So I really suck against Celestines, namely Shamarah, and I was wondering what tip anyone could give me to have a better offensive against the guild. Inquisition is really annoying because it doesn't take much to do it and it removes all your defs and makes it so you can't even so much as talk for .. what is it? 10 seconds? 15? I'm not sure. But anyway it's hard to keep some celetines in one place because they run, rub soulless, run, rub soulles. Suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!
EDIT: I'm a geomancer telekinetic

Celestines don't have any particular defensive weakness. If they're angling for inquisition, they're not going to have extra power, and all of their special defensive abilities are power hungry, so that's not usually a huge issue either. In terms of your offense, they're a very standard class.

In terms of survival, watch for blackout when they have a fully charged soulless, and run and shield at infidel.

so shield stops inquisition or heretic?

Rule of thumb: Tell him whatsup....

Be like "I'm Geomancer, you Celestine, you has to die, ok?" and he really should die...

yes, well-timed shields are the bane of all guardian offense. (of course, my job is to not let you shield.)

You can't hit people through a shield.

You probably know this, but just in case, but inquisition has a long setup. First, you need to hit the target with heretic (3p). Then, the Celestine has to wait for a message saying that you're glowing and vulnerable. Within a few seconds of that message (6-8), they can hit with infidel (3p), which causes a bit of damage and doubles up on the affliction rate of heretic. This is when you should run and shield. You'll glow twice, and they only really get one shot at each of those glows, so if you're turtling up, inquisition (6p) is awfully hard to hit.

If they fail to do that, they have to wait for all their power to come back before attempting again.

Flinging is really going to screw Shamarah over during soulless. Room Movement is guardian bane

So there really is no other choice but to run outta the room when certain things hit? Ok. Well if I'm always running how do I stick a kill.

You're not always running. You're running at infidel if you know they haven't spent power on anything besides heretic lately. Do it like you would anyone else. Angle for heartburst. Stack clots and damage kill. Whatever works for you.

Above is good tips to avoid Inquisition, which frankly, retardedly easy to avoid in the first place. Second, Inqui doesn't always last for the entire windup time of Soulless; in fact, I'm not even sure it does the majority of the time. If you spam movement and sip allheale to hopefully get rid of paralysis that might've been stuck, you might be able to get out of the way. Of course, if you're in the Starry Sea, tough luck...

PS, does Sham usually use inqui, or does he mask it like I did?

Heretic and Infidel fade after a while. If you get hit with Infidel, just leave for about 15-20 and come back. If you see them judge, use web or psychicpush them out of the room, or gust even. Psidagger with hadrudin might work against younger, less experienced Celestines. Above all, try to stay out of vapors (blackout) because 90% of them will Soulless you while you're blacked out. If you get hit with blackout a few times, tumble out of the room. Heck, burrow if you get stuck. Make sure you reject tarot users, no reason to get empressed while you're running.

Man, I need to make a Celestine. It'd be a nice change of pace after the eight billion or so Nihilist alts.

Running is extremely viable against a Celestine.

But for some reason some people refuse to accept it as a tactic. Leaving to escape inquisition then coming back isn't the same as running away from the fight.

I use inquisition in the vast majority of 1v1 fights. I almost never use blackout-soulless, not because I think it's cheap (it's not) but because it's much less reliable and basically just depends on the opponent being gullible.

Most people don't understand that, especially monks.

Lol, you ran from me! I'm a monk, you should stand toe to toe with me and fight!

lolno.

Well That's really what I'm tired of. People being like. LULZ YOU RAN! When it's really the only option you got. Especially with bards and the aurics. I always get owned by that because I don't like to leave the room. I guess I need to learn to use that as a tactic.

Yeah, I'm the same way. I got into a spar on my Cantor against a Tahtetso 80% my might once, and she refused to spar me after that because I kept leaving the room. She said it wasn't "honourable" to leave the room during a fight.

BS. You do what you gotta do in a fight. Against Celestines, shielding helps a ton. Against monks, I always liked to use double psychicfists on their arms to disarm them, so they had to spend time mending/rewielding weapons. ESPECIALLY shofangi/nekotai. Against bards, sip love, psychicfist arms so their instruments unwield, if they blanknote you leave the room until you can earwort again. TK's trip combo isn't great against acrobatics, but it helps a slight bit.

Above all, don't let someone talk smack to you and piss you off so you do something stupid. Fight them on ground that's the best for you, pick them off from adjacent rooms with staff, and don't rush until you have the advantage. It's not about fairness, it's about killing the other person. Don't take their taunts personally

I find Vathael's returnmessage IC very apt in explaining this.

Often people who can not beat your tactics will try to shame you into no longer using them. This is the meta conflict that goes on above the normal combat.

Many people will claim that X is cheap, broken, overpowered, etc if it kills them or prevents them from killing you. Very few are actually able to take a view of both sides and honestly comment on balance.

I.E. You should never feel bad about running, it is one of the most basic combat maneuvers and there are many skills and abilities that revolve around preventing it, chasing you, or forcing you to do it.

Of course in game I might mock all kinds of things about an enemy even if I know they are not true ooc. So you also need to keep that in mind.

Though I hear these days the best way to beat a celestine is with the UNCITIZEN command.

Uh. The key is to make the monks run from you.

He's a Cantor. How the would he do that?