I think someone is forgetting wizard and sorcerer again you know the guys who can bend reality in no armor with no weapon.
It doesn't really nerf the monk. When we played L5R the monk was the best character because the characters were constantly dealing with problems in town or in court. No one had armor so he was the only one that could avoid damage at all and his wrestling worked great in the land of only medium humans.
The monk is only weak if the gm picks enemies that make it week. Run a city intrigue game with a touch of Japanese / Chinese culture and watch the monk be the best class.
Wait... Why are you using an L5R example to show that the PF Monk isn't underpowered? If you can't use a PF Monk for that, then there is no point.
And second, if you really believe that a monk would be anywhere near the best class in a city intrigue game then I am really going to believe that you have never played Pathfinder before.
Trip did not use BAB for anything but the extremely easy touch attack. It was a raw strength check. Grapple did use BAB, but had so many other factors that added majorly to it that medium BAB wasn't that hindering (merely gaining a single size increase was basically the equivalent of going from medium to full BAB, in terms of the grapple check bonus).
And disarm was NOT a primary maneuver. Almost no one used it, because fighting enemies that not only used weapons, but had one super enhanced weapon (as opposed to a bunch of mundane ones that were one move action no-AoO draw action away from obtaining) was far too slim to specialize in it. Grapple and Trip were the primary maneuvers of 3E, with splats making Bull Rush join their ranks in usefulness (Knockback feat; Dungeoncrasher Fighter variant; etc...). Over Run was more widely used than disarm IME, just that it was used by wildshaped druids and their animal companions and summons in the form of trample attacks.
Enlarge Person is a level 1 spell...
Playing in a game with the default Fighter-Rogue-Wizard-Cleric and using anything remotely close to the expected wealth by level is far from a "Monty Haul game."
In a few select settings maybe a caster would be the social pariah you make it out to be Cranewings. However in most settings everything you listed about eh monk a caster can do. The skills, beating on humanoids, being hard to hit naked.
@ Darkwing
The game you describe is not typical of a 3.5 game at all.
The skills, the focus on beating humanoids, and the ok AC while naked make it the best class. I think it is better even than the wizard or sorcerer who aren't good for much besides angering NPCs and getting isolated.
Yep, I'm convinced you've never played Pathfinder before.
Everyone always thinks that the games they have the most experience playing are the ones which are most typical of the game system.@ Darkwing
The game you describe is not typical of a 3.5 game at all.
That doesn't change the fact that the game you describe is not typical of a 3.5 game at all.
There are a ton of variations on 3.x out there. But if we look at the major published campaign materials (Golarion, Greyhawk, Planescape, Forgotten Realms, Eberron, etc...), they are not low magic worlds with primarily human opposition.
So the fact remains that most people don't play in homebrew settings that are low magic AND mainly humanoid only.
Besides the fact that the sell really well and that the offical campaingns (PFS LG LE etc) are set in them. Nope non at all.
So what if it is a retcon? What difference does that make?
If its a retcon its clearly a change to the rules as opposed to being how it always worked.
Back to the original point of all this:
I just found out about this, and I'm going to ignore it.
The original interpretation for Flurry of Blows was one of the rare (and extremely powerful) advantages you could make use of if you knew what you were doing. Even if the new (or merely misunderstood in the past) ruling ignores Sohei and Zen Archer...come on guys!
Even with the wonderful new additions in Ultimate Combat, we're still talking about a cumbersome, difficult class that doesn't effectively emulate our high flying Wuxia heroes and martial artists just yet. At least, not without a series of feats that require a significant investment of resources to bring the class onto par with the other monsters of battle that reside in the standard PHB! :( Nobody here is asking for +6 Gauntlets of Game Breaking. Just that within the Monk's stated specialization (Combat Maneuvers for Battlefield Control, Light Fighting vs. Light Targets, high mobility combat, anti spellcasting, etc) that monk can handle and excel at those listed duties. At this moment, especially with this ruling, the monk has a difficult if impossible task in meeting these duties compared to other classes.
Unless of course you're a Zen Archer or a Sohei. They can handle those duties just fine.
Unless this ruling DOES affect Zen Archer or Sohei. Then I give up. -_-
Zen archer is fine and its been said nothing will change for it.
Sohei is going to have to deal with the new rules and probably get nerfed down in regards to its possible ability to flurry in armor.
But what is the topic at hand?
Is it whether or not RAW supports the claim that FoB has always been a type of TWF?
Whether treating it as a type of TWF is a good rule?
Whether classes should be anywhere close to balanced?
Whether the monk can survive the nerf?
Why the game designers would make such an obviously bad rule?
It doesn't really nerf the monk. When we played L5R the monk was the best character because the characters were constantly dealing with problems in town or in court. No one had armor so he was the only one that could avoid damage at all and his wrestling worked great in the land of only medium humans.
The monk is only weak if the gm picks enemies that make it week. Run a city intrigue game with a touch of Japanese / Chinese culture and watch the monk be the best class.
You can't use a corner case to make an argument. People don't try to make the monk weak. They just run standard games.
If I have to go out of my to run a certain game to make a class viable....--------------------
Darkwing Duck:
Low magic games are also not common, and even so casters normally rule such games because they are less reliant on equipment the higher the game goes in level.
You can use any gaming forum to find out that low magic is not the norm.
Zen archer is fine and its been said nothing will change for it.
Is this from an "official" source? If so, can you provide a link?
As to the OP question: No, I don't think it's an errata. I think it really is just a clarification.
But more importantly, I don't think it matters. What really matters at this point is what they're going to do about it. If they try and support the clarification, they're going to have to errata not only everything that has been released since CRB, but also some parts of the CRB itself in order to make it work. Or, they could just errata FoB itself so that it works "the way most people assumed all this time" and call it a day.
It's going to come down to, "Do we want to rewrite aaaaall of this material, or do we want to just adjust this single ability on this one class?"
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see which would be easier all around. ;)
You know what, I don't get it. Why is this "clarification" the "rules" now? Shouldn't the rules be what the PRD says, until an actual errata or FAQ or something else actually official is put out?
If you read the actual FoB entry, there is absolutely nothing stoping you from using the same weapon, and as mentioned there is tons of precedent in other official sources of monks being able to do just that. So, until something official comes out, how is this even RAW? Why would it affect PF Society play?
I'm genuinely asking, because this is not at all how things worked in 3E. If a developer in a forum or an advice column or whatever said something that conflicts with the RAW, his words didn't instantly become RAW. It had to be issued as errata in order for that to happen.
They are saying that since FoB references TWF that you were always supposed to use two weapons, and that this is not an errata or a rules change. It affects PFS play because it has always been the rule.
As for those monks in official publications, they will have to answer that.
PS:Not many people are happy about it. I feel for anyone in PFS that is using a monk.
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DD are you at this point simply trolling?
I'm being honest here I am starting to feel like you just want to have as many people respond to you as you can.
They are saying that since FoB references TWF that you were always supposed to use two weapons, and that this is not an errata or a rules change. It affects PFS play because it has always been the rule.
As for those monks in official publications, they will have to answer that.
PS:Not many people are happy about it. I feel for anyone in PFS that is using a monk.
They can claim whatever they like, it doesn't make it true. The lack of any actual rules text to support what they said is one thing. The example monks in official publications is another. In the same breath where they claimed this is how it always was they admitted certain archetypes were printed using the sensible interpretation the vast majority of the fanbase had been using, invalidating their entire claim. So again, how is this RAW if it hasn't been put out in some sort of official update / release / publication? The only definitive answers to "which interpretation is correct?" that we've seen in official publications all side with the sensible view. So I am bewildered at how the crazy screwed up view has been so quickly accepted as RAW.
DD are you at this point simply trolling?
I'm being honest here I am starting to feel like you just want to have as many people respond to you as you can.
Either trolling or he's seriously never once looked at the expected wealth by level table OR the monsters by CR index... The "default assumptions" of the game are vividly, painfully, blatantly obvious.
I am also going by people I have met in real life. If running a low magic game was so common then there would not be so many issues with trying to do so.
I will also add that the chance that only people who visit messageboards run the game using WBL or high is very unlikely. Strike that. It is unlikely that only those who post online period don't run low magic game/low WBL games. I have met people through meetup.com, and other sites. I have yet to be in one low-magic games.
I doubt that people online are that far from the norm. It is well over 90% in favor non-low magic games online. The chances of that flipping to below 50% is astronomical. I do visit a lot of forums, and so I have seen a lot of posters talk about their games, so I am sure that even though the messageboards are not an exact example they are big enough sample to get a decent idea. Pathfinder was made based on results of a playtest information gathered from online posters, and it sells well. If we were not a quality representation of what the rest of the gamers like they would not be doing so well, and neither would DSP, another company that used messageboard members to refine their product.
Just to be clear I am not saying someone has to play in a published setting in order for it to not be low magic. Many GM's make their own settings that are not low magic.
Not everyone thinks their style of play is the norm, well not anyone that pays attention to what other people do and/or has been exposed to various players and GM's anyway. As an example most GM's are more lenient than me when it comes to fudging rolls for players. Of course I am assuming other GM's I have met online are not lying. As for real life I know the ones I have met are nice to the players.
The games I was in were primarily low magic with humans being the primary enemy.
In the games I've played in, we've followed the WBL.
Low magic, but still follows WBL? That doesn't make any sense... I mean what gear do you spend 50,000GP on if not magic stuff?
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magic stuff made by halflings = low magic
Your idea of a Standard PF game is just another specific game. To people I play with here in the mid west, who partied up in game shops, PF standard as well as 3.5 is the oddity. You can't tell me about what standard is. Everyone I know hates the forums idea of standard.
A city intrigue game set in L5R is no more a corner case than your 4 encounter a day team vs. environment game.
I'm sorry, there seems to be some confusion here. I'm not trying to say Golarion is the standard. I'm not trying to say Planescape, Ravenloft, Eberron or Forgotten Realms is the standard. I'm not trying to say Organized Play is the standard. I'm not saying that all the modules and adventure paths published by Wizards and Paizo are standard. I'm not saying that homebrewed worlds are the standard.
All I am saying is that a homebrewed setting with both low magic and without many fantastical creatures is not the what most people playing using the 3.x ruleset.
If I have to run a setting that emphasizes class X's strengths that is not a vote of confidence for the class. That is what I mean by corner case. As an example if I run a mystery based campaign a rogue would most likely do well, but that does not mean the rogue is the best class. Nor does it mean by not running that type of game that the GM is picking things to make the rogue weak.
Saying run a skills(insert other game type as needed) based game, and watch the rogue(insert other class as needed) be the best class could apply to any class.
I'm not assuming maliciousness on their part. I'm assuming different opinions and philosophies from my own
No, you are assuming a specific set of those philosophies that you have no evidence for, it's pretty much the same thing. If you cannot understand that, then there's not much hope for you.
Are you aware that the monk was widely considered one of the weakest classes in Pathfinder (the power ups from 3.5 notwithstanding) before this ruling?
I am aware that the monk class takes a lot of skill to run it effectively. Monks are not weak so much that they are generalists in a specialist world. They have a lot of contingencies rather than a signature ability. Having a signature ability is really critical in Pathfinder/3.X.
FoB is supposed to be that ability, but doesn't cut it.
Are you aware that this ruling further nerfed the monk?
Well duh. What do you think I have been arguing here? Have you actually read any of the posts other people are writing? Have you not seen the other threads making suggestions about how the monk could be improved?
I prefer to assume they are intelligent, reasonable people who will listen to sane, reasoned arguments. If they aren't, then they aren't going to listen to anything, so there is no real viable alternative.
Even with the wonderful new additions in Ultimate Combat, we're still talking about a cumbersome, difficult class that doesn't effectively emulate our high flying Wuxia heroes and martial artists just yet. At least, not without a series of feats that require a significant investment of resources to bring the class onto par with the other monsters of battle that reside in the standard PHB!
have you8 seen my suggestions here?
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Regarding the OP:
1. I think it's less a retcon and more of a clusterveryrudeword.
I truly believe Jason Buhlman when he said he always intended it to work like TWF, including all the recently clarified language regarding off-hand attacks.
BUT
The Pathfinder flurry-of-blows entry was, frankly, very poorly written and edited. Furthermore, the lead designer's interpretation was clearly not shared and agreed upon by other developers, writers, and editors.
The original wording of flurry-of-blows in and of itself is inconsistent and unclear. And no, I'm not even talking about the "any combination of" clause, although that's problematic.
I'm talking about phrases like this:
A monk applies his full Strength bonus 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.
If you can flurry with a weapon wielded in both hands, it does not work like two-weapon fighting, or if flurry works like two-weapon fighting, then this clause about a weapon being wielded in both hands should not exist. Because I don't think it's talking about a double weapon here, because double weapons don't need that kind of clarification (not to mention, should have been identified clearly as "double weapons" so as to avoid confusion). And no wonder Zen Archer and Sohei/temple sword monks are confused--it says right there you can have a weapon wielded in both hands, so the comparison to TWF MUST be a loose reference regarding attack penalties only, right? That's a big source of the confusion right there.
And then...
A monk may substitute disarm, sunder, and trip combat maneuvers for unarmed attacks as part of a flurry of blows.
I am assuming that since you can substitute these for unarmed attacks, they can be "primary" or "off-hand" attacks in a flurry, but it can get messy -- if I'm wielding a sai and I already did my primary hand attacks with the sai, can I get my bonus from the sai to disarm or not?
If they really meant to change flurry from the get go as drastically as Jason said he intended to, all of this language should have been carefully reviewed, changed, and clarified. In fact, the 3.x wording should have been completely struck and the new flurry should have been rewritten entirely from scratch.
Further, as to not making sure the designers were all on the same page -- this is clear from not only from nearly every monk statblock in most APs and Modules (Ruby Phoenix Tournament, anyone?), but in particular the book designed to teach game masters how to run the game. This statblock and most others feature single weapon flurry.
It may not have been the intention, but it absolutely WAS the execution. So it's less retrocontinuity, and more massive inconsistency and poor editorial control/management in a huge way.
I'm sorry if any of that sounds harsh, but that's my view of what happened. This is not a "Paizo staff are bad people!" post. They are good people. They make mistakes. Unfortunately, this one is making it difficult to understand and use a key class feature of a core class, which is a big issue within the realms of playing the game. I trust this will be a learning experience that ultimately will result in a better situation for the staff and for us, the customers.
2. Off topic, but Ravingdork, PLEASE don't diminish a socioeconomic movement by comparing it to frustrated gamers. Whether you agree or disagree with the Occupy activists or think it is a worthy cause or not, it is not an appropriate metaphor for a bunch of gamers arguing about a rules clarification.
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Thanks for the input, DeathQuaker. I included the 99% bit for absolutely no other reason than I thought it would be funny (such is the way of internet memes).
Thanks for the input, DeathQuaker. I included the 99% bit for absolutely no other reason than I thought it would be funny (such is the way of internet memes).
I know you meant no harm. Just saying it kind of undercuts things a bit. :)
DeathQuaker, thank you for your input. Once again you cut right to the heart of the matter.
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No, at the levels we played (6th and lower) that stuff represented a large amount of wealth. How much do you think an authennticated sliver of Christ's cross would go for in today's economy? More than a sack of Hope diamonds.
What is the mechanical difference between a character with a cross sliver and one without?
If it doesn't change a characters abilities, it's not really fair to count that as part of his WBL.