The Monk Temple Reborn

[SunnyHirose]

If the DK / Twin buffs fall off for only the application of DK / Twin, the 9-step rotation is still a DPS loss vs. the 18-step rotation.* And you can forget about sticking Touch of Death in there at all.

* I estimate about 2% not including auto-attacks, but the numbers depend on your crit rate and stuff.

[Ricdeau]

If the DK / Twin buffs fall off for only the application of DK / Twin, the 9-step rotation is still a DPS loss vs. the 18-step rotation.* And you can forget about sticking Touch of Death in there at all.

* I estimate about 2% not including auto-attacks, but the numbers depend on your crit rate and stuff.

This seems around what I saw when actually testing. I think I had around 5% loss overall if not slightly more. As stated pending crit rate and whatever else. I think I saw around a 25 DPS loss at my then average dummy DPS.

[Viridiana]

Out of curiosity, how does this change if you have a second MNK doing DK for you, so that you're only worried about TS dropping?

[SunnyHirose]

Hm, I really ought to show my spreadsheet model if I'm going to throw numbers around, but it's not particularly robust, and AFAICT it's mostly in "the right ballpark" than amazingly accurate; it's got a skill speed (~2.43s GCD) and a crit rate (~13%) hardcoded in, and everything's aligned to the GCDs ^^;;

If you have a dragon kicker, and if Twin Snakes only falls off for one GCD, it should be ~0.7% improvement over alternating (without factoring in auto-attacks, and absolutely no ToD). I have no idea what kind of skill speed that would take (other than "lots"), but any more GCDs falling off and you lose it on a Bootshine.

This seems around what I saw when actually testing. I think I had around 5% loss overall if not slightly more.

Sounds a little more extreme than what my model would predict. But it's over 1% expected loss regardless, and that's the sort of difference that should be enough to balk at.

[Ricdeau]

Sounds a little more extreme than what my model would predict. But it's over 1% expected loss regardless, and that's the sort of difference that should be enough to balk at.

I'm just working off memory, I don't have the logs in front me nor do I even remember when exactly I tested it. I just remember seeing that it was a big loss and left it alone after that.

[Best-MNK-NA]

Former MNK main. Got the Dread claws from T13 tonight and am trying to relearn MNK to make T13 easier for the healers after stepping away to play NIN since 2.4...

The Updated rotation is

PB > Snap > IR > Snap > B4B > Demo > DK > TS > ToD > BS > True > Snap > BS > True > Demo

Would people still say this is the best opener, now with over a month of testing? When do you add the xpot? I would guess right after the TS before ToD to guarantee the potion delay doesn't stop TS? I was doing Tackle > ToD > PB > Demo > Snap > Snap > IR > DK > B4B > TS > x-pot > BS > sp > True > howling > Snap as my opener but it seems slightly less optimal (especially the pre-PB ToD).


Also, i'm still a bit confused on what the accepted usage of Fracture is. Back in the day I tried to work it in but no long fights could sustain the TP cost. When do you use it in your rotations? And are you only using it because you have a NIN? Our other melee is a DRG (and won't play anything else) so if I go MNK I won't have Goad available. Would that mean never use Fracture?

What's the best time to clip dots, or is it never at all? It seems a strict 1-2s rule on both Demolish and ToD is best to me. ToD is obvious - you reapply it right when it's about to come off, always. Demolish, on the other hand, if it has 3+ seconds left on it when you reach it in your rotation if you clip it then you are guaranteeing a lost tick, where as if you choose Snap instead you also guarantee a lost tick in the ~6 seconds it takes you to get back to Demolish but the damage Snap does is > the lost damage from the lost tick. But if you're re-applying Demolish at 1-2s then you might not lose a tick. Even if you Snap instead of Demolish right as Demolish falls off, that's ~6 seconds (two ticks) before you can demolish again and Snap Punch deals more potency than two ticks of Demolish + its initial hit... as long as you immediately rotate back to a Demolish that should be a dps gain in theory, right? Or am I missing something?

Another similar question: Do DK and TS affect themselves? Does your first TS on a boss do a straight 140 potency or is it really 154 potency (from its 10% damage buff) every time? I operate under the assumption they don't benefit from their own buffs, but wanted to make sure. If they do apply to themselves it makes clipping them at all useless most of the time.

Lastly, the last non-crafted BIS I saw was http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/OXH8 before 2.5. Do the new 110 accessories change any of that radically? Is it worth picking one up - or does it require a lot of other crafted gear to eek out a few extra STR? The stat gains seem rather minor compared to the cost until you reach 4-5 crafted pieces it seems. If you had to build a budget "BIS" with just 1 or 2 crafted items, what would it be? I see lists with either none or a ton and it's hard to figure out the best option as someone who really can't afford to do any more than 1-2.

[Odowla]

I use the Potion after the DK - makes them line up perfectly such that they both fall off at the same time.

Same rules apply that used to apply for DoTs -> clip at <5 seconds on Demo.

Fracture - Only when you have a ninja or a bard that plays a lot of paeon for you, its ~15 DPS extra, at the cost of massively increased TP usage. Very good for looking good on a parse though ;p

Honestly there's only a few really good i110 pieces, but as Dervy mentioned somewhere on these forums, too many crafted pieces might actually be worse off than having a lot of 130, even if the "stat weights" are higher.

[Best-MNK-NA]

I ask about clipping because it was a gray area I always wanted to explore more and with NIN it stopped being as relevant to maximizing class dps (due to the restrictive combo system) so my attention focused on other things. Basically it just seems to me that doing DK > TS > Demo > Boot > True > Snap > DK > TS > Snap > Boot > True> Demo > DK > TS > Snap > Boot > True > Snap as your rotation - or in other words alternating DK > TS > Snap and Boot > True > Snap with demo every third combo ends up clipping DK and TS at the ~5s mark a lot of the time - and I wonder if it's better to let them drop momentarily as well in the same way the opener does it. That would in effect make your basic rotation something along the lines of DK > TS > Demo > Boot > True > Snap > Boot > True > (DK falls) > Snap (TS falls) > repeat. That would make your Snap lose out on ~20 potency, then your next DK miss out on either ~33 potency or ~17 potency depending on if it applies its own buff to itself, and then the next Twin would miss out on either 14 or 0 potency with the same stipulations. So worst case scenario that loses you 67 potency to gain 92 (fully buffed boot over DK) + 61 (True > twin) = 153 potency... for a net gain of 87 potency every 18s. Of course, that's ignoring Touch of Death - putting that up at some point could cause your extra True to not get DK (so a bonus of only 38) and your Snap to lose another ~20 potency. In which case you gain 130 potency at the cost of 97 potency for a net gain of only 33 potency. 33 potency seems to be still a significant chunk to aim for. And if DK and TS do apply to their own hit, then that means you'd actually gain 63 potency when applying ToD in a rotation and 117 potency when not.

Anwyay, I haven't done any testing to confirm these theoreticals, but it seems to me that rotation (DK > TS > Demo > [Boot > True > Snap]x2 > repeat) should be, in theory, better than alternating DK > TS > Snap and Boot > True > Snap with demo every third combo. Unless there's something I'm missing about our basic maintenance combo post opener.

Without Fracture and doing the basic rotation and not the different one I was just talking about, I'm pulling about 570-580 with party buff, food, and a pot in the opener with this as my gear http://ffxiv.ariyala.com/PEU1 (i123 overall) and it seems like it's a little lower possibly than it should be? Or am I right about on track? Fracture puts it in the 585-590 range but then I run out of TP long before my second invigorate with my skillspeed and I'm sure in a real situation the damage lost from all that extra paeon would be too great.

[SunnyHirose]

On revision of my model*, it looks like the three combo rotation is slightly better (~0.6%) if Twin Snakes / DK only fall off for one GCD, and significantly worse (~1.2%) if they fall off for two. The primary issue is the loss of buffs on auto-attacks, because if you just look at weaponskill potencies, it's indeed a gain.

How much skill speed does it take to get to one GCD dropoff? Well, I did some field testing and 459 ain't enough! So it's possible, I think, but I wouldn't want to try.

* Did some testing today with Disembowel to settle an unresolved matter about whether "-10% piercing resistance" meant 10% or (10/.9)% damage increase. It's definitely 10%. Pending further testing, I'm going to assume the same of Dragon Kick.

[Ricdeau]

If I recall correctly I believe it's over 550. It has been some time since I did my test though.

Edit - Yeah, I just loaded up 529 SS with what I had on me, and it was still a two GCD loss at 529.