Here's the amended set of changes - I'll let you know how they work out next session...
I am thinking of combining your suggestions with mine
By all means, they are there to be used.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
A recently revived Monk thread made me wonder what I had posted in it. I came across an idea I had that might be viewed in a better light now for you Dabbler.
In the original idea, the Monk would Wisdom as a bonus to is attack and damage (in addition to strength/dexterity) but capped by double his AC bonus.
How do you feel about this idea now that you've done some playtesting with your changes?
At this level this change would make the monk worse off, unless he'd blown a feat on weapon finesse, when he'd have that same attack bonus and +2 to damage.
However, the reason I opted against that option was that it potentially give the monk up to +10 to attack and damage at level 20 on top of his usual dex/str bonus. That's the equivalent of a ranger fighting every target as his most favoured enemy. So, for example, if this monk had an agile amulet at 8th level, that's +7 to hit and +7 to damage, compared to +6 to hit and +4 to damage with a guided amulet.
I think it'd be too big an advantage at higher levels, but I will keep it in mind if the present scale fails.
At this level this change would make the monk worse off, unless he'd blown a feat on weapon finesse, when he'd have that same attack bonus and +2 to damage.
However, the reason I opted against that option was that it potentially give the monk up to +10 to attack and damage at level 20 on top of his usual dex/str bonus. That's the equivalent of a ranger fighting every target as his most favoured enemy. So, for example, if this monk had an agile amulet at 8th level, that's +7 to hit and +7 to damage, compared to +6 to hit and +4 to damage with a guided amulet.
I think it'd be too big an advantage at higher levels, but I will keep it in mind if the present scale fails.
It also requires serious investment in both ability scores too. Keep in mind that in order to gain +10 to hit and damage, the Monk would need to be level 20 (+5 AC bonus) and have a 30 Wisdom (+10 modifier). You can gain +11 to an ability score through items (+6 enhancement, +5 inherent), which requires a starting Wisdom of 19 (17 + racial). This is 13 of your points to start with a 19 in Wisdom; it also requires a race that has bonus to Strength/Dexterity and Wisdom, which basically means an Aasimar. Or it requires level up investment, or age modifiers. Either way, it's a serious investment into just Wisdom to get the +10 bonus.
What it does do, is give the 'to hit' bonus that all of the other martial characters get, but it's more constant, like a fighter. Keep in mind the reduced BAB or -2 penalty for flurrying, so it's actually only a +5/+8 bonus at 20th level, at leas when it comes to hitting.
Fighters or Rangers don't have to deal with the same MAD issues the Monk does, so they are likely to be having a 30+ attack/damage attribute, while the Monk would need a 30+ in two stats just to compete with them.
Say, for example, the Monk did have a +30 Strength, +30 Wisdom at 20th. He'd have a BAB of 15/18 depending on his attack, and he'd have a +20 to his attack and +20 on damage from ability scores. This totals a +35/+38 attack bonus with +20 on damage from just ability scores and BAB.
You're looking at something like a ~+40 attack bonus and a ~+40 damage bonus. This is a guy that dumped everything to get a 30 strength and 30 wisdom. He's likely to have a lower AC because he's not going to have a very high Dex, and his Int and Char aren't going to be anything to sneeze at either.
To use some stats from the NPC Guide (much as I dislike that book) for some Monks:
+3 unarmed strike +23/+18/+13 (2d10+7)
+3 unarmed strike flurry of blows +26/+26/+21/+21/+16/+16/+11 (2d10+7)
Str 18, Dex 14, Con 14, Int 13, Wis 24, Cha 10
The Ageless Monk would have a +6 increase to his attack and damage from the above addition. This is the most Wisdom focused of the 3 'end game' Monks in the NPC Guide.
'Sword Savant' Level 19
+1 unarmed strike +20/+15/+10 (2d8+6)
+23/+23/+18/+18/+13/+13/+8 (2d8+6)
Str 20, Dex 20, Con 10, Int 12, Wis 20, Cha
I didn't include the Longsword the Sword Savant uses because it wouldn't benefit from the Wisdom increase. But this guy would receive a +5 increase in attack and damage.
'Grove Guardian' Level 18
+2 unarmed strike +21/+16/+11 (2d8+4)
+2 unarmed strike flurry of blows +24/+24/+19/+19/+14/+14/+9 (2d8+4)
Str 14, Dex 22, Con 16, Int 13, Wis 20, Cha 11
This guy would also gain a +5 attack and damage bonus from his Wisdom score.
These are by no means 'paragons of Monk aptitude' in any way, shape, or form. But they are 'impartial' examples of Monks. It's worth noting that the above three have are nearly at the end of their 'enhancment' bonuses to ability score, but none of them have inherent bonuses. They are also using NPC WBL.
Conversely, compare NPC Guide fighters.
+5 adamantine elven curve blade +40 /+35/+30/+25 (1d10+21/15–20/×3)
Str 26, Dex 13, Con 22, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 6
'Infernal Champion' Level 20
+3 unholy cold iron falchion +40/+35/+30/+25 (2d4+23/15–20/×3 plus 2d6 vs. good)
mwk light pick +34/+29/+24/+19 (1d4+10/×4)
mwk alchemical silver falchion +38/+33/+28/+23 (2d4+19/15–20/×3)
Str 26, Dex 17, Con 18, Int 8, Wis 12, Cha 10
'Crime Lord' Level 19
+2 dwarven urgrosh +30/+30/+25/+20/+15 (1d4+12/19–20/×3)
+2 dwarven urgrosh +30 (1d6+12/19–20/×3)
+2 dwarven urgrosh (two-handed) +32/32/+27/+22/+17 (1d4+14/19–20/×3)
+1 spiked armor +28/+28/+23/+18/+13 (1d4+8)
Str 18, Dex 16, Con 20, Int 12, Wis 8, Cha 12
'Failed Disciple' Level 18
vicious unarmed strike +36/+31/+26/+21 (1d8+18 plus 2d6)
mwk ranseur +29/+24/+19/+14 (2d4+11/×3)
Str 22, Dex 16, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 14, Cha 8
Specifically, look at the Failed Disciple. He is level 18, and uses unarmed strikes, yet despite being 3 levels lower, he is leagues better than that of the level 20 Monk. Even with the change I suggested.
A Monk who dumps all of his stats other than Strength/Wisdom to get a 30 in both scores is going to have something in the range of ~+40 attack and +40 damage. He's not going to have a very good AC or HP so he's going to need to kill everything before it hits him because he'll go down pretty quickly.
The monks in question you feature were not designed with these changes in mind. I agree that if their stats were the normal, this would be fine, But they aren't what a good optimizer would use with this change.
For a good optimizer, strength or dex (with Agile) would be primary, and keep pace with what we could expect of a SAD character. Wis would start at a 16. Would he plough everything into wisdom? Probably not, he'd put enough in to cap it off at 26 at 20th level, giving him only a +8 bonus to hit and damage - still an awful lot, compared to a fighter's +6 to hit/+8 damage vs everything, and then accounting for the rising damage of unarmed strike.
On the way there the monk is at a big advantage over the SAD characters because where they can only enhance attack and damage with one stat-boosting item, he can spread it over two items, and that actually costs a lot less, as a +2 belt and a +2 headband cost 8Kgp total, while a +4 belt costs 16Kgp.
I'd rather stick with the one stat plus static bonus, because for one thing there are less variables to consider, and for another it's the standard that the game has been built on so far.
X-posted in my original thread here. Again, let me know if you don't want me posting here, Dabbler!
As promised, here are the details of my first playtest of the Chingon Monk:
The party included a human gunslinger, a halfling rogue, an aasimar cleric, a human THF fighter and a half-orc alchemist. The cleric and fighter couldn't make it, so the player of the alchemist playtested the monk as a second character. (as it so happens, the female members of the group were the ones who had holiday plans so we dubbed this session "The Multiple Personality Sausage Fest") The party including the monk and not including the girls was APL 5.
The alchemist player promised to take my monk rule changes and stretch them to the absolute insane breaking point. He did. He built a min-maxed STR/WIS Oread with decent DEX and CON at the expense of INT & CHA. He took the Oread monk archetype and the Dragon Style feat chain. Also, in a really nice move considering Kingmaker, he got an Amulet of Mighty Fists Bane (Human). What feats and items he didn't focus on DPS he pointed squarely at improving his AC. The thing hits like a beast, especially against humans, half-orcs, half-elves, Scion of Humanity Aasimars and human lycanthropes (but not human undead... anybody I'm forgetting?).
The game started at a feast in Restov shortly after the first year of the PC's reign of their kingdom. After some light diplomacy and intrigue, riders arrived with dire news of murders in Olegton.
The murders were being perpetrated by a human werewolf. The monk was pretty useless in the RP of trying to find it, though the party caught on pretty quick about who it was (it helped that the inn where the werewolf was staying was owned by the kingdom's Spymaster). However, the monk was the only one who beat its stealth check when it showed up that night.
The werewolf was CR4 so I wasn't too worried about the party, but I was thinking DR might be an issue. Combat began with the werewolf charging the flat-footed monk with a greataxe and landing a solid hit that probably put him in the neighborhood of death.
I have to admit I was a little surprised when the monk returned the favor with over 30 damage on the return hit. He didn't bypass DR but, at that level of damage, DR/5 was a non-issue. The player explained that, factoring in bonuses from bane, enhancement, STRx2 (from Dragon Style), WIS, Power Attack and the Oread ability Strength of Stone, his damage roll was 1d8 + 19 + 2d6.
After that, the gunslinger blasted the beast with his silvered cold iron bullets (which he calls "baneslayer rounds" because it sounds cool), the alchemist slapped it silly with his silvered double axe and the halfling rogue basically took a nap. They iced the werewolf within two rounds and, luckily, it wasn't able to get another hit into the monk (which may have dropped it).
BTW: The party thought I was trying to kill the monk but I was actually going by this:
During Combat Kundal rages on the first round of combat and then
focuses on one foe at a time, attacking that person until she falls
unconscious or dead before moving on to the next opponent.
The party then returned to their capitol city before setting out on the gunslinger's faction quest (I introduced one of these for each player per chapter to fill out the "empty spaces" of Kingmaker) for the Eagle Knights: rescue slaves from a makeshift market in the hold of a pirate caravel moored off the southern shore of the Tuskwater. This could have been a combat encounter, but it ended up being mostly RP. The three actual characters shone (especially the rogue) and the monk faded into the background.
After laying some seeds for later quest completion (which took at least an hour of RL time), the party headed back to the capitol city, where they were AMBUSHED BY NINJAS.
The half-orc alchemist's backstory is that he's a member of the Daggermark Poisoner's guild raised from birth as part of their organization and sent last year to assist the gunslinger (who is affiliated loosely with the Pirates of the Black Marquis) in assassinating the Stag Lord. Since then, he's been generally kept on a loose leash considering his station as Grand Diplomat of a rising River Kingdom.
Call me drooling idiot, but I thought the coolest and most appropriate side quest for him was to kill his twin brother who, having been raised by the Assassin's guild, left Daggermark with a crew of renegade cutthroats and decided to take over the PC's capitol city underworld. The PC monk is a representative of the Assassin's Guild sent to mercilessly kill these wayward members. I know. I know. I'm a giant dork.
I had already designed this quest by the time I decided to remake monk rules, so I decided to make it less roguish and more monastic. Subtract rogues; add ninjas! I'd already warned them about a new semi-Eastern-themed thieves guild in their city called the Shadow Dragons.
The second scenario was inspired by the opening scene of one of my favorite martial arts films: Duel to the Death. Riding through the city streets at night, the party is ambushed and surrounded by 4 highly acrobatic ninjas from the rooftops (CR3's = CR7 encounter). They have grenades strapped to their chests.
The surprise round begins with shurikens thrown at each of the party members. Everybody but the gunslinger gets hit good for sneak attack damage. The second round has ninjas jumping from the roofs and slapping the party with wakizashis. Every member of the party except for the gunslinger got hit with a sneak attack in first real round (the gunslinger and the monk were the only ones not flat-footed). The gunslinger managed to get away, but the ninja gunning for him went after the monk instead and scored a second sneak attack off a flank. Worse, the monk and the alchemist both got poisoned from the blades.
After one round of straight combat, things fell into a disorganized mess as the relatively undamaged members of the party decided that discretion was the better part of valor while the monk, who was very badly wounded, stayed largely put (in a cool moment, the halfling rogue used some weird feat chain to give a large AC bonus to the alchemist and himself with Aid Another). Again, the party members assumed I was trying to kill off the monk when he was really just the only viable target.
The ninjas were human, so he laid incredible hits on them. The gunslinger helped by blasting at them from just out of charging range on his horse. By the second round, two of the ninjas had been smashed to a virtual pulp by the monk and the other shot to hell by the gunslinger. The one which had landed the first sneak on the monk passed out and the others swarmed in and lit their grenades.
It was at that point that the monk decided to just withdraw and eat the two AOO's that were coming to him. He ended up making it out alive, but not until after a critical threat was scored against him. The player and I looked darkly into each others' eyes as I rolled confirmation: three points shy. If it weren't for an Oread monk archetype +4 AC bonus against crit confirmations, he'd have been toast.
After that, one of the ninjas exploded into bits, taking another one halfway into the grave with him. Another ninja at full health zoomed forward after the alchemist and the rogue to take them with him. The half-dead ninja, seeing himself alone against the dark and scary waterboarding spymaster gunslinger, decided to light up the passed-out ninja's grenades and go out in style.
I allowed the gunslinger to shoot the lit fuse of the grenade, ruling that it was an unattended object and therefore fair game. The half dead ninja then lit the other fuse and used his body to give it total cover. Then the gunslinger emptied his waterskin on them, putting out the fuse. The ninja then passed out.
The fully loaded ninja didn't make it close enough to anybody to be useful when he exploded but, once he did, he was surprisingly not-dead. Even with two grenades and an alchemist's fire strapped to his chest and no save... he was fine. Even if I had ruled an automatic crit he'd probably have been just barely alive. RPG's are weird like that. He decided to take that as a hint and run off into the night. The halfling chased him to no avail. The guards found his mysteriously mangled corpse later that evening.
Considering that the party captured two members of the criminal organization alive, I ruled that the guards used intelligence from their capture to strike a major blow against crime. I gave their capitol city the benefit of the Justice Prevails event.
All told, the monk was a solid, no hold barred, beast. He laid out incredible damage against the humans he fought. That said, I'm really not convinced my changes are overpowered since he came within a hair's breadth of death each time. Also, this represents not a typical monk but one experienced minmaxer's attempt to thoroughly destroy game balance with it. And, lest we forget, +2 to hit and 2d6+2 dam was coming from a bane effect (and humans were all he fought that session).
In other words, he dealt damage like a THF fighter/barb, but might have had less AC and definitely didn't have the same hit points or CON, though he did have some cool extra things like stunning fist and ki strike etc. He's a glass cannon, dishing out massive damage but not being a reliable tank. It's a flavor that would be completely different if he had chosen to go DEX/WIS instead of STR/WIS.
Maybe I'm wrong, but this is exactly what I was hoping for when I made my tweaks: a monk that is just as valuable on the front lines as a ranger or barbarian. Maybe even within an inch or two of a true fighter or paladin. When a high level NPC monk walks into a room, I want PC's to steel their resolve, not chuckle.
What do you guys think? I'm especially interested in Dabbler's thoughts considering his recent conversations about Wis to damage. I'm telling you, man: it's the way to go. Wis to damage in conjunction with full BAB is EXACTLY what the doctor ordered. I'm going to do some more playtests and post them, this time with the party facing off against NPC monks.
Minor nitpick and you maybe did it for flavor if nothing else, but a true fuse can't be doused in water. You have to cut the fuse to stop it from detonating.
Interesting way you have taken the monk. I've opted for the "keep the defences, push the offence up a little" approach, you seem to have gone for "all out offence" instead. You monk seems to be doing more damage than the barbarian with a greatsword in my game, at lower level...I don't think that's the way to go. While DPR is an important feature, given the monk's number of attacks dealing that much damage per hit could rapidly get broken. On the flip side, the damage the monk's taken...I would be worried about the character's survivability.
I'd like to see this monk's stats, if possible.
Interesting way you have taken the monk. I've opted for the "keep the defences, push the offence up a little" approach, you seem to have gone for "all out offence" instead. You monk seems to be doing more damage than the barbarian with a greatsword in my game, at lower level...I don't think that's the way to go. While DPR is an important feature, given the monk's number of attacks dealing that much damage per hit could rapidly get broken. On the flip side, the damage the monk's taken...I would be worried about the character's survivability.
I'd like to see this monk's stats, if possible.
To be fair, he wasn't actually "my" monk. This was created by a player in my game specifically trying to break my changes. He's playing an honestly over-optimized character and I'm pretty sure that you could build a normally optimized barbarian doing the same damage and I'm absolutely sure that he's not on par with a base optimized THF fighter. I don't know if you've ever read the DPR Olympics thread, but barbarians are surprisingly under-powered in DPR if they're not going for pounce or extra attacks.
I asked the player to shoot over his stats so he'll either post them here or I will. I think he might have them only on paper so it might be a little while.
I have to admit, though, this is some serious business here. A base damage of 1d8+17 is eye-popping for level 5. I think that's just his first attack and the rest are 1d8+15, but still... Also, extra Ki attacks pushes things over the top. Maybe the way I stacked things doesn't work out... but I'm not sure where to cut slack, if I should.
I imagine that he'd be doing similar damage using this build with your rules (just -4 from Wis and -2 from the 2nd iteration of Power Attack). Hell: he'd probably be a decent build with core rules. Full BAB only helps with increasing the bonus from power attack and for hitting outside of a flurry (the latter of which I felt was important because of the whole "monk mobility" mystique, as was discussed before).
My changes are basically just Full BAB, leveled Wis to Damage, GMF enhancement bonuses and minor feat tweaks. What the player did was go full bore on STR/WIS, use double/1.5 STR from Dragon Style, take power attack and utilize a +1 to attack and damage from the Oread monk archetype. AOMF Bane (Human) was icing on the murder cake. He managed to bump his AC up to that of our party THF fighter, but only by spending much of his cash on AC and using the Qinggong Monk's Barkskin ability.
Even so, he still doesn't have enough HP to be a full party tank and his AC would have to improve further to compensate. I don't think his build is defensively non-viable; it's just that he was performing as the party tank when he probably can't fully hack the job and the baddems got some good hits on him.
The monks that I wrote up as NPC's are all DEX/WIS monks. I imagine they'll perform much differently in combat and I'm pretty sure they won't be overpowered. Regardless, going to make sure the encounters ramp up in CR in a moderate way.
I'd say your player has succeeded, to an extent. On a full attack he's then doing potentially 3d8+47...that's way excessive, compared to a barbarian at 5th level, who could manage maybe 2d6+16. A fighter would be limited to 'only' 2d6+14 (that strength boost is very good).
I'm guessing you made it wisdom-to-damage-PLUS-strength...and there's your problem right there. One or the other is much better.
Now here's the thing about glass canons: hit hard enough, and it doesn't matter how bad your AC and hit points are. This what the barbarian relies on, that his enemy won't live long enough to do anything bad back to him. Now for a monk with high perception and good initiative, the odds are good that an enemy will only get one attack in before he gets to full-attack them. After that, they usually aren't a problem.
Where I am more concerned your monk will be weak is where all monks tend to founder: accuracy.
Take your monk foes, and have them dip a level of empyral sorcerer, so they base off wisdom, and their two spells will be mage armor and shield. That means they get a +8 to their AC...and you watch the monk die, because he can't land a blow. This isn't an unfair test, some enemies WILL be harder to hit, and combat classes should still be able to hit them.
I'd say your player has succeeded, to an extent. On a full attack he's then doing potentially 3d8+47...that's way excessive, compared to a barbarian at 5th level, who could manage maybe 2d6+16. A fighter would be limited to 'only' 2d6+14 (that strength boost is very good).
I'm guessing you made it wisdom-to-damage-PLUS-strength...and there's your problem right there. One or the other is much better.
Now here's the thing about glass canons: hit hard enough, and it doesn't matter how bad your AC and hit points are. This what the barbarian relies on, that his enemy won't live long enough to do anything bad back to him. Now for a monk with high perception and good initiative, the odds are good that an enemy will only get one attack in before he gets to full-attack them. After that, they usually aren't a problem.
Where I am more concerned your monk will be weak is where all monks tend to founder: accuracy.
Take your monk foes, and have them dip a level of empyral sorcerer, so they base off wisdom, and their two spells will be mage armor and shield. That means they get a +8 to their AC...and you watch the monk die, because he can't land a blow. This isn't an unfair test, some enemies WILL be harder to hit, and combat classes should still be able to hit them.
Oh bloody hell... you're right. Not about everything, but you're right. This build is OP. I hate to admit it, but it's true.
Let me start with where I disagree, though:
- Par AC for a CR5 critter is 18 and high attack is +10. My player's monk has a to hit bonus of at least +10 (+11 if he and the target are touching the ground; +2 more if it's human) and an AC of 21. That means that, in a flurry, he hits on a par 10 or 11 and he gets hit on a par 11. He's easily on par with most combat builds at this level on to hit and AC, just under on HP and WAY over on damage.
- The problem with going either WIS to hit or ONLY WIS to damage (not stacking with STR) is that it nullifies the reason to go STR. I think there are two main strains of monks: STR/WIS and DEX/WIS (also I think there should be an archetype that substitutes CHA for WIS, but that's another story). Your approach to fixing the monk takes away nice things from STR and gives them to WIS. That's problematic in my eyes, because it messes up STR/WIS monks. I like DEX/WIS monks more, but I don't think it's fair to create a system where they're the only viable build.
- One huge issue with balancing any monk changes, I'm starting to realize, is the extra ki attacks. They're the equivalent of adding x/day free no-penalty melee rapid shot on top of TWF. Anything we do to improve the monk is going to get borked by having these extra attacks.
- I'm not terribly impressed by the empyreal sorcerer example. Shield and armor will only last 1 minute and 1 hour, respectively, for 2 casts each per day. Par AC for a CR8 critter is 21, so he'd hit ground targets on a 12 for most level-appropriate threats in a flurry.
- One of the things that totally borked my math was Dragon Style. In most cases, TWF gives +STR and +1/2xSTR (+STR & +STR with Double Slice and +1.5xSTR for another feat at BAB+11). Dragon Style gives, for two feats by level 5, +2xSTR for the first hit and +1.5STR for all the others.
- As I see it, these are the major combat aspects to the class and one or more may have to go: full BAB (which adds +2 to hit outside of flurries and the ability to use Weapon Focus and Power attack at level 1); leveled WIS to DAM stacking with STR (adds +4 to DAM in this example); leveled GMF effect (increases att & dam by 1 at every 4th level); flurry (which functions as TWF); extra ki attack (which increases flurry DPR by 50%).
In conclusion, I think the only way to really find out what's OP here is to do DPR calculations using TWF fighters/rangers/barbarians as a benchmark. Do you think level 5 is an appropriate benchmark level or should we up it to level 10? The latter would be more fair, but it'd also be a lot more complicated. My vote is for the former. I'm going to start doing calculations and will post a link to the comparison spreadsheet (based on Tejon's legendary calculator).
Also, since we're basically trying to do the same thing here, I'd like to have all future discussions on your thread. Do you mind?
I did an exhaustive DPR analysis of various forms of the monk vs various par classes, hosted on GoogleDocs using Tejon's DPR Calculator. All calculations are based on a level of 5 and a CR5 par AC of 18. I know that DPR is not a be-all, end-all character aspect, but I believe it's a helpful gauge of base combat effectiveness. I feel that any honest discussion of changes to the monk should take a healthy look at DPR first.
I used TWF, THF and IUS/Natural-Attack builds for comparison and to establish a DPR par:
Chingon Monk (with AOMF flaming):
1) Weapon Focus
2) Crap bonus feat
3) Dragon Style
5) Dragon Ferocity
TWF Fighter:
1 Exotic weapon (wakizashi)
1 TWF
2 Power attack
3 Weapon Focus
4 Weapon Spec
5 Double Slice
THF Fighter:
1 Weapon Focus
1 Power attack
2 Furious Focus
3 ?
4 Weapon Spec
5 ?
TWF Barbarian:
1 TWF
1 Weapon Focus
3 Double Slice
5 Power attack
THF Barbarian
1 Weapon Focus
1 Power attack
3 Furious Focus
5 ?
TWF Barbarian (with beast totem, toothy, AOMF +1):
1 IUS
3 TWF
5 MA
TWF Ranger
1 Exotic (wakizashi)
1 TWF
2 Double Slice
3 Weapon Focus
5 Power attack
THF Ranger
1 weapon focus
1 power attack
2 ?
3 Furious Focus
5 ?
TWF IUS Toothy Ranger
1 IUS
2 AOB
3 TWF
5 MA
Here's what I discovered about DPR par (not figuring in monk builds):
- Par DPR for a combat class at level 5 looks like 20. The best performer is a toothy bestial ranger vs any favored enemy (38.78/27.65). Second place is a TWF ranger vs a double-favored enemy (24.96). Third place is a toothy TWF beast totem barbarian vs anyone (24.92).
- For the non-toothy builds, the best is a TWF ranger vs double-favored enemies (24.96). The second best is a THF ranger vs double-favored enemies (23.76). The third best is a THF barbarian (22.44).
- For non-toothy builds vs non-FA's, the best is the THF barbarian (22.44). The second best is the THF Fighter (21.12). The third best is the TWF fighter (18.34).
- In straight combat all rangers underperformed compared to everyone else when not fighting favored enemies.
- Builds that rely on multiple attacks perform significantly better against lower AC's and favored enemies (or in any situation which gives them a flat bonus to attacks or damage). Obviously, they also perform horribly against DR they can't penetrate.
- Toothy is probably one of the best things you can do to enhance DPR. If you're using a build that doesn't need a human's extra 1st level feat, pretty much anyone can benefit from a set of half-orc chompers (adding this to any of the THF builds increases DPR significantly without sacrificing much).
Here is my analysis vis a vis the Monk (note that, for every monk with GMF, I assumed that they had an AOMF adding 3.5 in extra dice per attack):
- The core rules monk using +1 ki attack without Dragon Style or Weapon Focus underperforms everyone except for the non-toothy rangers against non-favored enemies. Ki attacking every single turn is an absolute necessity to make a barely performing core rules monk. Also, without Dragon Style, Weapon Focus and Power Attack are similarly necessary. NOTE: a Dragon Style monk not using ki attacks deals about the same DPR (15.59) as a THF ranger vs non-favored-enemies and a core monk with WF & PA deals about the same (14.18).
- Surprisingly, having or not having full BAB has no effect on DPR in full attacks, except for the fact that it qualifies a monk for Weapon Focus and Power Attack at level 1 (also the penalty/bonus size of PA).
- The Dabbler rules monk actually does 24.54 DPR if he uses Dragon Style and has 18 WIS and 14 STR. A similar monk without it will do just about par damage (19.92) but he'd do significantly over par (23.39) with Weapon Focus and Power attack as level 3 & 5 feats. I have to say... your rules are very well balanced. Translation: If your PC were better optimized, he'd be dealing as much pain as a TWF fighter. If he were using Dragon Style or WF+PA, he'd be doing better DPR than a THF barbarian.
- Mind you, with your rules and core rules, you need to be using Ki attack every turn or your damage is absolutely pitiful.
- Using my rules, a fully optimized monk (AOMF+WF+DragS) does 36.86 DPR when Ki attacking. HOLY CRAP. Yeah that's overpowered. Better than a TWF ranger vs 2x-favored enemies. I eliminated abilities one-by-one to see what the culprit could be:
- Full BAB: going to .75 BAB and eliminating the use of WF&PA only reduces DPR to 33.78.
- GMF: Eliminating the Greater Magic Fang effect (therefore assuming that the AOMF grants +1 enhancement instead) only reduces DPR to 30.56. Also, without the GMF effect, monks can just purchase it permanently or have a party druid cast it on them.
- Stacking WIS with STR for damage: By not adding WIS to STR for damage, DPR is still 29.30. Dragon Style is a serious beast.
- Ki Attack: Removing the ability to Ki Attack reduces DPR to 26.08. Dragon Style is still a beast.
- Ki Attack & Dragon Style: Removing both Ki Attack and Dragon Style reduces DPR to 19.44 or (by adding in WF & PA) 21.88. This, I feel, is a lot more balanced. It puts a dpr-optimized monk with AOMF-Corrosive on par with a THF fighter and, without an AOMF or vs creatures with resistance, on par with a TWF fighter (though, of course, without heavy armor or SAD or extra feats etc. etc.).
My conclusions:
- Dragon Style is extremely overpowered. The only good thing I can say about it is that it makes the core monk playable, which isn't a plus in my book.
- Ki Attack is an extremely problematic ability, because it's a quadratic buff rather than a linear one. Anything we do to fix the monk is going to be exponentially increased by the ability to Ki Attack.
- The core rules are obviously crap. Monks have to ki attack all the time and invest in STR and Dragon Style to do anything approaching decent damage and must forego style feats at all and take WF+PA if they want to be useful otherwise.
- Dabbler's rules are actually very well balanced and kind to optimizers at level 5. Still, if the player in my game had been using your rules, he'd still do more damage than a THF barbarian (even if he stayed at 14STR-18WIS; 18STR-14WIS is even worse). I don't know how you feel about that; if you're not down I recommend banning Dragon Style. Also: without full BAB, your player doesn't qualify for WF/PA at level one and his standard attacks and AOO's are going to just plain suck. I like the elegant way you blended 20ft move as a swift with free action ki attacks, though (even though I suspect that your rules may exponentially break at higher levels because of it).
- My rules as they stand are obviously OP. I think the best way to fix that is to use the Banhammer on Ki Attack and Dragon Style. Without those two things, monks are much MUCH easier to balance. I could stand to lose full BAB if I had to and I could also reduce the WIS damage bonus to 1/2 Wis mod and still not sacrifice too much (though the latter might unduly harm DEX/WIS builds - I made a Crane Style DEX/WIS monk for this scenario which deals 16.17DPR vs 18.69 DPR with full WIS damage bonus - NOT including total defense penalty).
Thoughts?
OK this has been bugging me all night...
I know I took liberties with the word "exponential." This should be a fairer way to express what I was trying to say:
THF Fighter = 1X + Awesome
TWF FIghter = 2X + Meh
Monk = 3X + Godawful Crap
If we fix the second part of the Monk equation, things can get borked for higher values of X. I'm sure this was part of the original justification for making monks suck so bad: "Hey, we'll give them the equivalent of x/day melee Manyshot and that'll balance them out" but what that does is it makes functional core monks reliant on boosting static bonuses to catch up with melee classes.
Funny thing: this is the reason why rangers actually make the best level 5 TWF class (vs favored enemies) and barbarians the best level 5 THF class and level 5 fighters are somewhere in between on both. The TWF rangers multiply their favored enemy bonuses by 2, the THF barbarians take full advantage of their rage STR and fighters have moderate static bonuses in general. (of course, the best DPR ever is going to be either a pounce druid or a paladin archer smiting Team Evil)
Also: I didn't factor in animal companions into the ranger DPR numbers. They should be much closer to par with them (especially with Boon Companion). This makes core monks even sadder.
Par AC for a CR5 critter is 18 and high attack is +10. My player's monk has a to hit bonus of at least +10 (+11 if he and the target are touching the ground; +2 more if it's human) and an AC of 21. That means that, in a flurry, he hits on a par 10 or 11 and he gets hit on a par 11. He's easily on par with most combat builds at this level on to hit and AC, just under on HP and WAY over on damage.
That's a pretty good accuracy for a 5th level monk, and his AC is good too - the monk in my game is only hitting 20, after all. I agree, he's on par for accuracy and AC, and that makes his godawful damage bad.
The problem with going either WIS to hit or ONLY WIS to damage (not stacking with STR) is that it nullifies the reason to go STR. I think there are two main strains of monks: STR/WIS and DEX/WIS (also I think there should be an archetype that substitutes CHA for WIS, but that's another story). Your approach to fixing the monk takes away nice things from STR and gives them to WIS. That's problematic in my eyes, because it messes up STR/WIS monks. I like DEX/WIS monks more, but I don't think it's fair to create a system where they're the only viable build.No, it doesn't nullify the reasons to go strength although it does create extra options, of which reducing strength is one. Remember, I'm only giving the monk the option of wisdom to hit, not to damage - that's available through a weapon property, but it's not a given.
- You can make a monk that is wisdom focussed, getting more ki and having higher save DCs, and still be able to hit things accurately. Combined with this you can go strength-high for damage, dex-high for AC, or balance the two to get a monk that has decent AC and decent damage. If you dump strength, you won't get decent damage until you can afford the boosts for it, and that alone is a reason not to dump it.
- Go strength-focussed and you have a monk that can not only hit things but damage them as well. They just use strength-to-hit as normal.
- Dragon Style is still strength-based, for one thing, and is a reason to go for a strength-based monk all on it's own.
- Dexterity still works as well as it ever did, and going dex-focused you can get an agile amulet, burn the feats, and function just fine. It costs you feats, but you get a better initiative score, and dexterity boosts many skills.
Wisdom to hit just allows the option of a non-strength monk that can function effectively, but doesn't burn feats to do so, making him less MAD.
One huge issue with balancing any monk changes, I'm starting to realize, is the extra ki attacks. They're the equivalent of adding x/day free no-penalty melee rapid shot on top of TWF. Anything we do to improve the monk is going to get borked by having these extra attacks.
Yep. I recognised that one at the outset, which is why I didn't do damage boosts even with everyone telling me that in no uncertain terms I absolutely had to. It took a lot of work before I admitted that the enhancement bonus needed to be to damage and not just to hit, that's when I made it a magic fang effect. Beyond that, I haven't messed with damage, just accuracy - something you have addressed by using full BAB and enhancement.
I'm not terribly impressed by the empyreal sorcerer example. Shield and armor will only last 1 minute and 1 hour, respectively, for 2 casts each per day. Par AC for a CR8 critter is 21, so he'd hit ground targets on a 12 for most level-appropriate threats in a flurry.
And for 750gp you can get a wand of either, remember, and that's 50 uses whenever you need them. Besides, I was just making suggestions of how to challenge your monk, or get a monk a boost to AC.
One of the things that totally borked my math was Dragon Style. In most cases, TWF gives +STR and +1/2xSTR (+STR & +STR with Double Slice and +1.5xSTR for another feat at BAB+11). Dragon Style gives, for two feats by level 5, +2xSTR for the first hit and +1.5STR for all the others.
Indeed, Dragon Style monk is a strong offensive build. Another reason I never made changes to damage, there are enough out there in properties and the like. The monk doesn't need damage boosts other than what are available - he needs accuracy.
As I see it, these are the major combat aspects to the class and one or more may have to go: full BAB (which adds +2 to hit outside of flurries and the ability to use Weapon Focus and Power attack at level 1); leveled WIS to DAM stacking with STR (adds +4 to DAM in this example); leveled GMF effect (increases att & dam by 1 at every 4th level); flurry (which functions as TWF); extra ki attack (which increases flurry DPR by 50%).
I would drop Wis-to-damage myself. Take that out and you have a more manageable DPR, although it is still high. Remember that at higher levels the extra attacks will not make such a huge difference, a fighter caps at 4 attacks to the monk's 8 (including ki).
1) Yeah, the best way to fix that would be rejiggering that player's feats and abilities. Shifting some points to STR or adding Weapon Focus/Power Attack might be helpful.
2) I dig your style but... HELL NO! Guided weapon property is 3.5, not Pathfinder. Not allowed in my games. No way, no how. Using it to fix the monk is a cheap shot, in my mind. I understand your position about Wis-to-hit, though. Like I said in my analysis, your rules are actually very well balanced.
3) Again, I agree. Your rules are balanced. I like mine more, but we're both fine on DPR.
4) True.
5) Dragon Style is not just good... it's broken. Even more so with your or my rules. Hence my ban.
6)DPR without Wis-to-DAM is still 29.30 with Dragon Style and 24.26 without it. That's pretty damn high. Mind you it's 19.95 with DS & 16.17 without ki attacking... but ki attacking puts both well above the top normal DPR. Maybe that's OK? I'm not a fan of that, though. I think it's better to just ban Dragon Style and ki attacks. It makes things much more consistent.
All told... I think both of our systems work right now. We just need more playtesting to see how they work out. I'm really glad I ran the calculations because I was going to run a Dragon Style ki-attacking monk against the party next session. Would have been much rougher than I thought. I'm probably going to replace those feats with Weapon Focus and Power Attack or something.
To answer:
2) I should have clarified that I'm not using guided as-is, but as a wis-to-damage (instead of strength) for those with wis-to-hit. That basically means the monk or clerics with several feats. It's no more broken than agile in that respect. I agree, as written it's way too strong.
5 & 6) I am not convinced Dragon Style is broken in the long run. It seems broken now at low levels when the monk has access to it before the other combat-types get multiple attacks, but try comparing him to a sword & board paladin smiting...better? Also, you could modify the style so it's only ever strength x 1.5 to damage, not strength x 2 on the first hit.
Also going strength-high means less wisdom means less ki. Kingmaker falls into the 15-minute adventuring day trap a lot, if you aren't playing that way then the limits of ki become a lot bigger - you simply cannot use it round-on-round.
I agree, we've both got good changes here, and I think either can work.
To answer:
2) I should have clarified that I'm not using guided as-is, but as a wis-to-damage (instead of strength) for those with wis-to-hit. That basically means the monk or clerics with several feats. It's no more broken than agile in that respect. I agree, as written it's way too strong.
5 & 6) I am not convinced Dragon Style is broken in the long run. It seems broken now at low levels when the monk has access to it before the other combat-types get multiple attacks, but try comparing him to a sword & board paladin smiting...better? Also, you could modify the style so it's only ever strength x 1.5 to damage, not strength x 2 on the first hit.
Also going strength-high means less wisdom means less ki. Kingmaker falls into the 15-minute adventuring day trap a lot, if you aren't playing that way then the limits of ki become a lot bigger - you simply cannot use it round-on-round.
I agree, we've both got good changes here, and I think either can work.
Your words are wise, Dabbler. I'm really glad that you started this train. I'm glad to be on it!
2) That makes a lot more sense to me. I approve. I might go further and put some restriction like that it has to be the favored weapon of your deity, but that may be harsh. Ability to DAM as an item property squicks me for some reason. Maybe it's because I think that, if it exists, it should be a class feature.
5&6) Ooo... maybe I'll take you up on that challenge later. I'll bet it gives the S&B paladin a run for her money.
I can't wait until my next session! I've got all sorts of fun goodies for my players!!!
Well I worked a TWFing fighter that could turn out 2x 1d4+9 18-20/x2 at 5th level, which is fairly nasty, at +1 to hit over that which the monk can turn out. That doesn't beat the monk, of course, it just illustrates how damage can rack up. A smiting paladin will be higher to hit and higher on static bonus...and it's that which counts. 5th level is the "low point" for the full BAB classes compared to the monk, as they have yet to get their first iterative attack. At 6th, they are attacking twice (a TWF fighter or ranger can be attacking 4 times, paladin and barbarian have to wait to 7th) and it changes the dynamic a lot.
I'll crunch some numbers on that later...
Meanwhile, on to this evening's session!
First off here are the monk's levelled up stats.
Marshall Leessin Lodovka
Female Undine Monk (Drunken Master) 7
LN Medium outsider (aquatic, native)
Init +7; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +14
--------------------
Defense
--------------------
AC 20, touch 19, flat-footed 17 (+1 armor, +3 Dex, +1 deflection, +5 untyped)
hp 52 (7d8+14)
Fort +7, Ref +8, Will +9; +4 to avoid being knocked prone
Defensive Abilities evasion; Resist cold 5
--------------------
Offense
--------------------
Speed 50 ft., ki stagger, swim 30 ft.
Melee +1 shang gou +11 (1d4+1/×2 +1d6 acid) and
. . dagger +6 (1d4/19-20/×2 +1d6 acid) and
. . masterwork temple sword +11 (1d8/19-20/×2 +1d6 acid) and
. . sai +6 (1d4/×2 +1d6 acid) and
. . unarmed strike +12 (1d8+6/×2 +1d6 acid)
Ranged masterwork shuriken +11 (1d2/×2) and
. . underwater light crossbow +8 (1d8/19-20/×2)
Special Attacks drunken strength, flurry of blows, stunning fist (7/day, DC 17)
--------------------
Statistics
--------------------
Str 10, Dex 16, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 18, Cha 10
Base Atk +5; CMB +12 (+14 grapple, +14 trip); CMD 24 (26 vs. grapple, 30 vs. trip)
Feats Combat Reflexes, Deflect Arrows, Improved Grapple, Improved Initiative, Improved Trip, Improved Unarmed Strike, Snake Sidewind, Snake Style, Stunning Fist
Traits child of the temple, noble born - lodovka
Skills Acrobatics +18 (+22 to avoid being knocked prone, +26 jump, +25 to jump), Climb +5, Escape Artist +7, Knowledge (history) +4, Knowledge (nobility) +6, Knowledge (religion) +5, Perception +14, Perform (string instruments) +4, Profession (brewer) +8, Sense Motive +16, Stealth +8, Survival +6, Swim +13
Languages Aquan, Common
SQ ac bonus, amphibious, drunken ki, fast movement, high jump, hydrated vitality, ki defense, ki pool, maneuver training, slow fall, stunning fist (stun), unarmed strike, wholeness of body
Combat Gear Deliquescent gloves, Elemental gem (water), Potion of cure light wounds (3), Potion of cure moderate wounds, Potion of enlarge person, Potion of pass without trace; Other Gear +1 Shang gou, Crossbow bolts (20), Dagger, Masterwork Shuriken (25), Masterwork Temple sword, Sai, Underwater light crossbow, Boots of elvenkind, Bracers of armor +1, Guided Amulet, Handy haversack (17 @ 27.06 lbs), Ring of protection +1, Applejack (per gallon), Bedroll, Canteen, Flint and steel, Grappling hook, Silk rope, Trail rations (3), 50 PP, 3 GP
--------------------
TRACKED RESOURCES
--------------------
Applejack (per gallon) - 0/1
Crossbow bolts - 0/20
Dagger - 0/1
Deflect Arrows (1/round) - 0/1
Drunken Ki (Su) - 3/3
Hydrated Vitality (14HPDay) - 0/14
Ki Pool (Su) - 0/10
Masterwork Shuriken - 0/25
Potion of cure light wounds - 0/3
Potion of cure moderate wounds - 0/1
Potion of enlarge person - 0/1
Potion of pass without trace - 0/1
Stunning Fist (7/day) (DC 17) - 0/7
Trail rations - 0/3
--------------------
Special Abilities
--------------------
AC Bonus +5 The Monk adds his Wisdom bonus to AC and CMD, more at higher levels.
Amphibious (Ex) You can survive indefinitely on land.
Combat Reflexes (4 AoO/round) Can make extra attacks of opportunity/rd, and even when flat-footed.
Darkvision (60 feet) You can see in the dark (black and white vision only).
Deflect Arrows (1/round) While have an empty hand, negate one ranged weapon hit you are aware of (unless from a massive weapon).
Deliquescent gloves +1d6 acid dam to touch/weapon att. Natural/unarmed att is immune to ooze acid & doesn't split.
Drunken Ki (Su) Drunken Ki pool allows the use of Ki powers.
Drunken Strength (max 1 Ki) (Su) Add 1d6 per Ki point spent to a melee attack.
Energy Resistance, Cold (5) You have the specified Energy Resistance against Cold attacks.
Evasion (Ex) If you succeed at a Reflex save for half damage, you take none instead.
Fast Movement (+20') The Monk adds 10 or more feet to his base speed.
Flurry of Blows +5/+5/+0 (Ex) Make Flurry of Blows attack as a full rd action.
High Jump (+7/+27 with Ki point) (Ex) +7 to Acrobatics checks made to jump.
Hydrated Vitality (14HPDay) Gain fast healing 2 when submerged completely in natural, flowing, water.
Improved Grapple You don't provoke attacks of opportunity when grappling a foe.
Improved Trip You don't provoke attacks of opportunity when tripping.
Improved Unarmed Strike Unarmed strikes don't cause attacks of opportunity, and can be lethal.
Ki Defense (Su) A monk can spend 1 point from his ki pool to give himself a +4 dodge bonus to AC for 1 round.
Ki Pool (Su) You have a ki pool equal to 1/2 your monk level + your Wisdom modifier.
Ki Stagger (Su) As long as he has at least 1 drunken ki point, the monk can spend 1 ki point as a move action to move 5 feet without provoking attacks of opportunity.
Maneuver Training (Ex) CMB = other BABs + Monk level
Slow Fall 30' (Ex) Treat a fall as shorter than normal if within arm's reach of a wall.
Snake Sidewind Gain a bonus to avoid being knocked prone, and use Sense Motive check to confirm critical hits
Snake Style Gain +2 on Sense Motive checks, and deal piercing damage with unarmed attacks
Stunning Fist (7/day) (DC 17) You can stun an opponent with an unarmed attack.
Stunning Fist (Stun, Fatigue) (Ex) At 1st level, the monk gains Stunning Fist as a bonus feat, even if he does not meet the prerequisites. At 4th level, and every 4 levels thereafter, the monk gains the ability to apply a new condition to the target of his Stunning Fist. This conditio
Swimming (30 feet) You have a Swim speed.
Unarmed Strike (1d8) The Monk does lethal damage with his unarmed strikes.
Wholeness of Body (7 Hp/use) (Su) Use 2 ki to heal own wounds as a standard action.
--------------------
Zen Warrior: A monk may choose to use their Wisdom bonus rather than their strength or dexterity bonus for attacks made with special monk weapons, combat maneuvers, or with the monk’s unarmed strike. Regardless of which ability modifier is used, the monk adds his AC bonus to his number to hit with unarmed strikes and special monk weapons.
Currently, +5 modifier to hit.
A monk’s unarmed strike treats the hardness or damage resistance (of any type) of a target as less by one point for every level of monk the character possesses.
Currently, reduce DR by 7
Amending the Ki-Pool entry as follows:
As long as he has at least 1 point in his ki pool, he can make a ki strike. At 4th level, ki strike allows his unarmed attacks to gain a +1 enhancement bonus as the spell greater magic fang. At 7th level this increases to +2, at 10th level, his unarmed attacks are +3, at 13th level +4, and at 16th level his unarmed attacks gain a +5 enhancement bonus.
By spending 1 point from his ki pool, a monk can make one additional attack a round at his highest attack bonus.
In addition, he can spend 1 point to move 20 feet in a swift action.
The monk is proficient with all weapons of the type "monk".
The session took up where it left off. Levelling put the Barbarian on positive hit points, and he staggered up fatigued but whole. As the party started to get their act together, they came under a three-pronged attack: The shambling mound, the spiders, and the remaining fey rangers converged on them. I won't bore you with the details, they mopped up the opposition and looted the area in short order. My placed gear was picked up, including the monk's guided amulet.
Returning to Castleton they started repairing with few more encounters to run through in their following exploration.
The leucrotta attacked and missed, and the monk let loose with a flurry of blows...for the first time he dished out serious damage, with an extra attack he did 50 points of damage in one round (to be fair he rolled well), comparable to the barbarian's raging output. The rogue and cleric finished off the leucrotta, the cleric lance charging and the halfling rogue tumbling into a flanking position and using his Sap Master to dish 47 temporary damage...
Analysis: The monk is performing much better with better gear. Currently he can dish out a respectable damage - 14 per hit - at +12 to highest attack as compared to the barbarian's +15 to hit and 24 average damage (and greater threat range). The barbarian has slightly better DPR based largely on his better attack bonus, and with haste now being thrown around this margin increases. Some of the monk's damage is conditional - acid - while the barbarian has a fey-bane weapon that will swing things his way if fighting fey. They have the same AC, the barbarian has better hit points and their saves are comparable. The monk has slightly better mobility. Had this monk gone for a Dragon Style strength-focussed build he would have less ki (by one or two), less AC (by two or three), but much better damage (18 per hit) - a real glass cannon.
The magus can deliver around 23 damage with a spellstrike at +10 to hit once a round; he also has a host of buffs he can apply to himself and others. The ranger can kick out horrendous damage with a set of various bane arrows, favoured enemy, spell-buffs, and his bow. The rogue is able to stick a foe for 21.5 on a hit at +11 with his sneak attack - and he is a Scout archetype, so he can sneak attack on a charge.
This monk is where he should be, from what I can tell. Compared to the barbarian 7th level is a "sweet spot" for the monk as the barbarian's damage rises again at 8th thanks to Power Attack. The barbarian will stay ahead DPR-wise, the monk will probably creep ahead with AC and special abilities. As a raw fighter both are ahead of magus, ranger (except fighting favoured enemy), and rogue. However, the magus has his spells, the ranger has host of other abilities, and the rogue better skills. Range-wise all are superior to the monk, not just the ranger.
5&6) Ooo... maybe I'll take you up on that challenge later. I'll bet it gives the S&B paladin a run for her money.
It does - I crunched the numbers and a self-buffed, smiting, sword & board smiting 5th level paladin was kicking out: +14 (1d6+14 18-20/x2)/+11 (1d4+11 20/x2). However he was also AC25, a whole 4 points better off. If you treat +1 to hit as worth +2 to damage, they are on a par with one another when the monk burns ki; if the monk doesn't then the paladin takes the lead.
At 6th level the paladin takes a quantum leap when he gains an extra attack, and of course his smite increases in effectiveness with every level he gains.
Just out of curiosity, have you considered doing something akin to improving one physical ability score based on your wisdom investment up to your class level?
A wisdom modifier of 12 seems reasonable as a benchmark for full investment at level 20. That would improve your hitting stat by 6 points. You wouldn't have to do much beyond that to really kick the monks combat capability up several notches. It also makes the fluff and the crunch mesh well.
That's similar to Tel's suggestion, and I'd rather just keep it simple - if you have two stats to factor in, it gets very complicated working out the likely and potential bonuses. The only class that adds two stat bonuses together is the paladin, who adds charisma bonus to hit when smiting, but for him it's a bonus - the big thing with smite is the bonus to damage and the fact that smite bypasses any and all DR.
That's similar to Tel's suggestion, and I'd rather just keep it simple - if you have two stats to factor in, it gets very complicated working out the likely and potential bonuses. The only class that adds two stat bonuses together is the paladin, who adds charisma bonus to hit when smiting, but for him it's a bonus - the big thing with smite is the bonus to damage and the fact that smite bypasses any and all DR.
I'm not sure what you mean here Dabbler. How is it too complicated exactly? Is there some way to alter my suggestion to make it less complicated? It does resolve most of your issues with the fluff and it also deals with hit chance without actually altering much in terms of the classes basic mechanics.
Let me know how you would alter things.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I've already made my alterations, including the AC bonus as an attack bonus with monk weapons and unarmed strikes kept the monk's attack bonus up there quite adequately along with my other tweaks. I don't see the need for including any other statistic in this.
To summarise:
First session with all the gear loaded up, and it went well.
Given the party are 7th level, I didn't expect them to struggle and they didn't. The barbarian didn't even bother raging, although the sorcerer enlarged him anyway. He Cleaved two worgs, nearly killing them. The monk engaged the two injured worgs, using his 20' swift move to move and flurry, and killed both. A single critical shot from the ranger took down another worg, and the halfing charged and sneak-attacked another. It was then just mopping up the badly injured two by sorcerer and magus.
The barbarian insisted on skinning the bodies for some worgskin cloaks, of course...
Next encounter was with a chuul in the water. The monk had moved ahead of the party, and it sprang in them as they crossed a ford, missing the sorcerer by a hair's breadth. The monk did a flying leap back into combat and tried to grapple the chuul, and failed, but landed in a flanking position. The barbarian hit it, dealing serious damage, and the ranger and rogue joined in, the former doing more damage than the barbarian and the latter failing to hit. The chuul went for the barbarian, hit him and grabbed him. Then the monk unloaded (he could barely miss with flanking and the monster grappling the barbarian) and dealt out a mass of damage thanks to a critical hit, taking the monster down.
Assessment: The monk was dealing out serious damage when burning ki, more than I expected but when raging the barbarian still beats him on both accuracy and damage - just by a smaller margin.
On reflection, two chuuls would have been a better challenge for the party...I may well add a second later. The party now has four solid damage-dealers: barbarian, ranger, magus, and monk, and that really necessitates more foes for them to fight.
On reflection, two chuuls would have been a better challenge for the party...I may well add a second later. The party now has four solid damage-dealers: barbarian, ranger, magus, and monk, and that really necessitates more foes for them to fight.
Your party I 8 strong right? You should consider doubling the number of just about every encounter as it is, with your party being double the normal size. Adding an extra 1-2 enemies should be the bare minimum included, if you don't double the enemies outright.
I'm wondering how your party will deal with the murders of crows hanging a round. We're lucky our Cleric had some remove blindess scrolls on him as some people got their eyes pecked out.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Seven strong now, but yes, that's largely what I have been doing with most encounters they run into; I thought the chuul would make a challenge on it's own but underestimated the monk's damage output now he's powered up a little to the same level as the barbarian.
Yes, it will be interesting how they will deal with that challenge...
Seven strong now, but yes, that's largely what I have been doing with most encounters they run into; I thought the chuul would make a challenge on it's own but underestimated the monk's damage output now he's powered up a little to the same level as the barbarian.
Yes, it will be interesting how they will deal with that challenge...
My wizard almost killed himself to kill the crows. He has several sheets of paper with Explosive Runes pre-cast on them to use as sort of boody traps, grenades, etc. Against the crows, he ended up reading 2 of them in quick succession and dropped himself to negs in order to kill the crows, this was on top of the 2 fireballs he cast into the air. Half the party had their eyes plucked out at that point, including the Cleric's. We had to rest until the following day, and it still required some scrolls to clear it all up.
Nasty.
My party has a lot of area attacks available, with a sorcerer and magus present, so I think they will be OK.
Dabbler, I had thought on a fix for the monks move & attack synergy that I wanted to run past you before I put it into my house rules (I will GM a game one day, I swear.). Change "5 foot step" to "1/4 move", moving 1/4 of your base speed rounded down for most would still be 5ft but for the monk (and barb) it would be more. At high levels (15+) you would be moving 20ft and still be able to Flurry! Get Fleet twice and you could move a 25ft at 18th level, that is nearly as far as most peoples move action.
What do you think?
If you're having character problems I feel bad for you son, I got 99 problems but the Monk ain't one.
If you're having character problems I feel bad for you son, I got 99 problems but the Monk ain't one.
The hell...?
Dabbler, I had thought on a fix for the monks move & attack synergy that I wanted to run past you before I put it into my house rules (I will GM a game one day, I swear.). Change "5 foot step" to "1/4 move", moving 1/4 of your base speed rounded down for most would still be 5ft but for the monk (and barb) it would be more. At high levels (15+) you would be moving 20ft and still be able to Flurry! Get Fleet twice and you could move a 25ft at 18th level, that is nearly as far as most peoples move action.
What do you think?
Interesting, at 3rd level a typical humaoid monk can move 10', at 9th level 15', etc. On the other hand at 10th level a barbarian can rage-pounce, moving up to 80' and full-attacking. It helps, but I think 20' as a swift action or an extra attack on any attack action from 4th level helps more, and working out 1/4 moves requires a bit of number-crunching. A simpler option might be to say "Move half your bonus movement plus 5' when making a 5' step."
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Interesting, at 3rd level a typical humaoid monk can move 10', at 9th level 15', etc. On the other hand at 10th level a barbarian can rage-pounce, moving up to 80' and full-attacking. It helps, but I think 20' as a swift action or an extra attack on any attack action from 4th level helps more, and working out 1/4 moves requires a bit of number-crunching. A simpler option might be to say "Move half your bonus movement plus 5' when making a 5' step."Dabbler, I had thought on a fix for the monks move & attack synergy that I wanted to run past you before I put it into my house rules (I will GM a game one day, I swear.). Change "5 foot step" to "1/4 move", moving 1/4 of your base speed rounded down for most would still be 5ft but for the monk (and barb) it would be more. At high levels (15+) you would be moving 20ft and still be able to Flurry! Get Fleet twice and you could move a 25ft at 18th level, that is nearly as far as most peoples move action.
What do you think?
I think the barbarians rage-pounce maybe a bit OP anyway, trying to match it maybe a bad plan. When I read about pounce in 3.0 (*1) the fluff seemed to be that at the end of a charge (or was it movement) you where jumping on them with all your claws/teeth/other ready to hit them at the same time. It was because they were hitting simultaneously that you could do it when normally there wouldn't be enough time, if a barbarian can do it on a charge why cant s/he do it at other times? I don't see how a barbarian has the time to do that, have they changed the round time from ~6 seconds in PF? Anyway this isn't the place for this, We are here to talk about monks.
So you don't think my idea is OP/broken Fluff or mechanically? That's good to hear. The number-crunching could be fixed with a small table or maybe just telling them that its 5 feet for each 20 you can move with a note before the math saying that its 5 feet for characters that move 20 or 30 feet, that note would fit at lest 75% of characters anyway. If they cant work out how many 20s go into their move maybe they should be playing a game with a little less math, or maybe they should play more to improve their skills. IDK. 1/4 move could also be a feat so that those that don't want to deal with the math don't have to.
I like the idea of monks getting 'Move half your bonus movement as a swift move' in addition to my idea, don't think its quite what you had in mind but that’s what my brain recombined it to. Have you seen the feat 'Snap Kick' (from ToB), it maybe along the lines of what you want for extra attacks.
*1) I had a WereTiger wizard, made for a good gish at mid levels & the d8 HP helped one of the wizards biggest weakness.
The Pathfinder Pounce is just a full attack at the end of a charge. No, I don;t think your idea is overpowered, I actually worry that it doesn't provide enough to the poor monk, at least on it's own. My own ideas do not match the barbarian pounce, but they do make the monk more effective as a mobile fighter from 4th level.
Another session just completed, and interesting results!
For those that do not want Kingmaker spoilers, avoid the spoilers.
The party looked through the village, finding some clues, and eventually returning to the village well to investigate it. They found a dead, half-eaten spriggan, which prompted the question: "What killed him?" to which I replied: "I'm glad you asked that..."
I had placed a second chuul in the well, and this time it was the monk, alone climbing down the well, who faced it. However, the rogue was not to be outdone and plunged in too, dealing very serious damage. Both hammered the chuul, but didn't kill it. It retaliated by clawing the monk and getting a critical hit on the rogue.
Then the sorcerer dropped a lightning bolt in, on the basis that both the monk and rogue had evasion. They failed their saves, and there were words exchanged about the event as it took the poor halfling rogue to within a point of death.
Mending their fences and egos, the party pressed on to the fort overlooking the village, where the spriggans had taken over. The rogue scouted ahead, and saw a number of spriggans in the courtyard (I doubled the numbers of those in the courtyard to two, with another two rather than one on guard, and three drunk in the tool-shed. This was for a total of seven spriggans instead of four, as the party had seven members.
Sneaking around outside, the rogue was spotted and challenged by the two spriggans on guard (they were not going to sound the alarm for one halfling). Thinking on his feet he scored a massive bluff, convincing the spriggans that he wanted to join their tribe. They laughed and wanted to know what he could do, so he replied that he could hide very well, and offered that if they turned around for the count of ten, when they looked back they wouldn't find him. They agreed on condition they got to eat him if they could see him (I rolled intelligence checks for them and got a '1' and a '2' - not very smart spriggans!).
So they turned around and started to count, while the halfling loaded his sling and beaned one of them for masses of non-lethal damage (thanks to Sap Master) and getting a clean KO, then ran. The other was enraged, and enlarged himself as he jumped over the parapet to chase the rogue. From a hundred and fifty feet away in a gully the party saw this; the monk ran to his aid, but the ranger (favoured enemy: fay) killed him with one volley of arrows. The halfing then jumped on the corpse and managed an awesome intimidate check on one of the spriggans in the courtyard who went to see what the comotion was, demoralising him. That spriggan sounded the alarm and the party rushed toward the gate for the most part: the magus opted to fly, and the monk decided a running jump onto the tool-shed was as good a way to make an entrance as any.
Now this, in many opinions, is what the monk should do: rush in, disrupt the enemy, and keep them busy while the party do their thing to catch up. In this case, it certainly worked. The spriggans in the courtyard reacted by the demoralized one going to revive the KO'd spriggan, and the other attacking the monk, dealing some nasty damage. The monk's response included a critical hit with a head-butt (on the tool shed he was eye-to-eye with the spriggan), and killed it in one flurry of blows.
Meanwhile the halfling slipped over the palisade and lurked in wait behind the privies. The barbarian reached the gate and with one critical hit split it down the middle for everyone to storm in. The wolves in the courtyard attacked the party, and they had fun slaughtering them as the barbarian had Great Cleave.
The recovered spriggan attacked the monk while the demoralised one hung back, but before he could get there the rogue took him down a second time with another sneak attack. It really wasn't his day. The monk rushed the demoralised spriggan, but sheer terror kept him fighting, though badly.
At last the three in the tool-shed piled out and assumed giant size, but immediately became targets for the sorcerer's fireball, followed by a raging barbarian who felled the first with one blow. A charge from the rogue took down another (he had the scout archetype, which is really nasty combined with Sap Master), and the magus and the ranger killed the third with a critical hit apiece. The monk used stunning fist on the demoralised spriggan, and after dropping his halberd he gave up the fight at last, and that's where we ended the session.
Analysis: the spriggans are an odd foe, with low AC and not stellar hit points for their threat rating but quite nasty attacks and damage. The monk killing one with a single flurry would simply not have happened with the original monk design, his attack rolls simply would not have connected enough times. While killing a foe in one round is strong, bear in mind the barbarian was killing these enemies with one blow. The monk did his monk's job of getting in, disrupting the enemy, and keeping them busy while the rest of the party forced an entrance. In the event, the barbarian's critical hit on the gate made this academic, but it still forced the enemy to divert attention to two separate places and things could have gone very differently.
Another session just completed, and interesting results!
For those that do not want Kingmaker spoilers, avoid the spoilers.
** spoiler omitted **...
I agree with your analysis at the end. Doing enough damage to drop an opponent with a single flurry seems strong, but it's really not when compared to the potential of other classes. The changes I made to the Monk class on my own Monk in Legacy of Fire let him make a flurry of sunders on an intelligent staff that was controlling some wizards (custom scenario the GM put in). I dealt almost 60 points of damage by landing 6 hits (4 from flurry, 1 from ki, 1 from haste). The fighter in our group deals 2d4+25 points of damage on every attack and would have hit with every attack as well (+17/+17/+12) for ~90 points of damage.
How did your Monk player feel after this scenario? Is he enjoying the increase in damage?
Did the Sorc at least have permission to do that lightning bolt bit before hand? In my group, I told the casters it's O.K. to drop an AoE on me, especially if there are lots of enemies about, and the Rogue gave the same thing. We understand there is a risk, but we've got evasion, so we try and make use of it.
The player is loving it now he can dish out significant damage - his priority now is to bump up his AC, as it has fallen behind significantly. This is in part because the party policy is to boost whoever has the lowest AC first, so the monk has missed on a few minor items and gold spends. In fact, much party wealth has gone into their kingdom, not on themselves, one reason I rewarded them with a big haul of gear in the final encounter of Rivers Run Red.
The thing to bear in mind about the monk's damage output is that he's at the peak for quite a few levels, while the barbarian isn't; next level Power Attack will give him another flat +3, and he's got more fun and games to come as well (beast totem, greater, at 10th level). The Spriggans have an appalling AC for their CR, and their hit points are not amazing.
No, the Sorc did not have permission. OOC, she was informed this would have repercussions before she did it. However that player had just been up for 36 hours straight and wasn't at her best, so we smoothed it over afterwards and I will talk to her about it. It would not have been so bad but both rogue and monk rolled terrible saves and took full damage, reducing rogue to -9.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Last night's session saw some fun that highlighted the monk's weaknesses and strengths both. For those that do not want spoilers on Kingmaker, don't look!
The party had dealt with the spriggans in the courtyard of the compound, now they had the spriggan leader Agai and those in the blockhouse to fight, and this would prove harder although the spriggans could not use their large size.
As the party took down the last spriggan (they had stunned and incapacitated three that were not dead) they came under crossbow bombardment form the loopholes in the blockhouse. The magus got clever, cast haste on the party and flew over the top of the fortified building and landed on the lookout post. While cleric and monk made short work of binding the incapacitated spriggans, the barbarian charged...right into a pit-trap in front of the door. The damage wasn't severe, but it kept him out of the action for a few rounds.
The ranger and sorcerer held actions to return fire when the spriggans showed themselves at the windows, and injured some of them with bow-shot (the ranger had Improved Precise Shot) and magic missiles. The rogue rushed up to the blockhouse, and saw the murder-holes above the door.
Next round, the party are still taking shots as the close with the structure: again, the ranger shot another spriggan and killed one with a critical hit, but the sorcerer decided to try and risk shooting a fireball through the loopholes. He succeeded, doing severe damage to the spriggans inside. The monk used his Acrobatics to leap on top of the blockhouse, intending to follow the magus inside. The halfling rogue decided to try vaulting up to one of the murder holes and squeeze through it, and succeeded, emerging into the scene of carnage the fireball had left behind. Of seven spriggans (I had increased the numbers) only two were still standing, plus the leader Agai. Meanwhile the magus had got inside the blockhouse and landed again in the guardhouse.
Round three: Agai shot the cleric (he'd been getting hits every round, but damage was light) and changed his crossbow for his great-club, the magus cast vanish and stalked up to the spriggans on the second floor while the monk vaulted up to the look-out tower and dropped down the inside as well, into the guardroom. The halfling held action waiting for Agai to get flanked, not realising that he himself was flanked by the spriggans and that in small form they also had sneak attack. The dwarf cleric buffed the barbarian, now rather irate and out of the pit, with a bull's strength. The barbarian then smashed open the front door. Agai, however, had already called the spriggans below (another six) up in order to better defend the upper floor. They attacked the rogue with halberds, and sandwiched between Agai and them he took bad flanking damage.
The magus crept up behind Agai, pantsed him (using a Dirty Trick) and then stabbed him the buttock, while the rogue bopped him with his Sap Master and very nearly took him out of the fight (one hp away from a clean knock-out). The halfling then dropped himself back down the murder-hole, to avoid getting killed. From the guard room the monk could hear the spriggans rushing up the stairs, and used the guardroom door as a weapon to make his entry and laid about him with a hasted flurry-of-blows. It was carnage, he had five attacks and two could lay low any small-sized spriggan, and he all but wiped out half of the spriggan reinforcements. Of the rest, one charged the magus to keep him occupied.
Down below, the barbarian was foiled by the second door, with the sorcerer, ranger, and cleric piling in behind him. The cleric used woodshape to open up a doorway through one of the walls, and the party order reversed as ranger lead the way past him and into the lower floor of the blockhouse, reaching the last spriggan still on the stairs.
Fourth round: Agai chugged a healing potion, and regained his dignity. The magus used spellstrike to massively overkill his attacker with a shocking grasp stab from his rapier.
The monk use a five-foot step and a drunken stagger to reach and destroy another spriggan reinforcement. With the rest of the party fighting, the cleric started to explore the ground floor of the the blockhouse. The ranger used a hasted full-attack to chop down the spriggan he faced on the stair-well, and the barbarian rushed past him to destroy the last spriggan reinforcement with one blow. The halfling sprang up through a murder hole again, and readied himself to attack, but the remaining spriggan used shatter on his light mace.
Agai used shatter on the magus' rapier, and the magus responded by with fire breath, killing the last spriggan but not Agai, but the monk used another step-and-stagger combination to reach the spriggan leader and unleashed a flurry that really hurt the hurt him, but didn't drop him as he'd regained the temporary hp damage the halfling did when he drank his potion. However his move foiled the halfling's set-up charge, so the halfling instead tried to leap past the monk and spriggan. He failed, and met a great-club to the face that knocked him prone.
Agai exited stage left by dropping through the murder hole, and grew to large size outside the block-house. The magus sent a second blast of fire after him, and the monk raced in pursuit, double moving with haste right outside, and foolishly triggering an attack of opportunity from Agai.
This was the weakness: Agai had a +18 attack bonus in large size, and even with a top AC the monk would have been hit. The damage knocked him almost to single-digits. However, the rest of the party had Agai in their sights: the ranger raced up to the blockhouse loopholes and shot him; his elk animal companionm outside charged him, and last but not least the barbarian was able to about-turn and race outside (thank you haste) and once more reduce his enemy to -25 with one mightby blow.
After that, it was all over bar the looting!
The monk had some awesome moments in this fight. The hasted-ki-point-flurry combo really allowed him to chew through mooks almost as fast as the barbarian using Great Cleave. That said, he can't unleash the same kind of over-kill damage the barbarian can and does. He is still vulnerable to massive attacks, but at least he doesn't have to suffer them for long. His mobility was not as good as the magus' flight, but in this case it came a close second allowed him to do what monks are supposed to do: get around the enemy and surprise them, and actually do something when he did. Normally when a monk does this, they flail away and struggle fighting the mooks let alone the leader...in this case, the mooks fell in droves and the leader had to retreat.
This has all left me with a problem...the halfing rogue is now the weakest character in the party, and he's starting to feel it.
Damn, I gotta fix the rogue now...
I suggest a Sword of Subtlety for the Rogue. Especially if you allow the party to further enhance the sword through normal means and treat the 'Subtlety' enhancement as a 20,000 gp cost.
A +5 Sword of Subtlety in the hands of a Rogue gives him a +9 attack and damage bonus. The Subtlety enhancement almost makes up for 3/4 BAB, which is a good thing for Rogues.
If the Rogue isn't keen on using a short sword, you could allow him to put the Subtlety enhancement on whatever weapon he's wielding, though I, personally, would restrict it to finesseable weapons.
Nice. We've discussed some multi-classing options to beef him up a bit. The problem is that when he can charge and get in a sneak attack, he's awesome with masses of non-lethal damage. When the target is immune to non-lethal, or he cannot set up the charge/flanking, he's got problems.
What I suggested was a 2-level dip in fighter (lore warden) in order to get some bonus feats for Improved Feint. With his non-lethal damage output being so high, it should compensate for loss of the extra attacks.
Last night's session was no great shakes. The party did some general exploring a fought a few random encounters. They used a folding boat to travel downriver, and in the process disturbed a few monsters. Being an undine, the monk was swimming ahead of the rest of the party in the boat, spotting potential underwater hazards. This came with perils and advantages.
First encounter was with a chimera that spotted their boat on the river. Newly arrived in the area, the monster made a stealth-run attack on the boat and was only spotted at the last minute by the magus, who had time to shout a warning and haste the party before the dragon-head breathed at just outside reach of the party as it hovered. The chimera was planning on making a few passes this way...after all, it wasn't to know the party had very effective ranged weapons. Or could do salmon-leaps out of the water. And cast spells.
The chimera didn't survive the party's answering volley of two archers (barbarian and ranger), spells (blindness and lightning bolt), and a flying stunning fist (which failed, but the thought was there).
Second encounter was with a real beast: a peluda. As it was aquatic I ruled the creature was lurking in the water, and approached the party head on. It would originally have popped it's head up to breath fire, but it had a tasty morsel in the water it could not resist: the undine monk. He saw it as it saw him and gave a warning to the party, then got bitten with a critical hit for half his hit points. Because the peluda was under water the party's archery was of limited effectiveness, but after the monk exited the water to leap onto the boat, the sorcerer let loose another lightning bolt that hurt it.
The boat heeled over to shore (dwarf cleric at the helm) and grounded on a shingle beach. The peluda surged out of the water and as most characters were clustered at one side of the boat, shook itself and hit them all with quills. Most of the party saved (monk included, and thanks to evasion he took no damage), except the dwarf cleric (out of range) and the sorcerer (who took masses of damage).
The party's ready actions kicked in, and the peluda took hits from a magic missile spell from the magus, and a critical hit from the barbarian's greatsword. Then it was the barbarian's initiative...the peluda died, but the party came close as it's poison from it's quills kicked in. The monk used his Heal skill with the cleric to help those poisoned resist the damage, but the party ended up having to spend some days recovering. The monk was able to do some solo exploring for the peluda's lair and uncovered a nice little hoard for the party.
Back in their kingdom, the party are girding their loins to go after whatever is lurking in the south of the Tors of Levinies...
Second encounter was with a real beast: a peluda. As it was aquatic I ruled the creature was lurking in the water, and approached the party head on. It would originally have popped it's head up to breath fire, but it had a tasty morsel in the water it could not resist: the undine monk. He saw it as it saw him and gave a warning to the party, then got bitten with a critical hit for half his hit points. Because the peluda was under water the party's archery was of limited effectiveness, but after the monk exited the water to leap onto the boat, the sorcerer let loose another lightning bolt that hurt it
Everyone spent 3 weeks making these characters (took a week off for Christmas) then he told us to play these level 4 characters. Ended up throwing us against the peluda (thanks for the name). First round, pops up and shakes quills does ~28 points of damage on characters who's HP ranged from 30 - 45ish. Then comes the poison. He cheated to let us win (and we all knew it) but it still resulted in the deaths of 3 characters and the incapacitation of 2 more from poison (party of 8).
Afterwards, he told us he intended us to make 'expendable' cohorts, but forgot. None of us were happy as none of us supported the idea of 'expendable' cohorts. This was the final straw in a long list of grievances over this campaign (and how the GM was running it). I quit during that session.
So, I think, everything from this point on in the playtest will be new for me! I could care less about spoiling Kingmaker, I am not overly thrilled of the sandbox mechanic for it as it so heavily favors 5-minute work days.
It's good to see some poison and water come into play. With as much water presence as a place called the "River Kingdoms" you'd think water would have played a more important factor in the AP.
Isn't the Monk getting close to (or does he already have) poison immunity? My Monk just recently got it in Legacy of Fire, lots of fun challenging the party's fighter to a drinking contest knowing you're immune to the effects of alcohol >:)
With regard to XP I split it evenly between all party members - even those not present. My players all make their best efforts to attend, if some do not it's for good reasons and I don't want to penalise any characters. Players are encouraged to take leadership, but I have made clear that if they do cohorts will fill in support positions and are not there to accompany them on adventures, seven PCs is more than enough!
Anyway, the poison was nasty and if they hadn't finishged the monster off fast, they would have been in trouble. It was a tough encounter that came close to killing some party members, one reason I let them have a heap of loot afterwards.
It's good to see some poison and water come into play. With as much water presence as a place called the "River Kingdoms" you'd think water would have played a more important factor in the AP.
Likewise. As it wasn't written in, I'm adding it. The rivers are a huge part of the game, and the way this party is going they will be bigger.
Isn't the Monk getting close to (or does he already have) poison immunity? My Monk just recently got it in Legacy of Fire, lots of fun challenging the party's fighter to a drinking contest knowing you're immune to the effects of alcohol >:)
He's a Drunken Master, so he doesn't get the poison immunity, what saved him was evasion.
This evening's session was a 'typical' exploration session as the party went out to explore some areas they hadn't yet searched thoroughly. There were a series of encounters with no great rhyme or reason.
Marshall Leessin Lodovka
Female Undine Monk (Drunken Master) 7
LN Medium outsider (aquatic, native)
Init +7; Senses darkvision 60 ft.; Perception +14
--------------------
Defense
--------------------
AC 21, touch 19, flat-footed 18 (+2 armor, +3 Dex, +1 deflection, +5 untyped)
hp 52 (7d8+14)
Fort +7, Ref +8, Will +9; +4 to avoid being knocked prone
Defensive Abilities evasion; Resist cold 5
--------------------
Offense
--------------------
Speed 50 ft., ki stagger, swim 30 ft.
Melee +1 shock kusarigama +7 (1d3+1+1d6 electricity/1d6+1) and
. . dagger +6 (1d4/19-20) and
. . masterwork temple sword +11 (1d8/19-20) and
. . sai +6 (1d4) and
. . unarmed strike +12 (1d8+6)
Ranged masterwork shuriken +11 (1d2) and
. . underwater light crossbow +8 (1d8/19-20)
Special Attacks drunken strength, flurry of blows, stunning fist (7/day, DC 17)
--------------------
Statistics
--------------------
Str 10, Dex 16, Con 14, Int 10, Wis 18, Cha 10
Base Atk +5; CMB +12 (+14 grapple, +14 trip); CMD 24 (26 vs. grapple, 30 vs. trip)
Feats Combat Reflexes, Deflect Arrows, Improved Grapple, Improved Initiative, Improved Trip, Improved Unarmed Strike, Snake Sidewind, Snake Style, Stunning Fist
Traits child of the temple, noble born - lodovka
Skills Acrobatics +18 (+22 to avoid being knocked prone, +26 jump, +25 to jump), Climb +5, Escape Artist +7, Knowledge (history) +4, Knowledge (nobility) +6, Knowledge (religion) +5, Perception +14, Perform (string instruments) +4, Profession (brewer) +8, Sense Motive +16, Stealth +8, Survival +6, Swim +13
Languages Aquan, Common
SQ ac bonus, amphibious, drunken ki, fast movement, high jump, hydrated vitality, ki defense, ki pool, maneuver training, slow fall, stunning fist (stun), unarmed strike, wholeness of body
Combat Gear deliquescent gloves, elemental gem (water), potion of cure light wounds (3), potion of cure moderate wounds, potion of enlarge person, potion of pass without trace; Other Gear +1 shock kusarigama, crossbow bolts (20), dagger, masterwork shuriken (25), masterwork temple sword, sai, underwater light crossbow, boots of elvenkind, bracers of armor +2, guided amulet, handy haversack, ring of protection +1, applejack (per gallon), bedroll, canteen, flint and steel, grappling hook, silk rope, trail rations (3), 50 PP, 3 GP
--------------------
TRACKED RESOURCES
--------------------
Applejack (per gallon) - 0/1
Crossbow bolts - 0/20
Dagger - 0/1
Deflect Arrows (1/round) - 0/1
Drunken Ki (Su) - 3/3
Hydrated Vitality (14 HP/day) - 0/14
Ki Pool (Su) - 0/10
Masterwork Shuriken - 0/25
Potion of cure light wounds - 0/3
Potion of cure moderate wounds - 0/1
Potion of enlarge person - 0/1
Potion of pass without trace - 0/1
Stunning Fist (7/day) (DC 17) - 0/7
Trail rations - 0/3
--------------------
Special Abilities
--------------------
AC Bonus +5 The Monk adds his Wisdom bonus to AC and CMD, more at higher levels.
Amphibious (Ex) You can survive indefinitely on land.
Combat Reflexes (4 AoO/round) Can make extra attacks of opportunity/rd, and even when flat-footed.
Darkvision (60 feet) You can see in the dark (black and white vision only).
Deflect Arrows (1/round) While have an empty hand, negate one ranged weapon hit you are aware of (unless from a massive weapon).
Deliquescent gloves +1d6 acid dam to touch/weapon att. Natural/unarmed att is immune to ooze acid & doesn't split.
Drunken Ki (Su) Drunken Ki pool allows the use of Ki powers.
Drunken Strength (max 1 Ki) (Su) Add 1d6 per Ki point spent to a melee attack.
Energy Resistance, Cold (5) You have the specified Energy Resistance against Cold attacks.
Evasion (Ex) If you succeed at a Reflex save for half damage, you take none instead.
Fast Movement (+20') The Monk adds 10 or more feet to his base speed.
Flurry of Blows +5/+5/+0 (Ex) Make Flurry of Blows attack as a full rd action.
High Jump (+7/+27 with Ki point) (Ex) +7 to Acrobatics checks made to jump.
Hydrated Vitality (14 HP/day) Gain fast healing 2 when submerged completely in natural, flowing, water.
Improved Grapple You don't provoke attacks of opportunity when grappling a foe.
Improved Trip You don't provoke attacks of opportunity when tripping.
Improved Unarmed Strike Unarmed strikes don't cause attacks of opportunity, and can be lethal.
Ki Defense (Su) A monk can spend 1 point from his ki pool to give himself a +4 dodge bonus to AC for 1 round.
Ki Pool (Su) You have a ki pool equal to 1/2 your monk level + your Wisdom modifier.
Ki Stagger (Su) As long as he has at least 1 drunken ki point, the monk can spend 1 ki point as a move action to move 5 feet without provoking attacks of opportunity.
Maneuver Training (Ex) CMB = other BABs + Monk level
Slow Fall 30' (Ex) Treat a fall as shorter than normal if within arm's reach of a wall.
Snake Sidewind Gain a bonus to avoid being knocked prone, and use Sense Motive check to confirm critical hits
Snake Style Gain +2 on Sense Motive checks, and deal piercing damage with unarmed attacks
Stunning Fist (7/day) (DC 17) You can stun an opponent with an unarmed attack.
Stunning Fist (Stun, Fatigue) (Ex) At 1st level, the monk gains Stunning Fist as a bonus feat, even if he does not meet the prerequisites. At 4th level, and every 4 levels thereafter, the monk gains the ability to apply a new condition to the target of his Stunning Fist. This conditio
Swimming (30 feet) You have a Swim speed.
Unarmed Strike (1d8) The Monk does lethal damage with his unarmed strikes.
Wholeness of Body (7 Hp/use) (Su) Use 2 ki to heal own wounds as a standard action.
--------------------
Zen Warrior: A monk may choose to use their Wisdom bonus rather than their strength or dexterity bonus for attacks made with special monk weapons, combat maneuvers, or with the monk’s unarmed strike. Regardless of which ability modifier is used, the monk adds his AC bonus to his number to hit with unarmed strikes and special monk weapons.
Currently, +5 modifier to hit.
A monk’s unarmed strike treats the hardness or damage resistance (of any type) of a target as less by one point for every level of monk the character possesses.
Currently, reduce DR by 7
Amending the Ki-Pool entry as follows:
As long as he has at least 1 point in his ki pool, he can make a ki strike. At 4th level, ki strike allows his unarmed attacks to gain a +1 enhancement bonus as the spell greater magic fang. At 7th level this increases to +2, at 10th level, his unarmed attacks are +3, at 13th level +4, and at 16th level his unarmed attacks gain a +5 enhancement bonus.
By spending 1 point from his ki pool, a monk can make one additional attack a round at his highest attack bonus.
In addition, he can spend 1 point to move 20 feet in a swift action.
The monk is proficient with all weapons of the type "monk".
The first encounter was with a bulette that the party didn't see coming by much, and nearly killed one of their horses. The monk managed to get a grapple on it with his kusarigama chain, while barbarian and ranger inflicted very serious damage. The bulette responded by dishong out a lot of damage on the barbarian before it was killed, but wasn't a challenging fight.
The second ransom encounter was in a narrow gorge with a wyvern that performed a flyby attack on the barbarian (target chosen at random). Again, it was over-matched by the party's ranged capacity, and fell after the first pass.
Last encounter was a LOT tougher...
The scenario called for a single giant flytrap, but given the size and power of the party, I adjusted it to two on a small islet. The party detected some magic on the islet and used their folding boat to cross the river. The didn't perceive that the odd trees were not what they seemed. However, the rogue was not detected thanks to his awesome stealth. The monk, on the other hand, saw one of the detected items and reached for it, and was caught by a flytrap bite and successfully grappled.
In the same move the barbarian and ranger were also grabbed by the flytraps. The magus used fly to stay out of range and the cleric and sorcerer had not moved into range yet. While the ranger, barbarian and monk all struggled or fought, the magus started dropping flaming spheres on the two plants, while the cleric hurled flasks of alchemist's fire.
The monk managed to break free (he was the only one with a high enough grapple check to do so without a natural 20), while the barbarian was enlarged by the sorcerer to a size where he couldn't be engulfed (although the sorcerer promptly was). The barbarian still could not break free of the flytrap, and resorted to using his beast totem claws. The ranger was chopping away while being digested in the other flytrap. The monk unloaded on the first flytrap that had the barbarian and sorcerer still in it's mouths, managing to dodge attempts to eat him. The cleric was avoiding attacks from the same plant, adding prayer to the mix, while the magus used his scorpion whip and shocking grasp. The monk finally chopped down the flytrap with his bare hands, and it released it's prisoners as it died.
The promptly turned their ire on the other flytrap, the barbarian dealing out 70+ damage in one brutal round, and sorcerer following that with a lightning bolt that reduced the flytrap to a smoking stump.
This encounter was pretty challenging to the party, and the monk's improved accuracy and damage output was a telling factor. However he far and away didn't match the barbarian's damage output - with three characters attacking it, the first plant lasted four rounds (the monk inflicted close to 100 damage over three full attacks); the second only lasted one round once the full attention of the barbarian and the sorcerer.
Another session done, and this one was assembled from random encounters so no need for spoilers.
The party were moving into a mountainous region where for various reasons, and a couple of rolls of the dice, an eye-cult had set up around a group of Cyclops and a Great Cyclops. The party had gone a roundabout route, and so avoided the human cultists, but ran instead into a Cyclops patrol. The Cyclops spotted the party at distance and waited until night fell to attack the cave they were holed up in under cover of darkness. Smart plan, but Cyclops are not exactly sneaky and the dwarf cleric on guard at that time woke monk and rogue first. The rogue assumed a hidden position near the entrance to the cave, while the monk awoke the barbarian and the ranger next.
At this point, the Cyclops attacked, four of them in all. It was a brief and nasty fight, the Cyclops got in some good hits but were decimated by unexpected (to them) magic and the strength of the party. The monk snared one in a grapple with his shock kusarigama, and the ranger then shot it to death. The barbarian killed another in short order, the rogue laid low a third, and the last one would have run for it, but the party's damage output was just too overwhelming.
They took one prisoner, but he couldn't tell them much beyond the presence of "The Great One" and other Cyclops, and the cult of which the party had already heard. They released him, and used him to track back to the lair some distance away over the mountains.
There, in a narrow gorge they ran into five Cyclops and one Great Cyclops. An exchange of missile fire came out firmly in the party's favour with their spells and archery, after which the smaller Cyclops charged into melee, which in the constricted space worked in the party's favour. Our monk used his kusarigama to trip attackers on with AoOs and then beat them to death with a flurry of blows while they were down, and killed two this way. The ranger felled another, the halfling a fourth when he attacked from hiding, and the barbarian the last.
Then they had to deal with the Great Cyclops, who had been burned by the magus' flaming spheres, the cleric's spiritual weapon, and the sorcerers fireballs, but was still coming. He hit the barbarian for massive damage, knocking him back, then hit him again with an AoO when he tried to rise, making him perilously close to death. The barbarian retaliated with 96 damage in one round, and the rogue finished with a kill-stealing sneak attack.
Again the monk's wis-to-hit and weapon proficiency mechanic made sure that he was able to deliver attacks effectively as well as maneuvers. His damage was largely down to his deliquescent gloves and shock weapon, as well as a host of pre-battle buffs, but it worked well with his multiple attacks - he essentially was able to take care of a lot of lesser attackers while letting the barbarian deal with the most dangerous enemy.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Going over some of the threads for the Advanced Class Guide, it popped up that a reduction in DR similar to that of my own system was suggested, and rejected by Paizo as too much math mid-combat to worry about.
Accordingly, I have considered alternatives to this. The best I can think of is to remove the section on reducing DR completely and amending the section on ki pool as follows:
As long as he has at least 1 point in his ki pool, he can make a ki strike. At 4th level, ki strike allows his unarmed attacks to gain a +1 enhancement bonus. At 7th level this increases to +2, at 10th level, his unarmed attacks are +3, at 13th level +4, and at 16th level his unarmed attacks gain a +5 bonus. In addition the monk may bypass the hardness of objects with his ki strike. At 4th level he bypasses hardness 5 (wood), at 7th level hardness 8 (stone), at 10th level hardness 10 (iron and steel), at 13th level hardness 15 (mithral) and at 16th level hardness 20 (adamantine).
This is a small net increase in wordage, but the enhancement bonus now bypasses DR as a standard enhancement bonus does, and bypasses hardness as well - to the ki-strike entry on the table goes from "ki strike (magic)" to "ki strike (+1, wood)" instead. The net increase in wordage is slightly up, at 84 words.
For the moment I will continue to test my existing changes, but this is a possible alternative.
The full document for these different amendments is here.