U72 Early Look: Monk Revamp

[Svirfneblin]

Hi Steelstar, thanks for the updates to Monk.

Was hoping to see more boosts specifically to Ninjas using Shortswords and Kamas as they're notoriously weak, u almost never see someone playing them.

Was hoping to see some attack speed added to Ninja tree since everyone knows Ninjas are fast, real fast. Shortswords and Kamas aren't the best weapons, arguably among the worst in game. Was hoping for some Alacrity when using them afterall swinging a broom handle gets +15% attack speed in 3rd Core.

I like the poison immunity strip from Poison Darts but does the Ninja Poison keep its 5% stacking vulnerability? That paired well with poison weapons and the imbue.

Can u add some offhand doublestrike to Ninja tree?

Ninja doesnt have any crowd control would like some sort of Paralysis since they're the Poison experts of the class. Perhaps a button like Tomb of Jade.

Ninja doesnt have + to Melee Power or Imbue Dice and HM has gobs.

Sting of the Ninja Imbue only scales with 100% and other sources in the game are 200%.

No Mercy costs 2 AP per rank, the most expensive class source of helpless damage, can u put it on par with the others to 1ap/rank?

Can u add some Sneak Attack Damage bonus when using Shortswords and Kamas as those weapons are notoriously weak ??

Perhaps a Dodge boost when Centered?

Add a DEX trance to Ninja Tree?

 

[Goldy]

Hello, everyone!

We have decided that the time has come to take a look at the Monk class as a whole and make some adjustments while we debut the upcoming Dragon Disciple Monk Archetype (see thread here!)

<SNIP>

This looks like someone who has never played monk for any extended period of time ran the numbers and said we can make the "numbers" better. Unfortunately they have no clue how or why the Monk Class can be fun to play. I am saddened, dejected and disappointed.

When I was working on my heroic lives for my completionist, a long time ago, I really didn't want to do the Monk lives, I hated monk, my attempts at the class left me with a very bad taste in my mouth. When it came to the last heroic lives I only had Monk left, with a large stack of Otto's boxes I was very tempted to just skip th3e lives, however having actually earned every XP on that specific character I figured I would give it another try. Something funny happened on the way to the forum, I figured it out. How Monk plays worked. It is too bad this was well before Reaper, but that is rant for another day.

The dawning light is combos aren't about DPS, rather they are about the unique functionality that can be used in different circumstances. Tanking, becomes heal they self with Healing Ki , Dealing with Madstone try Dance of Clouds on the Seers, Raging Sea on a variety of bosses slows attacks for 60 seconds, and let's not forget Aligning the Heavens for you favorite Spell Casters before a Mana Dump End Fight.

There are players who complain about how Monks play at end game today, I understand that point of view. My counter point is that "Grandmaster of Flowers" is one of, if not they weakest, Epic Destinies for a "specific" class. There are synergies and potentials for Fighters, Paladins. Barbarians, Arcane Fighters, but Monk get an Epic Destiny designed to give Non-Monks Monk like abilities. Fixing Monks at end game starts with a revamp of Grandmaster of Flowers not gutting the Monk Class.

Right now I feel like you are gutting the unique playstyle of monk to smash large square pegs into small round holes where a few people will stand around and say owww Monk's getting a few small points of DPS increase.

Shintao - Attaining Enlightenment through Meditation
Why remove Conditioning? Your DPS view of Monk requires them to have less hit points?
Shintao Studies +1 Attack and +2 Damage (x4) I guess is better than a Poke in the Eye, but it is pretty pointless for a pure monk. It is like adding eight ounces of water to a five gallon drum of water.
Hand of Healing/Greater Hand of Healing. Placing this in the Middle of Shintao Tree is a lousy location, considering it was a Finishing Move available to monks in general.
Why is Fast Hands a Multi Selector when other Melee/Ranged enhancements are both? I argued until I was blue in the face it should be one or the other and not both, but as the precedent has been made this should follow it.
Mediation of War losing the penalties is probably the best change you could have and did make.

Ninja Spy - Skilled assassins and saboteurs who preferred stealth and trickery to the open and honorable combat
Ninjitsu, +1 Attack and +2 Damage, is out of character for this tree, make it Poison (negative) Imbue Dice
The problem with Ninja Spy is it could have been interesting, a different play style, but you are trying to force the square peg into the very small round hole.

Heshin Mystic - Elemental Masters of the Path of Man
Riddle of Fire - wait, what, you are giving the Elemental Masters the Wisdom to Hit/Damage but not the DPS Shintao, did I miss something.
Heshin Training, again would be better if it was akin to Arcane Archer Elemental Arrows, but a Melee.
Elemental Soul - See Heshin Training
Kata of Wind - Should increase Imbue Dice not concealment
Clear your Mind - Again why is this not in the Shintao Tree, that is your DPS Tree. This should be more about something that increases your Imbue Dice or elemental damage.


If Shintao is supposed to be Core Weapon DPS, Ninja Spy is supposed to be Poison Trick Stealth, and Heshin Mystic is supposed to be Elemental Weapon and Defense Than the enhancement trees should align better with those goals. What you are building is more akin to the Sorcerer's Savant Line with minor differences between the trees than taking Shintao and making it a cross between Falconry and Kensei Enhancement Trees, Ninja Spy a cross between Assassin and Deepwoods Stalker, and Heshin Mystic a cross between Arcane Archer and Sacred Defender. Using those tree as basis would make these tree better align with you goal.

 

[unknown32]

Late to this thread, so apologies if this was answered already; Are there any plans for GMOF's Master of Philosophy now that combo builders are being removed?

 

[Kyrr]

I am sad.

 

[woq]

Ninja Spy: Poison, Tricks, and Stealth/Sneak.

There is a distinct lack of Stealth/Sneak in the tree currently, which sparked some discussion on the official discord that led to, among other things, the following: Cores:

• Sneaking while in Shadow Veil now also makes you float, hiding you from tremor sense; but drains ki at rate of 2/second.
• Diversion: 10 sec duration, 1min cd; currently its more like a dmg steroid with your other long cooldown steroids; lower duration and lower cooldown would give more uses for the diversion part of it. Additionally, passive to replace the lost multi: While sneaking and for 5 seconds after exiting stealth, apply an extra stack of Sting of the Ninja on hit.

T5:

• Touch of Death: While sneaking, touch of death slays the enemy on failed save.
• Deadly Striker: grants you +5 Melee Power and Ranged Power and another +5 while stealthing and for 10 seconds upon exiting stealth

Further, some of the attacks should also work for ranged; such as Dark Flurry and Touch of Death.

There also seemed to be a *lot* of consensus on hopefuls wanting to keep their combo attacks and finishers if they want to go the hard route to gaining the benefits of those. While the easier and longer cooldown approach may be more approachable for newer monk enthusiasts, the *option* to use the harder way should be there for those who want to take their skill and knowledge to the limit.

 

[SpardaX]

A bit more value added for *using* stealth added to ninja spy which currently pays lip service to the idea in flavor while leaving Assassin rogue the only tree in the game that actually benefits from sneaking.
Maybe Touch of Death is an instakill while sneaking and its current form while not sneaking?
Maybe monk gains the ability to use QP without breaking stealth?

Maybe this can become the new 3rd core of Ninja Spy:

Shadow Veil: Ki Activate: You focus your Ki and draw shadows around you. You become invisible and 25% incorporeal for one minute. Actions that break invisibility do not remove the incorporeality portion of this effect. (Activation Cost: 15 Ki. Cooldown: 6 seconds). While sneaking, you gain negative (Some reasonable amount, somewhere between 2 and 10) passive ki gen, but are permanently affected by shadow veil. This effect remains for 10 seconds after leaving stealth, or after you run out of ki.

Note: Becoming uncentered for any reason immediately removes both components of the buff.

 

[SpardaX]

Can u add some offhand doublestrike to Ninja tree?

Do you mean offhand TWF strike chance? Offhand doublestrike as an effect doesn't really exist anymore. Your offhand doublestrike chance is just now directly related to your mainhand doublestrike chance.

 

[Viamel]

My

Maybe this can become the new 3rd core of Ninja Spy:

Shadow Veil: Ki Activate: You focus your Ki and draw shadows around you. You become invisible and 25% incorporeal for one minute. Actions that break invisibility do not remove the incorporeality portion of this effect. (Activation Cost: 15 Ki. Cooldown: 6 seconds). While sneaking, you gain negative (Some reasonable amount, somewhere between 2 and 10) passive ki gen, but are permanently affected by shadow veil. This effect remains for 10 seconds after leaving stealth, or after you run out of ki.

Note: Becoming uncentered for any reason immediately removes both components of the buff.

favourite version so far has been woq's suggestion, being that sneaking while shadow veil is active gives you ki drain but also makes you float and no longer detectable via tremor sense.
I like the idea that shadow veil let's you hide so well you can even hide from death (let me stealth by reapers)

 

[ChickenMobile]

I'm glad Monk is getting a generic overhaul so it supports all Monk weapons and not just the ones suggested in the trees. I like Kamas (they need more love!) Not sure if losing finishers is my cup of tea. I always thought that this was one of the things that made them play unique, like the Warden from lotro.

Stunning Fist not requiring handwraps anymore is a good change! I've never used it because of this XD.

What will you do with Instinctive Defense? Is this going to be moved to Henshin (the new 'tanky' tree)?

 

[Viamel]

Shadow Double
this one needs a rethink too (I'm aware it's not currently slated for change but we're here looking at monk)
Making it a bluff based on your concentration could be a nice way to have it fit "trickery"

50% doublestrike is overkill, but if in that window it increased your offhand doublestrike cap then it could be quite cute, even if the total Doublestrike bump was lower.

Even swapping the doublestrike out for temporary player based fort bypass, this might fit the ninja theme better and would consistently be of benefit to the player, this option could be a multi selector between fort bypass and doublestrike, I know some people will benefit from the big stack of doublestrike but it's a very limited pool at end game and the t5s really need to scale to end game

 

[Finngon]

Looking at the revamp, I'd definitely look into the automatic feats as well.

Currently looking, and there's no real incentive for monks to be in handwraps now. Especially if Shintao core now is giving +W for all weapons while centered.

I would consider bringing back the +0.5W (or at least +0.2W) for each Unarmed strike feat, because as of right now, that feat does NOTHING.

 

[Kyrr]

Looking at the revamp, I'd definitely look into the automatic feats as well.

Currently looking, and there's no real incentive for monks to be in handwraps now. Especially if Shintao core now is giving +W for all weapons while centered.

I would consider bringing back the +0.5W (or at least +0.2W) for each Unarmed strike feat, because as of right now, that feat does NOTHING.

Hey accuracy is helpful.

 

[Thal]

"The combo builders themselves are not especially strong." is a simple fix, just make them all do +damage like earth and add elemental damage as a bonus if they're a crit. There, fixed on that end. Those still scale from your Form Mastery feats, so they're balanced in heroics reasonably. Make a 2 AP item in Grandmaster of Flowers that doubles or triples or whatevers their value and boom they're better in epics too.

"Combo-building is clunky due to cooldowns." Yeah maybe a little bit, but as long as the payoff is worth the time spent building, I don't think anyone is gonna be bothered. You aren't always combo-finishing as a monk, so what? Time and place, which is thematically appropriate for the Monk as a class.

"The combo system is easily interrupted by common actions, resetting your combo." We've dealt with it for this long, it's not THAT big of a deal. Just add a disclaimer that doing anything outside your Kata Kung-Fu Combat Flow breaks your focus or something. Yeah maybe you gotta go through a few quality of life items and "opt-out" to make things easier. I promise you people will only be appreciative for the ones you do.

"Strengthening combo builders makes the Monk disproportionately powerful across all level ranges, especially as there is no cost (feat slots, action points) in gaining them - Monks get these and their trees and their bonus feats."
Uh...that's what classes are for? Is Barbarian innately broken because rage? No of course not, that's just the class having identity.
Is Sorcerer gonna get gutted because they cast fast?
Is Fighter because they get so many feats?
Man I hope not. I mean really, are Finishers THAT much better than having an extra 10 feats? C'mon.

"The cooldowns on the builders are structurally important to make sure the system functions as intended, and it is nearly impossible to reduce that cooldown without creating additional issues."
Just make the combos worth using. That's it. Maybe triple Earth Fists of Iron doesn't have a 100% usage if the equivalent for Fire isn't a level 1 spell with the cast speed of a hireling. Just spitballing here.

 

[Shear-buckler]

It seems like shintao will just be objectively better as a kukri build with T3/T4/T5 in VKF rather than a handwrap build.
Is relegating handwraps to pure flavour and bugged iconics a deliberate choice?

 

[Lotoc]

It seems like shintao will just be objectively better as a kukri build with T3/T4/T5 in VKF rather than a handwrap build.
Is relegating handwraps to pure flavour and bugged iconics a deliberate choice?

it's funny because ninja spy handwraps is likely going to outperform ninja spy kukri or longswords on single target dps simply because of the mechanics of handwraps (full offhand damage mod, full offhand doublestrike, faster attack rate than regular twf) and how sneak dice will scale with them.

 

[Shear-buckler]

• Dark Path: Kata of Ice: You perform an attack that encases a tainted target in ice on a failed Will save for 10 seconds. (DC = 10 + STR/DEX/WIS modifier + Monk level + Stunning DC boosts). Costs 20 ki, 12 second cooldown

• Dark Path: Kata of Dark Stars: You perform an attack that encases a tainted target in ice on a failed Will save for 10 seconds. (DC = 10 + STR/DEX/WIS modifier + Monk level + Stunning DC boosts). Costs 20 ki, 12 second cooldown

Are these supposed to be identical?

 

[Phoenicis]

I guess another monk nerf was inevitable, they had been left along for far to long.

Better Monk update: Make all three trees weapon agnostic.

Done.

As it is take 14 abilities all monks can access away, remove a ton of active attacks (including the ones in the trees if I read correctly). Give back SOME of the finishers in the trees that instead of getting for free you now need to spend AP to access.

Oh, and give some more back in an archtype tree.

This is terrible. IMO.

 

[Rull]

That's an interesting thought with the opportunity cost of not using other stances; will talk about it with the team.

wait what? buffing air stance doesn't make sense. 12% doublestrike is absolutely massive, beating even the crit multiplier on 19-20 from fire stance.

If you are strength based, you can still go fire for the +4 STR, not losing 2 con and the ki on hit... but in terms of raw damage (if you are dex-based or not) 12% (roughly 6.5% dps increase) is the go-to stance.

 

[Fisto Mk I]

At last! We will finally get rid of this abomination - this wretched builder/spender finished moves system! Best part of Monk revamp!

How about keep all the changes, but also keep the finisher combo system?

NO.

This 1000%. i've played monk for over a decade and this will kill most of the fun/dps for me.

And this is exactly the part of the system that for many years did not allow me to enjoy playing as a melee monk. If I wanted to play the piano, I would go to music school. But I don't want to. So tnx Steelstar! Brilliant changes! 8)

Touch of Death in T5 Ninja spy should be an instakill, it's single target anyway and compared to arcane casters it will never be oppressive for Monk to have 2 instakills

Right. And it must have ranged and DD "caster" version too.

Ninja doesnt have any crowd control would like some sort of Paralysis since they're the Poison experts of the class. Perhaps a button like Tomb of Jade.

Currently we have Flash Bang, it's enough good (not best) CC. After revamp, we clearly need something available to dark path too.

Add a DEX trance to Ninja Tree?

Yes yes yes omg yes pls!!!
HW trance just awful, same as whole tree for non-bows users!

Further, some of the attacks should also work for ranged; such as Dark Flurry and Touch of Death.

Exactly, and have DD "caster" variant attack too for synergy with new Monk archetype.

 

[Kyrr]

At last! We will finally get rid of this abomination - this wretched builder/spender finished moves system! Best part of Monk revamp!


NO.

And this is exactly the part of the system that for many years did not allow me to enjoy playing as a melee monk. If I wanted to play the piano, I would go to music school. But I don't want to. So tnx Steelstar! Brilliant changes! 8)

Right. And it must have ranged and DD "caster" version too.

Currently we have Flash Bang, it's enough good (not best) CC. After revamp, we clearly need something available to dark path too.

Yes yes yes omg yes pls!!!
HW trance just awful, same as whole tree for non-bows users!

Exactly, and have DD "caster" variant attack too for synergy with new Monk archetype.

I'm not saying that it wasn't friendly, but that's the reasoning and joy behind every single class or kit. Some of it can be challenging, some of it can be easy. Monk was one of the highest skill ceilings in the game, that's what made the class fun. The developers are taking the fun out of the reasoning to play monk, was the fun unique playstyle. Not everything needs to be made linear or easy.

Not signed, not approved. I have stepped away from the game due to faulty developer decisions.

This whole system could've been mitigated by doing a similar alchemist style by mixing two elements and calling it a finishing move and kept them entirely. Oh you want Fire Dark Fire? Now you only need Fire and Dark.

Not to mention, the finishing moves (builder, spender) was added function for this class, right? At end game and leveling those were niche abilities in certain spots. You could've leveled a wraps, quarterstaff or even shuriken without needing to use the builder spender system.