Gameplay, power, or fantasy, hat would have to change to entice you to play a monk?

Gameplay or power, what would have to change to entice you to play a monk?

  • Simpler Gameplay - Builder - Finisher revamp to use passively or with only finisher activation

    Votes: 27 55.1%
  • More Complex Gameplay - Builder - Finisher revamp to incorporate additional monk abilities

    Votes: 4 8.2%
  • What's a monk; what has he got? Nvm I don't care; I'll play him naught.

    Votes: 3 6.1%
  • Power - MRR Cap increase

    Votes: 13 26.5%
  • Power - Spell Resistance increase

    Votes: 6 12.2%
  • Power - DPS increase

    Votes: 20 40.8%
  • Simpler Gameplay - Enhancements: fewer active abilities that become more enhanced or passive buffs.

    Votes: 18 36.7%
  • Power: (non-DPS) Enhancements to have stronger utility, epic scaling, or AoE effectiveness.

    Votes: 9 18.4%
  • Relative Power: Nerf everyone else. Especially warlocks. Also nerf FoTW epic strikes to GMoF level.

    Votes: 5 10.2%
  • Fantasy: Monk archtype needs to represent a more prominent fantasy, such as samurai.

    Votes: 12 24.5%

  • Total voters
    49

Leesun

Well-known member
Rework builders / finishers
a pass of ninja spy tree
remove all staff fighting from henshin mystic and double down on ki fire/force sla and passive buffs. add wis to-hit/damage
make a new tree: monkey shen (warriors of the animal fist are a set of monk-esq prestige classes that focus on mimicking animals, and monkey shen focuses specifically on staff fighting)
 

The Nameless One

What can change the nature of a man ?
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Putti

Well-known member
Monk is by far my favourite class, but unfortunately I haven't played it in a while. I see 3 main reasons why it's not popular:

The enhancement trees are pretty bland and don't mix-and-match well.
They have an incredible amount of active abilities making them very bothersome to play.
They don't deep multiclass that well because of big restrictions on gear, alignment and playstyle.

It's just a really restrictive class. You're limited to certain gear (even more limited in weapon choice depending on your enhancement tree), enhancements are limited by the Path you take and limited to which classes you can multiclass with.

You can't mix-and-match much because they all have different requirements and focus areas.
Ninja Spy is about Assassinate, weapons and Dexterity and you have to be Path of Darkness to get the most out of it.
Shintao is about unarmed, wisdom and Stunning and you have to be Path of Light to get the most out of it.
Henshin is about quarterstaves and doesn't get much from the other trees. I don't feel like they mix and match as much as other classes enhancement trees. You just end up with a lot of enhancements that doesn't do anything for your build that you need to pick to reach the few good enhancements. This is on top of the fact that it's even less compatible with other classes.

Here are some things that I would change:

Clean-up active abilities
  • Elemental Ki Strikes should simply enhance your regular Ki Attacks. So Fist of Iron should add it's bonus to Strike of the Enduring, Eagle Claw Attacks adds the bonus to Fires of Purity etc.
  • Elemental Curatives should be passives that all add to your Healing Ki. Since you can just switch toggle anyway as needed it makes no sense for them to be individual toggles.
  • Elemental Words should also enhance your regular Ki Attacks, so that if you use Fires of Purity you apply the 10% fire vulnerability and the 2 stacks of Vulnerable. Strike of the Enduring would do the same for Acid vulnerability etc.
  • Smite Tainted Creature/Jade Strike do almost the same thing. Turn them into one ability. You start with the basic Wisdom to dmg+attack and jade on vorpal, then it can be enhanced to add the vulnerability + fortification reduction and jade on crits with an added reduced cooldown to compensate for losing one ability.
  • The same can be done for Tomb of Jade and Kukan-Do. Make Kukan-do add a shorter cooldown and ranged capability to Tomb.
  • Ninjutsus should be passives that all apply to your Touch of Doom.
  • Shadow Veil is basically always up anyway. Make it passively give 25% incorporeal and activate for invisibility.
  • Dismissing strike could have an alternative choice that's a passive that Banishes on vorpal (or similar)
  • Combine Wholeness of Body into Meditation so that you heal while you meditate. Also add increased charges to compensate.
Make the class less restrictive
  • Allow monks to be centered with non-monk weapons without requiring Kensei. Should probably be placed in capstone or something that required deep monk.
  • Make Shintao DR-breaking apply to all centered weapons. Could do it with a "Imbue with Ki" ability like "Imbue with Shadow" or just be passive to reduce bloat. This could also work for things like Ki Strike: Magic, Ki Strike: Lawful and Ki Strike: Adamantine.
  • Turn Stunning Fist into Stunning Strike so that it can be used with all centered weapons.
  • Give monks and option to gain wisdom to attack/damage without requiring one specific Universal Tree.
  • Add more passives to Shintao that doesn't only work for unarmed and to Henshin that doesn't only work for quarterstaves.
  • Remove alignment to allow for class combinations.
  • Allow for using either Stunning or Assassinate for the different tree abilities.
  • Give options for both Paths in all trees so one doesn't only enhance Dark and another only enhances Light.

Spice up the enhancement trees
Shintao
The tree is very focused on CC and defensives along with unarmed.​
  • Since CC doesn't work on bosses and other important mobs there should be some other draws to the tree. Could possibly add affects to the CC that do damage or debuffs if the mob is immune.
  • While there is a lot of focus on defensives there isn't much for actually tanking. You can only get 10% increased Threat Generation and there's nothing to increase your MMR cap or AC and the only way to increase the dodge cap is through sacrifice your damage (unless you get the captone) making it harder to keep aggro and you also forego the 10% extra HP.
  • Some of the Meditation of War penalties are pretty steep and you need to invest heavily into monk to remove them.
  • I don't think the cooldown on Rise of the Phoenix is necessary since it's already restricted to once per rest. Most quests don't even last 15 minutes. Could also be enhanced to be usuable on others.
  • Ki Shout uses Concentration, but Exemplar gives +Intimidate. I feel like that's a bit of a mixed signal.
  • Reed in the Wind provides a lot of dodge, but monks already have so much they're likely to hit the cap. Maybe it could also increase the cap or ignore it.
  • The tree is focused on Extraplanar, Aberrations and Undead, but there is only Dismissing Strike which focuses on Extraplanar. I feel like there could be an option for Disruption as well for the Undead.
  • As mentioned earlier, add options for Dark Path users as well
  • As mentioned earlier, add options for non-unarmed as well.
Ninja Spy
Ninja spy seems fun in theory, but it feels a bit lackluster. Sting of the Ninja applies much too infrequent to be of use as most mobs die before you get any noticable stacks.​
  • Sting of the Ninja only applies on crits, but monks don't get much to increase Threat Range. Have it apply on Sneak Attacks instead.
  • A lot of creatures are immune to poison, but you need to multiclass to remove poison immunity. Add something to strip it in the tree.
  • There's a is a focus on Sneak Attack, but the main way of enabling Sneak Attacks is Unbalancing Strike which requires Trip - a stat that monks otherwise don't need. Have it scale with Stunning or Assassinate instead. It's also a water attack which means it will break your Touch of Doom combo which you need to remove fortification and for your posion.
  • There is no Sneak Attack Immunity removal.
  • There shouldn't be a chain of incompatible abilities that you have to take in order to reach the tier 5 ability. You need to pick all 4 Ninjutsus to get Touch of Death, but you can only have one Ninjutsu on at a time. This could potentially be fixed by doing what was mentoned under "Clean-up Active Abilities".
  • A lot of the tree does nothing if you're unarmed or fighting with quarterstaves.
  • It could also use more poison themed (passive) abilites. Reducing saves would be fitting and combo nicely with the other abilities.
Henshin Mystic
Henshin is certainly more interesting after the rework, but there's still a lot lost if you're a non-staff build.​
  • If you want Void Strike you have to take all 4 Elemental Words, but I doubt many want all of them. I don't think they should be a requirement.
  • Lighting the Candle's Ki reduction can be quite punitive if you're not a quarterstaff user.
  • The Elemental vulnerability is not that exciting for the monk as they have limited ways of doing elemental damage. Other than the way mentioned under "Clean-up Active Abilities" I feel they could be buffed a bit. Possibly add an Immunity strip effect or some damage to them.
  • If the spells could also scale with Spellpower it might open up multiclass options.
  • It could benefit from some Strikethrough chance
  • The Quarterstaff attack speed comes very late compared to Thief-Acrobat
Enhance base monk

  • Meditation is a fun idea, but very lackluster. I like the idea of prepping before a fight, but the bonuses are neglible. The Ki generation is extremely slow. Reduce the "cast-time" to 10 seconds. Add an Action Boost to speed after meditating to compensate for sitting still.
    Add enhancements that gives temporary bonuses after meditating. Shintao could give you defensive boons, Ninja Spy offensive ones, Henshin could enhance allies.
  • Make Purity of Body/Diamond Body work on all Diseases and Poisons like in PnP
  • Make Heal a class skill as Path of Harmonious Balance has a strong focus on healing.
  • Make cleaves Martial Feats to give monks more AoE options.
  • Add AoE attacks to Enhancements.
  • Make Whirling Steel Strike an automatically granted feat where if you have Proficiency: Longswords and Weapon Focus: Slashing you automatically become centered with Longswords.
  • Enhance Finishing Moves
    • Finishing moves are very annoying to use. Make them passively trigger once you've done the combo (This also has the benefit of removing a lot of clutter abilities).
    • Most are not worth using at all. Increase the bonuses or make them last longer.
    • Don't make combos get interrupted by things like opening doors or using consumables
    • Add a UI element that shows your current combo
    • Another option would be to have them be something you "toggle" on by performing the combo and using the Finishing Move. You'd then have the benefit until you enable another Finishing Move. The buffs would be auras and the debuffs could be procs. This might be controversial, however, as it would be a big nerfs to those that actually use a varied amount of Finishing Moves.
 
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AngryGreek

Well-known member
"...a more prominent fantasy, such as a samurai"

Ok, who wants to tell him? In case nobody else does, let me help: Samurai actually existed. They were real. As were Spartans and Amazons (well, sort of. Scythians). I hope this helps. If you're looking for fantasy based inspiration for monks, maybe start with Avatar (The Last Airbender, not the blue aliens)
 

Eunostos

Active member
"...a more prominent fantasy, such as a samurai"

Ok, who wants to tell him? In case nobody else does, let me help: Samurai actually existed. They were real. As were Spartans and Amazons (well, sort of. Scythians). I hope this helps. If you're looking for fantasy based inspiration for monks, maybe start with Avatar (The Last Airbender, not the blue aliens)
I think perhaps you have not seen the phrase before so have taken him literally - but he's talking about the concept of a "class fantasy" - it's a way to describe a playstyle or theme.

The phrase is used for real-world things, not just imaginary ones. There are 'class fantasies' for styles of modern military combat too, in other genres.
 

Tilomere

Well-known member
The fantasy of playing a samurai is more prominent, than say, the fantasy of playing a henshin mystic (tabaxi trailblazer iconic), due to historical prominence, and that only the imbue matches to D&D Oriental Adventures prestige class. The ability to relate and connect with the fantasy is therefore easier as a broader depth of understanding enabling connection already exists. By poll numbers, this connection is as important as increased DPS.
 

saekee

long live ROGUE
As Purr, others and the OP point out too, in effect the trees are mutually dependent. A melee needs henshin for mp, imbues, prr as well as shintao—if you go ninja as a melee you are almost forced into the other trees since there is no MP or PRR in the ninja tree. Most melee trees are fairly self-sufficient whereas ninja is imbalanced. Really all the monk trees are imbalanced and require each other or a multi like kensai to cover them.
 

Xgya

Well-known member
Spell Resistance: Spell resistance, in general, needs a revamp. I suggest that all stats follow a consistent pattern. The current problem in DDO is that developers keep introducing more sources for spell DCs, tactical DCs, etc., allowing players to achieve 95% success rates, only for monsters to receive more resistance or attack abilities, which causes players to fail again, creating a vicious cycle.

There is a lack of a cohesive system based on character level and monster CR (Challenge Rating). My suggestion for monks is that they gain an Insight bonus to SR (Spell Resistance) through Diamond Body, based on their character level. This would give monks a unique advantage—they wouldn’t need an item for Insightful Spell Resistance. Additionally, monks could receive quality spell resistance from an enhancement tree.

In general, it should be possible for any character to achieve 100% working Spell Resistance against any monster, including raid bosses, if they invest enough effort.

I dislike 100% or 0% SR in general.

I'd love it if multiple sources of SR stacked the same way Energy Absorption does.
50% SR + 50% SR = 75% SR.

I don't know how that'd work with Spell Pen as it currently is, but if I had to build it again from the ground up, that's where I'd start.
Because that's where energy resist went, and that's where barbarian DR went to keep up with the current game while making sure it stays relevant in the future.
No amount of flat bonuses will ever cover power creep.
 

Smelt

Grumpy old Dwarf
Monks are one of my favourite classes, but I always play a staff monk for the strike through. In this regard I find them to be probably the fastest melee character for levelling in heroics and Epic. As some, or at least one other person, has said I only use the healing builders and finishers though because the others aren't at all useful beyond the level you acquire them. If you try and use more than one it also becomes a nightmare keeping track of what builder you used and how many times and so you end up not getting your finishers (that also don't scale well) as often as you should. I usually take light path until I have access to teir 5 henshan enhancements and then swap to dark path and take the opposing path strike for a much more powerful AoE heal.

To make them more appealing, as others have said, you need to simplifer the whole builder and finisher mechanic and make them scale a whole lot better. I suggest instead of having Wisdom to hit and damage in a tree you should put either a " choose a stat for to hit and damage" selecter in a tree or having dex to hit and Damage in Ninja, Wisdom to hit and damge in Shintoa and Con to hit and damage in henshan trees. That way you can choose what your prime state is going to be and then we may get some monks using a different stance to the water stance.

If the builders were scaling properly you could even make it so that you could only use Light/Dark builders and the corresponding builder to the stance you are in. You then only have one button for all the elemental builders and you stance determines which one fires. The same thing could apply to the special attacks like Fist of Iron etc. The biggest thing that puts players off playing Monk, in my opinion, is the amount of buttons you have to use all their abilities. If you cut those down by implementing the link to your stance I think the class would become less daunting.
 

Reifee - Orien

Well-known member
I'm playing one now to finish up Completionist. I have to say, I'm already counting the days until I TR.



There just doesn't seem to be a niche.



It doesn't tank well

Dps isn't great (We need more improved weapons and named handwraps to make them relevant)

It doesn't CC so far (still in heroics)

Healing is lack luster (They should get some huge boost from potions, maybe a HOT component when you drink a pot, similar to when a dwarf drinks an ale)

AE targeting (unless you use a staff) is well not there.

The combat system is really confusing. (it feels like I'm trying to play a 12 Stringed guitar, behind my back)((not very intuitive)

The KI system is O.K. I like the fundamentals but I feel like it needs a strong brush up. It feels like a level 20 Class that was great, but didn't get upgraded since Eberon Unlimited (2009)



It could really use an intuitive revamp and made relevant.



No Not a nerf, Ugh.
 

Bouncyboy

Well-known member
My first 3 lives on my main were monk.
Since then, I've ALWAYS thought of my character as a monk temporarily playing all the other classes x3.
But yes, monk has fallen so far that after 14 years, I'm now playing my least favourite class - artificer.

What did I love about monk...well, I bounce a lot so there's the mobility thing.
But really, I used to love the attack speed in wind stance.
I remember when Amrath was end-game, I'd go in with duel vorpal karma's and tear stuff up!
Sadly, I also remember about 10 years ago the day I logged on after the wind stance was nerfed, I was in lower Necro, it felt like each arm had 100kg weights, so sad, nearly quit DDO.

Recently I've found refuge in sacred fist pali's. 300+ ac, 5k hp's, 355prr, 155mrr and all saves above 130, with none failing on a 1. But damage was sort of lacking - hence the recent shift to arti.

So, for monk, and to a lessor degree sf's, what these two handwrap classes need is a power boost. The finishing moves are a gimick imo, so I would say focus on power, especially aoe.

Bouncyboy - a child of the LFM's and DDO fixture since '09
 

Aeromach

The Best
Here's a thought - how about the (Henshin) imbue dice doesn't 'literally' burn up your Ki?
Why does using imbue dice 'cost' Ki for a Monk when every other class gets to use them for 'free'?
It forces me to play in Fire stance while using Wraps for most heroic levels (Like 6-16) to have enough Ki for using any finishers or stun.
If I use Stunning Fist and Lighting the candle I only have enough Ki for like 2 stuns - unless I stay in Fire stance to build Ki.
And this is with Contemplation (+1 Ki) and sometimes Way of the Elegant Crane (+1Ki on crit)

Look I know how to build a wrap monk, I've been at it for over a decade, the DPS currently in heroics is just awful.
Not interested in using a quarterstaff. I have excellent gear and wraps. I can play monk, its just horrendously tedious.
Seriously as a warlock my effective DPS is 3X what it is as a monk in heroics. Not exaggerating.
 

Bouncyboy

Well-known member
On the subject of monks, it's too bad iconic tabaxi were assigned monk at level one.
I would have loved to see the duergar be introduced as a playable race and used as a beefy handwrap monk, maybe specializing earth stance with aoe taunts or slams that mega-stun.

Bouncyboy - child of the LFM's and DDO fixture since '09
 

droid327

Well-known member
I think monk should play like warden did back when i played lotro... Build chains of 3-4-5 quick basic moves to encode a huge variety of finishers, with various damage, buff, debuff, cc, and healing effects. Really give a unique playstyle and reward you for being able to skillfully queue up the right move at the right time for the mob you're fighting

Also unarmed has all the drawbacks of no aoe and poor synergy with aoe add ons

And the trees need an updating, though that can reflect the changes to combos, give bonuses to certain finisher types so you can specialize as a buff/debuff or aoe damage monk etc.
 
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