Curious about Protection monk strategies

[lithun]

Hi, I'm healing monk and I'm curious how a protection monk works in a group.

My "healing monk" setup is as follows:

Word of healing
Orison
Heal Party
Infuse Health
Heal other
Smite Hex
Healing Breeze
Rebirth

This setup seems to work fairly well in a group for me. Especially since I got Word of healing just a couple of days ago.

I read over the protection monk build but I'm still wondering if a protection monk is as desireable as a healing monk. Is it always a case of "as long as their is a primary healer, then a protection monk is a nice add-on?"

Anyways, I was thinking about adding some protection features to my setup but not sure if it will be viable. Do you protection monks find that you are a valuable asset in both PvE and PvP or just PvP?

Thanks.

[bodangly]

Personally I think you could be a more effective healer if you lost some of those direct heals for some enchantments, maybe Healing Seed or something. I find using Healing Breeze coupled with Healing Seed will save you a lot of energy in the long run, as frantically dropping Orisons, Heal Others, etc. can get expensive quickly.

[dbchan]

Protection monks are great when paired up with another healer. Protection skills generally consume more energy or energy uphold so a protector usually don't have much spare energy for heals. But they do a good job preventing damage in the first place so the other healer can do the healing easier. Things like Aegis, Protective Spirit are great, especially when you face big hitters (e.g. in Underworld).

But in most cases, direct heals are more effective.

[CancerTen]

Protection monks arent really very effective in comparison to plain healers. The only spell I find Protectors get which is more effective than a healer spell is reversal of fortune, which is an incredibly effective spell to cast on somebody taking damage.

[Corrodias]

bringing Healing Hands and/or Healing Seed from the Healing Prayers section and Aegis, Guardian, and/or Life Bond from the Protection Prayers section means that you should be able to keep someone alive through almost any physical bombardment.

don't be afraid to cast Life Bond on someone and then cancel it 20 seconds later. it's very useful in protecting a single target. it makes half the damage dealt to the target (and i don't know if this is only physical damage) go to you instead, and reduces that damage by some amount (21 at 10 protection prayers).

i am curious about how Life Bond interacts with Protective Bond.

[Herthbul]

Protection Monks tend to lack in PvE and shine in PvP. Monsters don't focus fire nearly as often as in PvP, so your single target enchantments like Guardian aren't getting the full bang for your buck. But in PvP, key spells like Reversal of Fortune and Shield of Deflection are your key players. Lay those on the focused target and watch the misses roll in.

[kleang]

It's depend on area. Protection monk will very useful in high level (that's why we got protection hency).

In some map, you absolutely need protection monk. Underworld as an example, monster attack you at 200-400 dmg (and 2-3 monster at the same time). No way to heal quick enough.

[Ahastar Darktalon]

If I may say so, in my opinion your layout is a bit unbalanced:

Word of healing
Orison
Heal Party
Infuse Health
Heal other
Smite Hex
Healing Breeze
Rebirth

Let's see. Word of Healing is a mighty nice *** saver, especially due to it's low HP extra boost for just 5 energy points. Orision of Healing costs and achives exactly the same as a boostless Word of Healing, but is less powerful due to lacking boost. You could do without it. Heal Party is very costy, but extremely reliable. infuse Health might be interesting if you wouldn't have Heal Other. A high Healing Prayers Heal Other totally pales Infuse Health, especially since it cuts down your own HP by 50%. Kick Infuse Health. Keep Heal Other.

Smite Hex certainly does it's job well and shows me that you do not enjoy hexed party members. Healing Breeze is a damn fine spell as well. And Rebirth might be the best PVE rez spell.

Now, how about this suggestion:

Word of healing
Healing Seed
Heal Party
Mend Ailment
Heal other
Smite Hex
Healing Breeze
Rebirth

This gives you a nifty frontline regen spell (healing seed cast on the main tank) as well as a muchly needed condition killer (mend ailment).

[lithun]

Now, how about this suggestion:

Word of healing
Healing Seed
Heal Party
Mend Ailment
Heal other
Smite Hex
Healing Breeze
Rebirth



Thanks for the input guys. I'm actually using the following setup now because I just got Healing touch.

Word of healing
Healing touch
Heal party
infuse health
heal other
healing breeze
rebirth
vengeance

If you don't use Orison or healing touch, how do you guys stay alive if you're getting focus fired? Healing breeze is often just not enough to keep myself alive.

How can you say that "heal other" is as good as infuse health? Infuse health is by far the best emergency heal. At 500hp, it's about a 300 hp heal; my heal other only heals for like 160hp + bonuses at 14 healing and 12 divine favor (it may be in the low 200s I suppose). Maybe Heal Other is better; I'll have to research it.


How about this setup?

Word of Healing
Healing Touch
Heal Party
Heal Other
Mend Ailment
Smite Hex or Remove Hex
Rebirth
Vengeance

[Ahastar Darktalon]

Well if you have 500 HP (damn), then it's a different story of course.
I have 290 HP max.

As far as your self heal on focus fire is concerned, I would recommend protective spirit, but with 500 HP it won't help you that much. That's why a low max HP is not exactly a bad thing as a monk, because while healing breeze is an absolute healing spell, protective spirit is a % one. Combine protective spirit with an 8 arrow regen and a max HP of around 300 and you are pretty well protected.

[lithun]

Well, I've evolved into a protection/healing monk. For PvE, my skill bar is set up as follows:

Word of Healing
Healing touch
Protective spirit
heal other
remove hex
rebirth
protective bond
aegis

I hit aegis everytime it comes up in battle. I put protective spirit on teammates that I see taking heat and then follow with heals unless I don't have time for that of course. Protective bond is a neat enchantment that I want to play around with but haven't much as yet.

I haven't done much PvP yet but will probably keep very similar build. Maybe switch out rebirth with unyielding aura.

[lred]

There's no reason why you could not be a healing/protection monk, unless you want smiting or put points in a secondary class skill.
With high divine favor and high protection you can still have some 10~11 healing. Devine favor+divine boon makes any monk spell a decent healing spell (comparable to orison), and you'll need to heal less because of protection.
A number of protection spells actually do heal by themselves, ie reversal of fortune, mend ailment, mend condition.
The weakness of protection is that the enchanments can be taken off by opponents, which can also do damage depending on the enchanment removal spell that's used.

[Tiani Li]

I am also a healing/protection monk.
My build:

Heal other
Rebirth
Life bond
Balthazar's spirit
Shielding hands
Shield of Regeneration
Healing Breeze
Blessed Signet

I use Life bond and Balthazar's spirit to keep the tank alive and give me energy. Personally I find shield of regen to just be wonderfully powerful. +40 armour is just darn nice. Shielding hands along with healing breeze takes care of most damage as does shield of regen. As long as my tank or myself is taking damage I have enough energy to keep spaming heal other if this get too heavy for the health regeneration to handle. If I'm running low on energy then Blessed Signet gives me energy depending on how many enchantments I am holding. Creatures that mess up enchantments give me quit a bit of trouble, but in PVE you will learn pretty darn quick which enemies drop your enchantments.

I've heard of people putting life bond on every single party member along with balth spirit on themselves then using blessed signet to keep it up in the down time between battles. I haven't tried this myself I usually just hold 1 or 2 life bonds only on the people who are taking damage.

[Cygnus Arnimane]

I am also a healing/protection monk.
My build:

Heal other
Rebirth
Life bond
Balthazar's spirit
Shielding hands
Shield of Regeneration
Healing Breeze
Blessed Signet

I use Life bond and Balthazar's spirit to keep the tank alive and give me energy. Personally I find shield of regen to just be wonderfully powerful. +40 armour is just darn nice. Shielding hands along with healing breeze takes care of most damage as does shield of regen. As long as my tank or myself is taking damage I have enough energy to keep spaming heal other if this get too heavy for the health regeneration to handle. If I'm running low on energy then Blessed Signet gives me energy depending on how many enchantments I am holding. Creatures that mess up enchantments give me quit a bit of trouble, but in PVE you will learn pretty darn quick which enemies drop your enchantments.

I've heard of people putting life bond on every single party member along with balth spirit on themselves then using blessed signet to keep it up in the down time between battles. I haven't tried this myself I usually just hold 1 or 2 life bonds only on the people who are taking damage.


Interesting stadegy. I would feel too vulnerable to Enchantment removers to use it myself..as you already pointed out...the Enchantment removers are out there :) I tend to come up with a more universal skill mix.

[Bravo]

An interesting combination that I stumbled upon whilst playing with a guild member exploring was:
Me: Mo/R
Spell breaker (elite) (divine favour)
Essence bond
Life Bond
Balthazars spirit
protective bond
quickening zephyr
serpents quickness
blessed signet

Elementalist: assorted nukes.
Healer henchman.

With the various enchantments I had running the enemy had no choice but to use regular attacks in the area I was in (caster heavy). As such their damage was at maximum around 24 (protective bond - no loss of energy thanks to the essence bond on me and him, and balthazar's spirit on me, with life bond on him so that essence bond and balthazar's spirit would trigger on me) and spell breaker up for 14 seconds out of every 15 (he had obsideon flesh to cover in between). Blessed signet would recharge fast enough to maintain energy. The healer henchman could easily keep up with the healing on the elementalist who basically drew the attention of all the mobs and killed them with spells.

[wheel]

spell breaker has a recharge time of 45 seconds.

[drakesis]

he was using serpent's quickness and quickening zephyr. both increase recharge time on all spells. serpent's is 33%, i believe quickening might be the same.. so, 45 seconds reduced by 60% or so.. i cant do math. so maybe that works.. damn, i need to try that! ;)

[Lord Zado]

If you don't use Orison or healing touch, how do you guys stay alive if you're getting focus fired? Healing breeze is often just not enough to keep myself alive.


Any decent monk should not be taking damage in PvE. You should worry more about your playing style than your skills if your problem is that you are getting focus fired.