Monks in Warcraft, I’d roll one.

After the Deathknight is old news, and the next expansion has rumbled into familiarity; what will be the next hero class?

Arch-Druid has been mentioned, Barbarian might help some synergy with Diablo 3, and Warcraft 3 had some neat classes. Regrettably most of them are too specalised to be applied to both Horde and Alliance.

I suggest the Monk, and here is why…

The Monk

Its a npc type that we have already seen and fought in many instances and abbeys. The character models exist, as to do the typical attacks (punch, kick. etc).

Monks have a glorious amount of material to source from IRL. Kane walked the earth, Kung Fu Panda in recent film, and the drunken master of Paladium and Jackie Chan.

The class could be created to add another Healing class to the game. This is important as Tanks are considered rare, and so are healers. We’ll be getting another potential Tank class in Wrath; so then the LFG channel will have healers as the shortage. The Monk could be a way to bridge the gap for those people who have stayed away from healing to prefer dps roles.

Monk Roles

a) Melee DPS. The twist of wearing only cloth armour and staff and unarmed as weapons means that they’ll not compete for all the existing gear, they will have to think carefully about combat position, and will need to be a true dodge based fighter.

b) Buffing and Healing. The

c) Controller and Breaker. Stuns, locks, moving mobs, combo moves, and finishing moves. Think the Quivering Palms from 1st ed Adnd, Dim Mak from Bloodsport, and the wacky stuff the Jet Li and such bring to the screen. They could even sunder weapons and armour without too much stress.

Monk Talent Trees

a) Ferocity – powers of speed and pain.

b) Tranquility – powers of recovery and healing.

c) Control – stuns, movement and mob shutdown. Moving the mobs and helping with positioning. Bringing kiting to the instance as a legit strategy.

How do they work?

Well like most melee dps classes the monk should be about hitting hard, but they have new complications to resolve. Hiting with “Unarmed” will be thier fast attacks, and I see the powers they have adding a consistent increase in the dps they can output as they raise in levels.

Other melee types use Crit as a basis for damage, and I’d like to see the Monk damage be power and affect based. Their basic damage would be steady, reliable, and not spikey. Then add the moves that manipulate the target rather than just hurt it.

Gear – A lot of cloth gear already exists, and there would not be a huge amount of effort needed to add new cloth recipies into the game for Monks. This adds breadth to the supply base of Tailoring.

Starting area – Starting in the Scarlet Monestry would be too cool, but would require the Keepers of Time to bring them forward to the current time. Otherwise an adjunct to the Northshire Abbey, or a lost mountain peak in some of the unused mountain areas between current zones.