Keeping the Ki flowing?

[benneburg]

How do you do it?

Even in fire stance, on my level 20 monk, I can rarely keep the Ki flow high enough to cycle Void > Earth > Earth > Fist of Iron > Finisher.

Any tips and tricks would be appreciated.


benne^

[elg582]

1. Are you hitting?

2. Do you have improved critical?

3. Do you have the Amrath pack? If so, get Oremi's necklace.

4. Don't feel bad about spending your ki as long as you're doing damage.

[benneburg]

I'm hitting, yeah.

Got improved crit ofcourse.

Oremi's Necklace sound like a good idea, will have to look for that.

I don't feel bad about spending it, it's just irritating that when I get to the finisher, there's never enough Ki to pull it off and it's wasted.

It does make me wonder, those monks that are almost always at a full Ki bar, are they just being lazy? :P

The yellow bar is a fight in itself, I must keep it down when slapping things about, the yellow bar is the real enemy.


benne^

[indigokid]

Not that I have a level 20 monk, but my experience has been that you're charged for your finisher even if you don't have the ki to complete it. Instead, throw a couple normal punches, then as ki builds toss in you finisher.

[sweez]

It does make me wonder, those monks that are almost always at a full Ki bar, are they just being lazy? :P

Post-u9, yes, they're being lazy.

[benneburg]

Yeah, can always do a few normal hits to charge the Ki, but when you get the rythm going for the attacks, it's easy to forget hehe.

Any experiences with Crane? Going to try it out when I can reset enhancements again, thought I may aswell ask now I'm already here.


Post-u9, yes, they're being lazy.
Haha I like to hear that, will tell my dwarven friends that.


benne^

[Kaldair]

It's not so much laziness, it's that a lot of monks are light monks and don't use void or the dark elemental weakness attacks. I know on my monk, vs harry for example, I spam lightning and earth III and IV, smite tainted, and because that still doesn't use up my ki faster than I make it, I throw in jade strike (for the 10% physical weakness, even though i'm not even sure that it effects him) and when smite and jade coincide, i throw in a fist of light for a quick heal. Fire and Water strikes don't do enough to overcome his resist/immunity, and those are all my damaging strikes. I don't even have the void line, just wasn't worth it in the end, IMHO.

[BOgre]

only lvl 6 at the mo, but i find i need to charge before every finisher. Which is fine, since most stuff is dead long before the finisher anyways. That gives me a chance to hit/charge on other stuff, and use the finisher when I'm darn good and ready. That being said, I'd love to see a higher standing Ki across the board, and faster recharge rate.

[DevHead]

Oremi's is the way to go. I use Wind Stance and I can spam my shock strikes and ToD.

[SensaiRyu]

Boss bar: void/light/void/finish/earth/iron/earth/smite
My usual combo: 123487654123765412347654321 pause and repeat.

Combos with orimi's and mountain stance barely keeps up.

Toss out aligning and walk right before a fight and I start fighting with <10 ki.

Yes, they're being lazy - my ki bar is almost always around 0 during fights.

[FuzzyDuck81]

It's not so much laziness, it's that a lot of monks are light monks and don't use void or the dark elemental weakness attacks. I know on my monk, vs harry for example, I spam lightning and earth III and IV, smite tainted, and because that still doesn't use up my ki faster than I make it, I throw in jade strike (for the 10% physical weakness, even though i'm not even sure that it effects him) and when smite and jade coincide, i throw in a fist of light for a quick heal. Fire and Water strikes don't do enough to overcome his resist/immunity, and those are all my damaging strikes. I don't even have the void line, just wasn't worth it in the end, IMHO.

I usually take tier2 void since its a handly little bit of force damage to fit into the cycle & against high-AC stuff the void-light-void-finisher gives +5 to hit, skills & saves for 10secs.. its useful in other areas where search/disable DCs might be pretty borderline too, just fire it off then have the rogue hit search or disable straight away to benefit - i guess it'd boost UMD too which could be useful in some circumstances too for scrolls for allies

Jade strike can effect harry & sally (possibly horoth too?), if you're lucky enough to get past their saves, so its worth throwing one in when its off cooldown just on the off-chance.

Also.. the ki must flow... i had a flashback to Dune.. and i only just got over my last binge of reading that

[SensaiRyu]

Jade strike can effect harry & sally (possibly horoth too?), if you're lucky enough to get past their saves, so its worth throwing one in when its off cooldown just on the off-chance.

Slot 9 on my quickbar is jade strike - I don't think I've ever seen it proc on a boss yet but I still try. Nice to know that it affects harry/sally/horoth? Don't know if it's worth using it 20 times for the 5% proc chance and then get only what... 6 sec of reduced fort? Maybe it is. I'm not doing the math.

If I have smite off timer I'd select it over jade strike.

I'm very happy that all of the void and stance regular attacks cost only 5 ki.

[DragonTroy]

1st off: jade strike does effect horoth,harry,sally. pretty sure it also works on the demon queen, and any other devil or demon you can think of.

2ndly: want to know if jade strike worked? right click/ tab the enemy you hit it with. then hit the little magnifying glass to open up all the things that are currently on the enemy. if you hit him, you'll see a 30 second picture that looks like the dark monk earth curse, and when you mouse over it will say 'jade strike'.

3rdly: sometimes i have trouble keeping the ki flowing as well. i keep forgetting to run my monk through TOD to get the oremi's neck

[edgarallanpoe]

i keep forgetting to run my monk through TOD to get the oremi's neck

IIRC Oremis is in Bastion, not TOD.

Also, the animal path you chose can have a dramatic impact on Ki. I have 2 capped monks currently and a 3rd one that is at 16th level and I rarely have Ki issues. My Horc is a FireIV/CraneIII monk and he has more than he knows what to do with. My WindIV/Tort will run dry on occasion but only during quick battles with big DPS friends. It is simply a matter of getting enough strikes in that instance. My Mountain III/CraneIII monk seems to be fine. He obviously doesn't carry the Ki of my Horc but he has more than enough to spam his earth strikes and light strikes. We will see how he fares after 17th level when things start to get a bit harder.

Unfortunately I have been unable, despite several attempts, to get Oremis on any of these toons. Truth be told, it would be useless (as a Ki generator) on my Horc, but my Wind and Mountain mountain could use it. That being said, I don't feel that it is something that a monk can't live without. It is a nice item, for sure, but isn't absolutely necessary to be a welcome addition to any party.

[SensaiRyu]

IIRC Oremis is in Bastion, not TOD.


...It's in TOD also. That's where I ended up getting it - and on my first run. The chest right before horoth drops so much of the named loot that you can pick it up much easier than farming it in bastion. I've seen it drop several times since then.


Also, the animal path you chose can have a dramatic impact on Ki.
Good point. I have Tort II FWIW.

[edgarallanpoe]

...It's in TOD also. That's where I ended up getting it - and on my first run. The chest right before horoth drops so much of the named loot that you can pick it up much easier than farming it in bastion. I've seen it drop several times since then.

I didn't know that. Thanks for the tip. Rep coming your way....

[thandros]

dark monk here on Bosses what i do is just go into fire stance and just use melee for liek 10 15 seconds which maxes out my 250 so ki then i switch to earth and just spam earth attacks and tod ) never run out. though i am using orimiees set

[Drakos]

It's not so much laziness, it's that a lot of monks are light monks and don't use void or the dark elemental weakness attacks. I know on my monk, vs harry for example, I spam lightning and earth III and IV, smite tainted, and because that still doesn't use up my ki faster than I make it, I throw in jade strike (for the 10% physical weakness, even though i'm not even sure that it effects him) and when smite and jade coincide, i throw in a fist of light for a quick heal. Fire and Water strikes don't do enough to overcome his resist/immunity, and those are all my damaging strikes. I don't even have the void line, just wasn't worth it in the end, IMHO.
^This

[Taimasan]

I would take a look at your attack score if your having problems in fire stance, and I would suggest taking crane line.

You don't gain ki if you are not hitting your opponent.

[redspecter23]

If you're looking to build ki during trash fights, round them up then cleave to get a massive burst of ki. If you happen to have oremi's and are in fire stance when you do this, you can build a bar surprisingly fast. It's also a prerequisite if you're shintao so it's not even a waste of a feat slot. When I'm using this technique, I tend to use my first 30ish ki on abundant step so I can get a jump on the other melee and get to the fight first.