Quote Originally Posted by Shurrikhan View Post
How does it avoid the fundamental issues faced by, say, making use of GL as anything more than maintenance or having choice in one's Stance (if ever balanced)?[/I]
It's generally a matter of whether or not we would accept the possibility of things not overlaying or fitting together perfectly.

I, personally, don't see jobs that auto-correct themselves as necessarily well designed (Paladin/Gunbreaker come into mind), nor ones that require manual correction.

I think Greased Lightning should be a resource, and Chakra should be more of one, though for a quick answer and overall revamp wouldn't fit neatly into this, so for now we'll focus on the fists and their buffs.

By creating Blitzes based on inputs, we curtail some of the need for each fist to mathematically be equal in terms of potency output when it comes to their buffs - They're more the bonus than the reward, though it does create potential blitz buffs and command rotations that would be 'optimal'.

To perhaps make them a bit different, we make them OGCDs that rely on the Monk's stance. This also has the fundamental benefit that they can only take up one button. Opo Opo for Earth, Raptor for Fire, Couerl for Wind.

Fist of X
ability
Recast: 15
Effect: Deals Y potency, beginning or building upon a Blitz strike. Requires [This] Stance. Advances into [that] stance.

This allows for a trait to provide the 'Riddle' bonuses later on.

Riddle of Elements
Trait
Effect: Fist of Fire, Earth, and Wind provide additional bonuses upon use for 18 seconds.

The bonuses we choose here can ideally avoid being potency based, but lets try "Greased Lightning is a resource" as a background change so we can toy with that some. As a design idea, Greased Lightning's benefit is unchanged but comes at breakpoints on a 0-100 bar, and every 25 grants the bonus that a stack does now. The monk's gauge extends at the same break points when leveling up, so the 25, 50, 75, 100.

Fist of Wind: Extends the Greased Lightning Gauge to 125. New cap doesn't grant more bonus, but more resource to play with.
Fist of Earth: Reduces damage taken, removes conditional requirements on Opo Opo skills.
Fist of Fire: Increases Greased Lightning skill costs and potency.

We also create an additional, if not more, meaningful place for Six Sided Star - Similar to old Touch of Death by linking Fists to Stances. It becomes a corrective GCD. We can also reduce it down to 2.5s recast so it's not silly. I think we could add Chakra generation here, but for the scope of this post it can be left out.

I believe with this we have a solid foundation for priority conflicts.