I beg to differ. Many monks are soheis, zen archers or martial artists. Hell, I am running a core monk in a game! So 'every monk' really means 'every monk I play' not 'every monk everybody plays' which really doesn't count for much.These monks have traditionally less AC than what it accessible to a qinggong monk as a compensation. Thus, you don't have to keep up with their AC as the OP wishes to do. Zen archer and soheis don't even need to improve their unarmed strikes.
We are talking about the monk's ability to improve his AC, which simply doesn't exist anymore unless you are explicitely using a pure core monk or a martial artist.
Just because YOU play said core monk does not remove the system's ability to fix this amulet slot issue with a qinggong power.
It doesn't change the fact that you asserted that every monk was a Qingong monk, when they aren't, which was my point. We already know the AC of this monk, so how they got there isn't too important - especially as they aren't using the barkskin power, implying that they aren't in fact a Qingong monk, making the reference to it irrelevant for the purposes of this discussion.
Air devotion adds a sacred bonus to AC for a 1 minute (1/day or 1/ per channel/turn undead if he has that). Starts at +1 increases slowly till +6 at level 20.
When he fights defensively, he will be 8 below the monk if he gets no new magic items.
Ah, thanks for that! So again, it's a 1/day power (this isn't a cleric/monk so far as I know) which is hardly a big issue, he'll save it for boss-fights if he can.
Some DMs have big egos. They feel they should be able to hit every player so they target the highest AC character.Why would your DM waste time trying to hit him when he can just ignore him? You are the guy who dishes out the damage, after all, so you are the primary threat.
That's a DM problem, not an AC problem.
He is therefore 4 or 8 AC below the monk. I feel Displacement or other miss chances are more valuable than attmpting to match AC.
I agree, something as simple as a cloak of displacement will be your friend to reduce the number of hits you take, if you are worried about it. The monk is going to be king of AC; the only advantage you have on the monk is heavy armour.
What I would suggest as well is to boost your hit points as much as you can - this is a resource you have that the monk can't match.
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Alright, so you guys don't think its much of a problem then? I don't want to get squished by the angry Gargantuan half-fiend minotaur with barbarian levels after dealing 200 points of damage (should I hit with all five of my attacks).
If the Monk is such a bad ass, then work in conjunction with each other. With his ungodly AC and your To-Hit, your teamwork could be quite affective.
Alright, so you guys don't think its much of a problem then? I don't want to get squished by the angry Gargantuan half-fiend minotaur with barbarian levels after dealing 200 points of damage (should I hit with all five of my attacks).
I doubt that will happen. If your DM decides he has to give the enemy +20 to hit, your DM is missing the point and playing to the monk's strengths, and nothing you can do will change that.
Play your character to your character's strengths and not the monks. As TWFer you are a damage dealer, focus on that, There's a few feats that can boost your AC, of course, but it's not essential. Your AC is good enough that if foes go at you you'll take three hits to the monk's two in most circumstances. I'm guessing you have better hit points, and you have the feats to boost them.
When the monk pulls out the stops, he's burning a lot of ki and he's using up his 1/day power, so he SHOULD be hard to hit. That's the monk's thing. It's also likely that he won't be dishing out much damage back, that's still your job.
If he's a quingong monk and has time to buff, yes.Come on, every monk today is qinggong, especially with experimented players.I beg to differ. Many monks are soheis, zen archers or martial artists. Hell, I am running a core monk in a game! So 'every monk' really means 'every monk I play' not 'every monk everybody plays' which really doesn't count for much.
Except the martial artist, the other monks can also be quingong monks and get barkskin.
Alright, playing a Halfling Ninja/Fighter. Currently I have Mithral Celestial Armor , with protection and natural armor items coming down the pipe. However, I need a way not to get destroyed when the Monk inevitably bumps his AC up to 40 ( Currently at a 36 ). I have combat expertise, and am a two weapon fighter.
That being said, this GM allows alot of homebrew, with items from the Magic Item Compendium allowed as well as anything from the d20pfsrd.
Currently my AC (After the +6 boost from Natural Armor and Protection) will be 33. I would like my AC to sit as close to a 40 as possible before I activate Combat Expertise, and I do plan to get Cautious Fighter to make fighting defensively worthwhile.
Any suggestions?
It would be helpful to see your builds, but you may wish to look into mithral celestial plate, which being mithral on top of the enhancements would be light armor and provide up to a +14 AC if fully enhanced.
Also, what level range are we talking here? I'm assuming mid levels, since you can hit AC 50+ by 20th. Assuming standard point buy, the monk's AC should tap out around 52, assuming that the monk was specializing in defense entirely (tanked Int and Cha, poor Str, high Wisdom and Dex, reaching 30 Wis and 28 Dex by 20th). A quick sample breakdown is as follows:
1. +18 from ability scores (at 20th)
2. +5 natural from item or barkskin
3. +5 deflection from item or shield of faith
4. +8 armor from bracers.
5. +1 insight from ioun stone.
6. +5 monk bonus.
Your Ninja/Fighter should be able to pull...
1. +8 from ability scores (Dex) (at 20th)
2. +14 armor from mithral celestial plate
3. +5 natural from item or barkskin
4. +5 deflection from item or shield of faith
5. +1 insight bonus from ioun stone.
6. +7 shield bonus from +5 mithral heavy shield
That brings you to AC 50. An armored kilt or dastana could get you to 51. Feats and special actions can push you higher as desired (+3 from fighting defensively, up to +5 from combat expertise, up to +2 for shield feats, etc).
I would suggest a defending weapon from there, but defending weapons got hit with the nerfbat hard in Pathfinder, because they decided that you have actively be attacking with a defending weapon (making them rather useless as a melee enhancement, since you'll lose the AC bonus almost every round if your enemies don't want to dance with you).
Personally, I don't think the problem lies with you or your monk. The problem lies with your GM trying to throw enemies who only rely on AC. If the GM is tailoring enemies to try and hit your monk to "challenge him", then the GM really needs to step up his game and expand his horizons. With an AC of 50+, even heavily optimized martial characters will only land a couple of hits on you at best. Instead, the GM should implement tactics that aren't stupid. For example...
1. The monk is horribly vulnerable to certain spells. Dispel magic and greater dispel magic utterly crush monks relying on lots of spell buffs (especially if those buffs come from potions or magic items, since the caster level on those tend to be low).
2. The monk has little defense against spells like chaos hammer which is possessed by many demons and other high-level enemies, or by any non-lawful cleric. These spells deal large amounts of damage and force saving throws vs bad effects. Monks are required to be Lawful, so it's a no-brainer against monks.
3. Summoned monsters. A monk with defenses like that is going to have a very shoddy offense. Throwing minions and mooks at the monk is usually enough to tie him up for entire encounters.
4. Debilitation. There are tons of spells that will challenge a monk. Stuff like Black Tentacles and Waves of Exhaustion can completely nullify a monk's contribution to a battle without much effort. Other spells and effects will dismantle a monk entirely. Simply removing the monk's ability to see means tearing them apart (most monks don't have particularly good flat-footed ACs).
Just pushing to-hit bonuses higher and higher is poor GMing. A character that has specialized in a high armor class bloody well ought to enjoy having a high armor class. There was literally no point if your enemies are just going to auto-scale up with you to keep the same hit %s. That would just be stupid.
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Except that was hyperbole, the ninja/fighter is at 33, the monk at 36 (presumably 40 when expending ki). As the monk cannot expend a ki-point every round (you just don't have the ki) that means 36 most of the time, which only makes the monk 15% less likely to be hit, or 30% less likely when he can afford to spend ki.
Well, that depends on how many rounds an individual combat lasts coupled with how many combats you have in a day. In a dungeon delve that is wall to wall combats leading to a boss fight and no rest or you get jumped in your sleep . . . sure the monk will be hurting for ki points. Then you build your character to suit that environment. Extra Ki is only 2 points but still useful. Qinggong for ki leech to keep getting ki from fights. Critical focus and improved critical to make it more likely you'll prove your crits and perfect strike to make crits happen more often to make ki leech more effective.
If you're only going to have say 3 to 4 fights per day and those last around 7 rounds each, you'll do fine with your basic load of ki points. Throw in Dimensional Agility/Dimensional Assault/Dimensional Dervish feat chain used with Abundant Step and you can get in and punch for full attack while taking advantage of your high movement rate.
Ki Attacks: 24 = 10 (½ level 20) + 6.5 (Wis mod starting at +4 with level bumps) + 5.5 (inherent & enhance thanks to a his starting at an odd stat in Wisdom) + 2 (Extra Ki)
Typical Ki User per combat:
Rd 1: Dimensional Dervish to get to enemy and full attack (2)
Rd 2-7: Ki Attack full attack (6)
8 Total Ki per 7 round combat
3 combats / day = 24 Ki / day needed
Use Ki Leech to replenish the 1 or 2 needed to keep ki strike charged up or if you need to make another Dimensional Dervish move to port out and full attack someone else, like the enemy archer who has wandered out of melee range or the enemy wizard that is just behind the archer.
It's not unreasonable to assume a monk has a starting Wisdom of 18. You'd need more extra ki feats if you took a higher strength and a lower wisdom or devoted all your stat bumps to strength.
Er...monk's tank? Generally not easily done. Quite simply, monks can't hit often enough or hard enough to get enemies to pay them that much attention. Think of them more like an armoured reconnaissance vehicle: they are hard to hit, but when you hit them you hurt. They go fast, but they can't do much to hurt a real tank.
Well, that's mostly true. Nothing really compares to a fighter with his chosen weapon. With the full WF/WS/GWF/GWS chain giving +2 to hit and +4 to damage, Weapon Training giving +5 to hit and damage, gloves of the duelist adding +2 to hit and damage, weapon mastery giving a +1 bump to the crit multiplier AND auto confirming crits, anything else would be lucky to match the fighter. But a monk built right can put up some good numbers on the damage per round board.
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I beg to differ. Many monks are soheis, zen archers or martial artists. Hell, I am running a core monk in a game! So 'every monk' really means 'every monk I play' not 'every monk everybody plays' which really doesn't count for much.If he's a quingong monk and has time to buff, yes.Come on, every monk today is qinggong, especially with experimented players.
Qinggong has exactly 0 required trade outs unlike say sohei or zen archer monk. Since Qinggong is 100% optional trade outs, you can apply this archetype to any monk you build. Since a character can have more than one archetype as long as their trade outs don't overlap (say both archetypes trade out slow fall, or stunning fist), you take your chosen archetype + qinggong. Then you trade out the stuff that doesn't really help your monk and get things like True Strike, Barkskin and such.
A monk built right can do some damage, but his chances to hit lag so far behind that compared to the fighter or barbarian he may as well not be there.
Alright, so you guys don't think its much of a problem then? I don't want to get squished by the angry Gargantuan half-fiend minotaur with barbarian levels after dealing 200 points of damage (should I hit with all five of my attacks).
You ac is fine. The issue is that the DM has no reason to ever attack the monk. You are basically alone on the front line. Instead of focusing on competing with the monk, you should try to kill monsters faster.
Also, what level range are we talking here? I'm assuming mid levels, since you can hit AC 50+ by 20th.
Only 50+ Ashiel? ROFLROFLROFL!
Behold! His name is... WALL!
AC 75, touch 37, flat-footed 62 (+14 armor, +9 shield, +7 Dex, +15 natural, +5 deflection, +6 dodge, +9 misc)
Wall is currently fighting defensively for -4 to to hit and +3 to AC and his Defending Hammer is set to include all +5 to AC as well.
Come on, hit me, I dare you to try!
@The OP, with proper feat selection and gear allocation, Monk's can't hope to match a fighter... Well a Dwarven Fighter anyway!
[Edit] DOH! I forgot to buy Boots of Speed, his AC just got +1 higher! (he still has some 120,000 gp to spend)
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A monk built right can do some damage, but his chances to hit lag so far behind that compared to the fighter or barbarian he may as well not be there.
It is a given that fighters will win on damage, but I beg to differ that a monk would be so eclipsed as to be pointless. The fighter is meant to give a beatdown. Between Weapon Training, Gloves of the Duelist, Weapon Mastery, the full Weapon Focus/Specialization chain, a fighter should be +7 to hit* and +10 to damage** over and above anyone else picking up the same weapon, before you add in magic weapons.
* that counts Weapon training +4, Gloves +2, and Greater Weapon Focus +1, because anyone can take Weapon Focus.
** Weapon Training +4, Gloves +2, Weapon Specialization +2, Greater Weapon Specialization +2 for those who don't know.
All of that is before the damage booster of +1 to the Critical Damage multiplier and auto confirming critical threats with your weapon of choice. Sure barbars try to make up with raging, palys with smite, and monks with flurrying. But they will all fall short of all those combat feats and weapon training the fighter gets.
I feel comparing a sword and board, two-weapon fighter to the monk would do the best to compare damage output, potential AC, HP and MAD. I've done the math on the AC side of things. I'm not sure what would be a reasonable starting Con for a fighter without a majority of folks crying "foul, not a fair comparison." So, I haven't yet done a comparison of their hit points to the level I'd like. The fighter's starting d10's give a good advantage. Would toughness, a decent Con and taking the favored class hp give the monk at least something near parity? Not sure.
But hands down, the fighter will win damage. The only question is by how much. Mega damage dice? Whole hordes of goblins worth of damage? A few points? Only a decent DPR calculator will tell!
Hm... I haven't actually calculated it out but I imagine that the Monk isn't going to be all that far behind. They have their own advantages like the fighter does: Monk's Robe, Greater Magic Fang on top of Amulet of Mighty Fists with elemental enhancements, the Guided weapon enhancement and class specific abilities like Stunning Fist which add into DPS as it lowers AC.
Not only that but the two are difficult to compare on a level playing field as most Fighters specialize in a particular fighting style and so do Monks. There are often hidden DPS increases from things like a tripping fighting style or the use of reach weapons (or both) that depend on attacks of opportunity and or the success of combat maneuvers to increase DPS.
Actually, Monks vs Fighters have been compared on a number of occasions. Monks have always been extremely far behind. Especially since Fighters can easily increase their DPR with critical hits. The best a Monk can get with an unarmed strike is 19-20x2 while a Fighter can have 15-20x3 or even 19-20x5.
Everything about the Fighter is geared for combat. He gets one of the best ACs in the game and some of the highest DPR possible. Other classes can get as good AC, but not an equal DPR at the same time, or they can achieve the same DPR, but not the same AC.
It's been said time, and time again, that a Monk should be able to keep up with a Fallen Paladin or a Non-Favored Enemy Ranger. Problem is, they usually can't.
Sure, various people on the forums have demonstrated some fairly good Monk builds, but those same people also have very high levels of system mastery that allow them to do so. They also draw from 3 or 4 different books to achieve this result.
A straight Core Monk vs a straight Core Ranger (No Favored Enemy) or a Straight Core Fallen Paladin, and the Ranger and Paladin will win.
BTW, this is not in a PVP setting, I'm talking about in a party dynamic.
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It's been said time, and time again, that a Monk should be able to keep up with a Fallen Paladin or a Non-Favored Enemy Ranger. Problem is, they usually can't.
Sure, various people on the forums have demonstrated some fairly good Monk builds, but those same people also have very high levels of system mastery that allow them to do so. They also draw from 3 or 4 different books to achieve this result.
A straight Core Monk vs a straight Core Ranger (No Favored Enemy) or a Straight Core Fallen Paladin, and the Ranger and Paladin will win.
When my wife was playtesting the monk for 3.0, she did feel the monk was an option that was only viable for a rules savy player. Not necessarily a trap option, but it needed someone to not fall for any other traps in picking feats, taking skills, or the like.
I've played a few monks and other "if you do it that way, you're doing it wrong" type characters, like say direct damage wizard in 3.x's Living Greyhawk campaign. I tend to leave other players stunned as to how I can make such "poor options" not only hold their weight, but outshine folks.
I find it hard to believe that the best a monk can hope for is to almost nearly equal a paladin with no class features (aka an NPC Warrior with a good will save and some funky skill choices) or a Ranger not going up against his favored enemy. Course some of my skepticism is all the times I heard "my cleric/wizzard/sorcerer is waaaaay better at being a fighter than your fighter, just give me five rounds to buff" in an environment where it was a given fights might last 5 rounds if you were doing it wrong. Granted Divine Metamagic/Nightstick/Persistent Spell came along and you had guys buffed to their eyeballs 24/7, but at least in LG that didn't last long and I couldn't imagine any sane GM allowing it either. Though it did prove WotC had stopped playtesting their stuff to see how it worked and was just phoning it in.
BTW, this is not in a PVP setting, I'm talking about in a party dynamic.
That is a given on my part. All this "my x can kill your y in three rounds." "Hell, my y will kill your x in the surprise round." nonsense never appealed to me.* The whole point in my mind of comparative building is to a) allow those with a low to mid level of system mastery how to avoid certain pitfalls and enjoy their character**, and b) give a decent metric for what can be rationally achieved.
After all, in a party where the wizard has a premo buff he wants to lay on a front line fighter, he has to pick between the various choices. If it is a matter of bring one guy up to barely snuff (the monk presumably) or allowing another to lay even crazier damage than he did before (it seems everyone is saying everything other than the monk) then this kind of discussion helps folks.
That being said, I've seen a lot of comparisons make some assumptions that are as equally unfavorable for the monk as any non-favored enemy using ranger. I've seen equal rationale for why wizards shouldn't direct damage. Seems for the wizzy, every enemy after you reach 5th will have SR, and Fire Resistance (as much as you can do with Fireball) And Evasion AND Improved Evasion and this poor wizzy is getting compared to fighters facing enemies that don't have DR or Regeneration (type of thing the fighter doesn't have) or anything equal.
So pointing out "yes the monk has Ki Pool, but it'll run out fast" doesn't match my experience when it comes to length of combat times number of usual combats per day. Of course, I could be too used to Living Greyhawk, Pathfinder Society, and my home games where we have two to four combats per day max and those combats last three to five rounds.
Now around level 1 to 5, I don't expect anyone to have their shtick fully up, so it doesn't surprise me that only having a Ki Pool around 5 won't be big enough to deal with four three round combats a day. But neither will the Barbar be raging ever round of every combat, nor will each of those fights be against a Ranger's favored enemies (all two choices) or the Paly will have his smite up and running for every evil enemy in every fight. And this is the first place the fighter wins, his shtick is feats, feats and more feats. Chosen wisely, those feats will apply to nearly 100% of combats and 100% of enemies.***
So I guess that is a long winded way**** of saying "Sure a monk doesn't equal a fighter, no one does, but that doesn't mean a monk can't punch monsters in the face and do some serious damage!" But hell, I may be crazy.*****
*Caveat: I did once try to arrange a 100 level pit fight using Epic Rules just to see how ridiculous things could really get.
**Which is what this hobby should be all about. Enjoying your hobby. Course for those who think optimization and role-playing don't mix at all ever, I say "You ain't been to an L5R social interactive recreating a Winter Court and seen a 100% useless in combat courtier outmaneuver a 100% crazy lethal optimized "seriously don't mess with me man, I'm warning you" bushi (aka fighter) and force the bushi into a position of either a) seppuku (yep the three cuts, the ole' kick the can, buy the farm, shuffle off that mortal coil) or b) ronin status (as in no more free rides or cool toys from daddy, hope ya know how to hunt cause you're going to starve). And the courtier's player does this all by talking in-character with the stats on paper to back up how crazy good his game sounds in person."
***Granted there is a whole branch of mathematics based on whether to Power Attack or not based on the enemy's AC and thank God 3.x's variable strength bit was taken out of PA to make it less of a pain.
****My stock in trade.
*****Least, that is what the guy in the white lab coat who's real mad I'm using he computer is telling me. ;-)
I really, really, really don't want to derail this into another 'Monk is weak' thread. Most every Monk thread that gets created, quickly becomes a thread complaining about how bad the Monk is, the Monk needs to be fixed, etc, etc. If you want to talk about the Monk, there are numerous threads out there that do so.
The Flurry of Changes to Flurry of Blows* is currently the most active Monk thread out there. If you want to debate the Monk's Strengths/Weaknesses and potential changes to make the Monk 'better' please do it there. However, please try to avoid complaining, as the Monk seems to be a very sore topic for developers. Mostly due to the negative reactions of many Monk fans that happens every time a new Errata or Book comes out.
*Warning, the thread is 28 pages long and has over 1,300 posts.
A monk built right can do some damage, but his chances to hit lag so far behind that compared to the fighter or barbarian he may as well not be there.It is a given that fighters will win on damage, but I beg to differ that a monk would be so eclipsed as to be pointless.
Well what can the monk actually do to the enemy other than hit them and score damage?
Maneuvers: these are good at low level, against humanoid foes that aren't too large. Go up the ladder of CR-equivelant monsters and soon your maneuvers only work 10% of the time.
Stunning Fist: for this to work you have to hit and do damage. Hitting and doing damage is not what the monk is brilliant at, and then the subject gets a Fort save as well.
...and that's it.
I feel comparing a sword and board, two-weapon fighter to the monk would do the best to compare damage output, potential AC, HP and MAD. I've done the math on the AC side of things. I'm not sure what would be a reasonable starting Con for a fighter without a majority of folks crying "foul, not a fair comparison." So, I haven't yet done a comparison of their hit points to the level I'd like. The fighter's starting d10's give a good advantage. Would toughness, a decent Con and taking the favored class hp give the monk at least something near parity? Not sure.
Been done. The monk is way behind on damage and hit points, occasionally ahead on AC and usually ahead on saves.
Where is the monk going to get a decent Con from? His priorities are wisdom, dexterity and strength (order varies, but they are the top three). The fighter's priorities are strength, dexterity and con.
But hands down, the fighter will win damage. The only question is by how much. Mega damage dice? Whole hordes of goblins worth of damage? A few points? Only a decent DPR calculator will tell!
A lot, is the answer.
* The fighter has better odds to hit thanks to weapon enhancement and weapon training and other feats. More hits = more damage.* The higher threat ranges of the weapons the fighter can use are better. More crits = more damage.
* The damage output of the weapons tends to be better because of enhancement and other static bonuses like weapon specialisation.
* The fighter has fewer 'vital' attributes he needs to invest in, so these tend to be at a higher score than the monk's primary attributes. This translates to more hits and more damage.
Edit: Tels is right, let's take this to the other thread and we'll show you the numbers there.
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Tels is right, let's take this to the other thread and we'll show you the numbers there.
Fair enough. Maths is good. Anecdotal gut feelings don't do it for me, because in other cases, my anecdotes say the opposite of what "common knowledge" and "revealed wisdom" say.
To go back to the OP's point. What the monk is doing is called "corking" in some circles. The point is to get a crazy high AC and then stand between the party and the BBEG. Thing is you've got to be able to either block the way at a chokepoint (thus the "cork") or have some way of keeping folk's attention. Can't do either, your AC doesn't matter.
The problem with corks only comes when the GM decides he just has to kill the cork. Usually, the type of monster necessary to kill that one super specialized character will take down the entire rest of the party first and then maybe it'll take down the cork. So in the end, you just gotta trust the GM to not kill the party.
Monks benefit vastly from Enlarge, Greater Magic Fang, and Haste, which are all pretty low level spells and not so hard to get someone in your party to cast on you.
If you need somebody else to buff you before you can become effective, there is something wrong. Which other class needs three buffs cast by other party members in order to function?
Fighters also benefit from Enlarge Person, Greater Magic Weapon and Haste.
So do Barbarians.
Rangers like it too.
Paladins enjoy.
Cavaliers love it (when not riding horses).
Swapping out Magic Fang for Magic Weapon, and you have the same kinds of buffs any martial class would like. Sure, all those classes can more easily get permanent enhancements, but not all campaigns have a Magic Mart.
Any buff that a Monk benefits from, the other classes probably benefit just as much, if not more so, from.