First thousand Gold: Monks flatout best?

from Demigod Forums

My assertion is that except for only some crazy corner cases, generals are always served best by picking up some monks when they leave the item shop at beginning of game.

Some info:

  1. Monks heal 10% of a DG's health, and can chain heal the same DG every 8.5 seconds
  2. QoT, without any HP boosting favor item, has 1450 hit points at level one, and heals 145 health from monks, an additional 17 HP per second.
  3. Monks heal in 'bursts' meaning that if you get hit hard, they heal up front, you don't have to wait a long time for the health.
  4. Monks come in pairs, so you can heal both yourself, and an ally.
  5. Monks can attack and do pretty good damage.
  6. Monks take hits from towers and grunts for you.
  7. Monks scale extremely well.  As you level up (even to the first few levels, before going back to store) their absolute effect also increases.  As you buy more HP items, they also get stronger. This is true of all healers, but part of what makes them a good early purchase.
  8. Monks can heal you and your lane buddy.

At worst case, I could see maybe QoT picking up some HP armor first instead, but then getting the monks asap afterwards. Very often the difference between a player holding a lane, and one that needs to return to base to heal, is that one has monks and the other doesn't. Strong bursting regen helps well against slow kills like Spit, fireball spam, and snipes, and almost completely dessimates a build based on auto attacking. Monks have a lot of HP early on, for most AoE abilities to kill reasonably, and they also heal themselves.

demigod
170,484 views 59 replies
Reply #1 from Demigod Forums Top

I always debate about this with myself playing Sedna. Monks help "me" a lot.  But if I don't get a least one helm, I can't heal my alles long before I'm "OOM" just when they need it. And it's almost luck if my monks heal my needy ally.

Reply #2 from Demigod Forums Top

When I play as ice TB, throughout a game I have serious issues with killing any general with monks+ because I can't do enough burst damage to kill them, and by the time ability cooldowns are back again, they have healed the damage.

Ends up with me going out of mana, and TB struggles to kill anything with only autoattack, even with mageslayer + skill points in stats.

Good players using generals almost always outlast me. You can try killing the priests, but they just resummon them, and all the time wasted dpsing priests, the enemy demigod will be eating your face.

Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting PurplePaladin, reply 1
I always debate about this with myself playing Sedna. Monks help "me" a lot.  But if I don't get a least one helm, I can't heal my alles long before I'm "OOM" just when they need it. And it's almost luck if my monks heal my needy ally.

But the monks will cause you to have to heal them significantly less. One more heal, maybe two, from a scaled helm isn't going to heal as much as two monks healing for 20 seconds.  Just save your actual heals for when they are needed, and you'll get a lot more out of it.

Reply #4 from Demigod Forums Top

Agreed.  A team with monks early always has a big advantage.  It doesn't decide games, but it sure gives the edge.

Reply #5 from Demigod Forums Top

monks are pretty darn good. I don't see that as a problem either. Having monks on the field is more interesting than having a bigger mana bar :P

Reply #6 from Demigod Forums Top

Never really thought of this as a game started (except with Sedna). Thanks for the tips guys, going to have to try this out.

Reply #7 from Demigod Forums Top

Monks flat out best?

Yes. 

Reply #8 from Demigod Forums Top

monks are superior. you'd better have a damn good reason not to take them if you're playing a general. 

 

also worth noting that they scale directly with your HP pool so starting combo of Blood of the Fallen with Monks is incredibly strong. 

Reply #9 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting transitive, reply 8
monks are superior. you'd better have a damn good reason not to take them if you're playing a general. 

 

also worth noting that they scale directly with your HP pool so starting combo of Blood of the Fallen with Monks is incredibly strong. 

 

The only real knock on the monks is how incredibly suicidal they are :p

 

And that I have to sit and twiddle my thumbs for that first 250gold for the TP scroll :)

+1 Loading…
Reply #10 from Demigod Forums Top

Even though they nerfed the exp and gold, as a TB player I still find myself leveling much faster and able to save up gold easily. 

Plus it gives me more targets for BotS.

Reply #11 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting Teseer, reply 10
Even though they nerfed the exp and gold, as a TB player I still find myself leveling much faster and able to save up gold easily. 

Plus it gives me more targets for BotS.

I think you're talking about reinforcements. This thread is about idols. 

Reply #12 from Demigod Forums Top

One of Sedna's ability buffs "priests" Does that mean it only buffs the Holy Priests idol or does it also buff Monks/any healing Idol? Sorry for the newbie question, I just don't know.

Reply #13 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting TAIElixir, reply 12
One of Sedna's ability buffs "priests" Does that mean it only buffs the Holy Priests idol or does it also buff Monks/any healing Idol? Sorry for the newbie question, I just don't know.

Healing Wind 2 increases the healing ability of both idol (any kind) and reinforcement priests. 

+1 Loading…
Reply #15 from Demigod Forums Top

Initial gold is best spent on getting 9 observation totems and placing them around the area so you don't get sneaked up on.

 

:ninja:

Reply #16 from Demigod Forums Top

I'm not entirely sure how the mechanics of monks work.  Do they heal themselves?  When they do, are they not healing you?  Is it their priority to heal you before themselves?

As Sedna, I can't help but feel that monks off the break sometimes leave me weaker- unless I get blood as the favor, or the cloak of the night which has inherent mana.  Granted, that is most of the time, but occasionally I get swift anklet on her, and when that happens I often find my monks getting owned and me running out of mana from having to recast them, and as a result of no mana helm and recasting monks, I find my mana pool tapped, my monks dead, and my health low.

I'm also bad at saving my monks.  I usually just let them get whacked on.  I suppose I should work on pulling them back.  Or just not use swift anklet on her.

Reply #17 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting DiceAreEvil, reply 16
I'm not entirely sure how the mechanics of monks work.  Do they heal themselves?  When they do, are they not healing you?  Is it their priority to heal you before themselves?

As Sedna, I can't help but feel that monks off the break sometimes leave me weaker- unless I get blood as the favor, or the cloak of the night which has inherent mana.  Granted, that is most of the time, but occasionally I get swift anklet on her, and when that happens I often find my monks getting owned and me running out of mana from having to recast them, and as a result of no mana helm and recasting monks, I find my mana pool tapped, my monks dead, and my health low.

I'm also bad at saving my monks.  I usually just let them get whacked on.  I suppose I should work on pulling them back.  Or just not use swift anklet on her.

Along those same lines, how much microing is involved in using Monks?

Reply #18 from Demigod Forums Top

I'm not entirely sure how the mechanics of monks work.  Do they heal themselves?  When they do, are they not healing you?  Is it their priority to heal you before themselves?

Priests prioritize healing DGs. A single unit may be healed once per 8s. Priests will heal themselves if you are not injured or have already been healed within the last 8s. Since you get two monks, they end up healing themselves quite often without detracting from the healing they give you. Unless you have an allied DG with you, in which case they will heal him. 

As Sedna, I can't help but feel that monks off the break sometimes leave me weaker- unless I get blood as the favor, or the cloak of the night which has inherent mana.  Granted, that is most of the time, but occasionally I get swift anklet on her, and when that happens I often find my monks getting owned and me running out of mana from having to recast them, and as a result of no mana helm and recasting monks, I find my mana pool tapped, my monks dead, and my health low.

Don't know what to tell you. Sedna with BotF + Monks is very strong early game. 

Along those same lines, how much microing is involved in using Monks?

A fair bit. I micro mine to attack enemy DGs that I attack, run away from people attacking them, run over mines for me, etc. 

Reply #19 from Demigod Forums Top

Awesome thanks again SoFFAcet, so just to be clear you can't tell Monks who/when to heal? You can only control their movement and who they attack?

Thanks a ton!

Reply #20 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting TAIElixir, reply 19
so just to be clear you can't tell Monks who/when to heal? You can only control their movement and who they attack?

Correct. 

Reply #21 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting [TAI,
Elixir" reply="19" id="2304738"]Awesome thanks again SoFFAcet, so just to be clear you can't tell Monks who/when to heal? You can only control their movement and who they attack?

Thanks a ton!

Correct.

Reply #22 from Demigod Forums Top

A few notes on Monks/priests/etc

  • They have a range that they heal in. They cannot heal someone outside that range.
  • Just because you are stunned, doesn't mean they are. If you are, for instance, running away by giving a long move command to your and your army, and get foul grasped, your monks will continue running on... outside of your range.
  • Monks heal 10% of your total HP.  Increasing your HP total makes them heal more.  This includes the ever awesome Sigil of Vitality.
  • If you select one of your monks, and right click on an ally, that monk will follow the ally around, and heal them when possible.  Note, they often die to towers eventually if you do this.  Still, it is good idea to do if you are returning to base to shop.
Reply #23 from Demigod Forums Top

Fighting a group of general who all bought monks as their first game is a nightmare. The staying poower is incredible.

Reply #24 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting SoFFacet, reply 18

Don't know what to tell you. Sedna with BotF + Monks is very strong early game. 

Right.  I was referring to Sedna with swift anklet having issues.  I don't really have issues with BotF and Cloak of Night early game when I grab monks.

Also I saw some post where someone mentioned a "smart team would stagger their ranks of priest".  What is the benefit of this?  Wouldn't having all of the highest rank of priest (sedna bug excepted) be ideal?

Reply #25 from Demigod Forums Top

Also I saw some post where someone mentioned a "smart team would stagger their ranks of priest".  What is the benefit of this?  Wouldn't having all of the highest rank of priest (sedna bug excepted) be ideal?

The rule is you can be healed once per 8s per type of priest. So if two allies have bishops in the same location, a DG will only be healed once per 8s. Obviously this is a waste. If you have High Priests + Bishops, you'll be healed twice per 8s. If you have Clerics + High Priests + Bishops, you'll be healed 3 times per 8s. Some of those heals will be a bit smaller than the max heals, but its better than overlapping since multiple Bishops in the same location don't help. 

Also afaik Reinforcement Priests count as "monks" (level 1 idol).