Why so few Monks?

[Lilly32]

Still sore about the loss of the tossable keg

spammable keg toss was great

[Volatilis]

spammable keg toss was great

Why would you want to throw Kegs and RP in class fantasy when you can use a jank stand still and cast cracked lightening???

[Nephys]

I think that no one likes Monks because of the fantasy, even though Shamans are weak and their kit is in an awful place mechanically their fantasy is amazing.

[Cracked]

When monks came out they had way too many buttons for me. I moved on and never looked back.

It's true that they had many buttons and it wasn't all that clear how they all fit together if you only played for a little bit. A shame, really, because if they were there at a time of slower levelling, I think many people would appreciate the kit.

[lolskillzz]

Flavor. The class had its biggest popularity spike in Legion, which was arguably its funniest for most of the userbase.
You mostly hear about a split between those who liked the class better during MoP and those who liked it better during Legion.

At the time of your thread, MW is strong in PvP and ok in PvE. BM is pretty outclassed as a tank, and Windwalker is a more complex and less effective Havoc DH.

Couple this with the class starting at level 1 (or 20), and you have your complete recipe.

WW Complex? ROFL its dh just slower and dont press the same button back to back. DH at this point requires more braincells with APM and requiring you to react quicker. Lets not even get into proper management of soul fragments and Meta being such a long cd and making or breaking your overall dmg.

To the OP, Monk isnt played as much because first off, its not as fun OR interesting as the other fantasy classes. it rly only appeals to the weebs or those who take an interest in Asian culture as a whole. MoP and the Monk class was a HUGE way for blizzard/activision to show their support and impress China. That said Legion WW was alot of fun, and current WW is a very enjoyable class, but the concept doesnt appeal in the warcraft fantasy world and will always suffer for that reason. The only time You see increase in rep is when one of the specs is horridly overpowered (Like WW is currently in PvP Arena ATM).

[Jackstraw]

DH at this point requires more braincells with APM and requiring you to react quicker. Lets not even get into proper management of soul fragments and Meta being such a long cd and making or breaking your overall dmg.

Yeah I agree. I mean, deciding where to bind Dance and Annihilation is pretty important, should be taken into consideration when discussing the humongous skill cap of a DH.

[Shelly]

BM monks need a damage boost and extra filler in their rotation. Getting back a legendary that'll let you hit keg smash twice is an excellent start. Although they could still use some form of self-heal mechanic that's not tied to RNG like the Ox Spheres or having to hard-cast a heal on themselves.

WW is convoluted in such a way that it's boring. I get what they are going for but I really do feel like they should just have hard hitting chi spenders rather than a very dull and inflexible rotation where for the most part you just hit whatever button your weak aura tells you to. Having a system where one ability combos into another or changes how a certain ability works would in my opinion be better rather than just don't hit the same thing twice. (Example, hit tiger fist, fists of fury, then your next ability becomes AoE. If you go say tiger fist then rising sun kick your next ability leaves a fire DoT, hit rising sun then go into fist of fury and your next tiger fist turns into a lightning roar and so on.)

Don't know much about MW, but seems like folks enjoy it.

[Yosho]

One of the issue with monk is that they got the crappy treatment that pally got in the past, where instead of improving on them blizzard decided to give their gameplay or abilities to other classes. For pally it was stun breaker blessing of freedom in the form of icebound fortitude to DK, anti magic blessing in the form of anti-magic shield for dk(tho they finally added it to prot pally when it was something players suggested for years since vanilla), old repentance in the form of paralysis for monks and so on. Blizzard gave all their solution to what could had made monks great then gave it to DH because they couldn't think of what to do with DH; like how Vengence DH have an ability to draw in all the orbs to heal them, something that didn't need to be a DH gameplay since that was never in any of its gameplay in any form in both wc3 & HoTS.

I'd say I think a violent martial artist like the Diablo monk that punches people and makes them explode is more what people are looking for in a monk fantasy rather than a monk like Chen who will sit there and drink while getting punched in the face. It's not as cool.

Like, compare the following gameplay visuals: In Diablo, a Monk auto-attacks a zombie and it freaking explodes. There's tons of speed, tons of impact. Mastery of self and form. Compare that to WoW where your Blackout Kick softy caresses the side of your enemy's face, and Fists of Fury where you just kind of limply move your hands forwards and backwards. It's not as epic.

I agree with you there, they should had made WW more like Diablo's Monk and BM have the drunken master theme. If they do that I think more people would play it; just like pally, with all their flashy abilities it draws people toward it.

[Super Kami Dende]

As a Monk Main for the last few expacs, I'd guess a lot of the People that went to Monk for its Mobility simply straight up changed to Demon Hunters in Legion. Mostly because Monk was touted as the class all about fast hits and highest mobility of all classes, then became 2nd fiddle in those respects with DH's release.

[froschhure]

What should blizzard do,they could not copy every aspect of ragnarok. Oh wait they could

[TigTone]

I main monk for years now, I guess people don’t like the play style or fantasy of it.

Monks are literally the only class directly empowered or taught powers by Wild gods.

Blizzard really missed the chance to show that in the class fantasy and visually show it with the all the spells of it.

[oplawlz]

I'd say I think a violent martial artist like the Diablo monk that punches people and makes them explode is more what people are looking for in a monk fantasy rather than a monk like Chen who will sit there and drink while getting punched in the face. It's not as cool.

Like, compare the following gameplay visuals: In Diablo, a Monk auto-attacks a zombie and it freaking explodes. There's tons of speed, tons of impact. Mastery of self and form. Compare that to WoW where your Blackout Kick softy caresses the side of your enemy's face, and Fists of Fury where you just kind of limply move your hands forwards and backwards. It's not as epic.

Silly as it sounds, I strongly agree with this. Thematically the monk class just lacks impact to play imo. I suspect if they had gone with the no autoattacks thing and made all the abilities hit REALLY hard to compensate it might have been more fun, but without trying it I couldn't say for sure.

Add to that the insane mobility they have DH while also better numbers and easy to master gameplay . . . well, yeah. Why would anyone roll a monk at this point?

[Ezyah]

They are never a safe bet to main dps/healing wise. They sometime have a tier where a miracle happens for them but most of the time they are in the lower bracket

[Sluvs]

Is probably a combination of being the last class added that begins at level one, fantasy being so grossly different from the other classes/world and people not getting over kung fu panda.

I personally love it. I mean, I can tank and breath fire? Man, I am SOLD. Not to mention healing with it is pretty cool and DPSing with it is pretty unique. I mean, I just love everything about the class, a shame that it does not get that much attention.

[Dakara]

Because most players DPS and Monks aren't a very safe DPS option. Also because the class is less flashy and in many ways, feels out of place in WOW.

Honestly though, Monks suffer the same problems that Paladins and Priests do. A single DPS spec means if you're not in the Meta, better learn to Tank or Heal... and for players who solely focus on DPS, that's less appealing. Technically Demon Hunters could be susceptible to the same problem... but you know, eye lasers and gliding. Druids have 2 DPS specs to fall back on, but even they seem to be suffering the fate of many other Hybrids. Resto is incredibly powerful, while the other specs just wallow in the "viable but not" territory.

Compounding on the above, Monks were not an original class so did not have that persistent fanbase over the expansions and unlike like DH's, had to start from level 1.

As for the class Fantasy, I agree. What we wanted was a D3 style Monk... what we got was Kung Fu Panda. I don't mind it so much as a MW main, WW alt. But BrM just irks me, throwing kegs and chugging brews.

Then, the class has it's "quirks". I honestly haven't tanked on my Monk since MOP, I hated BrM that much... but like MW and it's Fistweaving/Smart heals. You either love it, or you hate it. There doesn't seem to be any middle ground.

[ClassicPeon]

Personal opinion:
WW was awesome in MoP. Our mastery coupled with The trinket of reorigination made for some serious outplay moments.
Today its a "press whatever's not on cooldown" class. It wasnt super interesting to start with but its outplay moments(to set you apart from other monks) made it super fun to play competitively.

BM is one of the weirdest tank specs. I dont really like it. It feels squishy and you feel left over to your healers.

WW is basicly a much less interesting rogue
BM is just a weird and not very interesting tank spec
MW i dont know anything about this spec.

[melzas]

Yeah, definetly monk class being so connected to pandaria and pandarens takes a toll on classes popularity. Also, how many important lore characters are monks? One - Chen, and he isn't even that important. For me it just feels like monks don't really belong in the Warcraft universe.

[Hinastorm]

WW is just a poorly designed spec imo, thus leading to their low pop, since most people play dps.

[V x]

I would love to play Monk during next expansion but not with the Pandaria visual effects. (I don't even hate Pandaria.)

Let me glyph all the extra visual fluff out. I just want to play a martial artist who solely relies on his physical strength and nothing more. The wannabe naruto clone technique ability can stay, that's just whatever who cares.

I would love to play a more brawler feeling version of a monk

[ntlntl]

The visuals and sound are terrible. I can't stand it