State of Monks

[psykopeta]

I'm sorry but if you didn't flavor your monks as executing a combo of attacks with an epic finisher when making a full round attack, you failed at D&D.

looks to me he used to say "i attack"

just plain, all the time

nothing about jumping and hitting from over enemy's head, or using the insane moving speed the monk had to charge like a train against mobs

and the most important thing: that's not d&d, the only thing they're using is the d20 and some names of things

nowadays i have more hp, damage and ac, at lvl 5, than i could have at any lvl in pnp

and somewhere around lvl 12, we are able to one shot elder dragons

so it's not d&d, it's more like wow, and it keeps getting closer to it with player suggestions (pvp comes to my mind, balance between classes and powercreep are other examples of wow'ish mind in ddo players)

[Delacroix21]

I feel your pain, but effectively what you are saying is that every class should be able to solo every quest in the game....and I don't think that is going to happen.

I think you need to read my post again, as that is NOT what I am saying.


The point I was making is they gave us two ways to mitigate spell damage: MRR and Evasion, supposedly two methods on par with each other but as I pointed out this is not the case. If lazy Dev's add monsters with spell DCs higher then it is even possible to build a character with that save (as how many characters have 100 reflex, which isn't even high enough!), then evasion is then made meaningless, and now you are stuck with a character with a capped very low MRR, and lower hp to boot.


I said from the begining with the addition of MRR that while good, if you give one class a passive "always on" mitigation, and another with a "sometimes on" (or is the case of EE toee NEVER on) then you are going to add an unbalanced game mechanic. If they want to keep the current mechanics in game and keep evasion a viable option, then they need to make the reflex saves needed to save actually attainable, even if it is only attainable by very few characters (such as the 100 reflex). I would like to point out that her earthquake never knocks me down even on other toons with no fail on 1 reflex saves in the 80s, so the problem is specifically hellball.

[Lil'man]

I feel your pain, but effectively what you are saying is that every class should be able to solo every quest in the game....and I don't think that is going to happen.

That's not what he's trying to say, but like it or not how good somebody is in EE content is based off of how self-sufficent somebody is. "Full Groups" are harder and harder to come by nowadays in DDO, and the likelihood that you will have a FvS or Cleric baby-sitting you is slim-to-none. Everybody has to now pull their own weight, which is why class lines have blurred so much.
Self-sufficiency in this game is now the #1 determining factor on how good a build is, if you can't out-DPS a mob, while not dying, and then heal up yourself, then you're not playing a viable toon. Now (and especially with EDs) everybody can heal themselves. I would argue that over half of this game's population is level 20+, so leveling up from 1-20 is extremely reliant on how well you can solo quests.
As for the state of melee classes, here's the reality:

Paladins are Kings, they hit like a truck, have an amazing defense, and can heal themselves. They are the class to be right now.

Barbarians hit the hardest and don't have bad self-healing, many of them can sustain themselves and they are great at taking out everything from trash to red-named bosses. They hold the #2 position on this ladder.

Fighters can be anything they want, from an insane tank to a fairly sustainable source of DPS, their only "problem" is that they're the jack of all trades, but the master of none (with no self healing). As a result you'll see many people splash this class but not as many full fighters as you'll see barbarians and paladins.

Monks are a severely outdated class. They have a lot of good aspects with their combos, stance-shifting, and crowd control, but these get seriously outclassed in EE. Their red-named damage is hilariously bad, since their main weapon (hand wraps) has been broken for the past few years. Since the game has evolved and this class hasn't, their defenses are hilariously bad. AC and Dodge combined with meh health, will get anybody trying to wear pajamas in order to stay centered, one-shot in EE. But I'm just beating a dead horse right now, what I'm really trying to say is this:

The DDO that you knew a few years ago where every party needed a healer/tank/DPS balance is no more. Try and do a shroud raid, 99% of those PUG parties require you to be self-sufficient, enough said. Even on simple EE like the Lords of Dust chain, you will see quests designed to split up your party (spinner of shadows) that require whoever is tanking the witch, to be able to withstand punishment and to be able to self-heal, and likewise for the rest of the party. Simple content like this is puts monks at a severe disadvantage, their only source of self-healing requires them to constantly be in combat, but their lack of PRR or MRR makes it almost impossible to accomplish this, and AC + blur + incorporal does not stop the fact that the spinner of shadows can sneeze on us and we'll be dead. Monks either need a defining role in the game or else they'll go the way of the dinosaurs. Their DCs that made them "good" for controlling mobs are not good enough in epics, even with wis as a dump-stat. And half of their finishers become useless (looking at you fire-fire-fire finisher).

Sub-par DPS + outdated defense + not the best HP in the game + bad DCs = Monk class

[Delacroix21]

I have to agree with all the above post, as I believed he summed it up rather well. The game has evolved in what constitutes good defenses (per/MRR and self healing) and the monk didn't evolve with it. It says something when even wolf builds have dropped their monk levels and moved to full plate as well.


Monk attacks, finishing moves, and especially GMoF petal strikes were good when they came out, but since the Devs never bothered to code them to scale they are now useless. Honestly aside from shadow fade I don't use my ki for anything (as even a 81dc stunning fist gets resisted allot by the hezrous and gretches at the end of EE ToEE part 2, so I dropped it).


I love unarmed animations and whirlwind attack especially, I have played a unarmed character in every game I could, including all the elder scrolls games (skyrim and morrowind required mods for this). But I know when I play one now in ddo that I am gimping myself, and that takes my enjoyment out of the game. I get torn to shreds by a string of unlucky hits with 182ac, 25% incorp, and 30% dodge that my heavy armor high hp toons seem to handle well enough.


Unarmed truly needs its base damage per hit doubled, and the survivability and DCs improved as they can no longer hit EE reliable DCs compared to other classes.

[Amideus]

so it's not d&d, it's more like wow, and it keeps getting closer to it with player suggestions (pvp comes to my mind, balance between classes and powercreep are other examples of wow'ish mind in ddo players)

That's not an aspect inherent to wow, that's something EVERY mmo in history, long before wow took over, has had to deal with. And it's been requested from day 1 in ddo. I hate when people try to claim the game is being ruined because the 'pure' aspect of it is being overtaken by wow nerds requesting wow-like things when all they seem to complain about is the natural progression of an mmo.

THAT being said, I want to address the concerns of the defense arguments with something I will relate to early wow. AC was broken in ddo, because ddo is a video game. It was either the best AC possible and gave you godly defense, or the worst thing ever and let you get hit 95% of the time. There was like a 5 point margin of error in AC between wearing super plate and wearing toilet paper. This posed a problem, and therefor needed to be resolved. However I feel the combination isn't quite there. I like having all these different defenses and mitigation, but it does jack squat in practice.

So here is a proposed idea that might already be how it works, and therefor it still sucks. What if ddo started using a system similar to the combat table wow had in the early stages. Modified of course for our defenses in ddo. Here is a breakdown:

1. Fortification. This should be the first thing taken into account, crit chance/immunity. When attacked the game should check first to see if you can be crit, and if not PUSH crits off the table, meaning you can only be hit normally.

2. AC. The hit roll should be checked against the AC miss chance to see if the attack hits. Higher AC PUSHES the normal attack hit further off the table. So if you had a 65% avoidance chance, you would only have a 35% chance to be hit. Let's be clear, AC is always variable and might not provide the same percentage versus every enemy.

3. Dodge. This should be the final aspect checked in the table(since it is insane logic to factor in displacement/ghostly yet.) With enough dodge you should further PUSH normal attacks off, since this is checked last. So if you have 65% AC avoidance, and 32% dodge, you would only be hit 3% of the time. But since a natural 20 always hits, you always have a 5% chance of being hit anyway.

4. The above calculations have DMR for further attacks. This is to prevent godmode immunity to physical attacks, so each time you dodge an attack you lose some dodge chance n the table versus THAT attacker. So you are strong against trash as long as it dies quickly, but prolonged fights can lead you to be weaker.

5. Displacement/Ghostly. These should not be counted on the attack table, but rather factored in after all other defenses and an attack is determined successful. With this you can gain a much higher benefit from these abilities, but stronger enemies should be granted ways to mitigate this, through true seeing/ghostly bonuses or by reducing the effectiveness over time. By this I mean, EE enemies can *learn* your true movements as the battle goes on allowing them to hit you more often. Ghostly should remain at 10% all the time though.

I think with these changes damage will be less bursty and more controlled. Right now it seems like you have to have over 1000 HP, and consistent healing or solid cc and high damage to deal with EE because the game is so out of wack and things are overtuned. With a more reliable defense strategy like this, and changes to the AC/Dodge system (again, unless the current method is already similar/better) you could easily have dodge monks roaming around being really hard to hit in skirmish fights. So a monk would avoid 95% of those first few hits from all enemies, but quickly become overwhelmed in longer fights with stronger foes.

In original wow, there was a system to calculate uncrittable. It was 102.4% avoidance, the total value percentage wise of miss chance, block dodge, and parry for a pve tank. Once achieved this would PUSH crits off the attack table, and you would never receive a critical hit. If you got a high enough block chance you could reach total avoidance, meaning you would never take a full hit. But these values would suffer DMR for longer fights.

[Delacroix21]

While I agree monk survivability needs looking into, I want the dps set as a priority. I can deal with lower survivability and having good dps, but being bad at both is a bit much.


Let's focus on boosting unarmed/stances/and GMoF ED, then analyze mitigation a bit more?


People will play a high dps/low survivability toon, but no one plays high survivability/low dps toons otherwise we would see a lot more sword and board NON-vanguards out there, but we don't.

[Lil'man]

While I agree monk survivability needs looking into, I want the dps set as a priority. I can deal with lower survivability and having good dps, but being bad at both is a bit much.


Let's focus on boosting unarmed/stances/and GMoF ED, then analyze mitigation a bit more?


People will play a high dps/low survivability toon, but no one plays high survivability/low dps toons otherwise we would see a lot more sword and board NON-vanguards out there, but we don't.

When I first bought monks they seemed to be the best last-man-alive class there was in the game, at least in heroics. They had solid defense, good crowd control, and not bad DPS, but their utility also allowed them to have monks go rambo with self healing and healing amp as a light monk, or to see a dark monk one-shot a boss with a 2-4x proc of ToD. I personally think that this flavor of the monk needs to come back. Their stances had the potential to make them ready for any situation and I feel this is what drew a lot of people into them too.

However, with our call for change, I see the danger of Monks becoming another Paladin class, or another Barb or fighter class, and I don't want this to happen. I think monks used to excel at how flexible their role was, and I think this should be maintained at all costs. I know everybody's throwing their two cents in for what they think their changes should be. But I'd like to throw a few more ideas out there. I don't have any ideas yet on monk finishers, but I might throw something out later.

For stances I think that currently out of the four we have available, we only really have two, DPS and Tank. Which stance you prefer for each is up to you, but in favor of defining each stance more I'll try to define each stance a bit more. Also, I'm going to throw in a bonus for activating a certain stance in order to promote stance-switching and a more dynamic play style.

Grandmaster Fire Stance: +4 Strength -2 Wisdom. Your fists now harness the power of volcanic fire and they burn through enemy armor. Hence while you're in this stance you bypass 50% of an enemy's fortification. Activating this stance causes the user's next attack to damage an enemy's armor class by 1 every hit (stacks up to 6 times) for the next 15 seconds.

Grandmaster Wind Stance: +4 Dexterity -2 Constitution. Your fists now harness the full power of wind and you gain a 15% Enhancement bonus to melee and thrown attack speed, and grants a 10% chance to doublestrike with melee weapons. Activating this stance causes the user to gain a temporary 15 second displacement effect, the duration will be increased by 5 seconds for every worthy enemy killed.

Grandmaster Water Stance: +4 Wisdom -2 Strength. You harness the power of the ocean and as a result gain a deeper focus on the battle raging around you. As a result enemies now have to attempt to pass two consecutive saves whenever they try to avoid any monk ability from you (stunning fist, finishers, etc...) Activating this stance causes the cooldowns on any combat ability to be reduced by 33% (more SF, QP, fists of light, etc... but has no effect on abilities like meditation and wands).

Grandmaster Earth Stance: +4 Constitution -2 Dexterity. You harness the power of a mountain and as a result you are able to use the earth like armor. While in this stance and centered, you gain PRR equal to the amount you would gain if you were wearing medium armor. Activating this stance causes the earth to shake around you and nearby enemies have to make a balance check or risk being knocked down. (either this or some sort of shaken ability, not sure what would be more appropriate)

Why are my changes good? Well I've hoped to define each stance more, rather than just: First stance to hit harder, wind stance to hit faster, water for resistances, and earth stance to be "tanky." Here's what roles I wanted each stance to fill:

Fire: This is your boss-beater stance. If you're a sneaky ninja-spy but you can't get any sneak attacks off because you're facing an undead boss, you're in luck. Good against bosses.

Wind: This is your Mob-DPS stance. Making your monk hit so fast that it looks like he's having a seizure is fun, but not if you get one-shot. I wanted to add some sort of mob-survival ability so I threw in the temporary displacement that gets extended for each mob killed. This rewards mob-DPS but you're still susceptible to wearing pajamas. If you want to better control a mob...

Water: ... we have water stance. Tired of failing your SF? Or your QP? Well you're in luck, because enemies have to make two saves and survive an increased barrage of SF and QP! If you don't want a mob of 5 all attacking you, no problem! QP one, SF another, switch to wind and bam, you're set. (See what I'm trying to do here?)

Earth: Once the mob/boss finally notices there's a man wearing pajamas punching his mother, he's going to get angry and that's where Earth stance comes in. If you can't kill a mob fast enough then you have your ace-in-the-hole. For you light monks out there, hopefully the added PRR will finally make the fist of light regeneration actually make a difference. For somebody that wants to actually embrace a role as a tank, I think it would be a good idea to change the earth-earth-earth finisher into an AOE intimidate sort of deal, but based off of a concentration check instead of intimidate.

Also as a side note, the active on wind-stance (refreshing displacement) can no-longer be refreshed. As an example, if you switch to wind then quickly to earth and then kill an enemy in earth, you will not receive a +5 second refresher to the displacement.

What do you guys think?

[ThreadNecromancer]

... will finally make the fist of light regeneration actually make a difference. ...

Not to take away from the rest of your post, but my monk is Human...

All three Human Heal Amp enhancements & three Shintao Core enhancements & Iron Mitts
60 + 30 + 60 somehow gets me to 170 heal amp (maybe I'm missing 20 somewhere?). throw in Jitz-Tetka Fire stance and that gets you to 220 (Tested)

220 Heal Amp quadruples healing. Fists of Light gets me 4/8 and Vampirism gets me 4/8/12

Remove the Jitz-Tetka and you get 3/7 from FoL and 3/7/10 from Vampirism

Heal Amp is how you make a difference with Fists of Light

[Saekee]

I reset the enhancements on my pure 18 monk to play around with ninja spy a little bit. As far as i can tell, the toggle "poisoned soul", which is supposed to apply stacks of ninja poison over time, never applies any poison stacks. Anybody else tried this? Yes, i'm using shortswords.

Another question, how on earth do you ever make short swords do more damage than handwraps? At best, i would estimate my base damage with shortswords is about 60-70% of what it is with wraps. I guess the difference comes in epic? I can't see any reason to give up stunning blow for swords unless you are heavily invested into the poisoning aspect of the tree. Of course i had the same problem when he was specced into henshin, and found the staff dps to be pathetic compared to what i was doing with wraps.

I've also noticed that both void strike and touch of death never proc offhand attacks. Making that happen would probably raise these abilities quite a bit. Right now, i consider void strike to be nearly useless, but if you doubled the chance to erase your enemy i might like it more.

Also, i've tested, and touch of death is not enhanced by negative spell power. Maybe it should be.

I can try to answer some of this. The toggle should work--it is doing so on my monk splash. I assume you have it on your shortcut bar? If you become uncentered, you need to retoggle it.

The base damage of a pure monk is better with wraps than shortswords. In heroics that is 1d6 or 1.5d6 for later levels. The crit range is better but still junky unless you use named shortswords like Razorend or Cutthroat smallblades. The multiplier is still lousy.
The ninja master capstone makes them better (hence the success o the shuricannon). The named shortswords with IC piercing become 13-20/x2 + vorpal (like Drow weapon master, eCutthroat, Rebellion) and the forester brush hooks with IC: slashing become 13-20/x3 + vorpal. It is good but not 'endgame' because TF weapons have regular crit profiles (so 15-20/x2 + vorpal). A pure monk with drow can pair venomed blades and ninja Sting for a rapid buildup of DoT poisons. I am not sure how this is all scaling after U25 since that was for rogue trees.

Void strike only works on main hand.

[Lil'man]

Not to take away from the rest of your post, but my monk is Human...

All three Human Heal Amp enhancements & three Shintao Core enhancements & Iron Mitts
60 + 30 + 60 somehow gets me to 170 heal amp (maybe I'm missing 20 somewhere?). throw in Jitz-Tetka Fire stance and that gets you to 220 (Tested)

220 Heal Amp quadruples healing. Fists of Light gets me 4/8 and Vampirism gets me 4/8/12

Remove the Jitz-Tetka and you get 3/7 from FoL and 3/7/10 from Vampirism

Heal Amp is how you make a difference with Fists of Light

Sorry I think I was a little unclear in my post, first of light as an ability is fine. I was discussing how currently, pajama wearing monks have difficulty staying in combat because they run the risk of being two-shot. Yeah the 8-20 healing is awesome but in EE mobs you're not going to be able to take advantage of this because you'll be chunked by a mob due to the lack of PRR.

[Amideus]

People will play a high dps/low survivability toon, but no one plays high survivability/low dps toons otherwise we would see a lot more sword and board NON-vanguards out there, but we don't.

Plenty of people played sword and board based classes pre-vanguard and post vangaurd isn't that insane of a dps class to be honest. It's on equal footing with other builds from what I have seen. Pure S&B paladins existed before the rework. I think what you mean is people will only want to play the next popular FOTM build that gets lots of views and replies on the forums and solos everything. Which is essentially a handful of specific builds. Another issue entirely on that one.

[ThreadNecromancer]

Sorry I think I was a little unclear in my post, first of light as an ability is fine. I was discussing how currently, pajama wearing monks have difficulty staying in combat because they run the risk of being two-shot. Yeah the 8-20 healing is awesome but in EE mobs you're not going to be able to take advantage of this because you'll be chunked by a mob due to the lack of PRR.

Yeah... that 4/8/12 or 3/7/10 per attack doesnt really add up to the triple digits you get hit from epic mobs... that's why one of my finisher suggestions is to buff the healing output of the light finisher.

1d4 + 1d4 per two monk levels = 11d4 (11-44hp) on a pure monk
CLW@max CL is 1d6+7 (8-13hp)
CMW@max CL is 2d6 + 14 (16-26hp)
CSW@max CL is 3d6 + 21 (24-39hp)
CCW@max CL is 4d6 + 28 (32-54hp)

Healing Ki is about on par with CMW/CSW when looking at base numbers, and ignoring cooldowns.

I suggested 1d6/monk level, thats 20d6@ lv20 pure monk (20-120hp)... that might be a bit much in hindsight... we're not trying to compete with Heal here.
1d4/monk level = 20d4@ lv20 pure monk (20-80hp) Now that is much more reasonable.


Maybe something like this would help:
Epic Finishing Moves - Epic Feat, ML 24, 12+ Monk levels

Your understanding of how to channel power rivals spellcasting. Your finishing moves gain 100 Universal Spellpower, +10 to DC, and an extra minute to duration.


Edit: I realize that has nothing to do with what you were saying about PRR. Honestly, I'd rather monks get damage avoidance thru dodge/incorp/AC/etc than damage mitigation thru PRR.

[sacredguyver]

Meanwhile the Remington Roomsweeper Barb has already killed everything.

[jwelch]

In terms of "monks can't dps", I have to somewhat disagree. Can i do 500+ per hit, every hit? No.

but with a completed set of TF handwraps with paralyzing and mortal fear, 120+/per hit is my low end, and on a crit with whirlwind, 700+ isn't unusual. (not counting the mortal fear high end in this, since that's a special effect.)

my Stunning Fist is up at 70, so missing it, even on EE, is really uncommon. That's a lot of TF/Necro/Shadow Dragon/Double Dragon gear, and the bonuses from those + consuming darkness. On a whirlwind, I'm averaging around 300/shot.

is that as much as other classes? no, but adding in extra bonuses from various augments, the amount of damage I can put up in a hurry is pretty damned solid. And if paralyzing from the handwraps happens to proc when I hit with a whirlwind, that + the guild bonus on helpless enemies is ridiculous.

QP I never bother with because the Ki cost isn't worth it, esp. in water stance. EIN is still a thing of beauty, and the other GMoF strikes add up nicely.

I can DPS rather well, but I spent a lot of time on my build for it. (pure Shintao monk Shadar Kai, 36-pt build on my third Epic TR. I don't reincarnate often. I like my good gear too much.)

In terms of self-healing, I do okay there, given I've got some solid positive spell power going (around 250). If i focus on it, I can do really well, especially in CITW against her Hatness's Curse attacks.

Armor-wise...yeah, flanking is not my friend, and if I'm not careful and get surrounded, I can go down quick, but if i don't let that happen, I can jump over about everything all day slowly wearing them down with GMoF and whirlwind, plus an EIN every five minutes. But I don't expect a monk to just stand there. If I wanted to that, I'd be a paladin.

Would I like to do a grand per hit? Sure, but given the speed I'm hitting with and my ability to damage large groups of enemies quickly so the truly heavy hitters can get in there and take them out even faster, the only thing I'd like is to hit faster. My current damage per hit is actually pretty solid. It isn't always easy, but it's definitely doable.

[FestusHood]

I can try to answer some of this. The toggle should work--it is doing so on my monk splash. I assume you have it on your shortcut bar? If you become uncentered, you need to retoggle it.

The base damage of a pure monk is better with wraps than shortswords. In heroics that is 1d6 or 1.5d6 for later levels. The crit range is better but still junky unless you use named shortswords like Razorend or Cutthroat smallblades. The multiplier is still lousy.
The ninja master capstone makes them better (hence the success o the shuricannon). The named shortswords with IC piercing become 13-20/x2 + vorpal (like Drow weapon master, eCutthroat, Rebellion) and the forester brush hooks with IC: slashing become 13-20/x3 + vorpal. It is good but not 'endgame' because TF weapons have regular crit profiles (so 15-20/x2 + vorpal). A pure monk with drow can pair venomed blades and ninja Sting for a rapid buildup of DoT poisons. I am not sure how this is all scaling after U25 since that was for rogue trees.

Void strike only works on main hand.

Thanks. The reason i didn't think it was working is because the damage ticks don't display in the floaty overhead numbers, the way the other poison stacks do. You have to examine the mob to see it. If you can't see the hit points you might not be able to tell it's doing damage.

Yes, in heroic it's tough to overcome all the extra +(w) you get with wraps, especially on a wisdom based monk. Full offhand damage and noticably faster attack speed also make a difference. I didn't have the capstone, the monk was only level 18 at the time i wrote that. I guess i would have to do the math to figure out the percentage increase from the extra crits and compare it to the percentage increase in base damage when using wraps. The poison exploit damage is spectacular in heroics. With a little help scaling it from the devs, it could be a really cool mechanic in epics.

[Daitengu]

but with a completed set of TF handwraps with paralyzing and mortal fear

And without TF? I dont play at level 28 at all but I want to damage before.

[Amideus]

In terms of "monks can't dps", I have to somewhat disagree. Can i do 500+ per hit, every hit? No.

but with a completed set of TF handwraps with paralyzing and mortal fear, 120+/per hit is my low end, and on a crit with whirlwind, 700+ isn't unusual. (not counting the mortal fear high end in this, since that's a special effect.)

my Stunning Fist is up at 70, so missing it, even on EE, is really uncommon. That's a lot of TF/Necro/Shadow Dragon/Double Dragon gear, and the bonuses from those + consuming darkness. On a whirlwind, I'm averaging around 300/shot.

is that as much as other classes? no, but adding in extra bonuses from various augments, the amount of damage I can put up in a hurry is pretty damned solid. And if paralyzing from the handwraps happens to proc when I hit with a whirlwind, that + the guild bonus on helpless enemies is ridiculous.

QP I never bother with because the Ki cost isn't worth it, esp. in water stance. EIN is still a thing of beauty, and the other GMoF strikes add up nicely.

I can DPS rather well, but I spent a lot of time on my build for it. (pure Shintao monk Shadar Kai, 36-pt build on my third Epic TR. I don't reincarnate often. I like my good gear too much.)

In terms of self-healing, I do okay there, given I've got some solid positive spell power going (around 250). If i focus on it, I can do really well, especially in CITW against her Hatness's Curse attacks.

Armor-wise...yeah, flanking is not my friend, and if I'm not careful and get surrounded, I can go down quick, but if i don't let that happen, I can jump over about everything all day slowly wearing them down with GMoF and whirlwind, plus an EIN every five minutes. But I don't expect a monk to just stand there. If I wanted to that, I'd be a paladin.

Would I like to do a grand per hit? Sure, but given the speed I'm hitting with and my ability to damage large groups of enemies quickly so the truly heavy hitters can get in there and take them out even faster, the only thing I'd like is to hit faster. My current damage per hit is actually pretty solid. It isn't always easy, but it's definitely doable.

Except that 120 low end with 700 damage crits on whirlwind(which requires an insane feat investment) is terrible by current EE standards. Let's do a breakdown of why that is actually weak or bad DPS, not good or decent shall we:

Unarmed
120 normal hits, running GMoF. ~200-350 in LD
700 crits with Whirlwind, ~500 normal crits, ~1200 in LD
19-20 crit profile, essentially 10%

Swashbuckler SWF
~150-200 normal hits, ~400-500 in LD
~1000 crits, ~3000 in LD
16-20 crit profile, essentially 25%, with a stacking 10% additional chance for each consecutive non-crit attack between crits
6d6 scaling sonic damage on crits, and 33 to 105 Bleeding Damage on crits

overall, every melee might have roughly the same base damage as you, but as soon as you factor in crits you become obsolete. Not to mention that those same classes can no bring stuns from vanguard tank builds to replace you, and those TANK builds do more damage than you. Your dps isn't good, it's low for EE. That's the problem. Even if you can complete quests alright in EN and EH, in EE you are the anchor holding back the party, every other melee does your job better. That's the problem people are going to have. Why should I bother struggling through content as the only melee class not optimized for the content?

[Kodwraith]

Not to rub salt in the wound, I TR:ed the 28 monk into a lvl 15 PDK SWF pally. It's not even the same game.

I have more PRR, almost as good dps, better survivability and almost better saves than I had AT CAP on the monk life (barring the perma Haste at 27). And about 2/3rds as many HPs. At lvl 16. 20 points into SacredDefender gives me a standing PRR of ~80 at lvl 16 with no augment even slotted. My capped monk had 60 in Earth stance at a massively higher investment in AP and gearing slots. Oh and I eventually qualify for DR/60 by which time I'll have even more HPs?

True I don't stun everything, but I don't really have to. I can now kill things faster than before. The main downside is it feels like I'm running _so_ slowly.....

[Rhysem]

Not to rub salt in the wound, I TR:ed the 28 monk into a lvl 15 PDK SWF pally. It's not even the same game.

I have more PRR, almost as good dps, better survivability and almost better saves than I had AT CAP on the monk life (barring the perma Haste at 27). And about 2/3rds as many HPs. At lvl 16. 20 points into SacredDefender gives me a standing PRR of ~80 at lvl 16 with no augment even slotted. My capped monk had 60 in Earth stance at a massively higher investment in AP and gearing slots. Oh and I eventually qualify for DR/60 by which time I'll have even more HPs?

True I don't stun everything, but I don't really have to. I can now kill things faster than before. The main downside is it feels like I'm running _so_ slowly.....

Similar but bard -- oh and I do stun everything.

I tr'd a 20 monk from cap to a bard 15/ftr 3/rogue 2 the non-iconic way. The bard was clearly better than the monk, even with similar levels of gearing. Better defense, better offense, absurdly better stunning (guardbreaking cove buckler anyone?), better utility (ddoor) -- just better. Not a mass of too many buttons to push for too little effect, or too many weapons to collect -- muntineers blade and a thunderforged and you're pretty much good. Tons of ED abilities actually work with my weapon / destines mesh with my build unlike the monk that meshes with ... gmof and that's about it.

Yeah. Not planning to go back. If I run it it'll be for the +1 damage past life.

[Kodwraith]

Not a mass of too many buttons to push

That was the other thing that weirded me out. My main button bar has gaps. Gaps? That just doesn't look right. StunninBlow,Holysmite, PallyCleave, PallyGrCleave...

Then this weird negative space until I hit CCW and LoH.

It's just eerie.

I saved my 20+ heart. I'll be coming back some day because I love monks, but it's simply too much of a chore dealing with the brittle survivability while keeping up with my guild in the mean time.