RIP MNK 1.x - 5.x

[Sooru]

I don't know where this information is coming from as I've only watched the job actions 18 minute video but I think it looks fine?

I'll still play Monk, just don't know if it will be my main job or not.

[Kolsykol]

I don't know where this information is coming from as I've only watched the job actions 18 minute video but I think it looks fine?

I'll still play Monk, just don't know if it will be my main job or not.

They talked about them more in-depth on Stream, True Strike and Twin Snakes will no longer have a positional but the rest will still have it.

[VentVanitas]

As far as I know based off the trailer and demo:

- Brotherhood/Riddle of Fire probably on 60 second cooldown.
- Fist stances finally gone.
- New buff skill. (Riddle of Wind?)
- Perfect Balance and the addition of Blitz (and Light/Dark Chakra. You achieve them by using Blitz), 3 weapon skill charge duration, 40 second cooldown (should be shorter honestly), 2 charges of PB.

• Elixir Field and Rising Pheonix(?) as Blitz actions, with Star Shower Dive? (Or Phantom Rush) as the Blitz for when you complete both Yin/Yang Chakra.

• Exiting PB leaves you in Formless Fist.

• Blitz action are positional-less GCDs and appear to be on a timer of 20 seconds.(Anatman could possibly be changed to freeze the Blitz action timer, giving it a bit more use, but it'd still be terrible.)

- Chakra is still unfortunately the exact same, but you obtain the gauge at an earlier level.
- Arm of the Destroyer upgrade...? Don't know why this was necessary but okay...?
- New dash skill replacing Shoulder Tackle. Can be used to dash to enemies and party members alike. 3 Charges, 30 second CD. Pretty great solution to MNK's mobility problem if you ask me.
- True Strike/Twin Snake positionals removed. A huge shame, but it's not really going to change anything if Leaden Bootshine is still too strong.

It's far from perfect, but it's a better direction than what I was admittedly anticipating from SE.

[Neoyoshi]

As a Monk main whose played pretty much nothing but monk since release this whole time, at first i was like: "NOOOOoOOOOOOoo" - i typed that in the twitch chat. xD

But looking at how Monk is being built and designed going forward, i believe it's for the best, because they are right, they've made Monk a lot busier with the new yin/vang chakra system, so something had to go.

[Kahnom]

Oh they removed postionals from true strike and twin snake ?
Doesn’t matter tho, I’ll still move to the flank anyway.

[Alundarus]

Is greased lightning actually gone? I thought that they had just reiterated that it had been moved from a stacking mechanic to a trait, not that the current trait form of GL was going away.

If so, that's disappointing...

[Navnav]

The real problem is that they made a compromise. This compromise is probably single handedly the WORST thing they could of done. They only took positionals off two of their GCDs. Either leave all of them there or take them all off except for bootshine and dragon kick.
The people that love them, will hate losing two, the people that hate them will hate that they only removed two. Screwed themselves over big time. The biggest decision they had I believe is the positionals, if they screwed that up they would alienate current and potential players of the Job, which they did, so RIP.

Edit: Just went to do a rotation without using the True Strike and Twin Snake positionals, and guess what? Absolutely makes ZERO difference. Because you will still do positionals for two of your abilities every 3 hit combo, you are mostly already in the correct position for them anyway. The change makes absolutely no difference to anything. If you like the positionals, breathe. Nothing really changed. If you don't like the positionals, suffer, because nothing really changed.

To be fair, after more testing, it leaves you on the flank a LOT more often. After a bootshine, you can be on the fnak for 2-3-1-2-3. quite literally.
So basically only use True Strike from the rear if you have to apply Deomolish, otherwise always use from flank. Only use Twin Snakes from the Rear if you need to apply demolish after, usually in opener. This leaves you with a smoother positional rotation, and it is kind of actually nice for those of us who didn't like the monk positionals.
And for those that loved the positionals, essentially nothing really changes. Unless it is just to moan for the sake of moaning (no offense btw).

[Mikey_R]

I think it is too early to say whether removing only the 2 positionals was the right call. We need to get our hands on it to see if it was needed or not.

[dezzmont]

GL being gone makes sense, GL existed to give the monk a sort of positive identity, but it ended up being negative because the main 'good' thing about the job, attacking faster, was very conditional. It was ok as a trait but not very interesting.

Now, Blitz seems to be the new positive identity for Monk, and likely is replacing Chakras as a level 50 capstone and evolving over time. So now instead of getting faster attacks (which eats a bit into NIN and BRD), MNK is playing to get rewarded with awesome blitzes.

I think the intent is for Blitz to reward the main actual skill of monk: Being able to correctly flow through your combo, and removing the positionals is a mere placebo (because currently positional abilities don't matter except for bootshine anyway, and mostly exist to add to the 'information overload' issue of Monk).

Overall, it seems like its a good change and what monk needed: An identity based around 'unlocking' a cool attack, rather than having really limp basic attacks the whole fight and only having the opportunity to lose things, get overwhelmed, and mess up. Generally rotations based around trying to get something are easier to learn, even if they are more complex, because you are getting more concrete and instant feedback when you mess up, rather than feeling 'lost.' It also solves the 'I don't feel like I am dealing damage' problem: It is really hard to feel that way when you suddenly do a crazy blink strike attack.

We will see how Monk feels for monk vets, but it almost certainly is going to solve the 'New players try out monk or lord forbid start as one and think melee play sucks' problem.

[IruruCece]

We will see how Monk feels for monk vets, but it almost certainly is going to solve the 'New players try out monk or lord forbid start as one and think melee play sucks' problem.

'New players try out JOB and think ROLE sucks' is a problem that has affected this game since at least Stormblood. Between ill-advised button culls (followed with replacing them with buttons that more or less do what old buttons did, but "flashier"), and a focus on how the job will play at cap above all else, arguably every job in the game sucks before 50, some worse than others. And new players who don't choose to buy a boost will spend a lot of time doing content that is synced, so even if they are well above the level for an early story dungeon (happened to me on an alt), you're potentially having the majority of your kit locked away by the story, by the dungeons or boss fight instances, as you zip from quest marker to quest marker. They added an option specifically to allow players to enter leveling roulette for dungeons at or near their level, because it's pretty freakin' annoying to take a level 60+ job that's actually starting to feel like it's coming together, and get dragged into early ARR content.

I love FF14, but a well paced experience for newer players it ain't, and Monk is only one symptom of that problem. I recently decided to start leveling bard finally, and it's been so dull (its in the 50s now) that even when I ain't focused on classes, I don't even feel like logging in to level it. Summoner pre-60 is exceedingly dull. Black Mage feels stiff as heck early on and doesn't really come into it's own until roughly 60. Many DPS don't get proper AoEs for far too long. Healers have had considerable portions of their kits stripped away over the years to essentially force them to heal more and DPS less (while still placing the expectation that they DPS anyway). Every job feels like something is seriously wrong or missing until you get to the current level cap for one or many reasons, and that's pretty much on SE. It's been such a problem that there have been instances where they've needed to fix job quests to account for tools players once had being missing from the game now.