[Video] M*A*S*H Justicar/Shaman/Warden PVP @ Rank 4

[Miraodus]

FWIW, in a lot of warfronts I'm one of the top healers on our side, regardless of rank. And some of the key mechanics for M*A*S*H - especially my ability to cover a retreat or running FC - don't show up on the scoreboard. I can basically clear 3 DPS off an FC on the run.

I assume this is through the use of Humility one target, Battle Charge on another and Crushing Wave on the 3rd (in no particular order)? While clearing 3 people off a FC is definitely doable, I find the biggest problem with Rift PvP is that EVERYONE is DR'd by the time I get to them. Often times when I try a knockback, I see the oh so lovely green letters come up "Immune" or when I need to snare them "Immune" thanks to other people chain snaring said person. I can never truly understand why, back in 1.2, they put Roots/Snares/Knockbacks all on the same DR category. A Knockback + Snare combo to create a gap and maintain it should be a valid escape tactic - Instead, it ends up penalizing both you and your teammates since said target is now immune to all movement impairments for 15 seconds.

I have found in 1.5 that M*A*S*H has mechanics that counter the increased damage and healing debuffs we're seeing. The passive 16% Dodge and 16% Parry at R7 are excellent for surviving focus fire and keeping healing debuffs from getting applied.

16% Dodge and Parry is nice but can be completely negated with a weapon or item ~90 Focus (which is so easy to obtain). Are you finding that players aren't including sufficient hit/focus in their PvP gear to make Devout Deflection worth it? In my PvP gear, I have a mere 50 Focus which I believe works out to 10%. Once I add 2 Radiant Sharp runes, I'll be at 86 Focus == 17.2% and therefore completely negate your avoidance values.

[Guyjax]

This spec is not a strong ST healer - that is its primary weakness from a healing throughput perspective. That I totally agree with. But it's a very strong sustained AE healer IMO.

FWIW, in a lot of warfronts I'm one of the top healers on our side, regardless of rank. And some of the key mechanics for M*A*S*H - especially my ability to cover a retreat or running FC - don't show up on the scoreboard. I can basically clear 3 DPS off an FC on the run.

I have found in 1.5 that M*A*S*H has mechanics that counter the increased damage and healing debuffs we're seeing. The passive 16% Dodge and 16% Parry at R7 are excellent for surviving focus fire and keeping healing debuffs from getting applied.

My uptime is excellent, and I prefer it when DPS classes choose to focus me instead of another friendly healer.

Once I hit R8 I'll be posting more videos.

True its no where near as strong as the other healing souls , but I actually heal with my sham/justi/ward spec as well w/o any support . Its dps sucks compared to a normal shamicar spec but I can still top heals . In t2s , just pop RM on the tank , and keep up your other buffs . Its pretty fun , but sad when im the healer and top or 2nd dps in t2s .

[Covenn]

This spec is not a strong ST healer - that is its primary weakness from a healing throughput perspective. That I totally agree with. But it's a very strong sustained AE healer IMO.

FWIW, in a lot of warfronts I'm one of the top healers on our side, regardless of rank.

I wouldnt call it strong, I would call it adequate. Granted a good player running your spec compared to a bad player running a heal spec, and you will out heal them. Nothing can be done about people that fail to hit buttons or position themselves so horribly that they die repeatedly.

I have no doubt you are a top healer in a lot of warfronts because there are alot of warfront with crappy healing, or (and dont get pissed) warfronts with only one person running a true heal spec, and everyone else running dps or versions of yours and not having his/her back when they get focused. Hell, i've seen you out heal every other cleric except for me in warfronts more than once. The difference is that I was out healing you nearly 2 to 1 and was enabling you to stay alive and do more.

Anyways, I am not trying to give you a hard time because your spec and the inq version is fun as hell to run ...i just don't want clerics to wrongly confuse it for a adequate healing spec, because it isnt even close.

[Proxeneta]

I wouldnt call it strong, I would call it adequate. Granted a good player running your spec compared to a bad player running a heal spec, and you will out heal them. Nothing can be done about people that fail to hit buttons or position themselves so horribly that they die repeatedly.

I have no doubt you are a top healer in a lot of warfronts because there are alot of warfront with crappy healing, or (and dont get pissed) warfronts with only one person running a true heal spec, and everyone else running dps or versions of yours and not having his/her back when they get focused. Hell, i've seen you out heal every other cleric except for me in warfronts more than once. The difference is that I was out healing you nearly 2 to 1 and was enabling you to stay alive and do more.

Anyways, I am not trying to give you a hard time because your spec and the inq version is fun as hell to run ...i just don't want clerics to wrongly confuse it for a adequate healing spec, because it isnt even close.

lol<- at this post like big huge lol, if you are saying that a mini-tank up on melee doing 200-300k heals in say a whitefall while another healer heals him its not a good strategy imposible to do any other way then your wrong, if you had for example 2 straight up good healers and one of them gets jumped that is it, but this cute MASH build can whistand a serious beating while aoe healing for big numbers and having a healer heal him, players will concentrate on him and alot of battles get won this way.

Ive healed over 520k in port scion over 300k in library and whitefall on a traditional healing build, in this build, it becomes a tad bit harder to do but ive bene able to do over 300k in whitefall while taking hits from 3-5 players and a healer on me, if i die once or twice ill be surprised, most of the times i dont die atleast which usually means my raid survives aswell and we win an epic defiant camping battle more often than not and i am not R8 yet.

So while i have to admit your arguement holds true that it is not a traditional healing build it is ignorant of you to attack the build in such a manner that makes you sound as tho you mean to say it bothers you or you feel it is "not good enough healing".

[taugrim]

this cute MASH build can whistand a serious beating while aoe healing for big numbers and having a healer heal him, players will concentrate on him and alot of battles get won this way.

Ive healed over 520k in port scion over 300k in library and whitefall on a traditional healing build, in this build, it becomes a tad bit harder to do but ive bene able to do over 300k in whitefall while taking hits from 3-5 players and a healer on me, if i die once or twice ill be surprised, most of the times i dont die atleast which usually means my raid survives aswell and we win an epic defiant camping battle more often than not and i am not R8 yet.

Yea, I do what you wrote above - basically intentionally try to draw fire away from squishier friendlies.

I have a strong suspicion a lot of players do not have the HP numbers turned on for their opponent's HP bars, because if they did, they'd stop focus firing me when I pop Mien of Leadership and proceed to kite-tank them. This spec played correctly is a PitA to kill

So while i have to admit your arguement holds true that it is not a traditional healing build it is ignorant of you to attack the build in such a manner that makes you sound as tho you mean to say it bothers you or you feel it is "not good enough healing".

Just so people know: Covenn and I have grouped with each other across games for 3 years. I've run with his guild in a lot of premades. He's not trying to bash me - he's just giving his objective opinion.

When Covenn and I have grouped together, there are certainly times when he outhealed me by a significant margin. But usually when we're together, it's a lopsided win, and instead of focusing strictly on healing, I melee and try to draw fire away from friendly squishier friendlies, and do mean things like Charge them on the cliff in Black Garden and punt them down so we can kill them.

I get Covenn's perspective - it's just that I've had a lot of "success" with this spec, and it's situational utility is really high IMO.

[Covenn]

So while i have to admit your arguement holds true that it is not a traditional healing build it is ignorant of you to attack the build in such a manner that makes you sound as tho you mean to say it bothers you or you feel it is "not good enough healing".

I really come across wrong in a lot of my posts. I like running hybrid builds as well and do so to increase my fun factor quite often. Like Taugrim, I can run a hybrid build and excel at it by out damaging, out surviving, and out healing the average joe because we are both exceptional gamers.

Taugrim has influenced the community greatly with his posts because his videos are informative and well put together and the fun factor for the spec he highlights is extremely high. The negative part of this is that not everyone is a top tier (1%) player like him.

Maybe this is a better example of my point:

So if I am in a warfront with Taugrim and we were both running a hybrid role like this, you can be damn well certain that it work against most run of the mill opponents given that we are both top 1% clerics. Against a top notch opponent though, I would be forced to switch to a healing role. With both of us in a hybrid role we would lack the cleansing ability and the spike healing capability that we would need to succeed. I would switch to my main heal spec which will ae heal just as well (I can argue slightly better ), spike heal vastly better, provide the same amount of survivability, and give us more cleansing ability (at the tradeoff of course of being able to do exactly ZERO damage). I would make this switch so we -win-.

The problem is that I am seeing a trend for people to cling to hybrid specs in warfronts the neither have the capability to excel in the spec and/or are facing opponents with enough firepower to require spike healing capability. They are refusing to switch out to the deteriment of thier team.

Does that make more sense?

[Covenn]

Just so people know: Covenn and I have grouped with each other across games for 3 years. I've run with his guild in a lot of premades. He's not trying to bash me - he's just giving his objective opinion.

Certainly not trying to bash you, but you know me ...a little rough around the edges with my approach from time to time.

[Ailis]

Hey,

I have tried another variant these last 2 days, to get curative waters, overflow, ripple and smoothing stream from warden.
http://rift.zam.com/en/stc.html?t=00....med0z.EEbzozo

Maybe one of the most resiliant spec. Just refresh smoothing stream stack and curative waters from time to time, and you can go 1 vs 5 ^^ (not killing anobody but thats not the point ). Not super usefull spec, (I agree with Covenn about the limitations of only-DOL hybrid spec) , but it is lots of fun to pull of these defiants

[taugrim]

I assume this is through the use of Humility one target, Battle Charge on another and Crushing Wave on the 3rd (in no particular order)? While clearing 3 people off a FC is definitely doable, I find the biggest problem with Rift PvP is that EVERYONE is DR'd by the time I get to them.

Understood.

I usually use this order:
1. Battle Charge (especially to catch up to FC)
2. Humility
3. by now I'm hopefully caught up with the FC, so I knockback an opponent

Even if 1-2 of the opponents are on movement-CC DR, getting 1-2 off the FC is significant IMO.

I've cleared FCs from pursuers many times in WFS, it's awesome.

16% Dodge and Parry is nice but can be completely negated with a weapon or item ~90 Focus (which is so easy to obtain). Are you finding that players aren't including sufficient hit/focus in their PvP gear to make Devout Deflection worth it? In my PvP gear, I have a mere 50 Focus which I believe works out to 10%. Once I add 2 Radiant Sharp runes, I'll be at 86 Focus == 17.2% and therefore completely negate your avoidance values.

I see a lot of Rogues/Warriors not stacking any Hit, because not all targets have meaningful Avoidance stats. At any rate, the 16% D + 16% P have really helped noticeably in PVP pre-1.5 and especially in 1.5.

[taugrim]

Dinged R8 on Halloween, and I've just started streaming on Twitch.TV as of yesterday.

I'll be posting a schedule for when I'll be streaming narrated warfronts and World PVP, but in the meantime, you can check out this earlier stream:
http://www.twitch.tv/taugrim/b/299119328

In this reasonably competitive match, I finish:
#1 in healing
#2 in damage taken
#4 in killing blows (11)

My 1 death was totally preventable.

I still have to upgrade the following gear slots:
R6 chest
R4 wand
R3 crit neck

So I still have some room to grow in terms of gear.

--------------------------------------

Twitch.TV: http://twitch.tv/taugrim
Twitter: @taugrim

[beemoved]

Dinged R8 on Halloween, and I've just started streaming on Twitch.TV as of yesterday.

I'll be posting a schedule for when I'll be streaming narrated warfronts and World PVP, but in the meantime, you can check out this earlier stream:
http://www.twitch.tv/taugrim/b/299119328

In this reasonably competitive match, I finish:
#1 in healing
#2 in damage taken
#4 in killing blows (11)

My 1 death was totally preventable.

I still have to upgrade the following gear slots:
R6 chest
R4 wand
R3 crit neck

So I still have some room to grow in terms of gear.

--------------------------------------

Twitch.TV: http://twitch.tv/taugrim
Twitter: @taugrim

Huge grats on getting through the massive grind. Enjoy the rank 8 fun. Hit me up for some cleric pwnage anytime!!!

-kas

[ironzerg]

The problem is that I am seeing a trend for people to cling to hybrid specs in warfronts the neither have the capability to excel in the spec and/or are facing opponents with enough firepower to require spike healing capability. They are refusing to switch out to the deteriment of thier team.

I agree with you 100% here. I've tried a lot of hybird specs in Warfronts, and foundthat most cases it's better for me to specialize in either all damage or all heals, depending on what the team needs. This build is included it that. Sometimes, being 80% in two things isn't a good as being 100% in one thing.

While DoL certainly puts out nice heal numbers and throughput, I don't find it's critical for saving someone's life. I run a Senticar spec for healing in PvP, and it gives me many more tools to keep people (and myself) alive. I mix in Inquistor to give me a little bit of a bite, and can take most undergeared people solo, and make myself difficult enough to survive against a tougher opponent.

HOWEVER, I will say that these builds tend to shine more in open world PvP, where you need to be able to do a little bit of everything. Against anything but a cholormancer or -icar of some sort, this build should be a win versus anything else out there one-on-one. Against the other two, you're looking at a tie.

Ultimately though, I've found the most open-world succes with my 42 Inq/24 Just/0 Templar build.

But I can really appreciate the thought and skill that goes into a build like this one, and it's nice to see you having success.

[taugrim]

Been having a blast with M*A*S*H in World PVP small groups.

Check out this 5-minute fight in Iron Pine Peak on Dayblind:
http://twitch.tv/taugrim/b/299424299

[Nordain]

I usually facepalm when I see this spec in warfronts.

[taugrim]

Hell, i've seen you out heal every other cleric except for me in warfronts more than once. The difference is that I was out healing you nearly 2 to 1 and was enabling you to stay alive and do more.

One thing to keep in mind: rank / gear.

I don't think we've grouped up since August. I was rank 1-4 back in August, and that was before Valor normalization.

If you end up moving over with Irony to Dayblind, it would be great to group up again.