User talk:Isaiah Cartwright/Update20071108

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AssassinAssassin

Recall Recall

  • when this Enchantment ends, it now disables all of the caster's Skills for 10 seconds.
This doesn't solve the problem with the skill in Hero Battles. Obviously since people are already running highly defensive builds, disabling skills doesn't really matter since you're shadow stepping to a D/A or Rt/A anyway (they were already using Expunge Enchantments anyway). At best monks will just give the second Recall to a hero instead of using it in their own build. I'm going to repeat what I've said before: any update to Recall that still allows me to shadow step between the Central and the Mystic shrine on the Beachhead fails. The community has been asking for a real nerf to Recall for months, including just about every top HB player in the game right now. The same goes for SP sins. Just what else do you want us to do? --Draikin 12:17, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
After reading the explanation for the nerf, I can only come to the conclusion that Anet isn't even playing the same game we are: "Recall has single-handedly removed tactical movement from Hero Battles because combatants can use it to both easily flee and to quickly gang up on opponents. By disabling skills after using Recall to Shadow Step, we hope to maintain this skill's value for retreating and for general maneuverability while diminishing its offensive usage.". All those Mo/A + D/A + D/P + Rt/A builds weren't using Recall offensively to begin with, they were using it to outmaneuver your opponent and cap more shrines. The "general maneuverability" that you wanted to preserve is the real problem with the skill, why would you want to maintain that? The fact that it allows you to retreat so easily only makes it all the more broken but apparently you want to maintain that aspect as well. --Draikin 14:57, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Apperently you are not watching the same matches I am... becuase last night, there was a 3 man sin team (1 monk) that spammed this skill the whole match, Shadow stepping them selve up and down and through walls the entire match... even using it to counter spike a Warrior that jumpped on their Monk healer... kinda like a reverse Aura of Displacement. So I see the nerf... but... 10 SECONDS??? Thats way way way too long... maybe 5 seconds is plunty... becuase since normally kill their target in 3 seconds... so I think 5 seconds is more then enough... and besides, you are taking a penalty for the maintainece of it... I know there is Return but woof... SabreWolf 16:01, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
By "offensive" they also mean enemy monks that Recall over to get an extra man to help cap a shrine where you are approaching. The skill disable on a player as a monk can be potent, especially if you can catch him off guard. Odds are, the Heroes will have some added healing (Spirit Light, Imbue Health), but the player monk may still be vulnerable to a kill, and definitely can't heal or prot up allies being attacked now. I'd still like to see it hit harder (like, only porting projectile line-of sight so it's vulnerable to enchant removal), but now Dual Recall is a little bit easier to make kills against.--Skye Marin 16:16, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
What stops me from bringing the second Recall on another hero instead of my monk? The answer is nothing since you don't have to make any kills anyway. You don't have to use this skill "offensively" as a monk, just anchoring your heroes to yourself is enough. The only good nerf to Recall in Hero Battles is one that makes it disappear entirely, even the single Recall builds. --Draikin 16:50, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Ya rly. Shadow step is a bad mechanic, worse when you can initiate it from out of range (i.e., maintaining recall). If the caster had to be in standard spell range to step, it'd be a ton better. -Auron 01:38, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Someone needs to explain why GW is being balanced around an abomination like hero battles. Why don't you try balancing pvp around...real pvp? Shard 20:49, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
If it was balanced around HvH then assassins would have been nerfed into the ground together with the shadow stepping mechanic. In my opinion that would actually be a good thing for "real" PvP as well. --Draikin 01:03, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

DervishDervish

Mystic Healing Mystic Healing

  • decreased heal amount to 5..65.
-SNIFF- :-( Sad... but... can someone put up the build that caused this? Because I had a different build SabreWolf 16:11, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

http://gwshack.us/3ec37 is the original build that was used by my old guild (Draak empire) and the one they are on about as we made it popular in gvg.87.194.104.90 19:23, 9 November 2007 (UTC)Burton

Izzy clearly wanted HP to be the dominant party heal in the current meta, which is why he nerfed all the other useful party heals. Will be an interesting change to the meta though. Holymasamune 21:22, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Seriously though, having a bar full of enchantments and one partywide heal isn't what I'd call overpowered...but I do understand the need to make Heal Party viable again (though unlikely with 2 cast). --Life Infusion «T» 19:33, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Mystic Healing has always been borderline overpowered, it's just not gotten any attention because Light of Deliverance was grossly overpowered. --72.211.152.118 23:04, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

ElementalistElementalist

Shell Shock Shell Shock

  • decreased recharge time to 8 seconds. This Skill now has 25% armor penetration.

It was pretty useful already, but now, it is a powerhouse. I can see this appearing on a lot of PvP bars...I know my heroes will use it. One thing I don't understand is this: why did this need a boost and yet Ebon Hawk is left alone? This skill does more damage on average (especially on the targets both Shell Shock and Ebon Hawk are meant to be used on), it is not a projectile, it causes a stronger condition, has less casting time, costs less energy, always causes the condition and the other skills in its attribute get stronger when it is used, but are not totally dependant on it (all unlike Ebon Hawk). If you plan on boosting utility skills to be more competative. then please change Ebon Hawk to lower damage, 1 second casting time and always weakness. Oh dear, I am whining and begging and I promsed I wouldn't. Sorry Izzy, this is the last time I'll post this. Really. Nicky Silverstar 08:04, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Powerhouse? No. Usable? Yes. Now it is along the lines of Enervating Charge...--Life Infusion «T» 19:35, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
No, it's defenitely a powerhouse. Sure, it does a little less damage than Enervating Charge, but that is mitigated by the fact that it costs less energy and it strengthens itself after the first use. If you would count the extra damage the rest of your team does because of this, then it will do more damage than Searing Flames. Even without that, Shell Shock increases your own damage by at least 20% (just about everything that you encounter will have mroe than 60 armor). Compared to that, enervating charge seems a little...meek. Nicky Silverstar 12:01, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
40 damage, the condition can be removed seeing as though condition removal is a lot more common than hex removal. Yep sounds like a power house to me. To be honest, against midline/backline casters this really wont do anything now will it? Or do you mean more so PvE? Enervating charge is anything but meek, simply serves a different purpose. For upto 21 seconds someone dealing 66% less damage and having -1 attributes. That's up to 70% if they use an attack that requires attributes and are melee and also has an effect on casters via attributes. Less divine favor and other=less healing and cracked armor on a monk with 60AL=nothing. Versatile in it's own way now. If anything were to be changed maybe the recharge by a few more seconds but damage and effect wise the energy seems to match up alright. 74.229.66.241 17:49, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
Cracked armor doesn't affect 60 armor casters that stack up health and aren't in their shield set. Besides, monks have 2-3 recharge condition removal is it was that big of a problem. Consider that blind is much more dangerous than cracked armor and can be applied every 4 seconds (as opposed to 8). With a 8 second cooldown at best you can keep Cracked armor on 2 or 3 targets. You don't use enervating charge OR shell shock for the 40ish damage...and my comparison was about enervating charge's consistency as a weakness condition application.--Life Infusion «T» 03:47, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
Many teams use partywide armor buffs...even if it is just Watch Yourself. And sure, it's just a condition, but it is more powerful than weakness (which affect casters less than Cracked Armor affects casters) and the spell costs less energy. It is not TOO powerful, but it's potential is seriously underestimated, as is shown by the way you treat Cracked Armor. Nicky Silverstar 19:01, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

MesmerMesmer

Conjure Nightmare Conjure Nightmare

  • decreased Energy cost to 15.
I liked it better when it was 25 energy. This might have been the indirect way of weakening AI, which was the major power source of energy for clumsiness spam. --Shadetz X 12:41, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
It was, as Arena Net mentioned here. Erasculio 12:49, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Then what's to stop subbing in Chilblains or Deep Freeze instead? With Deep Freeze, you can even still use GOLE.--Skye Marin 14:51, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
I think they wanted you to get away from same profession skills... since the CN/AI was the most used combo, they are in a way, promoting AI's use for other skills in other professions. SabreWolf 16:10, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
this skill finally comes down to a reasonable cost/effect ratio, perfect change which will lessen AI's "collateral damage"(read:abuses) while preserving its original form. ~~ Azul Frigid Armor.jpg 19:15, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Very weak change in trying to nerf sineptitude builds imo. A better way to directly hurt it is by lower black lotus energy gain by 5, and making clumsiness/ineptitude only last 3ish seconds. Holymasamune 21:23, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
This is a good change. That said, Auspicious is really underpowered as compared to GoLE, which is a much more efficient non-strippable, non-drainable energy source. What's wrong about Auspicious is that it has very little synergy with the rest of the Mesmer skill line, it can be stripped (and is regularly in PvP) before used and requires serious energy management; by contrast, GoLE is brainless and overpowered, especially for Elementalists (30en, non-strippable, non-drainable!) -- IxChel
There's nothing wrong with a Mesmer skill which makes a Mesmer better at using it's secondary's spells. Mesmers are meta-casters, right? Personally, I did like using AC + CN, so this was a bit dissapointing. If the issue is Clumsiness, it should be directly nerfed, IMO. I never liked the buff in the first place. I guess PvErs would cry about that, eh? Well make Empathy and Clumsiness both have Adjacent AoEs, then. But I digress... I guess the change is overall a good one. Now CN is good by itself and there are still spells to use with AC anyway. --TimeToGetIntense 08:40, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Shrinking Armor Shrinking Armor

  • increased Health degeneration to 1..4.
No one mentioned about this before? its 2 more damage each seconds ffs, its 20 more damage after 10 seconds, thanks izzy. lol i broke Guild Wars Wiki:No Sarcasm. --Cursed Angel 18:51, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
This is a cover hex, ffs. People run Images of Remorse when they want a cover hex on an illusion guy. This is comparable: more damage if they're not attacking, a bit less if they are. Faster cast, slightly slower cast+recharge. Cracked armor is just gravy. Good change imo. --72.211.152.118 20:50, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
I'd say Images of Remorse is kind of lame on a 2 s cast compared to this. For Cracked Armor application though, I'd take Shell Shock any day. ~Seef II <|۞> 07:39, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

MonkMonk

Healer's Boon & Word of Healing on the Same Skill Bar

moved from User talk:Isaiah Cartwright

I love the buff to Healer's Boon, it was just what was needed to make Healing spells viable again, and I also like the buff to Word of Healing because it made it an alternative to Healer's Boon but still a viable and fun healing skill.

After J.Kougar and I did some testing, the only concern we have is Healer's Boon + Word of Healing being over powered, as by just using Arcane Mimicry and taking in two Healing Monks, one with Word of Healing and one with Healer's Boon but both with Arcane Mimicry, it has great potential especially for the one who starts with Word of Healing. Who ever has Word of Healing needs to copy Healer's Boon first and then who ever started with Healer's Boon then copies Word of Healing, that is if both monks decided to bring Arcane Mimicry. If the one with Healer's Boon copies Word of Healing first then the player who started out with Word of Healing will get two copies of Word of Healing since Arcane Mimicry always favors copying Word of Healing over copying Healer's Boon (when both are on the bar at the same time).

A monk with 15 in Healing and a 14 in Divine Favor that has Healer's Boon up and uses Word of Healing on a character below 50% health will heal them for 375 health before the Divine Favor bonus. They can drop a point in either Divine and/or Healing Prayers to take up Inspiration for energy management. Since only Arcane Mimicry and Healer's Boon/Word of Healing are needed that's two skill slots out of eight on one character, and then if you add at least one energy management that is still only three out of eight. If you add a Healing Prayer's Resurrect so Healer's Boon casts it 50% faster that's four slots out of eight. You can then take Infuse Health for another heal for a total of five used slots and three left over for hex and/or condition removal or taking Blessed Aura and a 20% Enchanting Mod to make Healer's Boon last more than long enough for Arcane Mimicry to recharge and recopy Healer's Boon and you technically only need Blessed Aura up when casting Healer's Boon if you are concerned with the maintained enchantment... though if you do maintain it Spotless Mind and/or Spotless Soul would also greatly benefit.

As a side note, the monk who has Healer's Boon can go without any points in Healing Prayers and devote themselves to Protection Prayers if they like, save for maybe Gift of Health, and not have to focus on copying Word of Healing for just 20 seconds with a 62 second down time. That would give the party a very powerful healer and still a very good protection monk as well.


I hate to point this out because I don't want to see the skills nerfed to uselessness, or reverted back to their unattractive and frequently unused previous selves, but I figured if it's going to be pointed out, better now than later. ~ User:Sabastian Sabastian 08:29, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

What you say sounds powerful, but is it really a problem when it only lasts 20 seconds and takes up the elite slot of the other monk, or forces you to go with 2 healing monks instead of the (still very useful) protection monk? Nicky Silverstar 08:43, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Actually if you read a bit closer, you'll see that the monk copying Healer's Boon can get it to last from 49 to over 70some seconds, not just 20... so they can keep it up non-stop.  :) ~ User:J.Kougar J.Kougar 08:48, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Not to mention the Protection monk can use Healer's Boon for Gift of Health if they took it but either way the Protection monk can go without an elite as the Healing monk can heal up to 375 health with a 15 in Healing Prayers and another 45 health with a 14 in Divine Favor for a total of 420 health every 3.372 seconds if target allies are below 50% health with Word of Healing. ~ User:Sabastian Sabastian 08:55, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Exactly, since Zealous Benediction is often the Elite skill found on Protection monk bars anyway, and it is nothing compared to the Word of Healing used this way... it would be no problem to give that up, especially since most of the Protection skills like Protective Spirit and Reversal of Fortune are already so over-powered that its not even funny (even Izzy has admitted this). ~ User:J.Kougar J.Kougar 09:02, 9 November 2007 (UTC)


Word of Healing.jpg
Word of Healing
Arcane Mimicry.jpg
Arcane Mimicry
Blessed Aura.jpg
Blessed Aura
Resurrection Chant.jpg
Resurrection Chant
Infuse Health.jpg
Infuse Health
Spotless Mind.jpg
Spotless Mind
Spotless Soul.jpg
Spotless Soul
Blank.jpg
Blank

The open slot is for Energy Managment of choice and Spotless Mind can be changed out with Cure Hex if wanted. Skills can also be arranged in what ever order best suites the user. ~ User:Sabastian Sabastian 08:48, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

That's really great and all, but how useful will it be on the actual battlefield? Armond 09:08, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
You'd have to have read the big old paragraph above the skill bar to have even the slightest idea, but it seems you just skipped that? If you go back and read it you might be surprised.  :) ~ User:J.Kougar J.Kougar 17:54, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
It's a fair criticism, as you don't mention using this setup for any actual gameplay (PvP or challenging PvE). While a 375 point heal sounds impressive, Infuse can generate bigger blue numbers with a less fragile setup. I can't recall a single popular or overpowered application of Arcane Mimicry. There are plenty of combinations where two elite skills would be very powerful, but the extra cost (forces another monk to waste his elite) and clunkiness (time to set up and vulnerability to shatter or strip) overshadows that.12.240.16.28 22:35, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
I'm wondering what this is going to be overpowered in. PvE? ANet's put in Ursan Blessing, I doubt they'd think twice about giving monks 500 point heals (although that bar is definitely not the way I'd try to achieve it).
In PvP (where imbalance shines the most), this wouldn't be a concern at all. For one, hybrid prot monks > pure heal monks (even in pve tbh), as mitigating damage is a thousand times better than reactively healing it; it saves time and energy, both of which a monk needs to devote to other things (infusing, hex/condi removal, kiting etc). And secondly, that is a really unwieldy bar for the very small improvement it offers; it screams for energy (the point of having hboon not be maintainable is to reduce the need for outside energy sources like bip, why would you put something like blessed aura back on your bar? :/ ) and isn't too good regardless (dismiss > spotless soul, and pve never brings hexes to make spotless mind any good). Unless your plan was to semi-afk all of PvE (which I would commend you for, as the PvE is generally not worth staying at your comp to do), better bars are easily available (consider glimmer and a bunch of small prots to mitigate multiple targets; you might not even need RoF). -Auron 09:25, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
No one will ever use Arcane Mimicry in pve because it has 60 recharge and I'm sure no one will bring this crap into pvp either. 80.133.83.171 14:08, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
LOL, you should really read before you put your foot in your mouth.  ;) Who cares about the 60 second recharge when you are copying a skill that buffs the rest all the heck and back and lasts 70some seconds if done right? Guessing you missed the article above the skill bar too eah?  ;) ~ User:J.Kougar J.Kougar 17:54, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
-cough- Urgoz Warren Team -cough- [[1]]SabreWolf 16:26, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
No one cares about your PvE builds and how it'll be OP. This game has always been (hopefully) balanced around GvG. In GvG, it will be hard to maintain Healers Boon with all the enchantment removal out there, and using arcane mimicry is very energy intensive as is (and is pretty prone to interrupts) Holymasamune 21:26, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Perhaps, but if used in PvP and only every 70some seconds (since it can easily last that long), it would make Word of Healing wicked powerful. Up to 420 health for only 5 energy, every 3.372 seconds for like 75 or more seconds before having to refresh it, isn't a bit over-powered? Also, Enchantment removal is an issue, but only if the monks don't keep some cover enchantments on each other, and in such a build as this, why would they not? ~ User:J.Kougar J.Kougar 22:02, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Besides, even if you didn't use this build to it's full potential in PvP, Izzy obviously cares about PvE monks being over-powered or he would not have destroyed all the PvE Only skills like Seed of Life after a few folks started using it in a gimmick build. ~ User:J.Kougar J.Kougar 22:02, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
It has no potential in PvP. And, like I said, better bars are easily available for general PvE. -Auron 22:12, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
You do know the bar has to be used with the combination explained in the paragraph above it, right?  ;) It was also just a suggestion of how to use the new exploit. ~ User:J.Kougar J.Kougar 22:44, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes, and the explanation is just as poor as the bar itself. You're suggesting spending 25 energy and 5 seconds (at least) each time you recast HBoon (10e, 2s cast for blessed, which you stop maintaining right after you cast HBoon, and 15e 2s cast for Mimicry). You are wasting time and energy for a very minimal benefit (either elite on its own performs quite well, there is no need to combine the two; hboon with Heal Other is just as powerful as Word, except you don't have to spend 30 energy setting it up and 5 energy every time you want to cast it). Remember, monk bars are supposed to do more than simple red bars go up; sacrificing 30e (including hboon cost) and then spending energy actually healing is a severe waste, considering that you're expected to do efficient hex and condition removals as well as the simple red-bars-go-up healing. -Auron 23:15, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Kougar, pretty sure you didn't read the part about enchant strips in GvG, and how rending touch takes it off immediately as HB is put on? And if Anet really cared about overpowered PvE stuff at this point, they'd nerf ursan blessing. If you don't GvG, don't talk as if you understand it and propose skill combinations that are inviable. Pretty sure you're not the only one clever enough to use cover enchants. Holymasamune 19:47, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
That build relies on Word of Healing way too much. What do you do against a Mesmer with Signet of Humility or if WoH is diversioned? The enchantments also risk being stripped away. I would rather run Boon Heal (Devine Boon + WoH) than that build if I would even consider either of the two, which I do not. --Shadetz X 06:39, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
I realized I missed one thing, that of Word of Healing not ending when Arcane Mimicry ends. If Izzy changed the second to cause the first to end when it expires itself, the problem would besolved right? Nicky Silverstar 08:08, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Much ado about nothing! 87.189.221.118 12:27, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Blessed Light Blessed Light

  • increased heal amount to 10..140.
Not going to change anything. This is meant as bar compression, but at 10 energy, it doesn't compress anything. Holymasamune 21:26, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Still pretty damned good though, it will never be 5 energy by some unseen design and 10 energy is heavy for your main heal, but this skill still trumps just about any problem you give to an enemy. --Ckal Ktak 17:46, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
At a 3sec recharge for both conditions and hexes, and no conditional requirements, this is probably the most versatile removal spell out there. Of course you pay 5e extra for that each time... It looks situationally pretty good given how much healing you get from it. If it still isn't used enough after this change, I'd reduce the heal and refund a little energy for removed conditions and hexes. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 18:23, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Not going to be used because Woh is 100 times better atm, lower the energy cost to 5 energy then it will most likely see play.24.109.3.127 20:07, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Lower cost to 5. Lose 5 energy when you remove a Hex.--Skye Marin 21:39, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I think this is a great idea. But to give Empathic Removal a chance, lose 5 energy when you remove a hex and/or condition. --Longasc 01:12, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
No, just hex. Otherwise it becomes a 10 energy mend condition with double the recharge. — Skuld 01:20, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
See, this is the issue with this skill. It's elite and it's already pretty powerful, but there are better heals and better condition removals. (It is the best monk hex removal though, in terms of hexes removed vs. recharge time) I like 5e (+5e for removing a hex), because it's a waste of potential not to use this to remove hexes. The other thought is having it cost 5e, but with another 5e charged whenever the skill removes both a hex and condition. That makes the skill much less conditional, I think, but without making it terribly overpowered. The healing might need a bump down to balance it out, though. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 08:19, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Maybe something like this. Heal target ally for 10...80 Health and remove one Condition, if target ally is hexed, the hex is removed and you heal additional 10....45 and you loose 5 energy. 3/4 cast time 4 second cooldown. Don't want it to have to long cooldown so it gets abused by deny hex. Fish 16:26, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Pretty powerful yet far far from as powerful as the current meta. Not sure if the last guy misunderstood of what but tbh I like idea of making it 5 energy and only if it removes a hex do you lose the other 5. The healing factor is not an aspect, still doesn't heal a lot, very little for its energy cost actually, not only that but it's divine favor and most people have much less of that than healing or prot. Still one of my favorite elites from a while ago but in the face of current standings this might just be considered in PvE? 74.229.66.241 17:34, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
The biggest issue with this skill is the fact that its in Divine Favor attribute, limiting your attribute spread. Basically, if you are going to invest so many points into divine favor, taking them away from prot or healing, then BLight better give a damn good return. At its current status, BLight doesn't do that. Blight needs to become much better for it to be a viable alternative to a prot or healing elite. On the other hand, it seems IZZY is doing the opposite and nerfing major prot or healing elites to even the playing field. Also, 230hp heal @ 14 healing on WoH is ridiculous.
Did not missunderstand about the extra healing, just wanted it to have some little bonus, even though it ain't much, BL is gud but just aint viable for the moment.... Fish 17:58, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Cure Hex Cure Hex

  • now affected by Healer's Boon.

Glimmer of Light Glimmer of Light

  • decreased recharge time to 1 second; increased heal amount to 10..115.


Who need Healer's Boon? Or for that matter another heal... just spam this puppy on anything you want. 5eng, 1/2 CT, 1 Rech, easy cap... this one has my vote. SabreWolf 15:50, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Horrible skill compared to the new WoH. Anyone who uses this over WoH is either bad or hasn't capped WoH yet in PvE. Holymasamune 21:27, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
WoH is definitely a powerhouse, but they really aren't designed to do the same thing. I'm thinking WoH and Glimmer backline; no real need for infuse (and if you wanted it, you'd have infuse on the WoH) and the glimmer bar would be full to the brim of small prots due to the lack of rof etc. -Auron 23:20, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
And in HA, pop this baby right on a build with channeling and you'll be spamming like none other. —ǥrɩɳsɧƿoɲ 00:06, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Indeed. It works with Channeling and spamming - in all other aspects, the new WoH is totally superior as Holymasamune stated. --Longasc 00:20, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
EXCEPT GLIMMER IS PRETTIER. -Auron 00:41, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
The problem with spamming this is exactly that, you're spamming it. You can't kite or do anything else while you are spamming. I still like WoH better - less spam more time to do something else. Dancing Gnome 08:13, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Dude, in HA, it's HA. HA backline builds thrive on being in a poor position. Now, in GvG, yeah, this won't see too much play but overall, still a damn flexible heal. Plenty of room for small prots to make a versatile monk bar. —ǥrɩɳsɧƿoɲ 15:22, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Did I read spam? Here you go Diversion Diversion Lightblade 23:54, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
Indent reset... this thing casts in .25sec. If you can't take out some time to kite between quarter second casts, you deserve to die. ;) This thing would also be insane in HA with channeling. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 18:26, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Best change in the update. WoH might overshadow it, but this really is an incredibly good change, making it essentially your RoF+Gift for a heavily specced heal-prot hybrid, allowing you to easily slot plenty of small prot. --Edru viransu 00:27, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Overshadowed in the one-shot-heal yes... however... if you use WoH as a replacement for IH, then you open a slot fo energy management there... however, the other Monk can use this GL with Channeling as the base healer and have WoH as a back up... although... it might be just better for the 2nd monk just ot carry DH or RC anyways... I dont know... but I still like the spam-a-bility of this skill. And the only problem with the Haste skill is you cant have enchantments on your bar... which takes away RoF, Gaurdian and such... SabreWolf 03:07, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Have you seriously tried using this as your only heal? I hope not. It will and has failed badly not only that but 5 energy a second is hardly manageable without divine spirit or something of the sort. Even then it would be far easier to spam WoH every 3 seconds for a third of the energy and a close enough heal. 74.229.66.241 17:34, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
Channeling. 165.199.5.192 14:22, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
The other day I saw a monk spam this while i bashed him with my warrior... he casted this about 13x on himself to just BARELY keep himself alive, While he did this, his team quickly died... 14:05, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Healer's Boon Healer's Boon

  • instead of an upkeep cost, this Skill now has a duration of 10..55 seconds and no longer ends after a number of Spells are cast.


What's the drawback on it now? Nothing! People are just gonna run Mo/E with HB, HP and GoLe again. At least make HB have like a 20 sec recharge so it has a small drawback, at this moment it's just broken - and it doesnt really change anything - LoD is only replaced by a way more powerfull heal. Nice: 5 nrg, 1/2 second cast, 150 heal hex removal (cure hex) NIEKler 13:32, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Gole is way easier to interrupt, so is Heal Party as well (even with a 40/40 its still1 sec). Its also not as spammable as LoD, so since you have to perform a "punctual" groupheal in a certain pressure situation you are likely to fall victim to a enemy mesmer or ranger diverting you either Gole or heal party (if they are familiar with the GolE + W/A/S/D faking procedures).--90.186.153.113 14:06, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Ya the buff of the HB/HP combo is huge... however, its very interruptable like that user said... But I think the big thing I like about this change is better energy management. You know the duration so you know when to recast it (who counts to 30 skills in combat), and no upkeep pip loss... so it helps in that department. SabreWolf 16:39, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Good job, at least you presented us with a strong alternative party heal in PvE. Won't see much play in high level GvG on stand monks though. Holymasamune 21:28, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
It's also great because Hench/Hero don't know how to run GoLE so it also encourages party play. Dancing Gnome 08:16, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Holaymasamune, have you watch observe yet? BlazeRick 09:55, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
I've watched Healer's Boon Monks get their shit pushed in by Rending Touch. The character is a complete pile if the other team decides to deny the Boon and sit on his face. -67.161.44.231 11:10, 15 November 2007 (UTC)
When you changed Healer's Boon to have duration instead of being maintained enchantment, why not do the same for related skill Healer's Covenant? Currently the latter remains in "piece of trash" category. --Toge 17:40, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
True. 80.133.67.82 18:59, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

It's much ado about nothing really, since any team with enchantment removal makes Healer's boon a pain to upkeep (not maintain anymore). 10 second recharge helps with this issue, but realistically you are going to have to reapply it against teams with more than one enchantment removal.--Life Infusion «T» 03:53, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Healing Breeze Healing Breeze

  • increased duration to 15 seconds; increased Health regeneration to 4..9.
The wammo in me screams in joy as I see this buff. Not really. Holymasamune 21:28, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
With an Enchantment Mod, it will last 18 seconds (14 H.P., 324+DF). It works very well on the Healer Henchmen, and who knows, maybe people get over the bad old experiences and will test it in PvP as well. --Longasc 00:23, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
This gains a pip for 15 healing monks too, so it almost maxes out your health regen on its own now. It's not a huge buff, but the extra 5/6sec (depending on whether you have +20% enchantment length) will help out in high-pressure situations where you might actually worry about it wearing off. Looks like another solid attempt to make healing compete a bit better with Protection. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 18:31, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Again, great for wammos and the healer henchmen, and useless everywhere else. It's not going to do anything when 4 guys are wailing on your target in AB, or in HA/GvG where heals over time are generally bad. Granted, it'll fit well on an ether prod runner, but that's because there's nothing better to take. Holymasamune 19:53, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I wouldn't say useless. I actually use this in PvE for when someone gets under attack from a lot of enemies at once. (yes, I play healing in PvE. It's unrelated to how good the build is.) This skill also shines really well in countering passive attacks like stacked health degen. (especially hexes which take forever to remove) I'd actually want to see where we end up with with necros and mesmers in the metagame before saying that it'll never get used at all. Keep in mind there's a tendancy to just dismiss changes unless you think something's overpowered when it comes to RPG balance, so you don't want to fall into that trap. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 07:54, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
It is now properly powerful compared to Mystic Regeneration, it was underpowered before that. I don't know if I am gonna use it, but I like the change. Nicky Silverstar 08:21, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Healing Ribbon Healing Ribbon

  • now affected by Healer's Boon.

Heal Party Heal Party

  • increased heal amount to 30..90.
It seems that Heal Party is now on par with Song of Restoration, but related Ritualist skill Protective Was Kaolai remains behind in healing parameters. Also Rejuvenation should have its recharge lowered to 20 or 15 to keep up with these three. You should always keep in mind related skills, so that there wouldn't be situations where other professions remain inferior in every aspect. --Toge 17:50, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Light of Deliverance Light of Deliverance

  • increased casting time to 2 seconds; decreased heal amount to 5..70; now affects all party members regardless of Health.
I agree this definatly needed a nerf, but IMHO not quite like this. Restore orginal casting time and 80% limit, reduce heal amount to 5...60.--Ryudo 20:10, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
I just played some gvgs, and played without LoD, took WoH with GoLe and heal party instead on LoD, tested Eprod flagger with HP, all that happend was that the assassin splits destroyed our defense because the eprod and the back team couldent counter enough, hold for a while but died. It also made us to use more passive defense such as aegis and DA to keep up with the pressure. Nerf LoD slightly but the two second casting time was to much sadly. Fish 22:21, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Izzy! What have you done! You argue that passive defense is bad for game play, but what about passive offense! You have buffed hero-way, degeneration way, and hex way like no other. Do you really think that Hexes aren't passive? or degeneration! like taint flesh, you just app. degen and WIN. This is SAD! You have a game where it is near unstoppable to stop this degen. Heal party is a 15 energy, Lod is a 2second cast. so what can we do? sit on our hands and die or gank. Before I rant on let me explain what passive offense is; Passive offense is when you can slap degen on 8-6 or whatever people and go AFK for the whole match, necro. hexes shut down warrior/melee totally, On a malandru I need guiding hands to HIT someone, and to top it off I attack 50% slower...yeah thanks. I was really hoping to see Anti-blockway but, instead you make this game to the point where passive/AoE offense is king, simply because monks don't have the energy or the time to single-point heal a whole party. It wouldn't matter if glimmer heals for 1000hp, to heal a party of 8 while there is massive hex-stack/degen could cost over 8 seconds and 40energy, and ohhh wait, 20seconds later you need to do it again while there are spikes and KD's all over the match. You forced the meta to take a U-turn, this is NOT balance but destruction. Before you say you "nerfed" Hero-way by nerfing 2 spirits; thoughs two spirits changes weren't as major as the change to the HUGE nerf of the defense to prevent it. Some people might not get what I'm saying so I decided to make a little example. If You (Izzy) made the game so axe damage was 3 less then normal per hit, then made ALL blocking a 2% chance to block, that would be a perfect comparison to this. If you want to make a game balanced, you must test your changes and take a very close look to the way it effects game play as a whole. Please for the love of god don't ruin this game by keeping awful changes like this. BetrayedArk

GJ making a very necessary meta skill obsolete. REVERT PLZ. spamming glimmer or woh is no replacement for a party-wide heal, and HP is pathetic because of the energy cost. monks can't afford to use HP (even with glyph) as needed, which puts that burden on midline chars, who are already whored out enough for utility use. LoD may have needed a change, but the 2 second cast renders it useless. now hexway and other party-wide pressure builds will absolutely dominate the ladder. Aeon Supernova 02:34, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

I Totally agree hex-way, and passive offense is now dominating, now as a guild leader what can I do? Simple, quit GvGing till revert, I'm not going to kill a perfectly good guild rank because you want to go on a power trip and murder the only healing skill that can beat this pressure-way non-since, this isn't good for "active playing" but boosts "Passive Offense" so what is the meta now? a 1000% chance to block, shrinking armor on all targets, KD spam on the monks, and to top it off 50% chance to miss + 80damage when you miss. Simply unstoppable pressure. Can I say it any clearer? Could this be boosting passive-gameplay anymore? Oh wait it can, because most pressure ways use heros, wow izzy. How "Passive" can you get? When half the team isn't even there! You clame active skills will be better to force skilled play, but sadly what you end up with is this. When a team of 4 "players" can beat a team of serious skilled 8 players. BetrayedArk 04:02, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

What about buffing Withdraw Hexes to make it a viable counter to hex pressure? -- Gordon Ecker 04:28, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
A single buffed counter does not a balanced mechanic make. You'd essentially just create another LoD, except that this LoD would be useless against any team not based around hexes, whereas at least LoD is useful against any form of pressure. Go to Aiiane's Talk page (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 04:32, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

True, That wouldn't cut it, because if a monk is casting DH on 8 targets something else is dropping let say the buff DH so it's 0 recharge 5 energy, it still wouldn't solve anything but force that skill to be in every bar... and besides, pressure-way uses both conditions+hexes, and no matter what you say this is a huge nerf to monks because many NF/gwen skills are pressure based =/. My point is a party-wide heal is needed to counter this, and running heal party on a monk is GG energy is just too high even with GoLE, the only way to fix the nerf is to lower casting time, but keep healing down. This skill got 2xed nerfed and I mean hardcore, running a balance in GvG is suicide (unless you have a very very VERY skilled split that can wipe the anti-gank. BetrayedArk 04:37, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

I don't like that that change. While i agree that this skills was too powerful, i think it will not see any play with the current stats (the 2s cast time kills it). Maybe instead of increasing cast time and decreasing healing power, the condition should be made a bit harder to fulfill. It doesn't really matter if it heals players above 80% health or not, because those players don't really need much healing anyway. If this condition would be dropped to about 66%, this condition would actually some kind of drawback but makes this skill still useable (if casttime is reverted to 1s). Another interesting option would be to change the recharge time to 2s plus and additional 1s for each player healed that way) --Lunk 08:45, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Its kind of cute how the game was quite balanced and then from no where they decide to nerf lod and basically take all options for flaggers and change them into mo or e/mo as well as taking a large dump on game balance. This skill was in no way imba, you can just dshot/diversion lod in pvp and its no threat. The biggest problem here was increasing the cast time and making it a useless skill. I can tell you from experience (monthly) that this is a Bad change.24.109.3.127 19:53, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Not so easy to disrupt the LoD when Blockway was still the meta. This is a big change but I think it opens more doors than it closes. It's been the linchpin of the defensive meta, but we've made it that way. This is basically a return to the EProd runner meta pre-NF, and that was a more complex meta IMO. But nerfing LoD w/o nerfing the offensive power creep skills was a mistake, and heroway (RaOs and N/Rts) is ridiculous now and needs to be stopped. In 8v8 human fights, though, I'm having more fun in GvG than before.--Lodurr 23:01, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
This game has ALWAYS been based around party healing, even before LoD, and I doubt you can ever make "active" healing ever take its place. Basically, you have to run a monk or e-prod flagger now, because it is almost impossible to survive any 8v8 encounter without a party heal. E-prods aren't very effective vs the powerful splits everyone runs now (lolsins), so basically you're forcing us to a 3-monk backline. Wait... wasn't getting rid of the 3-monk backline one of your goals awhile back? Pluto 23:17, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Izzy now we have a Block-pressure-4hero-way, you just killed the idea of running balance, thanks a lot...and as you can see I am not the only one putting hate on this.

Not sure if this is just me but I am noticing more 3 monk teams in GvG with one of the monks using Healer's Boon and Heal Party. Teams that don't have 3 monks have a rit runner with Kaolai and I will not be surprised if they start bringing Life. --Shadetz X 06:28, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

So I am not surprised that this skill finally got nerfed, but this is not what I would have expected. I always considered what made LoD elite was the cast time. In PvE, there are so many damage spikers in narrow areas where you cannot spread your party (such as Krait Arcanos in Magus Stones) that in HM can wipe a party with two shots. Using HB with Heal Party does not help, either, due to high recharge time. Even with a resto rit using Kaoli and Life, a monk with HB and heal party, and a prot monk (since Mhenlo uses LoD), the damage spikes were too much. I like some of the suggestions here including decreasing the health req to 66% and would even agree to an increased energy cost, but please give us back the 1s cast time. Mohnzh 06:50, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Wow. I think people relied on LoD far too much, and now that they have to create a viable counter, they fail to come up with something other than to say, "lul, izzy broke our LoD". UserDrago-sig.gif Drago 08:16, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Drago, LoD was a skill that was needed as nightfalls damage-creep was introduced. If you haven't noticed with each passing "update" the skills power has always been going in an upward stat. It is true teams don't really NEED LoD to survive but by limiting what a team can do to prevent epic AoE degen it limits gameplay to a 3-4 monk backline, and Izzy directly stated that he does not want this to happen, but by lowering the usefulness of a skill to defend against this is bound to come up. Drago, I'm sure if you just GvG some more you can see what this update has brought us, a HUGE buff to Hero-way, and a HUGE buff in LoLsins 3/5 splits (because a Eprod Ele has a poor time handling this split). If you think I'm complaining because I loved LoD you are dead wrong, I simply want to play a game where we have more options then a 4monk backline. This encourages MORE block/missing and even MORE 20min matches then ever before, and I for one do not like to play in that kind of world. K? Thanks.

BetrayedArk 17:54, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
LoD was one of those NF power creep skills, now that it's gone I hope Izzy will nerf the offensive power creep skills and heroway. The Eprod Runner/monk runner is a good thing because it gives the other team's offense more options in dealing with their party heal. A gank would pull away their HP spammer, HP is easy to interrupt, and HP costs more so energy denial might actually do something to him. LoD led to identical balanced teams spiking and counter-spiking for 20 minutes, and that was far more boring. This puts more strategy back in the game--once heroway and other zerg pressure has been toned down.--Lodurr 20:30, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Exactly my point, alone LoD was imba/overpowered, but because 60 other OFFENSIVE skills are also overpowered it made LoD "balanced" in comparison, by removing LoD you get Gimicy junk like heroway/gank sins start with LoD and end with the rest of the power creep and this will be just fine, but by just "removing" this skill from monks was a bad idea if it's not backed by nerfs to the offensive power-creeps. BetrayedArk 03:58, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I personally never used LoD until I got to EotN. But once there, the damage spikes were so high that I had no choice. Before, I used Heal Party if I needed a party wide heal, but I preferred not to do party-wides because it made gameplay so passive and I would find myself not paying attention and getting into trouble. But in EotN, damage spikes were so high and fast, I needed an equally fast party-wide. LoD was the only thing available. Now there is nothing. It has nothing to do with reconfiguring builds, or relying too much on LoD. I held out on using LoD as long as I possibly could. I was always being teased for not using it because I held out so long. Just isn't my play style. But now there is nothing to counter the massive AoE. The change in cast time makes the gold trim around the skill meaningless, IMO. Mohnzh 05:22, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
So simple to summarize this. If LoD even needed a nerf to begin with, it is NOT this nerf. Maybe a longer cast, maybe a little less healing, but both are beyond overkill. Not only that but it's ironic how they buffed the henchman of Proph which was easy enough and nerfed the one of GW:EN which I hear people actually have trouble with. I guess it's whatever floats their boat.
Izzy this was even worse then your SOD nerf. Andrew Patrick even agrees, and says in his appearance durring the RA bug in ID1 that a nerf to LOD would just make AoE and Hex-way dominate which is exactly what has happend. This skill was not overpowered and I dont think anyone but absolute nubs who know nothing about the balancing the game complained about it so why nerf it? Bring this back. Seriously listen to the people who play the game. If you have a problem with it fine, but ur gonna have to just deal with it, b/c the 150 million people who want it changed back should outway your 1 vote as an anet employee. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:74.135.1.179 .


Without going into too many details, as this will be long already; a party healing effect is a 100% necessary effect in Guild Wars. You cannot fight degen or any form of AoE without a party healing effect; not to mention that simple, incidental damage from the course of a fight needs to be cleaned up efficiently or it ends up killing you. This effect is sufficiently vital that, pre-Nightfall, teams devoted *an entire character* to defending and using that effect. This was in fact the biggest problem with the Factions metagame.

Light of Deliverance solved that problem by creating the first legitimately playable party healing skill for a Monk. This allowed a Monk to perform the job that he should have been doing from the start, and allowed the character that was previously pigeonholed into Heal Party to contribute to the team in more interesting ways; see the pinnacle of this, a few months after Nightfall was released, when teams were running flags with Domination Mesmers and true Water Eles. Eventually nerfs to spot defensive skills, and the emergence of stronger split templates forced more defense onto that character, but the general idea was preserved - a team was able to run eight flexible, powerful characters with which to execute in Guild Wars.

Of course other problems were introduced; Light of Deliverance was a bit too good at what it did and became a focus unto itself; but these weren't really new problems. The single point of failure that was LoD was Heal Party before it; it was simply better protected and more well hidden. It's not an effect that you ever wanted to be so singular; that has simply been a hole in the skillset that's had to be worked around.

So while on its own wrecking LoD can be seen as a good move, it's overall been a disaster; as the only good source of party healing, teams have been forced to warp their builds in order to fit in weak, fragile, but essential party heals. The biggest effect is the necessity of another Monk or pseudo-Monk character; if the LoD change were reverted with the other changes in, the game would almost certainly slip back into a more offensive 2 Monk meta, while instead that 3rd Monk, 'party healer' role has been forced back into the game. In a similar vein, the tactical depth of the game has suffered tremendously, as party healers, essential as they are, need to be babysat - polarizing the game on that build hole and leaving much less room for anything else. Instead of fixing the problem with the singular point of failure that was LoD, the change has created an even bigger one. I'd hope that the whole progression has opened up the opportunity to put in a real solution to this hole in the game; but in the interim we're in for a rough ride. -Ensign 12:15, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Oops my fault for suggesting LoD was overpowered! Seriously though, Izzy just said he wasn't going to nerf LoD anytime soon, then suddenly, BAM! unplayable! Even I think this nerf was a bit premature considering how shitty the alternatives are AND how strong pressure has become since NF came out. --TimeToGetIntense 12:36, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
It absolutely was overpowered; once things settle it will not be missed from competitive PvP. However LoD being slagged has left the game without a good party heal, and that distorts the game even more than LoD did. Hopefully the time without LoD will reveal some other issues that LoD was covering up, and the next balance update will address several of those problems as well as addressing the party healing issue, and leave the game in a better state than it was before the LoD nerf. The lolsin and heroway changes are definitely steps in the right direction that were catalyzed by the loss of LoD. A couple more of those, and some sort of balanced party healing, would do great things for the game. It's just going to be rough until that happens. -Ensign 23:32, 16 November 2007 (UTC)
All I meant was, it was a bit early. But I suppose a bold move was needed to find a better balance in this case. I agree that it definetly won't be missed down the road. --TimeToGetIntense 08:27, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

Restful Breeze Restful Breeze

  • increased duration to 8..18 seconds.
Nice little buff thats better then Shadow Refuge... um... so long as you dont think or move... SabreWolf 13:46, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Vigorous Spirit Vigorous Spirit

  • decreased casting time to .25 seconds.

This one already worked with 1 second. The true issue was it was never good enough, a 9th or 10th skill, for most monk bars. In PvE it was already useful when it was used on the other hand, and the buff to casting time is a bonus, but it does not promote the skill or make it so much better. The issue is that hero monks often use this when they should cast a heal, they cannot really make good use of this enchantment. --Longasc 00:25, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

This skill is often used as a cover enchantment (esp on IW mesmers), it is good, has a long duration, and cheap. It really didn't need a buff, and by adding the buff you really increase the power of IW and more powerful enchants that are covered by it. For example, when you see an IW mesmer start "IW" skill (1s), you can start your Drain Enchant (2s), so that by the time the aftercast kicks in, the IW is up for a split second before it comes back down. With this skill, you just don't have that window of opportunity nor the ability to interrupt this cheap cover enchantment. I suggest leaving the cast time alone, but increasing the healing if you think it requires a buff. -- IxChel

Is IW Mesmer a non gimmick build now? Dancing Gnome 09:09, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
My point was that with a .25s cast Vigorous Spirit becomes an excellent cover enchantment, if this is the goal - then fantastic. -- IxChel
Increasing the healing is dangerous, as this synergises with skills like 100 blades or frenzy that give you extra or faster attacks. On a build that really takes advantage of this enchantment, it can already regenerate health as fast or faster than healing breeze under certain circumstances. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 18:35, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Could you standardize every self-targeting, long-lasting enchantments to have 1/4 second cast times? Currently there's some weird mixes when every other such Dervish skill is 1/4 cast except Arcane Zeal and Onslaught. I don't think changing them has any actual impact on gameplay, but just keeping up some kind of order. --Toge 18:03, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
This skill is "target ally"- I'm not sure if that's what you were thinking of or not. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 13:14, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
Obviously, it's basically a self target skill since only wamos (and IW mesmers!?) use it anyway, right? For what it's worth, I think the 1/4 second cast makes this a very easy and cheap investment to keep red bars up in a very physically heavy build. Probably one of the most underrated healing skills in the game now. And I also have to know... WHERE ARE YOU SEEING IW BEING COVERED BY VIGOROUS SPIRIT? Seriously, I want to see this for myself. It sounds too epic to be believed without seeing it myself. Pluto 02:06, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

Word of Healing Word of Healing

  • this Skill can now target the caster; increased non-conditional heal amount to 25..150; decreased recharge time to 3 seconds.
Omg ty been waiting for this forever 165.199.5.192 14:13, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Ok... so you take out the need for IH/LoD combo... so you can heal the target for a big HP boost with out the loss of your own health... however its a toss up because you dont have the party healing ablility anymore which was boosted. So its kinda a toss up. SabreWolf 16:22, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
A bit much I'm afraid. I suggest choosing one (target caster OR increase in healing amount).--Ryudo 20:10, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Best all purpose healing skill now. Why take infuse when you can have a 270 point 3/4 cast heal that recharges every 3 seconds (or on average 2.4 seconds with a 40/40 set). Holymasamune 21:30, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
This skill is pretty amazing now. It does take quite a bit of effort to use it though, it's not just an I win button. Hope this change stays. --Deathwing 00:27, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Love this change, not OP. Keep it. Dancing Gnome 08:29, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I've have to agree, either target self or increase health, both is overkill because I've had so many matches time out in arenas and left HA because simply put for the energy if you lack the offense nothing will die and it bears no big toll. Increase energy if you plan on keeping it like this. Or if you insist on making it target self why not do the same with dwaynas kiss and all similar moves? 74.229.66.241 15:43, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
"If you lack the offense nothing will die", no shit. Lord of all tyria 15:44, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
If your reason for being is just to be smart just leave now if you refuse to look at the point. Ran WoH with prots and got over 20 wins in arenas my first go. Faster recharge than ZB, less energy in case of the spell failing. It's too over the top, if he nerfed LoD to get rid of a supreme healing spell he just made this replace it which got nothing done. Increase energy to 10, take off self target, or reduce healing. I still recommend you making Dwayna's kiss and others target self too. Nice job buffing monks but with good monks better skills go against the quicker battles aspect I thought you were going towards. 74.229.66.241 16:14, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Dwayna's kiss already makes some pretty huge heals, target self would break it. Making this 10e would make ZB so much better its unbelievable. Before this buff WoH was unviable, now it is actually usable. Lord of all tyria 16:17, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Pretty huge heals? What do you think WoH is? I'd have to agree with Holymasamune, with holy haste and divine favor it can heal over 300 in breakneck speed every 3 seconds...why waist 10 energy infusing then? Why not just bring hct or hrt and WoH infuse until VoD because the energy isn't hard to manage. Not only that, but in missions like Thirsty River HM where theres a monk boss with WoH and a priest right behind him we simply couldn't do it without a BHA. Did they just have pvp in mind when they did this? 74.229.66.241 16:22, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
WoH will never replace Infuse, cause you don't actually use Infuse for its awesome heals but rather because it has a 1/4s cast time, this is what helps in spikes, you can catch the spike before it kills your target and heal for a rather huge amount to negate the spike however if Infuse was 3/4 it wouldn't be really effective in spikes imo (RoF would be prefered in this case i think) . And WoH still has 3/4 so there's no way imo for Infuse to be replaced by WoH in a monk skill bar. Besides, WoH > ZB in this form, which is normal since ZB should only be a reliable healing option for prot monks however as ZB is now it should be reworked a bit to balance the difference between those two skills. If ZB wasn't adding DF's healing bonus before checking if the target is under 50% max health and if WoH was 4s reload and healing for 25... 130 then i think WoH and ZB would be balanced compared to each other. Concerning Dwayna's Kiss, it does some insane heals indeed when used under the situations it is meant to cover : hex pressure and/or enchantment heavy build so that's a very reliable option for teams which are going to face lots of hexes or that are playing with lots of enchantments. Holy Haste + WoH in pvp, won't be really effective since Holy Haste would get stripped right away and i don't think we should nerf a skill only because we have to take a BHA ranger to take down a boss in one mission... (besides BHA rangers are common in HM). It would work really well in PvE however it's not in PvE that this change is going to affect negatively the metagame, you're still free to use holy haste +LoD+Jamei's Gaze for somehow the same result, just harder for e-management but still reliable.~~ Azul Frigid Armor.jpg 17:18, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Resetting the indent. I could go both ways on this. Something to think about: if the skill is too good in its current form, you could switch the buff over to the conditional part of the skill. That makes it a strong recovery heal still, but without letting it be such a powerful general heal. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 18:40, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
It is now good enough to overshadow the other healing elites. It got triple-buffed: 1. Target Self, 2. More and unconditional Healing, 3. Shorter Recharge. Together all these buffs make it not only good, but awesome. Nothing against a buff though! But not 3 significant buffs, that is too much. --Longasc 01:38, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
To those who complain that woh now heals better than zb... i think you might miss the whole point of this update. Which was to make healing prayers the top line for healing again. Woh heals more than zb now because it is a heal and not a prot. That a prot specced monk with zb and gift was the better healer was the broken part, not that heal monks now heal better than prot monks. 134.130.183.235 01:44, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
At 13 spec, ZB heals for 160 health for 3 energy. 53.333 heal per energy. 64 heal per energy with 10 Divine.
At 13 spec, WoH heals for 222 health for 5 energy. 44.4 heal per energy. 50.8 heal per energy with 10 Divine.
ZB is actually more energy efficient than WoH when below 50%. WoH benefits from a 1 second faster recharge. While above 50%, WoH clearly has an advantage by itself. However, coupled with GoLE, ZB does better even above 50%, and actually helps fill your energy bar while below 50%. --Deathwing 02:21, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Coupled with GoLE, sure. But if you're gonna consider a two-skill combination for ZB, you should consider that you can put something else useful in that slot on a WoH monk. Being able to get two ZBs off for 5e every 30sec is nice, but I can put in channeling or something else useful on a WoH build. I think it's fine that ZB is more efficient, given how much WoH can heal for now. Elites should be different from each other, regardless of having different attributes. --Ari User Ari sig.jpg (talk) 08:03, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
this is wayyy overpowered now remove self heal or return healing to normal.
Using WoH means no Gift of Health.--Life Infusion «T» 04:18, 12 November 2007 (UTC)
But if they did this to remove LoD dependency it kinda backfired. Ive seen 4 wammo teams in AB with WoH elite, as a wammo? Sounds pretty stupid, but even for a nonmonk it can heal upto 200 and we actually had trouble taking them down due to the fast recharge low energy cost. Most monks I've seen in arenas also run WoH now, with a few points into prot for guardian soa and other such things. ZB might be more energy friendly, if not interrupted and below 50%, but WoH is energy friendly to begin with and already. Even I run this now, seems like it's been the replacement of LoD in a way which made a lot of other changes pretty overlooked. If you refuse to make any major changes make a minor one, maybe just increase the recharge by a single second or maybe to 5? Wont mess with the healing aspect or anything that way. I don't see this as a healing should always heal more issue, it's that this elite is better than most elites. 74.229.66.241 17:15, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Resetting indent. Jeez, this is quite a pain in PvE. I just coincidently was in Slavers and the Desert today, and realized it was WAY harder to kill things. One point in Slavers there were three WoH monks together, and it was just way too much. Even if you separated them, the one WoH could just shoot it back to full health instantly. 70.51.126.141 23:12, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry but if you think W/Mos that are using their ELITE (and attribute points) to heal people (instead of whacking with weapons) is powerful...then the issue is not Word of Healing, it's the lack of sense of some warriors.--Life Infusion «T» 03:42, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
The funny thing is, WoH is so strong and costs only 5 energy. You have seen the AB comment above, the concept is pretty easy and also shows that everyone and his daughter is using WoH, and if even Warriors think about using this elite in 4 man arenas or aB, you know that something is wrong with this skill. --Longasc 07:47, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
"Using WoH means no Gift of Health." Who cares? Word of Healing is gift of health on crack. Pluto 10:15, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

NecromancerNecromancer

Oppressive Gaze Oppressive Gaze

  • conditional effect now only triggers on foes who are below 50% Health.

This skill is now underpowered and useless on a pve necro, I see no reason why its still 15 energy. I would like to see this at 10/2/7. 80.133.83.171 14:14, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

A double conditional effect is pretty weak. Removing the weakness req and lowering to 10 energy would help.--Skye Marin 14:46, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Blood magic has always been trash in PvE outside of SV. No one cares. Holymasamune 21:30, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
It is indeed in a sad state, Necrosis does a better job than blood and requires no attribute investment. But this nerf was harsh. The reason given was the well-known "powerful Necromancer Spike build". I am sorry, but everyone who stands adjacent to each other and also allows himself to be weakend on top of that does not really deserve not getting spiked. This build might kill inexperienced players, but so did IWAY. Not really a good reason to make the skill such a TRASH in PvE and PvP as well. --Longasc 00:31, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I saw this build get whipped by Esoteric Warriors in a hilariously short time. They beat so many other guilds but like the person said above: don't nerf a build because people are dumb enough to stand next to each other. It's like the belief that spirits are stacked all in the one place... Dancing Gnome 09:13, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I really didn't find this too dangerous or even used too often in comparison to other spikes. A whooping 15 energy, 2 second cast which I hope you can do something about, and a 7 second recharge, why shouldn't this be AoE regardless of circumstances. It's not like it's 5 energy 1/4th cast, good deal more damage, now that would just be crazy wouldn't it? Yes that was sarcasm about bringing back ancestor's rage as costly and interruptible that is ya know? 74.229.66.241 17:40, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

Weaken Armor Weaken Armor

  • decreased Energy cost to 5; decreased casting time to 2 seconds; decreased recharge time to 5 seconds; changed the skill type to a Spell; functionality changed to: "Target foe has Cracked Armor for 5..20 second[s]."
The 2s CT doesnt make it weaker than Shell Shock ? - Kiji 14:37, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Lower recharge than shell shock,just a bit weaker, but a well balanced update IMHO.--Ryudo 20:10, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Make it 5-1-5, like Enfeeble. This condition is still not appreciated and there are few ways to apply it. And long casting times (2 or 3 seconds) make Necros even less attractive for PvP than they already are besides gimmicks. Would not hurt to make it 1 second, then I would give it a try. --Longasc 00:33, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Shell Shock makes this look bad. At least give it a 1 second cast time. --Deathwing 00:37, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
This spells still needs more teeth. It needs to be AoE and/or also apply the -20 armor penalty. ie: "For 5..20 second[s], target foe and all adjacent foes suffer a -20 armor penalty and have Cracked Armor." 10 energy, 2s cast, whatever recharge.
I really like the AoE suggestion, this would justify a higher cast time and differentiate it from shell shock or shrinking armour. User:IxChel
This is what would be needed to get this spell on a PvE skillbar. The recent change isn't a buff, but just a change. It's still useless. The -20 armor penalty was *better* than cracked armor. It needs both to be useful (or Cracked Armor needs a buff) Carinae Dragonblood 01:54, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Why did it need to change at all? You can't reduce armour below 60 with CA nyway and I never saw people abusing this stacking with CA on anything else. Dancing Gnome 09:15, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Might as well make it adjacent too. Might have some synergy with nuking.--Skye Marin 21:48, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
It's quite good now. On a primary mesmer. On a primary Necromancer, it's worse, which is of course a shame. Akirai Annuvil 16:58, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

RangerRanger

Time to repost this again I guess, now with even more useless skills listed! <Ahem> ...Is this a joke, or what? I cannot believe this is it. By the way, Punishing Shot is still worthless, Strike as One is still worthless, Expert's Dexterity is still worthless, Disrupting Shot is still worthless, Scavenger's Focus is still worthless, Power Shot is still worthless, Splinter Shot is still worthless, Arcing Shot is still worthless, Archer's Signet is still worthless, Companionship is still worthless, Expert Focus is still worthless, Dryder's Defenses is still worthless, Magebane Shot IS still worthless... I could go on and on and on. Arshay Duskbrow 00:56, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Punishing Shot, Power Shot, Scavenger's Focus, and pretty much every other "hurt stuff" skills are nearly impossible to get right because simplistic, powerful ranged attacks invariably feed spike builds, and more conditional stuff like Sloth Hunter's Shot winds up being more functional when the conditionality is met. Skills that nobody uses don't cause problems. The lack of options right now is mainly because the currently-fielded set of ranger abilities fits the bill for what rangers need to do extremely well, which means the others are probably going to stay inferior by design unless they become blatantly overpowered. Riotgear 20:18, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Worthless balances done to rangers again. I kind of like Magebane Shot though. It's decent now. - Anon--The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:147.226.221.150 .

Energizing Wind Energizing Wind

  • increased Energy cost to 15; decreased duration to 30..90 seconds; decreased Spirit's level to 1..6.
Spiritway was obviously devastated by this change. Wonder what's in HoH right now? Oh look, two Spiritway. How about addressing the real problems next time, like necromancers' non-elite Mantra of Recall from spirit deaths, or the still-retarded Rampage as One, or Frozen Burst, or... Riotgear 20:18, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Since the skll balancers obviously have no idea why spiritway is the only build run in HA, I'll just plain out tell you.
Soul reaping works on minions and pets. (spirits are fine now)
Smoke Trap and Dust Trap make hitting their backline difficult.
Smoke Trap make YOUR backline difficult to keep alive when they're dazed and taking 6 hits per second.
Ritualist heals are retardedly overpowered, combined with infinite energy makes then godly.
Notice how neither EW nor RaO is on this list. You're changing the skills that are causing the LEAST amount of problems. Other builds run dual RaO and EW and suck. Look at healing prayers. Look at restoration magic. Look at Soul Reaping. Learn math. Fix the game. Shard 20:36, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
The primary problem is soul reaping abuse, and part of why people can't stand it is the fact that RaO lets you make a effective melee template so brainless that I could probably let my cat walk on the keyboard and no one would notice the difference. You say dual RaO is run in other builds and sucks, except Spiritway is just the latest incarnation of dumb pressure templates based on RaO. Trappers aren't a mainstay in Spiritway, the trapper is a loose slot that can be replaced with another nuker or another thumper. Overhauling Soul Reaping is the solution to the N/Rt stupidity, but RaO is going to show up in the next gimmick unless it's tapped as well. Riotgear 20:56, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

EW was devastating to LoD monks trying to keep the team up while having to deal with the extra recharge. However, they nerfed LoD, so it doesn't matter, lol! Samcobra

Fertile Season Fertile Season

  • increased Energy cost to 15; decreased Health bonus to 50..150; decreased armor bonus to 8.

Magebane Shot Magebane Shot

  • functionality changed to: "If this attack hits, it interrupts target foe's action. If that action was a Spell, it is disabled for 5 seconds. This attack cannot be blocked."
The new disable function is nice but I prefer the old instant recharge instead. The only advantage this has over Distracting Shot is that this cannot be blocked, otherwise, Distraction Shot is much better than this. They both have 10 seconds recharge too. IMO I would rather have the disable skill feature removed and reapply instant recharge when a spell is interrupted. --Shadetz X 12:52, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Or cut the recharge from 10 to 5.--Skye Marin 15:12, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Skye Marin, if you decide to bring an elite interrupt skill you basically want it to cover the majority of interruption tasks what Magebane Shot doesn't do really well. Actually its 10s reload is what makes it far less interesting than the popular Savage Shot-Divert imo, it would be nice if this skill was able to handle on its own most of the interruption tasks with a 5s recharge as previously suggested (3 without any added dmg or disableing would be perfect but too powerfull i guess) and a 5-10s disableing. Increasing its cost up to 10e in this case would be needed and then i think it could be competitive enough to see some use throughout the community. ~~ Azul Frigid Armor.jpg 19:37, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Change functionality to:If this attack hits, it interrupts target foe's action. If that action was a Spell,this attack cannot be blocked and instantly recharges.--Ryudo 20:10, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Interesting change. Makes it a mini-dshot that can't be blocked. Could use a little more buffing for its elite status though, maybe to 7-8 second recharge or a slightly longer disable. Holymasamune 21:32, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
OK, it cannot be blocked. But even Punishing Shot with 10 energy (for Rangers 5-4) and 5 recharge and damage bonus does not see much play. This skill was not used before the update despite the instant recharge on spell disruption. What is it now? A tactical tool for an unavoidable interrupt? This is just not enough, especially not for an Elite. --Longasc 10:43, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

I think this is a step in the right direction for this skill to see some serious play, but it's not quite there yet. Making it unblockable is a great idea, but with a 10 recharge, the instant recharge is more appealing than a 5 second disable. Other possible changes could be reducing the recharge to five seconds, or moving it to Marksmanship or Expertise and scaling the length this disables skills, maybe 2..7..12 or something similar. --Rururrur 17:44, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

If you want this skill to see the light of day think about changing it to an elite dshot that cant be blocked on the same recharge then it is possible that it will be ran. Until then there is no use for this skill... its just another savage that takes an elite spot....24.109.3.127 20:01, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I definately agree. An elite version of D-Shot with the unblockable feature would be a great boost to this and probably shed some light on playability with the skill as an elite slot. Otherwise, might as well make it a normal skill if you leave it as is. Gustin 04:16, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Unblockable D-shot could be very problematic, d-shot is already an excellent skill as-is. Give me an unblockable d-shot and I'll put it on a mesmer. I doubt anything could displace d-shot and still be balanced, the skill is just too good. If an elite interrupt is going to be viable at this point, it largely comes down to two things: Whether or not there's a non-elite option good enough to displace cripshot, and whether or not the interrupt can displace Savage Shot. If it doesn't recharge in 5 seconds, it's probably not going to replace savage shot. Riotgear 20:18, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Agree with the comment above regarding a non-elite cripshot. In order for this elite to be run, a minor buff to pindown may be in order. I'm confused though, magebane shot disables the spell for 5 seconds, does that mean if you hit aegis with it, it's out for 5 seconds and then castable again or does it interrupt, disable for 5 secs, then makes aegis go through it's normal recharge?

That's really the problem with this skill. The ranger elite is very important for the class. Burning Arrow and Cripshot both allow a good splitter as well as being decent at the stand, but this skill takes up the elite slot for a character that then would be unable to split and is using their elite shot for a 5 second disable interrupt you can use every 10 seconds. Maybe make the skill something like: "If target foe is enchanted, this attack cannot be blocked. Target foe's action is interrupted, if that action was a spell, that spell is disabled for 5 seconds and this skill recharges instantly." 76.102.172.202 19:35, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

instant recharge on a skill with 5s disable is a little overpowered. This elite as it is now is viable enough to see play. The thing keeping this skill out of play is not it's power, but the power of non-elite alternatives to BA and cripshot, i.e. screaming shot and pindown. --Jaen 01:44, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Phht wtf do you think PD is? K? thanks. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:70.56.170.6 .

PD also disables your own skills for 8 seconds. --67.188.28.71 11:06, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

What made this skill really unique WAS the recharge... and for something that you can only get late-game NF it should be worth something.. I mean, no matter how you get this puppy, it's not exactly free to use. add that it's an elite and you only get a little something for that. Before, it was something you could use as a real interupt.. now, called shot, critical eye and disrupting accuracy are more effective and spam-able. There are lots of 'cannot be blocked' skills, why make this one just more? and why is this a mages' bane? Increasing the energy cost is the only effective way to nerf this (if that's what it needs [still waiting for your commentary]) than the 'no instant recharge' spamming it too much only kills my (or my heroes') energy and isn't very effective. Judicious use of this skill, though me means I can _Always_ have an interrupt if I absolutely need it. --OR-- Consider Daze, Energy Loss/Gain/Steal instead of disable. Vidnuev 08:53, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

RitualistRitualist

Ancestors' Rage Ancestors' Rage

  • this Skill is no longer considered an Enchantment.
The reasoning for the change to this skill was to Enchant Self, then ride lighting to spike the target... kinda like a lighting spike from a shadow stepping sin... But as a straight Skill, how does this effect the game? Is it stackable? You can still Shadow step spike with it... just has to be a little more cordinated. Not to mention it now gets a hidden buff with Expertise. SabreWolf 11:08, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Expertise does not affect Ritualist "skills" like Ancestors' Rage. 80.133.95.207 13:06, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
It doesn't? Expertise effects "attack skill" moves from like Warriors and other professions... and since this is an "attack skill" now, it should apply right? It falls into that rule technically... SabreWolf 16:04, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Nope. It's just a "skill". Expertise only applies to Ranger Skills, Touch skills, Attack skills, and Rituals.--Skye Marin 21:52, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Anyway the text can be changed on this one to something like "After 1 second, foes adjacent to target ally take x damage"? Just something about the way it is worded now hurts my head. --Racthoh 00:20, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
5 energy for 130 AOE damage will always be broken. Make it 10e. Shard 20:39, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Which this skill initially did. It was probably lowered due to the fact that people now can move away from the AoE, what they would do if they would not be KD'ed in the mentioned RTL combo. Leave Rits some love for PvE. You do not see them in PvP that much anymore as a primary. --Longasc 07:52, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
It was lowered when they added exhaustion. -- Gordon Ecker 07:59, 13 November 2007 (UTC)
I know what expertise effects... I am just inquiring it because there are some "skill" skills that ARE effected by it... so I was just wondering... hoping partially too. SabreWolf 13:54, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Spiritleech Aura Spiritleech Aura

  • fixed a bug that swapped duration and effect time.
The concept of this spell fails. Last week in RA I encountered a E/Rt using Aura of Restoration with Restoration Magic and it got me thinking of how useless this skill is. This spell is a triple negative, the heal is weak, it requires a spirit and it removes health from the spirits. Please change the function or this will never appear on any skillbars. --Shadetz X 02:08, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
I don't even understand the concept of this spell. Why would Rit player want to kill his own expensive spirits with this skill? Aura of Restoration is at least sensible, get healed for % of energy cost of spells. I'd say standardize this skill to have same parameters as Aura of Restoration, give +health for every spirit within earshot and add healing cap that is variable of how many points you have in Restoration magic, just like Aura of Restoration. That's it! --Toge 18:29, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
How about making the spirit lose ENERGY instead of health. Then maybe it would be more usable. --Life Infusion «T» 21:39, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Weapon of Warding Weapon of Warding

  • increased duration to 5..10 seconds.

Bringin' back the E/Rt runners I presume? —ǥrɩɳsɧƿoɲ 12:24, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Hopefully. This is a step in the right direction, but they still really need to buff Healing Signet to deal with this heavy-damage meta (like -20 armor + more health healed or 1s cast time). Splits won't exist outside of broken mechanic-exploiting (read: sins) unless reliable healing options are available, and Healing Signet is no longer powerful enough to keep split warriors alive. -Auron 12:40, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Nope, with the need for strong party heals, if the runner is an Ele, it'll probably be an E/Mo heal party spammer. Rits will be nicer now with the stronger warding, but I fear for a stronger thumpway :( Holymasamune 21:34, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Would be a really good change. Too bad the lod nerf made it impossible to be used on a flagger/split char. In the end this skill will see less play than it did before this update. Same with the rit class in general...24.109.3.127 20:03, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Splinter Weapon Splinter Weapon

  • functionality changed to: "For 20 second[s], target ally has a Splinter Weapon. Target ally's next 1..5 attacks deal 5..50 damage on up to 3 adjacent foes."
Ah yes, I always loved the Barrage + Splinter Weapon combo in PvE... but I see the need to nerf it in PvP. Is there a better way to implement this so that PvE is not affected as much? Perhaps a monster skill that increase resistance to AoE damage from weapon spells, or AoE damage in general? Alaris 14:42, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Ursan Blessing? -Auron 20:58, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
lol, who needs anything else in PvE when you can Ursan Blessing through everything. Holymasamune 21:35, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Splinter Weapon still does a very good job. Though the reason for the nerf, the clumping of the NPCs upon VoD, was rather poor. Better make the silly guys not clump together like that, they are fodder for EVERY kind of AoE spell, not only Splinter Weapon... --Longasc 00:38, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Make the damage armor-respecting lightning damage, revert the change imo. --Macros 07:21, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
That wouldn't address the reason why it was nerfed in the first place, so why the heck would they do that?
~164 damage average for 5 energy is still an excellent skill. Go to Aiiane's Talk page (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 07:57, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
The skill was one of the few builds which rangers could run in pugs for end game dungeons. GvG whiners complained about Victory or Death and all of a sudden this previously fine skill which was the rangers ONLY accepted (barely) build into dungeons like Slaver's Exile is nerfed to make it that much less likely a ranger will get into a group anymore. Rangers had to a) target mobs with aoe bow attacks and b) had to deal with energy. Common builds used by other classes in these situations are now MUCH more efficient. Why bring a ranger when you can bring a nuker? Dancing Gnome 09:06, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Agreed, spacing out the npcs and giving a lot of pvers their builds back would seem like a much more fair choice. Or is it just easier for you to change the skill than redo the npc lineup?74.229.66.241 15:47, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
The idea that nerfing Splinter Weapon ruined PvE Rangers is just silly. Have you ever tried Great Dwarf Weapon? Combined with Barrage it deals a huge amount of damage combined with an absolutely rediculous amount of disruption. Kabu To 20:29, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
The problem with Great Dwarf Weapon is it's target other ally only and of course it does less dmg than Splinter Weapon. You need someone with high deldrimor rank who will cast this skill on you every time. 80.133.94.14 23:30, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I just took 2 of the in "common opinion" ubernerfed rangers and a Ritualist with Splinter Weapon and other channeling into Duncan HM, together with my Curses Necro, another MM Necro and no Blood Necro. The First Ranger was BHA+Epidemic, which should also be another reason to take a ranger into a group... and the other used Barrage/Pet with Splinter Weapon and the Norn Skill "I am the Strongest". Granted, this time the Ritualist provided Splinter weapon, to only 2 rangers, and only one that really "splintered". Splinter Weapon is still capable of tremendous damage. It is still extremely powerful in combo with Barrage or Triple Shot. Rangers also offer Throw Dirt, evasive stances and tanking capability, not only warriors can do that. My gripe is the idea to nerf this because of VoD. Make the NPCs spread out more, otherwise every kind of AoE damage will cause similar slaughter. Remember how iQ suddenly pulled out a Meteor Shower at VoD, which also turned the tide of the battle. I would preferred having this nerfed for obvious pve reasons, together with Ursan. Too bad the only change, Splinter Weapon took place because of PvP. And it did not even totally fix such VoD issues, it is a problem of VoD, not so much of a single skill. --Longasc 00:19, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Regardless of how you look at it in PvE a single splinter + barrage in ideal circumstances is going to hit for about 750 armor ignoring damage every ~5 seconds. If for some reason groups stop taking that I would love to know what they use to deal damage instead. --Racthoh 00:34, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Hey Isiash, you did a nice job nerfing this build and made turai exp farming impossible with this nerf. In response, Dark Paladin X and many others who care will protest with the fistshake until u change it back.--151.201.37.93 03:30, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
yeah lets everyone fistshake, then he must change it back or else we fistshake more.--Cursed Angel 03:38, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Seriously, people need to get over this. The skill was overpowered so it got nerfed. End of Story. Now, in pve, you can only add 750 damage for 5 energy, how horrible (sarcasm).

You mean 800 right? Well, 795 to be exact. If you happen to trigger a +1 mod, then it goes up to 1008 damage. 795 or 1008 damage for 5 energy. That is just bullshit. How are we supposed to kill monsters now? --Deathwing 03:31, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Shaking fist violently without pause --68.102.128.17 03:56, 13 November 2007 (UTC) Bad call, I'd say. It's a nerf when when it could have been an adjustment so it was less useful in PVE and mega-splinter PVE builds, but still be a powerful and useful Rit skill. All it needed was to nerf the AOE (as was done), but buff the duration (to make it a better "seed" skill for other spells) or the number of times it can trigger. That way it still puts out good damage on small clumps of foes, but doesn't reliably nuke everything in range. The question really is is it better or worse than the old single use/all adjacent foes version now?198.28.92.5 16:09, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

You cannot seriously be saying it's worse than before it was buffed to have multiple charges. I cannot believe anybody who has ever played a Rit between the Rit Lord nerf and the pre-NF buff could seriously claim that.Akirai Annuvil 17:05, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

We already have a skill with "If target foe is non-human" condition, why not do the same with splinter weapon ? Target ally's next 1...4...5 attacks deal 5...41...50 damage up to 3 adjacent foes. If target foe is non-human Target ally's next 1...4...5 attacks deal 5...41...50 damage to all adjacent foes. 80.133.60.194
I really really cannot see why so many people are bitching about it and saying it is dead. 700+ damage for 5 energy every 5 seconds isn't enough? --Deathwing 22:58, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

Sundering Weapon Sundering Weapon

  • increased duration to 5..20 seconds.

I have seen this skill only used by a few spiritbuilds in HA. It is a one-shot skill to apply Cracked Armor, in the communing line, not everyone's favorite line for weapon spells. 10% AP only is not really good. I wonder if 25% would make this skill more attractive. I still guess not. Maybe it needs to add more AP to 1...3 attacks. --Longasc 00:43, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

Single-hit weapon spells aren't usually an attractive option, since it prevents the use of skills which capitalize on their being active, and their effects just feel weak. Making it work on 1...3 attacks sounds like a good solution, but the AP seems completely pointless, even then. (John Rittertualist) 05:52, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Even with 1-3 attacks unless it is removed it doesn't really matter. The time for three attacks to pass is very short so applying the same condition three times is pointless. Dancing Gnome 09:08, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Making it the next 1..3 attack skills and pushing the AP to ~20% might make it more attractive on a spike. That way you can control when the weapon is removed, and Cracked armor is certain to be applied.--Skye Marin 21:56, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
The armor penetration is just there for the name of the skill, a sundering weapon penetrates the armor and then it gets cracked. 10% isnt helping on only one attack but neither is 20% or more.--Cursed Angel 23:24, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
It seems the skill needs to be completely changed. Nobody sees any hope for this skill the way it is, even with buffs to AP or number of attacks or whatever. --Longasc 00:22, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
I attempted to use this on my ranger with Glass Arrows and Brutal Weapon...it was just too much trouble. Spell Shock is the best way to apply Cracked Armor and this skill is going to need a nice boost to be able to compete in any way shape or form. Maybe if it has a duration or for a specific number of attacks it provides the 10% armor penetration, and on attack SKILLS it applies Cracked Armor? Just a thought, though anything would probably improve this. Gustin 04:19, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Try making it like Withering Aura. It lasts the whole duration, and adds Cracked armor with 20% AP on every attack or attack skill. Even with that massive buff, it would be a touch more viable for consistent Cracked Armor application, but still far from overpowered--Skye Marin 22:28, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
Um....far from overpowered? How is a 20 second duration weapon spell that adds 20% armor penetration not overpowered? Even WITHOUT the cracked armor application that would be overpowered. Remember that not only would it add ridiculous amounts of damage to all your melee pressure, it would also be unstrippable. I say make it more like next 1..3 attacks have 5..15% Armor penetration and inflict cracked armor for X seconds (numbers could obviously be tweaked). Then lower cast time a little bit and lower recharge to 8 like the other cracked armor applications. If the timer was left the same then it could get some use. Maybe increase to 1..4 attacks even if that's not enough, but point is it needs more than a single application. 76.102.172.202 19:46, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

WarriorWarrior

Body Blow Body Blow

  • now works properly with scythes.
strength + scythes...why would anyone try that >.>--Life Infusion «T» 21:35, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
it was broken and did 160damage + deep wound, too bad i only got to run it for 1 day :( --59.167.110.164 00:36, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

Symbolic Strike Symbolic Strike

  • now works properly with scythes.

Thanks for the fix. 80.133.83.171

Wait, people care about this? Oh yeah, the bad warriors with dolyak signet and symbolic strike to power their damage! Holymasamune 19:55, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
I care about this. The dervish has a few fun signets and this skill requires no investment in attributes...and when hitting up to three targets, it can be recharged pretty quickly too. So yes, especially in PvE, this skill has a lot of potential. More that you'd like I assume. Nicky Silverstar 08:14, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

PvE-Only Skills

Winds Winds

  • fixed a bug that caused Winds (a Vanguard skill) to affect allies as well as foes.
Best change of the update. Now I can use this uber OP spirit. Not. If this thing wants to be remotely useful, make it a 3 second cast, 15 recharge, and 33% miss chance. Holymasamune 21:36, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Agreed. What makes this so powerful it has to be PvE skill anyway? --Toge 18:34, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
They made 10 skills for each profession, therefore they couldnt have made 11 for rangers by putting it in wilderness survival.--Cursed Angel 18:39, 11 November 2007 (UTC)
The special thing about this spirit is that it only works on FOES, not on your own rangers. But in its current state, it might as well not exist. It does not save people half as well from Charr Ranger salvos (HM Assault on the stronghold showed me they really can shoot people down...^^) as the Vanguard Ward of Courage (+48 armor vs Charr), Blinding Surge or mass weakness. I would prefer a different effect: i.e. reduce the range of enemy arrows by half, which would be very nasty. --Longasc 07:58, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

General

moved from User talk:Isaiah Cartwright

Wow, the extent of your failure surprises even me. All of your Monk buffs are simply terrible (aside gimmicky Glimmer). The nerf to LoD is idiotic beyond words. You should be replaced, as you lack every quality necessary to balance well. Come back when you are able to think and listen. gfg Readem 01:32, 9 November 2007 (UTC)


I thought you liked LoD, Izzy. ); --71.229.204.25 01:34, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Oh, and in before shitstorm. --71.229.204.25 01:35, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Mirrored Stance --Cursed Angel 01:39, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

I'm loving the changes to WoH and Healer's Boon is giving me some ideas as well for GvG. The change to LoD isn't bad, I just think it gives it a different purpose. It's looks good on a flag runner without the conditional below 80% health, but is pretty much done on the backline. I'm already having many old school concepts coming back to me I want to put to the test with these updates. Thanks for shaking things up. --Rururrur 02:01, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
There was a long discussion about the current metagame in here http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10205331
At the end the conclusion was, that either the current damage output has to be nerved somehow (which is quite difficult - Dervish, Para etc.) or the "Red Bars Go Up" Skills have to be buffed to make a monk able to keep up with the current damage without spamming LoD 24/7 and hiding behind 100 Wards and 4.235.345 Aegii. I like the update very much because of the above stated. One can now play an effective monk without just having to rely on passive/static defense. And the functionality change on LoD is just great it forces ppl to use alternative skills, or to dump group heal at all and rely on more specific heals.--Samurai Smartie 02:06, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
WoH heals a whopping 274 Health !!!!1111--Samurai Smartie 02:23, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Hopefully everyone can now agree that Restoration Magic is underpowerd. -- Gordon Ecker 02:46, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Recall needed fixing, but not to go from ruining HvH to WILL NEVER BE USED AGAIN. Mystic, meh guess it was exploitable. Shell Shock, fair enough wondered why it already didn't have the 25%. Mesmer, meh nothing too spectacular. Monk. Monk. MONK?! Why on earth have healing / restful breeze and Vigourous spirit been buffed? You want us all playing Wammo? LoD... well... not sure what to say. No monk can carry this anymore in GvG and I guess WoH could say bye bye to LoD/Infuse. Now what to do for a party wide heal. Mystic Healing, nope, LoD, nope, Heal Party ele?! Necro, yea that was needed. Ranger, Interesting I guess. Rit, so now allows massive AR stacks again? WoW and SW meh. Right sundering... If you want anyone to carry it it's got to read need next X attacks. Not next attack, but for a longer time period! Warrior, meh. 137.222.211.141 03:41, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Healing Breeze and Restful Breeze got buffed because they were trash. If they get abused on secondaries, they can make both the regeneration and the duration scale. -- Gordon Ecker 05:06, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
I like most of these changes, a bunch of good fixes there (and lots of bugfixes, which I really like). Things I disagree with:
  1. Splinter Weapon. IMHO the problem is NPCs clumping at VoD. Any AoE will do there, Splinter was just a nice one, and should easily be replaced. Proper fix would have been to improve the AI/VoD behaviour; if you got clusters of enemies, you WANT them to be punished in PvP. But Rits took yet another unnecessary hit for PvE.
  2. Magebane. As someone else already said, should be PLUS 5 disablement. Still a good change overall.
  3. Monk elites in PvE. HBoon, Glimmer and Word were already good there, and buffing good ones while leaving bad ones behind seems wrong. Also I feel Word should have stayed more tactical (higher recharge OR non-self OR more conditional, less unconditional healing), but is now another spammy powerheal like Glimmer.
But again, I mostly like the update, thanks! 134.130.4.46 04:25, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
The update, to me, did exactly what updates should: nerf overpowered, abused skills and buffed skills people never want to use. I personally think it's idiotic to complain about how skills like Glimmer of Light or Word of Healing got buffed, when they obviously NEEDED it. If you aren't nerfing skills that are abused in the meta and buffing skills no one wants to use, what are updates for? Good update. But there's still a long list of other skills that need buffing. (And why was Weaken Armor nerfed anyway? The very few people that brought it used it on 60ALs to drop them to 40. I guess in a modern steroid-buffed meta, it makes sense to deny the armor reduction to a 60, but eh... I never used it anyway.) --Reklaw 04:54, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for ruining another Rit skill! The past few nerfs pretty much scream "If you don't PvP don't play Guild Wars" I know it's hard for anyone to think people play PvE but some people do. I know... crazy huh? A Concerned Citizen 07:44, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

This update has much portential as it adds new posibilities to the meta. If only someone would nerf Readem...Nicky Silverstar 08:12, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Unfortunately, it doesn't, really - GvG bars will still be designed around having to counter SP sins ganking them for anyone not with the stand group, and the stand group will still be designed around party healing, just in a two-skill form rather than 1. Go to Aiiane's Talk page (Aiiane - talk - contribs) 08:29, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Yes you're right Nicky now all the Monk bars will have to change and that's great. 70.132.2.120 20:36, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Would it really hurt if some of those terribly designed or tweaked skills get a buff or redesign? I mean, one of those 8 hundred. 83.131.69.9 08:38, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
Pretty sweet update if your a pve healer, if you were trying to get GW taken somewhat seriously as a competitive game you'd probably be disappointed that the skill is being taken out of monking when you have aegis chains, heals, and a big prot just in case.
I have to agree with the people who think that Ritualist has become a poor man's healer (hold onto your begging stick I'll mending grip you to good health!!!!) especially after the super buff to healing prayers. I think the next focus should be on how to buff restoration magic without encouraging more N/Rt to appear. Perhaps buffing some of those ridiculously weak Spawning Skills or Spawning Power would be a good start. --Shadetz X 13:22, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Deadly Paradox is still broken. Triple KD sins are still seen left and right in the arenas. Ele, Necro, Mesmer and even Monks are still spamming Daggers with it. Please remove the +1/3 casting time from the skill to make the spells interruptable. One regular skill giving you full Fasting Casting and Mantra of Recovery together for 5 energy is too much. --Shadetz X 13:39, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Hear! Hear! If sin's are going to be casters, at least give us mesmers a fighting chance to interrupt them; I'd also like spells to be a different color on the casting bar so that I know *not* to try and interrupt, or ideally, make mesmer interrupts more like necro death spells, you can't use them unless the caster has started a spell (corpse spells require a corpse or they don't trigger) -- IxChel

Some translations error occurs on language...Hoping it will be fixed soon to be corresponding to the changes.Some are given here : http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/showthread.php?t=10218097 --Christix 18:48, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

? for you Izzy... are the wards going to get fixed? Cuase they last about 1-2 seconds shorter then they are discripted for... SabreWolf 11:19, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

So.... the attempt to move the meta away from non monk split chars is pointless. You will get 1 monk and 2 other people splitting all the time now.. runners will be monks. any split team will have a monk with them... the lod nerf was probably the worst move i have seen in a while... Change back lod and you will see ALOT more dynamic matches... until there is another viable party healing other than hp (Which can really only be ran on a flagger now..) the game is going to be out of balance..24.109.3.127 19:59, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

One thing you must agree on though: a 5 energy costing Heal Party with low recharge pretty much negates the need of all 1 target healing skills. Why just heal one target when you can heal everyone who's in danger for the same amount of energy? Nicky Silverstar 22:48, 10 November 2007 (UTC)
Single-target heals are mainly for low-health players when the party heal is going to take too long to bring them to a safe point. Riotgear 21:00, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Sin split is still broken, SP spike in general is still broken, Recall is still broken, Spiritway is still broken, Deadly Paradox is still broken, WoH spam is boring, nerfing LoD reinforced the 3-monk backline even more, this update fails in about every way it is possible to fail.

Things to hit: Shadow Prison, Black Lotus Strike, Impale's damage, Soul Reaping in general (i.e. make it more reliable in regular builds and less powerful in builds designed to set it off), Rampage as One (again), Deadly Paradox's recharge. Change Recall to put the enchantment on the target, with the skill disable, it'll make stripping it a much more effective strategy.

Party healing needs more options, Word of Healing works because it got overbuffed. Healing is a reactive measure that should remain a consistently less-efficient option than proactive defense and midline support that requires a lot more skill to deliver effectively. LoD didn't dumb things down in this way because it was always a maintenance measure to resolve undirected pressure, it was not good enough to cover for mistakes and certainly didn't lessen the role of prot.

Things to buff in that regard: Recuperation, Protective Was Kaolai, Never Surrender, Song of Restoration, Release Enchantments. Riotgear 20:46, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

Light of Deliverance

Wow, Izzy = Epic FAILURE. Glad to see the boys and girls of Anet spend sooooo much time thinking about GvG, that by nerfing LoD and "buffing" other "great" heal skills, they screw us HA players. The LoD nerf that was "long overdue" has given rise to the lamest noobway builds ever, including Spirtway/RaO powerbuilds, and basically un-does all the good that the spirt "nerfs" that occurred in the last two updates did. Until Anet decides to usefully change the metabuild by getting rid of spiritway and the massively overpowered N/Rt builds, and calming down Mass AoE/Hexway teams, truely good builds designed around physical damage, minor AoE pressure, and simply good tactics will fail. And, just so I leave nothing out- thanks for making it a pain to get my PvE chars to stay alive as well- somehow, HB/Infuse in PvE just isn't an effective way to heal... Can't imagine why my Hero monks won't do it... For that matter, it's not that effective in PvP either; it simply forces other monks to work harder to keep your infuser alive, and leaves a Divert Hex monk standing in D1, because you absoloutely have to bring 2 healers, and a prot to even dream of defeating Spirtway or other KD/Hex-heavy teams. So, in summary... Izzy FAILS, and should post a copy of his resignation here for us all to see, and his replacement needs to undo his latest in a long line of stupid and thoughtless nerfs. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:24.166.139.145 .

Sway is nerfed now, N/Rt's are nerfed now, all you have to do now is get an HB-Heal Party Monk. HB/HP=new LoD, even if you play HA only one time a day, you should've known this. Dual WoH works fine against pressure/AoE too. BlazeRick 07:41, 14 November 2007 (UTC)
Aren't you the wrong person to talk about epic failure? Just a question... 87.210.150.58 08:08, 18 November 2007 (UTC)


non exploitable pet corpses

Pet corpses should stay exploitable. One complaint has been with regard to Tombs; while I agree you don't need pets for bodies in Tombs, and that they are for body blocking, it is still not consistent with the game mechanics to not be able to exploit the pet corpse. If your hero, or an ally (such as one of the dwarf allies of the King in Thunderhead Keep), dies, they are exploitable. Tamable pets, before they are tamed, are exploitable--which I use often to start building an army at the beginning of an area (such as reef lurkers on leaving an outpost in Jade Sea); so why should they become non exploitable on taming? Makes no sense. I have not found pets to be as useful as they could be, what with two skill spaces required for them (one just to have, one to heal/rez), and this just makes them a tad less useful still. It is a stupid change to make, indeed. --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:131.104.163.178 .

Why not allow skills to act differently in PvP vs PvE?

Why not allow skills to act differently in PvP vs PvE? There are new PvE only skills, why not allow them to behave somewhat differently, since the game experience is different between PvP and PvE. Why ruin my experience, since I and many others, prefer PvE, just to make PvPers happier (even if there are more of them)? --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:131.104.163.178 .

I'm a PvE player only and yet I don't want to see PvE Only skills. Reason being I find they break the game somewhat. We attempted "Catacombs of Kathandrax" last night. 3 Humans rest were Heros. We reached the end of the dungeon but couldn't live long enough to kill the boss as his AoE damage is overwhelming. In the end we resigned. What's the answer? Well Pain Inverter as always. I like to to choose my builds, why should it be that we need to use a certain skill to succeed? --SK 15:00, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
An actual response to the above question however would be that the way Guild Wars is coded would make it prohibitively difficult to make skills different in PvE and PvP. - User HeWhoIsPale sig.PNG HeWhoIsPale 15:18, 4 December 2007 (UTC)
What a lot of PvE players don't realize is that many skills are unbalanced in their favor. AoE spells, for example, are balanced with the assumption that most players will move the instant they realize that they're standing in one. For another example, the Soul Reaping attribute would also be considerably weaker than it is if it weren't balanced around the comparitively low death rate. We can't expect the design team to effectively double their skill balance workload and still offer GW for free. Kabu To 05:44, 11 December 2007 (UTC)
I think the problem is that the skills unbalanced in favor of PvE aren't evenly distributed among the professions. Elementalists have dozens of skills which can tear through hordes of stupid mobs, while Assassins only have Death Blossom. -- Gordon Ecker 06:06, 11 December 2007 (UTC)