Magic Fang and Monks

[slade867]

Suppose a Monk has magic fang cast on him, is that on 1 arm or every body part?

[Absynthyne]

"The spell can affect a slam attack, fist, bite, or other natural weapon."

This seems to imply the singular, as in "A" ...fist. As it is read, Magic Fang appears to only improve one fist when being applied to unarmed strikes.
I'd imagine the same to be true when enchanting, for example, a cat's claws. Each claw (if two claw attacks exist) would have to be enchanted separately.

[meowstef]

if it is cast on a single natural attack, for instance unarmed strike it effects that natural attack

so yes, how ever the monk chooses to make that unarmed strike will be enhanced

[Majuba]

It's just one body part (unless it's the 'all attacks' variant of greater magic fang). Generally that doesn't hinder a monk very much, since they can make all their attacks with one body part.

However, if it was a fist, and then they had to carry something in both hands, that could be an issue. Or a foot, then they get stuck with a tanglefoot bag.

[Dabbler]

Mechanically it makes no difference as the monk can make all attacks with one weapon (like one fist), but Paizo clarified that Unarmed Strike counts as a single weapon anyway. Either way, you cast magic fang, you get to make all unarmed attacks at +1.

[Kazaan]

First off, the text from Magic Fang:

PRD wrote:

Magic Fang: Magic fang gives one natural weapon or unarmed strike of the subject a +1 enhancement bonus on attack and damage rolls. The spell can affect a slam attack, fist, bite, or other natural weapon. The spell does not change an unarmed strike's damage from nonlethal damage to lethal damage.

Note the line "...one natural weapon or unarmed strike...". This can be parsed in two different ways; "one (natural weapon or unarmed strike)" or "(one natural weapon) or (unarmed strike)". The first would imply that you have separate unarmed strikes for each limb and select only one to enchant. The second reading implies that unarmed strike is a singular weapon not limb-dependent. The FAQ on magic fang clarifies it as follows:

FAQ wrote:

Unarmed Strike: For the purpose of magic fang and other spells, is an unarmed strike your whole body, or is it a part of your body (such as a fist or kick)?

As written, the text isn't as clear as it could be. Because magic fang requires the caster to select a specific natural attack to affect, you could interpret that to mean you have to do the same thing for each body part you want to enhance with the spell (fist, elbow, kick, knee, headbutt, and so on).
However, there's no game mechanic specifying what body part a monk has to use to make an unarmed strike (other than if the monk is holding an object with his hands, he probably can't use that hand to make an unarmed strike), so a monk could just pick a body part to enhance with the spell and always use that body part, especially as the 12/4/2012 revised ruling for flurry of blows allows a monk to flurry with the same weapon (in this case, an unarmed strike) for all flurry attacks.
This means there is no game mechanical reason to require magic fang and similar spells to specify one body part for an enhanced unarmed strike. Therefore, a creature's unarmed strike is its entire body, and a magic fang (or similar spell) cast on a creature's unarmed strike affects all unarmed strikes the creature makes.
The text of magic fang will be updated slightly in the next Core Rulebook update to take this ruling into account.

In short, Unarmed Strike is a singular weapon with entirely abstracted "hitting surfaces" and, when you put Magic Fang or any similar effect on it, it affects any Unarmed Strike you could make.

[Majuba]

Thank you Dabbler/Kazaan, I hadn't seen that FAQ somehow.

[lemeres]

This can actually work out fairly well for, lets say, a monk 1/ ranger X. Since they can TWF with the unarmed strikes, and they can use magic fang for their to hit bonus, they could just get that permancied and use an Amulet of mighty fists for weapon properties.

Could this be cheaper than a normal TWF? Sure, it would never break through special material DR, but I suppose they could just take quick draw and use some spare weapons they happened to find for that.

[Dabbler]

...and one Dispel Magic and it's gone, and who will they get to cast it on them, and will they? This has been held up as a "solution" before, and it isn't for just these reasons.