Should monks be nerfed or other classes buffed...

Took 3 tries... without any stun reduction it was really more RNG based than anything. I'd think the only other class that would have a prayer to do this with just a weapon equipped would be chanter with their % hp based damage.

I bet Wiz before the Charged Bolt nerf could do it - and maybe still can. But they can't chain as much as Monks and die quickly if ambushed. So yeah Monks OP!
Now buff the other classes

I think every other class should just be brought up to the monk level. That's just me though.

Nal´s a chill dude. He wouldnt seriously fight a naked bald guy.

Well here I thought warrior was op as fuck. What´s the deal with monks? From what I know the resource management is pretty neat with the crits and stuff, but hell clear with boots only is pretty insane.

I've never found Nalatos to be an issue for any character to be fair. It's those nasty champions with crazy sets of affixes, especially when you pull several of them, that'll get ya.

Geared my ranger for comparison. He can 5-pull Nimgaul but only with absolute top end gear. Dropping ~10 life leech or switching to dual wield (yes dual wield still sucks) makes it difficult / impossible to 5-pull. He tops out at around 8k dps. I am still looking for one of the fabled staff of sentoth that I assume will increase his dps further.

I'm ok with this level of power, but comparatively, monks do at least triple the dps and are absolutely unkillable with endgame gear.

My Ranger is getting consistent 20k DPS, for comparison. Spikes at 40k on occasion. He has a Legendary, but that isn't making THAT much difference for 8-20k.

Level 99 and optimizing gear makes all the difference.

Hint:
As a Ranger you want the biggest baddest 2h you can find. Spec talents for Double Attack, Parry / Riposte. Load up on as much +Crit / +Crit Damage, +Double Attack, +Haste. (Elite Set bonuses are crap, just go for a mix mash of class gear that gives you the biggest Crit bonuses. Also be sure to upgrade everything possible)

Single hits land for ~7k max. Flurries and Double Attack procs just blow through trash mobs.

Though I do 100% agree you need end-game gear to pull any of this off in Nimgaul Hell. (As it should be)

I should also point out, with my build my Ranger is not unkillable. Getting a mix of Champions with Frenzy and whatnot can certainly (and has) killed me. I think I died 3 or 4 times in level 98 which was frustrating as all hell because you lose HOURS of work on each death.

I think bosses in general are way too easy. Every boss in the game is basically a joke and lots of champion mobs are stronger than them. I think some changes need to be made with certain mobs. Like dragons and giants should be immune to stuns. Bosses should have much higher damage output across the board. I haven't faced a boss that was in anyway a challenge whatsoever and has not required me to use any sort of strategy at all.

Your mileage varies depending what class you play. I played the SK in Beta and it was silly easy killing bosses. You have tools to interrupt casting (Fear for SK) that make encounters significantly easier. My Ranger struggled like hell leveling up on certain bosses. They just do not have much of any healing capability, very little crowd control, and nearly no ability to interrupt. The Wizard was by far the most difficult because they are like wet paper bags when being hit. Just like the ranger, single encounters were ok but the dual bosses or ambushes during boss fights resulted in MANY deaths for both of those classes leveling up. A few of the bosses took many attempts and ultimately a lot of luck combined with strategy to defeat them.

No classes are equal and I like that they require entirely different strategy.

*Edit* I should also ask, how far into the game are you? The normal clear of the game is pretty easy, but difficulty ramps up significantly in Nightmare and Hell.

Hard to say on monks. I died. A shit ton. I mean sure I do insane dps and now I'm pretty unkillable but.. getting there was awful. Until I was BiS I was doing good damage, but if I got a -dex debuff with a blind? Im dead real fucking quick. I died about 12 times at level 97 and 5 times at level 98 before finishing the gear I wanted.

War gets a blind? Heh, my dps probably goes up. Enchanter gets blinded? Oh I can stun every thing instantly. If that fades there is always mez. But.. Never even needed to do that. Shaman? Dex debuffs wont hurt because of talisman and blind will suck but hey quick refreshing heal.

My warrior and enchanter are pretty much invincible. Even without their emergency abilities. I literally never have to use them and they still dont even come close to taking damage. They also dont do as much dps.


Basically? Monks are fine. War/enchanter (once haste is fixed..) may need a tiny tiny boost. Shm and ranger could use a tiny boost. Bards need a boost. Every thing else seems to need a major boost. Monks are fun as shit. Its how all classes should be once youre BiS and maxed out. Not only that but nerfs are 95% of the time awful. Boosting every thing else takes way more work but is way more rewarding.

I'm in nightmare Nimgaul as a rogue. Maybe rogues are just stupid OP because no boss I've fought has been even close to a challenge. My health doesn't even drop below 80% ever. They are basically like orc pawns with way more hp's.

Also it's kind of strange but Nimgaul seems to be the easiest final zone in the entire game. Seems way too easy. I have like zero chance of dying whatsoever.

No idea about his dps. I've never died on nimgaul on any class I've played, but he usually has my lowest dps of any mob in the game. His is the lowest and the dragon is the second. One of the guardians I can't do much against, either.

But, almost all of my characters are straight up physical damage. I think that says a shit ton in itself. Monk is the top seller as far as dps potential. Its really close to balanced with war and enchanter (because war and enchanter WILL NEVER DIE) in my opinion and may even be balanced considering the pulling mechanic (it limits dps potential. A lot. So probably actually balanced)

Shaman and Ranger I lump together (maybe druids? Someone max one please? I'll get carpal tunnel if I try). Huge autoattack but meh other stuff. A little lifeleech and baller gear? Youre alright. Traditional logic would say balance around these two classes. Its hard to argue against when you have plans for harder stuff and better gear (current max level gear 68, max leve 99. Lots of upgrades incoming). I wouldnt be mad if these two classes were baselines, but monks are fun as shit and way too many people have experienced war/enc/MONK levels of awesomeness. Not that hard to boost shit, after all. New zones could even literally be just zone++ as far as stats go. sprites be damned. Number junkies dont fucking care. Loot whores dont care. Its just win to boost as opposed to nerf.

Rogues and Bards are kindve hurting (Youre not always hitting 20k dps? War/shm/Enc are). Hrm. Big boy potential but yeah. Not hitting it, Rogues apparently have long cooldowns I guess? and no autoattack buffs and bards are really cool but tons of effort and all that button mashing isnt paying off. I have no experience in clerics but I assume they are belonging in this catagory. The whole, 'You can do it!' catagory, but with an emphasis on survival at the cost of DPS. (Highly recommend against baselining/balancing on this tier)

Paladins and SKs seem to be bad. SKs are a hot topic, assuming paladins are pretty much on par with them. About average survivability with low dps. Maybe it fluctuates a bit betweel the two and it seems about equal with necros (which is bad and below average)

Necros seem to be less screwed than the other mages (enchanter aside) but still dont seem to be near the level of autoattacker/melees. Wizards are 'Why? Why would you ever pick a wizard? (Wiz was my first class, it really ghetto twinked a monk ((which was awful, see beaster deaths))) And magicials seem to still be hahahahaha.



TL;DR

Monk>War=Enc>Shm=Rng(=Dru?)>Bard=Rog>Pal=SK(=necro?)>wiz>mag

This is my personal observation with weight being given to chaining over dps. Chaining highly affects xp (over 100% right?) and magic find, so its justified.
Balance around monk, because seriously that is fucking fun as shit no joke its fucking cool bro. Aint mad at balancing around war and enchanter. Unkillable and big boy dps, alright still fun. Shm and ranger I'd be a little grr but you know I get it, balancing around big boys is harder than nerfing. The others? They need boosts, please dont balance around those unless youre releasing new gear the day after or something

I am drunk. So grain of salt, but I still feel all of this is valid.

Slight derail but beaster - how the hell are you doing such OP damage as a chanter? I see you're kitted almost wholly in warrior plate - are you killing the mobs your own self? Or via pet? Mezene has no trouble in hell but I'm certainly not having to spam D

My pet does about 10% damage if I am EXTREMELY diligent and drop pet/refresh best possible pet (QQ shredding/frenzy/chromatic) all. the. time. (like every 1.5 minutes, maybe not even worth it except to keep the chain alive when I enrage) I really wish all sets were this cool. Warrior set got it right. And losing casting haste and skill haste? Well.. Casters sucks because dmg spells suck (i have spells ive never casted on enchanters because why would I ever interrupt autoattack?) and skill haste sucks because who cares about that millisecond if it costs the skill (long cooldown unless youre a monk with wtf boots) 10k damage. No class I've played (even wizard!) uses their free spammable any way**

The set I am wearing (war set+haste/dex monk crap+enrage 2hb) will mean total domination on any class that has autoattack buffs. Even on ones that dont, I have a feeling they will be better than any thing else you'll be doing.. In the middle of testing but my hand seriously hurts from pressing D so giving it a few days break.

Gogo spamming Nevergrind.com on boards and games. Because this shit is infinitely more fun than any r2, kong, kabam (+whatever else) p2win bullshit. Plus? everquest meets diablo? Its so kick you in your teeth obvious from level 1. FUCKING AWESOME.

**Monk is almost the exception due to flying kick. If you are geared, you can spam flying kick as fast as you want and youre not suffering from rage issues. We wont really know some class's dps (mainly war/enc/monk) until pulling mechs (and alacrity) are reworked. But like I've stated, monks can die in 1 second in the perfect storm. The others? I mean.. I've pulled 5 and smoked a bowl and changed shit on spotify and been at 100% health)

Agreed. I think balancing around Shaman would be ok, as far as chaining and dps go. Monks are really fun to play, but probably op (balancing around them would hurt the longevity of the game imo), can't speak for War and Enc.
Also if the "pull next mob" cooldown gets reduced/removed it'll be a big impact change expecially for high dps classes, will make chaining a lot easier/faster...

This is true when you're twinked out with end game gear. Leveling an enchanter, your pet is 70%+ of your damage. Also I think you underestimate Chaos Flux. it's great to interrupt mobs casting, and it's insurance against elites with physical resistance (even if you don't have any +magic bonuses) because the amount of damage it does is a fixed % when it throws the mob up in the air. Even wearing plate, you can pretty much spam this to increase your damage and survivability. Your autoattacks will happen in between spell casts, which are still under 1sec I bet. I don't think you're wrong not using it while you're uber twinked, I just think its a cool and useful spammable for everyone else.






This is completely true. I think the reason this is happening is because none of the classes self buffs, 20point talents, or set bonuses have a better return than just buffing straight melee damage. It will probably stay this way until the other classes get improved.

OK you broke my brain, here's me using class appropriate kit and play methods and you're all like nah just plate up and smack the mobs to death.

/boggle

Yah ok might give that a whirl

If you have some melee gear banked, try it out and see if it's better. Re-do your talents to support buffing your own melee damage. I did have to level my druid and my wizard with real spells though, so may not always better

Warrior done. Time to do the drood. C:

I leveled my monk from 98-99 and couldn't get a staff of sentoth to drop.

Kill me, I know I had one at some point. I clearly didn't test the proc and the other stats must have been meh

I have an extra you can have when trading starts C:

i picked monk up in hc today. what a fucking beast. will be interessting to see how well he can handle hell chains.

I agree the hard-casters seem weak. Main one I can comment on is wizard, he does feel pretty weak.