Monk - epic fists at level 1

[username17]

I recently made a Monk alt and got him his epic at level 1. He has a RBG for haste which makes his fists roughly 9/14.

At what point should I start using weapons other than fists?
My max hit so far (I'm in the low teens) is 18. I was grouped with another monk who was dual weidling SoS with a CoF and I was out dpsing him because he was limited by the damage cap.
At 20 or 30 when I lose the damage cap should I throw a SoS in my offhand? Or keep going unarmed?

I'm a newb when it comes to monks so I'm looking for guidance.
Thanks in advance.

[Ando]

Yes this sounds very classic.

[Kagey]

you should parse the wu quivering at 20-25. it very well could be more dps because of the dmg caps.

but id have the SoS in off hand now already. your no where near master in duel wield so the times that it does go off you want 20 dmg hit. also to train in 1hb.

[emdubwubwub]

I would like to do some number crunching for my monk as well. How do you parse combat logs?

[Colgate 2.0]

gamparse

[fezzyfezz]

I recently made a Monk alt and got him his epic at level 1. He has a RBG for haste which makes his fists roughly 9/14.

At what point should I start using weapons other than fists?
My max hit so far (I'm in the low teens) is 18. I was grouped with another monk who was dual weidling SoS with a CoF and I was out dpsing him because he was limited by the damage cap.
At 20 or 30 when I lose the damage cap should I throw a SoS in my offhand? Or keep going unarmed?

I'm a newb when it comes to monks so I'm looking for guidance.
Thanks in advance.

Absolutely not, Epic fists in main hand with SoS off hand is the BiS unless you end up in top end raiding, and even then its close. This is a result of your main hand dmg bonus, which has a larger impact on the ratios of low delay weapons (such as epic, which is 9/16). Dual wield Epic fists is a great start and then I would add in a SoS once you start to hit some of your dmg caps (lvl 20 or 30)

Also, for anyone that is curious about weapon DPS, Quickfists did a google doc chart that makes comparing weapons super easy.
http://www.project1999.com/forums/showthread.php?t=163763


Just as an edit: Before anyone jumps all over me about how 2hers are > epic+SoS, that is only in the super early levels when dmg bonuses are still really small, however your 2hers will be capped by dmg limits at those times, making that argument irrelevant. And even when compared to a Tstaff, which is arguably the best 2her outside of VP, only from lvls 30-34 will it be any better, and only by the smallest of margins.

Thus, in conclusion, you spent the money for epic fists, just use them =D

[Haikushin]

monk without epic
is not much a monk at all
couple fist with stave

[Spyren]

Sorry for the super newbie question, but how were you able to get your epic at level 1? I just started my monk and have no idea how you would do that, but if there's a way to get your Monk Epic weapon that early, I'd love to hear how and see if I could do that same.

Thanks,

[Daldaen]

Sorry for the super newbie question, but how were you able to get your epic at level 1? I just started my monk and have no idea how you would do that, but if there's a way to get your Monk Epic weapon that early, I'd love to hear how and see if I could do that same.

Thanks,

He either bought it or did it on his main character.

You can obtain the monk epic at any level, you just need the assistance of several level 60 friends (either friends or mercenaries you pay).

As a recently starting player, you likely won't have access to this until after you've leveled up quite a bit, joined a guild and by then in your 50s, doing an epic is typical.

[Spyren]

Ok, yeah that makes sense. Was wondering how a level one managed to kill all the raid mobs necessary to get the epic lol.

Any good early game monk items I should quest for or target?

I played a ranger way back in the day but have forgot where a lot of items drop and whats good for monks.

Thanks

[falkun]

Crescent armor from Dalnirs (no drop). Jade Maces (1.5k? each) or knuckle dusters (500-600? each) will last a long while. 5/55 rings for 200-250p/each.

[Spyren]

Where exactly is Dalnir's again? I apologize, it's been forever. And this is my first character on P99 so I don't have any platinum saved up. Just some gold, I'm only level 4 atm.

Any decent early game weapons or armor that I could attain by solo-ing or duo-ing with the wife (druid)?

[DrKvothe]

You can buy pretty godly items for cheap on this server. Save for a wu's quivering staff and 2x 5/55 rings. Also get yourself magic boots/gloves. Otherwise you can't punch/kick some mobs (they're immune to non-magic physical damage). Gloves can be gotten for free in innothule or uguk from frogloks, along with a half decent set of stat-less armor (netted, woven, or mesh). But as an iksar that's quite a journey.

Your fists are going to be a lot better than the crap that drops for you until you can buy something better in EC. Check the monk wiki page to see the fist ratios at various levels and to compare them with junk weapon drops. One item that is currently OP (but set to be nerfed) is a skipping stone from swamp of no hope mob lvl 4ish. You should get 2, one for yourself and one for your wife. You can both sneak pull with this for fantastic results!

Don't kill any burynai. They're pretty common throught kunark zones and as long as you've never killed on they'll leave you alone. One kill brings faction with them down to kos, though. They're typically harder and less profitable than your other kunark zone hunting targets so don't ruin faction with them.

The two of you could tear up kurn's starting around lvl 12. This is an ideal dungeon for a monk/druid duo because it's almost entirely single-pullable so the relatively poor crowd control doesn't matter. Unfortunately, it's quite a long way to get more spells for her so she should bring her most important ones for upcoming levels with her. I'd say minimum bring ring of commons. When she hits 19 she can self-port to commons, sell all of y'alls loot in EC (bone chips ftw!), buy you a wu's quivering staff and herself the rest of her spells.

After the green con to blue con ratio starts getting shitty in upper levels of kurns, you guys should try to farm you an iksar berzerker club in the basement. This will make a fantastic 1hb weapon for you to practice your skills with.

Then head to LoIO near windmill and go nuts. She can charm and either fear/snare while you and pet act as dots or, if target isn't an animal, she can just heal you while you and pet tear up the mob.

[Spyren]

Awesome, thanks for the advice! We're currently over in Steamfront working on kobold camps, and will probably end up in crushbone at some point, but it's good to have some destinations in mind for our teens other than trainfest unrest!

So atm, I'm using a cracked staff in my main hand, but should I offhand it and work on my hand to hand for my primary weapon?

Also mend doesn't seem to be working, or going up in skill, did I need to drop at least one point into it at the trainer to get it working?

Thanks for the help and I'll check out the monk wiki as well!

[DrKvothe]

Mend is a huge pain in the ass liability for early levels. You're best off spending as many points as you can at the trainer. Same for bind wound to save you lots of time and bandages.

Check the wiki for h2h ratios. Your fists beat cracked staff by a lil bit starting at lvl 10.

Since there's two of you, you can very easily corpse camp summoned gear. So bug a high lvl mage to deck you out, then duel to the death before you log out and leave all your summoned stuff on the body. Just looking through mage page on wiki:

8 of these http://wiki.project1999.com/Dimensional_Hole_(Item) or the 6 slot variants
2 of these http://wiki.project1999.com/Summoned:_Ring_of_Levitation for the AC (until 5/55 rings)
http://wiki.project1999.com/Summoned:_Muzzle_of_Mardu 11% haste!
http://wiki.project1999.com/Summoned:_Modulating_Rod 8/26 1hb (lore, and dont click it)
http://wiki.project1999.com/Summoned:_Staff_of_Symbols 10/34 2hb

This is something of a pain in the ass if you're on your own, but together you could keep these things for weeks easily. This is easily worth it for the bags alone, since going over a very low weight (14 stones iirc?) starts to pretty heavily reduce your AC.

[Spyren]

So let me see if I understand the corpse camping method. Summoned gear ends up disappearing when you camp out, so we duel each other to death so the items stay on the corpse. Then the next day we login and reloot our corpses to continue using the summoned items?

That's a pretty slick tactic. Those items you linked were awesome, any of those things would be an upgrade.

I ended up getting ported back to my trainer in freeport and dumped almost all points into Mend. It's now going up in skill points slowly.

And yeah, I've noticed that I've had to run and sell a bunch as the more weight I have, the less AC I have. Weightless bags or 'Dimensional Hole' sounds vital for a monk.

Thanks for all the tips DrKvothe!

[Daldaen]

http://wiki.project1999.com/Summoned:_Muzzle_of_Mardu 11% haste!

This is a pet ONLY item. Note the Race: NONE.

No player can wear this mask.

All of that is far too much effort to make it worth corpsing every time you log, the 2AC on rings or the crappy ratios on weapons aren't worth it even to a player just starting out. The bags would be useful to help you carry more stuff but you have to make absolutely certain you never camp with those bags otherwise you lose everything in them.

[DrKvothe]

Thanks. Very sorry for all the bad info. I should have figured the mask thing out; I wondered why I never saw anyone make a muzzle for anything but a pet. Ring wiki page says 10AC each, but I suppose that is inaccurate.

The bags at least I'd still go with. A couple of them, at least; if you have to camp you can move your stuff into normal bags before you do.

The weapon ratios seem fine to me at lvl 4. He'll be able to afford a wu's quivering staff after a couple of lvls at cb, but if he's gonna get summoned bags for the weight reduction anyways, the summoned weapons seem like a nice addition.

[Spyren]

Man, I would be deathly afraid of putting anything valuable into a bag that would vanish when I camped out. I guess if it's just vendor trash, that wouldn't be a total lose if I logged with rusty weapons and such, but every copper/silver/gold adds up.

How much do weightless bags go for again?

Sorry to turn this into a Monk 101 thread lol

[DrKvothe]

http://wiki.project1999.com/Weight-reducing_Bags

Large soiled bag is a great purchase after you've gotten 5/55 rings and a great weapon, since you'll be carrying stacks of bandages and maybe ammo if they fix skipping stone.

The summoned ones should be free from a passing mage. I would empty them in town before you corpse camp them until you're used to it. If you don't wanna do the summoned bags, your wife can just master loot for you both.

[Kender]

you're not a real monk unless you quested the fists yourself (including raster)