Monk SLA Questions

[kenawyn]

Greeting fellow monks!

I have just started my first monk life - a wisdom based Aasimar Quarterstaff monk (Henshin Mystic / Falconry) - and while looking at the enhancement trees I realized that my knowledge about monk SLA mechanics are somewhat lacking. So I humbly ask the more knowledgeable elders of this forum to help me better understand the ways of the monk.

Here is what I know about monk SLAs:

- they use Ki instead of Spell Points
- they ignore spell resistance
- they cannot be interrupted (no concentration check)
- most are modelled after spells, but their effects cannot be dispelled
- their DC is usually 10 + Monk level + WIS modifier + Stunning modifiers
- they use Melee Power instead of Spell Power to determine the damage

I think I understand how the defensive, control and utility abilities work but I am a little puzzled by the offensive powers.

These are the abilities I would like to know more about:

- Breath of the Fire Dragon (fire damage)
- Ki Bolt (fire and force damage)
- Incinerating Wave (fire damage)
- Lily Petal (untyped damage?)
- Orchid Blossom (untyped damage?)

Here are my questions:

Damage
Since these abilities scale with melee power, the damage they deal will be far from impressive in higher difficulties.
I can probably get 200-250 melee power at level 30, which depending on the ability used is comparable to 400 (2x) - 750 (3x) spell power.
Considering the bad damage dice, the relatively high cooldowns and the Ki cost - it does not look good.
Granted - the elemental words can increase the fire damage by 10%, which is neat, but the base damage is still low.
Are there any ways to increase the damage of these abilities?

Critical
Most damage spells have the ability to score critical hits.
Can the monk spells score critical hits as well?
If so, how is the critical chance determined?
Do they use the appropriate Spell Lore stats?
Can their critical damage increased (Legendary greensteel items)?
If not, what are these powers used for? Just to add chip damage between the melee strikes?

Thanks in advance.

[Kodwraith]

- Breath of the Fire Dragon (fire damage)
- Ki Bolt (fire and force damage)
- Incinerating Wave (fire damage)
- Lily Petal (untyped damage?)
- Orchid Blossom (untyped damage?)

Here are my questions:

Damage
Since these abilities scale with melee power, the damage they deal will be far from impressive in higher difficulties.
I can probably get 200-250 melee power at level 30, which depending on the ability used is comparable to 400 (2x) - 750 (3x) spell power.
Considering the bad damage dice, the relatively high cooldowns and the Ki cost - it does not look good.
Granted - the elemental words can increase the fire damage by 10%, which is neat, but the base damage is still low.
Are there any ways to increase the damage of these abilities?

Critical
Most damage spells have the ability to score critical hits.
Can the monk spells score critical hits as well?
If so, how is the critical chance determined?
Do they use the appropriate Spell Lore stats?
Can their critical damage increased (Legendary greensteel items)?
If not, what are these powers used for? Just to add chip damage between the melee strikes?

Thanks in advance.

The general consensus is that these are terrible abilities beyond level 2. You're almost always better off just hitting things so as not to disrupt the attack animation. The one exception to this is the Orchid Blossom AoE knockdown which was fabulously useful before Dire Charge came out and now is mainly a good supplement to dire charge and Everything is Nothing. AFAICT none of the monk finishers/SLAs can crit and they effectively don't scale at all beyond very very early levels. They are cenrtianly not worth gearing for. The only useful spell power for a monk is positive.

Playing fist monk, my entire hotbar is full of stunning moves, fists of light and my finisher and has no elemental attacks at all. I only use any elemental strike very very occasionally these occasionally for the 10% spell point cost for water pos water when initially buffing. The henshin core flame abilities were an interesting flavor attack, but basically non viable for any content above heroic hard. If nothing else, you never stand still that long.

The GmoF attacks are basically also useless. You'd be far better off spending point sin things that increase hitting dmg, wis and saves. You hit things with melee 95% of the time and you have sorcs and inquisitors hitting things the other 5%.

[Discpsycho]

I found Ki Bolt fairly useful at low levels. The specific example that comes to mind is Swiped Signet, in which could reliably chip away at all the archers in the main cavern while melee-ing closer mooks to rebuild ki. Otherwise, it saves you a weapon swap for pulling groups.

I've heard anecdotally that Incinerating Wave's position is tied to the player, so theoretically it's possible to get multiple hits on a group of enemies by running backwards. I wasn't able to pull that off and wouldn't recommend it otherwise. While it might seem an AOE alternative to Ki Bolt, it doesn't share the same extended range and moves fairly slowly, so by the time it reaches a group you'll likely be in their faces.

As a staff monk you'll have oodles of Ki starting at level 6, and SCEWL means you don't have to spend it all on Fists of Light + Healing Ki. You'll get a bit more mileage out of these attacks than a Shintao monk, but not much.

Cauldron becomes viable for boss beatdowns or large pulls in epic. Though the fire damage is inconsequential (roughly 1k per tick by the end?), the capstone gives +1 crit multiplier and some PRR while standing in your cauldron.

[Logicman69]

The general consensus is that these are terrible abilities beyond level 2. You're almost always better off just hitting things so as not to disrupt the attack animation. The one exception to this is the Orchid Blossom AoE knockdown which was fabulously useful before Dire Charge came out and now is mainly a good supplement to dire charge and Everything is Nothing. AFAICT none of the monk finishers/SLAs can crit and they effectively don't scale at all beyond very very early levels. They are cenrtianly not worth gearing for. The only useful spell power for a monk is positive.

Playing fist monk, my entire hotbar is full of stunning moves, fists of light and my finisher and has no elemental attacks at all. I only use any elemental strike very very occasionally these occasionally for the 10% spell point cost for water pos water when initially buffing. The henshin core flame abilities were an interesting flavor attack, but basically non viable for any content above heroic hard. If nothing else, you never stand still that long.

The GmoF attacks are basically also useless. You'd be far better off spending point sin things that increase hitting dmg, wis and saves. You hit things with melee 95% of the time and you have sorcs and inquisitors hitting things the other 5%.

Pretty much this... though Orchard Blossom is not the AOE knockdown, that is Drifting Lotus and it is still useful (probably one of the few Ki Attacks from that tree that is, besides Everything is Nothing). Most of the effects you listed are outdated and situational at best. On my monk, I usually cycle between dire charge, quivering palm, stunning fist, and Orchard Blossom. For things that can't be stunned, Tomb of Jade and Jade Strike get brought in (constructs, undead). For boss fights, I'll add in the Eagle Claw attack for armor destruction. I do use the Water/Pos/Water when casters are buffing (why have them waste spell points there) and for certain raids Earth/Pos/Earth for Grasp of Earth Dragon (immune to stun/daze for 60 seconds). That can be a lifesaver in certain raids.

[kenawyn]

First - I must thank all of you for the amazing responses - you are awesome!

There goes my flashy energy bolt throwing monk down the drain.
I saw that these abilities were bad, but I had no idea of the magnitude...

---

Anyway... this changes my plans a little.
I hope you don't mind, if I ask some follow-up questions.

Based on your suggestions it looks like most people prefer the Light monk.
I started with the Light path as well - mainly to get the healing - but my plan was to change to Dark monk at level 12.

My reasons:
- The Balance in Dawn (Shadows Cannot Exist Without Light) T5 - Henshin Mystic power, looks like a stronger AoE healing ability than the light finisher
- Strikethrough works with Monk Finishing moves, so the Dark Finishers are AoE with a high DC because my main attribute is wisdom

Dark Monk Finishers look very nice on paper:
- Touch of Despair -25% fortification
- Pain Touch - 50% slow and disable
- Falling Star Strike - Blind
- Freezing the Lifeblood - Paralyze
- Karmic Strike - guaranteed Critical
- Curse of the Void - Charm

Enhancement Tree goals:
- get the capstone from Henshin Mystic
- get the Killer Instinct I,II and the bird attacks from the Falconry tree
- get the Aasimar cores, some healing amplification and some Fallen Aasimar racial abilities

I only play this character on the weekend in a premade party of friends.
At the moment we have an inquisitive rogue and a ranged cleric with the occasional hireling.
I was planning to use the Dark Finishers as a form of CC.

My questions:
- Are the Dark Finishers worth it? Do they work as advertised on the wiki?
- Do the Dark Finishers have enough DC to work on end game Reaper 1 content (Heroic / Epics / Legendary)?

If they fall short in Epics, my plan is to use:
- the bird attacks from Falconry (since on paper they have higher DCs than the monk finishers)
- Drifting Lotus
- Everything is Nothing
- and Dire Charge

What do you think?
Does this look viable, or should I remain in Light monk?

[Elfishski]

First - I must thank all of you for the amazing responses - you are awesome!

There goes my flashy energy bolt throwing monk down the drain.
I saw that these abilities were bad, but I had no idea of the magnitude...

Dark Monk Finishers look very nice on paper:
- Touch of Despair -25% fortification
- Pain Touch - 50% slow and disable
- Falling Star Strike - Blind
- Freezing the Lifeblood - Paralyze
- Karmic Strike - guaranteed Critical
- Curse of the Void - Charm

Enhancement Tree goals:
- get the capstone from Henshin Mystic
- get the Killer Instinct I,II and the bird attacks from the Falconry tree
- get the Aasimar cores, some healing amplification and some Fallen Aasimar racial abilities

I only play this character on the weekend in a premade party of friends.
At the moment we have an inquisitive rogue and a ranged cleric with the occasional hireling.
I was planning to use the Dark Finishers as a form of CC.

My questions:
- Are the Dark Finishers worth it? Do they work as advertised on the wiki?
- Do the Dark Finishers have enough DC to work on end game Reaper 1 content (Heroic / Epics / Legendary)?

If they fall short in Epics, my plan is to use:
- the bird attacks from Falconry (since on paper they have higher DCs than the monk finishers)
- Drifting Lotus
- Everything is Nothing
- and Dire Charge

What do you think?
Does this look viable, or should I remain in Light monk?

Yep, I'm playing more or less the exact same build at the moment (mid reapers, duo with a caster druid), and good news and bad news:

• The bad news is that ki bolt, incinerating wave are kind of garbage from a damage point of view. Ki Bolt for when an archer on a ledge has hamstrung you and you NEED vengeance, but you're not in a hurry and are philosophically opposed to swapping to a shuriken, and your inquisitive friend got distracted and wandered off. Incinerating wave for when you want everyone around you to go "wow, what was that?! It looked so cool!"
• The good news is that it's still a great build (probably not meta, but it's really capable, durable, and fun to play), with lots of situational options especially for CC that are worth using if you have the energy to remember what to use at the right time. Falconry attacks are super helpful for CC [use them from a distance as you're running in and the enemy will get tripped just when you reach them - in combat a bit slow to apply] and just applying helpless to things. Staff animations look great. DPS is fine. Lots of synergy between Henshin, Falconry, and Aasimar, then GMOF.
• Mixed news: the vulnerability/void strike line - vulnerability is way more useful than I expected, don't use normally, but when you're fighting a boss on a high enough difficulty for it to take a moment to kill it you can stack up 20 vulnerability pretty quickly by using all 4 attacks in a row (with doublestrike) as well as elemental. It seems like Void Strike is completely broken since the last monk update - I've been using it constantly this life and have never seen it activate. It used to be fun to get those random wiping things out!
• Dark Finishers - yes and no. I've tried them a little and they do seem to work with enough DC, but to get there you've got to make 3 kind of useless attacks in a row, that could have been better attacks, and you have so many better attacks. They work but I think the opportunity cost is too high to be worth setting up after low levels. Curse of the void is fun but it doesn't seem to last more than a few seconds.
• Better news - you probably don't need the dark finishers for CC. You've got 3 good falcon attacks that are reliable CC (albeit only partial with blindness), a couple of good GMOF attacks in epics that have CC, you've got instakills from level 15 with quivering palm, you can be setting up vulnerability, using the healing attack, etc. I find that against a single enemy I can keep it locked down indefinitely, and have good AOE options that at least reduce getting hit.
• Worth noting - there are some other situational but useful monk finishers. Water-Light-Water (e.g. unbalancing strike -> shadows can't exist without light or light monk attack -> water vulnerability or another unbalancing strike) finisher will give everyone nearby a 25% discount on spell points for a minute, which your cleric will love you for if you try to fit it in when you've got a spare moment. Other things include stun immunity or +4 to skills which are great at the right time if you can remember and need a little extra to get over the line on a check.

[kenawyn]

Thanks for the reply! This is all very good information.
Its just the more I know, the less I want to play...

Based on what I have learned so far, I think a STR or DEX based Monk / Fighter / Rogue would have been a much better option, considering that I only wanted to get the Killer Instinct enhancements from Falconry and now I will have to rely on it heavily. Looking forward for that stupid bird blocking my view... yay!

I just don't get it.
What is the point of all these unique monk stances, combos, finishers, special abilities and combat mechanics, when in the end they are mostly worthless and you are better off playing something else or using abilities from supplementary enhancement trees?
I am not a game designer, but shouldn't the main focus be on making the core classes and their playstyles viable?

I just wanted to play a pure monk that uses monk abilities.

I am sorry, I didn't meant to sound negative - I am just disappointed.
Anyways, thanks for all the help guys!
Have a great day!

[SocratesBastardSon]

I just finished up playing an Aasimar Ninja/Vile Chemist short sword user, and leaned heavily on dark finishers. My goal was to combine the increased poison vulnerability from Ninja Poison with Vile Chemist poison weapon damage, and it worked like a charm. The poison damage, including against otherwise poison-immune critters really cranked up nicely. Note, however, this was not a top-DPS build, even with the poison. I planned on leveraging the crowd control abilities dark monks have to make up for that, and that plan worked like a charm.
It was a wisdom build, but I did not use falconry attacks, mostly because I needed to get an Alchemist life out of the way and wanted to try out a poison-based melee fighter. I used Pain Touch and Freezing the Lifeblood all the time, and was very happy with them. I had a lot of points in WIS and they landed with ease through R5, including champs and even the less powerful red names with reasonable consistency.
I reserved Touch of Despair-Ninjutsu attacks for two occasions: when there were a LOT of mobs that I was going to deal with, Wave of Despair (WoD) was a nice way to debuff all of them at once; second, Poisoned Soul helped against tough bosses that were otherwise immune to other finishers. It seemed to be harder to land - I think it had a worse DC than other finishers. WoD is important because it affects DCs, and most finishers and special attacks allow saves. The alchemist/ninja combo allowed me to do a lot of debuffing. Imposing a -10 on fortitude saves on what I was fighting was not unusual, and even more at times. (Ninja attacks and finishers, along with VC attacks, rely on fortitude saves. I also used dual Envenomed Blades, which is - you guessed it - a fortitude save.)
The complaint that they take a long time to charge up is right, but if you have good Concentration score, you can pre-charge, so to speak, by activating it before going into combat, and therefore be able to use it immediately. I do that with WoD a lot. You don't actually have to hit something in order to get credit for the three initial strikes.
Speaking of bad DCs, Touch of Death is nearly worthless. For reasons that elude me, it has a terrible DC. I think it's because it does not include stunning bonuses. So unless your WIS is at god-like levels, don't bother with it. Next, I hardly ever see Poison Exploit proc. From what I understand, Deadly Exploits is broken, so don't use it. But near as I can tell, Poison Exploit is mostly useless too.
I hope that some day the devs see fit to repair this badly damaged tree, but I have to say, I had a great time combining it (t5!) with Vile Chemist (t3). I went GoF in epic and never looked back. As for playing a pure monk and going all in with Ninja? NOT a good idea.
Anyway, all of this to say that you can put together a dark finisher monk, but, and it's a big but, I cannot lie (that's right, we can all use a little Sir Mix-a-Lot), it can require some creativity to make it fun and viable. You don't have to go the way I did, using alchemist, but as I said, I would not do it as a pure monk. The tree is too broken for that.

[Logicman69]

Thanks for the reply! This is all very good information.
Its just the more I know, the less I want to play...

Based on what I have learned so far, I think a STR or DEX based Monk / Fighter / Rogue would have been a much better option, considering that I only wanted to get the Killer Instinct enhancements from Falconry and now I will have to rely on it heavily. Looking forward for that stupid bird blocking my view... yay!

I just don't get it.
What is the point of all these unique monk stances, combos, finishers, special abilities and combat mechanics, when in the end they are mostly worthless and you are better off playing something else or using abilities from supplementary enhancement trees?
I am not a game designer, but shouldn't the main focus be on making the core classes and their playstyles viable?

I just wanted to play a pure monk that uses monk abilities.

I am sorry, I didn't meant to sound negative - I am just disappointed.
Anyways, thanks for all the help guys!
Have a great day!

Monks have been hit with the nerf bat several times, unfortunately. There was a time when moves like Ki bolt were viable, but the power creep kind of left them in the dust. The issue I have with the dark finishers is they take a while to prep. Unlike a caster who can just press a button and get the desired effect, monks have to prep the finishing move in order to execute it. This takes time (9-12 seconds) and when you are dealing with mobs, that may be something you don't have.

I agree that the dark monk needs some love. They always have been slightly inferior to light monks. Personally I would like to see the dark monk get a bump in DPS and useful debuffing, while the light monk stays with the support/healing route.

[kenawyn]

Thanks for the responses!
I appreciate it.

I just finished up playing an Aasimar Ninja/Vile Chemist short sword user, and leaned heavily on dark finishers. My goal was to combine the increased poison vulnerability from Ninja Poison with Vile Chemist poison weapon damage, and it worked like a charm. The poison damage, including against otherwise poison-immune critters really cranked up nicely. Note, however, this was not a top-DPS build, even with the poison. I planned on leveraging the crowd control abilities dark monks have to make up for that, and that plan worked like a charm.
It was a wisdom build, but I did not use falconry attacks, mostly because I needed to get an Alchemist life out of the way and wanted to try out a poison-based melee fighter. I used Pain Touch and Freezing the Lifeblood all the time, and was very happy with them. I had a lot of points in WIS and they landed with ease through R5, including champs and even the less powerful red names with reasonable consistency.
I reserved Touch of Despair-Ninjutsu attacks for two occasions: when there were a LOT of mobs that I was going to deal with, Wave of Despair (WoD) was a nice way to debuff all of them at once; second, Poisoned Soul helped against tough bosses that were otherwise immune to other finishers. It seemed to be harder to land - I think it had a worse DC than other finishers. WoD is important because it affects DCs, and most finishers and special attacks allow saves. The alchemist/ninja combo allowed me to do a lot of debuffing. Imposing a -10 on fortitude saves on what I was fighting was not unusual, and even more at times. (Ninja attacks and finishers, along with VC attacks, rely on fortitude saves. I also used dual Envenomed Blades, which is - you guessed it - a fortitude save.)
The complaint that they take a long time to charge up is right, but if you have good Concentration score, you can pre-charge, so to speak, by activating it before going into combat, and therefore be able to use it immediately. I do that with WoD a lot. You don't actually have to hit something in order to get credit for the three initial strikes.
Speaking of bad DCs, Touch of Death is nearly worthless. For reasons that elude me, it has a terrible DC. I think it's because it does not include stunning bonuses. So unless your WIS is at god-like levels, don't bother with it. Next, I hardly ever see Poison Exploit proc. From what I understand, Deadly Exploits is broken, so don't use it. But near as I can tell, Poison Exploit is mostly useless too.
I hope that some day the devs see fit to repair this badly damaged tree, but I have to say, I had a great time combining it (t5!) with Vile Chemist (t3). I went GoF in epic and never looked back. As for playing a pure monk and going all in with Ninja? NOT a good idea.
Anyway, all of this to say that you can put together a dark finisher monk, but, and it's a big but, I cannot lie (that's right, we can all use a little Sir Mix-a-Lot), it can require some creativity to make it fun and viable. You don't have to go the way I did, using alchemist, but as I said, I would not do it as a pure monk. The tree is too broken for that.

Wow, what a nice build. I have never considered using poisons...
Granted it might not be meta, but flavor wise it sounds amazing.

I am not familiar with Alchemist, how did you get a -10 fortitude debuff?

Also, can I ask you what difficulty level you played, and what was the content the Dark Finishers started to fall short?

Monks have been hit with the nerf bat several times, unfortunately. There was a time when moves like Ki bolt were viable, but the power creep kind of left them in the dust. The issue I have with the dark finishers is they take a while to prep. Unlike a caster who can just press a button and get the desired effect, monks have to prep the finishing move in order to execute it. This takes time (9-12 seconds) and when you are dealing with mobs, that may be something you don't have.

I agree that the dark monk needs some love. They always have been slightly inferior to light monks. Personally I would like to see the dark monk get a bump in DPS and useful debuffing, while the light monk stays with the support/healing route.

I agree.

Here is my take on the situation, focusing mainly on monk Ki based spellcasting and Henshin.

Problems with monk:

- elemental strikes are usually worse than other CC related options
- finishers take too long to set up and execute
- combos are expensive (25 - 40 Ki)
- monk DCs are only effective if you max Wisdom
- Ninja Spy is slightly broken
- Dark Monk is somewhat underpowered and unreliable

---

If I could here is how I would change the Combo / Finisher system:

Combos and Finishers

I suggest the rework of the elemental/light/dark/void strikes and finishers:
- reduce cooldown to 0,5 second - to help activating finishers faster
- remove all damage to avoid burst damage spam
- remove Ki cost - since we do not deal any damage - these abilities are there as a selector for the Finishers

With the above changes the strikes should no longer be considered attacks, they now work like Hand Seals, that are used to activate various finisher effects.
Since hand seals on their own have no effect, we only need to send the actual combo (seals + finisher) to the server - could help reduce trafic and lag.

Seal Complexity
Finishers should not be locked to the current 3 hand seal + finisher recipe, instead use:
- 1 seal + finisher - simple self buffs
- 2 seal + finisher - mid level self buffs, single target CC, single target damage
- 3 seal + finisher - high level self buffs, AoE buffs, AoE CC, AoE damage, summons
- 4 seal + finisher - very strong AoE abilities, very strong AoE damage, unique abilities

More complex finishers have more powerful effects, but cost more Ki to activate.

Effect Tiers
Effects of powers improve with monk level as better stances are unlocked
- Tier 1 finisher: lesser stance (requires Monk 1)
- Tier 2 finisher: adept stance (requires Monk 6)
- Tier 3 finisher: master stance (requires Monk 12)
- Tier 4 finisher: grandmaster stance (requires Monk 18)

Seal types:
- Elemental (Air/Fire/Earth/Water) - all monks have access to them
- Philosophy (Light/Dark) - must choose one
- Special (Void/Shadow/Jade) - unlocked in the T5 monk enhancement trees; used for casting Henshin/Ninja/Shintao specific powers

Finisher types:
- Monk finisher - granted by the monk class, when activated monk finishers are cast
- Henshin finisher - granted by the Henshin tree, when activated Henshin powers are cast
- Ninja finisher - granted by the Ninja Spy tree, when activated Ninjutsu powers are cast
- Shintao finisher - granted by the Shintao tree, when activated Shintao powers are cast

The reason for the different finisher abilities is to allow the same recipe for different powers.

Finishers scaling:
- duration: scales with monk level
- damage: scales with monk level, tier (d4/d6/d8/d10) and melee power
- area of effect: scales with tier (5ft/10ft/15ft/20ft)
- other effects: scale with tier
- DC: scale with monk level, wisdom*, stunning modifiers, some rare feats and enhancements

* Note: special Feats, Finishers or Enhancement perks might allow the monk to use their Strength or Dexterity for DC
The decision behind this is to encourage STR and DEX based monks that can still use some Ki based abilities effectively.

---

Examples:
Note: these numbers are pulled out of my arse, and should not be taken seriously - they are here to demonstrate the idea.

Legend: A - Air (A), Fire (F), Earth (E), Water (W), Monk Finisher (MF), Henshin Finisher (HF)

Elemental Strike (* - Air/Fire/Earth/Water)
Imbues your melee attacks with elemental energy.
- Tier 1 (10 Ki, *-MF): +1d6 Elemental* damage
- Tier 2 (10 Ki, *-MF): +2d6 Elemental* damage
- Tier 3 (10 Ki, *-MF): +2d10 Elemental* damage
- Tier 4 (10 Ki, *-MF): +2d20 Elemental* damage

Applies buff on Self
Duration: 24 + monk level * 6 seconds
Damage scales with 1x melee power
Note: this is an example of a single seal complexity finisher
Note: the goal was to replace the old Elemental Ki Strikes, with a more useful ability

Breath of the Fire Dragon
The monk exhales burning Fiery Ki energy at his enemies in a cone shape.
- Tier 1 (15 Ki, F-F-MF): deals 1d4 * monk level Fire damage; 5ft AoE Cone
- Tier 2 (15 Ki, F-F-MF): deals 1d6 * monk level Fire damage; 10ft AoE Cone
- Tier 3 (15 Ki, F-F-MF): deals 1d8 * monk level Fire damage; 15ft AoE Cone
- Tier 4 (15 Ki, F-F-MF): deals 1d10 * monk level Fire damage; 20ft AoE Cone

Duration: Instant
DC: 10 + Monk level + Wis bonus + Stunning modifiers
Damage scales with 2x melee power
Note: this is an example of a 2 seal complexity finisher
Note: this demonstrates damage and effect scaling

Dance of Clouds
The monk surrounds himself with a cloak made of Air and Light Ki energy blurring his form.
- Tier 1 (20 Ki, A-L-A-MF): grants the target(s) 10% concealment
- Tier 2 (20 Ki, A-L-A-MF): grants the target(s) 20% concealment
- Tier 3 (20 Ki, A-L-A-MF): grants the target(s) 25% concealment
- Tier 4 (20 Ki, A-L-A-MF): grants the target(s) 30% concealment

Applies buff on self and friendly creatures around caster
Duration: 24 + monk level * 6 sec
Note: this is an example of a 3 seal complexity finisher using Air and Light seals
Note: this demonstrates effect scaling of a light and air based effect.

Riddle of Flame
The Henshin monk surrounds himself with a bright flaming Ki aura. Fireshield Red spell.
- Tier 1 (25 Ki, F-F-HF): striking the monk deals 1d4 + monk level Fire damage to the attacker; the monk receives 50% less damage from cold
- Tier 2 (25 Ki, F-F-HF): striking the monk deals 1d6 + monk level Fire damage to the attacker; the monk receives 50% less damage from cold
- Tier 3 (25 Ki, F-F-HF): striking the monk deals 1d8 + monk level Fire damage to the attacker; the monk receives 50% less damage from cold
- Tier 4 (25 Ki, F-F-HF): striking the monk deals 1d10 + monk level Fire damage to the attacker; the monk receives 50% less damage from cold

Duration: 24 + monk level * 6 second
Damage scales with 2x melee power
Note: this is an example how a Henshin specific finisher could work
Note: F-W-HF casts the Fireshield Blue version of the spell.

---

Here are some ideas for Void/Shadow/Jade abilities:

Henshin
Curse of the Elements - Void-* Ki ability - * is the chosen element. The target loses immunity to the chosen element.
Void Sphere - Void-Water-Void Ki ability - The Henshin Mystic creates a small immobile spherical barrier around him from deadly void energy. The sphere stops most incoming projectiles and protects against low level spells like magic missile. Hostile creatures passing through the sphere suffer damage and must make a fortitude save or be erased from existence. Death Ward and Deathblock protects from this effect.

Ninja Spy
Shadow Gate - Air-Shadow Ki ability - The Ninja Spy enters stealth, loses all aggro and teleports behind his selected target. After 12 seconds the monk returns to his original location.
Night Terrors - Dark-Dark-Shadow - The Ninja Spy creates an illusion that forces nearby - up to 6 - enemies to sleep if they fail their will saves, all enemies slept are rendered unconscious for the duration. Every 6 seconds sleeping enemies suffer psychic damage. Enemies that take physical damage get a chance to wake up every 3 seconds. Creatures immune to sleep are immune to this effect.

Shintao
Armor of Jade - Earth-Jade Ki ability - The Shintao monk surrounds himself with a radiant green Ki aura. Outsiders striking the monk must save or be banished. Any unnatural creature striking him must save or be entombed in jade. Creatures making the save suffer damage. This effect can only trigger once every 3 seconds.
Aegis of Jade - Light-Light-Jade Ki ability - Friendly targets are protected by death ward and for the duration rendered immune to all energy and ability drain effects.

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Critical Chance
To keep up with weapon damage and spell damage:
- Monk Finishers and monk SLAs gain a base 5% critical chance and deal +100% critical damage on a critical hit.
- Henshin Elemental Words (passive) - increase critical chance of elemental and force Finishers and SLAs by 1% (+4% total)
- Void Strike (passive) - increase critical chance of elemental and force Finishers and SLAs by 1% (+5% total)
- Henshin Capstone - increase critical chance of elemental and force Finishers and SLAs by 5%
- Ninja Spy Capstone - increase damaging Dark Finisher and SLA critical chance by 5%
- Shintao Capstone - increase damaging Light Finisher and SLA critical chance by 5%
- Some of the monk items like Soul of the Elements could give additional critical chance for elemental Ki SLAs and Finishers.

Note: Shintao and Ninja Spy should have other sources to increase their Dark and Light Finisher and SLA critical chances.

Why these numbers?
- Keeping the critical chance low is good for the game - since the impact of getting a big critical will feel much better and monks are not primary casters.

Why should we add critical chance to Finishers and monk SLAs?
- All other forms of attacks have them, why not monk Finishers and SLAs? We just brining them closer to the standard.

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Heroic Levels
Additional sources of melee power for monk finishers and monk SLAs
- enhancement perks - Henshin Mystic / Ninja Spy / Shintao trees - Monk Finishers and Monk SLAs gain implement bonus as melee power from Quarterstaff, Short Sword or Handwrap.
- feat - Ki Focus (passive) - Monk Finishers and Monk SLAs gain +1 DC and +5 melee power.
- feat - Greater Ki Focus (passive) - Monk Finishers and Monk SLAs gain +1 DC and +5 melee power.

Epic Levels
To keep the power going in Epics here are some ideas:
- Epic feat - Epic Ki Master (passive) - Epic levels count as additional monk levels for the purpose of calculating the duration, DC and damage of monk SLAs and Finishers.

Note: if this is too powerful, we could split-up the feat for Elemental Master, Dark Master and Light Master to represent each finisher group.

- Epic feat - Epic Ki Focus (passive) - Monk Finishers and Monk SLAs gain +2 DC and +10 melee power.
- Epic feat - Epic Ki Surge (active) - Activate to instantly restore 20-80 Ki points and for the duration of 30 seconds monk SLAs and monk Finishers gain +50 melee power. Target: Self. Duration: 30 seconds. Cooldown: 3 minutes.

Note: this also applies to Grandmaster of Flowers Ki abilities

- Destiny feat - Epic Ki Power (passive) - monk SLAs and monk Finishers gain +20 melee power

Note: this also applies to Grandmaster of Flowers Ki abilities

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Please note that my goal was not to create a complete rework of the monk class.
Obviously a lot of things are missing...
All I wanted was to demonstrate an approach - how to make the monk spells more viable.

Note: I did not include examples for spells that buff combat ability because this post is mainly focuses on monk spell like abilities.
If I did include some - they would probably grant burst damage or high survivability for a short time.

Because I believe that monk is a high finesse class that should be generally weaker than other combat focused classes like fighters, paladins and barbarians.
Only when they use their Ki based abilities should they exceed the capabilities of the other classes and only for a short time.

[SocratesBastardSon]

Wow, what a nice build. I have never considered using poisons...
Granted it might not be meta, but flavor wise it sounds amazing.

I am not familiar with Alchemist, how did you get a -10 fortitude debuff?

Also, can I ask you what difficulty level you played, and what was the content the Dark Finishers started to fall short?

The reason I got interested in poison is Ninja Poison adds an increasing vulnerability to poison, up to 100%. According to DDOWiki, that works with all sources of poison damage from weapons, including stances like Venomed Blades. Vile Chemist's core, Poisoned Coating, seems to operate the same way. And in longer fights the poison damage definitely increased over time. It was fun to watch.

It does not say that magical poison attacks, say Vial of Poison, obtain the same benefit, and I never tested it. But I wasn't primarily a poison spell caster so I didn't worry about it. I used Vials of Poison mostly for debuffs, but at higher levels in Epic the damage was quite good. Just remember you need a source of poison or negative spell power (both work).

The -10 comes from a quick test in a tavern in the PvP area. This build was designed with the following in mind, and while the potential is quite high, it's always a bit less than what a paper analysis says it should be (see my analysis last May). I may have mispoken a little bit because what I was referring to was the total fortitude debuff from all sources:

Contamination (Level 2 Greater Venom Vial, and t3 Vile Chemist's Toxic Augmentation): -4 (in practice it seems to be -2, but that may be an interaction effect with other attacks)
Heartseeker Poison Imbue (Level 4 spell): -3
Heartseeker Poison Imbue CON damage on crit: -0 to -3
Wave of Despair (t1 Ninjutsu): -2 from level drain
Fists of Darkness (dark monk strike): -2 from Shaken on failed save
Weapon level and CON drains: ++

One of my swords always had the ability to drain levels, which would add another -2 when it proc'd. That's another reason why Envenomed Blade (I used two) is so useful with this build because the poison damage and poison DOT are all increased by Ninja Poison, and it does a lot of CON damage, further debuffing Fort saves. Interestingly, a lot of these debuffs work on bosses.

At one point I took Improved Sunder for the Trauma effect (-3 Fort, stacks 5 times), but I didn't like it since it requires Power Attack, has a 10 sec. cool down, and the DCs are based on STR. I was doing an Aasimar WIS build using Falconry for WIS to dmg/hit. I did a level of FvS for the Divine Will trance, making my Ninja DCs even higher yet. As I said, I almost always hit my finishing moves.

I typically ran in R3, unless it was a really obnoxious quest and then we would do R1. I ran a few quests with full groups in R4-6, and it seemed fine, but I didn't really test it out enough to feel confident saying much about it. When I got to cap, and did some level 32-34 on R4-6 quests, then I noticed a drop in damage and survivability. I chalk that up to not be properly geared for that level, however.

Another caution: this build is very clicky and rotation intensive. It's great for solo'ing, or doing with a tr partner, but for fast run and gun groups where everything is done at a sprint you don't have time to charge up finishers, do the full Vial + Multivial Poison/Wave of Poison SLA/Poisoned Strike/Wave of Despair rotation. Not that it's a big deal because a monk in Ocean Stance (eventually taking Grandmaster of Forms) in Orchidium Reaction with Displacement and a Ghostly item (10% Incorporeal) makes a very survivable character.

[kenawyn]

Thanks for the detailed answer.