Archive:Team - IWAY

Overview
This build is mainly used in the Global Tournament

The IWAY build is based around the "I Will Avenge You!" shout when used in combination with pets belonging to several warrior/rangers. "I Will Avenge You!" takes all dead allies in the area into account, which includes pets. When several dead pets are in the area, the attack speed boost and health regeneration of this shout can be maintained indefinitely. This build is deadly when used correctly and is hard to counter once activated.

Composition
The IWAY team consists of:
 * Three Warrior/Rangers with pets
 * One "Order of Apostasy" Necromancer, a N/Mo
 * One "Order of Pain" Necromancer, a N/Mo
 * One "Oath Shot" Spirit Spammer Ranger, a R/E
 * One "Full Trapper" Ranger, a R/Rt
 * One "Psychic Distraction" Mesmer, a Me/E

One Sprint Warrior
[build name="Sprint Warrior" prof=warri/range axemas=12+1+3 streng=9+1 beastm=9][eviscerate][executioners strike][distracting blow][i will avenge you][charm animal][tigers fury][sprint][resurrection signet][/build] Distracting Blow can be replaced by Disrupting Chop. This build brings Sprint for any maps that involve an altar, so that the Iway team can capture it first, which is strategically desirable with this build. Sprint is also useful on relic running maps.

One Predatory Season Warrior
[build name="Predatory Season Warrior" prof=warri/range axemas=12+1+3 streng=9+1 beastm=9][eviscerate][executioners strike][distracting blow][i will avenge you][charm animal][tigers fury][predatory season][resurrection signet][/build] Distracting Blow can be replaced by Disrupting Chop.

One Wild Blow Warrior
[build name="Wild Blow Warrior" prof=warri/range axemas=12+1+3 streng=9+1 beastm=9][eviscerate][executioners strike][distracting blow][i will avenge you][charm animal][tigers fury][wild blow][resurrection signet][/build] Distracting Blow can be replaced by Disrupting Chop. This warrior uses Wild Blow to get rid of any key stances in the enemy's team. For example, Whirling Defense, Mantra of Resolve, etc.

Equipment

 * Max Gladiator's Armor
 * Sundering Axe of Fortitude
 * Any applicable shield with a Strength requirement.
 * +5 Energy Longbow of Fortitude

"Order of Pain" Necromancer
[build name="Order of Pain Necromancer" prof=necro/monk bloodm=10+3+1 soulre=8+1 healin=12 protec=2][order of pain][heal party][infuse health][heal other][heal area][healing hands][extinguish][resurrection signet][/build]

Equipment

 * Full max Scar Pattern Armor or Revenant's Armor
 * Insightful Holy Staff of Fortitude/of Enchanting for the 20 percent chance of half recharge and casting time of Healing Prayers with a backup +15 energy/-1 energy regeneration Truncheon and +15 energy/-1 energy regeneration focus for energy emergencies.

"Order of Apostasy" Necromancer
[build name="Order of Apostasy Necromancer" prof=necro/monk curses=10+3+1 soulre=8+1 healin=12 protec=2][order of apostasy][heal party][infuse health][heal other][heal area][mark of pain][extinguish][resurrection signet][/build]

Equipment

 * Full max Scar Pattern Armor or Revenant's Armor
 * Insightful Holy Staff of Fortitude/of Enchanting for the 20 percent chance of half recharge and casting time of Healing Prayers with a backup +15 energy/-1 energy regeneration Truncheon and +15 energy/-1 energy regeneration focus for energy emergencies.

"Oath" Trapping Ranger
[build name="Oath Trapping Ranger" prof=range/eleme beastm=11+1+3 expert=10+1 wilder=10+1 waterm=1][oath shot][dust trap][maelstrom][whirling defense][energizing wind][edge of extinction][natures renewal][fertile season][/build]

Equipment

 * Full max Druid's Armor
 * +5 Energy Recurve Bow of Fortitude and backup Insightful Staff of Fortitude

"Full Trapper" Ranger
[build name="Full Trapper Ranger" prof=range/ritua expert=12+1 wilder=12+1+3 restor=3][spike trap][barbed trap][dust trap][flame trap][whirling defense][frozen soil][serpents quickness][lively was naomei][/build]

Equipment

 * Full max Druid's Armor
 * Insightful Restoration Scepter of Fortitude or a single handed weapon with energy mod and a shield

"Psychic Distraction Mesmer"
[build name="Psychic Distraction Mesmer" prof=mesme/eleme fastca=9+1 domina=12+3+1 inspir=9+1 waterm=1][channeling][psychic distraction][cry of frustration][maelstrom][shatter hex][inspired hex][optional][resurrection signet][/build] The optional slot can be filled with skills such as Unnatural Signet, Ward of Stability, Ward Against Foes, Ward Against Melee, etc. Since, the Psychic Distraction Mesmer is the newest addition to the IWAY build, the skills are still quite variable. Many Psychic Distraction Mesmers prefer to bring Elementalist Skills such as Rodgort's Invocation, Meteor Shower, Fireball, and Deep Freeze to increase the overall damage of the IWAY team; they put max 12 points in Fire Magic and minimal points in Domination Magic. The only must have skill so far is Psychic Distraction as it is needed to interrupt enemy Ghostly Heroes that attempt to capture altars.

Equipment

 * Full Max Enchanter's Armor
 * Insightful Inscribed Staff of Fortitude with a backup +15 energy/-1 energy regeneration Cane and +15 energy/-1 energy regeneration focus for energy emergencies.

Usage
Most teams will start out placing Predatory Season, Energizing Wind and Edge of Extinction within range of where the team will be fighting. If the enemy team is not IWAY, the Oath Shot spirit spammer will drop Nature's Renewal to slow down enemy enchantment and hex casting. If the enemy team is a spike team, the Oath Shot spirit spammer will drop Fertile Season, giving all creatures more health and thus making you a harder spike target.

The IWAY team will then use bows on the enemy team to send their pets at them, setting off traps and giving players who don't know how to correctly counter them the opportunity to kill the pets so that they may be made into wells and to fuel "I Will Avenge You!". After the traps are clear, the warriors rush in.

The order necromancers' primary jobs are as Monks, and should focus on using the various healing spells to keep the team alive (basically staying a bit back, and almost constantly spamming Heal Party. Use discretion though, your energy is your team's life). With the high value of Soul Reaping, this necro should take advantage of all dying persons to quickly cast (basically spam) Heal Party so that Edge of Extinction does not also kill his own team. Order of Pain is used to boost the team's damage output, when the necromancer feels comfortable casting it (Order of the Vampire used to be a good alternative, and would boost damage dealing member's health, but it now conflicts with Order of Apostasy). Order of Apostasy is used to negate enchantments, and should be kept up at most times, but again, be careful with energy and never use it without Energizing Wind on you.

The Psychic Distraction Mesmer can either play a heavy offense by using Fire Magic skills or play more of a support role by using Domination Magic skills. Maelstrom should be used to scatter enemies that like to hide in wards. Cry of Frustration should be used to counter spikes and Vimway trappers that bunch up. Shatter Hex and Inspired Hex can be used to remove dangerous hexes like Migraine and Spiteful Spirit. Shatter Hex is especially useful on allies that are near enemies. Psychic Distraction is essential for interrupting enemy Ghostly Heroes, and it can be used to interrupt many other skills as well. The Mesmer must be careful not to have the skill Diversioned.

The Oath Shot spirit spammer's primary job is to keep the Energyzing Wind, Nature's Renewal, and Edge of Extinction spirits alive by using Dust Trap on them and using Oath Shot to make the skills recharge. For Oath Shot to hit more often, try hitting an enemy spirit or other non-moving target if present. If not, try finding a target without an enchant. Also keep in mind, the more often you renew the spirits, the more energy the necromancers will gain. The Oath Shot Ranger commonly brings Maelstrom with minimal attribute points is set to Water Magic to interrupt spell-casting characters such as healing ball Monks and spiking necromancers.

The full trapper's primary job is to supply traps defensively to protect the necros and the mesmer and to trap offensively to drive enemies out of wards and to do damage and spread conditions. Frozen soil should be placed when the opposing team has more dead people than your team does. Whenever frozen is active keep Lively Was Naomei ashes on hand as much as possible. This trapper can also snare opposing foes on Relic Run maps.

On Altar Capturing maps, the Sprint Warrior will take the Ghostly Hero by talking to him. When the doors open, the warrior will run as fast as possible to the altar, hopefully capturing it. During this run, other party members have to be careful not to block the Ghostly Hero since he does not have any speed boost unless the Me/E or R/E brings Windborne Speed.

On "Relic Runs", the team's trapper will trap their Relic. Most IWAY teams defend on 'Relic Runs'. After defeating most of the enemy team, the Sprint Warrior sneaks ahead, taking the relic and taking it back to your own base. It is preferred to try to do this without being spotted so discretion is advised.

Counters
Several tactics that work against warriors and groups of warriors will still be effective counters against IWAY teams, including:
 * Killing the IWAY team's Energizing Wind will keep their "Order of Apostasy" necromancer from spamming Order of Apostasy and will keep the cost of Heal Party and Extinguish high.
 * Note that you will not be able to depend on protective enchantments like Aegis and Healing Seed, since the IWAY team is using Order of Apostasy.
 * Use Hexes like Shadow of Fear, Spiteful Spirit, Blurred Vision, Thunderclap, Fevered Dreams, etc. that are effective against the clumps of warriors. Spiteful Spirit in combination with Reckless Haste works really well when used on the pets because they will not stop attacking.
 * Traps are very effective against IWAY, but beware, most IWAY teams will have a trapper as well. Full trapper teams are usually massacred by IWAY', unless the trapper team uses the skill "Victory is Mine!", which would give the trapper team the advantage, and is very common amongst full trapper teams.
 * Cause blindness and weakness.
 * The two order necromancers are the softest targets in an IWAY team, go for them and you can greatly reduce their ability to heal or damage. A warrior, interrupter, or ranger should be able to take these out.
 * Simply avoid killing the IWAY pets. This way, they cannot fuel "I Will Avenge You!" unless half their team is already dead.
 * Drop a Greater Conflagration nature ritual to totally negate the damage boost from Order of Pain.
 * Ward Against Melee, Ward Against Foes, and other slow downs greatly reduce the effectiveness of warriors.
 * If the team can deal a lot of armor ignoring damage, or life stealing, then Fertile Season will greatly reduce the effectiveness of an IWAY team.
 * Feast of Corruption spike teams can be extreamly dangerous to IWAY teams. Typically an FoC spike group will stay very close together and wait for the IWAY warriors to form up around them and then quickly dispatch the entire group by casting a hex on each target and following up with Feast of Corruption.  By eliminating all the warriors and pets at the same time the benefits of IWAY are severely diminished.

Variants
The modern incarnation of IWAY with a 3/1/2/2 split uses only three IWAY warriors, though in the past it used as many as 6-8 warriors.

There have been many modifications of the IWAY build since its creation. Some have ignored the Necromancers, using two Elementalist/Monks with Heal Party, protection Monks, Elementalist/Mesmer fire "nukers", Elementalists with Wards, and so on. Few of these see use for very long. Though the use of a protection monk was once picking up popularity, most players abandoned this for the "Trapway".

Some IWAY teams use a Ranger/Monk equipped with Martyr which is used to pull off conditions.

After the update of March 3rd, 2006 weakened many of the key IWAY skills, many groups have been trying variants to make up for the loss in power of the standard build. Many of these variants deviate quite substantially from the typical IWAY builds. For example, some have tried "Surge-Way", a variant that eliminates the trappers and tone of the necromancers in favor of three Mesmer/Necromancerｓ with Energy Surge, and various other Domination Magic skills. This builds upon the pressure theory of IWAY, combining the Area of Effect damage of the Energy Surges and Edge of Extinction with the constant flow of damage from the warriors to dole out more damage than enemy monks can keep up with, while at the same time denying those very monks of energy.

Another variant is known as "Curse-way", and employs more of a warrior-spike theory. Both trappers are eliminated and replaced by a fifth warrior and a Curses Necromancer. The Curses Necromancer uses Rigor Mortis, Mark of Pain, Barbs, and Weaken Armor. All the warriors then attack whomever the necromancer has targeted with his hexes. Rigor Mortis ensures that the target cannot be protected by popular anti-warrior spells, while Mark of Pain does an immense amount of damage to his nearby allies, as five warriors (all using Tiger's Fury) on him will land a great number of hits. Barbs and Weaken Armor just serve to kill the target as quickly as possible, as well as being cover hexes. The Curses Necro also uses Martyr and Purge Conditions, to fulfill the essential function of the Martyr Trapper that has been cut.

Yet another variant is "ViM-Way". This build uses the four normal warriors, but eliminates both necromancers and both trappers in favor of four Ranger/Warrior "Victory is Mine!" trappers. These trappers are used to inflict damage and conditions, while using their trademark "Victory is Mine!" to sustain their health and energy. It can be quite powerful, and ViM provides the durability needed to survive a long battle, but it tends to lack the explosive damage needed to defeat spike groups.

A variant build especially among lower ranked Iway groups replaces the "Full Trapper" with a Ritual Lord Ritualist that uses Communing spirits Shelter, Union, Displacement, and Shadowsong to protect the backline orders necromancers instead of traps.

Another variant is also for the Oath Shot Ranger to and bring Savage Shot or Gale to help interrupt the Ghostly Heroes in the Hall of Heroes. While the Psychic Distraction Mesmer focuses on interrupting one hero, the Oath Shot Ranger can interrupt the other.

Criticism
Note: Like any very popular build this build is being frowned upon by many players as being "overused" and "taking no skill", however with the latest skill balance updates, IWAY is becoming harder to use in group builds, so it may be considered a nice build in the future when it has become obsolete.

Fame Farming
Many people have argued that the IWAY build was not meant to take and hold the Hall of Heroes, but to gain quick fame for those using the build; the pejorative descriptor used is "fame farming". The criticism is partly due to the nature of this build: IWAY is quick to put together, easy to understand and use, and generally requires only loose coordination between team members; and partly because unranked players generally find themselves shut out of most groups except for IWAY or similar "fame farming" teams who are trying to get enough fame to achieve rank 3 or higher. It should be noted that good IWAY teams often do make it to the Hall of Heroes and may hold it for a time.

This criticism is perhaps the most apt when the IWAY build is used to win the first 3 maps in the Global Tournament, and then leave, regroup, and do it again, fighting mostly inexperienced teams and gaining a 6 Fame for 25 minutes or less of play. Whether this is actually more effective than playing the normal way, or not, is a matter of dispute.

History
Before IWAY there was Berserk. Although Berserk is not truly IWAY it's worth a mention as it is the forefather of IWAY. Berserk was originally created as a joke build.

Berserk consisted of 6 Warrior/Rangers with pets used to confuse enemies into thinking it was fighting the whole team while 2 order necros with 55 health hid in the spawn. At that time Orders were a World Enchantment and affected all players at any distance.

Apparently, IWAY started off with 8 Ranger/Warriors, also known as bunny thumpers, which utilize a Ranger's Expertise attribute to lower the cost of the Warrior's Hammer Mastery skills. They would also bring along pets and Tiger's Fury to speed up their attacks.

This proved to be quite effective, but eventually it was discovered that Warrior primaries were capable of doing more damage and they were changed to W/Rs. Further improvements were then made by adding a Tainted and an Orders Necromancer.

For quite awhile, IWAY consisted completely of 6 W/Rs, 1 Tainted Necromancer, and 1 Orders Necromancer.

It was general practice, at one time, to have one W/R carry Revive Animal to transport dead pets from one area of the map to another. Most groups have stopped using this skill. They opt, instead, to stay near their dead pets. This has since been replaced by the second EoE.

After this came 2 trappers, at the time, the IWAY groups brought 2 resolve trappers. This was to spam conditions on enemies, and give the Orders, and Tainted Necromancers a way out of the heat if being chased, barbed trap would slow chasers. One of the trappers generally took Winnowing, but it was later discovered that balanced builds could easily defeat IWAY using Aegis. So then the IWAY build became 4 W/R, 1 N/Mo, 1 N/E, 1 R/Me, 1 R/Mo.

The September 29th, 2005 update reduced the maximum attack speed bonus to 33%, down from 50%, slightly reducing the effectiveness of the IWAY build.

The March 3rd, 2006 update further reduced the effectiveness of the build, by cutting the attack speed bonus from the IWAY skill to 25%, and modifying Order of the Vampire to no longer stack with other necromancer enchantments.

With the release of Guild Wars Factions on April 28th, 2006, many IWAY teams have taken to using the new elite orders spell Order of Apostasy to remove the protective enchantments of enemies, as well as providing an extra healer in the N/Mo generally used. This is a very common build now, especially among the more highly ranked IWAYs. Order of Apostasy (abbreviated as OoA), is also effective in destroying the enchantments usually used to protect the Ghostly Hero in the Hall of Heroes, and thus is more effective at capturing the Hall of Heroes.

The latest change in IWAY is the new Psychic Distraction Mesmer who replaces one of the four warriors. IWAY teams were finding it difficult to interrupt the Ghostly Hero on Altar maps with Distracting Blow/Disrupting Chop because of the Ritualist Spirit Displacement. So the Psychic Distraction Mesmer came along and now must work with the Order of Apostasy Necromancer to make sure Spellbreaker is not on the enemy Ghostly Hero when Psychic Distraction is used.