Trying to continue on these older discussions:
Why I don’t like monks
First of all monks have weaker relations with their in-game function as scouts. Explorers of course are the ones that make most sense. The other military leader-types can still be somewhat justified if you consider it as some abstract way of representing their commanding of the army, like campaign heroes do. Monks in general are neither scouts nor military leaders.
Also the monk is too specific as a role (not that the name itself cannot be unique, in fact different civs already have different monk names; not suggesting it should use the same name as others). As we now have customizable hero skins, this name makes less sense.
You can justify most other skins for explorers/generals/warchiefs/princes. An explorer can dress like, say, Francis Drake, or Francis Drake can work as an explorer. (not counting the meme skins of course) Basically anyone can work as an explorer, if he/she explores.
Monks are not. They have specific social status and very strong images. Zheng Yisao is not a Shaolin master. Some ninjia is not a sohei. Some EIC officer is not a brahmin. Nor would monks dress like that.
If the role is a more generic one, that encompasses more identities and images, then these could be justified. For example, a “prince” or “lord” (we’ll talk about better names later) can be or dress like monks, ninjas, EIC officiers, pirates, etc. But not vise versa.
Basically if you really want to represent the few examples of monks that were also military leaders, it’s better to have a leader unit with a monk skin rather than a monk unit.
In short:
A generic, all-encompassing name with a specific skin is okay.
A specific name with a skin not specific to its role is odd.
Personally, I don’t like the religious-centered representation of Asians either.
What to do
Change the default Asian hero model and name to a more generic role like prince, lord or general (or equivalences in the respective language).
Or for more flavor, use some folk hero or knight errant type of names:
Youxia for Chinese
Ronin for Japanese (the mercenary unit needs fo be renamed to Kensei, or Shinan/Master Samurai etc.)
Bahadur for Indians (I know this word is Turkic so let me know if there are more fitting ones).
The current default monk models can be either turned into a custom skin, or more radically, assigned to the respective native sites as a native hero obtainable from techs, as we already have some. And in fact each monk already has their respective native site.
In addition I’d suggest the disciple to replace the rattan shield as Shaolin native unit (with the same stats). The rattan shield has little to do with the Shaolin Temple. It should be repurposed as a mercenary unit or sth.
What about the hero skins?
Luckily, all custom Asian hero skins are NOT monks (which again justifies getting rid of the monk name). So one can simply replace the default skin with a new one.
EDIT: if heroes are to de-couple from monks, the re-arrangement of mercenary, hero upgrade and religious buildings is also relevant:
