What I'd Like To See For Monk

[RSS News]

Still slightly in progress... Longer sections collapsed for readability.

Goals of Changes

• Make Forbidden Chakra / Enlightenment easier to work with and around when near to jump periods or end of combat.
• Make Anatman less annoying to use.
• Make Critical Hit not a calculation nightmare.
• Let Monk work in all compositions via Brotherhood changes (to all damage, up from just physical).
• Make Meditation scale appropriately in the presence of Deep Meditation and Deep Meditation II.
• Return some weight to Greased Lightning. This is partly an identity change and partly a QoL-minded attempt to trim its Form Shift spamming.
• In compensation, make it easier to reach higher Greased Lightning stacks from the start of combat.
• Make Form Shift and Perfect Balance a little more fluid and intuitive.
• Detach GL4 from Fists of Wind. Ideally, replace GL4 completely.
• Make Fists stances more valuable, partly by consolidating into them certain other functions that are currently lackluster or outright gimmicky or contrary to the core aspects of the job (i.e. Riddle of Earth's excessive positional skips).
• Return a burst CD to the leveling process, in this case via Internal Release.
• Still feels like we ought to have seven chakra? So I had Deep Meditation I/II increase maximum to 6/7 Chakra. Cus why not?
• (Not accomplished here) Make Tornado Kick situationally competitive with... not using Tornado Kick, at least at the end of burst CD periods with RoW ready. Though I've effectively brought back the old Riddle of Wind, it's not enough to compensate for the loss of GL4. Note that TK wasn't previously buffed; it just had its tooltip error corrected.
• (In progress) Actually tune all these suggestions just right to cost MNK about 400 rDPS, no more and no less.

Background Changes

• Critical Hit reworked as a stat. It now costs 125% per 1% increase to chance, down from 160%. Base Critical Hit damage multiplier has been increased back to +50% damage and no longer increases with Critical Hit stat. Instead all chances in excess of 100% increase the efficacy of their effects by that excess. A 120% chance to deal a Critical Hit, then, would do (100%+(50%x20%)), or 160%, damage.
• Critical Hit is thus a linear stat similar to Determination, compared to which it has identical efficiency but trades universal damage for chance with a reliable damage increase only where it tends also to most matter -- on auto-crit skills. It is always 4% less efficient, therefore, than Direct Hit (rather than starting far weaker than Direct Hit but overtaking it only at 4373 Critical Hit stat), but may better synergize with damage windows and certain jobs generally.
• Animation locks (currently generally at a fixed 38 frames of our 60-fps animations or .635 seconds) now scale with GCD speed, starting from 40 frames and decreasing to a minimum of 30 frames (.6 seconds), thereby allowing double-weaving until 1.8 seconds.
• All skills now trust that they have the conditions required to perform an action only upon the time of their actuation (release from queue). This means that as long as you still had Greased Lightning up when you hit Tornado Kick or as soon as it cleared the previous action's animation lock, it will go off; if you still had Dreadwyrm Trance up when you hit Death Flare, it will go off; if you started a spell under Thin Air or Astral Fire it will still be affected and permitted by those effects, etc., etc.

Greased Lightning

• Now falls off one stack at a time. Each time a stack falls off, the stack beneath is refreshed to full duration.
• Duration reduced to 12 seconds.
• Perfect Balance cooldown reduced again to 60 seconds.

Anatman, Brotherhood, and Tornado Kick

• Anatman now ticks instantly and then once per player GCD, rather than following the server tick.
• Tornado Kick now delays its GL cost until slightly after its maximum animation time has completed. This just makes it a bit easier to weave around.
• Brotherhood now affects all sources of damage.

Forms, Form Shift, and Perfect Balance

• Forms again last only 10 seconds, as per any other combo or combo step.
• Form Shift now instead offers access to skills belonging to a further stance until one’s next weaponskill, rather than shifting from one to stance to another, granting either Simian Slight, Raptor’s Flight, or Coeurl’s Might. These may stack together, each lasting 10 seconds in combat. While out of combat, their durations do not fade.
• At level 52, Monks also gain access to the trait, Formless, which causes the effects of Form Shift to occur automatically when out of combat without incurring the global cooldown, starting a global cooldown after combat has ended advancing with each GCD's time until reaching access to all three forms. The durations of these added forms do not fade until entering combat.
• Perfect Balance will now grant Simian Slight, Raptor’s Flight, and Coeurl’s Might at the end of its duration, allowing access to any form for their next hit within 10 seconds.

Chakra/Meditation

• The Forbidden Chakra and Enlightenment will now consume all available chakra, dealing 75 and 45 potency per Chakra consumed, respectively. This can be used at any point from 1 to maximum Chakra.
• Meditation and The Forbidden Chakra still remain attached to each other by default, changing Meditation into The Forbidden Chakra at 4* or more Chakra, but manually adding The Forbidden Chakra to your hotbars while Meditation/TFC is already present will decouple the two skills. *Increases to 5 and 6, respectively, with the maximum Chakra increase.
• If Meditation and The Forbidden Chakra are already separated, Enlightenment will bind to The Forbidden Chakra by default, to be used when two or more targets are within its line of attack. These, too, can be separated by manually adding Enlightenment to your hotbars.
• Deep Meditation and Deep Meditation II now also affect Meditation itself, granting its chance times your Critical Hit chance to generate a second Chakra.
• Meditation recast time will now always be equal to 50% of a GCD, rather than a fixed 1.2 seconds.
• Meditation can no longer be used outside of combat, but at level 54 (the level at which Meditation is acquired) Monk also gains the trait, Mind and Body, which causes the Monk to gain a point of Chakra every half-GCD when out of combat, as if Meditation were being used immediately and continuously but without triggering the global recast time.
• Deep Meditation now also increases the maximum chakra count to 6. Mind and Body can still only fill up to 5 Chakra.
• Deep Meditation II now also increases the maximum chakra count to 7. Mind and Body can still only fill up to 5 Chakra.
• The Forbidden Chakra and Enlightenment may again be used regardless of combat state. The awkward and unnecessary combat-check delay has been removed.

Improving Upon "Fists" Stances

• You can no longer be without a stance.
  
  Once Fists of Earth is acquired, it will be activated automatically then and each time you swap to Pugilist/Monk and cannot be turned off. Fists of Earth won't even take up a hotbar space until you acquire Fists of Wind, unless you manually add it to your hotbars.
  When you acquire Fists of Wind, it will replace Fists of Earth as the default stance and you will have a single hotbar slot by which to swap between the two stances, though you can add the other manually.
  Once you acquire Fists of Fire, Fists of Wind will remain the default stance but you will have two hotbar slots by which to swap to Fire or Earth. Once swapping to either, that slot will be replaced by Fists of Wind. You may, again, place Fists of Fire into your hotbars manually to break this coupled functionality.​
• Fists of Earth, Wind, and Fire now each have shorter animation locks and their shared recast time has been reduced to 1.5 seconds, down from 3 seconds.
• Fists of Earth revised: "Reduces damage taken by 10%*."
• Fists of Wind: "Increases Movement Speed by 10%* and Attack Speed by 5%."
• Fists of Fire: "Increases your damage dealt by 5% and causes you to generate healing equal to up to 10%* of your damage dealt based on your missing HP." *Healing effect diminishes between 25% and 75% HP, from the full conversion factor at 25% HP or less to half that at 75% or more.
  
  
• Mantra "Grants effect to self and party members within 10 yalms based on current stance. Fists of Earth effect: Reduces damage taken by 10%. Fists of Wind effect: Increases movement speed by 15%. Fists of Fire effect: Increases healing taken by 15%."
• New trait at level 46, Elements Within: "The Damage Reduction provided by Fists of Earth, the Movement Speed provided by Fists of Wind, and the Healing provided by Fists of Fire now increase by 5% per stack of Greased Lightning. Shoulder Tackle now gains additional effects based on current stance.
  
  (Fists of Earth) Steel Peak: "Stuns the target for 2 seconds, ignoring diminishing returns and generating 5 seconds of Earth's Reply. Reuse on the same target within 3 seconds to knock back the enemy 10 yalms or, failing that, knock self back 10 yalms."
  (Fists of Wind) Riddle of Wind: "Generates a charge of Greased Lightning and a portion of Twisting Winds. Reuse to consume Twisting Winds. Once Fists of Fire effect: Marks the enemy with Searing Fists, causing 10% of Damage dealt to the enemy to be stored over 3 seconds."
  (Fists of Fire) Red Lotus: "Marks the target with the Red Lotus, which duplicates and stores 10% of your damage dealt to the target for up to 10 seconds. Damage stored by Red Lotus at any point in time rapidly fades over 5 seconds. When the duration ends the damage stored will be dealt, and 50% of that damage will additionally be dealt to all enemies near the target. Reuse to end Red Lotus early.​
• At level 66, Earth's Reply is replaced by Elements Within II:" Fists of Earth gains Earth's Reply. Fists of Wind gains Twisting Winds. Fists of Fire gains Heart of Fire."
  
  • Fists of Earth: Generates Earth's Reply for a duration based on the damage absorbed*. Earth's Reply Effect: Increases the potency of your weaponskills at an amount based on remaining duration, to a maximum of 80 potency. This bonus potency does not stack with the bonuses provided through positioning, but may exceed and thereby temporarily replace them. Use of this bonus potency further drains the effect's remaining duration based on the potency granted used**. While Earth's Reply duration remains, Greased Lightning cannot end. Earth's Reply duration fades twice as quickly and its duration costs are doubled when outside of Fists of Earth.***"
    *This damage will be compared the %HP available at the minimum ilvl to attend the instance in each slot. Leveling dungeons use a mock-minimum item level.
    **Use from the proper position does not drain Earth's Reply unless Earth's Reply granted more effective potency than the positional could provide, in which case it only costs the difference between the two.
    ***This includes via the duration cost per action.
  • Fists of Wind: Your weaponskills and offensive abilities generate Twisting Winds. Twisting Winds effect: something, something recast times. IN PROGRESS.
  • Fists of Fire: Your damage dealt generates a proportionate value of Heart of Fire. Heart of Fire effect: something, something "activate this" to be allowed to generate %damage on each hit, consuming resource, while generating potency increases over downtime, including simply being able to clip skills at little to no cost due to that downtime bonus. IN PROGRESS.
• Riddle of Fire has been effectively replaced again with Internal Release, gained at level 22, which increases your Critical Hit chance by 40% (and thereby Bootshine auto-crit damage by 15%) on a 90-second cooldown. This would nominally equate to a 20% damage increase, whether to Bootshine or any other skill due to the Critical Hit changes, but has further synergy with the Deep Meditation system. The actual "Riddle" component of Riddle of Fire is replaced instead with the constantly available bonus resources from the various stances.
• At level 72, Enhanced Fists of Fire replaced by Elements Within III: "Passively generate Earth's Reply, Twisting Winds, and Heart of Fire. Each no longer fade or are consumed at an increased speed when outside of their relevant stances. Damage Reduction generated by Fists of Earth, Attack Speed granted by Fists of Wind, and Damage granted by Fists of Fire each increased by 5%." Thus, your maximum damage bonus will be 40% (50% with Twin Snakes), but your maximum Attack Speed will be 25%, and maximum Defense will be... 30%.
• The level 78 trait, Riddle of Wind has been replaced with Move as Lightning: "You will now benefit from half the effectiveness of Fists of Earth, Fists of Wind, and Fists of Fire even when not in their respective stances." Thus, you can have +25% Attack Speed, +35% Damage, and +15% Mitigation in Fists of Wind; +40% damage, +20% Attack Speed, and +15% Mitigation in Fists of Fire; or +30% Defense, +35% Damage, and +20% Attack Speed in Fists of Earth.
  Fists of Fire and Fists of Wind will both be of high use depending on future macrorotational sync (via Twisting Winds) and incoming oGCDs (due to the Attack Speed bonus not affecting oGCDs and Heart of Fire). Fists of Earth should be used just before raid damage if needed in order to ignore positionals. Fists of Earth is also technically the strongest skill for a regular Bootshine, as the up to 80 added potency can far exceed the 5/10% bonus of Fists of Fire.

Making Positionals Matter Again / Smoothing Potency values

• Bootshine potency increased to 160. This gives it a smoother positional value of 80, in light of the Critical Hit changes.
• Twin Snakes potency reduced to 130/170.
• Snap Punch potency reduced to 180/220.
• Dragon Kick potency reduced to 140/180.
• Leaden Fist potency reduced to 240, a difference of 80. It thus matches the normal positional difference and the normal critical value. Both the positional and Leaden Fist will each increase Bootshine potency by 50%. Together, they therefore increase it by 125%, worth always and exactly 200 potency given the Critical Hit changes. A DK-Bootshine combo thus deals 500/540 potency versus the 480 of two normal critical Bootshines, a difference of 60.
• Demolish potency remains 70/90. This is the only skill that maintains a low positional priority, largely to free up positioning just a bit. Most positionals will vary by 40, while Bootshine will vary by 80 (double), Leaden Fist by 120 (triple) and Demolish by 20 (half).
  
• NOTE: These positionals are being returned to importance only because you also will have a constant +20% to +40% Movement Speed at GL3 in Fists of Wind or after reaching the Move as Lightning trait, atop also benefiting from Earth's Reply (half of it without even needing to change stances after reaching Move as Lightning) to skip positional requirements. So, again, you now move faster and have unlimited access to Riddle of Earth via Fists of Earth, just in much smaller duration increments and at brief cost to 5% damage. Using Fists of Earth to absorb massive damage just before a Bootshine or Leaden Fist Bootshine, moreover, is now a damage bonus.
  
  That is to say, we'll again have by far the most positioning, but we'll also have the most means by which to allow for that. We have positional bypasses, just as actual snap-mitigation rather than as a CD, and we have super-seiyen speed to zip around from front to back. It's a good time to be a Monk, even with positionals for more than just a third of the time.

Continue reading...