Devs - Please throw unarmed monks a bone.

[MrWindupBird]

Just tried wraps on monkcher without IC. No crits on 19 with Holy Sword ( or "critical hit resisted" ).
Plus 1 enhancement to hit and damage does work. It shows the bonus in inventory sheet.

On topic. See, that's what I meant by point of reference.
I would kill for that ( wraps ) single target dps on Vanguard ( new tree ). Or try on Tempest haha ! Rogue ?
Any melees without all past lives, perfect gear. Or *gasp* not a race with dual boosts.
If you think that your ~3k dps ( or I don't know how much is it ) is bad or gimp, I don't know what to tell you.

Just because barbarian is completely comical ( lol and people were oh so concerned about Kensei revamp ), shall we buff everything to its level ?
Just look at the "barb follow up" thread. That's like Riker Picard Double Facepalm meme worthy.

Yeah, I would have been very surprised had that changed- I don't think that it's mechanically possible to have crit changes apply to handwraps right now.

As to vanguard, was yours a pure 20 vanguard? When I was using it, 20 pally vanguard (with shield capstone, lots of points in KOTC) was most definitely high-dps, and certainly higher than unarmed. Better stuns too: the capstone procs far more often than the 5% it claims. Others who've done the hobgoblin test with that setup claim around 4k dps, which feels close to what I remember. Vanguard is really quite strong, the problem is that pure 20 pally is really the only way to do it: everything else, including splashing or god help you going fighter, dilutes it dramatically. Oh and if you try and play it like a THF toon, it doesn't perform well: stay awaying from cleaves and auto-attack with use of the shield clickies is the way to go (which is boring as hell, but **** effective). But that's a different topic!

[Tinco]

Sad, thanks for testing on the spot, I really have to ask him what his setup was.

But that's a different topic!

Honestly, not really. What angers me the most is not the terrible dps, but the fact that all original strong non-dps defining options were thrown around like candy while the monk didn't get anything. In terms of stuns they are surpassed by warchanters and vanguards which, to add insult to injury, can use their primary stat for DCs. Quivering Palm is the laughing stock of instakills right now and everyone and their mother gets fast movement/wing abilities in their trees. The Monk is a butchered pile made of useless trees and antique class abilities. I TR'ed out of it and don't plan to look back for some time.

[Braegan]

I know exactly how it feels, and all we can do is bump posts like these.. I do not think anyone in the PC is pro-monk.

I'm also a big fan of monks. Just a super fun class to play.

I like the idea of crit range being added to Fire stance. That would make Earth crits higher but less frequent and Fire more often but for less at once.

I've also pushed for a really long time now the restoration of QP. Just increase it's CD timer to say 15 secs.

Otherwise, perhaps new wraps with expanded range and/or multi would help a lot.

[Tinco]

I'm also a big fan of monks. Just a super fun class to play.

I like the idea of crit range being added to Fire stance. That would make Earth crits higher but less frequent and Fire more often but for less at once.

Shintao overall should have way more options regarding stances and I still dream of a worthy T5 that lets me use two stances at the same time.

I've also pushed for a really long time now the restoration of QP. Just increase it's CD timer to say 15 secs.

Yep. Well, sundering bonuses aren't even needed that bad, but generic tactics have to be in the formula.

Otherwise, perhaps new wraps with expanded range and/or multi would help a lot.

Imo, thats a technical limitation at the moment more than anything else. I also think that keeping the high-base/low-crit characteristic would be preferable, even though that's clearly way harder to adjust properly.

Ki-Strikes/Finishers need a complete rework if they are meant play any role in epic gameplay.

[svinja]

Why do people believe that 80+ QP at was ever overpowered in the first place? You realize that DPS focused builds kill EE mobs even faster than the monk can gather the ki for a QP? And that DPS works on bossess, too.

My monk had I think 81 QP and he was not my strongest character. I have not played my monk since the DC nerf, I just logged in to check and today he has 63 QP and 86 SF. That is more than 20 points difference in a d20 system. Even worse, every ability except SF is at 63 or worse. Some are at 51. The bard freezes can have 85+ DC but Tomb of Jade has to be in the 50s? What is the reasoning behind this?

Unarmed monks got nerfed at a time when they were already outperformed by fighter/pally/monk type builds, shiradi casters, monkchers... And that was nothing compared to melee DPS today.

Go to youtube and look at a bard or a paladin plowing through mobs and then tell me old QP would be overpowered... And in my opinion, it was never overpowered. QP monk was never among the most powerful builds in the game and it got nerfed.

Not only do I feel like bringing back old QP would be perfectly fine, I want all my monk and gmof abilities to have viable DCs. Insisting on sticking a bunch of 50-60 DC abilities (and that's generous, many people are probably down in the 40s on the shintao abilities) on a class is very misguided on part of the devs.

[Dalsheel]

Why do people believe that 80+ QP at was ever overpowered in the first place? You realize that DPS focused builds kill EE mobs even faster than the monk can gather the ki for a QP? And that DPS works on bossess, too.

My monk had I think 81 QP and he was not my strongest character. I have not played my monk since the DC nerf, I just logged in to check and today he has 63 QP and 86 SF. That is more than 20 points difference in a d20 system. Even worse, every ability except SF is at 63 or worse. Some are at 51. The bard freezes can have 85+ DC but Tomb of Jade has to be in the 50s? What is the reasoning behind this?

Unarmed monks got nerfed at a time when they were already outperformed by fighter/pally/monk type builds, shiradi casters, monkchers... And that was nothing compared to melee DPS today.

Go to youtube and look at a bard or a paladin plowing through mobs and then tell me old QP would be overpowered... And in my opinion, it was never overpowered. QP monk was never among the most powerful builds in the game and it got nerfed.

Not only do I feel like bringing back old QP would be perfectly fine, I want all my monk and gmof abilities to have viable DCs. Insisting on sticking a bunch of 50-60 DC abilities (and that's generous, many people are probably down in the 40s on the shintao abilities) on a class is very misguided on part of the devs.

/signed

+1 to you, sir.

[Blackheartox]

What was strong during qplam times was the complaints of pmasters that could not get dcs even nearly as high as monks could.
Also the cd of palm was rather short so you could practically abuse it quite nicely.
You could stun a mob qpalm a 2nd, knock a pack down with lotus then qpalm again, you basically did a good trash clearing job.
It was horrible tho for boss dps.
Some fixed that issue by doing some odd builds, friend for example did a couple different variations.
Example one was a 16 monk 3 druid 1 fighter where he used wolf form with minor buffs and weapon swaps for a bit boss dps, another friend did a how was it hmm 15 monk 5 ranger and was running around in fury, using furyshot on bosses while qpalming trash til boss.

Pure monk with qpalm alone was bad since your sacrifice for boss dps was to huge.
You could do some dps with tod debuffs /sunder combo since you could pull off the fort debuffs so low on a full wisdom build to lan trinegat finisher.

It was ok, it could do the job, but nowadays even if we got old qpalm back it wouldnt be gamebreaking at all considering /bards/palies/bards/xbow builds nowadays

[ssHarlock]

Just finished my 1st monk (pure monk) life and it was overall fun.
From my expirience playing only heroic and EN devil assault i can say these:
Bonuses on mountain stance are useless but it's the only tree that gives bonuses to a stance.
Ki generation when you're not on fire stance is very slow
Stances are very good if not overpowered, except the fact that air stance's attack speed doesn't stack with haste and speed item.
Very good survivability with healing attack
Core ablities dont exist except the 10% healing amp for each core ability, i don't even remember what other things they were giving. I've also seen once a monk using the training dummy on EE GH and it was very cool, you can count it as EE ability to use.
I ended up thinking that monk should go for WIS as main stat since all finishing moves except otto's dance is wis bassed. Problem with this is that the dps would be even lower but thats for the player to decide, why bother with dps when you can instantly kill?
The finishing moves weren't that bad. What i would like to see with finishing moves is to cast them faster. I think it takes 2-3 secs for them to be completed.
I don't know how a monk can survive or what would be his role on EE difficulty, with 0 prr and mrr and boosts from earth stance and ED can not be considered as way to survive, i think in the end u can get about 30 prr?
I also don't like lack of MRR.

Overall for heroic it was one of the funiest classes i played but i don't think they stand a chance on EE.

The problem right now is that there is no point in pure monk. I'm 90% sure that Devs, like players, are looking at monks as multiclass option.
The solution to this would be a VERY GOOD boost to monk's core abilities.

Also another thing that would be nice is addition to healing finishing move to not be toggled but perform all the actions. Remove curse, desease, blindness and lesser restoration.
Same goes on ninja spy's tree for dark finishing move additions.

[Dalsheel]

What was strong during qplam times was the complaints of pmasters that could not get dcs even nearly as high as monks could.
Also the cd of palm was rather short so you could practically abuse it quite nicely.
You could stun a mob qpalm a 2nd, knock a pack down with lotus then qpalm again, you basically did a good trash clearing job.
It was horrible tho for boss dps.
Some fixed that issue by doing some odd builds, friend for example did a couple different variations.
Example one was a 16 monk 3 druid 1 fighter where he used wolf form with minor buffs and weapon swaps for a bit boss dps, another friend did a how was it hmm 15 monk 5 ranger and was running around in fury, using furyshot on bosses while qpalming trash til boss.

Pure monk with qpalm alone was bad since your sacrifice for boss dps was to huge.
You could do some dps with tod debuffs /sunder combo since you could pull off the fort debuffs so low on a full wisdom build to lan trinegat finisher.

It was ok, it could do the job, but nowadays even if we got old qpalm back it wouldnt be gamebreaking at all considering /bards/palies/bards/xbow builds nowadays

You seem like an experienced player, Blackheartox. Why do you still bother with maxWIS-dumbedSTR monk builds? These are nice for heroics (I guess?) but once you hit epics, and especially epic elite, next-to-zero-boss-DPS means you're a waste of party slot as a melee. Monk players aiming for high end ee questing get just enough WIS to qualify for Vorpal Strikes and put the rest into STR. Having sunder bonuses apply to QP DC was the only way to have a workable QP DC. And that was before eBoots of the Innocent came out, so fitting +10 Sunder into your gear was already a stretch.

Were there any builds that could abuse that, while keeping their DPS high? Yes, PDK wolf builds using a shortshot and CHA-to-damage. QP should not have been allowed to work with weapons equipped (or in wolf form, imho). Instead they allowed Quivering Palm to be used with weapons and then chose to nerf it to uselessness for everyone.

Besides, it's not like it was ever spammable, since it costs 30ki and we haven't gotten any +1ki item since U14 and using fire stance means you're sacrificing both DPS and defenses.

[Kaezin]

Monks have the highest melee red named dps in the game.

Hint: think green.

The game shouldn't need to be balanced around exploits and clearly broken mechanics.

[Enderoc]

As a melee in cloth you should be concerned in finding balance not in offsetting your balance in your active stance, so as you progress in mastery of forms it would seem logical you should have the lesser stances also active to lesser degrees.

So you could have Grandmaster of Earth, Master of Air, and Adept of Water all in effect at once or whatever you would want to arrange them as.

Even if you increase the penalties as the mastery increases...the benefits would still outweigh the costs.

You could increase these penalties only when more than one stance is active. While their current state when in one form would remain as is.

There could also be certain level of ki to maintain in having multiple stances active where they must be refilled to have them activated again through combat or meditation...though the Grandmaster would always be active. Not costing ki mind you, rather maintaining a certain level of ki. Lets say 50 for Adept, and 100 for master.

That would keep monk splashes at a further disadvantage than their counterparts who focus more on their monk training. The monk becomes Ki in pure essence, and maintaining that ki empowers them. If the lower stances are active only the penalties will apply if proper ki is not maintained. This continues with the thought Monks must remain balanced.

Also you should only be able to activate other stances at monk levels 7 and 14, allowing only 6 levels if you wish to multi-class and use this feature to its fullest...and then only adept and master respectively.

[Blackheartox]

You seem like an experienced player, Blackheartox. Why do you still bother with maxWIS-dumbedSTR monk builds? These are nice for heroics (I guess?) but once you hit epics, and especially epic elite, next-to-zero-boss-DPS means you're a waste of party slot as a melee. Monk players aiming for high end ee questing get just enough WIS to qualify for Vorpal Strikes and put the rest into STR. Having sunder bonuses apply to QP DC was the only way to have a workable QP DC. And that was before eBoots of the Innocent came out, so fitting +10 Sunder into your gear was already a stretch.

Were there any builds that could abuse that, while keeping their DPS high? Yes, PDK wolf builds using a shortshot and CHA-to-damage. QP should not have been allowed to work with weapons equipped (or in wolf form, imho). Instead they allowed Quivering Palm to be used with weapons and then chose to nerf it to uselessness for everyone.

Besides, it's not like it was ever spammable, since it costs 30ki and we haven't gotten any +1ki item since U14 and using fire stance means you're sacrificing both DPS and defenses.

I dont honestly as i havent done a monk build beside on lama on live servers after qpalm nerf.
I like the chopper builds with whirlwind, but they are underwhelming currently to me at least compared to cleaving or bursting /:


Honestly i just want monks and druids to have a proper place in ddo without to rely on stupid xploits and bugs to be competetive

[moo_cow]

Why do people believe that 80+ QP at was ever overpowered in the first place? You realize that DPS focused builds kill EE mobs even faster than the monk can gather the ki for a QP? And that DPS works on bossess, too.

My monk had I think 81 QP and he was not my strongest character. I have not played my monk since the DC nerf, I just logged in to check and today he has 63 QP and 86 SF. That is more than 20 points difference in a d20 system. Even worse, every ability except SF is at 63 or worse. Some are at 51. The bard freezes can have 85+ DC but Tomb of Jade has to be in the 50s? What is the reasoning behind this?

Unarmed monks got nerfed at a time when they were already outperformed by fighter/pally/monk type builds, shiradi casters, monkchers... And that was nothing compared to melee DPS today.

Go to youtube and look at a bard or a paladin plowing through mobs and then tell me old QP would be overpowered... And in my opinion, it was never overpowered. QP monk was never among the most powerful builds in the game and it got nerfed.

Not only do I feel like bringing back old QP would be perfectly fine, I want all my monk and gmof abilities to have viable DCs. Insisting on sticking a bunch of 50-60 DC abilities (and that's generous, many people are probably down in the 40s on the shintao abilities) on a class is very misguided on part of the devs.

because teh_troll is an idiot and for some reason people listened to his nonsense.

[Munkenmo]

Honestly i just want monks and druids to have a proper place in ddo without to rely on stupid xploits and bugs to be competetive

Me too