Is monk fun?

[Metalwrath]

It used to be fun but these 'QOl' improvements have just made the job very static and boring.You can do a lot higher dps now with the job wiithout any skill which is why its become more popular.
It's been my main dps since end of ARR.I was drawn to it because it used to be high skill high reward job and because of the changes they made this expansion that doesnt seem to be a factor anymore.
I wont be playing it this expansion as i cant see any possible way for them to bring it back to its former glory without a complete rework or the reintroduction of some of the skills removed.It's just not a busy job anymore compared to most other dps.

[SpeckledBurd]

I still enjoy it and the recent patch undid the things about it that I found actively unfun or jarring (Riddle of Fire no longer slowing Monk is a change that should not have taken 2 years to make, but thank goodness it's gone) and they finally gave Monk a quality of life change to Form Shift that puts Greased Lightning management on the level of what Black Mage/Ninja were capable of for their own buffs. However, it's very very very stale at this point and for all that the Form Shift change was a godsend, the vast majority of skills we've gotten since ARR can be described as "obscenely situational Greased Lightning Management Skills" instead of new skills that we get to use consistently (case in point they made Riddle of Earth an obscenely long True North because it had become completely useless, which is another issue IMO).

If you've never played Monk before, most of that won't be a problem to you, but if you're a long term player there's still a lack of satisfaction with the kit's lack of growth.

[Silver-Strider]

Why?

BotD: Instant cast with a 20s duration upon activation that you could extend to 30s max. 30s CD
RoE: Refresh GL on taking damage. 60s CD
Anataman: Freezes and Refreshes GL. Can't move during the channel. 60s CD
SSS: Refresh GL upon hitting target. GCD skill
Perfect Balance: Ignore Forms entirely to build up GL. 2 minute CD (60s CD in SB)

Not a single one of those skills is comparable to BotD on any level at all. You even claim that you would still lose GL even if RoE would apply on being hit vs taking damage while DRG can potentially have almost double the duration of GL with BotD and can still refresh it before it runs out due to the CD on it being half the duration of any of MNK's maintenance tools so on both a practical and technical level, BotD is far and away the better tool for maintenance in comparison any of those on MNK.

Whether or not Anataman is better or worse than RoW is irrelevant. They both are used to accomplish the same thing, which is build up GL quicker and while Anataman is reliant on server ticks, RoW required 2 shoulder tackles to build up GL. RoW was awful for transitions when there's nothing to hit but Anataman works great there. They're different in their method but functionality was the same hence why I used "replaced" since you can do just that.

RoF had a slow down that made double weaving oGCD necessary. That is no longer the case and thus the extra oGCD aren't necessary anymore and while I'll miss Howling Fist and Steel Peak, I can live with their removal so long as we aren't handicapped for it, which has been rectified now.

I'm not defending current design, I'm arguing that GL sucks as a core job mechanic as it added nothing to MNK but at least the QoL improvements made it less of a chore to manage. The class will never be as entertaining as it once was during HW, when I personally found it to be the most fun, but anything to make the class flow better is a plus from me and if SE is done with throwing MNK nothing but GL management skills than maybe the class can actually see some actual progress to its rotation.

[Shurrikhan]

You even claim that you would still lose GL even if RoE would apply on being hit vs taking damage while DRG can potentially have almost double the duration of GL with BotD and can still refresh it before it runs out due to the CD on it being half the duration of any of MNK's maintenance tools so on both a practical and technical level, BotD is far and away the better tool for maintenance in comparison any of those on MNK.

I never claimed Monk has as good a maintenance tool in RoE as DRG has in BotD. I said that what few fights could not maintain GL, such as through Byakko's quicktime phase, also generally didn't allow for the maintenance of BotD, or indeed any other time-limited resource. Was RoE as good? No. Was it sufficient in the same fights BotD was? Yes. Thus, it was "sufficient to the same extent as BotD was."

RoF had a slow down that made double weaving oGCD necessary. That is no longer the case and thus the extra oGCD aren't necessary anymore.

Heavensward didn't have RoF slow-down, either, and yet it had HF and SP.
5.0 Shadowbringers had RoF slow-down, and yet it didn't have HF or SP.
You can theorize whatever reason you want to the removal of HF and SP, but please do not argue causation off something that happened AFTER their removal. If we look at the history of the two aspects, there's not even a correlation.

Anatman gives 1 GL per minute during uptime. Wind Tackle-Riddle of Wind gives 2. Anatman sees use during downtime. Wind Tackle-Riddle of Wind does not. Anatman depends on server ticks. WT-RoW does not. Anatman prevents movement. WT-RoW are movement skills. They overlap only narrowly.
Anatman is far, far more alike to Samurai's Meditate than to RoW, except rather than merely drawing in an extra 120-128 potency on a good "fishing" attempt, it's a clunky but nigh-obligatory component of our openers. It is by no means a direct replacement. We lost RoW. We got Anatman. They do not compete for the same purpose, as one fundamentally supported an iconic need for uptime and use of GL as a true resource, and the other mostly stands as mitigation -- rather than encouragement -- for using GL as a resource. Anatman, in terms of design, is a means of removing TK from mid-combat, which is in turn a means of removing GL as a manipulable mechanic or anything more than a one-time wind-up punishment.

And that's my issue with it. It's built not to replace a capacity, but to carve it out so completely that the capacity is irrelevant. And all to do what? To then make SSS, Anatman, and RoE themselves irrelevant?

Any core mechanic will suck if it's purely a gateway to be trudged through rather than an actual resource to be worked around. It was the latter. And rather than doubling down on that, they effectively euthanized the mechanic and then put it on life support. And I'm not going to praise the band-aid fix for a problem they actively caused.

[Silver-Strider]

I never claimed Monk has as good a maintenance tool in RoE as DRG has in BotD. I said that what few fights could not maintain GL, such as through Byakko's quicktime phase, also generally didn't allow for the maintenance of BotD, or indeed any other time-limited resource. Was RoE as good? No. Was it sufficient in the same fights BotD was? Yes. Thus, it was "sufficient to the same extent as BotD was."

Except it wasn't? You could instantly apply BotD right back with minimal downtime whereas MNK had to rebuild from scratch over again and even PB had a small wind up to it due to requiring several GCDs to get GL back up.

Heavensward didn't have RoF slow-down, either, and yet it had HF and SP.
5.0 Shadowbringers had RoF slow-down, and yet it didn't have HF or SP.
You can theorize whatever reason you want to the removal of HF and SP, but please do not argue causation off something that happened AFTER their removal. If we look at the history of the two aspects, there's not even a correlation.

There was also no reason to remove Touch of Death, Haymaker, Featherfoot, etc. but time has removed those as well. In HW, we had no means of preventing us from clipping Demolish early outside of using ToD and Fracture to delay it as much as possible. The delay become less needed with the RoF slow doing that for us naturally in SB and now with GL4, we can literally refresh Demolish after 3 Snap Punches with minimal fall off, assuming we don't have to back away for a mechanic.

Anatman gives 1 GL per minute during uptime. Wind Tackle-Riddle of Wind gives 2.

This is flat out wrong and honestly leaves me questioning your credibility to everything else you have just said as a result. Riddle of Wind gave you 1 GL stack; The 1st Shoulder Tackle under Fist of Wind would unlock Riddle of Wind, which was a second tackle that refreshed GL and granted the extra stack. It did not and never granted 2 stacks of GL. The fact that you got this wrong leaves me questioning whether or not you actually ever even did do the Tornado Kick rotation at all or are just inferring based on comments that you've read and if that is the case, you have no idea wtf you're talking about at all.

[Kabooa]

This is flat out wrong and honestly leaves me questioning your credibility to everything else you have just said as a result..

And how many Tackles (and thus riddles) did you get per minute in Stormblood?

[Shurrikhan]

Except it wasn't? You could instantly apply BotD right back with minimal downtime whereas MNK had to rebuild from scratch over again and even PB had a small wind up to it due to requiring several GCDs to get GL back up.

Not when, I repeat, you do not lose the stacks to begin with. RoE does not help you regain stacks. It helps you not lose them. I've made no comparison between the two skills' ability to generate their respective resources, only their ability to maintain their respective resources.

In HW, we had no means of preventing us from clipping Demolish early outside of using ToD and Fracture to delay it as much as possible.

Technically, there was: a sub-1.85s GCD under GL3.

This is flat out wrong and honestly leaves me questioning your credibility to everything else you have just said as a result.

Are you incapable of dividing events per minute to calculate "GL per minute"?

2 Wind Tackles-Riddle of Wind combos per minute (as they are each on a... 30 second cooldown) = 2 GL per minute. Anatman has a 1-minute CD and is only optimal up to a single tick of the server tick during uptime, i.e. 1 GL per minute.

[Silver-Strider]

Not when, I repeat, you do not lose the stacks to begin with. RoE does not help you regain stacks. It helps you not lose them. I've made no comparison between the two skills' ability to generate their respective resources, only their ability to maintain their respective resources.

BoTD was still far more forgiving and had nearly double the duration of GL that it was still miles ahead of maintaining itself than GL and any of its maintenance tools. If GL lasted 30 seconds then it wouldn't be so farfetched a comparison but 16s max uptime vs 30s max uptime, even in the event that I was able to refresh GL prior to a transition and getting hit within the 16 seconds, I was looking at a 2s different BEFORE DRG hit BotD to get an extra 20 seconds on top. It's still a flawed comparison.

Are you incapable of dividing events per minute to calculate "GL per minute"?

2 Wind Tackles-Riddle of Wind combos per minute (as they are each on a... 30 second cooldown) = 2 GL per minute. Anatman has a 1-minute CD and is only optimal up to a single tick of the server tick during uptime, i.e. 1 GL per minute.

Except PB was on a minute long CD so to do the Tornado Kick Rotation on anything but in minute increments would be an absolute nightmare to actually pull off without being a DPS loss. The options were to get a weakened Demolish off due to having used Tornado Kick beforehand or having it land on a Snap Punch to minimize the losses, not to mention the reduced potency on the other skills you weaved during the build up to GL3 again.

[Shurrikhan]

BoTD was still far more forgiving and had nearly double the duration of GL that it was still miles ahead of maintaining itself than GL and any of its maintenance tools. If GL lasted 30 seconds then it wouldn't be so farfetched a comparison but 16s max uptime vs 30s max uptime, even in the event that I was able to refresh GL prior to a transition and getting hit within the 16 seconds, I was looking at a 2s different BEFORE DRG hit BotD to get an extra 20 seconds on top. It's still a flawed comparison.

What does generation matter to a maintenance tool if the maintenance tool is sufficient to maintain what it's supposed to maintain? For the third time now, I have never compared the generation of the two abilities, only their ability to maintain their respective resources. BotD is better, but when well used RoE can maintain GL in nearly every situation BotD can maintain BotD.

Except PB was on a minute long CD so to do the Tornado Kick Rotation on anything but in minute increments would be an absolute nightmare to actually pull off without being a DPS loss. The options were to get a weakened Demolish off due to having used Tornado Kick beforehand or having it land on a Snap Punch to minimize the losses, not to mention the reduced potency on the other skills you weaved during the build up to GL3 again.

Low SkS builds used TK per 30 seconds, not per minute. Even at a 1.82-second GCD, despite TK's scaling issues with SkS, I used TK 3 times per minute at a potency bonus over once per minute. I'm a bit shocked that you don't know this. It wasn't a nightmere so much as a faint Demo timing adjustment prior, easily dealt with.

[Silver-Strider]

...

Ok, so this is where me and you differed so it caused some confusion. I went the High SkS build that would run Tornado Kick every minute as opposed to the Low SkS build so I wasn't aware that the Low SkS build ran it every 30 seconds. That is on me and I will admit to being wrong there, sorry.

I still disagree with RoE being on par with BotD as far as maintenance goes but I'm going to agree to disagree on that point.

I think the main issue between us on this topic though, is how we view GL. You view it as a resource, I view it as nothing more than a glorified trait. It wasn't a proper resource until the Tornado Kick rotation came into existence and it seemed like SE viewed that as an unintentional design that they backed out on, putting it right back to trait status, so while you feel that this was the wrong move, I feel like it was whatever, I just roll with the punches, no pun intended. Would I like MNK's rotation to be more than what it is? Absolutely, but I never felt that GL was the way it should evolve as I felt that's what the Chakra system/Fist Stances/Riddles should have been how MNK was fleshed out with and now that SE has stopped fiddling around with GL mechanics, maybe we can actually get that to happen now.