = 5e + 5e + 0e + 10e = 20e. Ice Spikes is much, much kinder to your energy.

Can Heroes use this?
Even if you replace the PvE skills with normal skills - not very well. Heroes are better off with another kind of RoJ bar. They don't tend to use GoLE at the right time, and aren't always consistent with using Ice Spikes to snare for the RoJ. They are godly at using Smite Hex, Reversal of Damage, and Smite Condition though.

Where have you tested this?
Since this build is a 'self-sufficient' nuker, as in I don't expect to be propped up with a BiP or any other form out outside e-management, I tested this using full hench teams in each of the following areas. All were successful. (Though some had more deaths than bringing heroes... which is to be expected. None of them resulted in a DP higher than 30%. No consets/cupcakes/whatever. Would kind of kill the point of testing!)

Tested in:
Raisu Palace Vanquish
Zen Daijun Vanquish
Haiju Lagoon Vanquish
Sunqua Vale Vanquish
Arborstone Vanquish

6 and 4 man areas change group dynamics - so I'm pleased to say the build works in those too. =) Especially in Haiju Lagoon, I spent so much time moving my henches madly away from spirit rifts...  if you bring this build with humans, hopefully they're smarter than the henchies.