User:Jaigoda/Guides/Not Getting Enchantments Removed

The current PvE meta is one that revolves very much around the damage provided from melee characters. Melees can deal huge amounts of AoE damage through the use of skills like Hundred Blades and Vow of Strength, as well as outside buffs like Mark of Pain and Strength of Honor. However, in any given melee build, there is usually at least one enchantment that sucks when it gets removed (Critical Agility, Aura of Holy Might, etc.). A lot of people don't like running enchantments on melees because they tend to get stripped, especially Critical Agility/Defenses since they're pretty much always on top and thus the first to be removed. However, there are multiple ways to prevent enchantment stripping.

One of the most important things to note is that once in battle, melees are very low on the enchantment removal priority list. As long as there are other enchantments to be removed, you most likely will be ignored for more vulnerable targets. This is especially true if you have mass enchantments like Orders or Aegis where the enchantment removal from enemy mobs is spread out over your whole party (and you'll have a cover enchantment as well), at which you will almost never be targetted for enchant removal. The biggest problem arises in the entering of the mob, where usually the melee is the first to be aggro'd, and is ripe to be stripped of all of its staple enchantments. This is what you have to prepare against.

Cover Your Enchantments
This is probably the simplest way to prevent your staple enchantments from being removed is to cover them with expendable enchantments. One of the best ways of doing this is to use Orders. OoP/OotV and Dark Fury can be placed on a Necro, Dervish, or Ritualist and provide mass enchantments that are very quickly renewed. They also synchronize very well with melees, especially using Dark Bond as a boost for SY or other adrenaline skills. There are lots of other options as well, but Orders are one of the easiest methods for a very good cover enchantment. Also, while aggroing a group you can always micro a hero to put an enchantment on you (such as Death Nova) as a cover. The main problem is that covering enchantments doesn't protect against deep enchantment removal or multiple enchantment removal skills used all at once.

Pious Renewal
This skill deserves a special note because of its amazing power as a cover enchantment. Because Pious Renewal is recharged whenever it's removed, you can effectively keep yourself under a cover enchantment in any given situation. Even better, when it's removed you gain energy and health, so there's no real negative tradeoff. Its only disadvantage is against deep enchantment removal like Rend Enchantments, but if you mash the skill enough you can even cover against multiple enchantment removals.

Engage, Then Cast the Enchantments
This concept is very simple. Instead of casting your enchantments and then entering into the mob, you wait until you're in the thick of the mob to cast your enchants. This almost always works to redirect the enchantment removals to other targets. The disadvantage with this is that you have to spend time casting while you're in the mob, slowing things down. You're also more vulnerable to interupts and knockdowns.

Don't Go In First
This is a less common approach, but never-the-less effective in certain situations. The main reason enchantments get removed on a melee is because, especially when running with heroes, they're almost always the first ones to draw the aggro. If instead you flag your heroes forward, stay in the middle of them, and then unflag once aggro'ing, the enchantment removals simply don't hit you. Once you get through that first wave, enchant removals will pretty much never hit you. This method is simple, and it works. Of course, it does mean that balling mobs is not an option, so you're generally forced to cspace.

For ~95% of areas in GW, at least one of these methods will allow you negate all of the vulnerabilities that come with using enchantments. The other 5% is mostly areas with AoE- or very heavy enchant removal. At those points you may simply have no choice but to temporarily forsake enchantment buffs on your melee (for certain groups or the whole area itself).