Markwin Teldas

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29 posts (77 including aliases). No reviews. 2 lists. No wishlists. 2 aliases.




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Greetings dear co-forumites,

I am not a monk savant by any stretch of imagination. I know that there have been a billion threads about the (non)usefulness of monks. I also know that there have been very sophisticated and complex fixes on the class.

For myself, however, I am a fan of simple fixes, even if they miss some of the finer points. Thus, I would like to propose some specific alterations to the class to make it more easy to compete, power-level-wise, and I would like your opinion on that.

As far as I can see, monks have two main problems (notice, I said main, not only): They have terrible MAD and their abilities tend not to synergize all that well. The following proposal wants to address this and also rectify the fact that monks seem to get irrelevant abilities at high levels. The main changes are:
1) Flurry of blows is a standard action
2) The calculate AB and damage with Dex and Wis.
3) The ki pool does more things
4) Bonus feat have been expanded and moved to appropriate levels.
5) Abilities have been tweaked a bit.

This makes the monk the maneuver master in all levels, and also the guy that hits you fast and hard and then moves away. He is also the guy (or gal) who is really tough to pin and grapple.

This also means that most archetypes need a bit of tweaking, but not much.

How do you think it fares?

New proposal

Whenever no explanation is given, it is assumed that the ability stays the same. I also wrote the following in short format, with the assumption that the reader has some familiarity with the system.

Skills, Skill points, WPs, HD, Saves : The same

1st) Zen combat, martial arts training, bonus feat, flurry of blows, stunning fist, Unarmed Attack Damage (UAD) 1d6
2nd) Bonus feat, evasion, (UAD)1d6
3rd) Fast movement +10ft, still mind, (UAD)1d6
4th) Ki pool (magic), slow fall 20 ft., (UAD)1d8, AC +1
5th) Zen acrobatics, purity of body, (UAD) 1d8
6th) Bonus feat, slow fall 30 ft., fast movement +20 ft., (UAD)1d8
7th) Wholeness of body, (UAD)1d8
8th) Improved blind fight, Slow fall 40 ft., (UAD)1d10, AC+2
9th) Improved evasion, Fast movement +30 ft, (UAD)1d10
10th)Bonus feat, slow fall 50 ft, (UAD)1d10
11th)Diamond soul,(UAD)1d10
12th)Abundant step, slow fall 60 ft., Fast movement +40 ft, AC+3, (UAD) 2d6
13th)Elemental fist, (UAD) 2d6
14th)Bonus feat, slow fall 70 ft. (UAD) 2d6
15th) Quivering palm, Fast movement+50 ft, (UAD) 2d6
16th)Ki pool (adamantine), slow fall 80 ft., AC +4, (UAD) 2d6
17th)Timeless body, Greater blind fight, (UAD) 2d8
18th)Bonus feat, slow fall 90 ft., Fast movement+60 ft, (UAD) 2d8,
19th)Empty body, (UAD) 2d8
20th)Perfect self, slow fall any distance, AC +5, (UAD) 2d10

Zen Combat (Ex)
The monk is trained to use his opponent's force against him and to act at the exact appropriate time necessary. The monk uses his Dex mod instead of his Str mod to calculate his AB and his Wis mod instead of his Str mod to calculate damage, for all monk weapons, unarmed combat (including flurry of blows) and CMB.

Martial arts training (Ex)
Due to intensive training, the monk 's BAB is equal to a fighter 's, for the purpose of calculating his CMB and his flurry of blows AB only.

Flurry of blows (Ex)
Starting at 1st level, a monk can make a flurry of blows as a standard action. When doing so he may make one additional attack using any combination of unarmed strikes or attacks with a special monk weapon. Both attacks take a -2 penalty to hit. As said earlier, for the purpose of these attacks, the monk's base attack bonus from his monk class levels is equal to his monk level. For all other purposes, such as qualifying for a feat or a prestige class, the monk uses his normal base attack bonus. Flurry of blows can be also used in any case that a single attack is specified in a feat or ability 's description (Spring Attack etc) and for the maneuvers disarm, sunder and trip.
At 8th level, the monk can make two additional attacks when he uses flurry of blows. The first two attacks are at-2 penalty and the third at -7.
At 15th level, the monk can make three additional attacks using flurry of blows. The first two attacks are at-2 penalty, the third at -7 and the fourth at -10.
A monk applies his full Wis bonus (see Zen Combat) to his damage rolls for all successful attacks made with flurry of blows, whether the attacks are made with an off-hand or with a weapon wielded in both hands. A monk cannot use any weapon other than an unarmed strike or a special monk weapon as part of a flurry of blows.

Bonus feats (Ex)
At 1st level, 2nd level, and every 4 levels thereafter, a monk may select a bonus feat. These feats must be taken from the following list:

Catch Off-Guard, Combat Reflexes, Deflect Arrows, Dodge, Improved Grapple, Improved Bull Rush, Improved Disarm, Improved Drag, Improved Feint, Improved Trip, Improved Reposition, Improved Sunder, Scorpion Style, Mobility, Stand Still and Throw Anything.

At 6th level, the following feats are added to the list:

Gorgon's Fist, Greater Disarm, Greater Drag, Greater Feint, Greater Grapple, Greater Reposition, Greater Sunder, Greater Trip, Sidestep, Spring Attack, Combat Patrol, Landing Roll, Passing Trick, Steady engagement.

At 10th level, the following feats are added to the list:

Improved Critical, Medusa's Wrath, Snatch Arrows, Improved sidestep, Whirlwind attack.

At 14th level, the following are added: Cockatrice strike .

For the purpose of qualifying for feats, the monk is considered to have all prerequisite feats of the bonus feat he chooses.

Slow fall (Ex)
At 4th level or higher, a monk takes damage from a fall as if the fall were 20 feet shorter than it actually is (notice the absence of walls here!). The monk's ability improves with his monk level until, at 20th level, he can fall from any distance without harm.

Ki pool (Su)
At 4th level, a monk gains a pool of ki points, supernatural energy he can use to accomplish amazing feats. The number of points in a monk's ki pool is equal to 1/2 his monk level + his Wisdom modifier. As long as he has at least 1 point in his ki pool, he can make a ki strike. Ki strike improves with the character's monk level.

At 4th level, ki strike allows his unarmed attacks to be treated as magic weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. His hands and feet can also be enchanted as weapons. This usually takes the form of magical tattoos.
At 7th level, his unarmed attacks are also treated as cold iron and silver weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction.
At 10th level, his unarmed attacks are also treated as lawful weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction.
At 16th level, his unarmed attacks are treated as adamantine weapons for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction and bypassing hardness.

By spending 1 point from his ki pool, a monk can do one of the following:

Make one additional attack at his highest attack bonus when making a flurry of blows attack.
Increase his speed by 20 feet for 1 round.
Give himself a +4 dodge bonus to AC for 1 round.
Add his Wis mod to his SR, if he has any.
Add +2 to any skill roll that is based on Dex, Str or Con, for a minute.
Forfeit any of his extra attacks to do an extra die of damage in one of his main attacks, as if using the Vital Strike feat, for one minute. For anyone attack he forfeits, he adds one die to one of his main attacks (not all of them).
Add 1 plus 1 for every five levels he has, to his attack and damage rolls for a minute. (5th level)
Add +2 to his CMB for 1 round per level. (6th level)
Add +2 to his AC for 1 round per level. (7th level)

By spending 2 point from his ki pool, a monk can do one of the following

Make an additional Stunning Fist attack (5th level)
Change the saving throw needed to resist his Stunning Fist and Quivering Palm attacks from Fort to Will. (9th level)
Make an additional Quivering Palm attack. (15th level)
Make an additional Elemental Fist attack. (13th level)
Add his level to all his attack rolls for the next round. ( 8th level)

Each of these powers is activated as a swift action.
The ki pool is replenished each morning after 8 hours of rest or meditation; these hours do not need to be consecutive.

Zen acrobatics (Ex)
At 5th level, a monk adds his level to all Acrobatics checks (not only jumps). In addition, he always counts as having a running start when making jump checks using Acrobatics. By spending 1 point from his ki pool as a swift action, a monk gains a +20 bonus on Acrobatics checks for 1 round.

Wholeness of Body (Su)
At 7th level or higher, a monk can heal his own wounds as a standard action. He can heal a number of hit points of damage equal to twice his monk level by using 2 points from his ki pool. Also, if he spends a whole day meditating and if he has at least one ki point, he or she doubles the recovery rate of hit points and ability damage.
The monk also gains immunity to all poisons.
(This has been merged with Diamond Body and expanded a bit)

Diamond Soul (Ex)
At 11th level, a monk gains spell resistance equal to his current monk level + 10. In order to affect the monk with a spell, a spellcaster must get a result on a caster level check (1d20 + caster level) that equals or exceeds the monk's spell resistance. The monk can lower his SR as an immediate action.

Elemental fist (Su)
At 13 level, a monk picks one of the following energy types: acid, cold, electricity, or fire. On a successful hit, the attack deals damage normally plus 1d6 points of damage of the chosen type. The monk must declare that he is using this feat before he makes the attack roll (thus a failed attack roll ruins the attempt). He may attempt an Elemental Fist attack once per day for every four levels he has attained , and no more than once per round.

Special: A monk who had picked Elemental Fist as a feat earlier, can attack a number of times per day equal to his monk level, plus one more time per day for every four levels he has in classes other than monk. In that case, at level 13, the damage of Elemental Fist becomes 2d6.

Quivering Palm (Su)
Starting at 15th level, a monk can set up vibrations within the body of another creature that can thereafter be fatal if the monk so desires. He can use this quivering palm attack once per day plus once more per day at levels 16th, 18th and 20th. He must announce his intent before making his attack roll. Creatures immune to critical hits cannot be affected. Otherwise, if the monk strikes successfully and the target takes damage from the blow, the quivering palm attack succeeds. Thereafter, the monk can try to slay the victim at any later time, as long as the attempt is made within a number of days equal to his monk level. To make such an attempt, the monk merely wills the target to die (a free action), and unless the target makes a Fortitude saving throw (DC 10 + 1/2 the monk's level + the monk's Wis modifier), it dies. If the saving throw is successful, the target is no longer in danger from that particular quivering palm attack, but it may still be affected by another one at a later time. A monk can 1 quivering palm in effect at levels 16th, 18th and 20th.


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Recently I have been toying with a Thunder and Fang build and I came across this question:

Thunder and fang says that : "You can use an earth breaker as though it were a one-handed weapon"

Power attack says: "You can choose to take a –1 penalty on all melee attack rolls and combat maneuver checks to gain a +2 bonus on all melee damage rolls. This bonus to damage is increased by half (+50%) if you are making an attack with a two-handed weapon, a one handed weapon using two hands, or a primary natural weapon that adds 1-1/2 times your Strength modifier on damage rolls"

So, when the Earth Breaker is used in thunder and Fang style, does it gain the +50% increased damage or not? It seems to me that since it still is a 2H weapon used as though it is one handed, it should. But I also believe that this is going against the spirit of the rules.

What is your opinion?


Dear co-forumites,

I have a PC that I would dearly like to try out in a PF game. He is a half orc ranger who makes liberal use of archetypes and variant racial abilities. More or less, he is an animistic wilderness specialist, not a nature warden, with a penchant for archery and a spiritual connection to his ancestors. The question is:

Is anybody interested in running a PF campaign where I could try him out? He is currently made in 20 point buy at third level, but I would be more that happy to adjust his stats.

Here is a link to his sheet: Asdoukar.

So, how about it?


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Endless are the discussions among the Wise on why, and how, a fighter has been rendered a useless class to play. This is not a thread about this subject. I want to propose a reworking of the fighter, based on specific presuppositions which I take for granted. I will explain which are these presuppositions and I will try to justify why I believe the changes I propose address them directly and indirectly. If you disagree, fine, my point is not to convince you, just to state my opinion. If you agree, then I would be very interested to hear your opinion on what I did with the class.

To my mind, the fighter in PF should try to model the great fighters of myth and literature. From Beowulf and Hercules to Conan and the Hulk, these mythic figures could jump over mountains, wrestle dragons from the sky and climb sheer cliffs that led to the palace of the gods. The PF fighter does not, I believe, make room for such kind of heroics. I would like the fighter to be able to eventually to perform feats of extraordinary prowess which border on the supernatural, without actually being magical. He should, as he levels up, be able to go from capable swordsman, to 'This is Sparta!', to besting demigods in wrestling matches.

I take as axiomatic more or less, that the goal of the game is to have fun, by playing with other people and contributing to the party. The fighter can be a very fun to be play. As a class, it does well what it was intended to does well, which is hurting enemies and withstanding their punishment. It appears however, that if a fighter wants to do things outside combat, or things inside combat other than hurting the aforementioned enemies, he faces an uphill battle (combat maneuvers excluded). This makes the fighter less versatile within a party than he could be.And it certainly breaks with many of the archetypes that it strives to emulate. On the other hand, it is important that each class retains a niche on which it thrives. The fighter should leave room for other melee combatants within the party.

The fighter also seems strangely prone to specific attacks. While in previous DnD systems he was a juggernaut (all good saves, for example) in 3.5/PF he seems much more fragile to specific attacks. This detracts from his usefulness and has no real justification in myth and tradition.

Finally, in the magically conductive environment of PF, magic equals versatility (among other things). Paladins, rangers and magi become more useful in a greater variety of circumstances, mainly because they have access to magic. Barbarians also have abilities which make them more agile in different circumstances. Fighters, for some unexplained reason, lack these resources. But there is nothing that prohibits them from having some kind of extraordinary abilities, derived from their sheer stamina and heroic spirit. Once in a while, they could and should be able to jump 30 feet in the air through sheer strength, climb towers by plunging daggers in the walls or break through magical shields by the strength of their arm. These, after all, were the accomplishments which made them special in the stories that inspired us to play them.

To address these issues, I propose the following changes

BAB, Weapon and armor proficiencies, HD, Saves : Unchanged.

Skills: 4 per level. Skill selection unchanged, however see Initial training below.
(I don't think that takes away from the skill monkeys. Also, other fighting classes seem to be doing fine with 4 skillpoints per level. I don't see why fighters can't have broader horizons)


1st) Bonus feat, Initial training, Skill and hard work
2nd) Bonus feat, Weapon aptitude, Grind the teeth
3rd) Armor training
4th) Bonus feat
5th) Weapon training, Heroics
6th) Bonus feat
7th) Armor training
8th) Bonus feat
9th) Weapon training, Heroics
10th)Bonus feat
11th)Armor training
12th)Bonus feat
13th)Weapon training, Heroics
14th)Bonus feat
15th)Armor training
16th)Bonus feat
17th)Weapon training, Heroics
18th)Bonus feat
19th)Armor mastery
20th)Bonus feat, Weapon mastery, Got you now, Heroics

Initial training (Ex): The fighter selects one of the skillsets below. These skills become class skills. He treats the associate ability score for these skills as 12,if it it isn't 12 or higher already. This becomes 14 at 6th level, 16 at 10th level and 18 at 15th level. If the skill is one that he already has in his skill list, he gains a +1 competence bonus to it, plus +1 every five levels (5, 10, 15,20).

Guard: Knowledge(Local), Perception,Intimidation
Inspector: Diplomacy, Intimidate, Sense motive
Wilderness warrior: Knowledge (Nature), Survival, Knowledge (Dungeoneering)
Mounted warrior: Ride, Handle animal, Knowledge (Nature)
Knight: Knowledge (Nobility), Diplomacy, Knowledge (Engineering)
Thug: Stealth, Climb, Acrobatics
Temple protector: Knowledge (Nobility), Knowledge (Religion), Spellcraft
Collegiate guard: Knowledge (Arcane), Spellcraft, Knowledge (Planes)
Mercenary: Diplomacy, Intimidate, Nobility
Caravan guard: Handle Animal, Perception, Appraise
Sailor: Climb, Acrobatics, Swim

(This is intended to make the fighter more versatile in out of combat situations. He or she will never be as good as a bard in Diplomacy, for example, but he or she will be able to make a secondary face without having MAD)

Skill and hard work(Ex): The fighter can ignore the ability requirements when he selects a feat as his fighter bonus feats, if the ability in question is 10 or more.

(While I liked the idea behind the ability requirements for feats, I find that in the end they just seem to penalize the fighter by making an one trick pony. This, I believe, will enable him to do more things better, such as battlefield control, by taking multiple feat chains).

Weapon aptitude (Ex): As a full round action that does not provoke an AoO, the fighter can change the weapon specified in his feats (weapon focus, improved critical, etc).
(The fighter is the weapon master after all.)

Grind the teeth (Ex): A number of times equal to the fighter's Con mod + 1 per 3 levels (3rd,6th,9th,12th etc), the fighter can substitute his Will or Ref save with a Fort save. This must be decided before the roll is made.
(This is a step back to AD&D. It reflects the fact that fighters are tough. They persevere through grit and they have the scars to prove it. Note that the paladin still remains the save juggernaut, but the fighter is a close second.)

Heroics (Ex): The fighter learns to perform extraordinary acts of heroism. He learns one at 5th level and one more at levels 9th, 13th, 17th and 20th. Every time he is eligible to learn a new heroic, he can also replace the ones he already knows with others from the list.

Decoy: Once per day per 5 fighter levels (5th, 10th etc), a fighter provokes a foe to attack him to exclusion of all others, as a standard action. He does so by appearing to leave guards unguarded, being staggered and so on. The target of the attack must make a Will save against 10+ fighter level or engage the fighter at the best of his ability (ranged attacks, spells, melee etc).

Burst of speed: Once per day per 4 levels as a standard action, the fighter can increase his speed by 20ft for a number of minutes equal to half his level.

Put your back into it: As a swift action, a number of times per day equal to his Con modifier plus 1/4 levels, the fighter can add half his level to a Str, Dex or Con based skill.

Just a flesh wound: Once per day, the fighter can take a minute to assess the damage done to him and convert a number of hit points equal to his Constitution modifier*level to nonlethal damage.

Break through: Once per day per 5 fighter levels, the fighter can ignore spells,spell-like abilities and supernatural defenses and effects that grant protection when engaged in combat with an opponent. The first successful attack acts as a targeted dispel, which does not actually dispel the active effects but instead allows the fighter to ignore it for the remainder of the encounter. The CL is the fighter's level.

Ignore impediment: Once per day per 5 fighter levels, the fighter can as a standard action, ignore any and all impediments to his movement, as per the freedom of movement spell, for a duration of 1 minutes per level.

Combat mobility: Once per day per 5 fighter levels, the fighter can, as an immediate action, take an additional move action as part of his turn.

Overextending: Once per day per 5 fighter levels, the fighter can, as a move action, extend his reach 5 feet for the duration of an encounter.

Surprise Shift: Once per day per 4 fighter levels, the fighter can move 5 feet as a swift action. This movement does not provoke attacks of opportunity and does not count as a 5-foot step.

Solo Tactics: The fighter’s allies are treated as if they possessed the same teamwork feats as the fighter for the purpose of determining whether the fighter receives a bonus from her teamwork feats. Her allies do not receive any bonuses from these feats unless they actually possess the feats themselves. The allies’ positioning and actions must still meet the prerequisites listed in the teamwork feat for the fighter to receive the listed bonus.

(These are the extraordinary abilities I was talking about. They are weaker than spells, but useful nevertheless.)

Armor mastery: The DR given by the ability is DR/10.

Got you now (Ex): Once per day, the fighter can use his chosen weapon to make a touch attack (ranged or melee) as a standard attack. If it hits, it is a considered a confirmed critical. The ability is not expended if the attack misses.

So what do you think? Is that a more versatile fighter? I eagerly await your thoughts!.