Monk Rework just brought us back to 2.0 MNK but with no GL.

[SpeckledBurd]

That's what SE does. People complain 'cause their job is not part of the meta and when SE listens it gets oversimplified. Kind of a careful what you wish far scenario.

People complaining about Monk for the last three expansions haven't been complaining about it's meta position (for the most part). Heavensward was the closest, but the complaints there were largely that Monk suffered from basic design problems that were fixed on other jobs like how it lacked Aggro Control and how its TP sustain caused it to burn out extremely fast in a fight. The last two expansions have been complaints about the new actions and abilities that the job has received running contrary to what players want from it such as RoF's slow and the Crit RNG of Deep Meditation or the new skills being objectively terrible at what they were actually designed to do such as Riddle of Earth being so bad at GL refreshing that they made Anatman, which in turn was so bad at it that they eventually just changed Form Shift.

[ssunny2008]

snip

Let´s face it, ppl complain about everything everywhere or want this or that changed, not only on Monk. Samurai for example is probably the most broken class in FF14. The damage is insane even if you doesn´t play that well. The whole kit has everything you could imagine on a melee class to keep up 100% uptime easily without a real damage loss. You can even adjust your rotation if its needed. But still ppl complain about this or that because "it´s not perfectly timed", whatever.

You´re obviously fine with the new Monk, but what do you think will happen with 6.0? What is in the need to change when you can play 123 and spam off gcd´s? Away from the useless abilities and being soulless?! Whatever will happen, ppl will probably complain about that. And tbh, i can´t imagine something real is gonna happen, because it would´ve happen already. 1-2 more off gcd´s? God please no... The bar is already filled and spamming some buttons on cd is no fun.

5.3 felt way better and objectively seen here is a pro/con list:

Pro:
- RoE was better to do badass mechanics. Would´ve been the same in the current content like E12s diamond dust/gaias rage or E11s cycles, etc... Now you´ve to spam it, so SE can´t even be serious about "please play positionals".
- Fists of wind was much smoother in the fights.
- There were less off gcd´s which put the player under pressure for max. damage output especially in the opener or at such badass mechanics where you can´t keep uptime all day long.
- It had a soul.

Con:
- You lost GL stacks when you died or in cutszenes.
- Brotherhood only effected phys. dps.

The other changes are more QoL things which were not needed that hard. After cutszenes you normally had your opener up again and dieing shouldn´t even be a thing.
The only real improvement came with brotherhood and i seriously can´t see how this class still needs a lot of work. It´s already braindead af and thx to the complaints the smooth gameplay is gone as exchange that we don´t have to maintain GL anymore. So what should happen?! Objectively seen it is what it is and any new stuff would just overfill the bar for no real reason.

[SpeckledBurd]

Let´s face it, ppl complain about everything everywhere or want this or that changed, not only on Monk. Samurai for example is probably the most broken class in FF14. The damage is insane even if you doesn´t play that well. The whole kit has everything you could imagine on a melee class to keep up 100% uptime easily without a real damage loss. You can even adjust your rotation if its needed. But still ppl complain about this or that because "it´s not perfectly timed", whatever.

You´re obviously fine with the new Monk, but what do you think will happen with 6.0? What is in the need to change when you can play 123 and spam off gcd´s? Away from the useless abilities and being soulless?! Whatever will happen, ppl will probably complain about that. And tbh, i can´t imagine something real is gonna happen, because it would´ve happen already. 1-2 more off gcd´s? God please no... The bar is already filled and spamming some buttons on cd is no fun.

I wouldn't say I'm fine with it, but frankly I don't think GL being gone actually impacts Monk in terms of how you play the job all that much outside of no longer having to spam Form Shift and getting screwed on down time at least as far as going from 5.3 to 5.4 goes. The heart of GL in ARR/HW was that it required aggressive play in order to keep your stacks. However the death knell for that wasn't making GL a trait, it actually came in 5.05 with Formshift allowing you to refresh it with minimal nonsense, and frankly it was necessary because the way they designed fights wasn't conducive to Riddle of Earth and Anatman. If I'd had to do Limit Cuts+Super Hawk Blaster transition or Wormhole Formation without Formshift refreshing I straight up would have switched to Samurai to keep my blood pressure down instead of clearing TEA on Monk. Like most I don't think they needed to remove GL and turn it into a trait either. It just needed a non-stupid means of rebuilding it that didn't require a trade off, be it standing around for a GCD or trading what was accidentally made into one of our heaviest damage cooldowns to get back to full, and for Tornado Kick to have a different effect than dumping stacks.

The devs didn't do that, but in terms of how it informs gameplay removing GL and giving us a skill to regain GL was fundamentally the same since upkeep was already brainless. It wasn't without an advantage either, because with GL just being a trait they aren't able to design more stupid upkeep skills for it which will force them to do something else.

I don't know what the devs will do going into 6.0, as I'm not them. I know what I'd like to see, which is for Chakra to be reworked so it isn't RNG based at all and with more skills that actually use it and overhead. If it isn't completely changed like that, it should at the very least be changed so that the design of Chakra is changed so that the RNG is actually deliberate instead of just tacked onto Meditate. It also needs another mechanic on it, full stop, and it would have needed one if GL hadn't become a trait. It just needs it now more so than ever with GL having become one. The reason Kenki/Ninki work on Samurai and Ninja is because it's one layer of complexity on top of Iaijutsu and Ninjutsu, systems that are well fleshed out in their own right. On their own they aren't enough to support a job without it being incredibly brain dead, and Chakra either as RNG or as a consistently building resource which is their equivalent, and by extension it isn't enough to support Monk either. I'd be all for Monk getting a Sabin/Zell like system where we enter a Blitz State and execute three weaponskills corresponding to a certain sequence of Opo-Opo/Raptor/Coeurl form which finishes the sequence with Suplex/Dolphin Blow/something similar. The most important thing though is that Monk doesn't stay like it currently is and gets something beyond just chakra, because Monk with only Chakra is quickly becoming an intersection of both boring and miserable to play.

As for other things, I want them to kill the fist stances as they exist because there's no reason they should have gotten past Stormblood's action cull as a series of Three Stances of which you only ever use one. They should reconsider Riddle of Earth and make it a flat 20 seconds with no charges (and also change the animation to what played when it got hit because that was hot). Old Riddle of Earth was superior, but it was almost too much, Monk is the positional job and being able to ignore them for up to half the fight at a whim was too much, but 6 seconds is way too short, especially with how busy the job is. On the other hand if they keep it as a 6 second effect, Monk should gain a new counter attached to it, Monk is the OG counter job going back to FFIII and while Featherfoot/Haymaker was a bad joke, that doesn't mean that the concept should be abandoned on the job. Monk also needs a decent mobility kit instead of two Shoulder Tackles that you're incentivized to weave into your burst window and Six Sided Star, a teleport or a dash would be a godsend. It needs some sort of ranged attack at low levels is needed for spot pulling in Palace of the Dead. Anatman is an obvious sore spot that I wouldn't be surprised to see get axed completely considering how poorly it was conceived on literally every level. I'd also say that Leaden Fist needs to go because it was as guilty as Monk's kit falling to pieces around itself as Anatman. There's probably more that could be done or is needed, but that's the gist of it.

[ssunny2008]

snip.

Thx for the long answer. Just about your wishes:

I still think that Chakra is fine as it is. It´s not that hard RNG anymore. Of course it´s annoying when a crit or bootshine goes into nowhere, but the damage loss is negatable. I don´t want to see a "safezone" like kenki has for its skills and i don´t want to see more skills used with it. Of course it can still procc at any time and in bad situations, but it´s still better than having nonamed static cd´s you press every 30/45s, just because of reasons.
But there are some situations where it hurts hard, e.g. E11s when the boss disappears and you sit on 3/4 points left. That´s really sad since you lose pretty lose alot of points in such downtimes. It would be cool if they go the other way, no safezone, but you can unleash the attack with a damage loss.

The 30s RoE was superior yes, but pretty much needed in this or that mechanic aka E8s. 20s with the same cooldown could be too less or some mechanics and you could still spam it every minute. 30s and 3min cooldown or something would´ve been great to play around mechanics like ilya, the current diamond dust or whatever without button smashing and without being that broken.

I´m still a fan of combinding the stances in some way too. I liked the way GL worked with fist of fire into fists of wind with the same damage but more movement speed. It could be like you start in fist of fire. Once you´ve done requirement X you can activate a 2nd stance of your choice permanently. If you reached that requirement again, you can activate the last one for 15s. In my preference i would´ve more damage, more movement speed and FoE as def then. They could even combine them for new skills you can only use in different fist combinations.

What i really don´t want to see is a ranged attack. It doesn´t fit the class tbh. SSS is a great skill and fits the class 100% in such escape situations. But i would highly prefer overall more movement speed from FoW than that short boost you get from SSS.

Dashes should be reworked on any class. It doesn´t make sense that they get abused for more dps in the burst windows. Just look at dragoon who turns around to do a backjump to the boss, because the regular skills are needed for the damage. I don´t get why they aren´t there just to be there with X cooldown as gapclosers. Of course you can still save one stack or enough kenki to make use of them at any time, but it´s not a great design.

[Irisdina_Wiloh]

Snip

God bless you SpeckledBurd, you always know how to sum up everything wrong with Monk and suggest good ideas. 6s RoE feels like a kick in the teeth with fights now and while yeah 30s probably was too much, it did help get us through more intensive parts of fights where going for positionals was out of the question and even having that 30s, you still had to manage TN usage correctly too to get the most out of it all. 20s feels like a fair trade though. I want to have faith that 6.0 will finally be a turning point but it's hard to stay positive at this point. Props to you for continuing to play Monk and not wavering.