How should Monk 4.0 have been done?

[silentwindfr]

the trouble is they really have none dev that must play monk as main, logical if you think about it... if the player don't want them, you really think the dev with them limited time want them.
it's even easy to know which jobs is played with the focus, some jobs get great change or very insane add, when some barely get anything. looking meh.... but in the case of the monk is far below meh situation.
we can try to find any way to make monk better... if they don't open the discution with us... we can't understand each other.

so far everything shown for the monk, only have prove us that the dev team have barely any knowledge about our situation or need.

[Clethoria]

1. What makes a Monk a Monk?
Punching and kicking.

2. What did you most enjoy about Monk gameplay?
Shoulder tackle punching and Tornado Kicking

3. In what way were 3.x designs an improvement over 2.x. Which design ideas should have been extended in 4.x?
Single target utility and stacking DoT. Tank and DPS in solo duties, make bosses die faster in party instances.

4. What significant issues did Monk still face in 3.x? To what degree, or under what conditions, were they acceptable?
I don't look that deep into stats and every point of damage, I just like playing the game.

5. How could these issues have been solved, if necessary?
Same as above.

6. How could the overall experience of Monk gameplay have been improved in 4.0?[
Buffing Arm of the Destroyer and not slapping on stance changes. If I'm in fire, I want to stay as such, not switch to wind if it's not needed.

[Shayuki]

Form Shift, Meditation, Forbidden Chakra, Purification, Tornado Kick. These are all examples of skills that would be completely worthless if Greased Lightning wasn't a pain. "Bandaid fixes", as you might call them. If the boss does not ever jump, they are completely worthless. In fact, Tornado Kick now has anti-synergy with many of those skills and Riddle of Earth. Well, I guess Forbidden Chakra does get some help in the expansion, but still.


I'm not saying that skills shouldn't have synergy or shouldn't be meaningful. But they still should be something you feel good about using. Do you feel good about using Riddle of Fire? Maybe, even though the attack speed slow down breaks the flow of the spec and makes it feel bad to play as. Are you excited about Shoulder Tackle doing 30 more potency? Are you excited about your double dash being locked behind Fists of Wind, which would mean that you'd have to give up on your damage bonus, which means you'll never be able to take advantage of that? There are many ways to have actually good abilities that feel good to use rather than feeling like there is a whole army of abilities designed to make an annoying class mechanic feel slightly worse. If GL3 caused Monk to deal insane damage, sure, maybe it'd be worth it. But it's just a maintenance buff that allows Monk to perform on par when accounting for raid utility, pretty much. And what's even worse, it's not even a complicated maintenance buff that requires any thought. It just is there, automatically. You're completely at the mercy of encounters. And, again, instead of changing the skill itself, they get billions of bandaid fixes that only are useful if the encounter design screws Monk over to begin with. A sustained fight that should play to Monk's strengths? Half of your 50+ toolkit does nothing.

Elixir Field is in my opinion easily the most fun Monk skill in HW / SB, and what does it do? 220 potency AoE, nothing else. It doesn't need to be extremely complicated and there does not need to be a massive trade off of losing GL3 or lowering weaponskill recast speed. As a simple example, you could make an oGCD ability that's relatively weak but has a damage bonus when used during Opo-Opo form, for instance. Didn't get it? No big deal, you just dealt less damage. Got it? Nice, more damage, feels good! An oGCD ability to make Twin Snakes or Dragon Kick have double the duration for the next attack? Nice, planning required, a rotation change required, a DPS increase and no trade off elsewhere if you get it right. Another example: oGCD ability that says "If your next weaponskill is a critical hit, instantly gain 3 Chakra". Planning required(Save for Bootshine, don't waste Chakra), no rotational trade offs, still impactful when you get it right.

[Shurrikhan]

Elixir Field is in my opinion easily the most fun Monk skill in HW / SB, and what does it do? 220 potency AoE, nothing else. It doesn't need to be extremely complicated and there does not need to be a massive trade off of losing GL3 or lowering weaponskill recast speed. As a simple example, you could make an oGCD ability that's relatively weak but has a damage bonus when used during Opo-Opo form, for instance. Didn't get it? No big deal, you just dealt less damage. Got it? Nice, more damage, feels good! An oGCD ability to make Twin Snakes or Dragon Kick have double the duration for the next attack? Nice, planning required, a rotation change required, a DPS increase and no trade off elsewhere if you get it right. Another example: oGCD ability that says "If your next weaponskill is a critical hit, instantly gain 3 Chakra". Planning required(Save for Bootshine, don't waste Chakra), no rotational trade offs, still impactful when you get it right.

Not actually disagreeing, but just playing Devil's Advocate here...

Elixir Field could as easily be wrapped into base potencies, though. Apart from needing every other to fall into IR, and the same CD-holding concepts that go into every AoE oGCD (which, I do find enjoyable and significant; I can't fake otherwise), it simply devalues Perfect Balance, Howling Fist, and one's difference between AoE and ST rotations very slightly, as this would otherwise fall under HF, AotD, RB, and PB-RB spam alone.

The other parts though vary somewhere between Power Surge and Life Surge. Note that the prior was trimmed as it would only be used with one paired ability, and the latter probably survives only because there's still compromise available between maximization of its bonus potency and of its uptime (though this will likely be removed with the 26% increase to Full Thrust damage). Put another way, the more tools you have that ought to be paired with one particular skill, the more your balance depends on these pairs that do not actually require thought but merely tracking. As we no will no longer have ways to time our cycles through stance-less skills in SB, we will have no way to actually change or rotation in-combat to meet these new abilities. As such, they become bloat just as much as Power Surge was. In effect, you still just have Bootshine, but with that Bootshine (as if passively) gaining additional effect at x interval. The double duration on Dragon Kick would never be used in a boss fight because the opportunity gain of more Bootshines so outweighs that of True Strike unless at an effective crit chance of 85+% and willing to subject oneself to an additional layer of RNG or of 100% if not. Etc., etc. Choices, unless balanced, aren't choices, but rather just bloat.

Again, this is just Devil's Advocacy, and I picked that portion only because the rest I just can't argue with.

I'll supply though that Form Shift, Meditation, Forbidden Chakra, Purification, and Tornado Kick were flawed more in iteration (their specifics) than their base concept. A GL-consuming skill like Tornado Kick could have fell into a sort of use that was neither obligatory by situation or rotation and would have been perfected only under apt awareness, but with little damage loss from failing that or preferring one's own style of play. But it wasn't. The details weren't there; the support wasn't there. And so it remains just a bandaid for the opportunity costs of downtime on a Monk (which, paired with up to 15 seconds of downtime use via Chakra, isn't bad number-wise, but still feels kinda shitty). Does that mean though that GL itself is flawed? It certainly doesn't feel perfect, but on the whole I would guess there are more aspects of it than not that more of us like than dislike. My point is any additions really do need near surgical precision in order to fall into "interesting" gameplay, which I would argue has to be impactful, adaptable, and non-obligatory (within specific pairings or frequencies, i.e. no more than any other combat tool). Should one skimp on the details, the intention doesn't stand a chance.
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EDIT (for clarification):

"Elixir Field could as easily be wrapped into base potencies"? No, because it's an AoE.

Working backwards from an resultant AoE value over time, one could manipulate potencies in all other forms of AoE—Rockbreaker, Howling Fist, and Arm of the Destroyer—to closely mimic the same AoE dynamics as with the inclusion of Elixir Field. This is simple spreadsheet math. The issues are how closely, when that AoE potential is deposited (being otherwise OP for x-to-y level range), and how it affects internal balance. (Buffing AotD changes its value relative to DK and Bootshine, and not necessarily for the rotationally better; buffing Rockbreaker enhances PB-RB spam; buffing HF potency makes it your AoE feel very singularly centered or all-or-nil while reducing HF cooldown other than by a with a CM equal to IR's feels balances front-loaded DPS over long-term sustain due to eventual desync.) [This is the exact thing that so infuriates me about a lot of the AoE changes on SMN, SCH, and DRG, for instance.] In other words, while something's bound to have been irreversibly changed when trying to trim previously added abilities, it's rarely so pervasive as general (AoE/ST/cleave) output unless the designer intends to change any of those things at the same time, and is merely using the removal as an excuse to do so (e.g. DRK cleave or SMN AoE sustain).

And regardless, that's like saying that everything could be easily wrapped into basic attacks, where you just click the opponent and deal optimal DPS.

Yup. Well, beyond the point that creates strategic/tactical decisions, at least. Which is why while I respect SE's desire to trim bloat, I feel like as long as button efficiency is a matter of potential enjoyable gameplay or gameplay decisions per button, what they've trimmed gameplay-wise has cost as much as the reduced button count as gained. And then they made SB Monk / shat the bed.

My suggestion with buff duration extension is NOT like Life Surge or Power Surge simply because by doubling the duration of the buff, you would CHANGE YOUR ROTATION and would have to take that into account. It'd not just be a "press this to make this deal more damage". You'd have to actively take advantage of it by not rebuffing yourself with Twin Snakes when you usually would but instead would perform another True Strike, which is something I really would like in a job I'm playing. Gaining an advantage, but having to think a little(It's not exactly complicated) to achieve it. And importantly, again, not making you give up something to do so, and not making the skill situational and useless 90% of the time.

To be clear I meant it in the same sense that the decision never varies except across SS plateaus, not that it doesn't change rotation, and that something is always given, even if it's as stupidly simple as base potency. When you add a trick that can provide up to x value for z total DPS, assuming balance, your z total DPS is reduced whenever you fail to maximize x value. The more of these things added, the more skill gap increases. I happen to like skill gap, but only where there are actual adaptive decisions to be made, rather than remembering to hit a particular keystroke at a particular interval.

Speaking of Tornado Kick, by the way, IIRC they didn't want a Tornado Kick that's worth using on cooldown and worth having to rebuild Greased Lightning because it would feel bad having to slowly build the Greased Lightning back up. But what do you know, Riddle of Fire feels EXACTLY like it. Except it feels worse, and for a longer time.

At least they're likely not aware of the irony?

Thanks for mostly agreeing, but I'll still try to drive these points home.

Thank you for doing so. /bow

/abandoning Devil mask

[Shayuki]

Thanks for mostly agreeing, but I'll still try to drive these points home.

"Elixir Field could as easily be wrapped into base potencies"? No, because it's an AoE. And regardless, that's like saying that everything could be easily wrapped into basic attacks, where you just click the opponent and deal optimal DPS. But some people actually want to play the game and do things. Now, this doesn't mean it's an incredibly well designed skill. It's just the BEST designed skill since ARR. This says more about the rest of the skills than it does about Elixir Field.

My suggestion with buff duration extension is NOT like Life Surge or Power Surge simply because by doubling the duration of the buff, you would CHANGE YOUR ROTATION and would have to take that into account. It'd not just be a "press this to make this deal more damage". You'd have to actively take advantage of it by not rebuffing yourself with Twin Snakes when you usually would but instead would perform another True Strike, which is something I really would like in a job I'm playing. Gaining an advantage, but having to think a little(It's not exactly complicated) to achieve it. And importantly, again, not making you give up something to do so, and not making the skill situational and useless 90% of the time.



Speaking of Tornado Kick, by the way, IIRC they didn't want a Tornado Kick that's worth using on cooldown and worth having to rebuild Greased Lightning because it would feel bad having to slowly build the Greased Lightning back up. But what do you know, Riddle of Fire feels EXACTLY like it. Except it feels worse, and for a longer time.

[Eisenhower]

1. What makes a Monk a Monk?
Perhaps I'm ill informed or it could be that I have a different impression of things, but to me the core of the Monk is about being this self-reliant and sustaining force in battle. Kind of like how the Black Mage having infinite mana, the Monk's staying power (and I guess flexibility) is what stands out. I know it's not how the job is perceived or even used right now considering the content we get pitted against. Even so, seeing all the different tools such as stuns, silences, buff removal, mitigation, movement enhancement, and healing enhancement I dreamt of the day they'd see good use again.

2. What did you most enjoy about Monk gameplay?
To me, the Monk job has the most pronounced rhythm of all the melee DPS. The Monk moves back and forth over the flank/rear threshold just as it moves back and forth over the action pairs for each stance ("pair" since Arm and One Ilm aren't used). The stance loop that doesn't break if you use a weaponskill outside of it and the compactness of the nine "core" weaponskills felt really nice to work with. The same can be said about the three fist styles. There's a symmetry to the job throughout the actions and traits that felt very charming and I wish that all parts were equally useful.

Outside of that, as mentioned above, being able to change from damage to mitigation and movement speed bonuses felt really cool - disregarding the actual rate of use between the three Fist modes.

3. In what way were 3.x designs an improvement over 2.x. Which design ideas should have been extended in 4.x?
Of the stuff given to monk in 3.X, I feel that the Chakra stacks and Form Shift were the most useful but their implementation left something to be desired. The way the changes were made in 3.X seem to spill over into 4.X in the sense that core concepts are interesting but implementation are either lacking or entirely out of touch with how job is used by the players.

To me the chakras felt like a resource the built over the course of a battle that could eventually be unleashed by the Monk. But in 3.X it was locked behind the Mediation action instead of being generated by other things passively (which is what I would have preferred). For me, it felt difficult to find good openings for using Meditation and building stacks that didn't interfere with the desire to use Form Shift or other actions. The steady build-up of power is a theme that I would like to see further developed even in Stormblood.

4. What significant issues did Monk still face in 3.x? To what degree, or under what conditions, were they acceptable? How could these issues have been solved, if necessary?
This is simple: Monks lacked raid-wide utility outside of the INT debuff and Mantra. I think that it could have been solved by specializing the job into a greedy DPS that had sufficient personal DPS and survivability (being able to either survive mechanics unaided or being able to recover from mechanics unaided, to accommodate their DPS greed) to offset the loss of raid-wide buffs like Trick Attack and Litany.

5. How could the overall experience of Monk gameplay have been improved in 4.0?
Passive generation of chakra should have been a thing in Heavensward and I think it was incredibly poor judgement on Square Enix's part to have implemented it the way it was. I firmly believe it would have been much better to have passive generation in HW and add a way for the Monk to instantly generate extra or even fill their stack of chakra in SB. Brotherhood seems great, to be honest. Though I'm sure the actual numbers could use some work.

I believe there are ways to build on the flexibility and sustained style that I feel defines the monk. The three Fist actions (riddles) and elemental tackles could have been way more interesting. Just off the top of my head (with each riddle granting or requiring their respective elemental fist):

Riddle of Fire
Gain one stack of Flame's Reply every X seconds over the course of Y seconds. Each stack of Flame's Reply increases damage dealt by Z%. All stacks of Flame's Reply are lost upon taking damage.

This plays into the greed of the monk when the enemy is focused on someone else. The Monk gets to deal increasing amounts of damage as long as they manage to avoid taking a hit, working like a second layer of Greased Lightning. In a burn-phase where the monk can DPS safely, this riddle variant would become very valuable. But if the Monk draws the attention of the enemy or is fighting alone, it would be better to use other tools.

Riddle of Earth
Whilst Riddle of Earth is active, gain one stack of Earth's Reply upon taking damage. Stacks up to X times. Activate Riddle of Earth again to deliver an attack with a potency depending on the number of stacks of Earth's Reply.

This riddle variant works well when the Monk needs to mitigate damage and gives the player a reward for swapping Fists to adapt to the situation rather than solely relying on the mitigation tools of other players. If the Reply stack lasts long enough, it would also mean that the Monk gets to build some power during phase transitions and come into the next phase packing a punch.

Riddle of Wind
Increases the movement speed bonus of Fists of Wind by X% for Y seconds and grants Wind's Reply. Whilst under the effect of Wind's Reply, the range of Wind Tackle is increased by Z yalms and the potency of Wind Tackle varies with the distance travelled.

This is where my head fails me. Ideally the wind variant should be all utility, but it feels like it cuts into the fire's damage or the earth's mitigation no matter how I spin it. Along this train of thought, I imagine Wind Tackle to normally be a low potency tackle with low cooldown, but have the potential of dealing big damage if the Monk rushes in from far away.

[Leonus]

I could see riddle of fire not penalizing Mnks if the track increase was lowered to... say 10-15% like drgs new B4B. I am personally a fan of how they did the cross role system. I never really agreed with Drg having internal release or mnk having B4B and stuff like that. Some of the cross role stuff is still... headscratching though. They more or less make sense though.