Changes to Meditation, Tornado Kick, and Other Actions for 5.0 Monk

[Oxdarock]

They can't undo the form shift change now. It simply can't happen 90% of Mnk's will riot. It's what Mnk has needed for a long time. The simple fact is TK is almost never useful. Unless it gets a massive potency buff, destroying your 20% attack buff will never be a good trade off for a skill that does only slightly more than a majority of your attacks. The investment to build GL is simply too great. The only time it is useful is when you're ending a fight or there is a transition will you physically can not move for more then 15 seconds.

Wow... I like how people still swear to heaven and back how 6SS and TK are virtually useless despite me writing an extensive guide on how to use them mid-rotation. I know not everyone has to time to look through a 33 page doc, but to not even want to go into the game and try hitting the dummy for a few minutes to compare rotations is astonishing...

[Xaert]

Well, the main reason why we wouldn't want 6SS and TK is just how they are in their current state: Greased Lightning Management. One's used to refresh to maximum (though sometimes, the delay when using it makes it not refresh anyways) and to dump our stacks for a moderately powerful oGCD.

The Form Shift change allowing shifting from Coeurl -> Opo-opo was something that would've made Monk fantastically better for the past two expansions; to get rid of this change after just implementing it would all but sow chaos. That being said, we now have too much GL management in our kit. Riddle of Earth, TK, SSS, and Anatman are all now even more niche than they were to use, except Riddle of Earth which now gives 30 seconds True North, which I'd argue is the main use of this Ability now. Perfect Balance for the Opener and Form Shift for the upkeep are all we need.

While I did like the TK rotation, the one you propose doesn't incredibly impact DPS like it did before, and relying on Anatman as its crutch for generating GL mid-fight is very risky and reliant on server ticks, as well as not being used for its intended purpose, something that Devs really don't like, hence why we no longer have the TK rotation.

It's not that people don't necessarily want SSS and TK, just not their current form. But an overhaul is yet another expansion away and there's no guarantee that the class will progress, just like how Monks waited from SB to ShB. What I want to see happen is Greased Lightning stacks not be used as a resource. It is our core mechanic, not a resource pool, that is what Chakras are for. To have two independent "resource" pools might just be what the devs are being torn upon.

[Oxdarock]

The Form Shift change allowing shifting from Coeurl -> Opo-opo was something that would've made Monk fantastically better for the past two expansions; to get rid of this change after just implementing it would all but sow chaos. That being said, we now have too much GL management in our kit. Riddle of Earth, TK, SSS, and Anatman are all now even more niche than they were to use, except Riddle of Earth which now gives 30 seconds True North, which I'd argue is the main use of this Ability now. Perfect Balance for the Opener and Form Shift for the upkeep are all we need.

While I did like the TK rotation, the one you propose doesn't incredibly impact DPS like it did before, and relying on Anatman as its crutch for generating GL mid-fight is very risky and reliant on server ticks, as well as not being used for its intended purpose, something that Devs really don't like, hence why we no longer have the TK rotation.

I did pick up on being able to start attacking the boss in Opo-Opo stance, but I've yet to see a reason to do since you usually want to start with a Demo on the boss after a long disconnect (mainly E3s). Only reason I can think of for doing so is if you have the LF buff up, but that's a 30 sec buff that's unlikely to wear by the time the boss becomes targetable again.

Using Anatman mid-fight really isn't that risky since you're only standing still for up to 3 seconds for a single stack. I guarantee that if you use 6SS+Anatman back to back quickly, you will always get a stack of GL. This is, of course, if you can find the time to do so, and I admit, you won't always be able to. As of writing this, I wasn't able to find a decent place to use it during the Cycle attacks of E2s and you absolutely can't use it during the panto phase of E3s (You can actually do it before the Tidal Wave mechanics, but you have to delay the 6SS+Anatman combo a couple of GCDs). It's not like you have to stick to using TK at the end of every RoF window. If the fight doesn't allow it, the fight doesn't allow it. Simple as that.

I actually think the devs actually support the TK rotation, since 6SS and Anatman seem to be used for just that purpose (and if they made 6SS give you a GL stack, it'd be amazing). As someone who doesn't double-weave unless it's absolutely necessary, I wasn't a fan of how I had to keep going with my rotation in SB when using Wind Tackle/RoW and being forced to either clip a GCD or do a True Strike while not in FoF. And from what I've seen and heard, other than the LB gain exploitations (which they touched upon during live letters), the devs don't punish players just because they use a game mechanic in a way that's not intended. For example, it was actually stated from Yoshi-P himself that the dev team didn't think about the tank LB strat for Byakko EX, but didn't patch it so that it couldn't be done because they didn't want to punish players for figuring that out.

[SpeckledBurd]

Wow... I like how people still swear to heaven and back how 6SS and TK are virtually useless despite me writing an extensive guide on how to use them mid-rotation. I know not everyone has to time to look through a 33 page doc, but to not even want to go into the game and try hitting the dummy for a few minutes to compare rotations is astonishing...

A guide that people have thoroughly debunked because they'd already tested using Six Sided Star and Tornado Kick rotationally and found it to be a damage loss outside of the extremely niche uses that people ascribe.

[Xaert]

Using Anatman mid-fight really isn't that risky since you're only standing still for up to 3 seconds for a single stack. I guarantee that if you use 6SS+Anatman back to back quickly, you will always get a stack of GL. This is, of course, if you can find the time to do so, and I admit, you won't always be able to. As of writing this, I wasn't able to find a decent place to use it during the Cycle attacks of E2s and you absolutely can't use it during the panto phase of E3s (You can actually do it before the Tidal Wave mechanics, but you have to delay the 6SS+Anatman combo a couple of GCDs). It's not like you have to stick to using TK at the end of every RoF window. If the fight doesn't allow it, the fight doesn't allow it. Simple as that.

I actually think the devs actually support the TK rotation, since 6SS and Anatman seem to be used for just that purpose (and if they made 6SS give you a GL stack, it'd be amazing). As someone who doesn't double-weave unless it's absolutely necessary, I wasn't a fan of how I had to keep going with my rotation in SB when using Wind Tackle/RoW and being forced to either clip a GCD or do a True Strike while not in FoF. And from what I've seen and heard, other than the LB gain exploitations (which they touched upon during live letters), the devs don't punish players just because they use a game mechanic in a way that's not intended. For example, it was actually stated from Yoshi-P himself that the dev team didn't think about the tank LB strat for Byakko EX, but didn't patch it so that it couldn't be done because they didn't want to punish players for figuring that out.

I'm not trying to disprove the efficacy of the Anatman/SSS efficacy within those hyper niche situations where it is a DPS increase, I'm trying to tell you the lack of practicality of it is its own downfall. The devs aren't going to punish players for using certain skills outside of their specified uses. It's not like they handed out bans for people employing the TK rotation, but the simple fact that they made the TK rotation unviable post-SB is more than clear that they didn't like the TK rotation, otherwise a good portion of Monk's new skills would expand upon that rotation, evolving it from being the most optimal rotation found by the playerbase into the normal rotation. Anatman being risky is attributed to being reliant on server ticks, where the closer to the tick you are, the higher your DPS will be instead of just standing still for those 3 seconds. Any rotation that can't be employed with absolute certainty at the time required shouldn't be normalized. When I heard the Anatman rotation was the most optimal rotation, I decided I'd let my sub run out and wait for the future until Monk didn't need such a rotation for optimal DPS. Little did I know 5.05 would change Monk.

As for the Form Shift change, I left out the crucial detail where it refreshed Greased Lightning going from Coeurl -> Opo-opo, that's my bad, since that's why I mentioned it. This is the biggest game changer for Monk currently and in the future.

Personally, I just don't see the payout for using this rotation, though using TK for a damage increase would be nice. However, I also equally would not like to use SSS, for clunkiness and not-so-short GCD or Anatman. Anatman would've been much bigger had we not gotten the Form Shift change, but this change is just too critical to not use. With this, GL management is complete and as such we should practically never be losing GL in any situation that's not right before the target dying with no subsequent targets. If the rotation was more black and white, per say, a boss that always has no positionals and/or is stationary a fantastic portion of the time, I think many more people would be accepting of this rendition of the rotation.

I guess my rebuttal is: If using this and losing GL4 only does increased damage in these rare situations, why just not use it and maintain GL with our new tool if it isn't make or break? "If we can, we should"?

[Oxdarock]

I guess my rebuttal is: If using this and losing GL4 only does increased damage in these rare situations, why just not use it and maintain GL with our new tool if it isn't make or break? "If we can, we should"?

I think the bit that's getting to me (which it shouldn't since this is the internet) is when people keep saying that 6SS, TK, and Anatman can only be used in niche situations when they can easily be implemented in the regular rotation. That said, it's really a choice of play style. Not using TK is a lot simpler and does consistent dps while using TK does roughly the same amount of damage, but can be potentially higher if 6SS and/or TK crit (since both moves are more potent than a LF Bootshine), though you do have to know a fight inside and out to find the perfect times to use it mid-combat. It's just really satisfying when you see a crit for 37-40k and a dcrit for 48-50k on a monk, which is why I'm a die-hard fan of using TK as much as possible.