Monk guide

[fiveeauxfour]

I found this monk guide while digging deep in the monkly business forums. Enjoy:D
I tried to format it to the best of my ability. Link to the guide itself (http://www.monkly-business.net/forums/showthread.php?t=8621)

Forward

This guide is geared towards players who have a good working comprehension of EverQuest game fundamentals but wish to achieve additional information on classes they might

want to play. If you are a new player in EverQuest, then I suggest reading the EverQuest Manual and looking at our new player section before continuing.


Overview

~The Masters of Melee Damage~
This is a title often given to Monks, and while many rogues would disagree with it, claiming that under the right circumstances they will out-damage a Monk in a fight, no one disagrees that the melee output of those two classes are far above any other.

The path of a Monk is one of poverty and humility. Monks are extremely powerful and agile fighters, but there is a downside to this power. To maintain his full effectiveness, the Monk must stay at 14 weight or below which severely limits his ability to carry coins or items. He is also limited in his armor, only wearing cloth and leather armor types.

As a Monk do not expect to ever have much money, but this is not too much of a problem, seeing as your equipment needs are the least of any fighting class. A completely naked Monk can still fight at 80% - 90% effectiveness, showing how little we are affected by our belongings

So, what is a Monk? A Monk is a hard-hitting fighter who is also agile and good at avoiding getting hit. When he does get hit however, he gets hit hard, and he cannot take much punishment before dying. He has access to some rogue skills (Safe Fall, Sneak, Instill Doubt) and has some unique abilities of his own (Mend and Feign Death). Those last 2 skills are very important to a Monk--more on them later

Monks also lack the Taunt ability, making it difficult for them to get the creature to stop attacking the weaker members of the party


~Monks are not good tanks.~
True and false. Monks have high AC and also the highest defensive skills of any class, making them very hard to hit. This means that they will take less damage. However the Monk has very low hit points, so it seems they are getting hit harder to those who do not realize this.

Example: A Warrior and a Monk attack creature X. In the first fight, the warrior takes the damage. In the second (versus an identical creature), the Monk takes the damage

Fight 1: Warrior takes 1000 damage out of his 2000 hit points, leaving him at half health.

Fight 2: Monk takes 800 damage out of his 1200 hit points, leaving him at a third health

So, at first glance, it would seem that the Monk makes the more efficient tank. Even though he finished on a lower percentage of health, he would heal it back faster or take less mana for a healer to heal him. However, at high levels when clerics get spells which heal to full, regardless of the amount of hit points the target has, the warrior becomes the more efficient damage-absorber, as clerics can heal more for their mana


~Iksar Monks get a tail attack.~
Again, true and false. Some people believe that Iksar get additional attacks than their human counterparts. This is not true.

The Iksars gain an attack with their tail (Tail Rake) at level 25, but it is a direct replacement for the human level 25 skill “Dragon Punch,” and the two skills are identical in performance

Creating a Character can be a daunting undertaking, for it can be straightforward and complex at the same time. You can create your character depending on what type of situation or role you want to classify in.


Race

Another large factor in creating your Character is deciding what race to play.* This is not only a personal choice depending on how you want to role-play, but it will also effect how you play.* Each race has diverse starting attributes, location, and disadvantages over others

One thing to keep in mind is that although stats are very important in EverQuest, the most important thing is that you choose a race that you like, and most importantly, have a roleplaying reason for choosing.* Never choose a race simply for its stats - there are dozens of wood elf and halfling druids out there (many of which were chosen simply for stats) - an adventurous Druid may choose to be a human or half elf, for the sole purpose of being different


~Human~
Humans get a choice of deity, which affects their starting location. Agnostic Monks start in Qeynos, while their brothers who follow Quellious are based in Freeport. Humans have good faction and the best damage output with their fists. However they have no night-vision and heal slowly.

~Iksar~
Iksar follow Cazic Thule and start in Cabilis in Kunark. Iksar have marginally better physical statistics than humans, infravision, regeneration, an AC bonus, and can Forage for food and water. However, they require more experience to level (20% more than humans), are not quite as good with their fists, KOS (killed-on-sight) to every race except their own, and cannot wear plate armor (there are a few plate bracers and gloves which a human Monk can wear that an Iksar cannot).


Attributes

One of the most significant parts of character generation is choosing where to put your bonus points. This will let you further modify your character’s role to be more helpful in diverse situations. A Warrior might add more to his Strength, so he can cut deeper into his quarry. While a Necromancer would be much more interested in increasing his magical powers and spreading the evil deeds with Intelligence. A thing to keep in mind, you can even further increase your attributes with magical items found inside the game, so incase you make a oversight, it is not very hard to correct.

One thing is for sure though--attributes only have a marginal effect on the game when compared to other things, which have a more direct effect. The main ones are Level, AC, and Hit Points. While having good attributes will help you, do not sacrifice AC or HPs for them.

Strength (Useful for Monks)
Influences your maximum and average damage ratios, the more strength you have the more likely you will hit harder. Additional strength will let you learn your offensive faster.

Stamina (Useful for Monks)
Affects how many total hit points you have, and how long you will be able to hold your breath under water, also how fast you lose stamina when wielding weapons.

Agility (Useful for Monks)
Increases how difficult it is to be hit. Also affects how quickly you can learn some defensive skills.

Dexterity (Useful for Monks)
Influences how often your weapon proc (spell) will engage, and how quickly you learn weapon skills. Will also increase how fast you learn rogue skills.

Wisdom (Ineffective for Monks)
Directly affects the amount of mana the priest classes have, including rangers. Also affects how quickly you can learn many skills if your wisdom is higher then intelligence.

Intelligence (Ineffective for Monks)
Directly affects the amount of mana of magi classes, including bards and shadow knights. Also affects how quickly you can learn many skills.

Charisma (Ineffective for Monks)
Affects amount you will be paid for goods by NPC merchants, and how much they will pay you. Also effects saving throw on ccertain bard and enchanter spells (charms in particular)

[fiveeauxfour]

Combat

The Monk is a pure melee class, meaning they are at the front line, mixing it up, and not casting spells in any form.

The Monks first role (many would say primary role) is what is referred to as “pulling.” When a creature is encountered, it often is in the company of friends, and it is preferred to fight the creatures in as low numbers as possible, being less dangerous and also more efficient. The Monk excels in breaking a group of creatures apart, using the skill Feign Death, which he can learn at level 17. More on this skill, and pulling, later.

Combat itself is pretty straightforward. Pick a target, and switch on attack. Use your special attack of choice, and then hit it again every time it refreshes (Monks get special attacks at level 1, 5, 10, 20, 25 and 30). Each new attack is more powerful than the last, but they cannot be used in conjunction with one another. Under some circumstances, you may wish to use the level 27 skill Disarm to attempt to remove the targets weapon, and you may also want to use the level 18 skill Instill Doubt to cause the creature to flee from you in fear.

Note: One thing definitely worth mentioning here is two of the starting skills.


1) Dual Wield
Monks start with the ability to use both hands at the same time in combat (the only class that does), however, they also start off with a candle to light the way. If you hold this candle in one of your hands (or any non-weapon item), then you will not attack with that hand, reducing your combat effectiveness


2) Dodge
The first of the defensive skills is available at level 1. However, you do not start the game trained in this skill like you do all the other level 1 skills. Before you can use and learn Dodge, you must visit your guildhall and be trained in the basics


Special Information

Disciplines
Once a Monk reaches level 51, he has access to special skills called disciplines which are level dependant and have long (some longer than others) recycle time.

It is also worth mentioning that the starting timers listed below for the disciplines seem to lower by one minute as you increase in levels. For example, at level 51 Stone Stance resets in 12 minutes, but at 60 it resets in 1 minute.


~Level 51: Stone Stance~
When using this discipline, the Monk will take roughly 1/10th damage from most physical attacks. This discipline lasts for 12 seconds, and has a base reuse time of 12 minutes. The reuse time for this discipline will decrease as the Monk gains additional levels.
While this is how Verant described the discipline, in actuality it seems to only cut 1/3rd off the damage dealt.

~Level 52: Thunder Kick~
When this discipline is activated, the next successful flying kick will do additional damage. The base reuse time for this discipline is 9 minutes, and will decrease as the Monk gains additional levels.

~Level 53: Whirlwind~
When using this discipline, the Monk will automatically riposte every attack landed on him by the opponent he is facing. This discipline lasts for 9 seconds, and has a base reuse time of 60 minutes. The reuse time for this discipline will decrease as the Monk gains additional levels.

~Level 54: Voiddance~
When using this discipline, the Monk cannot be hit in melee combat. This discipline lasts for 8 seconds and has a base reuse time of 60 minutes. The reuse time for this discipline will decrease as the Monk gains additional levels.

~Level 56: Innerflame~
When using this discipline, all hits landed by the Monk will be for at least four times the base weapon’s/hand’s damage. This discipline lasts for 12 seconds and has a base reuse time of 30 minutes. The reuse time for this discipline will decrease as the Monk gains additional levels.

~Level 57: 100 Fist~
When using this discipline, the Monk will be hasted (e.g. will hit much faster). This haste stacks with every other haste in the game, including haste items and spells. This discipline lasts for 15 seconds, and has a base reuse time of 30 minutes. The reuse time for this discipline will decrease as the Monk gains additional levels.

~Level 59: Silent Fist~
When this discipline is activated, the next successful Dragon Punch (Tail Rake for Iksar) will do additional damage and have a chance of stunning the target. The base reuse time for this discipline is 9 minutes and will decrease as the Monk gains additional levels.

~Level 59: Ashen Hand~
When this discipline is activated, the next Eagle Strike will do a surprising amount of damage, and under certain circumstances may have a chance to kill the target outright. The base reuse time for this discipline is 72 minutes.


Skill Information

Bind Wounds - Level 1, skill cap = (level +1) * 5
The ability to heal damage received using bandages. This seems expensive at first, as bandages cost quite a lot of money, but at upper levels it is an invaluable skill. From level 1 to 50, the Monk can heal himself or another player but cannot raise anyone above 50% health using this skill. Each bandage will heal (skill level / 4) hit points. At level 51, he can heal up to 70%, and each bandage will heal 80 HPs.


Mend - Level 1, skill cap = (level +1) * 5
Once every 6 minutes, the Monk can attempt to instantly heal himself of 25% of his total hit points using this skill. Success is based upon the level of your skill, and once it reaches skill 101 (at level 20), it will never fail. At lower levels (1-19) it is possible to critically fail the skill, causing you to LOSE 25% health. Though this will not kill you, stopping you at 5 HPs if it would have otherwise caused your death.


Safe Fall– Level 3, skill cap = (level +1) *5
Safe fall is the ability to reduce the damage a Monk takes from falling. While the rogue and bard classes have this skill, they are limited to 100.


Sneak – Level 8, skill cap = (level +1) * 5
Sneak is the ability to move quietly, not alerting your enemies to your presence as long as you can stay out of its line of sight. One side effect of this skill is that you can use it to trade with merchants who would normally refuse to deal with you.


Feign Death – Level 17, skill cap = (level +1) * 5
The ability to pretend you have died and fool creatures into no longer attacking you. This is useful as an escape tactic and to avoid otherwise certain death, but the main use for this skill is in pulling creatures.

Feign Death, a skill Monks learn at 17th level, is quite arguably one of the best, if not the best, skills in the game. With this skill Monks can learn a technique called the "Feign Pull." This technique allows the Monk to split creature spawns up and bring them back one at a time to his group to fight. This allows for more efficient battles and easier pulling later after the spawn spot has been "spaced" properly.


I will be explaining the details of this technique as best I can so that my brother & sister Monks may learn from my knowledge. It should also be noted that the necromancer and shadow knight also get Feign Death but as a spell and not a skill. The same technique can be used by either of them, but I would advise against it as spells have a casting time, can fizzle, can be interrupted, and can also fail just as our skill can.


I would also like to say that the Feign Pull is also an art form. Not everyone can do it, and not everyone can do it well. It takes skill, timing, judgement, strategy, and patience. As with all things, it also takes lots of practice. While the principle of the technique will be the same everywhere you use it, there will be little things you will have to learn in each zone. Not every creature reacts the same way. All areas will not offer the same tactical advantages and NPC creature pathing will not always be the same.

[fiveeauxfour]

That being said, I would now like to define some terms that I, myself, or the Monk community at large uses when speaking of the Feign Pull.

"Aggro" When a creature becomes angry with you and attacks.

"Aggro Range" The range in which a creature will detect and attack you. This range differs from creature to creature and also gets smaller as your levels go up.

"Chain Pull" When two or more people work on a pull. A Monk is the primary puller, and anyone can be the secondary puller, however, another Monk is preferable.

"Feign / Feigned" When you use your Feign Death skill you will be lying on the ground and, if successful, creatures will think you are dead.

"Feign Pull" The technique used to break up a creature spawn and bring back manageable numbers of creatures for a group to fight.

"Home Point" The spot where a static spawns.

"Mem Wipe" When you are removed from a creatures hate list.

"Pop-N-Drop / PnD" When you stand up and re-Feign several times to increase the chance of a Mem Wipe on a creature.

"Pull / Pull'n" The act of going out to find and bring a creature(s) back to your group to fight.

"Sort / Sort'n" What you do when you are Feigned and waiting for creatures to leave the area you're Feigned in so that you can bring the last one standing near you back to your group.

"Static / Stationary" A creature that always stays in the spot it spawned in.

"Wanderer / Roamer" A creature that has no set spawn point and moves around a certain pattern or path.

Now to explain how the technique is actually used. Again, this is based solely on my experiences and what has worked for me.


1. If you do not know the area you are hunting you need to go do some scouting and learn the lay of the land. Learn what kind of creatures live there, where they spawn, how often they spawn, and where the wanderers are. Learn all the twists, turns, and landmarks of the area. Lots of this will just come with time and exploration.

2. Find a good spot for your group to hunt. This should be an area with few to no wanders. Also the closer to the zone border you can be, the safer it is in case of an emergency. Many good hunting areas will be far away from any zone, so a Monk's skill with Feign Pull will mean the success or failure of a night's adventure.

3. Find a good spot far enough away from your group and the creatures you will be pulling. You don't want creatures close enough to your group that they agro on them. You also don't want to be close enough to the creature’s area you just pulled, so they re-agro on you.

4. Find the creatures you want to pull. You can use a thrown weapon to attract their attention, you can run up and attack them hand to hand, or you can Agro Range pull them. Each method of pulling has its own advantages and disadvantages. It's up to the individual to figure out what works best for them and what method works best in which areas.

5. After you have some creatures angry with you, run back to your Feign spot, turn around where you can see them, and Feign Death. If you are successful, the creatures will stop attacking you and just stand there for a little bit. The creatures will then start to leave and go back to where they came from. They will usually do this one at a time, but occasionally they will all leave at the same time. If they all leave at once, you will have to make judgement calls and use every split second of distance between the creatures to further work to space them more by standing and re-Feigning. Sometimes you just have to bring more than one, but if you are patient, you can almost always bring a single.

6. Once all creatures but one have left you, stand up, attack the creature, and head back to your group. A hotkey set up for a /gsay "Incoming" is very useful. It allows your party to be ready for your return and can also be used to let your group know how many creatures you bringing back if you have more than one. Example: "Incoming, Incoming, Incoming" when you are bringing three creatures back.

7. Help your group to kill the creature(s) you just pulled then check with all casters, so you know how much mana everyone has. You should always check with your casters after every fight. If you run off and bring more creatures and your only healer is at 20% mana, then you could be in trouble. Don't rely on the casters to take initiative and give you mana updates. You control the flow of the pulls, so you should always know how combat-ready your party is.

8. Now its time to pull again. Depending on how quickly you can sort your pulls and how quickly your pull dies, you may need to wait a few minutes between battles to pull again. This is to allow you to "space" the spawn time. If you are pulling a large area and several different creature camps, you will want to do this for ease of pulling later. There is no need to have to Feign Pull every single time if you can set the spawn time to allow you to pull a single as soon as a creature spawns.



That is the basics of the Feign Pull and should work well just as described on all creatures below 35th level. Creatures 35th and above behave differently to Feign Death, so more patience and techniques have to be brought into play to be successful.



Shorter Distance - In step 3 any distance far enough away from the creatures area you pulled from is good, but not so at higher levels (at least for better success rates that is). You will want to shorten the distance you pull the creatures away from their spawn spots, but you still need to pull them far enough away so that when you have your single creature left it does not re-agro his friends when you pull him. The reason for the shorter distance is two-fold: it allows you to see--sometimes hear--when a creature is back to its Home Point, which in turn increases your chance of a Mem Wipe on these same creatures.


Pop-N-Drop - This is a very useful technique and also usually involves a bit more pain. It is used on Wanderers and for Statics that you have pulled long distances. Each time you Pop-N-Drop successfully it increases the chance of a Mem Wipe on the creatures you pulled. This is also useful to Mem Wipe creatures when you are just passing though an area and don't want or need to fight but have creatures go agro on you. The extra pain of this technique comes into play when you are trying to keep one creature with you to pull back to your group but still have to Mem Wipe all his friends. You have to stand up long enough to find out if the others are coming back or not. In turn you will be attacked by the one still with you. Once you are sure you have Mem Wiped the others, call the "Incoming" and head back to your group.



Chain Pull - A Chain Pull can be used on any and all pulls, but is only necessary in certain situations or places. The main time a Chain Pull is used is on the Planes or on difficult creatures such as Imps and Giants in Sol B. This allows much harder creatures to be pulled single and with as little injury as possible to the pullers. A pair of Monks is always best to do a Chain Pull, but anyone can be a secondary puller. Also, more than two people can be used to Chain Pull to increase the pulling distance, but I will only explain the technique used for two Monks.

1. The secondary puller Feigns in a spot where the primary puller will pull to and Feign.

2. The primary puller goes out, pulls some creatures to where the secondary puller is Feigned, and then Feigns himself.

3. Just as with the basics of the Feign Pull, the secondary puller waits for all but one creature to leave then brings the last one back to the group(s).

4. The secondary puller then goes back to his pulling position and Feigns.

5. The primary puller often has only to stand to bring creatures back to him as he has not done a Pop-N-Drop. He then Feigns and the secondary puller repeats steps 3 and 4.

6. When creatures no longer come when the primary puller stands, he then goes to pull again and the process is repeated.

[fiveeauxfour]

Feign Tips:

-Always turn off your auto attack before you Feign.

-Wait for an enemy caster’s spell to hit you before you Feign.

-Use walls and line-of-sight to help split up multiple casters.

-Teach your healer / buffer / bard when it's ok to cast on you. Lots of times a Song, Heal, or Buff cast on you right as or after you feign can cause all the creatures on you to go after the caster of the spell.

-Make sure YOU are the only one pulling. Two pullers not working together can cause lots of trouble.

-Know what your group can handle. Sometimes it's ok to bring more than one back.

-Make sure you know everyone's mana status, especially Healers.

-Make sure your Healers know if you have Mend recycled or not. You will have to use it sometimes on a pull that's not going well.



Instill Doubt – Level 18, skill cap (level +1) * 5

1. What is it?

Instill Doubt (or "ID" for short) is a skill usable by all 3 classes with access to rogue skills (Monk, Rogue and Bard). It was accidentally missed off the Monk trainers when EQ underwent commercial release, and that fact was not discovered for many months until one Monk received the skill by accident when a GM used a special command to restore his character. This Monk questioned the fact that he suddenly got the skill, and Verant finally admitted that all Monks should have received it and added it to our trainers.

When the skill is used, you attempt to intimidate your target into running away by performing a Martial Arts 'kata' to demonstrate your power to it.

2. When do I get it?

Once you reach level 18, you can learn the skill by training at any of the Monk trainers in Freeport, Qeynos, Rathe Mtns. or South Karana.

3. How do I raise it?

Instill Doubt is the hardest of all Monk skills to raise. When you put your first training point into the skill at level 18, that will grant you 18 skill in the ability. It is generally accepted that the skill goes up much slower between 18-40, and that increasing the skill to 40 using training points will save many weeks of frustration trying to build up the skill manually. Having a total of 23 skill points available at level 18 will allow you to buy the skill up to 40.

The skill can be raised by practicing it while having anything targeted (except yourself). NPCs, PCs, Pets, Corpses, Boats... If you can target it, you can raise ID on it. The skill will only raise on a successful skill check. You do not need to be in range of your target for skill to get an increase. You will get a message that the target is out of range, but there is still a chance of a skill gain.

So practice, practice, practice. When making those long runs across the Karanas, target a guard and ID as you run. When travelling across the sea, practice on the boat. When waiting between pulls at a camp, practice on your group-mates. Mash that ID button at each and every opportunity, and it will slowly, slowly creep upwards.

4. How do I use it?

The secret to successful use of ID is knowing that it counts as a special attack, even though it does not gray out, nor is it grayed out by a special attack.

If your special attack button is grayed out when the ID 'kicks' at the end of its animation, the result is an automatic failure of the skill. Also, if your special is available, and then your ID succeeds, your special attack will not work for a period of time equal to one kick. If you activate the special in this time it will fail to work.

A summary of the requirements for a successful ID:

a. Your 'special attack' button is not grayed out when ID 'kicks'.

b. The skill-check for ID succeeds.

c. A further skill-check on ID is done to attack the target. This is done as a 'kick' using the skill of ID rather than your kick skill. This kick must connect.

d. If the target can only be hurt by magical means, you must be wearing magical boots.

e. The target must not resist the fear spell.

That’s a lot of ‘ifs’ isn’t it? Well don't give up on the skill just yet. "a" can be dealt with using a little trick I will detail below. "b" and "c" will improve as the skill improves. "d" can be forgotten about after a small investment in footwear, but unfortunately there is little you can do about "e", except to have magic-resist debuffs cast at the target.

Timing ID and your specials:

1.With both buttons available, press the 'Instill Doubt' button.

2.When ID 'kicks,' and you get the message indicating it succeeded or failed, immediately press the button for your special attack.

3.When ID pops back up, hit it immediately.

4.When your special pops back up, do not press it immediately, instead wait for ID to 'kick,' then press it.

5.Repeat from 3.

This guarantees that ID gets a chance to succeed every time.

If you successfully fear your target, run after it, whacking it in the back, doing free damage while it is unable to hurt you in return. Keep using ID with the above timing because if you succeed on another ID while it is still running from the first, it will extend the fear spell.

5. When do I use it?

Because ID causes your target to run away from you, there are many circumstances when it should not be used. A common nickname for Instill Doubt is 'Instill Train,' because when used in a dungeon, the results are almost invariably lethal for the Monk and his group, as the feared creature runs for his life, aggravating every other creature it runs near to attack the Monk, causing horrific trains.

For this reason ID should only be used in outdoor zones, and even then, only when you know that the pathing will not cause the target to run near allies.




Conclusion

The Monk is a wonderful class to play, offering many skills and abilities to a group, other than just his damage output. None of the melee classes are particularly suited to playing solo. However, of them all, the Monk is the best soloer, as he can do full damage from any position (rogue needs to be behind to backstab to get near the Monks damage output), plus has good healing ability (high Bind Wounds skill and Mend).

Monks are hard to play at the low to mid levels before the skills are learned that define the class, but once those skills are learned, they become very powerful and highly desirable in groups at high level.

[holsteinrx7]

came for the monk guide. came to the seinfield gif.