by Moorgard on 2001-05-07
Ah, the good old days. I'm talking pre-Kunark here. If you're truly "old school," you remember the thrill of reading about Fear opening and seeing all the fancy class-specific armor that made your jaw drop--back when Fear used to drop armor for all classes.
Warriors in full Lustrous Russet, er, Indicolite. Rogues in Woven Shadow. Paladins in full Valorium. Monks in full... uh...
Okay, monks never wore full Shiverback. Yes, the tunic was nice. The shoes were excellent. The gloves gave us precious Serpent Sight. But we wore Azure Sleeves over the arms, Symbol of Loyalty to Vox and Hero Bracers over the bracers, and often Gator Scale Leggings over the legs. Well, that's okay, some of the other classes didn't wear full planar armor either. We were confident Kunark would fix things.
When Kunark showed up and we saw the new class-specific armors dropping from Trakanon and Venril Sather, we drooled at the thought of what we would be getting. Low and behold, monks got Crescent armor--which was lower level than Shiverback. That's right, monks were the only melee class who got a class-specific armor downgrade. Granted, it was nice for the mid-level players, and we did get a nice quest robe, but that hardly matched the full armor set that other classes got.
Finally Velious arrived, and monks got some pretty nice equipment upgrades. A monk in full Kael quest armor (Golden Star) has far better stats than a monk in the best Kunark gear. Monks even got a sweet new graphic in a recent patch. Thank you, Verant.
There's just one problem. No monk wants to wear a full suit of Golden Star armor, because there are so many all/all items that are better.
I'm not saying every melee class wants to wear their full quest set, either. Most players drool over the crowns of the Dain and King Tormax. But look at the stuff that Denron, a monk from Fires of Heaven, wears. He lists a grand total of *two* pieces of monk-only gear, and I wouldn't be surprised if one of those pieces, the bracer, is only situational, as there are now several other bracers that are far superior to the Golden Star. The only piece of Golden Star that is guaranteed to be found on every uber monk is the arms, and the way items are showing up in Temple of Veeshan, I predict the arms will be eclipsed shortly. [Edit: HAHA! One day after posting this article, I am proven right. See the "I Am a Prophet" message thread below.]
Okay, okay. Many monks--me included--who aren't in the upper echelon of uber guilds look forward to wearing a lot of the Golden Star (or other Velious) armor. But the difference between monk armor and, say, warrior armor, is that once warriors gets their 59 AC breastplate from the Kael quest, they can rest easy knowing that they clearly have the best warrior BP in the game. With monks, there are at least four tunics on par with--and at least two vastly superior to--the Kael quest BP. And guess what? To obtain this stuff, you're going to have to live in Sleeper's Tomb and deep, deep inside Temple of Veeshan--which most players simply aren't ever going to do.
Look at Denron's picture again. If the page didn't tell you what class he was, would you think he was a monk? With all due respect to the work he's put into his character, I didn't play a monk to look like that. But at least for now, if you want those stats... you have to.