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I need some advice on how to build this character concept. Mostly I am worried about nerfing my character by multi-classing.
Concept, an irritating, rude, ugly, drunk, typical dwarf that signs on as the parties cook (terrible cook) and pack mule (great pack mule). He carries around his dwarven axe, and probably even uses it sometimes, but I envision him generally smashing people with his giant beer stein, a table, a battering ram, chairs, doors, whatever he can get his hands on. And mixing in a healthy assortment of headbutts, butt smashes, belly bumps, and shoulder slams via unarmed attack.
Starting at 4th level, home game but would love to be able use concept and build for society play.
Starting Monk of the empty hand/ Monk of the four winds/ Qinggong Master lvl 4
Stats:
STR: 16
Dex: 14 (+1 at lvl 4)
Con: 16 (+2 dwarf)
Int: 10
Wis: 16 (+2 dwarf)
Cha: 5 (-2 dwarf)
The question is do I stay monk? vs
Build into Ninja because all improvised weapon attacks count as flat footed? vs
Something else I am missing?
Love the concept, have you considered working Drunken Master in there somewhere? And I'd stick with monk, myself.
Definitely a nice concept.
I might consider dropping his Con a bit and using the points to either boost Dex or Wis. Con is obviously important for any melee'r but I think the monk really needs some of his other stats first.
Just my two coppers though.
I would love to see the feat tree that you have planned.
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I think his stats are just right. I'd go drunken master/quingong monk, myself and not worry about ninja. Multiclassing can really hurt monks. Keep a high strength, pick up barkskin, buy a wand of mage armor and perhaps UMD though traits and go to town.
I'd throw in some style feats too. Perhaps boar style, or dragon style.
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I would love to see the feat tree that you have planned.
Aeric, this is what I have so far.
Monklvl 1 Toughness
Monk 1 Improved Grapple
Monk 2 Dodge
lvl 3 Power Attack
Qingon power lvl 4 Barkskin
lvl 5 Improved Overun?
Monk 6 Improvised Weapon Master?
Monk/ Ninja
lvl 1 Combat Reflexes
Monk 1 Improved Grapple
Monk 2 Dodge
lvl 3 Power Attack
Qingon power lvl 4 Barkskin
lvl 5 Bludgeoner?
Ninja Trick lvl 2 Vanish? Shadow Clone? Nothing really fits the flavor of the character, but both are powerful.
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I think his stats are just right. I'd go drunken master/quingong monk, myself and not worry about ninja. Multiclassing can really hurt monks. Keep a high strength, pick up barkskin, buy a wand of mage armor and perhaps UMD though traits and go to town.
I'd throw in some style feats too. Perhaps boar style, or dragon style.
Anburaid, I like the style feats, especially dragon style feats. Thank you very much for the advice.
My issue with Drunken Master is it doesn't work with Monk of the Empty Hand. I really am attached to the idea of beating things up with random items.
The big draw to Ninja is an extra 1d6 of damage with every improvised weapon strike, and the extra skill pts.
I am not seeing where improvised weapons catch people flatfooted. Where is that?
Ninja might grant a damage boost, but its short lived, situational, and pushes back monk abilities from when they are relavent. Staying monk lets your damage increase, movement increase, AC increase, keeps your flurry/CMB bonus relavent.
nevermind its in catchall eh? You still need the feat to make that work and its only against unarmed opponents.
Edit - still highly situational. Good for starting fights.
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I am not seeing where improvised weapons catch people flatfooted. Where is that?
Ninja might grant a damage boost, but its short lived, situational, and pushes back monk abilities from when they are relavent. Staying monk lets your damage increase, movement increase, AC increase, keeps your flurry/CMB bonus relavent.
I missed the "unarmed opponent" clause. That settles it. Thank you Anburaid.
Any advice on feat selection for a monk of the empty hand/ monk of the four winds/ Qinngon master?
Furious focus, hammer the gap, weapon focus (unarmed). Get an amulet of mighty fists mighty quick, and only with enhancement bonus on it, no special effects. Attack bonus is to monks what icecream is to children. It spazzes them out and makes them highly annoying.
You can pick up greater grapple at some point. Some way to get Ki back would be good. That's why drunken master would have been awesome. You could just drink your ki points back. Honestly I would consider just taking catchall as a bonus feat instead of taking the empty fist archetype. You could still throw/swing improvised weapons in rounds where you have to move and can't use flurry.
Ki points are difficult to keep going and archetypes that can get them back do more damage over time. And while the Drunken master's abilities might seem expensive they are assuming that you are spending ki like you just don't care.
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I think his stats are just right. I'd go drunken master/quingong monk, myself and not worry about ninja. Multiclassing can really hurt monks. Keep a high strength, pick up barkskin, buy a wand of mage armor and perhaps UMD though traits and go to town.
I'd throw in some style feats too. Perhaps boar style, or dragon style.
Dude. I love the drunken master + quingong monk concept, but each archetype replaces the same abilities. Too bad, I would have loved to rock this for my upcoming monk.
qinggong actually stacks with all the other monk archs because it only has the abilities you swap out. For example, the drunken master doesn't use slow fall, or wholeness of body, which can be swapped out for qinggong abilities.
@Anburaid:
I can see where Furious Focus is awesome. If you are going to power attack with any regularity, might as well take FF too to make that first attack that much more likely to land.
I'm curious though with respect to Hammer the Gap. How often, given the to-hit problems that monks generally have to begin with, does this actually go off? I'm particularly concerned given that it requires consecutive hits, not just previous hits on the turn. In your experience, does it still go off fairly regularly?
Hard to go wrong with Improved Grapple. I'm not a huge fan of Toughness but it largely depends on your group makeup too. If you are going to take it though, might as well take it early since so many of the better feats require a +1. Otherwise, I might consider Dodge in there and then Combat Reflexes at 2. This then sets you up for either Power attack or a Combat Style at 3.
I'll second that toughness choice. If you want to be in the thick of things, having that extra hp is nice. It aught to put you right up there with the full babs.
@Anburaid:
I can see where Furious Focus is awesome. If you are going to power attack with any regularity, might as well take FF too to make that first attack that much more likely to land.
I'm curious though with respect to Hammer the Gap. How often, given the to-hit problems that monks generally have to begin with, does this actually go off? I'm particularly concerned given that it requires consecutive hits, not just previous hits on the turn. In your experience, does it still go off fairly regularly?
You can find the bonuses to make up the difference if you look for them (flanking, spells, bard song, trip attacks), but really it's just nice to have in addition to power attack and dragon style feats to stack those flat bonuses. At 7th level (most likely when you have hammer, PA, and style feats) you have 3 attacks at highest bab. By 10th you might eek out 5 if you can land a medusa's wrath (a bit iffy), and a crap ton of iterative attacks. Oh and don't forget haste which stacks with ki attacks. +1-3 damage is worth a feat. Anything else is just awesome-sauce.
Anburaid, I like the style feats, especially dragon style feats. Thank you very much for the advice.
Dragon style is great for a strength-focus monk. Snake style is best for getting the most attacks.
My issue with Drunken Master is it doesn't work with Monk of the Empty Hand. I really am attached to the idea of beating things up with random items.
Fair enough. Monk of the Empty Hand gets some neat abilities anyway.
The big draw to Ninja is an extra 1d6 of damage with every improvised weapon strike, and the extra skill pts.
No...that's only sneak attack, you don't get that just for using improvised weapons. The feat may be called Catch off-Guard, but it doesn't mean you constantly have surprise on your enemy.
I can see where Furious Focus is awesome. If you are going to power attack with any regularity, might as well take FF too to make that first attack that much more likely to land.
Only with two-handed weapons, so not that much use.
I'm curious though with respect to Hammer the Gap. How often, given the to-hit problems that monks generally have to begin with, does this actually go off? I'm particularly concerned given that it requires consecutive hits, not just previous hits on the turn. In your experience, does it still go off fairly regularly?
In my experience, no. Out of a flurry of 6 attacks, you will be lucky to get three or four hits. The more you hit, the less your chances of a subsequent hit. So three hits will grant you +3 damage in total, and that's on a good day (compare to weapon specialisation, which grants +2 damage per hit, and you need 4+ hits to match the utility of that feat).
It's maybe worth it at high level for a monk, but before about 12th level I wouldn't bother.