Hi all,
I'm currently level 27, and duo (or dual box) with a disciple.
We like making exp in dungeons and we do a lot of work in pulling singles (since 2 4 dots could get us soo killed).
I went in Pantheon of the ancients, and crossed these huge walking statues, followed by 3 scarabs.
At first, couldnt get them splited, but finaly managed to get the 3 scarabs without the big one.
Whatever i did, the 3 scarabs where comming together.
Untill i managed to really get them separated from a long distance.
I managed to get each scarab solo (with some work, and of course nerve strike.
So i'll now try to check what distance is needed to split mobs that are "supposed" to be linked and just happen to have huge social aggro.
Anyone could confirm that there are no linked mobs ?

Thanks fujitsu
Some friends told me to skip the tomb, and go for the hunter's league quest.
I'm currently doing the URT series at the moment, but it seems quite fast to do so should i go for the hunter's league when i finish the URT or go for the lord's tomb ?
And by the way, the duo monk + disciple you recommended is awesome, the disciple has a nice complement of dps, and their HoT and instant heals are perfect to heal a monk imho.

Hi all,
I've seen a guide to get a yellow parrying sword in Lord Tsang Tomb, but from what i've read, i would need a key to access the tomb.
I cannot find any guide to it.
Anyone could give me some tips to get it ?
Do i need faction with Martok to get the key or the sword ?
Is it duoable with a disciple ?
At what level could i start the quest series ?
How many game hours should it take to make the quest ?
Thanks for any info

Hi all,
After a looong break from VG (actually i played just a month or two after release) i'm coming back since some irl friends are having a good time in game.
I was going to play either DK or War, but i think i'm going to stay true to my first love with EQ that is : Monk.
I'm looking for a few advices to start up again.
First i'm going to play with my girl friend, she've played WoW with me and will be playing a healer.
We'll be duoing 99% of the time since i'll get scorched if i play without her ^^
So what healer class would work best with a monk ?(and we would like the same starting area)

Second, i hope joining the raiding sphere once i'll hit 50, i was wondering if monk FD pulling was working and/or required or if other classes where better at pulling (for dungeon situations or raid situations).
If they are really usefull, what monk path would be best suited for a puller ?

Third regarding weapons, what should i aim for ? unarmed ? hand to hand weapons (claws/ulaks) or two handed (martial sword, staff etc ?). Also, from what i saw, the raw DPS on these weapons is always lower than a comparable weapon for other classes. Is there a "hidden" bonus for monks or something ?

Fourth, what stats should i focus on ? I remember when i started EQ everyone said go Str agi and dex, untill they realised it was useless and instead to focus on stamina. Everyone seem to say Con is useless atm, but from some comments i've read regarding raids, people seem to think con is very usefull.
So ? what should i aim for ? regardding stats ?

And lastly, i know that this will be totaly subjective, but do you guys think it's worth playing a monk currently in VG, knowing that i like to be in charge of the pace of combat like i was with a monk in EQ and a war in Wow.
If i only have a DPS role with a monk, i'll be frustrated.(i'm talking here at level 50, as if i like VG i'll play a longer time at 50 than the sum of the playtime i had at every other level.)

Thanks for any answers

Thanks for the answers


How do you do that just inser the disks and install again ?
I'm quite confused
Even with lowest config you're having huge lag ?

Hi all,
I was wondering if anyone of you had managed to dual box on the same computer ?
I dont find the way to have two instances of vanguard launched on the same computer (with 2 different accounts of course).

Olso, what duo would be the best in dual boxing with a monk ? (i know that "best" and "monk" in the same sentence is quite strange but eh, i just dont want to play something else ^^)

Any help would be appreciated

I'll add my 2 copper for this thread :
- Our lack of an energy bar isnt compensated by Jin uses. Even rogues get an energy bar, and us monks, witch are supposed to be the most "mystical" of the non caster classes, we dont have any. This is a built in flaw that will cripple us unless we get some huge compensation.

- Damage reduction for monks is allmost non existant. As we get a few "tanking" abilities, we should be given some kind of survavibility to use them. Avoidance has always been unreliable, unless you can scale up to like 50%. I'd prefer to have 20% mitigation and 0% avoidance than 30% avoidance and 0% mitigation, because i know i wont get bursted and killed with a few lucky shots. So either raise our avoidance by a large margin (but with a mechanism that dont allow us to build too much aggro, like lowering our hate each time we avoid an attack, else we'll suplant tanks) or raise our mitigation. A Sorcerer with same quality gear of same level will have a better mitigation than a monk since he get massive self mitigation buffs.

- The dragon stance "fix" we had since last patch is ugly : i would rather have a stance that doubles natural hp regen than a self invis that wont add a lot to both survavibility or utility.

I've updated the original post.
I'll try to update it more as we get consistent issues.

1) No energy. This is really a big issue, as we gain nothing from +wis or +energy items. Other classes can use their HP, End and energy bar, 3 ways to act and react, we loose one mean of action.
Possible Fixes :
- Give us an energy bar, and powers based on energy.
- Make that non energy users transform +energy into +end with some kind of ratio (maybe 4 to 1 or something).

2) Broken procs. Secret of fire, secret of ice, or one of the dragon stance are supposed to proc, but they seem to be really buggy or proc once every 100 hits or so ...
Possible fixes :
- Fix it
- Raise the proc ratios.

3) Jin uses. Jin has really little uses, and could live with some new abilities based on it.
Possible fixes (mutually non exclusives) :
- New abilities more usefull than a basic attack or a mediocre buff.
- Jin dump skill : like execute for wariors in wow : spend all your current Jin to do X damage/jin point spent.
- Jin stance scaling with number of jin points stored. (like 1% dodge or 1% damage or 1% haste per current jin, like bards and their stances.)

4) Our abilities arent based on weapon damage. When you first get them they are already sub par compared to a good equiped offensive fighter ability, but once you level up or you upgrade your weapons, it stays at the same level.
Possible fixes :
- Raise all the base damage of our abilities by a fair margin
- Make our abilities based on our weapon damage.

5) Even if we are supposed to be also pullers (our utility that we pay with much lower dps) we only have 1 skill with 2 level ups to pull : Feign Death. From the point of view of some higher level monks, FD seems to be quite buggy or resisted a lot.
Possible fixes :
- Fix FD or reduce the resist chances.
- Give us pull tools like a lull kind of spell, some limited sneaking to reduce our aggro range.

6) Our weapon skills are messed up. Sometimes i keep hitting my ennemy with the sword i sold 2 hours aggo.
Possible fix :
- Fix this as this is a bug, when hitting with my fists i shouldnt get martial staff upgrades or two handed slashing.

That's all for now, hope you guys will find other ideas, and correct me too

This kind of posts have been quite popular and usefull in a lot of games :
So here it is, the "monk community" list of issues and suggestions, since we these forums are the only monk specific forums, i guess we could have some kind of legitimity.
I propose to list the top 10 consensual issues on monks and possible fixes.
Go on, shoot your proposal, i'll update the post (or mods feel free to take the lead on this post) to keep it up to date.

Issues :
1) Feign Death :
The ability seems definately broken. Fix the mobs camping the monk's corpse. Resist rates are also way too high versus higher level mobs. It should be skill based, or have a modifier to resists.

2) Itemisation :
Monk weapons are useless at the moment. Ulaks/knuckles/claws lower the fist dps, witch make no sense. Make theses weapon give +dps to the unarmed damage ratings, or at least, since only monks and disciples can use them, make them on par with the unarmed damage of the equivalent level.

3) Stances :
Monk stances are either bugged or if designed as such are clearly an obstacle. It seems that at the moment they are more of a hindrance than anything, actualy lowering dps. Some dont work at all (like the hp regen stance) other remove more than they give. The stances need a complete revamp.

4) Energy :
As All classes have energy and thus can add dps/utility through endurance AND energy, monks will necessarely lagg behind those classes. We dont get anything from +energy items, and really little from int/wis compared to other classes. Give us an energy bar and abilities according, or make that +energy items add to endurance in some way or another, but just for non energy classes.

5) Avoidance :
The avoidance nerf has hit us hard. It was our only way of lowering incoming damage. As it is now, our avoidance is really marginal, we cannot rely on it. We need a large raise in avoidance, or in reduction to damage in some way.

6) Counters :
We get a lot of counters, but are really not worth it. The activation time is too low, the endurance cost is to high, and the damage is even lower than our normal special attacks. Since the avoidance nerf, our counters are even less usefull as we cant trigger them, nor can we decently put ourselves in a position of tanking. This also needs a full revamp.

7) Overall DPS :
Most classes have their damage scale with their weapon damage, sometimes inflicting X% of the normal damage + modifier (X being > 100). Our attacks are either based on 100% of our damage, or dont depend on it at all. If we are supposed to be a dps class, we need our special attacks (and/or our normal ones) to have much higher dps in order to stay on par with other offensive fighters.

I'll add more issues as we get more feedback from the community.

Thanks Dojo, for the reply and for the welcome
Sorry for the long post, i'm just bored at work, and i hope it'll please a few fellow monks to have something to read ^^

Hi Negumi !
Great link, and excellent work on this database.
If i may, i'd like to suggest a few improvement to have a more convenient database :
- Better search selection : you can search an item by name, but not a creature. I think it could be usefull to have that functinality. Also, having more search criteria lists for items, like choosing a slot, a rarity and a type (heavy/medium/light) etc ...
- I hope you're planning to link loots to mobs to quests, so that we know who drops what. Also it would be nice to have quest chains.

Anyway, i'll gladly install the client this evening

Thaks again, keep the good work

Hi all, please let me introduce myself :
I am Zerathule, an Orc monk on Gelenia.
In my past lives, i was Zerathule, Iksar Monk on EQ's Tholuxe Paells and later Antonius Bayle Server, for more than 5 years (from kurnark to pre GoD).
I was also Starhack, Troll Skald in Daoc, Flamycogyre a Fire Blaster in CoH, Tyler a dwarven warrior in WoW, and many more.

I started my mmorpg "career" with a barbarian rogue in EQ, and by my level 13 i was exploring the depth of Blackburrow. Exploring the place, i fell through a hidden pit in some unknown place. Anyway i started to kill some gnolls wondering how i could manage to come out. Then from the top of the pit, i saw a naked human jumping down taking allmost no damage, he aggroed 5 mobs, and started to kill them with his bare fists. So with courage, i rushed in the battle thinking i could help. But before he could see me, i miserably died, letting me with 5 mobs on me.
At that moment i knew i would be dead, but to my biggest surprise, the man stood up and started punching and kicking, but eventually they where too many and i died.
He sent me a message beging for forgivness, but i did not understood : i knew the risks, but died. He told me he could have FD before and thus i would not have taken the train. I didnt understood everything at that time, but basicaly, this guy could just kick some arses, literally, and when things would go bad, just fake his own death.

This is when i created, Zerathule Milleetunemorts (a Thousand and one Deaths in french), an Iksar monk.
For monthes i explored norath, made the trip to freeport and Qeynos at level 14, learning how to bank in a KoS town, exploring most of norath's dungeon. I choosed my surname at level 20, and i'm pretty sure i had already died more than 1001 times ...
Anyway, my first true monkly experience came from grouping 3 times in a row with the same Pick up group.
In Cazic Thule (before the revamp), we where clearing th 4C area (or pyramid, 4C standing for 4 corners).
We were killing stuff. Yep that's it. I had no idea where i was, what i had to do, or just what other did. Until that day, the game was just to kill stuff.
But someone said at some point "Hey you're the monk, go pull !". After a few questions (i'm french, and i'm not totaly fluent in english) i understood i had to bring mobs to the group.
Easy !
We did the 4 corners quickly and easyly (and we had an amazing enchy because at these levels chain mezzing 4 or 5 yellow/red mobs was awesome) until we ran out of mobs.
We waited, but then i said, brb, i'll get mobs.
So i went to the top of the pyramid, flip flopping my way up (i had no grouping experience but soloed in dungeons, i learned this quickly), and once at the top, aggroed a guard, ran and jumped over the pyramid's walls ...
So we got like 20 mobs on our arses and died.
I learned that day what pulling meant.
I mean "true" pulling.(i'm not pretending to be an expert, just meaning that i learned the principles).
Anyway, i had monthes of experience practicing (all around norath) until as i approached the level 45.
My guild (yeah i was guilded in the only french speaking guild of the server, allied to the only german speaking guild) was regulary talking about "raids". I imagined this was some kind of race or something (because they where quite speedy on the guild chat) but never truely imagined what it was.
So on a morning before such a raid, and before going to work, i dingued 46. The guild leader applauded and said "great ! our monk wont be there tonight, make some exp so that you dont delevel in PoH and you'll pull for us."
Ok that was chineese for me, but as usual i replied "Ok ! Np !"
During that work day, i recieved a mail of a friend linking me to some website (allakhazam) and he told me how great it was (he was even more clueless about EQ than i was at the time ^^).
So i spent my whole day on the web (i love my work ^^), until i found monkly-business ...
That was a shock !
I read everything i could on raid pulling, and printed everything on PoH, and realised that i was in a trouble.
I left at 4 pm (i really love my job ^^) so i could make a few bubs of exp.
That night changed my gaming experience : with 23 fellow raiders, we cleared the first floor (we had 1 level 60 mind you ^^) up to 1 am. We wiped once due to a wall aggro bug (DON'T JUMP !!! DON'T TOUCH THE WALLS !!! ^^) but i finished with just a half blue bub of exp in my level 46 (one more death and i would have been stuck and could not get my corpse back).
From that day, i went from a clueless casual monk, to a hardcore wannabe aware of his limits monk.

To remind me, and i hope to remind you readers all those moments, lets have a quick tour of what was the best game experience i had as a monk.
Killing contests : running with my pull team (my "disciple" monk in training, a rogue and a druid) and playing who'll kill who during raid downtimes.
Vindic races, building your aggro with javelins on vindic while the raid was buffing.
Old content rushing, going with a few friends in ToV, sleeper's or Trakky giving the loot to a newbie guild chain wiping.
The netiquette and reputation in EQ, where everyone could know everyone through various contacts, knowing that bad players would not last long since they would be flagged instantly agter a scam attempt.
Corpse runs in the old planes, be it when we where lowbies, or later when i was paid to do CRs for small guilds.
The whistling fists quest run on the MB boards, when everyone was progressing as fast as they could to finish the quest but still giving all their infos and thus having the greatest community experience i ever witness as we solved the quest in just a few days.
Vex Thal chicken runs to camp mage alts for CoHs all over the place.
Vindic/AoW ogre/barb checkers with stupid names (Icheck, Vindiccheck, Aowcheck, Mychecker etc ...) level ones running naked all over Vindic/AoW spawn places.
Camping Raster ! err no that wasnt so good  (well it took me 2 housr for raster, 2 weeks for targin the rock, but 6 monthes for the pawduster !!!)

Ok that was good memories.
If Vanguard can provide me as much as 50% as much fun, i'll really be satisfied

Zerathule Encoremort, Orcish Monk of Gallenia.

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