User:Altariel Noldorin/Monk Builds

=Solo 55hp Monk= The 55hp Monk is used to solo many popular farming locations containing Griffons, Hydras, Mountain Trolls, and Minotaurs. It is an enchantment heavy build, so it is not suitable for areas with disenchanting mesmers or necromancers.

This build is often called "55 Monk" because of its low health -- only 55 hp. The low health makes Protective Spirit, which limits damage to 10% of a character's maximum health, reduce all received damage to 5hp/hit, which is easily countered by the 8 pips of health regeneration granted by Healing Breeze (16 hp regained every second).

This build no longer works as described because of the Wednesday 25th of October monster AI update, whereby monsters that can be knocked down no longer kill themselves on Shield of Judgment (meaning Hydras can still be farmed with this build for they cannot be knocked down). If you run past the Mountain Trolls in the cave outside Droknar's Forge, use this build to farm the Tundra Giants, be sure to use a skill like Dolyak Signet against them so you can cast your healing skills and Shield of Judgment to prevent them from disrupting you with their stomps. This also works well with Sand Giants  in the Scar area of the Crystal Desert.

It does work in areas such as the zone with Hydras and Griffins outside of the Augury Rock. It is still effective only takes longer. In the Nightfall campaign of Guild wars the build works real well against the groups of  Tusked Hunters and Tusked Howlers outside Yohlon Haven

See the article Invincible Monk for a discussion of the concept of the build.

Equipment

 * Any 20% of Enchanting, preferably with extra energy. A Totem Axe or Rajazan's Fervor is ideal.
 * The off-hand item is the -50 Grim Cesta obtained via the Cities of Ascalon quest.
 * Ascetic's Armor offers the most energy which is beneficial to this build, all armor pieces have to have Monk superior runes: one of each with one extra to bring your health down to 105 (this doesn’t include health deduction with the -50 Grim Cesta). Keep in mind that you don't need high armor for the build, so any Ascetic's with maximum energy will do.

Usage

 * Cast the first 4 enchantments before the fight. You won't have any energy regeneration, so use Blessed Signet to regain energy out of combat.
 * Before aggroing mobs, cast Protective Spirit. You should not need Healing Breeze unless you have more than 3 foes that cannot be knocked down (such as hydras), or 5 that can be knocked down (such as forgotten).
 * The energy gained from Essence Bond and Balthazar's Spirit should be more than enough for all situations.
 * Blessed Aura and your weapon of Enchanting will prolong your Shield of Judgment, which is your core offensive spell.
 * The build is most successful against melee attackers and is least successful against spell casters (especially Mesmers). To use it for farming, find an area with a heavy concentration of melee attackers (such as the Blessed Griffons in Snake Dance or the Hydras in Skyward Reach) and take them on.

List of Soloable Bosses

Wajjun Bazaar Lian, Dragon's Petal - (aggro as many as possible for energy benefit)Instead of Essense Bond bring Zealot's Fire for additional damage.

Variants

 * Monk
 * Replace Essence Bond with Zealot's Fire for more damage output. See the notes on casting in succession to avoid breaking aggro.
 * Replace Blessed Aura with Smite for more firepower. Note that if you are used to Blessed Aura, then getting used to the decidedly shorter durations of Healing Breeze, Protective Spirit and Shield of Judgment will take some time.
 * Replace Essence Bond with Strength of Honor while using a melee weapon to do more Damage.
 * Replace Essence Bond with Symbol of Wrath and use it right after Shield of Judgment tends to kill Mountain Trolls with one round of Shield of Judgment.
 * Replace Healing Breeze with Shield of Absorption for 0 damage (With Totem Axe and Blessed Aura, Shield of Absorption will come back soon enough to recast before it ends.
 * Use Watchful Spirit for more regeneration
 * Warrior, secondary
 * Replace Essence Bond with Bonetti's Defense for an excellent energy providing skill, though dodging will reduce the DPS average.
 * Replace Essence Bond with Balanced Stance to protect yourself against knockdowns, such as Meteor casted by Hydras. This will make Hydra-Farming a lot easier.
 * Replace Essence Bond with Dolyak Signet to securely eliminate knockdowns from monsters such as Tundra Giants
 * Elementalist, secondary
 * Replace Essence Bond with Aftershock. This works fine with the knockdown provided by Shield of Judgment and does not break aggro like Zealot's Fire.
 * Replace Shield of Judgment with Glyph of Renewal and use Sliver Armor for damage.
 * Replace Essence Bond with Bed of Coals.
 * Necromancer, secondary
 * Replace Essence Bond with Suffering. Use this after Shield of Judgment, when the enemy(s) are knocked down because of its 2 second cast time it's easier to interrupt. For large mobs, cast it into the center of the group.
 * Mesmer secondary, you could do one or more of the following:
 * Replace Essence Bond with Channeling to gain tons of energy from crowding foes (this works well in conjunction with Zealot's Fire).
 * Replace Blessed Aura with Arcane Echo to lengthen the effect of Shield of Judgment.
 * Replace Essence Bond with Mantra of Resolve against enemies with interrupts. This can be useful against Titans and Mountain Trolls.
 * Replace Balthazar's Spirit with Sympathetic Visage. This will deplete enemies' energy and cause spellcasting monsters such as Hydras to attack you more once they no longer have the energy to power their spells.
 * Ranger, secondary
 * Replace Essence Bond with Serpent's Quickness for back to back Shield of Judgment casting.
 * Replace Blessed Signet with Brambles to add damage and inflict bleeding when enemies are knocked down by Shield of Judgment. Remember that Brambles is Factions only.
 * Dervish, secondary
 * Mystic Regeneration based:


 * Benefits - more points in Divine Favor and Smiting Prayers means Shield of Judgment does more damage for a longer time. Mystic Regeneration is far better than Healing Breeze (0.25 cast, up to +16 health regen for 24 sec).
 * Replace Watchful Spirit with Mending if you don't have WS.
 * Replace Watchful Spirit with Fleeting Stability if getting knocked down is a problem ("only" get max +14 health regen though). Suggested: Protection Prayers at 9 and Earth Prayers at 6 for longer Fleeting Stability.
 * Additional equipment: a wand + the Grim Cesta in another weapon set. If an enemy runs away, switch to wand, attack it then switch back to usual set. Unless the AI has changed, it should run back to attack you.
 * Mystic Regeneration for healing.

Counters

 * Enchantment removal
 * Interrupting
 * The dazed condition
 * Life stealing
 * Degeneration

Build Concept
While there are different tactics for different situations (explained below, in the tactics section), the general outline of how this team works is very similar to most other 55/SS teams:
 * The 55 monk attracts all aggro of the enemies. This includes the important step of taking melee attackers to spell casters and/or ranged attacker whenever possible to allow Spiteful Spirit to kill as many foes simultaneously as possible. Solid lining up of ranged attackers and then solid piling of melee attackers on them are the keys to making this team build effective and successful.
 * The SS necromancer's job is to carefully administer Spiteful Spirit on foes so that as many foes as possible drop at the same time. If the 55 monk does a solid job piling up foes, then Spiteful Spirit placed on two of them can take out the entire group in a matter of seconds.
 * The 55 monk's primary responsibility is to survive. He/she must be accustomed to playing the role of invincible monks because 55ing in the Fissure is a more difficult breed of 55ing than, say, the Crystal Desert. Also, perfecting the timing of using Arcane Echo and Spell Breaker takes time.
 * The SS necromancer is in charge of killing, and must utilize his/her skills in the way that takes out the most dangerous foes first.

The Invincible Monk
Usage:
 * Cast the 4 enchantments on the right of the skill bar at the beginning. Note that you will have 0 energy regen when you put all 4 on, so you will need Blood Ritual from the SS Necro when you are in need of energy.
 * In situations where there are no enemy mesmers, the approach is to put Protective Spirit on and engage. With 4 pips health regeneration from Mending, you should not need Healing Breeze until you round all foes and they are all hitting you at the same time.
 * The Energy from Essence Bond and Balthazar's Spirit should be more than enough for all situations.
 * The combination of Blessed Aura, Arcane Echo, Spell Breaker and a special weapon with "of Enchanting" is to make Spell Breaker (SB) last for over 1 minute. This is needed for cases where spell casters (enemy mesmers and necromancers) can remove enchantments and kill you instantly.
 * To invoke this combination, invoke Arcane Echo first, then Spell Breaker then Protective Spirit and go into the enemy. When Spell Breaker is about 1/3 of the way recharging, invoke the copy held in Arcane Echo's slot (you cannot wait till SB starts flashing because by then the copy in Arcane Echo will have expired). When the echoed SB is about to run out, invoke the original SB which would have recharged. This combination should allow for about 74 seconds of immunity to all spells.
 * To cast the first three spells in the sequence above, the monk needs 40 energy to start. Then he/she needs to go into battle quick so that enemy hits can fill up there energy reserves fast enough so that there is enough energy for the echoed SB to be cast. Timing and measuring all of this takes practice.

Equipment:
 * A sword/axe with at least an 18% enchantment lengthening upgrade on it. This is important to guarantee continuous Spell breaker coverage for over minute against foes that can remove enchantments. Ideally, a +5 energy mod in the sword would also help out a great deal. Rajazan's Fervor, the Totem Axe or the +5 energy Katana available in Divine Path (and upgraded) all make great weapons for this build.
 * The off-hand is not by choice in this build. It has to be the -50 off hand (see Cities of Ascalon).
 * Ascetic's Armor offers the most energy which is beneficial to this build.

SS Necromancer
Usage:
 * Patience and good timing are the most important aspects of success. Give the 55 monk room to operate and round up and gather aggro. This is not like a run in the Underworld where the tanking is more or less straight forward. The monk will need space to move. Following closely will only result in breaking up aggro and making fights longer. Something that can endanger the monk in fights against mesmers/necromancers.
 * Once the enemies are piled up into one nice pile, or as much as the 55 monk can pile them, invoke Awaken the Blood then proceed to echo and apply Spiteful Spirit on foes. Generally, warriors make the best targets as they attack the fastest and invoke stances while attacking which only serves to increase the damage SS deals.
 * If the enemy group contains a monk or more, Sympathetic Visage (and if possible Ancestor's Visage) on the monk and the use of Desecrate Enchantments will facilitate taking them out.

Equipment:
 * Ideally, Villnar's Glove as a focus item and the Wayward Wand (Curses) from the Adept of Bone as a weapon. These combine for a 36% chance to halve the recharge time of Curses (which includes a 4% chance of making it presumably 4 times faster but the recharge time is capped at half). This reduces the average recharge time of Spiteful Spirit to 8.1 seconds compared with 9 seconds with only one fast recharge item or the full 10 seconds with no fast recharge items.
 * Scar Pattern Armor is best for energy.

Tactics
Much of the success of this build relies on reading and responding to certain situations:
 * Shadow Monks: If a group of Shadow Army forces includes Shadow Monks, they can make things difficult with their powerful healing. Their healing will cause mismatches in damage between foes, making Spiteful Spirit less potent, they can also heal allies around them with a powerful Heal Area and worst of all, if a member falls they can resurrect him. In addition, if there is more than one, they can virtually keep their group alive infinitely. Approach: The key to defeating them is to drain their energy with SV much like the Smite Crawlers of the Underworld. The 55 monk needs to pull enemies so that he/she is next to the monk(s) (easily done by simply attacking with the weapon described above) and also so that the other attackers are adjacent to the monk so that SS can work faster.
 * Shadow Mesmers: The greatest threat they pose is Shatter Enchantment which (if it hits Protective Spirit) will instantly kill the 55 monk. Approach: If there is more than one Shadow Mesmer, then it is best to go with the safe approach and echo SB. The monk should try and pile the mesmers, but (as was mentioned above), if the monk keeps moving around a lot to line up foes, he/she may not have enough energy to cast the echoed Spellbreaker. If there is just one Shadow Mesmer, the 55 monk can protect the enchantments by covering Protective Spirit with Healing Breeze. If the Mesmer shatters Breeze, nothing will happen.
 * Skeletal Ether Breakers: They are much like Shadow Mesmers and the worst thing to be feared from them is Shatter Enchantments. When coupled with Skeletal Icehands, the echoed SB approach is the only way to avoid their spells and the Icehands' Maelstrom.
 * Doubter's Dryders: They possess two enchantment removal skills, so Spell Breaker is a must if taking them on. However, an easier approach is for the 55 monk to cast Spell Breaker on the Necro and have him kill the dryder solo.
 * Abyssals: Abyssals are quite brutal for a 55 monk to take on, especially if more than one is attacking. Their attacks can knockdown the monk frequently disrupting Breeze or, worse, Protective Spirit. Approach: The monk can first start off with one Abyssal at a time around the Tower of Courage. Slowly they will be able to time their casts so that they can go through after the knockdowns. If taking on more than one, it's best to move around a bit so that they are all hitting at the same time, this spares the monk the agony of being knocked down mercilessly because if two knockdown attacks hit at the same time, they only knockdown the monk once.
 * Ancient Skales: These are basically a 55 monk's worst nightmare. Their skill set includes the much dreaded Rend Enchantments, health degeneration and life stealing. They will also place a strain on the SS Necro because they will switch targets and place their life draining hexes on him/her too. Approach: Continued SB coverage is necessary to take them on. The Necromancer should always move away after casting on them so that they do not invoke Grenth's Balance on him/her and steal life (their AI is such that they will look for the target with the most health when using that skill, which will not be the 55 monk). Since these skales do not drop Obsidian Shards, perhaps the best approach would be to avoid them completely.