Combination... >:[

[psubull]

<div></div>I have to rant about how useless and frustrating this AA is.  I'm respeccing off of it until it's made useful and recommending everyone else do the same, and here's why.The attack sounds neat.  A free, 100% chance to hit attack that is instant.  The drawbacks?  You have to use a punch, kick and a jab within about two seconds.  If you don't, you fail, try again.  All that for a whopping 300 extra damage... once every minute...In essence, we have another rumbling wyrm, but this one has a 10% headache increase for the duration of the game session.I commented daily in beta that the skill was so underpowered that it was borderline useless, and that it would be treated that way come launch.  Others did too.  We got it changed to remove the cast timer.  And they also added in a (horrible) chance for it to strike 2 or 3 times.  Whoopies!  Watch out parse, incoming monk!!!! /endsarcasmEDIT:  Another thing I forgot to add in the post originally is that if you're lagging, or the zone is lagging, you will NEVER get to use combination.  The timer will always expire by the time the game makes you trigger it, thus the skill is just a wasted AA point.Something has to be done to make this worth the AAs spent in bad CA upgrades.  Not to get off topic, but it's almost as stupid as the range increase on dragonbreath (Unwanted adds?  INC)Here's a few ideas I had:<ol><li>Allow it to recharge every 5 seconds after use, so that we are encouraged to trio our skills together thus getting more uses out of it.</li><li>Make each order of the combos do a different thing in addition to the damage.  Jab > Kick > Punch would be a stun, Kick > Punch > Jab would be a daze, Jab > Punch > Kick would be a high damage hit, etc.</li><li>Make the damage significant.  1500-2000 at the LEAST.  It's once a minute and we have to play Simon to use it, so make it more than a bee sting.</li><li>Make it a maintained buff that goes off whenever it detects that a punch, kick and jab have been used without other skills interrupting.</li><li>Make the hits on it guaranteed to be three with a possibility to do six or nine (groups of threes)</li><li>Make the hits have a maximum possible of 12 and give an increased chance to do more than one strike, but keep the damage.</li></ol>It's an end line ability, and should be treated that way.  I am a DPS monk that offtanks, and this skill seems to be aimed at monks like me.  You'd think that even for 1 AA, it would be worth it, but that's sadly not the case.  I can spend that one extra AA point in Rumbling wyrm and get the same amount of DPS boost, or in one of the defensive/taunt AAs for more useful bonuses.  Let's not let a cool idea like combination go to waste.<div></div><p>Message Edited by psubullet on <span class=date_text>11-20-2006</span> <span class=time_text>07:35 AM</span>

[Cirth_Beer]

I also find that it's an useless aa (and i also find the cast time is too short) which should not be like that at all.<div></div>

[Jobeson]

the skill is not about overall dps boost it is about burst dps.  You can get it off easily unless you are stunned, especially if you chose the instant jab AAs.  The only change I would want in this attack is to make it unresistible.  I hate how it gets resisted 1/6 attempts.  This skill ends up another 15-20 dps only however it shoots burst dps through the roof.  This is an easy skill to master.  However no amount of player skill can stop those annoying mob resists for this art please take those out if we land the three hits we shouldn't have to worry about landing the combo with a resist check.  <div></div>

[psubull]

<div><blockquote><hr>Jobeson wrote:the skill is not about overall dps boost it is about burst dps.  You can get it off easily unless you are stunned, especially if you chose the instant jab AAs.  The only change I would want in this attack is to make it unresistible.  I hate how it gets resisted 1/6 attempts.  This skill ends up another 15-20 dps only however it shoots burst dps through the roof.  This is an easy skill to master.  However no amount of player skill can stop those annoying mob resists for this art please take those out if we land the three hits we shouldn't have to worry about landing the combo with a resist check.  <div></div><hr></blockquote>Having it mastered is not a problem.  The only time I don't use it is when i'm lagging a bit and the spell delays.  I never miss it when my connection is fine or the servers aren't backlogged.  I've noticed about a 2-5 dps increase over the course of all of freethinkers, lyceum, labs and clockwork menace.  In the shorter, 30 second fights I received a 5 DPS boost.  In the longer fights, 2 dps boost.In grouping, I don't notice a change in my DPS numbers because I miss out on autoattacks to use some of the skills to activate combination.  Soloing, I haven't noticed anything due to the fact that they borked our soloability altogether.I autoattack at .5 delay for around 250-400 (crits included).  All of my attacks are mastered, with one attack from T6 being adept three still, and the jabs/kicks/punches lines are all AAed up for me.  I average around 1100-1200 dps on raids without dps mods or group procs.  When I'm not raiding, I'm questing in groups or solo, doing instances and dungeon crawls as well as mentoring friends.  In every single one of these situations, combination has proved to miss the mark of acceptance.  350-400 damage once every minute is not burst DPS.  Crane flock is burst DPS.  Ice Nova, Fusion and Manaburn are burst DPS.  Harm Touch is burst DPS.  Decapitate is burst DPS.  Savage blows + 100 hand punch + kidney punch are burst DPS.  350-400 damage isn't burst DPS, it's another combat art to put at certain places in the hotbar.  I'm not the only person that feels this way, I'm just the first person to get enough free time to complain about it.</div>

[Sslarrga]

<P>Calling Combo burst DPS has got to be a joke.  That was yet another wasted AA point spent in addition to the wasted AA in Enhance: Soaring Dragon as it's broken only adding approximately 1% damage increase per AA point.  The damage increase is only added to the initial hit and not to each tick of damage.</P> <P>When using combo, I get roughly a 5 DPS increase.  Wooo.  Mantis bolt even on a bad streak of proc luck still adds more than 3 times that amount of DPS.  And it isn't a final ability.</P> <P>So far, for my playstyle and our current raid setup.  All 3 final AA abilities are absolutely worthless.</P> <P>Regards,</P> <P>Croaker</P>

[psubull]

<blockquote><hr>Sslarrga wrote:<div></div> <p>Calling Combo burst DPS has got to be a joke.  That was yet another wasted AA point spent in addition to the wasted AA in Enhance: Soaring Dragon as it's broken only adding approximately 1% damage increase per AA point.  The damage increase is only added to the initial hit and not to each tick of damage.</p> <p>When using combo, I get roughly a 5 DPS increase.  Wooo.  Mantis bolt even on a bad streak of proc luck still adds more than 3 times that amount of DPS.  And it isn't a final ability.</p> <p>So far, for my playstyle and our current raid setup.  All 3 final AA abilities are absolutely worthless.</p> <p>Regards,</p> <p>Croaker</p><hr></blockquote>Yup, that's exactly what I'm saying.  Don't even get me started on master's evasion and evade.  I might explode, >:[<div></div>

[Osi]

well they answered one prayer... from the test notes if you haven't seen them - A Monk's "Combination" can no longer be resisted.<font color="#ffff00">So at least theres that...</font><div></div>

[Prodigus]

Which 3 do you prefer to queue up?  I respecced to this right before a Labs raid (via cell phone tether connection) and seemed hard to get off due to the lag, which was to be expected. Just curious if there is a combo that works best.  Currently using Frozen Palm, Rumbling Wyrm, Leaping Tiger, then Combination. Still havent had much of a chance to play around with it yet.

[Chay]

What I resorted to was to create macros so that I try to use it after punches, kicks, and jabs just to get it to go off. It only does about 1% of my outgoing damage regardless of where I'm fighting.  It's a pita to use and for so little output. If anyone has a good combination that would be good info.

[Kainsei]

Well, spamming the 3 required CA make you lose some autoattack damage, if only combination was doing something like 3k damage, it would be decent, but atm rumbling wyrm is way way way better if you want to an orange 350 number over the mob's head (uber awesome damage, isn't it ?? ). Lol, even <b><u>Leaping tiger</u></b>, which is our worst combat art (at least with AA rumbling wyrm has a fast casting time), is better than this useless AA Oo .

[Couching]

Combination is a joke. I had it and it's a waste for spending aa on it. I re-specialized aa and never look it back.

[KaelVolorus]

I second the OP's ideas to implement something to make Combination worthwhile.  Hell, in PVP, it's not even that much damage that gets put across.  Not to mention with all the stuns flying around, I land it in about 10% of the fights I'm in.  Compare this to Bruisers' Drag ability.  This ability is FEARED in PVP.  Why?  You can eliminate one person from a fight if you're near a cliff.  Just drag them over and send them off.  You can also drag someone away from a cloud/portal so they can't escape.  Combination is a rarely landed waste of an ability. Hell, none of the end line abilities are good.  We don't need Evade, we already have a detaunt stance.  We don't need it to make someone lose target, because we have feign death.  Masters Evasion?  Yeah, let me blow this ability when there's already at least a 50% chance I'll dodge the attack anyway.  Real useful.  As for suggestions for Combination: 1.  At the very LEAST, make it automatically go off when we land the 3rd ability in the chain.  Sometimes I can get off the 3 abilities, but either the target moves or I'm stifled and can't land Combination.  2.  A burst in damage really wouldn't hurt.  We're already signing the role of "tank" over to the plate wearers, giving us a bit more DPS sure wouldnt hurt. 3.  A 5 second daze or so would make it worthwhile.  Idunno about you, but if someone landed a 6 hit combination attack on me, I'd have to take a breather to reorient myself. Bottom line, it's obvious that this ability needs some love.  The only reason I have it is because its cheap.  Go ahead and jack the cost up about 9 points, I don't care, as long as its useful.  It's not like most of the other points in the Monk tree are doing a whole lot.

[Ocello]

Yes I totally agree...ever since I figured out to space out my CA's in order to hit my auto-attacks, I haven't been able to use this attack ONCE.  Using a 2-hander, you can't afford to lose out on those auto-attacks, and especially not for something that does about 600 damage.  BTW I could have sworn that the combo always landed (and doesn't cost power), assuming you get it off...

[mattmandude]

I set up my hot bars to make it easier to get combination off:                                     {combination} {jab}{jab}{jab}{kick}{kick}{kick}{punch}{punch}{pu nch} Something like this, that way it's easier to see which abilities are up and available to activate combination... But I still agree, this needs some serious beefing up to make worthwhile.

[Junaru]

I had this ability for a whole 4 hours. Thats how long it took me to realize that the added trouble to get the ability to work wasn't worth the DPS I gained/lost from it. ANd in those 4 hours of using the AA, not once did it hit more then one time. I was hoping for a lot more for an end AA thats for sure. Just to give you some idea of how messed up the Brawler/Monk AA's are. I have 79 AA's and not one end ability. I really think SOE needs to look into that. It's kind of sad that not one end ability is worth getting over the sum of others.

[Chay]

I found that... Punishing Cobra, Soaring Dragon, Failing Centipede, Combinations works. I've not gone over the log to see how much it hit for or if it hit though. So typically I can fire it every other time those come up in a fight. Not exactly a lot. Definitely needs some attention to make it really worth while if you ask me.  Really I'm at a loss of what to put my points into for EoF otherwise.  For the most part they aren't very good.

[Jobeson]

I would simply like to put in that you do not lose out on auto attack damage if you time this attack correctly, atleast depending on your weapons.  My auto attack runs .7-.8  I start off with auto attack hit then hit .5CA, auto, .5CA, auto, .25JAB, instant combo1, auto, combo2, auto, combo3, auto.  again I do not waste a single auto attack in there. The burst damage is more for duels/pvp or picking up quick agro while tanking.  My main problem with combination that needs to be fixed 100% is that it can be reflected because it is a spell.  When you get an epic reflect you take 9k-12k damage you regret ever using combination...  It is far from uber and I would like to see it made more appealing however it is not useless, I love it in duels, when starting a fight, and when dpsing on a raid.   Improvements I would like to see for the end ability: 100% interrupt to each of the combo hits.  45 second cool down OR a repeat of the last three combat arts Personally the repeat is what I find most appealing. NO REFLECTS!

[blueduckie]

<p>Hm not sure why so many find it useless I find it to be one of the coolest aa's monks get. It hits 3x probably95% od the time I use it. It isnt hard to get it to trigger if that is your problem it is jus your set up and as said above you can do it with out missing much if any auto attack but I use a 2h so might be difference. Once you trigger combination dont hit a ca for 2-3 seconds. That is how you get it to tripple proc almost everytime. An extra 1k-1500 dmg every minute is never useless. Been looking at it alot and getting around 6-8k dmg total in 6 seconds when doing it. I use all my low dmg ca's to trigger it. Artic Talon, rumbling wyrm, leaping tiger. If you dw and dw fast weapons your more likely to miss some auto attack rounds.</p><p>I am just surprised how many find it useless though. Might consider trying it out again if you got rid of it so quickly... 1k-1500 extra dmg every minute for 1aa... Sounds like a hell of a deal to me. Funny about the reflect thing with it though never knew it was spell check.</p><p>just checked it out to look at auto attack. Getting a auto attack after every ca while chaining thing and triggering it. Getting tripple hit with it everytime. I find it hard to believe anyone finding that useless. </p>

[Jobeson]

It always "tripple procs" blue even if you use CAs after.  The point of combination to make it uber is to have AA in the quick Jabs.

[Goozman]

Combination should be just like the "double up" skill brigands have imo, repeating the jab, punch, and kick you just did.

[Hydor]

<cite>Goozman wrote:</cite><blockquote>Combination should be just like the "double up" skill brigands have imo, repeating the jab, punch, and kick you just did.</blockquote>No offense but I don't like this idea. If you are in a long fight and at some point you can use rumbling wyrm, leaping tiger and any punch would you like to have these 3 reapeated? I guess not. It would be nice to use again Flailing Centipede, Punishing Cobra and Soaring Eagle but that would not always be the case. Even if you don't mind focusing on timing it right (have the CAs up when Combo is up) sometimes you get stunned before you finish the combo. Now you have to wait or use other CAs to land the combo. Would be nice for short fights assuming nothing goes wrong but in the long run I don't think it would work very well.

[Goozman]

<cite>Hydor wrote:</cite><blockquote><cite>Goozman wrote:</cite><blockquote>Combination should be just like the "double up" skill brigands have imo, repeating the jab, punch, and kick you just did.</blockquote>No offense but I don't like this idea. If you are in a long fight and at some point you can use rumbling wyrm, leaping tiger and any punch would you like to have these 3 reapeated? I guess not. It would be nice to use again Flailing Centipede, Punishing Cobra and Soaring Eagle but that would not always be the case. Even if you don't mind focusing on timing it right (have the CAs up when Combo is up) sometimes you get stunned before you finish the combo. Now you have to wait or use other CAs to land the combo. Would be nice for short fights assuming nothing goes wrong but in the long run I don't think it would work very well.</blockquote> I don't understand your argument. As it is, it does less damage than those 3 you mentioned, so yes it would still be better.

[Hydor]

Yes, it would still be better but still not good enough. Anyway I agree that even that would be an improvment but I would like it to be stronger than the worst case senario (reusing rumbling wyrm, leaping tiger).

[Cirth_Beer]

Tufai what is your stuff quality and on what are you using Combination with 3 times 1k5 hit ? it is useless because of the lag ... 2 sec to trigger it is simply not enough, and the hassle of the use with other things to do is not worth the 450 damage (x1) i do with it ...

[Kanlei]

I LOVE COMBO you guys have to figure out what works to get in in thats all.  This may be a little long and choppy but heres my attack set up and I land it every single time it is up, and yes I know I could do it sooner than what I'm about to post but I mash buttons so this is how and when I get it in.  Here goes, this is how I start out each fight. Rumbling Wyrm Leaping Tiger Flailing Centipede Silencing Palm Soaring Dragon Artic Talon Assaling Jaguar Frozen Palm Soaring Eagle Punishing Cobra Rumbling Wyrm Leaping Tiger Combination It may have not gone off once or twice just due to the mobs dying to fast or me not paying attention, Like I said thats how I do it and I have great results from it. My last Freethinkers raid it done 31854 damage...thats easy decent damage, once you figure out what works for you to get it to land, hold off for a couple of secs to let all three hits land then rinse and repeat if available.

[Jobeson]

<cite>Kanlei wrote:</cite><blockquote>I LOVE COMBO you guys have to figure out what works to get in in thats all.  This may be a little long and choppy but heres my attack set up and I land it every single time it is up, and yes I know I could do it sooner than what I'm about to post but I mash buttons so this is how and when I get it in.  Here goes, this is how I start out each fight. Rumbling Wyrm Leaping Tiger Flailing Centipede Silencing Palm  Soaring Dragon Artic Talon Assaling Jaguar Frozen Palm Soaring Eagle Punishing Cobra Rumbling Wyrm Leaping Tiger Combination </blockquote>Using your jabs last will make for combination to be able to be fired with greater ease when working around auto attack if you picked up the Jab AAs.  IE your first setup of wyrm tiger centipede works perfectly for working around quick dual wield auto attack swings.  The second starts off with a jab (silent palm) which means you would lose an auto attack or the 2 second timer for the CA.  We get the majority of our dps from auto attack and when working around auto attack DPS goes up a great deal. I would suggest doing a kick punch jab combination to allow for the most dps if you have the Jab AAs.  also I would like to say again that it is a decent skill and it ups our burst dps by around 25 (every raid parse is effected by burst.  Every short trash encounter that only lasts 45 seconds then has a 15 second pause until the next means your 1 minute CAs are doing 25% more dps by the parsers view) Which is nice but long fights it only ends up around 10-20 dps added in.  Again there could be many improvements to this ability but I have to agree with you that it is not as useless as many claim, but 20 dps for an end ability does seem weak in comparison to many others.  Reducing the cool down would up the longer fight dps it has and I believe that increasing its actual damage, at least when fighting a mob (non pvp) would create a very useful ability, and/or allowing each combination swing to proc would also help.   I am not happy with the ability meaning I do not find it on par with others end lines however I find it more useful than a single point in another offensive ability.   

[Chay]

Since reading some of the posts here I've had some better experiences with Combinations. It's still a bit weak and I still miss getting it off every time (lag mainly sometimes I just get too ahead of myself).