To be more specific I am talking about monk tanks from levels 15 to 80-ish, with full heirlooms, in dungeons.
As a healer I have a profound dislike of them - the class not the player - and when I start a dungeon and see them in the group I am half tempted to simply leave immediately. Here is why.
The warrior tank can pull two or three groups, perfectly hold the agro even if I spam healing spells, and if it is just one normal pull I only have to use a healing spell every five seconds or so. It’s like they refuse to die or take damage. To quote Drago from Rocky: “He’s not human, hes like a piece of iron.”.
But if the monk tank pulls more than one group, for any reason, it can easily result in a wipe depending on the mobs. A few times struggling with even just one normal pull or boss as I am desperately spamming healing on him and myself and getting attacked in the process while the others die, all this while he has absolutely horrid threat management.
The difference between the two classes with their respective tank specializations is so great that it feels like they are from different games.
So I want to know what is going on, because I refuse to believe that warrior tank players are somehow 200IQ english gentlemen that simply refuse to play poorly. Do monks peak at other leaves while warriors are exceptionally good earlier on? Do they need specific gear only accessible at high levels? Or azerite traits? What is wrong with them?
I’m not trying to “vent” or call large groups of monk players bad as I know there are plenty of bad players in every class, but I get the suspicion that the monk as a tank vastly underperforms compared to other tanks, especially vs warrior.
Monk Tanks require actually understanding how the spec works. Good monks are fine. Bad monks are total garbage to a degree other tanks won’t be. Even during leveling. WoW frontloads most of its abilities and such.
The only actual way of mitigating damage they have is learned just shy of level 30. Below that, they’re no different than a DPS that generates more threat.
Does it make that much of a difference? I know there are classes with a higher play difficulty, but surely it can’t be so much of a difference that 7 out of 10 dungeons is pure chaos with the remaining 3 being decent, while I rarely get more than 1-2 bad dungeons with warriors (and even those are not really too bad, more like slightly below average).
It’s really not any more complicated than other tanks if you ask me. But that ability Eyez linked is the stickler. That’s their main mitigation. Stagger spreads out the damage but doesn’t actually lower the total. Purifying Brew lowers the total so it doesn’t get out of hand. Bad monks neglect the hell out of that button.
Maybe it has something to do with it not being a DPS button, whereas say a Paladin or Blood DK or Vengeance DH will all be hitting buttons that keep them alive just to by DPSing.
But if that were the case, Warriors would have similar issues, so idk. I guess guides tell Warrior Tanks to use the Demo Shout talent that makes it give them rage so that would be -some- mitigation, but not -really- and not consistently.
Well then I sincerly hope this is a L2P issue on their end, because I would dread the idea of the class being this bad and having to deal with it as a healer for the rest of the game.
It’s kind of a combination of both, honestly. Brewmaster doesn’t really become a solid tank until around level 80. Their mastery makes a HUGE difference even at baseline mastery levels, and the kit is pretty weak until then.
It’s difficult as hell to level as Brewmaster for these reasons, but then if you level as Windwalker, you have to learn Brewmaster without much primer at higher levels.
I wouldn’t really call it an ideal situation. It’s not like Prot Warrior where you pick up Shield Block and Ignore Pain by level 36 and just giggle at mobs.
Well, this does make a lot of sense and clarifies quite a few things for me (as a someone who has never played as a monk). I’ll be a bit more reserved and understanding with them from now on. But a buff for them wouldn’t hurt either from what seems to be going on.
You’re absolutely not wrong about that. I love my Monk, but I gave up on leveling as Brewmaster around level 18, and beelined my way to 120 as Windwalker.
It’s genuinely not that lowbie Brewmasters aren’t trying to make your job easier, it’s just that their kit is not conducive to mitigating damage for way too long. That could be helped if they got the Celestial Fortune passive (chance at +60%-ish additional healing any time they are healed) earlier, but even that comes into play around 65 or 70, I believe.
In general, I find that it’s best to provide them with an offtank. I suggest bringing a non-squishy DPS friend who can pull mobs off you in a pinch, like a Warrior or Paladin.
Given the maturity of the game, WoW is really a max-level game at this point.
While leveling, different classes/specs come together at very different times (though all long before 80 so far as I know). Further, low-level dungeons aren’t a good gauge of anything, because everyone is wildly overgeared in heirlooms and whatnot, and everything dies too quickly to really gauge what’s happening.
That being said, I plan to level a brewmaster to learn the spec (I find leveling a spec to be a best way to learn it), so I’m interested to see when it really comes together.
That’s a brave move, man. It’s not like you’re going to struggle with questing or anything, but trying to tank group content before you hit 70 is gonna be rough.
Monks don’t have a toolkit at a lower level. You can’t learn a monk during those levels because you don’t even have basic tools to tank properly. By level 40 every other tank can AoE pull with multiple cooldowns and self healing when things get rough. Monk gets their first defensive at level 55, and they don’t get Rushing Jade Wind until level 90.
At max level BrM is one of the easiest tanks to play, but because they don’t have many baseline abilities Blizzard decided to give them 1/8th of their kit and spread it across 80 levels.
Just wearing plate and a shield is probably enough to out tank a low level monk. And if they don’t understand purify or can’t spare brews then they’re just a wind walker with a steady dot on them.
All of monks power comes from mastery (80), extremely strong talent (45, 75, 100), and end game systems (azerite, essences, op trinkets) stagger is possibly one of the best physical mitigators but you still take 100% of the damage eventually. You may not be spamming heals but you’ll be casting them long after the dangerous pull.
Warrior gets high armour, block chance, victory rush, shield block by 20. Ignore pain is at 36 then it’s just an easy ride to max.
Yeah, but they can pretty easily make due with Ironskin Brew and Purifying Brew. Mitigation CDs aren’t really going to be necessary even if one levels in dungeons.
It’s just too bad that both Brews are unlocked well after group content becomes available to queue for.
I had a really hard time tanking starting at around 55 as a Monk (not just due to how overtuned Stratholm was just in any dungeon at that point). So badly I ended up actually crying of frustration thinking I did something wrong.
Ohh that makes sense Ive heared that before but I had so much fun as MW I just sticked with it, I guess.
Ive been around still just at different times I usually post, due to lots of work lately. But I still try to read (and post sarcastic comments) whenever I can. I also had to serve and protecct Azshara and Sylvy from bullies.
