Monk is my favorite job, so i don't get to play my favorite job very much ....
I love monk in every single FF property i always feel its fun to play, and XI is no exception ... however i see some major problems in game design on monk, a lot of abilities that dont have thier place or home and are rarely used in newer modern content ... and a lot of really confusing equipment options and design ....
So lets start at the meat and potatoes the job and abilities itself ... this is what i would do ...
First i think we need to break monk down into 3 sub roles and i think some of those sub roles need more than one option as well.
Tank - We havent seen this one but rarely since abbysea ... to many mobs with endeath or rediculious endrain effects, as well as aoe magic damage flying everywhere and many mobs almost REQUIRING the tank not to engage.
Damage dealer - The only thing monk is allowed to play right now and generally your are pretty much last pick as slow TP gain, a near inability to self sc, and being one of the frailest melee dd's in the lower gear tiers make you a very risky pick.
Magic damage dealers - Really old like 50 cap and 75 cap old ... boost and chi blast sets lol haven't seen that in forever ...
-----------------------------now----------------
I want to hit these one at a time lets start with tank and we'll move on to roles as we go until i run out of space.
First problem :: Counterstance
I understand the learyness of the developers after abbysea to give monk a mainline role as tank as they also deal a llot of damage but nowadays no one bats an eye when a run/drk or run/sam pull staggering damage numbers while tanking ....
I'de like to point out if you look at every other tanking ability in the game you generally give up offense to increase your defense or give up nothing at all (Defender, Sentinel, Utsusemi, etc.) Monk has the distinguished honor of having the worst designed defensive ability in the game ... you trade tons of defense ... for a better chance to not get hit by regular auto attacks .... adoulin mobs and up have tp regular attacks all day, ws one shot you without even a 2 hr, and you still have the glaring monk weakness of absolutely no magic defense. to give the tank ability back to monk we have to make it mutually exclusive.
So i want to propose a few simple solutions to this .... one change counterstance into a "Stance" meaning it cannot be dispelled lasts super long and refreshes cooldown on zone. and what it does is increase guard chance and the percentage of damage reduced by a successful guard(primarily weapon skill damage reduction) nd increase counter chance (less than it currently does) and an enmity bonus in exchange for attack and counter attacks now generate enmity, finally allow counter attacks form the entire 180 front ark and guard from all directions. this places it firmly in the tank abilities ... it will lockout any other "monk stance" until the cooldown is over or a zone happens or another job gives a JA refresh (like corsair).
This way a DD with paper armor cant just throw on counterstance at no cost, the enmity will make that a risky gambit, and their damage will suffer.
Second up the new stance needs equipment support.
Weapon Spharai changes ...
Give spharai DT - II less than paladin more or less than runefencer can access depending on where you want them to fall in damage, switch the afterglow to attack on all attacks.
Artifact 119+ take all the counter, counter attack damage plus, Highest defense and HP stats of all the endgame job specific gear and then add DT- This set at +3 should add up to 50 DT- with a +1 moonbow belt on. wearing this armor on a monk should mean the highest max HP in the game ... no other FF property has monks with lower health than any job in the game ever ... but ill take highest hp on tank role only if that all i can get.
Change Mantra to a passive aura that grants max HP to the monk (double) and allies based on the monks unadjusted by gear max health. mantra plus on gear will increase the % health gifted as will merits or JP. giving monks a dynamite gift to give the party.
I would make a few conditional changes to some abilities while under the effects of counterstance as follows ::
Chi blast :: becomes aoe on target and generates increased enmity(like provoke), does not break sleep.
Perfect Counter :: Negates the next physical weapon skill and gives the monk 100 tp if successful.
Boost :: Change boost back to a spammable 10 sec cooldown ability, but with a longer duration so you can stack it ... it will be used to prepare other abilities faster.
under effects of counter-stance :: resets attack cooldown, and ignores haste for next attack round and generates no enmity, every three boost stacks will be immediately consumed to reset chackra cooldown.
Chakra :: Under the effects of counterstance ::
Can be used regardless of CC status (cannot be prevented by any physical crowd control magical crowd control or conditional like paralyze) Scale the burst heal differently to be more like half the monks max health, but chakra + gear will add to "Invigorate" instead. change invigorate regen to be +regen amount and have it stack with autoregen or spell regen. every 2 seconds and upon initial use of chakra remove one physical debuff.