Guide:Monk

The Monk profession is one of the most important roles in Guild Wars. While many professions are designed to kill, the Monk is primarily designed to keep its allies alive. There are two major aspects to Monks; Healing and Protection. Healing is the reactive approach to restoring lost health to allies to prevent death. Protection is the proactive approach of shielding allies from damage to prevent death. In areas where it's only practical for one Monk to be used in a team, they're usually a balanced mix of these. In areas where you can bring two or more Monks, they will usually specialize in either Protection or Healing.

Monk armor has a maximum armor rating of 60, provides 2 extra pips of energy regeneration, and an additional 10 energy.

Primary Weapon

The Monk's primary weapons are the Staff, Wand, and Focus.

Staves are two-handed projectile weapons that can be linked to any of the four Monk attributes. They normally do Holy damage, but staves linked to the Divine Favor attribute often do Fire damage. Their maximum damage range is 11 to 22 and their attack rate is 1.75. Being ranged weapons, they receive a damage bonus against targets on a lower elevation and a penalty against targets on a higher elevation. They have a maximum +10 energy bonus and a 20% chance to half the recharge time on Spells.

Wands are one-handed projectile weapons that can be linked to any of the four Monk attributes. They normally do Holy damage, but wands linked to the Divine Favor attribute often do Fire damage. Their maximum damage range is 11 to 22 and their attack rate is 1.75. Being ranged weapons, they receive a damage bonus against targets on a lower elevation and a penalty against targets on a higher elevation.

Foci are off-hand items usable when wielding a one-handed weapon. They can be linked to any of the four Monk attributes. A focus will provide a maximum energy bonus of 12, but requires investment in their linked attribute to gain the full bonus.

Primary Attribute: Divine Favor

"For each rank of Divine Favor, allies are healed for 3.2 whenever you cast Monk spells on them."

Divine Favor is considered one of the best primary attributes and most monks will have an investment of at least 9. Most Divine Favor skills either provide additional bonuses to Monk spells or have similar (but weaker) effects to Monk spells from the Protection or Healing Prayers attributes. The most popular skills from this attribute include Peace and Harmony, Divine Healing/Heaven's Delight, and Healer's Boon.

Attributes

Healing Prayers

"No inherent effect. Many Monk skills, especially spells related to healing, become more effective with higher Healing Prayers."

Healing Prayers focus almost entirely on spells that restore health to allies with the amount of health varying because of spell cost, casting time, and conditional requirements. Most monks will be primarily invested in this attribute or in Protection Prayers. Skills from Healing Prayers include Word of Healing, Patient Spirit, Infuse Health, and Signet of Rejuvenation.

Protection Prayers

"No inherent effect. Many monk skills, especially enchantments which prevent damage or provide healing, become more effective with higher Protection Prayers."

Most Protection Prayers skills will either prevent damage or remove harmful affects from allies such as hexes and conditions. Commonly used skills are Restore Condition, Life Sheath, Guardian, and Reversal of Fortune.

Smiting Prayers

"No inherent effect. Many Monk skills, especially those related to dealing holy damage, become more effective with higher Smiting Prayers. Holy damage is especially powerful against the undead."

Smiting Prayers focus on dealing holy damage. Some spells will deal the damage directly, such as Ray of Judgment. Others will deal damage when conditions/hexes are removed or when an ally is attacked, such as Smite Condition or Reversal of Damage. Still others will enhance damage done by allies, such as Judge's Insight. The lack of healing in Smiting Prayers makes the bonus from Divine Favor very important when using a monk with heavy investment in this attribute.

Common Monk Builds

PvP

• The Word of Healing Monk is one of the most popular builds. With a high investment in Healing Prayers and enough of an investment in Protection Prayers to hit important breakpoints, the build is well balanced for countering pressure. Depending on where it's being used it will often bring self defense or energy management skills.
• The Restore Condition Monk sees occasional use in GvG and HA. Almost exclusively a dedicated Protection Monk, its primary purpose is to prevent pressure and keep allies active through field awareness. Usually run if there's already a Word of Healing Monk in the team.
• The Ray of Judgement Monk has many variations. It's popular in Alliance Battles, Jade Quarry, and Fort Aspenwood because at 16 Smiting Prayers it can usually kill them in one cast, especially in Jade Quarry. This frees many slots for utility skills such as "Fall Back!" and "Make Haste!".

PvE

• The WoH Hybrid is an efficient way to keep party members healthy with a combination of WoH, a powerful heal at low cost and protection spells like Protective Spirit to prevent health from going down.
• The Healer is a popular build that uses skills like Healer's Boon and Unyeilding Aura to boost the healing effectiveness of skills like Dwayna's Kiss and Patient Spirit
• The UA and a HB monk Mimicry backline is a common backline used widely to cope with high-level areas.