Spirit Forest

[Wuzzman]

Has anyone seen this build? I have. Its horriible. Well for the monks. See I was running a funny new ranger spike in hero acsent when we encountered this literal forest of spirits. EVERY spirit in the game except go figure the one that helps rangers:rolleyes:. I couldn't catch their build. They had the 2 stupid warriors in our face and we would try to spike the spirit spammering rit...other then taht it was only till the game ended that I noticed that they even had a monk or 2 because I litterally couldn't tab through all those spirits to check their build. The painful part is that our two poor boons prots where trying soooo hard to keep their heads above the horrible effects of all those spiirts. If you seen it tell me...its amazing and I would like to know the build :azn:

[Abrupt]

Sounds like it could have been NR/Tranq, which is fairly common in HA.

[tarutaru]

Here's one version of it. It packs 20+ spirits, all of which can be quickly recharged and re-cast quite quickly. The universal effects are hard for any opposing group to keep track of/work around. Dual shock warriors rip up anyone who gets close enough to the huge amass of spirits. The spammers should use the spirits tactically, i.e., using them as body-blockers, to prevent relic runs, or to just swamp the alter to prevent any other ghostly hero from capping it. The main goal of the spirit spammers is to ensure that anyone wanting to get to your monk backline cannot literally get to them due to pathing obstacles. An example team setup is as follows, however it varies to to personal preference. Some teams chose to use fewer spirit spammers and have some support classes...


Ritualist/Ranger
Spawning Power: 13 (12+1)
Communing: 16 (12+4)

Bloodsong (Communing)
Disenchantment (Communing)
Displacement (Communing)
Dissonance (Communing)
Earthbind (Communing)
Pain (Communing)
Ritual Lord [Elite] (Spawning Power)
Boon of Creation (Spawning Power)

Ritualist/Ranger
Spawning Power: 13 (12+1)
Communing: 16 (12+4)

Restoration (Communing)
Shadowsong (Communing)
Shelter (Communing)
Soothing (Communing)
Union (Communing)
Ritual Lord [Elite] (Spawning Power)
Boon of Creation (Spawning Power)
Flesh of my Flesh (Restoration Magic)

Ritualist/Ranger
Spawning Power: 11 (10+1)
Restoration Magic: 16 (12+4)
Beast Mastery: 8

Life (Restoration Magic)
Preservation [Elite] (Restoration Magic)
Recuperation (Restoration Magic)
Primal Echoes (Beast Mastery)
Fertile Season (Beast Mastery)
Symbiosis (Beast Mastery)
Boon of Creation (Spawning Power)
Flesh of my Flesh (Restoration Magic)

Ranger/Ritualist
Expertise: 13 (12+1)
Wilderness Survival: 16 (12+4)

Oath Shot [Elite] (Expertise)
Brambles (Wilderness Survival)
Frozen Soil (Wilderness Survival)
Muddy Terrain (Wilderness Survival)
Nature's Renewal (Wilderness Survival)
Quickening Zephyr (Wilderness Survival)
Tranquility (Wilderness Survival)
Resurrection Signet ()

2 x Warrior/Elementalist
Strength: 9 (8+1)
Axe Mastery: 16 (12+4)
Air Magic: 10

Eviscerate [Elite] (Axe Mastery)
Axe Rake (Axe Mastery)
Executioner's Strike (Axe Mastery)
Bull's Strike (Strength)
Frenzy (Warrior other)
Sprint (Strength)
Shock (Air Magic)
Resurrection Signet ()

Monk/Mesmer
Divine Favor: 15 (11+4)
Protection Prayers: 11 (10+1)
Inspiration Magic: 10

Mantra of Recall [Elite] (Inspiration Magic)
Divine Boon (Divine Favor)
Guardian (Protection Prayers)
Reversal of Fortune (Protection Prayers)
Mend Condition (Protection Prayers)
Inspired Hex (Inspiration Magic)
Signet of Devotion (Divine Favor)
Protective Spirit (Protection Prayers)

Monk/Mesmer
Divine Favor: 15 (11+4)
Healing Prayers: 11 (10+1)
Inspiration Magic: 10

Blessed Light [Elite] (Divine Favor)
Dwayna's Kiss (Healing Prayers)
Gift of Health (Healing Prayers)
Signet of Devotion (Divine Favor)
Healing Whisper (Healing Prayers)
Power Drain (Inspiration Magic)
Drain Enchantment (Inspiration Magic)
Heal Party (Healing Prayers)

[ZiegDivine]

tarutaru, why are you running a boon/prot with nr/tranq?

[bellissima]

You should probably run 2 N/Mo instead of Mo/Mes with tarutaru's build. They'll have practically infinite energy with that many spirit spammers. Put an infuse health in there somewhere. And yeah, ditch the boon prot, he'll be in for a world of hurt with NR/Tranq.

[Patccmoi]

It's pretty likely the kind of build you faced.

I'd go for 1 Hammer-1 Axe warrior and put some nukes on the Rts (Doom seems like a natural choice), and 2 N/Mos healers (they can do some corpse control too!). Out of that, it's what you can expect from mass spirits teams.

3-4 spirit spammers, 2 damage dealers that can usually do crazy damage (for example warriors under all these spirits can very likely stay in Frenzy nearly all the time, because they won't be targetted that much and if they are they have Shelter-Union-Restoration-Displacement on their back and can just switch to Rush if it's too much or if the spirits drop).

For the Rt spirit spammers, i'd likely reorganize them as such:

1) R/Rt

16 Expertise
12 Communing

Bloodsong
Shadowsong
Pain
Dissonance
Disenchantment
Restoration
Whirling Defense
Oath Shot

2) Rt/X

15 Communing
14 Spawning

Shelter
Union
Earthbind / Soothing
Displacement
Doom
Boon of Creation
Ritual Lord
Flesh of my Flesh

3)Rt/R

Spawning Power: 11 (10+1)
Restoration Magic: 16 (12+4)
Beast Mastery: 8

Life (Restoration Magic)
Preservation [Elite] (Restoration Magic)
Recuperation (Restoration Magic)
Spirit Transfer
Feast of Soul / Rupture Soul
Primal Echoes (Beast Mastery)
Fertile Season (Beast Mastery)
Flesh of my Flesh (Restoration Magic)

I don't think Symbiosis is truly required at all, you don't use enchants, it can only help the other team. Fertile Season should only be used when holding an altar.

The reason for the R/Rt is that attacking spirits don't require Spawning Power (they're very likely to never be attacked with all the spirits around, and the R/Rt in Whirling is safer to go plant them offensively), and if you want to use Dissonance/Disenchantment (25E) under QZ (32E...) you better have Expertise or you'll just never recast them, even with Boon of Creation.

Restoration spirits shouldn't require to be recast that often, and so Boon of Creation seems a waste (considering NR/QZ/Tranq, seems like you would lose energy in the end trying to keep your Boon up). It's ok for the Shelter-Union-Displacement Rt because he can hang far in the back, so the 4 sec cast of Boon is less likely to be interrupted and he can just safely put his spirits up, none requiring to be need the other team to be efficient.

Thumpers as damage dealers can be great too because they are absolutely devastating under QZ with fast recharge on their attacks (with Ferocious as elite that is, otherwise you can run into energy trouble), and they can use Hammer Bash really often, which is great when having Earthbind around. If you don't use Thumpers, Soothing seems like a better choice than Earthbind since warriors already have enough KD duration with their stoneskin gauntlets.

Just some suggestions =p

[Wuzzman]

wow thanks. That was the build exactly....now to start farming fame ^_^.

o by the way how does earthbind work exactly....I can't seem to understand the logic behind it(seen it with action and I wanted to scream....), I'm usually good at this stuff and I don't believe anet made a useless spirit....

[Servant of Kali]

by the way how does earthbind work exactly....I can't seem to understand the logic behind it

Let's say that warrior comes near someone and does Shock. The target is, thanks to Earthbind, knocked down for 3seconds. Earthbind itself doesnt do anything, it just makes knockdowns last 3sec instead of 1sec let's say.



btw, i dislike HA because of cookie cutter builds, but if anyone ever needs a spirit spammer for this build, gimme a call pls :P seems like fun style, even though i would tweak it a bit.

[tarutaru]

Yeah, just go with Pat's version. I was just throwing together a quick example, from my experience in watching in HA. Definately no boon-prot though. That's what I get for quickly copy and pasting monk builds at the end :P

[scamPOR]

earth bind doesnt help shock warriors... stonefist has the same effect

[David Holtzman]

earth bind doesnt help shock warriors... stonefist has the same effect
Shock is one second. Add one from Stonefist and that's two for a shock warrior. Earthbind gives 3 seconds.

[Bravo]

I thought unless otherwise stated a knockdown would take 1.75 seconds from knockdown to able to activate skills, so stoneskin gauntlets would make shock knockdown for 2.75 seconds, no practical difference from earthbind...

[David Holtzman]

I thought unless otherwise stated a knockdown would take 1.75 seconds from knockdown to able to activate skills, so stoneskin gauntlets would make shock knockdown for 2.75 seconds, no practical difference from earthbind...

As I recall (and I have not tested this so it may not be accurate) all knockdowns unless otherwise specified (gale, backbreaker, etc) are 1 second.

[Ashin]

Often I see builds that have nr/tranq request a resto rit for healing.

As a sidenote I have been given some outrageous skillbars when asked to be said resto rit, so sometimes I think when folks make these builds, they need to recognize whether they know the class they are building well enough.

I always accept skillbars that are given to me by the team leader, but imo the best team leaders explain the rationale for the skillbar and let me modify it if I think I can achieve the same objectives with better results using a slightly different build.

[David Holtzman]

As I recall (and I have not tested this so it may not be accurate) all knockdowns unless otherwise specified (gale, backbreaker, etc) are 1 second.

Did some testing. Above seems to be accurate.

[asxtc]

/agrees
with bobbank
A sensible approach..which sadly is rather lacking in the " this is the build i want and if you dont bring it..ill kick!" mode some ppl are in.

[halfthought]

lol, saw that build too, it was utterly PATHETIC, but the forest of spirits was kind-of cool and creative