Despite a rather up and down schedule over the last few weeks, I've still been managing to turn up most week for the Tuesday N00b Club, which is very much still alive and well. Well, alive in the 'Ongoing Week to Week Interest' sense of the word, rather than the moment to moment 'All Aboard the -60%DP Express' sense.
We do well most of the time, but aren't so veteran that we can't be steamrollered by the occasional end stage maps and challenges. Part of this is the simple business of having a team full of people, and no heroes or henchmen, and while a couple of the regulars actually enjoy Monk Based Healing duties, we often find ourselves a team almost entirely made up of DPS, and not a lot else.
I try to do my bit as often as I can, but despite repeated goes, being a Monk has never really clicked for me, and to be frank, I suck at it. One of the main problems is that I try this as a Mesmer/Monk, rather than rolling up a new alt for the specific purpose, and this is less than optimal, because of Divine Favor, or more precisely, my lack of it. This skill is only allowed to Primary Monks, and heals the Monk's targeted ally for extra whenever they cast any spell friendly on them.
An example would be Orison of Healing, a standard Monk staple; cast at 12 Healing Prayers, it heals for 60 hp. With 12 Divine Favor on top, the spell would do an extra 38 hp; significant, and a must-have for any dedicated Monk. Poor old Mesmer me on the otherhand, can never use Divine Favor, and instead get fast casting, which is all very well, but makes me a poor Monk Stand-in.
But I want to do my bit, so have been looking into other ways to heal. I tried Paragon's Motivation for a bit; this was my initial dual-class pairing; Me/P. I had some limited success with it, but only at the really early levels and soon ended up going single-class with it, in Mesmer. Motivation is a great 'assist heal' type of role, but you wouldn't want a primary healer using it; it relies on 'Earshot' range AoE stuff too much, and people can be a bit unpredictable in their positioning!
The other option was Ritualist's Restoration, which I have some passing familiarity with already. I was a Rit through my Factions adventures, and know the basics, although specialised in Channeling back then, which was more offensive than support.
One of the great things about Ritualist healing, is that it has no support attribute, like Divine Favor, and is very self-contained, as a skill set, compared to the Monk equivalents. Rits get Spawning Power instead, which makes spells and spirits last a bit longer and have more health - not essential for what I want at all.
A quick scoot around various Factions skill trainers and I came up with this early experimental healer build:
The Rituals of Restoration
Restoration 12, Inspiration 12, Fast Casting 3
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Requires: Factions
Equipment: Inspiration Staff, Runes in Insp or FC; general purpose Caster Insignias and Runes to fill out.
Mostly, its all about the Restoration, and almost any Primary could do reasonably well at the role, swapping #6 and #7 for something handy from their own lists. Saying that, the 'caster' Primaries are likely to do better than Warriors or Rangers, mostly due to their higher innate energy regeneration and capacity.
Ritualists typically work through one of three types of mechanic.
Spirits (#1 and #'2 above), which are summoned static deployables, and can help or harm. The Elite above, #1 (Preservation) acts like a static mini-monk, and will randomly heal a nearby friendly every 4 seconds, for 94pts a go. The random bit isn't so helpful, but is still good if you're rubbish at micromanagement like I am; simply set it up and it works as a decent back-stop.
#2 (Life) is like a timed AoE Healing Bomb; set this up ahead of time, just as the rest of the team are starting to charge into the fray. It'll sit there and do nothing for 20 seconds, and then die, healing the entire party for 120hp each. The timing takes a bit of practice, but it works well as a big 'spike-heal', and the heal effect has a seemingly unlimited range, unlike most spirits. If killed before the 20s is up, it'll still heal everyone for a bit less.
As well as their own effects, many of the other Rit skills function in a much improved manner if Spirits are nearby; #3 in this case (Mend Body and Soul). This does a straight, and very efficient direct target heal for 96pts, and for each spirit nearby (in my case, two usually), will remove a Condition from the target. Compare to an equivalent Monk heal; Orison again, which heals for about the same, costs the same, has similar cast time and recharge, but does nothing about Conditions, and requires two Monk attributes at 12, instead of just one for the Ritualist.
This efficiency is echoed across many of the Restoration spells; as long as you can fulfil the situational requirements of the spell, they seem to be a fair bit more powerful and flexible than straight Monk equivalents, and for Mesmers, this 'If target is X, and Y, then Z...' stuff is a very familiar and natural state of affairs. Like Mesmers, many of the Ritualist's best work only happens in specific circumstances.
The second main Ritualist mechanic is the Weapon Spell. This is a buff, like an Enchantment, but on the ally's weapon, not them. As such, these leave no yellow 'up arrow', and so cannot be removed with the large variety of anti-enchantment spells in the game. To counter that, they're usually very short duration. #4 (Weapon of Warding) is one I picked from the Restoration list, giving +4 regen and 50% block, which is helpful enough in it's own right, but is mostly there as an enabler for #5 (Wielder's Boon), which heals the target for 51pts, and if they have a Weapon Spell active, for a further 63pts. All very efficient!
There is a third mechanic which I'm not using here, but am dabbling with too; the Item Spell. This summons a carryable urn of ash, which has effects when held, effects when dropped, and again, is supported by a large variety of spells that do even better 'if holding an item'. More to dabble with there.
#6 (Revealed Hex) is an old favourite from Inspiration, removing hexes from allies and turning into that hex for your own use for 20s. I don't tend to actually use that bit of it much, but the Hex removal is a good way to round out the build; Ritualists don't seem to get much Hex Removal as far as I can see. It also provides energy. #7 (Ether Signet) is one I always find room for if I can; if Energy < 9, gain 18 energy. Win-win, although the timing takes a bit of practice.
#8 (Flesh Of My Flesh) is a fairly standard Resurrect, because you never know, and also, many people go silent with incredulity when you calmly remark that you're the healer, but you don't have a rez.
It seemed to work quite well as far as I've tested it so far. Could probably do with some tweaking, but the very Mesmer-like decision-making involved, and at the same time, the quite hands-off nature of the Spirits all made for a much more comfortable Healing Experience than any of my previous adventures as a Monk-wannabe, which just seemed to degenerate into a frenzy of party window clicking, culminating in me dying, because I'm so busy concentrating on healing folks that I forget to run away when the monsters start hitting me in the face with hammers. Ritualising just seems to flow more naturally for me, for some reason.
In general, I'm starting to notice that while the initial basic 'Prophecies' Guild Wars game has a very designed-in-from-scratch dual-class interdependency, with the basic six professions tending to mingle quite freely, the later added professions seem to be much more self-contained things, as seen in the Ritualist's Single Attribute Total Heal/Support Package, or our TNC Dervishes using almost nothing from any Secondary, on a regular basis. It shows perhaps a trend away from the original concept of making a unique class of your own, halfway between one and the next, and perhaps a move toward something more comprehensible, more self-intuitive and ready-out-of-the-box. Who knows? I wonder what we'll see for GW2?
Anyway, what I do know is that if you want to be a useful healer, and don't want to roll a new character to do it, the Any/Ritualist with 12 Restoration is the way to go!