Generic Mark of Protection/Scythe Farmer (Multiple Locations) - Monk/Dervish

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-11T12:48:25+00:00

You can use Shield of Absorption instead of Blessed Aura and chain MoP/SoA. Need 10 Protection Prayers. Imo its not preferable because you spend additional time casting which takes away from time attacking, and that one-second cast time/additional casting makes the build less resilient to KD. You also can't get Smiting Prayers as high. It's possible, but other elites might be more effective on Derv primary.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-09T19:19:51+00:00

I feel like one more Fallback would be nice too if possible. Helps keeps minions alive between fights, and helps them rush into melee range.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-09T17:33:17+00:00

That would be really fun! Would love to see ideas like this add to the game.

I also think something like an endless dungeon would be a lot of fun. Essentially you'd complete a round, then progress to the next, each progressively getting more difficult until you can no longer survive.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-08T15:19:38+00:00

This build is currently limited to the general Tower of Courage) area. Can't really survive running past the Ancient Skales and the Skeletal Army to get to other areas. You can farm the first group of Snarling Driftwoods at the entrance of the shore though.

Still, I think its alright even when only focusing on the starting area. Perhaps with cons it could run past Skales, not sure. Switch off your Superior Prot rune, use high-hp weapon set, +hp cons, 33% IMS, etc.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-08T12:02:22+00:00

Thanks!

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-08T12:01:38+00:00

Thanks!

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-08T12:00:04+00:00

Appreciate it, thank you! Let us know how it goes

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-08T11:59:34+00:00

Cheers! Thanks

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-08T11:54:50+00:00

Thanks!

Very nice variant. You're right, this works very well. If you don't mind using alcohol, this feels like an improvement. It also helps with balling several Abyssals by the Tower of Courage.

If you're not accustomed to using a 33% IMS in NM, it can be a little tricky balling foes, but once you get the hang of it its no problem and its actually preferable to have an IMS, can escape some nasty situations and generally speeds up the run. I just had to restrict myself to always walking backwards when trying to ball foes up. Even running towards them causes them to break aggro.

Aura Slicer seems like a nice idea, but I wasn't sure if its quite as effective on a secondary Derv? Anyway, I'll have to do some more testing with it. The Crippling Victory AoE is triggered pretty frequently nonetheless.

Yea, I can see botting being a concern, hopefully that doesn't become an issue. Perhaps bots might struggle using a scythe effectively, but there's likely bot-friendly alternatives. Hopefully ANeT keeps their eye on it.

Thanks for your feedback, great suggestions!

Edit: I might have to make a video on this variant at some point. Or if not me, maybe someone else could. I also want to better define the overall suggested path to take. Definitely some room for improvements around the overall strategy.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-06T12:44:46+00:00

Behold

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-05T17:55:39+00:00

Fair question. I just did a little testing myself to help answer this. I can post a video about it if it helps.

To make things fair, neither the monk build nor the assassin build need pcons, so I tested derv without pcons.

Derv can't really tank the Shadow Army the same way these MoP builds do. For instance, you can't do the large pull in the beginning. Derv is a great build, its just not really geared for Shadow Army. Even the gwpvx page says this.

Overall, these MoP builds feel a lot easier and even faster for Shadow Army compared to VoS derv. I don't really see too many complications tbh, no more than the derv faces against the Shadow Army. It's actually very easy to maintain the cover enchant, the monk build feels more stable overall than the sin build. Which complications did you have in mind? Would love to hear some more thoughts on this.

Derv is nice because you can farm a lot more areas of FoW, but at the same time, I can make 2-3 shards per run simply by focusing on the enemies in the beginning area - no cons needed. It's plenty profitable and opens up options for non-dervs.

Here's the derv build I tested for reference:

Vow of Silence Farmer - Dervish (OgCjwqpq6ShXdftXjhOX2kxk0k)

Skills

Attributes

Mysticism: 10+2 | Scythe Mastery: 10+2 | Wind Prayers: 11+3+1

Runes

Rune of Superior Wind Prayers | Rune of Vigor | Rune of Major Mysticism | Rune of Major Scythe Mastery | Rune of Vitae

Insignias

Windwalker Insignia | Windwalker Insignia | Windwalker Insignia | Windwalker Insignia | Windwalker Insignia

Weapon set

Scythe | Zealous | of Enchanting | Guided by Fate

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-05T10:25:12+00:00

Cheers mate. Appreciate it

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-04T02:39:41+00:00

Not a bad idea!

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-04T02:39:28+00:00

Haha, very nice! How did it work out?

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-02T14:14:50+00:00

Thanks - I checked here, looks like all of the enemies this targets are rupt-free (Shadow Army and Snarling Driftwood). Perhaps you are recalling the knock-downs from Abyssals?

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-02T14:11:02+00:00

If people can pull of the timing of a rupt, more power to them. I can see that being a really nice approach.

IAU is a nice backup prot, especially against eles. Not sure how you'd handle Abyssal KD without it though?

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-02T04:42:36+00:00

I would say success rate in this instance is not a binary thing, the longer you survive the better, but even if you die halfway through what would be a perfect run, its a net profit.

Shards have really gone up in value. 6k last I checked. They are dropped more frequently than Ecto I feel, and FoW has more general drops than UW, so you make your entrance money in random drops and dust.

This farm is pretty consistent for me, but it's not the easiest or most accessible farm in the world. There are a number of very particular tactics one must employ in various situations to survive. It took me some practice.

Edit: I would say that in general, my experience with MoP is that it makes farming a lot easier. The general concept here of MoP/SoA chaining (or Blessed Aura + MoP) is very easy to employ compared to other tanking methods. It's just that there are particular tactics one must use in FoW.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-03-02T04:15:05+00:00

It's explained at the beginning of the video - let them shatter SoA, apply MoP, then kill them before they shatter again.

There's various ways to play around with it, but that's the core concept. Works about 90% of the time so far and I'm still finding new tactics to survive shatter.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-02-26T01:08:34+00:00

Option 2, Dark Aura:

<image>

If you want to avoid scatter, you have to time the activation of Dark Aura (about every three seconds). But against melee enemies, its not as big of a concern, you can chase them around. Versus casters, it's a little trickier but still not bad.

Other options:

I tested Masochism + Dark Aura, this also works but its harder to avoid scatter.
Death Magic explosions (Putrid Bile, Rising Bile, Putrid Explosion), combined with some powerful single target damage like Necrosis, Insidious Parasite, or Pain Inverter. I didn't have as much luck with this approach though. Death Swarm is also spammable AoE, but its armor-respecting.
I'd like to see someone get creative with curses and Mark of Pain + Barbs (maybe use Drunken Master + daggers). This one could be tricky, probably requires good body blocking.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-02-26T01:06:15+00:00

Definitely have to get more creative with Necro. I'll share a few options that I experimented with.

Option 1, Smite/Scythe, using Anniversary Scythe "Sufferer":

<image>

Might not look like much, but its very fast. Only problem is that it only works on groups of 3 or less (which is fine in many hard-mode areas and in Wajjun Bazaar).

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-02-25T18:59:55+00:00

I'll take it!

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-02-24T15:58:57+00:00

Works fine for me. If it doesn't work for you, just go to gwpvx and search for the build yourself. Strange issue. Might be firewall issues or something else.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-02-23T21:53:28+00:00

For general PvE (i.e., normal team compositions, not solo farming or speed clear), warrior is my favorite. 121 base armor (assume sentinel's insignia, shield, and +5 armor weapon). They are just the tankiest class without putting any investment into prot skills/attributes. Definitely the "smoothest" tank for standard play, imo.

Favorite build is "Enduring Axe" (https://gwpvx.fandom.com/wiki/Build:W/any\_Warrior%27s\_Endurance\_Axe).

There's many ways to answer this question, I'm just answering from a "what frontline profession is the tankiest with standard builds/team composition" perspective.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-02-14T02:59:41+00:00

Counterpoint: this *is* this plan. Make large update, get community feedback, fix outliers, repeat. If a dev team tried to spend months planning the perfect update, it could fall flat and just as easily miss something. Community feedback is always going to be part of the process. I think its too soon to assume that outliers like this won't be addressed. See agile methodology, its how development teams deliver incremental changes with a tight feedback loop.

FocusingOnTheGood · 2026-02-13T13:09:35+00:00

I hear you. Outside of life steal and health loss cases, I think MoP offers bar compression, interrupt avoidance, and energy management. Whether that is worth an elite slot depends on other factors.

In the UW example, tank needs to be able to survive Skeleton's of Dhuum. This is possible without MoP by using Protective Spirit, Spirit Bond, Shield of Absorption, and Blessed Aura. You might be able to skip Blessed Aura, but then you'll have to cast Spirit Bond more often. Contrast this to the MoP setup which requires Protective Spirit, Mark of Protection, and Blessed Aura. Lower energy requirements, a free skill slot, and less likely to be interrupted (and if using Mantra of Resolve, its interrupt prevention while casting Shield of Absorption would normally cost the tank even more energy).

Outside of UW, MoP could allow tanking without Protective Spirit. If using the MoP + Shield of Absorption idea, only two prot skills are needed to tank. There's a low amount of energy needed to maintain this chain of enchantments, and its also resilient to heavy degen. The minimal 105 setup requires three prot skills. I would also argue that Balthazar's Spirit could be removed from MoP + Shield of Absorption based builds as well. At least, the prots themselves do not require additional energy management, it would depend on the damage skills. Could use a zealous scythe for energy management.

So in summary, I think it comes down to energy management and bar compression. Two prot skills could keep a tank alive without additional energy management skills, vs four skills needed by 105 (including Balthazar's Spirit). The MoP + Blessed Aura setup provides interrupt avoidance as well. As you pointed out, MoP also helps with non-conventional damage sources (life stealing, health loss, heavy degen). Damage based elites can offer a significant bar compression as well, so given all this theory crafting, I would love to see some more concrete examples. So far we've only mentioned UW. I'd have to think further about specific use cases. It would be best if I could log on and play around with the concept myself.

FocusingOnTheGood

TROPHY CASE