People should be concerned seeing the recent monk buffs

[Jasmyne]

Disclaimer: I'm a normie, the aspects of games that I enjoy is creativity and job identity even at the 'slight' cost of balance. I played all through 2.0 but quit after HW after what they did to my favorite job bard, and returned at the end of SB. Also this is simply an opinion post and in no way am I claiming "facts"

That being said, I believe people should be really concerned with SE's mindset after seeing what they just did with monk (and previously most other jobs). Historically monk has always been a mid-high skill cap job that was easy to learn but hard to master with its very unique play style. That's not to say it didn't have it's problems (for example the meditation change that's 2 years late) but the initial direction of the job had great potential...

Now it's almost impossible to drop greased lightning, and 75% of the time you get to ignore positionals which was the main part of its identity. (I never liked positionals personally, but I would NEVER demand it change because lots of people DO like it.) The job, in one single patch, has basically become a job that was difficult and unique, to a job that practically plays itself. It's really sad to see.

I've never had an issue with varying difficulties with jobs, in fact I think people have a much higher sense of accomplishment if they get good playing a difficult job, but the homogenization and "dumbing down" of originally unique classes is kind of frustrating and I think will end up losing them subs from the normies like me (who I feel they're trying to appeal to) as opposed to gaining them.

[Hezzlocks]

I've not really played any melee dps much so I don't know how well they've ever played in endgame, but I will note that with the bosses we've been getting lately, like Leviathan, Titan Savage, the add phase on Titania, the final Amaurot boss and the final MSQ boss, it's probably a good thing that positionals are becoming much easier to ignore.

But hey what do I know. I only ever play ranged, healing and tanking.

[ReiMakoto]

I've not really played any melee dps much so I don't know how well they've ever played in endgame, but I will note that with the bosses we've been getting lately, like Leviathan, Titan Savage, the add phase on Titania, the final Amaurot boss and the final MSQ boss, it's probably a good thing that positionals are becoming much easier to ignore.

But hey what do I know. I only ever play ranged, healing and tanking.

Those bosses you mentioned dont have positionals anyway, bosses where you cant move around them like that just let you hit them from anywhere and it counts as a correct positional

[Drayos]

Disclaimer: I'm a normie, the aspects of games that I enjoy is creativity and job identity even at the 'slight' cost of balance. I played all through 2.0 but quit after HW after what they did to my favorite job bard, and returned at the end of SB. Also this is simply an opinion post and in no way am I claiming "facts"

That being said, I believe people should be really concerned with SE's mindset after seeing what they just did with monk (and previously most other jobs). Historically monk has always been a mid-high skill cap job that was easy to learn but hard to master with its very unique play style. That's not to say it didn't have it's problems (for example the meditation change that's 2 years late) but the initial direction of the job had great potential...

Now it's almost impossible to drop greased lightning, and 75% of the time you get to ignore positionals which was the main part of its identity. (I never liked positionals personally, but I would NEVER demand it change because lots of people DO like it.) The job, in one single patch, has basically become a job that was difficult and unique, to a job that practically plays itself. It's really sad to see.

I've never had an issue with varying difficulties with jobs, in fact I think people have a much higher sense of accomplishment if they get good playing a difficult job, but the homogenization and "dumbing down" of originally unique classes is kind of frustrating and I think will end up losing them subs from the normies like me (who I feel they're trying to appeal to) as opposed to gaining them.

I think the major thing is everyone’s been asking for this to happen to monk since GL introduction.

While it’s true in some ways, look at the most popular jobs, they are never the complicated ones. And given what they did to ninja.. I wouldn’t be too worried,

The community were the ones asking for this to happen to monks realistically

[Jasmyne]

I think the major thing is everyone’s been asking for this to happen to monk since GL introduction.

While it’s true in some ways, look at the most popular jobs, they are never the complicated ones. And given what they did to ninja.. I wouldn’t be too worried,

The community were the ones asking for this to happen to monks realistically

I agree partially... some people were asking for this yes, but I wouldn't necessarily call them "the community". The few Monk mains that I know, while frustrated with some of monks previous clunky features, never actually asked for directionals to be removed or a permanent greased lightning, all they want is a functional fluid experience but with the same play style that got the to love the job in the first place. In my opinion the people asking for that are people who aren't willing to put in the work to bring out a jobs potential with time and skill, the same people who wanna be able to play all classes on a whim because they get bored of their mains.

Like I said before I don't like directionals, but my solution is to play another job that I do like. I'd never demand that every job change to fit my preferences. It may be selfish of me to say but IMO if people wanna play another job, they should "get good" at said job, and SE should focus on polishing classes instead of constantly fundamentally changing them.

[ForteNightshade]

I agree partially... some people were asking for this yes, but I wouldn't necessarily call them "the community". The few Monk mains that I know, while frustrated with some of monks previous clunky features, never actually asked for directionals to be removed or a permanent greased lightning, all they want is a functional fluid experience but with the same play style that got the to love the job in the first place. In my opinion the people asking for that are people who aren't willing to put in the work to bring out a jobs potential with time and skill, the same people who wanna be able to play all classes on a whim because they get bored of their mains.

Like I said before I don't like directionals, but my solution is to play another job that I do like. I'd never demand that every job change to fit my preferences. It may be selfish of me to say but IMO if people wanna play another job, they should "get good" at said job, and SE should focus on polishing classes instead of constantly fundamentally changing them.

Uh... Monks have been begging for an equivalent to Blood of the Dragon and Huton since Heavensward. I don't see how it made the job difficult to essentially lose a massive portion of your damage because the boss decided to jump and you had no way of maintaining Greased Lightning. I'll never forget when the Monk in my old static had to make a macro to click off crit Adlos because it prevented him from taking damage, and thus Riddle of Earth didn't proc. As for the positional change. I may be a little too good, but at the same time, Monk remains the only job with a lot of positional requirements. A lot of fights simply don't allow you to get all of them. So it's either Monk suffers a damage loss or they do something like this to compensate.

[Bright-Flower]

I think the major thing is everyone’s been asking for this to happen to monk since GL introduction.

While it’s true in some ways, look at the most popular jobs, they are never the complicated ones. And given what they did to ninja.. I wouldn’t be too worried,

The community were the ones asking for this to happen to monks realistically

I certainly wanted something to make keeping GL up 'easier' rather than getting a bunch of different situational ways to do it, but I think tacking it onto form shift is tipping the scales a little 'too' far, now it should NEVER fall off outside of phase transitions where you lose control of your character, like Eden Prime or 'active time maneuvers', or if you die. I think they went a little too far with the change.

For example dragoon, you can't keep BOTD up indefinitely without something to hit, but you CAN refresh it once to keep it going before it falls off and you have to start over. Maybe something like that would have worked better, like a 1m cd that refreshes GL without having to hold still or take damage etc.

[Shurrikhan]

I think the major thing is everyone’s been asking for this to happen to monk since GL introduction.

I've asked to have back the positional freedom I had before through stance-less & position-less skills of low cost if delayed (as we had in ARR and HW). I have never once asked that MNK outright ignore its positionals for 30-50 seconds at a time.

I have asked that GL fall off stack-by-stack or have more frequent (or, relative to SB, responsive) means of quickly generating GL, anything that would make it a more reactive mechanic to match its urgency and importance. I have never asked that GL maintenance be reduced to a still-sluggish wind-up once per instance followed by spamming an additional button for the instance's remainder. In the process of giving us a "QoL' change, they've managed to gut a core mechanic and replace it with carpal tunnel. How is that a good thing?

[ADVSS]

Well I think OP has a good point in regards of the direction the game is heading overall, even if slowly. Personally it isnt just the recent changes to monk, its actually been put around a lot of things in regards to combat. To a degree I have to agree, but then again it might just be better the way theyre taking the game, i dont know at this point.

[Ibkee]

I'm not sure I follow, OP. Why should the changes to MNK, a perennially overlooked and previously largely unplayed class, be worrying to the rest of us?

Those who enjoy it will enjoy it, those who don't will move on. Not every job needs to be left with glaring problems that make it feel unfun, just to maintain some manufactured idea of identity. Similarly, not every job has become easier or had it's flaws removed or addressed, some (looking at you SMN) have become more complex and challenging than ever

So for those of us who haven't touched ShB MNK, like you and me OP, let's just let the many MNKs finally loving their class to do so. There's nothing to be concerned about with that.