Effective monk guide

''Note: This article is intended to provide guidance for experienced characters playing new monks or experience monks looking for additional options. If this is your first time playing Guild Wars, please see Getting started in Guild Wars Prophecies/Getting started in Guild Wars Factions.''

A Monk's Place
Monks are the lifeblood of all parties, healing wounds or preventing damage. Monks are primarily support characters, acting to enable the rest of the party. As non-combat casters, monks are usually well away from the thick of battle.

Being a Monk
Playing a monk can be a rewarding experience, or an extremely frustrating trial. Having few direct damage skills, monks are dependent on the rest of the party for damage and defense, but the healing and protection they provide can be the difference between victory and death. Monks however can also play a offensive role which will be noted later in the guide (ie. A smiting monk would be a good example of this).

PvE Monks
In Player versus Environment gameplay, there are very few situations which do not require a Monk. Due to their integral role and high demand, Monks rarely have trouble finding a team. Since having a Monk in your team will attract fellow players, they can easily start their own teams, as well. Most players will consider the advice and demands which a Monk makes before starting the battle. Since they spend most of their time watching the health bars of the team and the progression on the battle field, Monks are in a good position to announce tactical changes, to command moves, and call for retreats by drawing on the mini-map.

PvP Monks
During PvP combat, communication with the rest of the team is vital for a monk's success. Be absolutely sure to effectively communicate what is impeding your intended job ("shutting you down"), any pressures that you may be under, and frequently comment on flaws in team positioning. Teams that talk, win. More specifics on Monks behaving in PvP is discussed below.

Divine Favor
For each rank of Divine Favor, allies are healed for 3.2 whenever you cast Monk spells on them. Several Monk skills, especially spells related to Energy gain and healing become more effective with higher divine favor. For example if your rank is 1 in divine favor a additional +3 is added to the original heal and so forth.

Healing Prayers
No inherent effect. Many Monk skills, especially spells related to healing, become more effective with higher healing prayers.

Secondary Profession Options
For an extended comparison when choosing a secondary profession, see Secondary professions for a Monk.

Warrior
For random arenas, skills such as Bonetti's Defense and Auspicious Parry are great, but elsewhere, a poor choice. "Watch Yourself!" and "Shields Up!" are useful in PvE however.

The exception to the above is in PvP, during which monks are constantly the target of enemy attacks. A warrior secondary allows for various defensive benefits and skills such as Shield Bash and Balanced Stance to counter melee based spike and pressure damage as well as knockdowns. Try to watch the other teams Warriors, and use Shield Bash and Balanced Stance right before they hit you.

Invincimonks generally prefer Warrior as a secondary. Balanced Stance or Dolyak Signet provide an excellent anti-knockdown for solo farming, while Bonetti's Defense reduces the likelihood of being hit by an interrupt from Bladed Aatxes.

Ranger
Ranger is a GREAT secondary profession for monks looking to be runners, or to pursue an exploration title. Skills like Serpent's Quickness, Storm Chaser, Dodge, and Dryder's Defenses can allow a monk with the correct setup to run anywhere. Having an 80%, 90%, or even 100% exploration title on a monk proves that they are capable of more than just support/healing roles.

Necromancer
Offering of Blood is a great energy management skill, however the 20% health sacrifice can mean it is impossible to use when under pressure. Recommended only for PvE when proper tanking is happening.

Mesmer
Mesmer's Inspiration Magic contains a wealth of energy management skills which will ensure you have plenty of energy. Of these, Channeling, Mantra of Recall, Energy Drain, Ether Signet, Drain Enchantment, and Inspired Hex are commonly seen for a Mo/Me. A Mesmer secondary also allows for some defense against certain attacks, such as with Hex Breaker.

Elementalist
Glyph of Lesser Energy helps out when using Aegis or Heal Party.

Glyph of Renewal and Divine Spirit can provide near-continuous reduction of monk spell costs. With a weapon of Enchanting (20% recommended) and 13 ranks in Divine Favor, Divine Spirit lasts 14.4 seconds, nearly the recharge time of the Glyph. This strategy is vulnerable to enchantment removal, however.

Combining Glyph of Sacrifice and Resurrection Chant skill is common practice in PvP, bringing back your team mate in a mere second. Since this requires two skill slots which can be put to better use for a Mo Primary, this combination is usually given to an E/Mo rather than a Mo/E.

Assassin
The Shadow Arts of the Assassin can provide the Monk extra kiting abilities with skills such as Return and Dark Escape, making if fairly easy to survive dangerous situations. The cost of these is the lack of energy management from your secondary profession, but this should never be a problem for experienced monks.

Ritualist
Though the spells of the ritualist do not become more effective with extra divine favor, many provide forms of alternative healing. More ritualist skills give the user a unique meld of protection and regeneration (a few weapon spells help improve defense and health regeneration). The bulk heals of the ritualist are often over shadowed by the monk equivalants, so the main purpose of this secondary is not to redefine the healing role. Unique to this profession however are item spells, giving the monk a nice little bundle to tote around. Most of these items are extremely useful to a monk, giving such benefits as extra armor, extra health, health regeneration, immunity to interruption, blinding nearby enemies, etc. However, keep in mind that using item spells means you are wielding the item and not your weapon sets so you lose any benefit from those while holding the item. In the role of a smiter, ritualist skills allow a much smaller basis, possibly giving helpful spirits or items.

Dervish
Skills like Conviction and Mystic Regeneration can help in the survivability of a monk. Conviction has a long duration, low cost, and is a Stance which cannot be easily removed as enchantments which many monks rely on for defense. Fleeting Stability can also be used to prevent knockdowns, but it must be continually renewed. The Wind Prayers line also offers kiting skills such as Featherfoot Grace and additional healing skills that can affect the entire party.

Paragon
This combination is most useful to a smiting monk, and allows the enhancement of allies with a combination of smiting enchantments such as Judge's Insight, and chants such as Anthem of Flame. However, this combination lacks solid energy management skills and is better suited to short skirmishes than to prolonged combat.

Types of Monks
Monks, unlike most other professions, are expected to fit into a narrow set of primary support categories. There are several predominant monk roles:
 * Healer
 * Prot
 * Boon Prot
 * Bonder
 * Smiter
 * Invincible Monk. Also called 55s or invicimonk.

Healing Monk
The Healing Monk combines inexpensive healing spells with high divine favor to provide fast, repetitive heals to the party.

Attributes for Healing Monks
Healing Monks usually focus on two attribute lines: Healing Prayers and Divine Favor. Several Healing Prayer spells provide the basic setup of the Healing Monk, while Divine Favor is mainly chosen for the additional bonus health it gives the character. Some Healing Monks choose a third attribute line, mainly one from a secondary profession that provides skills to regain energy.

Suggested Strategies for Healing Monks
Attempt to keep allies within your casting range, and foes outside your aggro circle - be the backline. Watch the health meters of your party, and cast healing spells when a party members health meter begins to approach 75%. It may be helpful to select party members with the mouse, and queue skills with the keyboard. Another strategy is to assign party members to Function keys for quick selection.

Style of Playing: Signets

 * To deal continuous heals at low cost, you can use Signets. This might come in handy, especially when you are new to monking and you find yourself out of energy all the time. Alternate with Signet of Rejuvenation or Signet of Devotion, e.g.
 * Word of Healing
 * Signet of Rejuvenation
 * Orison of Healing
 * Signet of Devotion
 * This helps a lot with keeping your energy up, and it makes sure you are always casting something. While you aren't casting you might feel like you should be and waste your energy!

Style of Playing: Heal Party

 * Many groups are quite large and a challenge to be tended properly. Heal Party is a popular spell that heals each party member for up to 84 points, making that well over 600 points altogether. As a healer in PvE, Heal Party should be your first choice when encountering mobs or area effects which cause widespread amounts of health drain, such as the poisoning spiders in Maguuma Jungle or the Domain of Health Draining in the Dragon's Lair. Mo/Es may try combining Heal Party with Glyph of Lesser Energy, reducing the cost of 2 Heal Party to 5 Energy every 30 seconds.
 * In PvP, the use of Heal Party is ambivalent. Having two seconds of casting time and a quite high energy investment, it should not be used frequently. Use it to counter massive degeneration or to restore minor wounds on the whole team in one shot. If multiple monks are equipped with this skill, only one of them should be casting at a time, so the other one is available to cast more powerful spells on single targets. It is also popular to have an Elementalist/Monk use heal party because of the Elementalist's primary attribute, Energy Storage, which raises the Elementalist's maximum energy and grants exclusive access to some of the best energy management skills in the game.

Style of Playing: Dwayna's Kiss

 * Dwayna's Kiss is one of the more powerful healing spells around. Its extended healing power relies on the target being buffed. It is best used to heal attuned Elementalists, Enchanted Warriors and other party members enchanted by a Bonder. Heavily hexed allies are also a prime target for this healing spell, as it heals for a substantial amount more then Orison of Healing with even just one hex. Another target for this spell are Dervishes, who frequently maintain many enchantments on themselves. To increase overall effectiveness, have a Protector bring Aegis or party with a Bonder.

Special Case: Infuser

 * Infuse Health is by far the most powerful healing spell in Guild Wars. Paired with Divine Boon, it can heal over 400 points if the caster is well-equipped. However, this healing comes a heavy sacrifice of 50% of the casters current health. Because of this, Infuse Health is most often followed with Healing Touch or another high-health skill as a self-heal. Infuse Health can be used either as a backup skill in special situations or as a monk's main healing spell (the latter, however, would be extremely dangerous to the monk). See Infuse Monk for more detailed information.

Special Case: Boon Healer Monk

 * Boon Healer Monks are a relatively new build, utilizing the Healer's Boon enchantment from Nightfall to use normally slow Healing Prayers skills to support Protection monks.

Protection Monk
The Protection Monk combines protection spells that prevent damage with skills that keep the party free of conditions. Unlike the Healing Monk who is reactive, Protection Monks are pro-active and don't wait until after the damage is done to heal the character - the spells are pre-applied to their teammates to prevent the damage from happening.

Attributes for Protection Monks
Protection Monks will mainly rely on Protection Prayers with some Divine Favor bonus, since protection spells themselves do not offer any healing. As with Healing Monks, a third attribute line might be used for energy reasons.

Suggested Strategies for Protectors
Attempt to keep allies within your casting range, and foes outside your aggro circle. Watch out for party members taking damage and use your protection skills. Unlike the Healing Monk, do not wait until they have taken considerable damage, cast your spells right at the first sign of trouble. Further tactics depend on your choice of skills and whether you play PvE or PvP:
 * PvE
 * If applicable, rely on your condition removal skills (e.g. Mend Ailment or Restore Condition) to keep the party health high.
 * Have an extra eye on the tanks and buff them before they aggro the next group of mobs.
 * PvP
 * Buff soft targets beforehand. Renew their buffs every once in a while if you can afford the energy costs, even when they are not the target. Most groups switch targets quickly, usually to unleash their adrenaline skills all at once.

Boon Prot
This build has been nerfed and is now considered out-dated in PvP combat.

Boon Prot Monks are monks who combine the preventive power of protection spells with the huge healing bonus of Divine Boon, essentially filling both the role of a traditional Healing Monk and Protection Monk at once. That power comes at a price, though - Boon Prot Monks run out of energy very fast and often are required to dip into the Mesmer class for energy management ability.

Bonder Monk
The passive protection monk, or "Bonder Monk", uses maintained enchantments to provide continual protection. A specialty, the Bonder Monk does not actually cast spells during combat. Instead, Bonders cast maintained protection enchantment on party members before the battle starts and concentrate on keeping those enchantments up.

Attributes for Bonder monks
All Bonding Monks use a fairly standard set of skills from the Protection Prayers line, combined with the skill Balthazar's Spirit (but without any attribute points in Smiting Prayers), Life Bond and the skill Blessed Signet from Divine Favor. Additional attribute points are used for secondary profession line Inspiration Magic, which provides a few skills that help to speed up Blessed Signet, such as Mantra of Inscriptions. Keep in mind that many PUGs may grow impatient at having to wait on a bonder before moving on to the next area. In such cases, teammates may very well move beyond the range of your bonds.

Suggested Strategies for Bonder Monks
Cast your chosen bonds and stay well clear of combat. Use Blessed Signet as often as possible to prevent your energy from reaching zero. Watch your maintained bonds and the party status window for stripped enchantments and replace them as soon as possible. When you are getting a lot of additional energy through Balthazar's Spirit, cast non-maintained protection spells to help your healer.

Other Monk Roles

 * Smiting monks, though rare, can be extremely destructive in areas populated by Undead creatures.
 * Invincimonks, or 55 tank monks, use protective spirit, low health, and powerful regeneration spells.

Armor & Runes
Monks are, in a sense, the most important part of any team: No other class will contribute as much to the fall of any team by dying as monks do. That means that monks should take the utmost care not to die. Part of that is not using superior and major runes (which carry health penalties) unless really needed. As a rule of thumb, no monk should carry more than one superior rune, and even monks with only minor runes are very common. Of course, runes of vigor are an exception to that rule, since they actually boost health. There is no commonly agreed on "best" monk armor, however most top level PvP monks opt for +10 Vs. Physical Damage armor, to further reduce their damage taken.

Weapons
The choice of weapon is less important for monks, since they are not the main attackers. More important than the actual damage are the upgrades (like additional health, armor and energy, or reduced casting and recharge time of skills). Note that most weapons have a requirement in attributes. High-end unique ("green") weapons come with maximum upgrades (be aware that some unique weapons don't) and are usually cheaper than similar, non-unique weapons.

Combat Tactics
A monk has 2 roles in combat: Staying alive and keeping the team alive. Since the second requires the first, staying alive should be the highest priority.

Positioning and Kiting
The simpliest (and at the same time hardest) way to stay alive is by not being hit. Monks don't need to be close to the enemy - they can afford to stay back behind the attackers, just in range for heals, but out of range of enemy attacks. Good attackers will position themselves such that they block the enemy from the monk and keep the aggro on the attacker instead of the monk. In case someone still breaks through, or you get targeted by ranged attacks and spells, don't hesitate to run. You are more valuable to the team running away than dead. Run away from the fight (so as to prevent getting targeted by even more enemies) and try to lose the enemy. If you are a monk with Protection Prayers, you can also try to stay and tank, but that is risky and should only be done if you are sure of surviving. If other players on your team can support your kiting, don't hesitate to ask them for a buff, such as Guardian, Windborne Speed, or Sympathetic Visage.

Specifics: Team and Random Arena

 * Since your team is pretty small and there won't actually be a main front but more a melange of your fighters and enemy fighters, you'll have a hard time figuring out a good position. You get the best results by circling the spot where the fight takes place. Try keeping your allies within casting range all the time.
 * [[image:ta_circling.png]]

Specifics: Global Tournament

 * In most cases, just behave like in Team Arena. Everything else depends on the map you are playing. Especially on relic runs, keeping a good distance to your own members will be very difficult. If possible, split up the monk team so each of you covers a part of the map. The most simple modus to kite on is probably in King of the hill. The main fighting area will usually be in the middle of the map so your path will be a perfect circle. Just watch out for smart Warriors and Elementalists to block your way.

Specifics: Guild versus Guild

 * In GvG matches, monks are most often the first targets to be attacked, and the ones who have to deal with the most pressure. Due to the high power of Dervishes and speed of Assassins, monks need to carry skills that will help them survive, in return helping their team survive. Common elite skills used are Blessed Light, Zealous Benediction, Divert Hexes and most commonly Light of Deliverance. Light of Deliverance Monks can also be employed as flag runners to secure morale boosts, using Light of Deliverance to keep their party's health up from afar, but they are most commonly used as main monks partnered with a Restore Condition or Divert Hexes monk.

Hex Removal
Hexes are a special type of spell that affects enemies for a period of time. Some of these are minor annoyances, but some have devastating effects. Since removing hexes is time consuming and hex removing skills can not be spammed, it is important that you learn to tell harmless hexes from bad ones and only remove the latter. Affected persons can help by "calling" (CTRL + left click on the hex icon) bad hexes.

Since there are quite a number of hex removal skills and most of them behave very differently, they need to be discussed by type.
 * Contemplation of Purity
 * Since this removal skill only works on yourself, it is not suitable for helping the team. But it does an outstanding job helping you to stay alive. Since you usually are enchanted, CoP will grant you a great amount of healing while purging an indefinite amount of hexes. But be careful: The activation is cheap and quick, but restoring your enchantments can be quite consuming. This is a good way to remove hexes such as Backfire from yourself, because CoP is not a spell and will not trigger them in the process.
 * Holy Veil
 * This skill is very delicate in application. It is a maintained enchantment removing one hex upon termination. If you simply need the removal, terminate the Veil right after casting. However, it can be very useful if being maintained on the target, making hexes less efficient and creating opportunities for your interrupting Rangers and Mesmers.
 * Divert Hexes
 * This skill enables you to remove up to 3 hexes at once, with additional effects of healing and conditions removal. Having a relatively small recharge time compared to other means of hex removal, this skill is very effective against Necromancers and Mesmers who cover dangerous hexes with cheap ones. This spell can be very energy efficient when used to its full potential
 * Blessed Light and Remove Hex
 * These are of the type "fire and forget". If you have the energy at hand, just remove any hex that comes up. The low recharge time enables you to remove up to three times the amount of hexes compared to other skills in the same time span.
 * Inspired Hex and Revealed Hex
 * These removal skills from Inspiration Magic have one advantage: they are really energy friendly. On low skill levels, they cost no energy if a hex is removed, and on high levels even yield energy. Another advantage is that redundant removal attempts will not cause this skill to be recharged, so if your team mate was faster in removing than you, you merely sacrificed 5 Energy while other skills would be blacked out for some time. The downside is the long recharge time upon successful removal. Have other characters bring additional removal skills if you use these.
 * Other Hex removal skills
 * There are plenty of other skills out there, which can remove hexes. In most cases however, none of them is recommended to usual Monks. Most of them make a good choice for other classes or in specific situations like Smiting Monks.

Condition Removal
Conditions are less severe than hexes, (still some are more troublesome than others) but they can be applied to enemies at less cost. It is especially the role of Protection Monks to keep the party free of conditions.

Energy Management
Energy management is crucial to a party's survival as a monk with constant energy problems may as well not be there. Three basic rules exist for managing your energy:

1) Be careful not to "over heal" or "over protect" a teammate. Learn how much your spells heal and how effective your various protection spells are. If a target is only missing 30-40 health, it is a waste of energy to heal them, as half of your spell has no effect. Similarly, putting too much protection on a single target can be overkill. If you just used Shield of Deflection on a party member, Guardian would have little effect on them.

2) Never be at full energy.  Being at full energy for 4 seconds means that you didn't use 4 seconds' worth of energy regen, which is roughly equivalent to 5 energy.  Put that energy regeneration to good use by spending that 5 energy and keeping yourself just barely under maximum energy.  The only time you should be at full energy is right before the beginning of a fight.

3) Take breaks between fights to regain your lost energy.  Most groups are quite willing to wait for you to regen. (This applies to PvE)

4) Use the right spells for the situation.  Healing Breeze is perfect when a party member is dealing with minor damage over time, but it becomes a liability (and waste of energy) if enchantment shatterers are nearby. (Note, Healing Breeze is not to be used on a main Monk in PvP, it is considered a waste of energy and extremely inefficient. Some Monk runners may have room for this skill)

Bonding monks have a very unique energy management situation as they are constantly losing energy to support their many maintained enchantments. Close attention will have to be paid towards the recharge cycle of Blessed Signet and the limited energy that can be spent on other spells such as condition removers.

Resurrecting
Some very few special cases apart, it is not a reasonable thing for monks to resurrect team mates during battle. Monks should be carrying a resurrection spell for the worst case (PvP is an exception here), but only use it after the battle. If the fight goes really wrong, run away and wait for the enemy to scatter before resurrecting.

Resurrecting takes a long amount of time, so if a monk resurrects during battle, usually other team members die before the spell is finished. However, Healer's Boon and Holy Haste can be used to drastically reduce the casting time of resurrection spells in the healing line, and with a staff, wand, or offhand providing 20% half casting time of healing spells, you can occasionally further reduce the casting time of resurrection spells. Glyph of Sacrifice is another option if you can spare the skill slot and the 5 energy to activate it.

Two Monk Backline
Generally teams in Guild battles and Heroes' Ascent bring two Monks. Common backlines include Divert Hexes Monks paired with a Restore Condition character, dual Blessed Escapers, or any of the preceding and a Light of Deliverance Infuser. Generally each Monk shares the duties of removing conditions and pre-protting targets. With a two Monk backline, the Monks usually spend most of their time with the main team, healing the party at the flag stand if there is a dedicated "gank" team.

Three Monk Backline
Three Monk backlines are impractical now in Heroes Ascent, due to the change from eight player teams to six players. Most of the utility Monk positions (such as an Infuser with Spellbreaker) are obsolete. Where there are three Monks in a guild battle, often the player is dedicated to running the flag and is equipped with Heal Party or Light of Deliverance, to ease the load on the primary Monks.

On occasion, split teams will assign a third Monk to assist the team attempting to kill the opposing teams archers and footmen. This role may also be filled by a Ritualist.

General Tactics
Monks should generally stay within the back-line of their parties formation, but should always be prepared to push up to heal the front-line characters when a big push is happening (a good, tight formation makes it easier to catch spikes or heal the front-line). Generally, monks should play a defensive game, allowing their team's melee to wreak havoc on the opposing team's back-line. Communication between the party is key. Let the rest of your team know what is a threat to you (i.e. a Mesmer is shutting you down), and let your party know when it's time to play defensively or offensively (generally this is when you start to run low on energy). Whenever a party member pushes too far forward (this is called "over-extending" and is generally done by melee characters) let them know they are too far up and in danger (experienced melee players can, under the right circumstances, over-extend and get back in range before it becomes a problem).

Always watch the other teams front-line. Watch who they go for and use protection skills such as Protective Spirit, Spirit Bond, and Shield of Absorption on the target you see them running at. This is commonly called "pre-protting" and plays a major role in good monking (i.e. keeping your team alive). If there is an over extended character or Frenzied warrior in your back-line, tell your team to kill it. In these situations it helps if the mid-line falls back and body blocks the over-extended enemy so it can't run back to its back-line. Self-awareness is extremely important. Self-awareness includes knowing which skills to use when, on what characters and against what, which skills combine well together (this is something to consider both when you put together your build and when you are using it), how to manage your energy and what to do if it runs low, your positioning within the formation, and when to avoid the other team's melee (this is called "kiting").

Unless the situation specifically requires it, try to avoid splitting your two main monks unless the build is designed for it. Having one monk against more than four opposing people can often lead to disaster. This tactic should only be used in dire situations or when it is a tactical advantage (for instance if you face a spike team splitting them up will generally greatly reduce their damage output).

Prioritize your team mates and skill usage. Know that blind on a Mesmer is not as important as blind on a Warrior/Assassin/Dervish/Paragon. Try to prioritize your hex or condition removals to the people that need it the most (for instance, don't bother removing Blurred Vision from a Mesmer). Communication is key in knowing what needs to be removed and what doesn't need to be removed.