Two Months In: Will You Reconsider GL IV?

[Asher_ff]

Just chiming in with my 2 cents here. I've played monk since ARR, raided with it in Coil, Alex and Omega Savage. A lot of what I'm going to write has already been stated here, but I'll state it again because I think these are good ideas and deserve more attention.

Also, before anyone cries about these suggestions being overpowered, please keep in mind SE can adjust numbers. Most of what I'm going to write is from a gameplay perspective and I'm going to avoid getting into numbers or percentages. I think mnk is already in a good place numbers-wise, but has felt like more of a mess with each expansion. Here's what I think needs to be done to tighten up the job and remove bloat while maintaining and strengthening its identity:

RoF, TFC and GLIV:

Since the topic started with RoF, I'll address that first. RoF can't be discussed without also discussing TFC. SE's intent seems to be to slow us down so we can fit in more TFC as they proc under brotherhood (note RoF shares a cooldown with Bhood for this reason). This makes sense and works well. However, it doesn't change the fact that, to many players including myself, it feels bad, especially if TFC is not proccing. To alleviate this concern, I recommend letting us save multiple TFC (max 3 seems reasonable) so that we aren't pressured to double weave during the Bhood window.

I can hear it already -- but Asher, letting monks have 3 TFC saved up prior to the fight is overpowered and having to manually charge them pre-pull every time is a pain in the ass! Here's the solution: remove our ability to charge chakra. Instead, have us gain a chakra every GL refresh and increase the dmg of TFC. This accomplishes several things: 1) it removes much-hated rng, 2) it allows SE to buff chakra's dmg without putting us in an awkward situation where it's a dps gain at 4 chakra to stop attacking and instead charge a 5th chakra and use TFC, 3) it allows us to save multiple TFC specifically for burst phases instead of being forced to use TFC immediately to avoid wasted procs, 4) it removes the annoyance of having to charge chakra before every pull, and 5) it makes chakra feel more impactful instead of the wet noodle it currently is.

Now that we have a bit more freedom regarding how we spend TFC, let's talk about RoF. I've been wanting GLIV since HW was announced and I know I'm not alone. I suggest replacing RoF with GLIV as a temporary dmg buff that can only be activated during GLIII and lasts a set amount of time before fading. It would make us do more dmg (not necessarily go faster, as the dev team has acknowledged that speed is an issue) and have a fancy red aura effect similar to derplander and lyse in the SB trailer (how come they got this but we didn't??). Remember how cool it looked when drg got BotD? That's what GLIV should be like for mnk.

The Fist Stances and Other Riddles:

I recommend removing the fist stances and replacing them with traits that give us the effects of the stances at the level at which we would have obtained them. Obviously FoE would need to be changed since it's a bit overpowered to have that active 24/7, so perhaps make it a flat 2% passive hp buff or 3% def buff or something. Without stances, Tackle Mastery would also be removed (good riddance).

Replace RoE with a defensive cooldown that would trigger the defensive buff immediately, without needing to take dmg. Remove the GL refresh requirement and instead reduce the cooldown of PB to 60 seconds similar to BotD and Enochian. PB's cooldown is unreasonably long compared to other classes.

I have two suggestions for replacing RoW: 1) a chi-based ranged attack similar to Enpi, Piercing Talon, and Throwing Dagger that would do moderate damage and would not interrupt our stance but could only be used at range or 2) a backstep similar to Yaten, Repelling Shot, and Elusive Jump. Either of these would be very welcome additions since mnk is the only melee dps that lacks a ranged attack and a disengage ability.

Tornado Kick:

Make this into mnk's equivalent of Mercy Stroke -- a big hit with a long cooldown that can only be used when a mob is at low hp. Would not require GLIII and would no longer remove GL.

Steel Peak, Arm of the Destroyer, 1 Ilm Punch:

Remove the silence from Arm of the Destroyer and the stun from 1 Ilm Punch. Having these debuffs on moves tied to our stances makes them virtually useless as they are completely unreliable. Steel Peak lost its purpose in SB, so give it its purpose back by adding silence or stun. Arm of the Destroyer needs a dmg buff to fit into our regular aoe rotation. 1 Ilm Punch should be removed from the game entirely or perhaps given a dot/debuff/buff that does not require precise timing in the way a stun or silence does.

I think that about covers it...Hopefully we see some of this next expansion...

[RiceisNice]

Steel Peak lost its purpose in SB, so give it its purpose back by adding silence or stun..

Realistically speaking, nothing has changed about steel peak as far as how we use it or it's purpose; it has and always been a damage fluff ability. It could be made more interesting, but it's purpose hasn't changed at all going from 3.0 to 4.0.

[SpeckledBurd]

Core Monk Mechanics

• Greased Lightning: Add an additional stack for a total of four. Reduction to damage increase per stack (5%). The end result would be 20% damage increase and a 20% Attack Speed increase.
• Fists of Fire: Changes to a constant 5% - 10% increase of Critical Hit Rate.
• Fists of Wind: Changes to a constant 2% - 5% increase to both Direct Hit and Skill Speed.
• Fists of Earth: Changes to a constant 5% - 10% increase of Determination and Damage Reduction.
• Chakra: Gauge increased from five to seven. (We did unlock 7 of them after all.) Chance for chakra gain also given to a Direct Hit, and upon a Direct Critical Hit there is a 100% chance to gain a chakra.

This just leaves the Fists in the same place they're currently in. We'll just pick the one that boosts damage the most and the others will go untouched. The Chakra change just reduces the effectiveness of Deep Meditation and Normal Meditation in exchange for Job flavor, so there's really no tangible benefit.

The only change that really should be made to the Fists is to just turn them into traits unless they plan on giving the 5% damage increase to all of them and making Fire do something else that doesn't increase damage. There's no meaningful interaction there, make it go the way of Ninja's poisons.

Unlike Enochian with polyglot though, maintaining GL3 can be out of the question when it comes to certain boss designs or mechanics. It's what we've seen with Life of the Dragoon and Bahamut, and SMN does take a hefty nose dive to their dps if anything were to happen to that process. It's counter-intutitive to their design philosophy for reworking the jobs (closing the gap in floor:celling and lowering the skill floor).



The damage should just be baked into existing skills and keep the cooldowns to a minimum. I (and most likely other people) rather not go back to the time we have three dedicated buttons just to pop cooldowns.




This is not a QoL change that makes MNK easier to play, this is a direct buff to MNK's performance.

Also accurate. An actual quality of life change would be to leave Brotherhood's buff as Physical only, but have the chakra effect proc off of Spells while reducing the chance to 15-20%. This allows monk to not be impacted by there being multiple casters in parties, allows it not to be a total flub in 4-man's during single target.

Here's the solution: remove our ability to charge chakra.

This is a really bad idea.

The point of the Chakra charging is to mitigate damage lost when the boss is untargetable and forces us to lose Greased Lightning or when we're out of range due to dodging/mechanics. Taking this out of Monks kit puts Monk closer to being ARR Monk. We don't want that. ARR Monk is hell.

Realistically speaking, nothing has changed about steel peak as far as how we use it or it's purpose; it has and always been a damage fluff ability. It could be made more interesting, but it's purpose hasn't changed at all going from 3.0 to 4.0.

Sort of true sort of not. It does still just exist for more damage, but before it at least had utility in being a stun. Now it's just a button for the sake of a button that improves damage but doesn't meaningfully interract with any other aspects of the Job in the way that, say, Mug does with Ninja's Ninki gauge, nor is it critical to the flavor of the Job in the way Jump is for Dragoon (literally not a FF Dragoon without it).

[enthauptet]

One thing that did come to my mind just now reading asher's post (well just a bit of it) is if Riddle of Fire and Brotherhood have the same cooldown time then why are they two different skills? Why is brotherhood not a trait we get at 60 to enhance riddle of fire? It just makes us press 2 buttons instead of 1 there is literally no point to them being different buttons.

[Asher_ff]

This is a really bad idea.

The point of the Chakra charging is to mitigate damage lost when the boss is untargetable and forces us to lose Greased Lightning or when we're out of range due to dodging/mechanics. Taking this out of Monks kit puts Monk closer to being ARR Monk. We don't want that. ARR Monk is hell.

Did we just find the one monk that actually enjoys charging chakra? I don't know if you are reading my recommendation out of context but I listed several changes in conjunction with removing the ability to charge chakra that together make TFC better for burst, remove the annoyance of charging it, and allows SE to buff it without impacting our rotation. These things give TFC an identity and I think more than compensate for the loss of our ability to mash a button 5x during downtime for a mediocre damage attack. If the issue is dps loss during downtime, the changes to PB and TFC potency should make up for it.

[Ayirez]

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Obviously the six single target positionals are core mechanics, but they don't require a change. They've worked well since ARR (albeit demolish has gone all over the place) and I don't think splitting the 30% buff from RoF among them would make anything better or creative, it would just be a way to eliminate the Riddle system.

...

Ah, you are right it is a direct buff, not only to Monk's performance but to the entire raid party itself. I'll edit that to be more clear, but as it currently is Monk is either in a largely melee composition or not used at all. The objective behind applying it to all types of skills whether physical or magic is so that Monk can be included in any party composition.

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And I doubt you are, many people lag or even play from across the world. I know a couple who play on my server in NA but are from Australia! In the end, lag is a killer for sure, and going faster would indeed put stress on players from different reigons. But progress always comes at a cost. To make Monk true to its core speeding up is one of several options, but it's also the most legitamite one. In the end it will be up to SE to provide stronger and better servers and connections, and internet in general to be improved and offered to all those around. Besides, it isn't as though any of these changes will happen tomorrow, it will take years, by then perhaps your internet might be a little better!

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Indeed, it'd probably be the case that people would have a favoured or even optimal fist stance, but that's why I made it so that each Riddle would last ~1/3 of its cooldown time, forcing players to change between all three. Steel Peak was also aligned to 1/3 of each Riddle's cooldown time so that you can get one of each. As for Gramma, that's fine eh xD

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It appears you as well did not read closely, the Riddles force the player into that fist stance while using their powers, in that way you cannot simply stay in one fist stance and be strong, you'd HAVE to switch with each riddle to expect the strongest performance you can give.

Oh and to tag this on here, during the ~30s of no riddle abilities (assuming you were to just use them back to back) players would indeed find an "optimal" fist stance to be in. But don't forget that more and more these days we're in control of our stats. Materia VI's give 40 of each, so most gear can have up to 80 of your desired stat (or more if you choose gear based on your desired stat and make up for it's lacking areas with Materia). With stat weights apparently being hard as hell to calculate, maybe we're starting to go in the direction of Player's choice? If so I know I'd be focusing on Speed and DH over Crit and Det, at least if my system were in, as it would allow to me to choose. Granted, Fists of Earth would be the most unpopular choice but I have an idea to help with that, check my main post for more details.

[Ayirez]

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I like a lot of your ideas, but think some of them could be improved;

RoF/GLIV: Like others have suggested, making this into a temporary buff stat would be pretty neat even if it's not what I personally desire. I think though that making it red would be questionable, the reason that it's green is because the element of wind is green, Greased Lightning being a wind affinity ability. I know that's really minor but I'd rather have it still be green but more like the Ki aura around DBZ characters x3

TFC/Chakra: No qualms here on the TFC side, I think having a larger chakra storage would be great so that we don't have to deal with getting a single TFC in a brotherhood while someone else might get three. I do however disagree about the whole charging chakra. A solution to this may instead be "Cannot be charged in battle", thus making you able to start with chakra rather than nothing at all. Who wants to start a fight with an incomplete opener? Not I >.<

The Fist Stances: I disagree about making them into traits, this would take away from the class rather than improve its identity.

RoE/Tornado Kick/Steel Peak/Arm of the Destroyer: No issue with these.

One Ilm Punch: I think the best possible way to incorporate this otherwise useless move is to fuse it into the AoE combo and make it too an AoE, otherwise it's just (as it is now and always has been) out of place.