If you really want to PvE, you should turn pure VIT, why? Here's the answer. Monks are natural tanks and PvE is more effective when you have your friends with you especially if you have a tank, dps and a healer on your team (which is composed of you and your friends already). PvP is somewhat a bonus when you're pure VIT, you'll be able to attack and your Guillotine Fist will not be lower than 10k while your enemy is standing @ ML 30.
My friend has AGI yet it needs great amounts of AGI to improve your evasion but this is also good as your level up since monsters from Dark Whisper to Forgotten Payon hits like a truck..
Actually, you can't really say that, because additional defense becomes less and less effective. If you like to do Colo or want to be a tank early on, you can focus on VIT. But sooner or later, a focus on defense becomes quite insignificant.
Let's say you've spent 300pts on VIT. If you've maxed Steel Body and Iron Skin, that's 2,100 DEF in total.
(300 VIT = 600 DEF => +250% bonus via Steel Body & Iron Skin = 2100 DEF).
And although this sounds like a good benefit, it might be marginal:
30k defense => 89,1% defense rate
32,100 defense => 89,7% defense rate
So 300pts in VIT might result in an additinal benefit of 0,6% defense rate!
(warriors, knights & monks can even achieve better defense values => even a lower benefit out of VIT)
The same is true for the Iron Skin skill in general. Let's use the 30k defense, but let's remove Iron Skin.
You end up with 25,714 defense => 87,5% defense rate... a loss of 2,6%! So who believes this skill is broken?
(30k DEF includes a 250% bonus, but w\o Iron Skin, you only have a 200% bonus => 30,000 / 3,5 * 3,0 = 25,714)
The same way, 300 VIT might result in about 7k HP (including Pron buff, etc.). That's ok, but not overwhelmingly great nor life-saving, especially in PvP. Well, spending 300pts in STR isn't that great either, so it's ok to focus on VIT, but it's surely not a must-have.
Being good at something is relative to your class and if you suck at doing DPS and you're an Assassin, you aren't good at PvE. Same as being a Monk, if you suck at tanking (which is the nature of Monks), you're not good at PvE. You don't compare a banana to an apple.
Monks are stereotyped as useless after using 2 Guillotine Fists, however, tanks can use Protection Ki (reduces incoming damage to 50% for 10 secs.) and still hit other classes in PvP. Also, you won't need 3 Spirit Spheres when your Steel Body is active as it disregards the need for Spirit Spheres on Protection Ki. Evasion is also helpful as it gives 20% evasion rate. It is justifiable since it gives direct percentage to the evasion.
Beast Masters are considered tanks because of their huge amount HP and because of the defense cap. The first one is self explanatory while the second one, you'll be asking "why?". Well, it is because the Monks can reach way beyond the cap but then again, because it is capped, you can't go beyond it. With Beast Masters, even though not all can reach the defense cap (?), they are compensated with higher HP that's why they are harder to kill. They can also work under pressure since they have Survival and has higher HP that can be instantly filled even if lower than 30% (with an Explorer Potion). HP > Capped Defense. As for the latter, most Knights are considered to DPS and can't handle much mobs compared to Beast Masters and Monks because of Battle Tactics.
Actually, Sowlemia isn't that wrong. He stated that once a monk has used his two G-Fists, he has to wait quite some time until he can use them again.
Let's first use the starting cooldown:
A G-Fist has a cooldown of 60sec. This means it can be used twice every 120sec. You can also reset the cooldown once during that time using Summon Spirit Sphere, so you can use the G-Fist a third time. On average, that's a 40sec cooldown.
And that's the crucial point --- It's twice the cooldown of other 'ultimate' skills like Rage Strike, Brutal Strike. Shield Cannon, etc. Do monks deal twice as much damage instead? - Of course not!
With Vigor:
Vigor doesn't help here because other classes profit as well and might even have a higher value to begin with. So no matter how high the vigor rate gets, monks will still have at least twice the cooldown... even with a cooldown reset.
I also talked about other PvE disadvantages in regard of AoE damage last time and can't let Battle Tactics and the BM heals unmentioned either. But even your argument about Evasion and Ki-Protection needs a few corrections:
Whereas monks can get 20% dodge rate, Warriors can get 40% Parry rate and Knights 20% damage reduction (Aura Shield) and a permanent 10% of their Shield. And whereas the monk has Ki-Protection, Warriors have Endure and Knights Shield Fortress.
IIRC Ki-Protection never requires 3 inner energies, that's a mistake in the description. I'm not 100% certain though. I rarely used it this way.
So the only two advantages of a PvE monk are a higher dodge.and resettable self-protection skill... and the former is lost with Eddga gear. So is it enough to be competitive to the other tank classes?
About PvP:
Here, the monk profits more from a cooldown reset and auto-crit., but still suffers especially during mass-fights. Yes, it's an advantage to deal an automatic crit. damage but that comes at the cost of a tripled cooldown. Yes, it's an advantage to reset the skills for a fast second G-Fist, but it's a rare thing, so what do you do in the meantime?
And would you prefer a Shield Cannon every 10sec or a G-Fist every 30sec with an possible reset every 60sec?
And about the other frequent complains about monks?
He can one-shot! || He can two-shot! || He always crits! - Well, in 30~50% the cases (typical crit. chances with buffs), other classes get a crit. the old-fashioned way. And the damage isn't that much higher compared to other classes. And it's still a combo (not like Cross Impact, Sacrifice, etc.), so there are several moments where monks can simply miss. You miss with a Brutal Strike, well repeat it 10sec later. You miss with a G-Fist? Hope SSS is up or try again 30sec later. You're dependant on a double-G-Fist and one misses? Next attempt 60sec later! Your target heals himself between the G-Fists.... well better have some friends nearby!
But this doesn't mean that monks are a bad class!
Although they'll probably have 40% of the threat of Warriors & Knights in PvE (or less), they are still reliable tanks.
In PvP, they are quite useless in mass fights, but they can still be the bane of 'weaker' classes in 1on1 situations.
And in Colo, they are 
+ 
... and that's basically what Sowlemia said with 1/100th the word count.
Edited by Greven79, 24 February 2015 - 11:10 AM.
you read before...
