Reading the Forum: Depressed: Shine Some Light?

[eq2NT]

<DIV>I am a new player in eq2.  I've played a number of classes to level 10 or so and the monk class is by far my favorite (followed closely by the bruiser class, but Freeport theme is not to my liking).  Currently, my monk is level 20.  I harvested a bit and made some money so I can afford Mastercrafted armor and Mastercrafted jewelry.  Currently my spells are primarily Apprentice IV/Adept I but as I hit tier 3 (levels 22-31), I will start upgrading major abilities to Adept 3.  I do pretty well solo and in groups.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Having read the forums, however, I am beginning to develop a feeling of impending doom.  Is my monk doomed?  Will I be shun from groups as a "tank suppor" and crippled in my ability to solo?  Expectations of EoF vs. Actuality of Eof aside, how do you like the monk class?  Am I wasting my time in leveling up my monk?  Am I better off making another class?  Shine some light on the class please!</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Thank you!</DIV>

[Bladewind]

<P>We have problems tanking yellow+ con named heroics and blue+ con epics at the moment due to issues with avoidance being ineffective.  Hopefully, this will be fixed sometime soon.</P> <P>Other than that, we are about the same as usual - decent damage for a fighter (comparable to a dps-specced guardian or crusader, but less than a zerker/bruiser), great solo ability/utility, solid group tank.</P> <P>We're far from doomed, we just a need a little tweak so we can fill our main role.</P>

[eq2NT]

<P>"We have problems tanking yellow+ con named heroics and blue+ con epics at the moment due to issues with avoidance being ineffective.  Hopefully, this will be fixed sometime soon."</P> <P><EM><STRONG>OK.  But this was the case pre-EoF, right?</STRONG></EM></P> <P>"Other than that, we are about the same as usual - decent damage for a fighter (comparable to a dps-specced guardian or crusader, but less than a zerker/bruiser), great solo ability/utility, solid group tank."</P> <P><STRONG><EM>Do we solo better than the other fighters?</EM></STRONG></P> <P><STRONG><EM>What does a monk class provide over other fighters?</EM></STRONG></P> <P>We're far from doomed, we just a need a little tweak so we can fill our main role.</P>

[Almeric_CoS]

<DIV>Haven't done any epics since EoF, but in a full group I was able to tank some pretty ucky named mobs.  The nastiest, so far, was a 75^^^ named boss from the SolRo God Quest 5 instance.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Won't say it was an easy fight, but an orange named isn't SUPPOSED to be.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Soooo, I think we're doin *ok*</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[Illustrious]

<P>Its not doom and gloom.</P> <P> </P> <P>since EoF i have tanked Nizzara including the Boss with no shammie even (warden+ temp) and tanked a good deal of MM castle with no mezzer so we still can tank al be it with more effort and quicker healers than an equivilant equiped plate tank. That said i think we could still do with an upgrade to our uncontested part of deflection from defense stance to at least that of a tower shield..say 20% or so.</P> <P> </P> <P>DPs wise we still pretty good on. On raids im about the same as bruiser on single targets with zerker behind me but zerker in the lead mainly on grped encounters (unless crane flock is up of course), pretty much what u expect really.</P> <P> </P> <P>remember all tanks have gotten nerfage at solo play since eof. Those easy green and blue heroic namers pre eof now have double the HP for the most part and hit a lot harder. So unless u can root, farming namers aint quite like it used to be solo for anyone.</P>

[githyanki]

Well since they fixed some of the avoidance issues monks had after EoF my monk can actually tank in current content.  I've done catacombs and the kos instances since that patch and did fine.  I did it with two healers temp and either warden or defiler.  My wife plays the templar and she said in nest she never had to use more then reactives on me even on the end boss.  The other 2 kos instances she took more of an active roll but i could tank it ok.  I haven't tried to tank the EoF instances purely because i'm chicken and dont want to waste the lockout timer on a failure later on.  Tonight we where messing around in Kaladim and got up to the 70 and 69 heroic linked mobs before we had to leave and did ok.  That zone is nuts for adds and we did fine with her (69 temp) me 70 monk and a ranger illusionist wizzy and fury.   I'm mostly legandary gear with 2 pcs from the new wu's set armor( forearms and arm).  My stances and single taunt are adept 3 with group taunt master 2 and the majority of my other spells master lvl or adept 3.  I run 4488 in stamina line and 4465 in int line.  Still need to max it out and no aa's in the new EoF aa's yet.  Epics I wouldn't even try unless i had lvls on them and they where green mobs at that.  Personally i think monks are no longer as broken as they where.  We didn't gain any ground pre EoF but we stopped loosing ground on other tanks.  We can tank current content but personally i think we shine the brightest as an assist to the main tank in a dps heavy group.  Other people may say that we should be viable mt's in instances zones and epic runs but we are not there as of yet.  When EoF came out i shelved my monk and started a wizzy.  But now i'm playing githyanki more and more.....Its fun to be a monk again.

[Morrolan V]

<DIV>You have nothing to worry about playing a monk unless you are are looking to be a raid main tank regularly.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I have tanked all of the EoF instances with only one healer, and have tanked Mistmoore with two (warden and defiler).  I can personally attest that there is no heroic content in the game we cannot tank. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I offtanked Labs last weekend and stood in front of Vyemm for half the fight when our berserker MT kept getting hammered by energy vortex.  On the other hand, when I tried to pick up the Corsolander, he ate me alive.  We are viable as offtanks in epic encounters, but I would not want you to expect to be a guild's primary raid tank.  If that's what you want to do, roll a guard or a zerker.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Monk is a great class -- we can do good DPS, tank well and have great soloability and single group utility (just ask any group who has done Claymore how much nicer it is getting in and out of Sanctum or PoA fifteen times with a monk to train you through).  I can get virtually anywhere in game solo, using feign and windwalk, barring deep in Mistmoore or HoF or anywhere in raid zones.  It's safe and fast to solo, due to FD and good fighter DPS.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Soooooo, great class, but somewhat of a jack of all trades -- does many things well, but no primary raid role the best.</DIV>

[Raidi Sovin'faile]

A lot of what's being hashed out on the forums is due to the Bait'n'Switch and Slap-in-the-Face changes the devs have been doing lately. First they promise to "Fix" avoidance, to only make the disparity between plate and brawlers more pronounced.Overall, I've got more options now than I had before. If anything, I'm doing more DPS than I was before, now that caps are raised.We can still do the same things we did before, for the most part... just stuff that involved tanking are gonna be harder. I'm more upset that the Devs are basically writing us off as tanks.<div></div>

[Nerill]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Morrolan V wrote:<BR> <DIV>You have nothing to worry about playing a monk unless you are are looking to be a raid main tank regularly.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I have tanked all of the EoF instances with only one healer, and have tanked Mistmoore with two (warden and defiler).  I can personally attest that there is no heroic content in the game we cannot tank. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I offtanked Labs last weekend and stood in front of Vyemm for half the fight when our berserker MT kept getting hammered by energy vortex.  On the other hand, when I tried to pick up the Corsolander, he ate me alive.  We are viable as offtanks in epic encounters, but I would not want you to expect to be a guild's primary raid tank.  If that's what you want to do, roll a guard or a zerker.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Monk is a great class -- we can do good DPS, tank well and have great soloability and single group utility (just ask any group who has done Claymore how much nicer it is getting in and out of Sanctum or PoA fifteen times with a monk to train you through).  I can get virtually anywhere in game solo, using feign and windwalk, barring deep in Mistmoore or HoF or anywhere in raid zones.  It's safe and fast to solo, due to FD and good fighter DPS.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Soooooo, great class, but somewhat of a jack of all trades -- does many things well, but no primary raid role the best.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR>What this guy said. :smileywink:

[selch]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Morrolan V wrote:<BR> <DIV>You have nothing to worry about playing a monk unless you are are looking to be a raid main tank regularly.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I have tanked all of the EoF instances with only one healer, and have tanked Mistmoore with two (warden and defiler).  I can personally attest that there is no heroic content in the game we cannot tank with raid gears. </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I offtanked Labs last weekend and stood in front of Vyemm for half the fight when our berserker MT kept getting hammered by energy vortex.  On the other hand, when I tried to pick up the Corsolander, he ate me alive.  We are viable as offtanks in epic encounters, but I would not want you to expect to be a guild's primary raid tank.  If that's what you want to do, roll a guard or a zerker.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Monk is a great class -- we can do good DPS, tank well and have great soloability and single group utility (just ask any group who has done Claymore how much nicer it is getting in and out of Sanctum or PoA fifteen times with a monk to train you through).  I can get virtually anywhere in game solo, using feign and windwalk, barring deep in Mistmoore or HoF or anywhere in raid zones.  It's safe and fast to solo, due to FD and good fighter DPS.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Soooooo, great class, but somewhat of a jack of all trades -- does many things well, but no primary raid role the best.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P><BR>Corrected a tiny single ironic point.</P> <P> </P><p>Message Edited by selch on <span class=date_text>11-28-2006</span> <span class=time_text>01:50 AM</span>

[Jessyme]

<P>I agree with Morrolan.  I have tanked much of the heroic content in the game, often with just one healer in the group (usually a fury or an inquisitor, sometimes both), and we have done quite well.  Obviously you need to have decent gear/food.  But the key is to know how and when to use your skills.  We have some incredible combat arts, such as three stances, Tsunami, Will of the Heavens, a heal and Outward Calm.  We also have some nice AA's.  I am a HUGE fan of the Wisdom Non-EoF line (have not done much with the EoF AA's yet).  One of our biggest problem areas as a monk is holding group aggro.  Crane Flock (last AA in the Wisdom line), a speedy two handed staff (I use a Velium Staff atm) and Dragon Advance will often allow you to keep group aggro against even a aggro hungry warlock with a huge death wish *grin*  </P> <P>I have never tanked a raid, but I will say that monks tend not to be in demand for raiding.  Generally one monk/brawler is all a raid will want. So if you are intending to raid a lot, it might be better to choose a more stackable raid class, which will usually be a non-tank.  Healers, mages and scouts are all very stackable and in demand for raids.    Basically if the raid has a choice of Xyla or Quij, they will almost always pick Xyla.  I do get to play Quij sometimes in a raid, but it is more of a "we've got enough to do what we need to do, so you can bring the Frog if you want."</P> <P>But for non-raid grouping and soloing, we are pretty darned good :smileywink:</P> <P>And a note about the monk (or any classes) forums: Try to read them with a grain of salt (that is a really weird little saying, isn't it?)  They will have you depressed about your class in no time if you get too involved.  You can choose pretty much any class forum and find lots of folks very upset about a whole variety of things; according to the forums, pretty much every class is doomed.  I recommend just picking a class you are interested in and just getting out there and playing it *smiles*  You will like the game MUCH more if you come to the forums rarely.</P> <P>And bear in mind that much of getting regular groups involves building a reputation for being able to play your class, whatever it is, well.  </P> <P>Quijana  </P><p>Message Edited by Jessyme on <span class=date_text>11-28-2006</span> <span class=time_text>01:59 AM</span>

[Cirth_Beer]

<div><blockquote><hr>Morrolan V a écrit:<div>You have nothing to worry about playing a monk unless you are are looking to be a raid main tank regularly.</div> <div> </div> <div>I have tanked all of the EoF instances with only one healer, and have tanked Mistmoore with two (warden and defiler).  I can personally attest that there is no heroic content in the game we cannot tank. </div> <div> </div>...  <div>Soooooo, great class, but somewhat of a jack of all trades -- does many things well, but no primary raid role the best.</div><hr></blockquote>humm just a little question on that, you are in full fabled right ? i dont know if a legendary/treasured stuffed monk can tank all heroic instance of the game. (i dont think he can)</div>

[selch]

<DIV><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Cirth_Beer wrote:<BR> <DIV>humm just a little question on that, you are in full fabled right ? i dont know if a legendary/treasured stuffed monk can tank all heroic instance of the game. (i dont think he can)<BR> <HR> </DIV></BLOCKQUOTE><BR>He is not full fabled I believe but raid-drop legendaries included such as excarnates, which comes to same point imo. I can confirm legendary / treasured monks can tank "many" instances but not all with "more than one healers" , even with the case, can have aggro problems greatly due to being healed a lot.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV><p>Message Edited by selch on <span class=date_text>11-28-2006</span> <span class=time_text>05:58 AM</span>

[Kinless]

My monk can and does tank the heroic content in game, including MM Castle. Every tank class is having spike damage issues right now and every tank class is having aggro issues. I feel we are on more of an even slate now than ever before in that regard. As far as raid slots go, I never have a problem with getting a raid spot in my guild and when our bruiser is online we both are on the raids. The new haste and DPS caps has really been a boon to DPS if that is my role in the raid. Since expansion I have offtanked epics with a surprising degree of success. Epic mobs on average are hitting me for about 500 more than the plate tank vs thousands more that they used to. The new bit of uncontested avoidance has even allowed me to see some avoids vs these epics which is a nice change. Vymm no longer one or two shots me, I tanked him for a good while last time we were there, and I even ended up with aggro on second named in Freethinkers and held it just fine untill the MT got it back, at least 40 seconds time. I actually survived through the switching to defensive stance, which never has happened before. So all in all things really are not looking bad in my opinion .  I learned in EQ1 that the fastest way to become frustrated with your character was to read character forums. Never let someone else tell you what you cant accomplish. In reality you can accomplish far more than people expect when you go at things with that approach. Kinz 70 Monk of Forsaken Lucan <div></div>

[selch]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <P></P> <HR> <P>Kinless wrote:<BR>My monk can and does tank the heroic content in game.</P> <P>Kinz 70 Monk of Forsaken<BR>Lucan<BR></P> <BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P>Don't you love how people in "Fabled" bragging about tanking "heroic" content in game?  Eq2players.com for the win about that.</P> <P>Don't you see the problem? Some progression is backwards here...  With this equipment, you should be MT and not brag to stand more than 40 seconds in raid and never mention heroic content at all. Not different than a Legendary players telling they tank solo content just fine.</P> <P> </P><p>Message Edited by selch on <span class=date_text>11-28-2006</span> <span class=time_text>11:27 AM</span>

[Kinless]

Selch,   When i say I tank comparably, I am comparing myself to fabled out plate tanks as well.  I know I can MT raids, but am just fine letting the Gaurdian do that while I play the role I like, watching for adds, off tanking when need be, Throwing well timed heals, intercepts, or rescues as situation demands.  So while your argument about full fabled does have a lot of merit, I am not comparing my survivability to legendary or treasured plate tanks but to fully fabled as well. I am sorry for not clearing this up in my first post. I didnt come here to brag, I dont need to. Someone asked a valid question. I stated my experience. Instead of doing the "woe is me" routine I am seeing so many others do around here. I am pointing out that there is hope. Many of you would be far happier with your class just with one easy little step. Instead of convincing yourself you cant, find out how you can. The new changes have been a bit difficult to get used to for me as well. While I do survive better in group tank position, my ability to solo what I could before EoF is very lacking. Which is okay by me in some respects, just harder to make in game coin now.  I know you are angry and not happy with changes or the class not being what you want it to be right now. You have your rights to that just as much as any other person. But dont chastise me for finding a way to make it work the best I can to keep me happy. Kinz 70 Monk of Forsaken Lucan <div></div>

[selch]

<P>Sorry Kin if that sounded personal to you, was not meant for offense, so I'm sorry if it is...</P> <P>I'm just tired of "we can tank heroics just fine and have no problems" told in fully fabled equipments like there is absolutely no problems whatsoever.</P> <P> </P> <P> </P><p>Message Edited by selch on <span class=date_text>11-28-2006</span> <span class=time_text>12:35 PM</span>

[RaunII]

<P>well, my wife has a lvl 70 monk. my 70 berserker far out dps's her (specced my gear and AA's for dps), but so far, she has proven to be as good of tank as my zerker...my zerker is wearing legendary/Xegonite gear, she is outfitted in legendary, and she has almost as much mitigation as myself, and more avoidance. for mobs white heroic or lower she is by far the better tank.</P> <P> </P> <P>i think all the fighter classes are slightly messed up at the moment, but all in all i wouldnt say a monk is a waste of time.</P>

[Morrolan V]

<P>Yes, I have full fabled/raid legendary/claymore gear.</P> <P>Tell you what I will do -- in the next few days I will put on my backup (all T7 legendary drops that should be obtainable by any Monk that cares to group) and see how it goes tanking some of the EoF instances.  Will it be tougher?  I'm sure.  Will it be impossible?  I highly doubt it.  Well, Mistmoore might be impossible, but then Mistmoore is aimed at groups outfitted in raid gear, just like Nizara.</P> <P>I really get tired of the overstatements of the problems that exist.  Do we need different skills than plate tanks to tank top end heroic stuff? Yes.  Do we need to work our [Removed for Content] off to hold aggro on multiple-mob encounters?  You bet.  Is our tanking completely broken?  Against 99.9% of the content in the game it absolutely is not.  We are quite capable tanks for that content.  It appears that this is the role that SoE envisions for the brawler, while reserving the top-end raid tank role for warriors.  Assuming that is what they are aiming for, they have hit the mark.</P> <P>We can dislike that they have not made it more viable for us to tank in raids, and I do, but we should not perpetuate the notion that more is broken than actually is.</P><p>Message Edited by Morrolan V on <span class=date_text>11-28-2006</span> <span class=time_text>01:29 PM</span>

[Quind]

For what my little level 42 opinion is worth...We can tank heroics.  At least, we can tank heroics at level forty-two with full mastercrafted, an assortment of appIV-m1 CAs, a dirge, and mend AAs maxed out.  And some cheap heal pots.  I can stand in front of high blues, and arrow up white heroics just fine when we're duoing.  With a healer along, I'd be a lot more willing to dive into groups of yellows with arrows.  Nonheroic, I think my record is +6 or +7, but I burned pretty much everything from mountain to my heal pot.  God I love Steamfont quests.  I should note that the oranges were all single pulls- I was being very well behaved because I didn't want to tempt the dirge's evac finger.I don't notice myself having tons of aggro issues beyond keeping things out of the encounter on me, but that's because pretty much all I have for that atm is the sparking cobra line.  Then again, I'm running with a dirge who keeps the hate song on me all the time.  I'm spoiled, in that respect.Don't buy into the doom and gloom.  I'm happy with my performance, and I expect things will only get better as I fill out my AAs more.  Still trying to decide what brawler lines to go for to maximise my group tanking ability.  Heh.I don't like the fact that it's probably not in my starts to mt raids any time soon, but I don't feel gimped or broken in any way.  I'm pretty optimistic, all things considered.<div></div>

[Bobbubski]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Morrolan V wrote:<BR> <P>Against 99.9% of the content in the game it absolutely is not. </P> <P>Message Edited by Morrolan V on <SPAN class=date_text>11-28-2006</SPAN><SPAN class=time_text>01:29 PM</SPAN></P> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE> <P><BR>Well put.</P> <P> </P> <P>One last thing I'll say is the way it seems now-a-days is finding anyone who is LFG or willing to group is a blessing.  I've spent many a night looking for a group or else being in a group who needs a tank or healer.  The fact that a monk can be either the tank or else DPS makes them quite versitile for any group looking for that 5th or 6th player.  Don't let the "broken monk" talk stop you from playing the class.  Every class board on this sight cries of the same plight.</P>

[Xerxess]

<div><blockquote><hr>Bobbubski wrote:<div></div> <blockquote> <hr> Morrolan V wrote: <div></div> <div></div> <p>Against <b>99.9%</b> of the content in the game it absolutely is not. </p> <p>Message Edited by Morrolan V on <span class="date_text">11-28-2006</span><span class="time_text">01:29 PM</span></p> <hr> </blockquote> <p>Well put.</p> <p>One last thing I'll say is the way it seems now-a-days is finding anyone who is LFG or willing to group is a blessing.  I've spent many a night looking for a group or else being in a group who needs a tank or healer.  The fact that a monk can be either the tank or else DPS makes them quite versitile for any group looking for that 5th or 6th player.  Don't let the "broken monk" talk stop you from playing the class.  Every class board on this sight cries of the same plight.</p><hr></blockquote>I don't know about 99.9% but I know around 95%...some of the higher end heroics tend to shred my fully lengendary monk like paper...sometimes I still get one shotted. I think our avoidance is a tad broken, It seems some 70 ^^^ fights I barely get touched and the healer is bored, and then some 70^^^ I get beat to death like a rag doll. I know high end heroics and raid encounter I tend to get beaten to death badly. All in All I think we are ok but I wish they would tweak avoidance a bit more...anywho we are a fun class!!!</div>

[Quind]

<blockquote><hr>Xerxess wrote:<div>I don't know about 99.9% but I know around 95%...some of the higher end heroics tend to shred my fully lengendary monk like paper...sometimes I still get one shotted. I think our avoidance is a tad broken, It seems some 70 ^^^ fights I barely get touched and the healer is bored, and then some 70^^^ I get beat to death like a rag doll. I know high end heroics and raid encounter I tend to get beaten to death badly. All in All I think we are ok but I wish they would tweak avoidance a bit more...anywho we are a fun class!!!</div><hr></blockquote>Behold the pitfalls of avoidance tanking: RNG streaks.  Sometimes it loves you, sometimes you sploot.  =/  But I agree.  Monks are the love.<div></div>

[Sslarrga]

<P>No, I'm still not backing down from my stance that SoE hasn't got a single clue what it wants to do with the Monk class.</P> <P>I'm only speaking from a raid point of view here.</P> <P>Originally we sacrificed tanking ability to be a step up from all other fighters in DPS ability.  That's fine, everyone understands that mitigation tanking will always be better in cases where mobs can hit hard enough that a bad streak of avoidance will equal more damage than the available healers can heal.</P> <P>However, with KoS, they made it so that when spec'ing for DPS all other tanks become on par or better at DPS than Monks while also tanking better.  And when spec'ing for Tanking, the disparity between mitigation tanks and avoidance tanks became rather huge.  Especially since certain mitigation classes could get fairly close to us in Avoidance.</P> <P>With EoF, they narrowed the tanking gap between mitigation and avoidance tanking somewhat.  However, now all mitigation tanks have the potential to have better avoidance vs. high con epics and named epics.  20%+ uncontested block in ANY stance for a mitigation tank vs. 12% uncontested deflection in Defensive stance, less in balanced stance, and absolutely none in offensive stance.</P> <P>Not to mention with the right gear even SK's have passed up monks in DPS ability.  So at the moment.  Monks are the worse tanking option for high end content, and tied for worst DPS of all fighter classes when spec'd for DPS.</P> <P>Yeah, joy.</P> <P>Every single monk alt in our guild has been retired by their owner or has betrayed over to Bruiser.  And the ones that betrayed to bruiser are happier for the switch, but still feel the disparity between the mitigation based fighters and avoidance based fighters.</P> <P>I still won't give up on the monk yet, however, since I like the IDEA of a monk, more than I like the IDEA of a bruiser.  Although I've been seriously toying with the idea of retiring the monk in favor of a more useful mitigation fighter.</P> <P>From a heroic standpoint.  </P> <P>Monks are still slighly better group tanks versus green heroics.  Almost equal against most blue con heroics.  Slightly worse against white con.  Significantly worse against yellow con and high difficulty yellow cons.  Due to the way avoidance works.  Avoidance scales with difficult in a different manner than mitigation.</P> <P>Also, monks should still be slighly better at DPS than mitigation tanks unless you're running around doing heroic content with a raid-DPS group setup.</P> <P>Also, from a soloing standpoint, brawlers gained +3% +dps (below 65? you gain a +3% bonus to +dps and +haste) while solo monks (in balanced stance) lost +5% or more +haste.  Yay, for the disparity growing ever so slightly larger.</P> <P>However, in solo and group situations it's unlikely you'll notice much of this if you have a good healer unless you are looking for it.  Or you have a similarly geared out mitigation tank or bruiser that you regularly swap spots with just to see how things compare.  On raids, however, it's quite a bit more noticable.  As it's easy enough to watch the monk go splat.  Or if you can keep him up compare the heal parses.</P> <P>Regards,</P> <P>Croaker, Deaths Door on Everfrost...blah blah blah...too lazy to make a sig.</P>

[Cirth_Beer]

I share the point of view of croaker, in the raid part i dont see much use of a monk (i would be happy if we could be puller as we were in eq1 but being oneshot when pulling is not fun :p) i dont think we should be main tank but i would be neat if we had a niche which would make us usefull and wanted, for tanking heroic instance we do ok with one healer even if it's a templar (except in castle mistmoore where it is quite hard like hof was when kos went live).<div></div>

[githyanki]

<DIV>Ok In response to morralan in particular saying that monks can tank all instances in EoF i invite you to do just what you said.  I'm almost fully legendary geared and i wouldn't even want to try tanking the last few mobs much less named in OoB.   Orange mobs tear me up and if i got a few of em in one encounter i'd be dead with 2 healers....it just  wouldn't matter.  I have off tanked till the plate tank gets done with his mob however, to get initial agro from 2 72 3 ups and survive just isn't possible for me.   People have mentioned that SoE stated sometime awhile ago that all tanks should be able to do the mting in heroic instances in player made gear.....i think they are on crack.   Now for you in particular morralan I really encourage you to do just what you say so you can eat your words.   I'm not trying to cause a flame war here dont get me wrong.   And if you can somehow pull it off kudos to you i'll put my monk in a pink tutoo and retire him.  But maybe...just maybe you can see what its like from the nonuber side of the game.   So....I encourage you to look me up on the station player site...i'm on the butcherblock server.   Get as close to my gear as you can and I would love to see the heal parses you can generate vs what you normally run.  Try it with one then 2 healer even.   And if it can be done....what kind of difference would it be heal parse wise and damage taken vs a similar plate tank with equivalent type gear.  My aa's are 4488 stam ..and 4464 int.   Have a day.</DIV>

[Harvash]

<P>I am currently 55 in all MC armor, weapon and about 50% MC jewelery.  I have a few drop pieces of jewerly with nice resists and +combat stats.  My spells are, unfortunatly, mostly a mix of ap4 and Adept1s, although i have one or 2 masters and my buffs are master II.  That being said, i went with a short group last night to the Meladrath Mine instance.</P> <P>The group was a Fury and a Necro, we didnt have any real probs with the trash mobs, although I was almost OOP each time. It took us about 4 tries to kill the first named CW boss. After many different strategies we got it done.  Figuring to be short on DPS we added a friends Wiz this dramaticaly improved the pwr conservation and hastened us thru the next boss and many trash mobs. Aggro was a toss up..mostly i could hold it, but when i lost it - right for the healer who was healing me like mad while my health and pwr drained away like I had sprung a leak.</P> <P>The 3rd boss, named mino Steelwhip or some such, was just an impossible task...and we finally ended up all nekkid and in need of repairs. Curtain Close.</P> <P>My question is, [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] am I doing wrong...i had semi retired him and recently brought him back out to explore EoF.  Back in his heyday (maybe prior to LU22 or 24) I remember him sitting in the red on health, and daring the mobs to hit him...seemingly forever would he sit there in the red - avoidance ftw.</P> <P>Last night, different story...those blue con hero's were throwing me around like a girl scout at a drunken frat party.</P> <P>As a disclaimer, I have two Zerker tanks who i absolutly luv and tank like a champ, people ask me to log them in to tank instead of whatever toon of the day i m on..lol.  So as far as a skill as a tank, i think i have that covered.</P> <P>Thanks for anyfeed back,</P> <P>Also Depressed In EoF</P>

[Quind]

Out of curiosity, which sets of MC are you using?  Also, I've noticed a huge difference in my ability to hold aggro with my taunt skills upgraded to AD3/master.  Are you mashing your CAs as soon as they pop, or are you allowing yourself some breathing time to regen and letting the DPS folks do their jobs?  Which stance did you have up?  Were you running the -hp haste?  Storebought or player-made food?  How carefully were you pulling?  Do you believe in using the face of the mountain line or the stone stance line?Just asking to sate my own curiosity, not to imply that you're having nub problems or anything.  ^^<div></div>

[superdave]

<P>Orange cons in OOB wow thats news to me. Are you level 70 yet because last time i have been in there they were yellow. hey morro i save you the trouble i did tank in mostly legendary in all 3 eof instances. it was harder but not imposssible. Dam nsomeone tank nizara naked for christ sake. Stop the crying and the horse is bleeding to death. You can tank any instance in the game end of story. I am tired of this [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn] ohhh i cant tank i am retiring. well do us all a favor and go. Because of threads like this people get confused if u dont have anythingt to add that would help dont post.</P> <P>On to the monk class. we need some tweaking and you will do fine with tanking. take the time ot to learn the class and what it brings to the game. we great solo class if thats what u like. we bring lots to raids ie grp fd mend rescue offtanking etc. group encounters we do fine in. my suggestion is to learn the class first. GL</P>

[KnAdidas25]

Do you pay for my account?  Have you payed for my account for the last 2 years?  If not [expletive haxx0red by Raijinn],  we are no where near the tanks we were its as simple as that.  People i have grouped with for over a year now see it too.  If I see a problem i have all the right in world to come here and air it so please go stroke your ego elsewhere.   thanks.<div></div>

[githyanki]

<P>To the poster that said the thing about the orange mobs..my mistake think they only go up to 72 in OoB.  So that would make them yellow cons.  I admit when i'm wrong or have made an error.  My post on this page was to illustrate a few points to the masses and especially to the people who have big e-peens about their full fabled gear sets.  Now before we get into the ...you suck and should just retire....work harder for your gear you newb.....do you know how to play your class at all?...what are you doing wrong?...people.  </P> <P> Let me stroke my own ego here.  Every group i'm in i improve on its survivability and how easily they get done what they choose to do.  I am one of the better players as far as strategy and skill that i have seen in the game.  I use all the tools available to me as a class and player.  And i use them well.  I have the best gear that i can afford and have worked very long and hard to attain it.  There is still a large difference..not as bad as eq1...but still a difference in non-raid and raid equiped folks.   That i beleive should be a given when considering game balance and mechanics in eq2.  Pre-EoF we tanked fine and i did all the content available to me short of one heal tanking HoF.  </P> <P>Never tried to main tank in raids but i have offtanked in labs and a bunch of other lower t5 and t6 raid zones in my guild which is not big or uber either.  After EoF release monks sucked to be comepletely honest.  And instead of crying about it i waited for the patch they said they where going to do i rolled a wizzy to wait out the storm.  After that patch monks where able to tank again.....to a point.  We still can't do some of the more challenging group content main tanking at least not without a second healer now.  And to those that say I just have a lack of skill because I DON'T have a full set of fabled or 3k miti in middle stance and 9k hit points in my buffs.  I salute you with my middle finger raised.  </P> <P>Now it seems that the monks in mostly legendary gear are the ones that seem to be having the issue lately so to the ubers let me pose this question to you.  You all realize there are issues with tanking yellow and orange mobs for us.  We get hit harder for more damage compared to equally equiped plate tanks.  The random number generator can only account for so much.  Avoidance tanking still doesn't seem right.  So if you got the tone and tenor of my previous post on this second page here you would realize that i'm trying to get hard numbers to not only see the difference between ubers and non-ubers.  But also the difference from plate to avoidance tanks.  I can be a bit grating with the feel of my posts but that is just my personality coming thru and my frustration.  But if i can get other players to admit there is a problem and maybe by chance a dev to see something i spouted off in a huff then i have done some good.  So is it required to have 3k miti and 9k hp's to main tank with a single healer in the EoF instances?  Show me the numbers or please go back up to your mountain top.</P>

[superdave]

We will get hit harder because we dont wear plate. Try tanking in defensive. Bring a dirge/[expletive haxx0red by Raijinn]/coer with for aggro. Do i think advoidance [Removed for Content] absolutely. No buffs i do have 2917 mit and 8400 hps. do i wear fabled i do. Dev's have seen hundreds of post about monks for 2 years. As for mistmoore that place is ugly even for the best geared in the game.  So i say if your having a problem with lets say oob for agrument sake. Setup a two healer grp so what, it what works for you. My last instance run i ran with a dirge a temp a brigand necro and ranger.  i tanked in defensive and didnt have any aggro issues and i do see the spikes but thats usual. What are your mit and hps at in full grp? i will do the test that u speak of in full legendary some pieces will be from claymore line. which is easeably attained imo. i will get as close as i can to your mit and hps as i can. so please either im me or post your mit and hps. i can not do the same with others in my grps since they are mastered out. oh maybe thats the difference also. we see. i do it this weekend and post my findings come sunday or monday.

[KnAdidas25]

Gee i cant imagine why hes not having too many probs.....  http://eq2players.station.sony.com/characters/character_profile.vm?characterId=167537106almost fully fabled......  Hes got almost as much Mit as our Pally who isnt in Fabled + he gets the extra avoidance and has almost 2000 more health....   I had a feeling all the people that arent having probs were in Fabled and that seems to be it.... Those of us who hate to raid are getting screwed.<div></div>

[superdave]

i never said i wasnt in full fable nor would i never deny it. having 2000 more hps is because thats way i speced mostly. let me tell ya something else if u could get all mastered out u would see a difference. masters>gear any day of the week. u may or may not have the option of getting masters i dont know. maybe i am wrong but at 2917 that would be a bit low for a pally. i doint play one nor do i know the class so like i said i may be wrong. i was trying to post something that would have helped eq2nt but if i was new to monk class i would have given up too after some of post before mine.<p>Message Edited by superdave on <span class=date_text>11-29-2006</span> <span class=time_text>08:14 PM</span>

[jeffdo]

I like to think I'm about halfway between the top and bottom as a monk. Mostly legendary, 3 pieces of relic. What I do have is all masters, with just a couple ofadept 3's. I box a warden, so I do alot of heroic content by myself. My capabilities definitely went down with the expansion, heroics that were easy before now give me a much harder time. This can depend on the zone though, which leads me to believe that Soe was just plain sloppy when they redid mobs based on the new mit/avoidance changes. Example, after the changes I can still box 68 names in Sos with relative ease. But 65 names in Forsaken City are rough, 67's almost impossible.As for raids, I tried to off tank one of the adds on the third named in labs the other day. I believe it was the alzid with the 2 droags. I just got owned by the one droag I pulled off the mt, I didn't avoid one hit. Had I known it would be that bad I would have thrown Tsunami up before I rescued. The fact that some mobs in Labs seem pathetically easy now, but others are harder or still impossible for an avoidance tank, reinforces my thoughts that they did a sloppy job of fixing mobs. Labs is supposed to be the easiest of the t7 raid zones as far as I know.Lastly I am still speced unarmed, since nobody sells decent weapons on my server and because I box I really don't want to take the dps hit. I think once I spec for defense and fully outfit myself with augs, I'll be close if not back to where I was prepatch. (Pls give me a Calamty Mr Ravager.) That's something to consider for those of you who aren't full fabled etc, defensive aa do make a bit of difference. I<div></div>

[Jessyme]

<DIV>I would like to reiterate something Superdave said: Work hard on getting fully mastered. It really does make a difference.  For the record, I am not an uber monk.  I don't get to raid often, and sadly no leather relics have dropped on the raids I have attended.  I am Legendary/mastercrafted (feel free to look me up) with about half master spells and half Adept III spells, and I have tanked much of DoF and KoS heroic content.  I have not tanked the new expansion yet, so I have no first hand info to contribute on that.  And I have never tanked or even offtanked a raid.  But I will say that monks can tank most heroic instances from my own personal experience, though I will not contest that plate tanks probably can do it more easily and with less effort from healers to keep them standing.    </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>But we can do it.  I did and do, with no fableds and often one healer.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Again, I go back to three pieces of simple advice:</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>1) Play what you want to play.  </DIV> <DIV>2) Read the class forums rarely (there is great info there) but try to not let negative posts depress you about your character.  Every class forum has doom and gloom "the sky is falling on our class" posts. Every class forum has folks that think their class is broken and needs to be fixed.  It may be correct, it may not.  But the reality is that this is a dynamic game that is being tweaked/radically altered all the time . At any given moment there are several so-called "out of favor" classes that have folks saying they will be quitting the game unless they are fixed.  Read the other class forums, you will see this to be true.  </DIV> <DIV>(Quick side story: In EQ1 I played a Froglok Shammie.  I adored her. Then one day I visited the shaman forums.  The more I read, the more convinced I became that my character was sadly lacking.  I would go there all the time and then repeat what I read in the forums to my poor beleaguered guildies who kept telling me the same thing:  "You were fine before you read this stuff.  You play well in the game  and we like having you in our groups. We liked you before you found out that you were supposedly sadly lacking, we still like you now.  For goodness sake, PLEASE stop reading those dratted posts in the forums!  Or we will start to not like you due to all this whining!"  They were right *grin*)  </DIV> <DIV>3) Read the forums less, play the game more *grin*  Trust me on this one. You will be much happier if you do.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>So eq2nt, go play your monk! And may the blessing of Marr be with him/her.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Quijana</DIV><p>Message Edited by Jessyme on <span class=date_text>11-29-2006</span> <span class=time_text>08:59 PM</span>

[selch]

<P>Point is Teidden, yes, you are right, everyone plays "to get better", that's the spirit of progression.</P> <P>What I and others wanted to point out here is, your progression is to be better at raids, raiding to be better in raids.  My progression to be better in heroic content so I don't get my eyes on Fabled equipment.</P> <P>What is the wrong with the monk progression is to compare "heroic content abilities" to "gear designed for raid content", for instance my equipment is known. Claymore rewards till AoA part, a fabled gloves that I can find on broker, 2 fabled weapons attunable, rest are legendaries and best I can equip (attention: non-raid drop legendaries, so excarnates out of question), all M1's as in spells, 7900 health, 4100 power, 45.7% mit. 65% avoidance.</P> <P>Now let's take a better look on this:</P> <P>Many raiding monks claim "We are good in all heroic content, but in raids" True. However that means "We are good in all heroic content 'with raid gear' but not in raids" and sad in a way. We should be good in raids with raid gear.</P> <P>Same can be said for legendary players "We are good in all solo content, but in heroics" , that's also true. Especially with Defensive stances taking 15% rather than a number, this gap grows more for people to compare "unhealthy"</P> <P>So class does not mean fine and dandy if you can do heroic content barely with mostly fabled gear. Have to try to look to bigger picture, rather than our enviroment and ourselves.</P> <P> </P>

[githyanki]

<P>If i can get it loaded right this is my profile from eqplayers.</P> <P> </P> <P><A href="http://eq2players.station.sony.com/characters/character_profile.vm?characterId=392130108" target=_blank>http://eq2players.station.sony.com/characters/character_profile.vm?characterId=392130108</A></P> <P> </P> <P>My stance are adept 3 but just about everything else minus tsunami is master including my self stat str wis buff.  </P> <P> </P> <P>7230 hp's.   3798 power.  In defensive stance i'm 2412 miti at 42%     Avoidance is 10332  or 64.1 with no potions or outside buffs.</P> <P>Message Edited by githyanki on <SPAN class=date_text>11-30-2006</SPAN> <SPAN class=time_text>03:51 AM</SPAN></P><p>Message Edited by githyanki on <span class=date_text>11-30-2006</span> <span class=time_text>03:54 AM</span>

[artophwar]

<DIV> <P><SPAN>I have no problem tanking any instance with 1 healer other than MMC. I parse around 1-1.4k dps on every raid encounter while in the MT group. I also play our guilds off tank and I even MT on cretin epic names. Since the update the incoming damage has been normalized and it takes a lot less effort to keep me up. I have M1 for every ability but 4 of the 58-60 spells. Here is my profile if you want to see the gear I have. I've put a lot of time into my monk and since I'm on a PvP server I'm still a fairly young character.</SPAN></P> <P><SPAN></SPAN> </P> <P><SPAN><A href="http://eq2players.station.sony.com/characters/character_profile.vm?characterId=333169120" target=_blank>http://eq2players.station.sony.com/characters/character_profile.vm?characterId=333169120</A></SPAN></P> <P><SPAN></SPAN> </P> <P><SPAN>I truly believe that our class will be on par with any plate wearers if they just make our deflection ability uncontested. Plate tanks have shields that have 20% uncontested avoidance and superior mitigation while we only have around 12% uncontested and around 1/3 less mitigation. Deflection is our shield and it should at a minimum be equal to the uncontested avoidance on Legendary Tower shields. The recent eof changes and patches following it have made vast improvements on our class. The main problem other than the lack in uncontested avoidance is the bell curves effect on resists.</SPAN></P></DIV><p>Message Edited by artophwar on <span class=date_text>11-30-2006</span> <span class=time_text>06:19 AM</span>

[Quind]

<blockquote><hr>Jessyme wrote:  <div>1) Play what you want to play.  </div> <div>2) Read the class forums rarely (there is great info there) but try to not let negative posts depress you about your character.  Every class forum has doom and gloom "the sky is falling on our class" posts. Every class forum has folks that think their class is broken and needs to be fixed.  It may be correct, it may not.  But the reality is that this is a dynamic game that is being tweaked/radically altered all the time . At any given moment there are several so-called "out of favor" classes that have folks saying they will be quitting the game unless they are fixed.  Read the other class forums, you will see this to be true.  </div> <div>(Quick side story: In EQ1 I played a Froglok Shammie.  I adored her. Then one day I visited the shaman forums.  The more I read, the more convinced I became that my character was sadly lacking.  I would go there all the time and then repeat what I read in the forums to my poor beleaguered guildies who kept telling me the same thing:  "You were fine before you read this stuff.  You play well in the game  and we like having you in our groups. We liked you before you found out that you were supposedly sadly lacking, we still like you now.  For goodness sake, PLEASE stop reading those dratted posts in the forums!  Or we will start to not like you due to all this whining!"  They were right *grin*)  </div> <div>3) Read the forums less, play the game more *grin*  Trust me on this one. You will be much happier if you do.  </div> <div> </div> <div>So eq2nt, go play your monk! And may the blessing of Marr be with him/her.</div> <div> </div> <div>Quijana</div><p>Message Edited by Jessyme on <span class="date_text">11-29-2006</span> <span class="time_text">08:59 PM</span></p><hr></blockquote>Good points, there.  The forums, for all that they are a valuable source of information, often become a cesspool of whining, especially after major changes.  People get concerned about their classes, particularly classes that they love.  I saw it in WoW, with the druid community, and in EQ1 with the chanter community, and in L2 with what tiny shreds there were of community at all in that game.  Don't fet too much about numbers, group makeup, raiding, and whatnot.  If you choose to raid, great.  IF you choose to level mostly through quests and solo content, spanky for you.  The guys that work hard on fabled content will have the gear they need to survive doing what they enjoy, and the guys that work hard on heroic and small-group content will have the gear THEY need to do THEIR job.  Maybe not right away, but eventually we all get the tools we need to do our jobs.If it takes one healer to keep you up in a group, sweet.  No healers, rawr.  Two healers?  Three healers?  If you can come by 'em, why not?  Give them some practice and keep them on their toes.  Give them a chance to shine in the group.  Make sure you praise them for keeping you up, and help them find ways to improve.  I'm sure they could offer some advice as well.If you're standing in front of a mob, doin' your thang and gettin' beaten on, you're going to be sexier with more support, all the time.  Nobody likes a saggy, floppy tank with more wrinkles than a prune.  What they do like is a pert, perky, well-rounded, firm tank that knows his job and knows how to lean on his support people.  Have fun, make some buff requests, sink some plat on the broker or level up a tradeskill or three.  Get your monkly groove on, and try to be the best that you can be.  Find a zone you like, people you want to be around, and enjoy yourself.  Don't worry about the minmaxing, peening, and whatnot.  In the end, it just leads to Another Long Thread In Which Several People Try To Defend The Class And The Rest Of The Posters Accuse Them Of Lying Or Misrepresenting Things When All They're Trying To Do Is Give People Hope And Show That With The Right Work On The Right Things, And A Friendly RNG Day, Anything Is Possible.<div></div>

[superdave]

look at adornments there alot out there that can help you in so many differnt ways. +400 health to shoulders. tailor makes these common 1 powder 9 fragments. take u about 10-12 treasured items to get tranmutor to get this for ya. thats just one. i dont see the heriocs being a problem. before the changes yes could i solo a herioc named of course. you should be able to do this its made for group of 3 or more. fine your nitch and you be fine. noone ever said it would be easy thats for sure. because if it was you quit in a week because it wouldnt excite you to play. find what works for you and go have fun is what i am saying. everyone so quick to point at its soe fault and such. if u need to go camp named in mmc to get items u need for class sets then go onto the instances. whateever it takes just go do it. thanks for posting your info i try get as close as possible.

[Bladewind]

<P>I really like Jess' outlook and have enjoyed her (I assume) past contributions to the community greatly.  I try to garner information from the fora to then test myself.  I appreciate the 'make it happen' point of view, and I feel that I am doing specifically that.  </P> <P>I can tank just about any heroic instance in the game fine with a single healer (two needed for the few really tough ones), *but* I have almost full fabled gear and 3/4 of my arts are masters, including all of my defensive abilities.  I have a few items adorned, but I am waiting on the market to drop before I buy others.  I have baout 70 AA, specced 5448 sta and 4488 int brawler and monk points put in maxing skin like the mountain and taunts.  I really do not think being full fabled should be a prerequisite for tanking heroic instances successfully.</P> <P>I've been a tanking monk (our aknowledged primary role) since launch.  It is well-known that avoidance went haywire with KoS, severly hindering a brawler's ability to tank end-game content.  Several key changes were supposed to rectify this situation and were set to accompany the release of EoF.  Only some of the chnages materialized, and left avoidance tanking more or less where it was in KoS.  The uncontested avoidance issue came to light about this same time, and the numbers show that brawlers have both the worst mit and worst avoidance vs end game content.  Recent changes have narrowed the gaps, but not solved the problem.  I've gone out and tanked Castle Mistmoore a few times and went away seeing that my composite 73% avoidance collapsed down to about 14% vs the trash named yellow heroics there.  I had adept 3 defensive stance at the time, so 9.5% was uncontested, meaning that about 62% of my avoidance collapsed to 5%.  This seems quite severe.  Coupled with the fact that any plate tank will have more mitigation (about 15% more damage resist with diminishing returns fully buffed) and more avoidance (19-25% uncontested plus a few more % of collapsed contested), and things seem really out of whack.</P> <P>Let's look at how a brawler balances vs a plate tank in 3 situations (assuming both are raid equipped, standard heroic assumes one healer, and epic heroic/raid assume a stacked group designed around keeping the MT up):</P> <P>Solo:  Brawler - 3k mit 60% avoid; Plate 5k mit  45% avoid - balanced well thanks to diminishing returns on mit scale kicking in above 4k - small disadvantage to brawler compensated by higher solo damage output (on average)</P> <P>Standard Heroic: Brawler 4.5k mit 65% avoid, Plate 6.5k mit 50% avoid - balanced very well - incoming damage comes at almost the same average rate to either tank- makes sense since both do dramatically less damage when tanking.</P> <P>'Epic' Heroic (ie, MMC):  Brawler 5k mit 70+%(15% max true) avoid, Plate 7k mit 50-55% (23-27% true) avoid - balance slips here quite a bit - the brawler's avoidance is cut to 1/4 of the previous case while the plate tank loses a bit more than half of theirs.  This leads to the plate tank having more avoid and mit than the brawler and thus the plate tank having a significant tanking advantage. Brawlers can still tank this content, but do it in a noticabley worse manner.</P> <P>True Epic (raid): Brawler 5k mit 70%(15% or less (12% min)adjusted) avoid, Plate 7k mit 50-55% (25% or less (19% min) adjusted)  avoid -The disparity of the above case widens, leaving a brawler very vulnerable in raid situations.  Once again, some content can be tanked successfully, but a good chunk is either effectively impossible or so wasteful of healer mana that it is not worth it for a brawler to be the tank.</P> <P>The simple truth is that in the end game situations, brawlers are at a severe disadvantage performing their primary role.  I'm asking for this to rectified.  One change should do this - making all deflection from our defensive stance uncontested.  This would make us roughly equal in terms of incoming average damage vs plate tanks when taking on mistmoore castle level content, and slightly inferior but still viable vs full raid content.  Having an ability to modestly increase uncontested deflection through AAs or equipment (like all other fighters) would be an ideal additional change, but I'd be happy with the stance fix alone.</P> <P>I hope this did not come across as doom and gloom - I tried to state it in a manner that shows what I have observed, my perceived problem with the observation, and a minimally intrusive solution to rectify problem.</P>

[githyanki]

<P>Well let me pipe up here for a few points that i have seen brought up.  Im my opinion this game is all about numbers.  People will say to you that you should just forget it and play the game for the immersion factor and let the devs worry about all of that stuff.  Frankly the devs aren't always at the tiller of the boat for all the classes and unless you bring up, as a specific class, issues that you see you are considered working as intended.  Its kinda hard to be immersed in anything but the ground when you cant do what you should be able to as a tank class.  </P> <P>Numbers push this game in all areas...from crafting to solo to epic fights.  Now what scale and ratio and what not they use is out of the players hands for the most part.  Some people have brought up some valid points as far as adornements and if they weren't crazy expensive i'd be able to purchase a few of em.  But as of right now if you get an upgraded item that adornement is stuck on the gear you put it on and the money gone.   Makes me a wee bit cautious to be honest.  </P> <P>Back to the numbers thing now.  There are some very smart people who play this game who have knowledge of parses that i dont have or the gear to be able to test it properly.  I'm not much of a computer geek but i do understand plain numbers as easy as the next average joe.  Hence my push to try to get them out there.  I can't do it on my own otherwise i would and i'd stop complaining.  I have alot of time invested in my monk and i'm getting to the stage where i want to be able to do all the stuff my gear should allow me too.  And pushing for upgrades all the time to do stuff i cant do now.   My guildies think i'm a wee bit crazy for some of the stuff i try to pull off but i'm just pushing myself to improve and better their playing experience also.  My wife plays this game with me as a templar and the most dreaded thing she hears from me is..." let me try something here".  Its not a lack of will its lack of solid math that stops me from doing all the stuff i should be able to do with the gear that i have.  </P>

[Harvash]

<DIV>sorry took so long to respond to the WAY above poster..lol.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>My MC armor is about half STR/AGI and Half STR/STA/AGI.  Taunts are upgraded, again..no real probs with aggro beyond the healer having to uncork the mana stream after i have taken several spikes in a row and be on the verge of death.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Stance is upgraded, and WIS/STR buff is M2</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Ran my zerk thru a diff instance the other night...the whole run was Cake, and they are similary equiped in terms of quality of spells, buffs, armor and weapons..</DIV>

[Sslarrga]

<DIV>Yay, yet another "fun" showing for the superiority of Mitigation tanking to Avoidance tanking.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>In Freethinkers's today, we had the great idea to experiment with different tanks offtank the adds on the named that spawns adds when she touches someone.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>With a monk and 3 healers 1 add not much of a prob, 2 adds have some issues, 3 adds huge mana sink and eventual splat.</DIV> <DIV>With a bruiser and 3 healers pretty similar except less of a mana sink with 3 but still eventual splat.</DIV> <DIV>With a guardian (relatively new to guild) with less fabled and in general worse quality armor.  2 healer.  up to 4 adds no problem, 5th add started to have some issues 6th and 7th add = splat.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>BTW - that's with me, the monk, spec'd for avoidance tanking.  I might as well suck on my thumb for as much good as that does against epics compared to a mitigation tank with a good tower shield.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Again, that's basically Fully Fabled with the exception of some legendary that's better than some fabled when it comes to avoidance tanking.  Basically when tanking almost ever single piece of gear contributes to avoidance with either +parry, +defense, or +deflection.  And with some pieces for +mitigation where it made sense.  Just looked at my profile and it doesn't have all my tanking gear on.  That's just what I use when farming low greens in SoS for treasured.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>True, when doing HEROIC instances in full fabled it's not so bad.  Doing it with a full fabled mitigation tank is also significantly easier.  Parts of Mistmoore Castle are doable with a very good healer and a very good chanter but then again it's a LOT easier...not a little...a LOT easier with a mitigation tank.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>So I guess the moral of the story is.  If you want to do Heroic instances with a monk do it fully fabled and you can do it about as well as a fully legendary mitigation tank.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I'm in no danger of losing a raid spot, but if I wasn't a monk.  At this point in time I wouldn't recommend our guild to recruit one.  Unless things change, I'd take a Pally, SK, Zerker or Bruiser before I'd take a monk.  Yes, that is how disillusioned I am with the class when it comes to raiding.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Like just about any decent guild, we parse extensively with a focus to maximising DPS, Tanking, and Heal efficiency.  Substitue any fighter class in my spot in the DPS group and they'll parse roughly the same (pally/guardian) or higher (zerker, bruiser, SK, guardian in DPS mode).  Granted I can pick up a whopping 60-120 DPS by specing for full DPS, but that's still short of the real fighter dps classes.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Only missing 2 masters, neither of which will impact DPS in a positive way with a m1.  Outward Calm and Rumbling Wyrm.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>So yeah, whether it's tanking or DPSing, we're the red-headed stepchild of the fighter class.  Am I being over pessimistic?  Yup, most probably.  And I will continue to be until I see some sign from SoE that they have a single bloody clue what they want to do with the class.  First thing I'd like to see is them address the monks over reliance on haste to balance DPS.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Am I saying not to play a monk?  Well, if you like it you like it.  If you're a casual player then the monk is nice if you like a challenge and don't look to closely at how well the other classes do their jobs.  The very fact that it's relatively different than a traditional armor and shield tank will mask most of the flaws for a while.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>There's a reason why all tanks in Vanguard are mitigation based.  And all avoidance fighters are classified as offensive fighters.  </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Regards,</DIV> <DIV>Croaker, Deaths Door, Everfrost blah blah blah...</DIV><p>Message Edited by Sslarrga on <span class=date_text>12-02-2006</span> <span class=time_text>01:38 AM</span>

[BK613]

a lot of great posts on this thread but they all miss the most disappointing aspect of being a brawler class: not enough gi armor <span>:smileywink:</span> <div></div>