The Death Knight was an incredibly exciting addition to World of Warcraft, with its unique starting experience and boosted levels, with its cosmetic differences and free weapon enchants, and with its wild overpowered-ness and hideously difficult balancing that took all of Wrath to get right.
The Monk had none of that, but perhaps that's all right. It does have unique combat animations, though, which is something.
Like the Death Knight, the Monk was made available to a wide variety of races (though not the Cataclysm-era ones,) yet because of its co-introduction with the Pandaren, it is perhaps not surprising that most people made a Pandaren Monk.
In addition to bringing in a new tank and dps spec, the Monk is the first new healer to be introduced since WoW's launch in 2004. Sadly, I can't actually say much about Monks as healers, as I've never really played any healer. I do know that they seem to be ok, but that's from a tank/dps perspective, so whatever balance issues there might exist, I don't really know.
The Monk resource system manages to blend the old with the new, keeping a Rogue's energy but using Chi instead of Combo Points. While Energy is important, it's really the Chi that gives the class its rhythm.
Appropriately, Monks feel very mobile, mainly thanks to Roll, and their ability to fight with fluidity is reflected in the mechanics of the class.
Brewmaster:
Case in point, the Brewmaster feels very different from any other tank on the field. Sure, in this era of active mitigation, you can't just wade into battle and expect to survive on heavy armor alone, but the Monk needs to be constantly working to keep up that survivability. Essentially, you have to juggle maintaining Shuffle at all times, maximizing uptime on Elusive Brew, and getting your powered-up Guard up as often as you can, while trying to maintain one spare Chi to use Purifying Brew if you get in trouble. Compare this to, say, Death Knights, who simply have to hit Death Strike as often as they can.
On the other hand, in my experience, Threat seems easier to maintain on a Monk. With Keg Smash as well as Dizzying Brew and Spinning Crane Kick, coupled with the mobility granted by Roll and Clash, not to mention your Ox statue, it's not too hard to pick up those big swarms that tend to be a nightmare for other tanks if they don't use some big AoE attack at the exact moment on the exact target they need.
Monk tanking is challenging, but fun, and it's a real change of pace from the other tanks.
Windwalker:
I'll admit I mainly know Windwalkers from soloing. Essentially, the Windwalker does feel pretty fast-paced, like other Monks. Despite mobility abilities like Roll and Flying Serpent Kick, you'll also need to know when to plant your feet and do Fists of Fury. While Windwalkers do fine in single-target situations and excel in AoE, the cleave-like situations that make up most trash groups are a little tricker, though I believe that's what Storm Earth and Fire are for (I've only run one dungeon as a Windwalker.)
Like Brewmasters, you have a lot of cooldowns, both short-term rotational and long-term burst damage, to juggle. Windwalkers use Tigereye Brew frequently to boost their damage, and Fists of Fury is rotational, but feels almost like a cooldown. The only baseline cooldown that is more than a minute seems to be Energizing Brew, which boosts your energy regeneration. However, at least in my experience, one tends to be more worried about spending Chi than gasping for Energy to Jab more. But again, I've done very little Windwalking other than solo questing.
Mistweaver:
I can't really talk about this from practical experience, but Mistweavers do seem to have a very different style of healing, using channeled spells and other spells that can be cast during those that will boost them and refresh DoTs.
Additionally, they seem to downplay Spirit-based mana regeneration in favor of Mana Tea. Again, I can't comment all that much on this.
While Mistweavers have a built-in Atonement-style damage-to-healing mechanic, it looks like you can't just play as if you were DPS and still put out the same level of healing. I imagine that if you're doing content that you out-gear, you can probably just spam your melee attacks, but I get the impression that Eminence healing isn't as good at dealing with big spikes on the tank.
The Monk HQ:
Perhaps the most notable thing about Monks as a class is Zen Pilgrimage, and the Peak of Serenity. Like Moonglade and Acherus, the Peak of Serenity is kind of the "class guildhall," with amenities designed for that class. However, just as Acherus had far more interesting things than Moonglade, such as training dummies and rune forges, the Peak of Serenity is specially-built for leveling (and level-capped) Monks.
This is primarily because of the quests. Every ten levels, the Monk gets a cool piece of blue-quality gear. In addition, there's a daily quest there (requiring you to defeat the same opponents) that awards "Enlightenment," which greatly increases you reputation gains. At the level cap, you instead get a whopping 3000 mastery rating, which is borderline absurd.
Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting:
Despite these advantages, and the overall benefit of being designed from the ground up more recently than all those classes that were carrying eight years (or four, for DKs) of baggage, Blizzard managed to do a good job in balancing Monks. Unlike in Wrath, where DKs were the best tanks and the best DPS (at least at first,) Monks have slid in fairly inconspicuously, doing very well for those who master them, but not overshadowing the older classes.
So overall, a successful addition to the game.
(Now give me a Demon Hunter.)
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