Heya! I'm a longtime tabletop/role player first time Pathfinder player. Lovin' it. I'm starting a long haul campaign (levels 1 through 18-20) and I'm currently playing a face beater 2-handed fighter with lots of attack options (lunge, cleave, and all that jazz) but I want a backup character encase he bites the dust.
I'm a sucker for strange play styles and the Tetori looks like fun. Sure, they get gimped by swarms and slimes, but you get to suplex ghosts. How cool is that? After chugging down the rules the swishing for a while I came up with some kooky ideas and picked up some tips from guides and forum posts. My DM is allowing us to use just about any PF published book, cause he's nearly got all of them. But I have a few questions that I hope the PF community can help me with:
1: Is the Hamatulatsu line of feats good for a grapple build? The idea of getting a grapple off a charge, an Attack of Opportunity, Stunning fist, or Vital Strike regardless of enemy size sounds sweet, even with the penalty. Or is simply running up and giving a killer brograb just a better option most of the time?
I've been toying with the idea of putting armor on the Tetori monk early-mid levels instead of relying on the AC bonus monks' get. I'll take a one level dip into fighter for the boat load of proficiencies, +1 BABs, extra feat and pick up a chain shirt with armor spikes (Mithral breastplate later on). I'll lose Fast Movement, but that can be offset with magic items/buffs or burning a Ki point to increase the Tetori's movement speed. Strangely, it looks like the Ki ability doesn't care if a monk wears armor. (If I'm wrong in the assumption, let me know.)
2: Are there any other Tetori/monk specific penalties I should know about before tossing armor on this guy?
The main reason for this is armor enchantments. Namely I'm interested in the Grinding Enchant to further increase my damage output while grappling.
3: The Grinding Enchantment description states the enchantment counts as armor spikes. Does that mean it is armor spikes (D6 +enchantment bonus when I make a grapple check) or does it use the rules for armor spikes and just deals the flat enchantment bonus on a successful grapple check? If it is the latter, what happens if I affix spikes to the armor?
Here's the starting stats and feat progression. Not overly concerned about optimizing stats. I think it's solid, but if you have any advice, let me know!
El Calamar
Human Monk (Tetori/Qinggong Monk)19 /Fighter 1
20 point buy
STR 16+2=18 (10) (Human's ability bonus)
DEX 14 (5)
CON 12 (2)
INT 10 (0)
WIS 14 (5)
CHA 8 (-2)
Starting Equipment- Monk Kit, Flint and Steal, Monk Clothes, Winter Clothes, luchador mask, body oil
Monk 1- Snapping Turtle Style, Weapon focus(unarmed strike)
Fighter1- Hamatulatsu
Monk 2- Extra Ki
Monk 4- Snapping Turtle Clutch
Monk 6- Vital Strikes
Monk 8- Hamatula Strike
Monk 10- Rapid Grappler
Monk 12- Hamatula Grasp
Monk 14- Improved Vital Strikes
Monk 16- Pinning Rend
Monk 18- Body Shield
Thanks for any help with my questions!
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You may want to consider a Shirt of Immolation if you're not considering anything else for that slot. It allows you to do 1d6+10 extra fire damage per round to a grappled opponent for ten rounds per day.
I think tetoris are very cool. When I was already playing my monk character I considered it but was not crazy about losing Flurry of Blows.
Have fun with the character. My PFS monk is currently level 18 and getting ready to play Shattered Star Book 6.
That's a very nifty item! I'll certainly pick that up.
That's a good point on the Hamatula. The feat line may be a better option for a full BAB Grappler-centric character.
I'd nab Anaconda's Coils as soon as you can manage, so you can take the Final Embrace Feat. It lets you Grab creatures your size or smaller without spending Ki, and also gives you Constrict.
I find Hamatulatsu to be pretty useful though myself, however my Tetori is a Mythic character, and multiclassed with Fighter and Ulfen Guardian, so his to-hit bonuses are a fair bit higher.
Just remember, if you wear armor you also loose your wisdom bonus to CMD. Making it easier to escape.
My pfs tetori didnt go for turtle style. Its a nice sryle to get free grapples off, but the ac boosts require a free hand. So you either loose it while grappling (what you should be most of the time) or take a huge penalty to grapple with one hand.
I was looking at dragon or monkey style for my tetori. Decided on monkey for the cool weirdness.
I enjoy playing the tetori. :)
Edit:
I would recommend higher con however. As while you focus on a single enemy, the others are free to attack you. You loose AC when grappling, up until level 4.
Just double check your feats. I see weapon focus at lvl1, which requires BAB 1. So as a monk you can only take it later. The same with vital strike. Vital strike would also not help your grappling damage.
For weapon focus, you also need to choose (grapple). Unarmed strike attack bonuses do not apply to grapples.
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Tetori + armor spikes is win in the early levels. Better ac and more damage.
How Does this work out for you with out level dipping or wasted feats? And how low Wisdom do you go with for your tetori?
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You can't pick Weapon Focus at L1 (not enough BAB) or Extra Ki at L3 (you don't get Ki until L4 of monk).
Stay pure Tetori. Drop Vital Strike. Drop Hamatulatsu feats. At mid-levels, pick up Final Embrace feat line and Pinning KO as they are your friends for massive damage output.
Body Slot should be used for Body Wrap of Mighty Strikes to boost your Unarmed Damage when constricting or grappling to do damage.
I highly recommend a 2 level dip in Cavalier with the Order of the Penitent....Once you have Greater Grapple and Expert Captor, just focus on things that improve your Grapple Mod. Take 1 level in Alchemist...
Woah! That's pretty cool. Our party has a good amount of control and buffs through our tanky warrior, battle field control wizard and bard/oracle. The big bonuses do look sweet, but I feel like I'll lose out on some of the Tetori's class abilities like ghost touch and iron body. I may try it out if we party wipe and switch up roles
I'd nab Anaconda's Coils as soon as you can manage, so you can take the Final Embrace Feat. It lets you Grab creatures your size or smaller without spending Ki, and also gives you Constrict.
That is a must have. Wow! I didn't know abilities granted by magic items let you qualify for feats. I was going for the Final Embrace line, but didn't feel like it made a good impact when constrict came in (naturally) very late at level 15 and I could only get the first two feats. This changes everything.
My pfs tetori didnt go for turtle style. Its a nice sryle to get free grapples off, but the ac boosts require a free hand. So you either loose it while grappling (what you should be most of the time) or take a huge penalty to grapple with one hand.I was looking at dragon or monkey style for my tetori. Decided on monkey for the cool weirdness...
Ah- very true. I think I'll change the turtle for dragon to gain a bit more damage. Though monkey looks like a good style too. I'll keep armor on, I feel like the armor enchantments are too good to pass up.
Stay pure Tetori. Drop Vital Strike. Drop Hamatulatsu feats. At mid-levels, pick up Final Embrace feat line and Pinning KO as they are your friends for massive damage output.
Body Slot should be used for Body Wrap of Mighty Strikes to boost your Unarmed Damage when constricting or grappling to do damage.
Pinning KO comes at level 10- but I can see how picking it up earlier can speed up fights.
I read that Vital Strikes can be good in a grapple build after you get Greater and Rapid Grapple. You can you can pin with the first check (move action), if the first check success you can then unarmed strike/tie up/move/ect with the swift action gained by Rapid grapple, and Vital Strike with the standard action you have left. Is this a wrong interpretation or should I be doing something else with the last grapple check?
And thank you- I've been looking for the name of that magic item.
As for the feats- I guess I've been making too many fighter builds, hah.
Thanks for the input everyone- this has already given me lots of ideas.
The dan bong weapon adds +2 to grapple checks and if you are using it to grapple its enhancement bonus will also apply
Dan bong is tricky: it takes up one hand, so you take the -4 penalty for grappling one-handed (unless your GM rules otherwise). You can use Grabbing style to get around that.
If you want to be an armor-wearing grapple build, you can try a Brawler, specifically the Strangler archetype.
The tetori 9th level ability to suppress freedom of movement is kind of hard to beat, though.
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My pfs tetori didnt go for turtle style. Its a nice sryle to get free grapples off, but the ac boosts require a free hand. So you either loose it while grappling (what you should be most of the time) or take a huge penalty to grapple with one hand.I was looking at dragon or monkey style for my tetori. Decided on monkey for the cool weirdness...
Ah- very true. I think I'll change the turtle for dragon to gain a bit more damage. Though monkey looks like a good style too. I'll keep armor on, I feel like the armor enchantments are too good to pass up.
I think the chance to go swift: Enter turtle style, move: provoka attack of oppotunity, see it miss and start a grabble as a immidiate action, and then pin with your standart action beats what ever damage boost dragon style can give you.
And i think you loose too Many things by wearing armor as a tetori monk. Better be a brawler then and use pummeling style on the guys that have fredag of movement.
My brawler have a brown fur transmuter in the party but for Those that must go with a normal druid or arcane caster getting a AC or a Mount so you quailfy for the Animal soul feat allow you go get animal growth cast on you:)
Also in your build you take extra ki Before qualifying.
Tetori is one of the few monk builds that work. They are a one-trick pony, but it's a good trick they can make work almost every time. Turtle Style is excellent for Tetori as well.
Great- thanks everyone this really helped me get a better grip on the trickier parts of PF rules and character building.
You cannot Vital Strike during a grapple attempt, but you can do this:
Move action-maintain a grapple, do something grapply
Swift action-do something grapply
Standard action-make an attack action with Vital StrikeI think that's what Elven Blubber was suggesting.
Yep- that's what I was getting at.
I wanted to see how a build dipping into one level of fighter fared against pure Tetori. So I hammered out the Stats, Feats, AC, CMB,CMD, magic item buys, and average damage output for levels 1, 5, 10, and 15.(I'm too burned out to do 20 right now) I also compared the numbers to about 10 randomly selected CR appropriate (with a few bonus +2-4 CR) monsters to see if the builds actually work against the creatures the wrestlers are fighting. (they are hitting those CMDs with regularity- nice) The feats for both builds are nearly identical (save for the extra fighter feat) and concentrated on the Final Embrace line with no Hamalatsu or Vital Strikes. The general idea was to run up, bear hug, and crush enemies with constrict.
The numbers (so far) are telling- The armor spike build had higher damage outputs and better AC. Though the gap for AC closes as the levels rose. Pure tetori builds had better CMB and CMD and was much cheaper- giving the player the option to purchase higher quality items/more items compared to the armor build. This in turn, can make the pure Tetori better at adapting to situations (flying creatures, environmental hazards, magic...) with items. This also meant pure Tetoris could chase down bad guys waaaay better then armored ones thanks to Fast Movement. Though as the levels rose, the two builds had closer CMBs (around 1 to 3 point difference) but the pure tertori always had much higher CMD. Of course, I want to double check the math, try different magic items, and figure out level 20 before saying anything concrete.
I'm pretty sure they'll mostly even out at LV20 with the biggest difference being the damage output VS adaptation. Neat how a single level dip can affect a character! Though the math isn't be all end all,(qualitative factors exist when its game time!) it'll give me a good idea what to expect as I level the character.
It would be cool to look into Scott Wilhelm's idea. Looks very powerful, though not what I'm envisioning for my specific character. My visions of glory is a guy busting people up with his own two hands rather than using mutagens and magic. Mine may not be truly optimal, but I think its fun and still effective for laying down pain and limiting a baddy's options.
The Chokehold feat sounds like it will let you go straight to pin without having to wait one round for a maintain check.
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Derrick, I would have to disagree with you.
You would need to be the one grappling the opponent.
The tie up option of grappling comes from a grapple maneuver check to maintain--if you maintain then you have several options among them, tying up your opponent.
If someone else is grappling an opponent, you cannot make a grapple check on that same opponent--you can only assist that creature with its grapple check.
Multiple creatures can attempt to grapple one target. The creature that first initiates the grapple is the only one that makes a check, with a +2 bonus for each creature that assists in the grapple (using the Aid Another action). Multiple creatures can also assist another creature in breaking free from a grapple, with each creature that assists (using the Aid Another action) granting a +2 bonus on the grappled creature's combat maneuver check.
The expert captor rules do not override the normal grappling rules regarding multiple grapplers, only the penalty for tying up if you skip to a pin.