Looking at the class design for the monk, I wonder if spirit spenders like Lashing tail Kick, SSS, and Wave of Light are truly useful. Are they damaging? Yes. But if you take their damage and consider their cooldown, their overall DPS is probably less than just spamming a spirit generator. I haven't done the math yet but a skill like Several Sided Strike can do 14 attacks at 130% damage for 1820% damage, usable every 30 seconds, for an average DPS of 1820/30 = 60% weapon damage dps/second. Is that kind of damage much better than just spamming spirit generators? A lashing tail kick is actually better, you can rune it with fire for 312% damage with only a 3 second cooldown, so it can 104% weapon damage/second. But if we can swing our normal attacks once per second how is this worth the spirit?

The other spenders you pick up for the effect they do rather than the damage. Yes Lashing Tail Kick can knockback, and SSS can give you some limited vulnerability, but are these skills truly better than BoH or Serenity, or the Decoy/Ally, etc.? I don't think that it's a coincidence that these three skills I'm talking about are the three skills in the passive Beacon of Ytar, that removes the cooldown. It gives you the ability to spam these skills constantly. However, the 75 spirit cost of SSS and WoL makes this more of a massive spirit dump against a boss. Truly, the one skill it really improves is Lashing Tail Kick, because it would still be quite cheap to spam. 312% fire damage spammable that hits everyone around the monk and knocks them back might truly be worth the spirit cost if you're willing to use up a passive to do it. That might be the best damaging skill we have.

There are other spenders besides these three that do damage, but damage isn't what makes them desirable. Also, SSS/WoL/Lashing Tail Kick can all be runed to stun... though several generators can stun as well. To me, the monk seems designed to be more offensive with his generators, and more defensive with his spenders. Any thoughts on this?

You should take into account that you're still doing your usual combo attacks when the Spirit spenders are on cooldown. So, SSS's impact on total damage output would be something like 1820% + 27*100% over 30*100% when compared to auto attacks, assuming SSS takes the same time to complete as 3 auto attacks. Lashing Tail Kick would be 312% + 2*100% over 3*100%. To compare with more realistic figures you just substitute proper attack damage and number of attacks to the equations.

Well that is true and I suppose that since a power on a cooldown doesn't stop you from attacking, you could look at the damage of these skills as more of a damage buff like the area effect of Sweeping Wind. I think I really might need to sit down and do the math. Of course, besides not having true damage and weapon speed numbers, I also don't know the relative difference in how long a skill takes to complete. If the animation for Lashing Tail Kick was noticeably faster than Exploding Palm for instance, that could certainly skew things towards that spender.

There's no question a single push of any of the "finishers" (SSS, wave of light, lashing tail) will do more dps than a single push of any of the generators. If they don't then Blizzard has simply messed up the math and will adjust.

Having said that, there are still decisions to be made.

1. On the micro level, do I need spirit, or do I need to a generator's effect refreshed? If yes, then the generator is the better button to push.

2. On the skill choice level, how many generators, mantras, or utility-spenders (e.g. heals, protective shields, movement skills) can I afford to give up to have one more finisher on my bar? No point in having SSS, lashing tail, and wave of light on your skill bar if you're always dying or running out of spirit before you can use them.

I'm quite sure someone will make a quirky build that doesn't use any finishers, but I'm also quite sure that every "well rounded" build will have at least one, if not two.

Edit: Actually, upon further thought, I guess it's not automatic that a finisher (especially lashing tail) would do more dps. You could certainly come up with rune combos where the generator does more dps, and the finisher was used more for utility (e.g., mangle + scorpion sting). Still, going back to the original question, you will certainly be able to use your generators for spirit + utility, and your finishers for damage. You don't have to do it that way, but it looks very viable (and is in fact how I plan to do things).

Also consider that spirit doesn't have to be spent immediately. Now consider a build with Beacon of Ytar and Obsidian Lashing Tail Kick (Hand of Ytar). Save up to full 200 spirit on weakling mobs and then if there's a boss, you can rapidly spam 5 ranged 312% weapon damage hits (edit: and it slows movement now as well, apparently). Lashing Tail Kick casts fairly rapidly, so this can be considerably higher dps than any of the spirit generators, and at any distance.

Or consider Alabaster Seven Sided Strike (Fulminating Onslaught). This will not only hit individual enemies directly for 130% weapon damage, but also all of the enemies around them for some amount of holy damage. Using this on a crowded pack of enemies will demolish them rapidly, as every hit should hit the pack for the full holy damage, so every mob gets hit seven times (and some more than that). The hits should be fairly rapid, so the AoE dps should be very high.

None of the spirit generators can do quite what either of what those skills do, so it's something to consider. I plan to include both in my build, because then the monk will have a ranged attack and a solid aoe attack, in addition to single-target damage. They're both effective boss killers too, which is great (or so it would seem).

I guess this post was a little bit of me playing the part of a contrarian because I kinda knew the answers I would get. It all stems from the other post on this forum about a Sweeping Wind build, and I started to think about which spenders were worth stopping the triple stack effect of that generator. I probably should have kept this post in that context. When I get a chance, I'm going to try my best to compare straight Sweeping Wind damage to stopping to use a spender, and post some math here (working today so I don't have a chance right now).

A lot of the builds I've been toying around with all seem to include wave of light's Pillar of the Ancients tied with Beacon of Ytar. It's just such a big nuke and is somewhat spammable (somewhat being a 75 spirit cost.) And because it just hits so hard single target I've been mainly taking AoE spirit generators like Crippling Wave and Sweeping Wind. I guess you could do the opposite and build single target spirit generators and AoE spirit spenders to compliment one another.

Just don't forget it does 900% over 2 seconds (can the mob move out of the area of effect before the second hit?). I'm really liking hand of ytar (obsidian lashing tail) for spam dps, and the way the text reads it's ranged too =)

I've been saying this for weeks, that the Spirit skills seem too defense oriented and of the few offense-oriented, several have cooldowns. This has sapped some of my excitement about the Monk.

PS - I really really really wish/hope they remove the cooldown on Lashing Tail Kick. Even without the cooldown, it still wouldn't be all that powerful compared to some of the stuff the Barb's got.

PS - I really really really wish/hope they remove the cooldown on Lashing Tail Kick. Even without the cooldown, it still wouldn't be all that powerful compared to some of the stuff the Barb's got.

There used to be a rune that removed the cd, but it got changed. :(

This has sapped some of my excitement about the Monk.
Well, it is supposed to be a "weave in and out" sort of style of combat, big spirit nuke dumps don't really support that.

Continuous damage from combos are the bread and butter.