Let's talk Monks - A Discussion For The DPS Freaks

[zipzo]

I tried to test two rotation, one with every attack in (switching between Bootshine and Dragon Kick and also alternating between Twin Snakes and True Strikes) and just Dragon Kick -> Twin Snakes->Demolish/Snap Punch.

I always had the feeling that the repositioning of Bootshine and True Strike is not worth it and my parser said the same. It's a difference of 2 DPS in favor of the way more simple rotation that let's you stay at the side of the boss all the time and concentrate more on dodging things.

I just want to say, that it was just a short test, nothing legit over long time and could be just vaild in certain gear or whatever, just thought it was worth mentioning so somebody else could test this aswell.

Unfortunately, simple copping out of the positional requirements is not something I'm opting to do. Since Bootshine an True Strike are inherently more effective from behind I find it a bold as hell argument that not adhering to the positions yields an equatable amount of DPS compared to doing so.

If you played Defilemancer in Rift (or Shaman in Storm Legion) it is very similar, everything about Monk is a priority rotation and it gets even more difficult when you introduce Impulse Drive into the equation in figuring out where to fit it. I don't consider it impossible, I do think it would be made easier if you could instantly identify your debuffs on the mob (make them HUGE, or give us an option to disable displaying all debuffs that are not ours). It is nowhere near impossible just because the rotation is not something static.

You need to fit in your 2 extra DoTs (Touch of Death + Fracture) at a convenient time so that Twin Snakes is going to be up for them and that GL stacks will not drop before you can refresh, Demolish is easy to manage as it fits so well in the rotation. Really the only difficult part I find is being able to instantly tell what the status is of my 3 DoTs + Dragon Kick on the mob.

I did not play Rift at level cap. Impulse doesn't fit anywhere, and it doesn't need to. In fact you're better off not using it. It doesn't activate a stance and by trying to use it you're simply added un-wanted bloat to an already bloated collection of skills. Your benefit from using it is not evidenced in the numbers and time calculations. The same goes for Fracture. The Monk rotation simply doesn't have any room to allow third party skills unless said skill does at least twice the damage of the other skills being used (which it doesn't), or it's instant, and even given the former you're not progressing your stance chain - thus your cycle is halted when you use it, throwing everything off. Monks skill ladder is that of requiring a consistent flow, and pretty much any non-Monk skill is out of the question for that flow.

I'm not saying cross skills are bad for Monk, there are instant cast skills which can be used without inhibiting our timer-heavy setup, but given you're behind/flanking a boss in a raid situation, there is little to no point in using cross skills that require you to "weave" them in, interrupting the already tight nature of the monk buffs/debuffs. Their effect just doesn't stack up to being worth breaking your cycles.

I think its a bit too early to start worrying about rotations and MNK should instead worry about priorities like people are saying in the thread already.

Right now Twin Snakes buff and Dragon Kick debuff are must haves 24/7 and don't require alot of GCD to set up.

It's never too late to start worrying about rotations. Priorities are inherently fused to that of the Monk rotation, they aren't a mutually exclusive couple of conversations.

Your point about Twin Snakes and Dragon Kick is a given, considering they share the same GCD as every single other action with a GCD on your hot bar, so I'm curious why you're implying somewhat that any of the GCDs differ at all?

Shoulder Tackle should be lower cd and refresh GL

Also according to my testing, adding in DoTs = DPS loss. I dropped all dots and did 30 more DPS (Touch of Death, Demolish and Fracture)

You're also asking the impossible to keep going to behind. Some mobs like in Amdapor Keep final boss, they have massive tail attack.

He rarely gives me time to use Bootshine -> True Strike. Most of the time I used Bootshine and have to GTFO

I'm with everyone on Shoulder Tackle. It makes almost no sense, the CD on this ability. There's such a huge array of uses for this move as a Monk yet it doesn't get to live out its potential because its CD is horrid.

On the subject of DOTs, let me clarify a pervasive line of thinking...as far as I can tell the FFXIV APP parser is not properly accumulating DOT damage (at least for Monks yet), so there is no way to properly gauge damage given a Touch of Death/Demolish rotation. Take a look here at this link...

http://ffxiv-app.com/History/

You'll notice as early as July 5th it was pretty much full-stop not a question that DOTs were not being properly measured. In the updates following, he occasionally mentions a fix specific to certain classes, one even mentioning Demolish but absolutely no mention of ToD. It is with this we are able to assume that ToD is not measured because he does not know the formula, and that his Demolish formula is still in need of tweaking (though it seems he might be closer to getting Demolish).

That being said, with ToD's potency, you can be certain that if you're noticing a DPS loss while using this parser in conjunction with applying ToD, you are seeing a completely incorrect adjudication of your damage. Until the parser has been tweaked and fixed in this regard, it cannot be trusted to properly authenticate Monks DPS.

Dragon Kick does not out damage BS. Bootshine is given an automatic critical modifier when used from behind. Being generously forgiving and assuming critical hits are even 1.5x (as opposed to the usual 2x) that of a normal hit, Bootshine is clearly the more superior choice for an opener, and the go-to ability if Dragon Kick need not be refreshed. The critical modifier would have to be 1.2x or probably a bit less for your statement to be true.