Monk too click-intensive for me, help?

[mezzorco]

Hi, I've unlocked monks but never played one because I can't stand all those melee buttons. I'm posting because you could help me deal with it, or at least I hope so

Correct me if I'm wrong, but main reason to cycle through attacks seems to be to activate finishing moves, at least for a multiclass toon. The thing is, it seems to me too much effort to endlessly click all those buttons in order to gain short term buffs or to produce effects mobs can save against. Clearly speaking, Fist of Iron is the only move I would like to have on my hotbar

I don't even know how to move, click special attacks and do basic attacks simultaneously. Should I activate mouse look? Should I activate auto attacks?

I don't feel that all that clicking fits my playstyle, but I would like to play at least a monk-splashed centered toon.
Say I'm going to be a rogue/monk/pala staff build, would it be viable to limit or completely neglect ki attacks and finishing moves? Or am I loosing too much benefits?

Thank you all for every bit of help you'll manage to give me

[Therrias]

Just use stunning fist. That's the important one.

If/when you get more comfortable with active attacks, you can mix in fists of iron and such.

[Uska]

I mainly just do triple light finish for heals with some sort of removal or lesser restore attached I am sure I am losing out on something but my monks kill fast enough. I use to do grasp of the earth dragon in ToD for stun prevention but that's almost never ran. You can run your monk with out lots of button mashing if you wish you will lose out on some stuff but you can still be fine. Fighters can be button intensive as well and the caster classes

[LuKaSu]

I mainly just do triple light finish for heals with some sort of removal or lesser restore attached I am sure I am losing out on something but my monks kill fast enough. I use to do grasp of the earth dragon in ToD for stun prevention but that's almost never ran. You can run your monk with out lots of button mashing if you wish you will lose out on some stuff but you can still be fine. Fighters can be button intensive as well and the caster classes

I think a lot the same way as Uska on this. On my hotbars, I have Cleave on #1, something that makes me go fast on #2 (haste potions, expeditious retreat for a dragonmarked human, or at monk level 12, abundant step), my finishing move on #3, healing curse on #4, and stunning fist on #5. Start the fight with stunning fist, and throw out healing curse often. Every three healing curses, you can do an area of effect heal as a finishing move. Throw cleaves around to keep your ki up when it's low. I put all my elemental attacks on the next hotbar, and only use them when I need a specific buff, like the stun blocker thing.

I have trouble with the clickiness of a Paladin, but that setup is managable for me.

[ArcaneArcher52689]

It's not just finishing moves, though those are nice:
a monk in wind stance can fire off one ki strike every other attack chain easily, usually 2.(about 1/second)
with regular stances, that's 1d6 extra damage, 3.5, x2 for twf=7 extra damage
adept stances, it's 2d6 or 7 extra, 14 with twf
master stances deal 1d20, for 10.5 extra damage, 21 extra w/ twf
grandmaster deal 2d21, for 21 extra damage, 42 extra damage w/ twf.

By cycling your attacks, you can really increase your damage out put than if you just ignore them.

Fnishing moves, fists of light, stunning fists, tough of death are all good too.

[Grailhawk]

None of the monk clickieness requires auto attack just quickly hit the move and return to holding down the attack button.

I recommend the following be on the hot bar and you use them as you can
Stunning Fist, Fists of Light, Fist of Iron, Grandmaster Strike of the Enduring, Master Strike of the Enduring, and Adept Strike of the Enduring

As you get better you will notice the earth finisher come available at times use it its not bad (attack with a +2 Crit Multiplier)

Use Autohotkey to create macros for the following, use them before and after fights
Healing Ki: Combination: Light - Light - Light - Finisher
Dance of Clouds + Shadow Vail: Air - Light - Air - Finisher - Shadow Vail

If you run ToD also have a macro for
Grasp the Earth Dragon: Earth - Light - Earth - Finisher

You should give it a try it is a significant improvement to your output and makes you a better player to learn how to handle all the clicking.

It really is not that different from cycling Cleave, Great Cleave, Momentum Swing, and Lay Waist.

[sebastianosmith]

Hey mezzorco,

Monks can be played without using finishers, but learning to use them effectively can certainly increase both DPS and party viability. I suggest you check out Spencerian's Book of Syncletica as a general guide and the Finishing Moves section in specific. Most importantly - Practice your twitch skills. Monks really shine with mouse look active and in almost constant motion.

Best of luck!

[Stoner81]

On my challenge farmer toon I use the following set up on my hot bar :

1. Stunning Fist.
2. Unbalancing Strike.
3. Cleave.
4. Great Cleave.
5. Quivering Palm.
6. Dismissing Strike.
7. Jade Strike / Tomb of Jade (can't remember off the top of my head but it is one of those two anyway).
8. Fists of Light.
9. Smite Tainted Creature.
0. Finishing Move.

All other specific finishers are on a seperate bar out of the way that I can just click through very quickly (e.g. Aligning the Heavens) and Abundant Step is elsewhere which has the ALT key as the modifier so it can be used easily

Pretty much every fight starts the same... Stunning Fist! This one single ability will probably keep you alive longer than anything else especially against trash mobs, if it fails then use Unbalancing Strike to get them to turn round for a few seconds. This should give you time for Stunning Fist to come off cool down so you can try it again, buttons 5-7 are only in specific fights where they are effective other than that they are ignored and buttons 8-0 are fairly obvious. It may not be optimum by any means but for me it works and it works well

Hope it helps

Stoner81.

[Lonnbeimnech]

I don't even put elemental attacks or finishers on a hotbar.

Stun, cleave and touch of death.

[mezzorco]

Thanks to everyone your help is much appreciated
So it seems that I don't have to use every move, particularly on a multiclass build
I really love monks, but I'd rather prefer a more d&d/"ninja turtles" feeling, instead of this "naruto" like flavour :/

Anyway, thank you everyone again

[Nayus]

Thanks to everyone your help is much appreciated
So it seems that I don't have to use every move, particularly on a multiclass build
I really love monks, but I'd rather prefer a more d&d/"ninja turtles" feeling, instead of this "naruto" like flavour :/

Anyway, thank you everyone again

Keytabs.

Eg: Set a combo to E-R-T, then you just need to press E-R-T instead of clicking.

And don't take to many clickable abilities.

[Seikojin]

Thanks to everyone your help is much appreciated
So it seems that I don't have to use every move, particularly on a multiclass build
I really love monks, but I'd rather prefer a more d&d/"ninja turtles" feeling, instead of this "naruto" like flavour :/

Anyway, thank you everyone again

LOL, it is true. No one really uses most of the finishing moves because most are subpar and a waste of effort.

[schelsullivan]

Its true the the finishing moves arent all that great so you dont have to learn them all right away. But when I do use them I do it with my Logitech G11 gaming keyboard. Its great for setting up macros. Oh and I use the middle mouse button for quivering palm.

[Xiadais]

I don't understand how anyone can be effective by having to click things in combat routinely. Clicking means you aren't holding down the left mouse button (if a non-caster), and it also means you have mouselook off (unless you toggle that with T, which I find causes issues). Mouselook is key to how I play. All other methods of turning don't have enough control or reproducibility.

As a rule of thumb, anything I need to use while pressured (meaning, in combat) is activated with the keyboard. The number keys 1~6 are useful. 7-0 are difficult to reach and would require removing my right hand from the mouse, unless I try harder with my left (which may disrupt WASD movement).
I also have plenty of bars with modifier keys. I have a bar with CTRL+(1-0), a bar with ALT+(1-0), V+(1-0), CTRL+ALT+(1-0), the NUM pad keys, NUM pad + CTRL, NUM pad + CTRL + ALT, etc. I don't remember exactly which ones I use, but certainly the normal numbers, the num pad, CTRL, ALT, CTRL+ALT+NUMpad. The other combinations I typically don't use because they're just buffs or equipment swaps and such, and those are mostly used outside of combat, when I don't have to do anything other than "use" that bar slot.
My personally chosen modifier key is V, because its default is to hide overhead names (which is just plain stupid, and I'd do it way too often on accident and not remember how to put it back), and because it's easily accessible with the left thumb, which is usually situated on the spacebar for lots of jumping. It's easy to only press V, only press the spacebar, or press both at the same time for jump-casting. It requires no hand manipulation at all, since my left thumb is already relaxed on the spacebar anyway.
I also have some of the more-useless letter keys set to slots on a separate hotbar. H and J are for hjealing meh (conveniently located so that I can keep running away from teh n00bz who are trying to kill meh while I hjeal--on my current main character, H is Cocoon and J is my stack of Heal scrolls), K is for killing things (activating a burst move of some sort such as Ten Thousand Stars), U is for a large defensive ability (Improved Uncanny Dodge, for example, or Displacement), N is also defensive but none of my characters currently use it, and it's irritatingly close to M for Map. I also have 2 buttons (forward and backward arrows, intended for use on web browsers, which I do actually use them for too) on the side of my mouse, which are extremely convenient for things which are routinely used, such as Cleave and Great Cleave, etc.

Hotkey things, be absolutely confused for a while, die several times trying to remember where you put your all your hjeals, and then have full control of your character after "learning" them. In combat, you should never have to maneuver your mouse pointer over to a specific square of hotbar. You can misclick, you can die (or other bad things) from having to abort mouselook, and worst of all you have to divert attention from the middle of the screen to the icon and mouse pointer to get them to occupy the same pixels. Having to stop looking at whatever is killing you in order to activate an ability is very dangerous.

[Lonnbeimnech]

I don't understand how anyone can be effective by having to click things in combat routinely. Clicking means you aren't holding down the left mouse button (if a non-caster), and it also means you have mouselook off (unless you toggle that with T, which I find causes issues). Mouselook is key to how I play. All other methods of turning don't have enough control or reproducibility.

As a rule of thumb, anything I need to use while pressured (meaning, in combat) is activated with the keyboard. The number keys 1~6 are useful. 7-0 are difficult to reach and would require removing my right hand from the mouse, unless I try harder with my left (which may disrupt WASD movement).
I also have plenty of bars with modifier keys. I have a bar with CTRL+(1-0), a bar with ALT+(1-0), V+(1-0), CTRL+ALT+(1-0), the NUM pad keys, NUM pad + CTRL, NUM pad + CTRL + ALT, etc. I don't remember exactly which ones I use, but certainly the normal numbers, the num pad, CTRL, ALT, CTRL+ALT+NUMpad. The other combinations I typically don't use because they're just buffs or equipment swaps and such, and those are mostly used outside of combat, when I don't have to do anything other than "use" that bar slot.
My personally chosen modifier key is V, because its default is to hide overhead names (which is just plain stupid, and I'd do it way too often on accident and not remember how to put it back), and because it's easily accessible with the left thumb, which is usually situated on the spacebar for lots of jumping. It's easy to only press V, only press the spacebar, or press both at the same time for jump-casting. It requires no hand manipulation at all, since my left thumb is already relaxed on the spacebar anyway.
I also have some of the more-useless letter keys set to slots on a separate hotbar. H and J are for hjealing meh (conveniently located so that I can keep running away from teh n00bz who are trying to kill meh while I hjeal--on my current main character, H is Cocoon and J is my stack of Heal scrolls), K is for killing things (activating a burst move of some sort such as Ten Thousand Stars), U is for a large defensive ability (Improved Uncanny Dodge, for example, or Displacement), N is also defensive but none of my characters currently use it, and it's irritatingly close to M for Map. I also have 2 buttons (forward and backward arrows, intended for use on web browsers, which I do actually use them for too) on the side of my mouse, which are extremely convenient for things which are routinely used, such as Cleave and Great Cleave, etc.

Hotkey things, be absolutely confused for a while, die several times trying to remember where you put your all your hjeals, and then have full control of your character after "learning" them. In combat, you should never have to maneuver your mouse pointer over to a specific square of hotbar. You can misclick, you can die (or other bad things) from having to abort mouselook, and worst of all you have to divert attention from the middle of the screen to the icon and mouse pointer to get them to occupy the same pixels. Having to stop looking at whatever is killing you in order to activate an ability is very dangerous.

I use mouse look with the arrow keys for movement. that puts the numpad and the insert, home, pg up, pg down, end, delete, ctrl and shift in range of my left had. that's 21 keys for whatever and 1 for jump and 1 for block. Anything that I don't use regularly like gh clicky (as opposed to cleave which would be used every 6 seconds) I will hold the right mouse button to move the pointer to that hotkey and double click it.

[TeacherSyn]

LOL, it is true. No one really uses most of the finishing moves because most are subpar and a waste of effort.

Never played Diablo II?

Their Assassin uses the same finishing charge routines as the Monk.

I might have disagreed with you before on this very topic, and stand by it. A Tower of Despair run is nearly done before it starts without a Light Monk in party keeping your party from getting stunned. Spell points are saved. Extra stacking saves and skill bonuses. And that's just the light Monks.

Player laziness does not give evidence to lack of character effectiveness. A mere Monk bludgeon is a poor Monk.

[ArcaneArcher52689]

Never played Diablo II?

Their Assassin uses the same finishing charge routines as the Monk.

I might have disagreed with you before on this very topic, and stand by it. A Tower of Despair run is nearly done before it starts without a Light Monk in party keeping your party from getting stunned. Spell points are saved. Extra stacking saves and skill bonuses. And that's just the light Monks.

Player laziness does not give evidence to lack of character effectiveness. A mere Monk bludgeon is a poor Monk.

I have to agree with Spencerian here. Any character I have with Fists of Light will keep Grasp of the Earth Dragon and Walk of the Sun up pretty much constantly. Dark finishers aren't worth much on splashes, but on pure monks, they can get the job done.

[Robbenklopper]

I think everybody who has can recommend you a MMO-Mouse. Get one, 9 Buttons for your right Hand will make it easier. Here are stunners, finisher and some others.

Furthermore for left hand, I took 3 hotbars: shift+1 for any earth-based attacks, shift+2 for any fire-based attacks, shift+3 for FOL and the shintao moves. On those, i just Need to jump from 1-5 with my left Hand for the attack-moves.
Additional ^+q+e+ctrl+alt for left hand, that´s it. Not that much more.

I Make much use of any combination or finisher, depending on the Situation what for. And it´s quite useful.

Monk is challenging, you differ much from a 2-button nuker or a 5-button blitzer.

[mezzorco]

I think everybody who has can recommend you a MMO-Mouse. Get one, 9 Buttons for your right Hand will make it easier. Here are stunners, finisher and some others.

The fact is, I played WoW for years. As a pvp enhancement shaman, I had something like 30 abilities in my hotbars, and I was able to use them effectively.
In wow you can right click to focus/autoattack an enemy, and you can move with w,a,s,d,q,e in pretty much every direction. This way you can click with your mouse on your least used abilities.
In ddo you can't use your mouse effectively because you have to hold left button, this is my problem.
I tried to play with settings, enabling auto attack and changing movement keys, but in heroic content there are too many enemies and they die too fast, so I get tired pretty fast hard targeting each one of them every time.

[Munkenmo]

In ddo you can't use your mouse effectively because you have to hold left button, this is my problem.
I tried to play with settings, enabling auto attack and changing movement keys, but in heroic content there are too many enemies and they die too fast, so I get tired pretty fast hard targeting each one of them every time.

I know exactly what you mean. I ended up writing an autohotkey script that leftclicks every 10mili seconds when I press mouse14. (consecutive mouse14 clicks turn the script off or back on)

If you want the same functionality:
Step 1: Download Autohotkey (& install it)

Step 2:
Open up a text file and copy the following:

mouse14::pressleftclick()



pressleftclick(Interval=10){

   static Toggler

   Toggler := !Toggler

   TPer := Toggler ? Interval : "off"

   SetTimer, ClickClick, %TPer%

   return

   ClickClick:

   Click

   return

}

Step 3. Replace mouse14 for whatever key or mouse button you would like to have activate the script
eg. if you want f12 to be your activation key the first line could read
F12::pressleftclick()

Step4. If you feel left click is not getting pressed fast enough You can change the number in the line:

pressleftclick(Interval=10){

1 = 1 milli second 1000 = 1000 milli seconds (ie. 1 second) (the lower the number the faster the press rate)




Step 5. Save the textfile as: Toggleleftclick.ahk (the .ahk is of absolute importance)

Step 6. doubleclick toggleleftclick.ahk to activate the script and you're all set. (you can close the script in the taskbar)

(it's actually possible to have the script automatically open DDO.exe and then close when DDO.exe is closed, but that's a lesson for another day)

*edited to avoid stupid emoticons.