The reason you would use a weapon over your fists  is because of the bonus the weapon gives.  Some weapons give % Parry chance, which obviously would be used in tanking situations.  Some weapons give more crit chance, which again, can be situational depending on the quality / how rare the weapon is and how much DPS it has, and whether or not it would benefit you greater than just using your fists.

I was using a Martial Staff that gave +20% Parry chance.   I used this strictly for tanking, and I definately noticed the difference in my survivabilty. Sure, I noticed the drop in my DPS, but I definately felt like I was surviving a lot longer than if I was using my bare fists and just trying to pump out as much damage as I could. 

Honestly, the best advice I can give you is to keep one of every weapon type in your inventory.  Adjust your weapons for the certain situations.  If you feel like you are surviving fairly well, just use your fists for pure damage and ownage.  If you feel like the mobs you are facing are giving you more trouble than you're comfortable with, bust out one of your +Parry or Dodge weapons.  Keep an open mind with your weapons

Is there any way to know how much dps are u doing with ur own fists?To compare it with other weapons that u might want to use...

Anyway , i have been thinking and after some time if they start patching new zones with new dungeons and usually with better gear ( better weapons,etc...) , other ppl will see their dps increasing as they get better weapons, but if we are stuck forever weaponless, how are we going to match their dps after a while ? I say this becasue i saw in another post some ppl saying that even at  40+ is still better fight with your bare fists.

well this is what they started out with in eq, but then the other classes began to complain that they needed all this armor and weapons and monks didnt need any ect ect. so they started balancing things out which meant monks took a big big hit it  in the dps and damage dept>wasnt pretty and it was pretty late in the game.

but they never upgraded the monks armor or upgraded the weapons at any great lenght so to speak ect. so im a big fan of weapons with cool graphics and some types of armor that cool for a monk.

because whats gonna happen is the monk gonna out tank the warrior and when this starts happing the doodoo gonna hit the fan. dont mean to be a doom sayer here just  rather they didnt load my fist up with tons of dps and just give us cool looking staffs an other martial arts weapons to make up the dps that way if the nerf bats HitS take it out of the weapons or the armor   some where down the line they will need to balance things out .

when they do come to this point each class will have to give up somthing i say u want less dps from a monk ok take it out of my staff or sword, you want monks take more damage?? i say ok take it out of my armor!!! but dont take dps out of my kicks or backfist dont make me take more damage by less effect dodge or my fd success rate was drooped but what ever they do i just want them to  "leave my monk "ALONE!!!!!!""


i hope im making sense guys n gals because this is very important issue for our class

hmm i need a little clarification.

 do monks lose damage from equipping claws/knuckles/hand wraps? i thought those were ideal monk hand to hand weapons.

I just switched form bare fists to dual wielding a claw and a knuckle, and I swear my crit chance seems lower now.  it sure as hell isn't higher.

As of now at level 25, I have yet to find a pair of hand wraps or a Martial Staff that beats the DPS output of the bare fists.  As I said before, the only reason I have ever used a weapon was for the added Parry / Dodge chance when tanking rather difficult mobs.