Vanguard Monks

I read on the Test Server Patch notes that Reed in the Wind is going to have it's "intended" 2 minute cooldown timer added. In the off chance that a developer actually reads this, I would recomend not changing it from what it currently is.

I do agree that on first glance it does seem to be over powered, but if you really look at everything you have to give up to spam this ability you will notice that there is very small net benefit to the monk and changing it to a 2 min cool down would mean I would never use it.

First off, it's only 12 sec buff with a huge cost of 40% endurance. The endurance cost is what keeps it from being overly exploited as if you are attacking normally you will not be able to spam this ability cause you won't be able to meet the endurance cost. You lose DPS to be able to Counter-attack kill a mob.

Since the only use for this buff is to counter-attack that means your tanking at the moment, In a group scenario your DPS is cut way down and you will have to be spamming your agro atttack which cost Jin and Counters don't add jin back so at best you are throwing in your 2 jin kick every refresh to maintain your endurance to keep up RitW permanently through a fight. Chains are not really feasable because that eats up your endurance. Lower DPS means harder time holding AGRO to remain able to counter attack. In Solo scenarios, great I can barely survive the green/blue 3 dots that would have out right killed me. I can still kill deep red 2 dots easier solo for more XP than almost grey 3dots without using RitW so not sure why it may be thought as over powered unless it may be Tank classes complaining?!?!


If it gets changed as stated at best, I die 12 secs later  at the cost of maybe ending the fight 12 seconds earlier with a big chain finiher cause now I am waiting to click my greyed out button waiting for endurance to regen. Even then, if the "fix" goes through then just becomes another rarely used emergency type attack that after you died you think, crud I could have used that worthless buff and maybe we would not have wiped but I always forget about it cause it is so worthless.


Please think the whole process through before you abitrarliy change what now is an interesting buff to what will be just another useless placeholder on my hotbar.



Soulfyst
42 Drunken Monk

It feels wierd that Iron Skin (mitigation equal of it) wasen't noticed to be missing it's intended 2 min reuse. 10 minutes feels a weeee bit long as it dosen't offer any perfect immunities of any kind.

reed the wind was basically just a really great soloing ability monk had that helped up become up to par with other classes for soloing, that most of us will just remove off our bar now (along with SEVERAL other useless monk abilities) OR keep in that out of the way spot incase we take too much aggro in a party (hah, if thats ever even a problem considering our classes state...)

a 30 second refresh I could deal with. maybe 1 minute I guess I might keep it on my bar. 2 minute timer to dodge 1-3 attacks and maybe counter attack 1-3 times max? lol. as if that will be any good for any particular purpose anymore....

Why don't the dev's just remove these abilities to save memory in the games code?

I agree.  It's not really worth using now with this change.  Back to being a gimp solo'r again.

I had been trying to get this skill before the patch, but no matter how many times I observed it from the spiders by TK, I never actually learned it. Today I logged in to check out the new monk stuff, and its in my skill list (didn't have it last time I played)

Tried it, and wasn't impressed. 10sec 2min refresh. Yay. I got hit once and dodged twice during that 10sec. While soloing I'm pretty sure I dodge 2 times in a row often in a 2min timeframe, without the buff.

I can't see a real use for this ability. If I get aggro grouping, I'd rather FD. I don't see the use in it for soloing anymore, seems like a waste of end. If someone does see a use for it let me know, I'm tired right now, and it just doesn't compute.

the patch note should've read:

Monk - Reed in the Wind actually turned out to be a fairly useful for the Monk class and brings them up to par solo wise with other classes, so we've added the intended Monk nerf to make sure they continue to suck.

This is actually one of my many reasons for finally quitting my monk.

The change to Reed in the Wind was a COMPLETE slap in the face from Sigil and I don't care how "intended" the reuse timer was.

We are so messed up even still (especially defensively) and when we finally accrue one ability that HELPs us on the defensive front, it's nerfed to the point of being near useless.

Screw all these attacks and abilities on long timers, for all classes. It makes the game boring and mundane. I don't think anyone feels like watching over 15 different abilities waiting for them to become active again only having to say "Hey should I really waste me 5 second duration skill now?" or not.

It's a dumb concept to begin with.

40% END cost kept the skill balanced, the reuse timer made it useless.

Probably the second or third largest reason why I've quit.

Don't think you're a tank and the change won't bother you.  Having played both a monk and a healer, I find healing one person alot easier then 2 because one is trying to offtank.  Something runs towards the healer, stick the aggro back on the tank, thats what goading slap is for.  Off tanking is a phantom role, it doesn't exist.

While the majority of users on this site would disagree with the "phantom offtanking" statement, I actually generally agree.

Offtanking in MMO's is generally situational at best and far below what I would call "important."

There theoretically should be no offtanking as it is the most inefficient form of CC.

Given that so many classes in Vanguard are capable of CC, offtanking should and is in my opinion irrelevant.

Monks should be doing hard damage and Reed of the Wind is needed to aid soloing and the very slight scenarios in which a bit of off tanking is needed.

Clearly you hvae not visited the numerous zones that are immune to all forms of CC (mez, root, snare, fear, etc.) and off-tanking is the only option =P. This is when DK/War/Pal's get picked over monks for dps slots in groups.

Exactly. When CC is not available, you get another tank. Not a monk.  :'(

But then it's not off-tanking, it's regular tanking. See my point?

Heh.

Regardless, Monks cannot take hits, and if they're intended to "off-tank," whatever that may actually be in Vanguard, they're not capable of doing it now especially.

I tank, off-tank and solo all the time, thats why I play a drunken monk and not a dragon. And I don't understand the "we can't pull agro" comments either. with Zank at 43 in greystone with bard in group and fully buffed I was contiually hitting chains of 15K to 22K, I guarentee I can pull agro from damage alone. Goading slap is a joke cause it has a reuse timer. And best I have been able to tell, FD does not wipe agro, as soon as I pop back up I am back at top of agro unless I stay down long enough for a Tank to pass my hate. So now I either have to skip the big chains or hold them to later in a fight.

My whole original post is kinda moot since they removed the timer from our other single use Dodge buff and you can just as easily hotkey and spam that. That being said, from a Drunken monks perspective, I do not understand at all what the point of our patch was. The only benefit was the higher mend err Ignore Pain. Every other skill that was "upgraded" had some kind of negative effect added to it. My main DPS stance had the agro removed, I got a 1% increase to damage and then an -8% mitigation added to it? wth!! skills were increased in power or time but then had greater cooldown timers or negative effects added. The net effect for the whole patch was nagative for drunken monks.

I still enjoy my monk and it is the only class I am interested in playing. I just don't understand the thought process being used to modify skills or playstyle. Good things are redundant and bad things are exponentially bad. They need to pick a system then stick with it, if we are going to timers then add endurance to the game, if endurance is going to be the limiting factor to skills or playstyles then remove all timers, let me choose whats most important. As it is currently, I can't tell which way to play patch to patch.

Soulfyst
45 Drunken Monk
Shidreth

I, as a Dragon monk, even MT most of the time, due to an overall lack of panzers on our server (in the areas I visit, at my level, during my playing times). All it takes is for a healer to get to know how you play for an hour or so, for you to adjust your Ignore Pain and - in my case - Fury of Ghaln to their mana/endurance regen rates and heal timers. Single pulling in the open is no problem where I go. A well-aimed Shuriken or a FD + Nerve Strike pull will ensure you have 1 or 2 when you would have 2 or 3. Even in the case of 3, I draw decent aggro on damage alone (in Magnificent Storm Dragon stance)

Tanking might not be our core business, but we're not terrible at it. We are in my opinion a liability when doing so, because we're avoidance tanks when we do. That results in damage spikes even the best of healers struggle to keep up with. That also means tanking more than one red mob will get you and/or several others killed. Our mitigation is no better than a ranger or bard's.
RitW on its original "non-intended" timer meant we could decrease the amount of damage spikes, ensuring greater survivability and thus reliability for not only ourselves, but groups that might depend on us. It gave us a compensation for the fact that FD hardly works when you need it.
At the cost of 40 Endurance, this should never have been intended at 2 minutes re-use. It should have been 40 Endurance, period, for reasons listed by Soulfyst.
Or, possibly, 40 Endurance and a 20 sec reuse, so even at the highest rank we wouldn't be able to chain it - 13 secs duration if I have my facts straight. 40 Endurance still means you're sacrificing DPS and thus aggro and spending copious amounts of time doing nothing but staring at the little green bar.
The scenario I'd like the least is switching it to 30 END and a reuse time of 30 seconds, but at least in that scenario it would be moderately useful while not overpowering. Anything below that is unacceptable without further compensation in the fields of either mitigation or avoidance - creating multiple ranks of Iron Skin would be an idea, starting at about the same level as RitW.

At 30, I solo'd a 22 4-dot with RitW I in its original state, and it STILL took me all the uses of Ignore Pain I could squeeze out, my racial ability and very, very close Endurance and Jin monitoring. I've seen Necromancers solo these exact same mobs at level 25 and coming out with half their mana bar intact. I feared for my life every single second of the fight, which is how soloing a four dotter should feel, IMO.
Then how, by any invokable deity, is what we could do unbalanced? Don't give me FD as an answer, since they have it. Don't give me self heal, because they can do it, and then some. Don't give me fragile, because without RitW I could maybe take 6 punches from that grey mob if I was lucky. Don't give me... oh right, almost forgot we didn't have fear and snare abilities or an abomination that can take a couple of punches for us and dish out damage. ???