Vanguard Monks

We are probably the worst or second worst class in the game now. (rogues are either worse or just a bit better than us.)

From my experience, Disciples have the same or better dps than us (using just fists no abilities). Level 21 disciple friends fists are 95 dps main 35 off. Mine at 21 are 75 main 25 off, before you ask we both had the same buffs.

I am not sure if dps is based off dex, but I got 140ish str 140ish con and 120ish dex, around 430 armor class 2400 defense and 1700-1900 hps depending on what weapon I use at level 21. I CANT solo 2 dots at all effectively (lose either half life or more depending if I get crits (total crit chance is about 15%) which does not equate good grinding.)

Yes I know group game blah blah blah, but you know what you cant always get a group, cant always get an effective duo or just dont have the time to group. Most 20+ 2 dot mobs all debuff melee damage, which I think is asinine, basicly telling us healers and casters can solo but FU to pure melees. Furthermore group bonues xp is non existant, it is more efficient to solo as a caster/healer than group since there is very little xp bonus to grouping.

So just a heads up, if you plan  on making a monk expect to be frustrated and have the feeling of being inferior to other classes. And if you decide to play on a FFA pvp or team pvp server expect this frustration to be ten fold. I spend more money on repairs than new armor weapons simply because monks are basicly Free Infamy.

I now know this, and I STILL continue to march (less because I love the class so much, and more because regrinding 20 levels on any class is enough to shoot yourself in the head.) Dont get me wrong I love the "concept" of the monk class, but in its current implemation it is decidedly lackluster.

Not saying there arent issues with the monk, but ranking us as the worst class due to our dps isnt top notch is a tad narrowminded..or you can ask the countless of groups monks have saved from terrible 'tombstoneruns' in deep places if they also think we're that crappy. (No they dont, they love us)

As a harmonic monk (cant speak for others since the stances seem to be what distinguishes the different monks more than abilities)  soloing is doable also, the game isnt designed for 'any' class to plow through even con mobs and exp is somewhat slow in VG.

Here is what I have found  most efficient. (10-15% exp / hour in mid 20ies depending on if you're buffed or not wich is very much comparable to what a druid does)
First mobs in the open usually come in 2 levels 21-22, 23-24 etc (Odd number first). I fight mobs in the same range as i am currently self in, once I go out of this range it get unefficient. When I was 24 i fought the 23-24 range and at 25 i moved to the 25-26 range.  Sometimes I need to grab some cheese after 2 mobs, other times I can kill 10 without having to rest just going from mob to mob.

This is all using Crane Stance giving me roughly 65% evasion to melee attacks wich helps a lot, at lower levels I used Tiger Stance a lot more but mobs are starting to hit harder faster than my AC/HP goes up.

Also you need to find mobs that arent arent overpowered for their levels or have too nasty abilities that messes up your dps too much. (Yes there are crows and bugs and crap that have like zero nasty abilities in the mid 20ies)

Oh and today this happened that made me feel..not so crappy *grin*

(http://www.andy.se/pics/52.jpg)

I think some of the problem is with dragon style. 

We get the storm style.. which adds a small proc to help our damage.
We get the dragon style.. which adds health regen.. this is 100% broken and doesn't work
We get stone dragon.. which adds AC.. while slowing attack 20%. both too minor to make much of a difference.

I can tell you this... I am rarely over 50% health and usually at 0 endurance, 0 Jin when done fighting an even con 2 dot.. and i've moved around thinking maybe I was hitting undercons. 

Besides that I don't think we as a group do much more damage than the healers and tanks.  I dont' think thats the idea of offensive fighter.

Again Naum- not to pick on you or anything- but again- tis like youre ready to defend the Monk, but you're not paying attention to what everyone is saying and the REAL information thats out there.

Our DMG sucks right now, plain and simple. We are a DPS class. That means, as Harmonious, even if I go into Crane Stance for added defense, I should still be outdamaging any Warrior, Shaman, Cleric, Dread Knight, etc. in every fight- regardless of Dot lvl. Right now I cant, and theres something wrong with that. Granted the gap will close if I keep using fists as I gain in level Tiers, as the Fists move up the rarity weapon chart, but this gap is maginified when Monks try to use weapons.

There is simply no way, even if Im in my defensive Crane stance, that my dmg should not at least equal a warrior and be above all the healing classes- Right now, in the mid 20's its not, and theres something a bit disturbing about that, whether you would like to admit it or not.

Dont worry, I dont feel picked on at all but put words in my mouth again and this is my last reply to you.
I'm just simply explaining how I have overcome the "DPS issues", while you rant I find the class interesting enough to keep playing and wait for "fixes"

(start pointless cheer up banter)
We are all at these boards because we love the monk class, right? I personally <3 monks and have since eq1. I know we have issues atm, i know i feel useless in a lot of groups atm (besides crs) but for some odd reason i have faith in someone somewhere to give us some fixes. I still have hope!!
(end banter)

I loved my monk in eq1, I loved my monk in eq2 and I'm loving my monk in VG no matter what :)

But I do have a question. Is going bare fist the better option? I'm using ulaks and claws and sometimes a martial staff. Wondering what people reckon :)

well i have to say that i love the monk class. i also intend to stay with it. that being said, the op is correct on alot.  i wont reiterate that dps wise atm we are probably at the bottom of the list.  i will however add a few comments about whats broken, or atleast to me is broken. 1 we are practically useless in groups.  reasons why this is... are dps sucks, we are out dps'd by rangers, rogues, bards, some healers, etc.  we provide pratically no utility to a group.  fd pull you say,  screw that i grouped with a bard friend yesterday.... he can not only pull singles with no wait what so ever using sleep, but he can also slow the run speed and attack speed by 70 percent.  sorry by the way about capitals and such as my shift key is broke atm. are fd itself is quite bugged.  if you have 3 or more mobs on you and you fd, even when you get the message that everyone thinks you are dead, you dont exit combat which means you dont regen. which also means the mobs perma camp you. sure you can try and get up and redo the fd hoping that the bug will clear, but in my experience it usually does not in a dungeon and you end up dying to a dot or being immediatly hit by 5 mobs.  this alone makes it tough to go in a dungeon and pull corpses.  sure that is a good utility and with patience and maby a couple fails you can succeed at it. this fact alone is not good enough to put me in a group.  all i have to say is thank god i came over here with my guild because  i probably would rarely get groups otherwise.

I'd have no problem with monks being out-DPS'd by Bards and Rangers.

I have a huge problem with monks being out-DPS'd by Bards and Rangers AND we offer less utility to groups.  And I definately have a problem with monks being out-DPS'd by non DPS classes.

My take on the issue is... either of:
1) Give monks some good utilities - buffs or heals or CC
2) Or give monks higher DPS


For now, I play a monk simply because i love being a monk, not because it's the uber class (coz its not lol)

well thats my problem... we offer the least dps of all the classes and we also offer pretty much zero utility.

however i too love being a monk so i am sticking with it in the hopes that we will be looked into in the future. and if we are not ...well... ill still be sticking with it because i love my monk

First off, I am not here trying to elicit sympathy for myself nor the monk class as a whole. I just want new players to be able to get a realistic view on the class in its current state. Will we get buffed? I am pretty sure something will be done, however how effective it will be is something I have my doubts about.

Second, I do have a problem with Rangers and Bards out dpsing us. Both of those classes leave us in the dust as far as utility goes. Rangers get buffs, snares, heals, and a multitude of other abilities over us. And dont even let me mention what Bards get, cause if you think monks currently get more utility than a bard you should go play another game.

The monk should be the BEST dpser in a strait up fight, where we get out dpsed by a rogue when they are in their element (behind and stealthed) and it shouldnt be close between Ranger and Bard for melee dps, but should be made up with their skills (Bow for Ranger and spells for Bard.) As it is now I get smoked in melee with a ranger cause they dont have to wait for a crit to get off a special move, and the Bard has their unresistable spells to deal with (at least now since most people have no resists worth mentioning).

The ONLY utility a monk has is Feign Death, and as I stated earlier it doesnt work when its really needed. (+2 or higher 3 dot or higher dot mobs will usually see through it, and by the time it would work you are already dead.) Also most groups just have a sorcerer evac you out if SNARF hits the fan and most classes prefer this over the monk FD and rez cleric option, as they dont incur xp loss. Is it nice to have when it works, you bet, but it shouldnt be our "calling card" to get into a group.

Pulling has already been addressed, there are several other classes that do it better than a monk. Also a lot of mobs that would require split pulling are linked so its useless.

Right now a monk needs better insta damage that requires nothing to use (up boundless fist and or crescent kicks damage and lower the finisher moves so we get more consistant damage.) because as it is we are very very subpar at what the strength of this class is supposed to be, and thats melee dps.

And what is with us never getting a snare, anyone ever here of knee kick? As a martial artist myself, one of the most effective and also the most protected against moves is a kick to the knee. I dont see anyone running away from a knee kick that lands sorry. Also if you see UFC those fighters that hammer their opponents thighs/legs during the fight eventually slow their movement down.

Anyway enough ranting, I will close by saying I enjoy the thought of being a monk, but right now it needs A LOT of work to be what it should be.

Word has it that melee evades are going to be "re-worked" in the patch today.  I hope it's not yet another nerf to the monks, Sigil.  It better not.

Since Beta5 monks have getting nothing but nerfs (Storm Stride, Crit Chance, Endurance) and skills taken away from us (Reed in the Wind, Secret of Ice), while we're all sitting here hoping they'd give us something so we have more to offer to groups.  Forget about getting comparable utilities to bards or rangers, Sigil need to stop nerfing an already medicore class!

Hi,

The problem with your premise, though, is that you want to offer new people a "realistic view."  However, your view isn't realistic.  It's completely biased and subjective to you.  It's your opinion.  People agreeing with your opinion doesn't make it fact, either :)

I, for one, disagree with most of what you said.  I have no problems soloing 2 dot mobs my level or even a level or two above (no buffs by my own), being a DPS class doesn't necessarily mean doing big numbers.  Even the term itself (dps, damage per second) is a measurement of damage over time.  Sure, we may not spike like rangers and do lots of damage in spurts (which we can, actually), we deal a good amount of damage consistently over time.  While you make thing this doesn't mean much, or amount to much, I assure you, it does.  In long haul fights, a lot of the damage is coming from us.

I never have a problem feeling underutilized in my groups, if I'm grouped I'm generally pulling, which with FD is a natural niche for us, I'm doing damage, occassionally offtanking and basically supporting the group as a whole.  I am happy to play a monk and be more concerned with how I can contribute rather than how I can't or how I want to be but aren't.

While you may love playing a monk, it sounds to me like the playstyle and benefits of the class aren't what you're looking for.  Perhaps instead of warning people off because of the negative attitudes you have and self-limitations on you create, you should invest time in finding something that suits you a little better.  And I don't say that to be mean at all, but if the class isn't doing it for you, why play that class?

Be aware also that thankfully Sigil isn't taking the same view that many MMO's do.  Classes will be marginally balanced but they will have strenghts and weaknesses.  These are the things that give our classes the very definitions of what they are.  Everyone's so concerned about balance that it makes all the classes homogenous and then aside from aestectics, there's no good reason to choose one over the other.

So with all that said- you have no problem being outdamaged by a Cleric, huh?

If not, you're certainly in the minority....

im not saying classes should be balanced within each other.  everyone should have something to offer though.  rangers can dps, give utility including slight heals and in some cases off tank just as well, bards can give of alot of utility, in some cases tank, they can pull better and slow and they can dps better, what i am getting at is what do we have to offer... besides fd because in most cases bards pull better and rogues can get tombstones just as easily if not easier then us... where is our benefit to groups

I am glad that some people would still enjoy playing a monk despite doing less damage than healers and tanks... kudos for you.. Everyone has their reasons for playing and everyone gets enjoyment out of their class in a different way.

.. however, I actually like to raid and perform a role for my group, one of which is provide damage.. as that is what an "offensive fighter" does.  This is not because I am making my own rules for monks.  Beyond the fact that every major MMO that has had monks has them as a top dps class,  it's also how Sigil described the monk.  So that is what I expect to do.

I just couldn't imagine a warrior saying something like.. "I don't mind that a rogue can tank and take damage better than me.. I can still kill blue 2 dot mobs and sometimes my guild will even let me join them on a raid when they feel sorry for me."

I easily out dps my shaman friend and my dreadknight with my monk.  I am level 12 i use a sylvan bladestaff.  trying to find something with the parry though.  I crit and hit my finishers and no one is able to pull hate off me unless they have many skills that add hate.  Not to be an ass or anything but if you guys are having this many problems maybe your doing something wrong.  I do however agree that we need more damage as an offensive simply for survivability.  Also it would help when killing healers in pvp

It would be nice if monks are bumped to the top of dps scale, then I would completely not mind the lack of utilities.  It's probably not going to happen though, coz at some point back in beta apparently a dev clearly stated that a monk is supposed to do "baseline, and consistent damage", meaning we're supposed to be the average, with rogues doing slightly less, bards doing slightly more dmg than us, and rangers even more (something like, 90%, 110% and 120%, but i already forgot the numbers).

So we're probably destined to be the no.3 in terms of dps.

i can easily out dps a ranger the only thing i have a problem with is our pvp dps.  taking out a healer is really really hard for us even if our finishers proc a lot.  we need to be able to do enough burst dps so that they can't just heal through it over and over again.  I would like to see us not have to drain their energy completely before we can kill them.

Morgul where are you getting that you outdmg a ranger at lvl 12? Perhaos youre grouping with a Ranger with a gimped weapon,b ut that statement is just not true. Even when Monks get their form at 15, the Dragon Stance monks sometimes cant equal ranger DPS- you certainly arent doing so at lvl 12 unless the Ranger you're grouping with absolutely sucks, or youre getting the first 2-3 hits in before the ranger starts attacking.

Our animations look cooler?  :-\

Level 19 monk: -

Friend of mine which has been playing for a while mentioned that Dragon monks were awesome AE DPS, so naturally I felt inclined to follow the path since I was a monk and a bruiser in EQ2 and craved the damage scene. The class was stupid gimped there, and I'm actually rather sad to see that it's followed, although I have higher hopes that we will get love faster than anything else in the past - Hopefully.

My biggest concern is, as stated previous by others in various ways, is DPS and the lack thereof. I here two ranger guildies always talk about their 500 - 1000 damage bow shots and ability to just flatout own mobs. Now, I'm not a ranger, and don't know the combat system 150% in and out, but that blows away my 100 damage AE + 40 Dragon proc which consumes half my endurance and only rewards 1Jin. Dragon stances, I might add, are appearantly bugged. Someone mentioned before that the HP regen is broken; I know from experience that the Stone stance is utter garbage; Storm dragon stance pops out everytime I Cross a zone/Randomly, Doesn't consume the Jin it advertises(Thank god), and is stupid low damage.

As far as I have seen, I have retarded utility. A hate lower for defensive target, a taunt, and Jin Surge are the only three things I can think of right now that effect others than myself - And that's regardless of usefulness, of which there is none. I would give all three up in a heartbeat for an increase in DPS or something. FD is cool, but always fails when I need it. I'm constantly out of Jin, and it's to  the point with endurance that I can actually time the tick so well that the abilites don't have a chance to hightlight before the abilitiy fires - and that's a skill developed soley because I am always staring at the thing waiting for the tick.

 I've experimented with abilites and weakness exploits, ways to increase Jin, and various other ways to end the fight with Jin remaining. I understand that Jin was meant to be spent quickly, but damn.. it goes fast. Starting a fight out at 0 is harsh, and also nullifies the usefulness of meditate. I pretty much meditate now just to get Aum abilites, which if that's the intention is pretty lame. Jin deterioration hurts, since I have to wait between pulls for HP/Endurance because HP stance is bugged, but I can live with that in a group setting. So far the best art spam I found was boundless fist/crecent kick spam until 4 Jin, dropping an Ashen hand bomb,  maybe a little flying kick action, and repeating as needed. That's a nice way to use 10+ abilities. Beyond all I have said here, however, I can still do decent damage. Not as a much as a Bard whose buffs are amazing, and not as much as a ranger with twice my utility... heh... decent damage.

As it stands right now I am still enjoying the game a lot. I still have high hopes that this won't be another anti-monk game. As it stands at the exact moment, I hope it's all in my head, monks get better after 30, or I am necroing this thread and monks are amazic.

At least I can still brag about my aum abilties not costing silver...

What a day.

I'm definately not unhappy playing my monk, I have alot of fun and they are still good to play, even as dragon. Dont get me wrong though, they do need a decent amount of loving.

-Crit nerf definately hurt our DPS a ton. Mainly because most of our skills are triggered from crits.
-Our skills cost perhaps too much endurance; there is no gear available thus far with +endurance or anything of that sort. Alot of the medium armor we can get has +energy, but that means diddly to us.
-Our off-hand dps is terrible compared to primary. Are monks (martial artists) really that uncoordinated?

With that said, there's plenty of avenues for improvement, such as decreases on endurance use, more crits, higher base dps, haste, etc. I'm fairly certain that a large portion of the monk dps is collected later on in the game but also I'm pretty sure we will get a bone tossed our way at some point.

Definately if you are unhappy with the class and want to be able to solo well or put out mass dps, there are other classes available, however, I'm sure classes like shaman are going to get the nerf boot up their hind end. In the end I'd just recommend playing whatever class you have the most fun in.

To the OP - if you find this game not solo friendly enough , then maybe you should consider a different game, as the higher you get the less solo friendly it will be - or maybe try a new class such as the necro if you don't think you'll have the time to group more often than not .

I dont' think that's as much of an issue because the lack of dps is causing us to stink in solo, group and raid situations.

I honestly don't care. I'll solo or group.  I do what gets me from level 1 to level 50 the fastest.  Now this may change but for now at least until level 30, soloing is more efficient.  Groups are bugged, people are spread out, more solo quests and for some reason group experience is not all that great compared to soloing mobs. That's the just the way it is.  It's a viable option (probably more than they intended).

 For me and even most people in my guild.. we don't care.. we just want to get to raid level as that is what we enjoy most.  Although.. I will say you miss out if you don't group  some of the time to enjoy some good dungeon crawls. But it's not like EQ where you really needed to group 100% of the time if you wanted to advance.  At least not right now.. maybe that changes at higher levels... I don't know.

Either way, I don't want to be the best soloer.. I expect a healer to be able to kill tougher mobs easier than me but it should take em longer as they shouldn't be able to damage them as fast.   But at the same time it takes them to kill the 4 dot, I wanna be able to kill 2 mobs that are 2 dots which essentially gets me similar xp.  As of right now, not only can most classes kill group mobs efficiently, many of these classes can kill 2 dots faster than monks.  Not only can they do that, but they end the fight with mostly full hp, energy and endurance.  Monks just aren't competitive... I'll go one over that.. dragon monks are really hurting.

This effects soloing efficiency to the tune of taking twice as long as others to level solo.
This effects grouping by being much less valuable then almost every other class.

I dont' have to be the best soloer or be highest dps in groups, but don't make me the smelly kid playing with the cat turds in the sandbox. 

you say soloing is not the issue and then you right a long rant entirely about how you can't solo ....

you mentioned that soloing is probably more a viable option than they intended - well maybe they are trying to fix that , since soloing is much too easy for too many classes right now

monks are valuable to groups , and not great at soloing - so either roll another class that can solo, or do what a monk does well and group , those are your options, don't worry about what any other class can do

Sorry to burst your bubble mr deluded fanboi, but any one of the offensive fighters fill our roll in a group much better than our class. Each possess not only more dps, but much more utility than our class, granted rogues are not much better than us if at all (maybe they are worse) but bard and ranger bring more dps AND more utility. When people start to learn more about classes than just reading the manual that Sigil made (very misleading imho) you can beat monks will be invited into less and less groups.

But you know what youre right, I shouldnt complain, because its all my fault, that I paid 50 bucks + to play a game only to discover the class I wanted to be is far far far substandard, which I might add isnt my opinion but just how it is.

you must have missed the first line of my post that said  "we stink in solo, group and raid situations"

Either way, you come on here making claims about our group value without backing it up.  Instead you pull out the "if you want to solo go roll another class" routine.. how original. Have any of your own thoughts?

Please Oh Wise One... tell me how we are valuable.

1.  We do not heal.
2. We do not tank
3.  We can pull.. but no red cons (most groups are hunting red cons)
4.  We can't out damage most offensive fighters, healers, sorcerors, necros or tanks.
5.  We can't mez, snare, root or control crowds
6.  We now can't even offtank since the evasion nerf
7.  We have no utlity other than Jin surge that provides a slight increase to group damage.

The only other class in the same situation is the rogue. 

We are monks. We specialize in attacks.  Thats why almost all of our abilities are attacks.  We are offensive fighters. I expect to be an offensive fighter. That means I dont' expect to tank, heal, buff, debuff, snare, root, charm, mez, or lull.  I expect to damage.  When classes that have these other abilities do more damage than me, then I expect them to fix it.  Again, to clarify, this has nothing to do with solo ... it has to do with your role.. specifically in a group or raid.

This was not the case with monks in beta or at launch.. that's why I don't want to or shouldn't have to roll a new character.   The reason I am here talking to other monks is to see if

1. I am doing something wrong.
2.  There isn't some kind of bug (such as losing your stance when you cross a chunk)
3.  Find out if other monks have been able to find new ways to do damage
4. Hope to see a response from a Sigil Monk rep that says, yes we know, hang tight.. or we are lowering everyones damage,  bear with us.. or nope, you guys will do less damage then tanks and healers.. if that is the case then I will honor your wise advice and roll another class.

I'd like to add my 2 copper to this thread.
In EQ the monks knew a few ups and downs.
Pre Luclin, and thus pre nerf, you could see tons of monk twinks running everywhere. We monks where the kings as we could outtank and outdps allmost any other character. Post nerf, twinks where put aside, and monks became a rare sight.
All mmo will always play the up and down game to keep people playing their game : you up a class : everyone rerolls to this class. You nerf it, everyone plays another class. Well of course not everyone, but i guess you'll get my point.

When i heard about Vanguard, i had high hopes that this game could be the new EQ (in terms of pleasure i had playing that game).
Reading that the monk would be a high DPS class and still possessing the FD ability made me buy this game.

Whatever the issues we have as monks, i'll keep playing my char as i'll know that i'll be doing what i love the most in an MMO : high end raid pulling !
We have the tool, we'll have this awesome role in the future.

But as for now, i must say i'm quite disapointed.
First, i saw that Warriors had a mana bar. Sorry, energy bar. At that point i thought we would have one as monks, after all, a  monk is supposed to be trained since childhood, both mentaly and physicaly.
To my surprise, we had no mana bar, sorry energy bar.
This was the first disapointment, as i really thought every class could use all reserves (hp, end, energy). In fact i think we're the only ones not to have an energy bar (maybe the rogues dont have one too ?).
To me this is probably the first explanation of our "underpowerness". It could really be a design flaw.
It's really unfair, and illogical to have just a couple of classes that wont benefit from +energy gear or buffs.
In EQ monks had the same issue, but rogues and warriors where with us. I "loved" the way they fixed it (5 or 6 years after release) : they made all + energy items give also 50% of the energy score in endurance. While it helped us, it boosted even more hybrids.

Now we have a second issue : a lot of our special attacks are fixed damage, not base on our "white" damage value. These attacks are "ok" compared to what we currently have, but still undepowered to other melee special attacks.
But the worse is that once we'll reach higher levels, equipment will play a much higher role, and since thse sub par attacks wont scale up, they'll be even more underpowered.

The third issue, is regarding bugs. It seems most our stances are bugged (or have been nerfed), but there is also the weapon change bug (for some reason if i equip a weapon to see its effect, i keep doing damage with it even after unequiping it or even selling it, raising the skills etc ... while there are some exploits to do with this, when i try a weapon and realise it sucks, i'm even more desapointed when i HAVE to fight with it).

The fourth issue is utility, as some have pointed at we dont have a lot of usefull tools.
As i said before, we'll be the raid pullers because of our "culture" of pulling, and because FD will be needed (well i hope so). But as in EQ, we wont be used a lot for group pulling, as some classes will be chosed because they'll be able to get allmost as good results (or even better) but with 5 times less fight.
It took 5 years in EQ to get pulling tools with the addition of "lull" like effects.
I hope it'll take us less time with Vanguard.

Finaly, the Jin idea, while interesting, it has at the moment really limited usefullness. In fact, i feel like its more of some kind of limitation. Why dont we have Jin dumps like an attack that spends all your remaining Jin and does damage accordingly ? Or powers that do damage according to your current Jin etc ...
At the momement it realy feels like an unfinished feature.

I hope we'll get some kind of attention, and give a faire share of usefullness to our favourite class :)

Pretty much the nail on the head, with the exception of mez, we do get nerve strike. Depending on the situation its better then the Bard mez, since it doesnt take the player out of combat after the mez and drain anything and it lasts 30 seconds, will probably be nerfed though.

Dont get me wrong, I love my monk and I still have fun regardless, but at the current point in time, there really isnt a role for us.

No, I have no issues being outdamaged by a cleric.  Because I don't feel the need to compete with other people and measure my epeen in such methods.  I'm happy to play a monk because I like how a monk plays and I like what a monk can do.  If you don't and you're simply looking for sheer big numbers, go play a ranger.

Its people like you who lead Sigil to believe everything is all right in balance land. Being outdamaged by the best healer class in the game, with you being supposedly the "offensive/dps fighter" is just asinine, and out of balance. Just because you like to go out there and put up your substandard numbers, probably because you have a full time friend group or just because youre one of those types that could care less, shouldnt dictate how a class is balanced.

I have news for you, the game is still in its infancy, so a lot of people are still treating everyone basicly fair. However once its learned that you will be better off with certain types of classes than others, you will see some classes being snubbed for groups. Monks are going to be prime targets, simply because we dont bring enough to the table, dps wise or utility. I have personally been dropped from a group simply because they could get a ranger. I was irritated, but I said to myself why not get better dps, with some utility to boot.

I am competitive by nature, as are a lot of people who play these games, hence the reason I play on the FFA pvp server. To know that I get beat 80% of the time or more not because I suck at pvp, but because my class is holding me back gets frustrating. Being devoted to my class giving these situations should tell you I love the class and its concept and will hold out for improvements down the road.

However the last to changes to the class have been nothing but nerfs, (less crit chance, and the defensive face smack) with absolutely no enhancements. This tends to lead people who are like me, competitve, to be negitive about what we use. Why should I have to grind another 21+ levels on a class I wont like, simply because YOU are satisfied with being at the end of the pack?

Im a monk, I will play a monk to 50 and beyond, but if you think I wont bitch, complain, or otherwise be a pain in the ass to see the class I love get improvements, you will be terribly disapointed.

Yeah i liked how my monk played and what a harm monk could do.

Not anymore though.  If I cannot excel at something I'm supposed to be good at (I dont call 13% more evade at cost of 20%dps "excel"), u bet i'm going to have a problem with someone that outdamages me, wears heavy plate, AND heals.  On the other hand, i dont really think a cleric can outdamage a monk ... unless the cleric got an uber legendary weapon and the monk is using just his fists (or a stupid windblade! No point in using it now!.

Use a bladed staff, ive found they usually do the most dps, and if you avoid the +parry ones you can get some nice +hps which since we no longer have any defense, is the best option for migitating damage.

Just to take what Vaz says a step further:

Being balanced and having value is important to a lot of people and that has nothing to do with having an e-peen.

It has everything to do with being able to contribute to a group or raid.  Especially a raid where there is a 24 man limit.  To beat challenging mobs, you need the best players, playing well as a team and contributing highly.  If the guild needs dps and I'm getting outdps'd by the healer.. i will be replaced by a ranger. it's that simple.

I'm not even a hardcore raider, just someone that enjoys raiding and likes to raid 2 or 3 times a week.  In a hardcore 6 nights a week mandatory attendance guild.. they would purty much make you change class. I've seen rangers in EQ go through that gimp stage and seen guilds actually ask rangers to re-roll to rogues because they were more valuable.

What happens if I get a job at night and now have to find a late night guild... it will stink when you go to their app forum and see, recruiting open only for healers, tanks and rangers..  Sorry we are not accepting monks at this time.

My point is that it's really not about trying to impress anyone.  We aren't really competing with anyone, we are teaming with people.. to achieve a goal.   Some people might think we are taking it too seriously, but this a game like anything else and people like me take it somewhat serious... the same way I play baseball, to win.. if that means bunting for the team I do that.  All i want to do is get up to plate and have my shot to help the team.. right now I can do that but I feel like I'm bringing a broken wooden bat while everyone else is using an aluminum bat.

when i speak of class balance, i do not speak balance in the terms of everyone being able to get the same job done.  i dont mean everyone should be able to solo equally well.  i dont mean all healers should be the exact same.  what i do mean is that every class should be balanced to the point where when it comes to grouping EVERY CLASS has something to offer. 

right now the way things stand is that monks have nothing to offer that another class cant do better.  which means we are no where near balanced.  again here are the points

what do monks offer to a group...

dps .. no we are out dpsed by rogues, bards, rangers, clerics, casters... oh hell we are out dpsed by just about everyone

utility... nope we have absolutely no utility

can off tank... not anymore

we can fd pull... bards do it quicker, more efficiently, and less buggy using sleep... and let me not forget to mention that they can also slow the mob speed by 70 percent both movement speed and attack speed.. so no bards are better

so you tell me ... why would anyone chose a monk over a bard/rogue/ranger/ whoever when it comes time to form up groups

Here's something I want to show you.. it's called the gimpiness of rangers. 

For those that never played EQ.. the Ranger was a crazy class.  It was insanely overpowered at release.. everyone played a ranger.  They could almost tank as well as warriors, had great damage and even the light heals.  They finally had to do something and totally took away their defense.  After that rangers had no agro wipe, so it was common for rangers to get agro and just die right there where rogues could evade and monks could FD to loose agro.  A lot of rangers couldn't adapt and for a long time it was extremely common to see the world of EQ covered with ranger corpses.. even long after this rangers didn't do the dps of rogues and monks and had no real utility.. they were not a wanted class...

This was from EQ, originally happening over 5 years ago... yet their gimpedness is so legendary it still lives today.

http://forums.vanguardsoh.com/showthread.php?threadid=28043 (http://forums.vanguardsoh.com/showthread.php?threadid=28043)

Do you want to be the vanguard version of the ranger?

not sure if that was a reply to me or an add on to your last post. if that was a reply to me then reread... i agree the monk is gimp

Sorry Soluss, I wasn't replying directly to you at all... it was just a reply in general to those that keep claiming that there is nothing wrong with monks and claiming that we shouldn't care how we compare to other classes. 

They say we are just whining and it doesn't matter what other classes do.
They make it sound like we are somehow just wanting to get the dev's to beef us up so we can swing our e-peen.
They are making it like we are complaining only because other classes can solo better than us... then telling us to re-roll to another class that solo's well.

My contention is that it does matter how we perform compared to other classes and its an important part of a complex game for those players that intend on taking part of the challenges of difficult dungeons and raid encounters. 

When anyone brings up soloing, we are not saying that we don't solo well because of how the monk is structured. .we don't solo well because we have no defensive skills and marginal dps..which is the same thing that causes us to be poor in groups or raids.   

A few people here have offended my integrity with their overused cliche's like "go find another class"  and they try to paint a picture that I am some uniformed punk that watches kung fu movies and just wants to pwn in VG and complain that I'm not uber enough. 

That is not the case at all.  I enjoy playing MMO's.. I use to be a hardcore raider in EQ, but  not these days... I do hope to raid 2 or 3 nights a week in the future.  I started this game with a guild, with grouping and raiding in mind. 

I was in beta for several months... I played a lot of classes to the 20's:  DK, warrior, blood mage, rogue, monk, necro.. I knew exactly what a monk could do at release and I thought I knew for the most part what direction they were taking them.  I started an orc monk first day of pre-release knowing it wasn't the best solo class.. at the time knowing that the martok monk style quest was bugged, knowing dragon stance was still bugged and knowing my orc would need a ton of faction work...

Basically.. I didn't start this class looking for the easy road or thinking I had some kind overpowered solo machine.  Monks were never overpowered, that is why they are very unpopular class compared to say the ranger. 

I started this class to be valuable high dps offensive fighter that would be a benefit any group.  That's all I ask for.  And right now that is not the case.  I don't want to re-roll.. I love the concept of the class and I was even OK with it at launch when we were a little underpowered... unfortunately for some reason they hit us hard and it makes no sense when you look at what they are doing with other classes. 

Yeah maybe I am ranting and complaining.. I'm just totally disappointed and I really dont' want to re-roll because this class has so much potential to be exactly what I am looking for.

well put i agree with you 100 percent... i am in pretty much the same boat and attitude as you..except i only got beta for about 3 weeks

Pre patch, monk was fine with me, i had my 50% evasion, and my skills to control hate. For example i was a good group utility because i could take a good amount of damage, and use a skill to pull mobs off of people. A mob might run to a caster because they are nuking, i could pull it off em, and take some hits. Now after the patch, monk is well, terrible. Not only do i have SNARF for defense, but they nerfed my weapons which means i have SNARF for crits. I might crit maybe twice a fight now, as opposed to every other hit.

Im going to stick with the class, because its fun to play, but i thank god im in a guild that i have been with for the past 5 years, otherwise i would be stuck soloing, and have to rest after every single fight.

This  is indeed kinda sad :( Makes you wonder what to do. I still love my monk but I was totally unaware that Disciples also had FD and pretty much everything a monk can do + heals. Seeing our guild only has ONE blood mage also makes me wonder and groups always screaming for healers, making a lvl 14 be able to tag along a ToD group just cause there's lack of healing.

I played a monk in EQ1 and was mainpuller and I loved it. I was monk in eq2 but never got to highend before I quit. I was a priest in WoW and the grouprequest were out of this world. I played a Paladin in Daoc and that went so so, was mainly a staminabot for everyone.

So what do I play in VG? Stick with my monk? Blood mage? Disciple? I'm not the one that calls quits fast, but the thought that they just hit a homerun with our nerfbat and that it could take quite some while before ANYTHING is done kinda bothers me, bothers me quite a lot to be honest.  Any thoughts on this?

I'm pissed about the nerfs and everything, but to be fair, it has nothing to do with Disciples. We are not competing with Disciples in any manner. Their FD has a 1 minute recast and a limited duration.

Well, I have plenty of thoughts on this. If you've played an EQ1 Monk, you must know of the past record of Brad McQuaid and his evil minions. They still have a lot of nerfing to do before the game gets bland enough for his taste. Rumor is that Brad only likes 2 things: bland classes that all feel equally useless and underpowered and live puppy burgers.
Seriously, they are NOT going to have a real look at class balance before months. They are only going to nerf whatever looks overpowered from a distance and leave the players to feel sorry until expansion#4. EQ1 Ranger after release. EQ1 Paladin until Luclin. Oh, and yeah, Alchemy is not broken.

siul, yes the disciples have fd but it is nowhere near as effective as ours. the recast is like a minute on it and it is only a short term fd. as far as what do you do.... play what makes you happy.  dont worry that your guild does not really have any healers pick some up along the way.... if you enjoy playing a healer then try one out and see what you think.  but whatever you do play what you want, what makes you happy.... never play something just because its needed as it will just frustrate you to play something needed that doesnt make you happy

You should literally never be allowed to talk about monks again.

TeH CaLiBiX

Oh, and Bonz.

If you were a women I think I'd ask you to marry me. :smitten:
TeH CaLiBiX

This is advice that I give regularly. If you play a healer 'because it's needed' you are more likely to dislike the character, feel like you're grinding, resent guildmates that played what they wanted and 'stuck' you playing a healer.

Now you may find that you enjoy playing a disciple ... I personally find them an awesome class ... I'm just saying that if you play something because you feel that you 'have to' or 'need to' you are more likely to unfairly judge the class, the game, or otherwise lessen your enjoyment of your play time.

I, myself feel like the monks is a broken class. Coming from EQ2 I wanted to recreate my monk as my main, but the harsh reality of it is that my group friends would be better suited if I were to play ANYTHING else. The Monks burn through all their endurance in about 3-4 moves and if they don't get the crit to open chains you have to autoattack and wait. It's terrible right now and maybe one day they will fix it but I could actually lvl other chars much easier to keep up with my friends than I can trying to catch them with my monk.
Vandel[/size]

Just gonna throw in my 2 cents. 

I like my monk alot, even though the last patch made me a little pissed, 22%+ avoidance gone.  As a drunken monk i feel my dps is pretty decent overall if you pay attention to what your doing, weaknesses ect.  I agree with not having enough endurance, once you really start to learn the monk and get in the flow of things, you run out alot.

I really hope for something for FD also.  It's saved my ass countless times already, but failed 4-5 times ina row on higher level things.  I can only keep my self alive for so long! lol 

I'm torn here.  EQ fd was pretty awesome for surviving ALOT of mayhem, i lived through some hairy stuff in my day in EQ.   Any real monk knows what im talking about.  Just you and the wind left in NTOV, your guildmates scatered around you, lol.   :'(

On the other hand VG fd wipes aggro almost everytime, and is obviously gone or not.  Thats very very nice.  After years of having SNARF come back and chase you...lol   :tickedoff:   Thats almost worth the amount of fails, almost...   When they corpse camp you its easy to remedy, just wait for fd to refresh and tap it quick twice.  If you do it fast enough nothing re-aggros.

I guess theres really no point to this other than voicing my opinion.  Push on monk brothers( we need a raised fist emote..  )


Mac