| Diplominator |
With the understanding that this will probably drift into a discussion of the relative merits of monks, I'd like to propose a new option for monks. Flurry of blows would still be allowed, of course, but I'd like to give them another option. One of the themes of pathfinder seems to be giving classes choices in how they are made, and the monk has none beyond the standard feat and skill choices.
Basically, I hate that monks are terrible in combat unless they are full attacking. That's not exactly a terrible thing to be good at, but combat consisting of moving next to an enemy if you aren't already and full attacking if you are isn't especially interesting, and it makes all the interesting speed and mobility powers of the monk a lot less useful.
I'd like to replace the TWF feats that FoB gives with the Vital Strike chain, but, quite frankly, that would be too good. TWF feats have +1/+6/+11 BAB prereqs, and VS feats have +6/+11/+16. So...that won't work. Vital Strike would be way too good at level 1. Vital Strike and Improved Vital Strike could be decent replacements for the ITWF and GTWF, but they still need something at first level, and probably a way to get greater vital strike at some point.
So, two questions.
1. What would be a decent level 1 FoB substitute for a monk that hits things HARD, not over and over? Power attack? The ability to treat unarmed strikes as two-handed attacks? A faster unarmed damage progression?
2. Would giving monks a full BAB for hitting without flurry and for qualifying for feats really be so bad? They don't get the to-hit increasing abilities of the other martial classes, and it's harder to get enhancement bonuses. They already get a lot of the benefits of a full BAB; I don't think they would be overpowered with the rest.
Commence heated discussion of the utility of monks in general, hopefully while answering my question.