monk skills tweaking?

[Enuch]

(at level 10), your current skill bonuses and ranks (including all modifiers) are:
Skill Name | Current Current
| Bonus Ranks
Armor Use..........................| 20 4
Combat Maneuvers..................| 70 15
Brawling...........................| 102 24
Multi Opponent Combat.... ...| 62 13
Physical Fitness................ ..| 120 30
Dodging............................ | 105 25
Harness Power....................| 15 3
Mental Lore - Transformati ..| 5 1
Survival......................... .. | 90 20
Perception.........................| 54 11
Climbing...........................| 50 10
First Aid........................ ..| 90 20
Spell Lists
Minor Mental.......................| 3

also adding my CMANS in case that plays a role in the robes question

Feint feint 2
Surge of Strength surge 1
Evade Mastery emastery 1

Available Combat Maneuver Training Points: 4

I know off the bat people will think my FA and Surv is probably way too high. I love to skin and I have a pelt bag which is centered around my character(krolvin pelt trader). My main question is as it relates to quality skinning and foraging can I afford to go to 1x survival? I know that would help me get close to 3x dodge.

Also thanks to DR I may have 10k BS for the 6x robes. Given my 3x dodge setup are robes ideal, or would I be better suited to train up into something else? Thoughts and perspectives on adjustments greatly appreciated. I still have some time for my 30 days. I am currently training at a pace of spells every 4 levels or so.

[Astray]

Monks get penalized for wearing anything that isn't robes, if I recall correctly.

But the good thing is iron skin helps greatly in that area, till something casts at you.

Might want to get perfect self ASAP, since it's basically a self-enhancive with no time constraints. The bonuses help. Also, hunt with spells. Particularly ones that help with warding.

[TheLastRowmi]

My only advice here is: if you're going to wear robes, you'll definitely want to single in Transformation and drop the armor use. If you want a mutant armor wearing monk, don't go for robes.
Everything else is subjective. I still don't have FA or Survival, as I find them tertiary far post cap goals.

But everything is sacrifice when it comes to playing a monk. Choose your battles.

MoC was the real game changer for me. I'd suggest focusing on that whenever you can until at least 90 ranks.

As for CMANs, I remember the punch/grapple/kick mastery (choose one and stick to it) helped immensely early on. But then, I doubled CM.

[Enuch]

yeah the Survival and FA are for character/RP purposes. But I will drop armor training and I think maybe single survival and try to put some transform ranks going

[Middian]

Armor Use..........................| 20 4 (Drop)
Combat Maneuvers..................| 70 15 (2x)
Brawling...........................| 102 24 (2x)
Multi Opponent Combat.... ...| 62 13 (2x until 90)
Physical Fitness................ ..| 120 30 (3x)
Dodging............................ | 105 25 (3x)
Harness Power....................| 15 3 (I 1x until 20-25 ranks)
Mental Lore - Transformati ..| 5 1 (get to 15)
Survival......................... .. | 90 20 (I would drop, your call)
Perception.........................| 54 11 (1x)
Climbing...........................| 50 10
First Aid........................ ..| 90 20 (I would drop, your call)
Spell Lists
Minor Mental.......................| 3 (1x until 20ranks and then 1x in minor spiritual)

also adding my CMANS in case that plays a role in the robes question

Feint feint 2 (combat mobility first)
Surge of Strength surge 1
Evade Mastery emastery 1

(Punch mastery, Rolling Krynch, perfect self)

[SpiffyJr]

99% sure it's impossible to train like you suggested.

[sentral]

well about perfect self, my monk doesn't have any of it, and he does fine. I would do slippery mind before perfect self. combat mobility definitely. surge of strength and burst of quickness. I don't think you will need any feint, once you can start mstriking things then. Get ambush too, so you can punch things in the head, its usually an instant kill if your in the excellent tier.

[Maerit]

99% sure it's impossible to train like you suggested.

You are correct. This is what I was able to fit in for my monk to 25 levels:


Skill Name | Current Current
| Bonus Ranks
Two Weapon Combat..................| 5 1
Combat Maneuvers...................| 117 29
Brawling...........................| 154 54
Ambush.............................| 90 20
Multi Opponent Combat..............| 120 30
Physical Fitness...................| 154 54
Dodging............................| 154 54
Harness Power......................| 105 25
Perception.........................| 111 27
Climbing...........................| 50 10
Swimming...........................| 50 10

Spell Lists
Minor Mental.......................| 20

2x PF and Dodge - 3x is a goal worthy of much later on. Don't worry about minor spirit spells as much since you can easily find them, and most Empath / Cleric will toss them on you for free, and I was only able to 1x CMAN since I wanted to 1x MnM spells.

Ambush training is for when you want to start aiming punches. I probably trained it too early. It would probably be better to just push those points into CMAN and be about 1.5x CMAN.

Monks have a few hunting style options. I prefer to go the more magical route for now because it's easier at low levels. Harness Power is necessary for 1) casting your defensive spells and "spelling up" and 2) using 1207 in the field. My hunting is simple - 1207, then MSTRIKE PUNCH, then finish off the target. Of course, I play a F2P monk, so it's a more single-target focus hunter. The other method is a more CMAN centric build.

-- The 1 rank in Two Weapon Combat is to activate the off-hand parry bonus. When you're using Brace, you can parry with UAC, so this can actually help increase your parry chance and parry DS (though eventually you should aim to be .5x in TWC for full parry DS bonus).

[Gnomad]

Comparatively, another affordable build:


Monk (at level 30), your current skill bonuses and ranks (including all modifiers) are:
Skill Name | Current Current
| Bonus Ranks
Two Weapon Combat..................| 5 1
Combat Maneuvers...................| 154 54
Brawling...........................| 164 64
Multi Opponent Combat..............| 130 35
Physical Fitness...................| 164 64
Dodging............................| 196 96
Harness Power......................| 66 15
Perception.........................| 5 1
Climbing...........................| 90 20
Swimming...........................| 50 10

Spell Lists
Minor Mental.......................| 20

I forget why I only have 1 rank of perception. I haven't played this character in a while. 3x dodge + rank 3 evade mastery + halfling has served him well, though. Probably a little slower to kill than a build with ambush, but he's a dodge tank. I open with either 1207 or mstrike jab, and then follow up with quickstrike punches (and some punch mastery).

Apparently I'm migrating my cmans, or I'd post those.

[Enuch]

appreciate the insights! Taking a hybrid of both of those builds to get to 1220 ASAP and then will probably revert to my training for like 20 levels or so (because I love skinning so much) and then revert back to the hybrid build to pump up the 100s into the 50-70 range.

[Brad]

One thing I would suggest is 30 ranks of MOC as soon as you can. That made a huge difference for my monk when I got that around 20ish. Depending on where you hunt and all, that is pretty close if not a one shot kill for your 20s.

Also on a related and fun note, once Reim is open again, Flurry of Blows is pretty awesome there if visiting it a lot turns out to be an option. That was a lot of my monk's 20s, with all the mstriking and free jabs.

Punch punch punch.

[Enuch]

Curious from fellow monks, I am forecasting getting close to 5k BS and was wondering if I should spend 4k for the 5x realm flaringn gloves or hold out the BS for the next DR.

I got the 6x robes and currently have the 4x unbalance/knockdown flares. Is it really worth the 4k BS for those realm flares and 5 UAC boost or are there items I am overlooking besides gloves and robes I should get?

Should I invrst in a helm with head and neck protection with flares or is that silly? Or maybe some magical trinkets or just get bags and other nonsense. To me the 5k BS for the 5 UAC bump from te other grapple flares is not worth it but the realm flares are intriguing given how they change based on the hunting ground.


Also unrelated should I stick with voln or is GoS a good route to go? I love warcamps but I had a ranger who once he hit 20 warcamps were not possible solo even just for my tasks and with spells. But man GOS with Moc has got to be sick. But undead hunting and UAC opens slot of areas

[Maerit]

The UAF increase will show minimal improvement. The realm flares are not as amazing as they might seem unless you're hunting very specific areas (they're nice in Icemule, but then so is normal fire flaring). If you can farm the BS, you'd be better served getting the 6x disruption flaring equipment or switch to the 4x disintegration flaring stuff for 250 BS each.

What really helps is getting your gloves ensorcelled. They will give you a lot of extra stamina!


GOS is probably pretty nice for a Monk, but I would not expect warcamps to be amazing. My experience has shown that monks are not great in swarms (at least early on), and you have a TON of CS casting grim to deal with. I'm usually more interested in Voln for my Monk because of the undead advantages. Having to deal with non-corp undead as a monk tends to be a pain since they're immune to stun, crits, and tend to have an arsenal of annoying spells.

If you do go GOS, get the 24k BS double fire-flaring gloves in the high-end shop. Then go do troll warcamps...

[Enuch]

yeah pretty torn, the big thing will be the TD issues, I love the flexibility and kai for undead as I would never need a bless, but with all the stam perks of monks using GoS wouldn't be too big a hassle, and the unique tasks albeit tough would be nice. May ditch voln and go GoS even though I know money won't be good going that route.

Ill probably just hoard my remaining BS and hope something good comes in next years DR, maybe pick up some warpaint and a cloak but stockpile for next time. Got the robes that was really what I wanted and 24k BS is out of my league or else I would get that in a heartbeat!

[Brad]

There should also be new stuff available next time at DR from what it sounds like. For Voln, it seems it might be good to go with blessable gloves, best with the holy water flares from clerics, for your punching concerns if I am understanding correctly and you don 't get the attack bonus otherwise. Ensorcelled gloves are definitely awesome though, as mentioned, especially considering the extra first jab with an mstrike, etc.

[Enuch]

Ill start saving for ensorcelling gloves. Decided to go the GOS route. We'll see down the road if that was the right choice

[Dintarl]

So - if you're still doing your warcamps, I cannot overstate the usefulness of Flurry.

Double up that MOC, drop Krynch and use Flurry, then just watch the waves of camp critters melt when you mstrike - especially if you have some nice flaring gear.

My halfling, with non-flaring gloves/boots and a drake yierka-spur, would kill 2-3 trolls and 1-2 orcs on approximately 80% of her mstrikes - I did over a dozen camps with her between 8 and 15 and used Flurry the whole way. She got significantly deadlier once she got her flaring gloves and boots at 10th level, too.