Mantra of Evasion (50 Spirit): For the next 3 minutes, you and all allies within 40 yards have an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks. You and allies within 40 yards when you activate this Mantra gain an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks for 3 seconds. Neither of these dodge chances stacks with itself. You can only have one Mantra active at a time.
The first of the available Mantra skills, the Mantra of Evasion is a very simple but very nice defensive boost. The fact that it’s a dodge chance makes it a touch on the unreliable side- it could do nothing for several attacks, or it could wind up leaving you untouched by all the attacks in a given chain- but it’s a nice defense boost all the same. The brief improved initial boost is hard to take advantage of, as you can hardly work up 50 Spirit that quickly on a regular basis, but it can be nice if you start the Mantra at the beginning of a fight. Like all the mantras, a good party-benefitting skill.
Hard Target (50 Spirit): For the next 3 minutes, you and all allies within 40 yards have an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks and a 20% increase in armor. You and allies within 40 yards when you activate this Mantra gain an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks for 3 seconds. Neither of these dodge chances stacks with itself. You can only have one Mantra active at a time.
Adding the 20% boost to Armor makes this Mantra not only more powerful but more reliable- Armor always applies on every physical hit, so that part of the defensive boost won’t ever leave you hanging. A good improvement.
Divine Protection (50 Spirit): For the next 3 minutes, you and all allies within 40 yards have an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks. You and allies within 40 yards when you activate this Mantra gain an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks for 3 seconds. Neither of these dodge chances stacks with itself. You can only have one Mantra active at a time. When a character under the effects of this Mantra is reduced below 25% Life, they are protected by a shield for the next 3 seconds that prevents 80% of all damage to them. This shield can only form on each character once per 90 seconds.
Divine Protection, while usually no more reliable than Mantra of Evasion, grants a huge durability boost to any character who finds themself in serious danger- making it a must-have for facing off with dangerous opponents, like some of the higher-level champion and rare mobs, and some of the more damaging bosses. Since the effect isn’t constant, you may find it of less use than Hard Target- after all, it’s always better not to get in danger to begin with than to have a way of getting back out of danger.
Wind through the Reeds (50 Spirit): For the next 3 minutes, you and all allies within 40 yards have an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks and improve your/their movement speed by 5%. You and allies within 40 yards when you activate this Mantra gain an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks for 3 seconds. Neither of these dodge chances stacks with itself. You can only have one Mantra active at a time.
Not the most useful rider for Mantra of Evasion, while a movement boost makes sense, a 5% boost is very much on the small side. Tactically, the advantage of a boost that small is tiny compared to the possible benefits of a 20% Armor increase or the emergency shield of Divine Protection. Generally, you should ignore this rune.
Perseverance (50 Spirit): For the next 3 minutes, you and all allies within 40 yards have an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks and reduce all impairing effects like Slow and Frozen by 20% of their duration. You and allies within 40 yards when you activate this Mantra gain an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks for 3 seconds. Neither of these dodge chances stacks with itself. You can only have one Mantra active at a time.
While it’s less universally applicable than the armor increase or emergency shield, Perseverance’s control resistance is a very nice thing to have when facing foes like Izual. While it won’t help with all fights, it makes some of them a lot easier to handle- so if you’re more worried about being stopped or slowed than you are about being beaten to death, you may want to use this rune.
Backlash (50 Spirit): For the next 3 minutes, you and all allies within 40 yards have an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks. You and allies within 40 yards when you activate this Mantra gain an additional 15% chance to dodge attacks for 3 seconds. Neither of these dodge chances stacks with itself. You can only have one Mantra active at a time. When a character under the effects of Backlash successfully dodges an attack, there is a chance that they will release a burst of flame that deals 35% of your weapon damage to all enemies in melee range.
While not as useful to ranged attackers who want to stay out of melee combat to begin with, Backlash is a very strong way for melee party members to effectively improve their damage simply by letting you put the dodge improvement of Mantra of Evasion on them. While the Fire damage type isn’t so great, and the damage amount is only decent for a ‘counterattack’ effect, the frequency it can fire at makes it worth a try if you want to squeeze in some extra damage for close combat.
