And it has already been proven in other threads that an optimized monk can match an optimized fighter in both offense and defense.I am intrigued by this. With all sincerity, I would request a link to such a build/thread.
Every thread I've seen that claimed this, has a severely optimized Monk, competing against an under-optimized Fighter. The Fighter vs Monk is also usually posted by the same person. He builds a Fighter intending to allow the Monk to win.
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Monks are meant to be part of "two great tastes that taste great together" as one half of many gestalt builds.Except that Pathfinder has no gestalt in RAW.Except that all the cool kids seem to be talking about it anyhow without you saying "That's not RAW!"
So do go over there and tell them they're doing it wrong. I won't mind. *shrugs*
For a PFS player, if you are not using RAW, yes, you're doing it wrong.
was there gestalt rules before 3.x? If not then the monk predates it by a good margin, and I doubt it's the design intention.
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With a 20 point build, I usually do the following:
Str 15
Dex 14
Con 14
Int 10
Wis 14
Cha 8I don't see how those stats aren't good enough to be an effective monk. 15 point buy would be a little harder. You don't need to start with an 18 strength to be effective.
A monk should have balanced stats which fits the athletic, wise, well-rounded monk.
Some of you focus way too much on maxing out stats even when doing so is completely unnecessary. Letting the fighter have the 16 or 18 strength doesn't make you any less as a monk with a 14.
I really see a lot of people undervaluing all the perks of being a monk with saves, SR, self-healing, and the like.
what perks does the monk have that allow them to contribute and not merely survive?
SR is a double edged sword that makes you harder to heal or buff
the self healing is too expensive and doesn't heal enough to be viable
paladin and barbarian, have better saves, better AC, and deal more DPR than a monk can dream of.
and considering the monk needs a decent attack bonus to compensate for being one of only 2 3/4 bab classes with no way to augment their accuracy, a 15 is not enough strength to make them viable. unless you play an onispawn tiefling and blow your first feat on armor of the pit.
here is a viable 1st level onispawn tiefling monk
Str 17 (15+2)
Dex 14
Con 14
Int 12
Wis 16 (14+2)
Cha 5 (7-2)spend your 4th level stat point on strength, wield a magic temple sword in both hands, take power attack at 3rd level. now you have a halfway viable damage dealing melee monk. or take the dragon style chain and pray your DM allows you to enchant one gauntlet to improve your unarmed damage and retain your monk damage, instead of houseruling it away.
I view the monk as a secondary physical damage dealer. He does not compete with the fighter, barbarian, paladin, or ranger. Or any of the Full BAB classes.
The monk competes with the secondary classes like the Inquisitor, Rogue, Magus, and Bard.
The difference between the monk and those classes is the monk is back-loaded. It's weaker at low levels and much stronger at high levels. Just the other day my 9th level monk with Blessing of Fervor and a Temple Sword hopped into combat attacking six times with a ki point and extra attack from Fervor annihilating the regular mooks. No one in my part at 9th level gets six attacks.
My AC is one of the highest in the group. Even if a creature manages to bypass my AC, I have a single deflection from Crane Style that also gives me another attack.
If Paizo were to improve the monk, they should do so for the low levels. That is where the monk is weak.
I completely agree with your complaints up to about level 5 or 6. I think most people playing monks don't get to see how good they are at higher level. They are very good. My hungry ghost monk heals himself and recovers ki with every crit, which is quite often at lvl 9. I rarely run out of ki and I don't need healing mid combat.
Monks are also one of the few classes able to cast restoration as a standard action spell-like ability. I don't obtain that until lvl 12. If I should start to get drained of ability points or negative levels, I will shrug them off with a restoration.
Once again these are all abilities a monk doesn't get until higher level.
If you're going to argue, then the argument should be that monks should get some abilities early on that make them more viable in combat. So they don't have to suffer the first five or six levels compared to the barbarians, paladins, and all that.
I don't agree they are inferior at higher level. They are quite powerful as you rise gaining abilities or access to abilities that other classes do not. They do quite a bit of damage when they get to play ginsu blade against opponents.
I understand why Paizo is so careful giving monks upgrades. They are powerful class with balanced defense and offense. Give them too much and they will outshine everyone. They have to be careful with monk upgrades. Though I do think they need to tighten up the stats so a monk doesn't need four stats and improve their low level damage dealing.
Something along the lines of "Strength with the Spirit" allowing them to do wisdom damage instead of Strength might be a nice improvement or Wisdom damage stacking with Strength damage. That might be too much as well.
As far as the monk at high level, they don't need much of anything but the ability to bring to bear the full force of their fists. That would only require an improvement of the Amulet of Mighty Fists allowing it to match a regular weapon.
I still don't get why monk should fight as hard as a class called fighter. Do fighter should have the same saves of a monk? or the same skills of a rogue?
I don't agree that the monk are supposed to be dps machines. What people want from him is a fighter with on top all the cool monk stuffs. That's not balanced at all.
I view the monk as a secondary physical damage dealer. He does not compete with the fighter, barbarian, paladin, or ranger. Or any of the Full BAB classes.
The monk competes with the secondary classes like the Inquisitor, Rogue, Magus, and Bard.
And he still loses, except possibly against the rogue. In my opinion, he actually loses harder in that lineup than when he's compared to the fighter, paladin and barbarian.
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Personally, if a Monk can reliably hit, the damage will follow. The problem, most times, is the Monk has a hard time hitting.
One of my house rules is Monks can add their Wisdom to hit ONLY, not damage, in addition to their Str/Dex. Solved a lot of problems and our Monks don't feel bad when compared to other characters. This could easily be abused by a character min-maxing Str/Wis, but we simply don't have to worry about that, none of us really play that way.
This allows our Monks to do consistent, if low, damage, while still being able to be good at Maneuvers (as the Wisdom to hit also adds to CMB).
you know how much weight to put into an opinion when it states magus and inquisitors as secondary damage dealer.
people have talked about monks using dex or wis to hit and damage, but then other people say no way, way too good of a dip for x class.
Restricting it to monk weapons only, and it works fine because it is already out there: the sensei monk archetype uses wis-to-hit from 2nd level, and I have yet to see hordes of CoDzilla builds dipping sensei.
The last "Monk's Suck" thread had unarmed DEX build monks with high AC and saves dealing > 100 DPR at 12th level. Without using an archetype.
Dex build was certainly the best. It was certainly still eclipsed by all the other combat classes.
Some of you focus way too much on maxing out stats even when doing so is completely unnecessary. Letting the fighter have the 16 or 18 strength doesn't make you any less as a monk with a 14.
Yes, actually it does. He gets +4 to hit and +4 to damage from that strength, you get +2. He has +1 BAB, you get +0 or flurrying -1. He has enough spare feats for Weapon Focus, you may not, and that's another +1. So he can attack for +3 or +4 advantage over you, doing more damage with a better threat range. You aren't second rate here, you are seriously not even in the same park as this guy.
I've just started a game in which one player is running with a barbarian who tops +7 to hit and 2d6+12 damage when raging with his greatsword.
I really see a lot of people undervaluing all the perks of being a monk with saves, SR, self-healing, and the like.
Saves? Paladin has better, but they are good I'll grant you.
SR? Give me a break, it's been demonstrated again and again that SR is more of a hindrence than a help...
Wizard: "I caste haste!"
DM: "Make a caster-level check to overcome spell resistance."
Wizard: "What for, I'm casting it on the party...oh yeah, him." <rolls> "Crap."
DM: "Everyone is hasted but the monk."
Cleric: "I cast heal on the monk!"
DM: "Make a caster-level check to overcome spell resistance."
Cleric: "$%^&@~"
DM: "Monk bleeds out."
To add insult to injury, given that enemy casters are often levels above the APL, they are more likely to get past the monk's SR than his allies.
Self-healing? At a level at which everyone is carrying cure potions you get to expend your scant ki resources to do the equivelant of drinking a potion. Sorry, this ability is pretty useless.
Of the monk's other abilities, the immunities are nice, the high jump is great, and most of the rest are spell-like abilities gained long after the spells are available to even 2/3 casters.
100 DPR is hardly incredible for 12th level and don't forget that Dex monks are useless until 5th level when they can afford an agile amulet of mighty fists so dex monks are hardly an argument for monks being balanced with the rest of the martial classes.
Pretty much this. I will add that at low level the monk can excel by using maneuvers, off-setting this disadvantage. However they will have to blow feats on Weapon Finesse and Agile Maneuvers to do so. So for two feats and a weapon property you can almost not suck.
Martial Artist. Also, agile is a +1 bonus according to This page on the SRD.
Martial artist gives up all the ki powers that supposedly make up the standard monk's mojo, and stand-alone he's not that great - but he is a good dip for a barbarian. It's a great ability, and one that would have allowed core monks to function as intended if they had it from the start. They don't. Indeed in all the "monks don't suck" claims, they usually revolve around using an archetype, not the core monk. Sohei, Zen Archer, Tettori are OK, especially combined with Qingong. Of the others, those that are not out-and-out terrible make great dips for other classes trying to out-monk the monk (successfully, I might add).
Monks are all around harder to optimize than other classes for less reward.
Fun? Yes.
Balanced? No.
I've never understood why people can't make this distinction. Balancing a class will not make it less fun (unless it gets hard nerfed).
It can make it more fun, though. And I will add, balancing the monk is not about DPR, either. It's about increasing the monk's effectiveness by enough to make him a decent 2nd-rank warrior without detracting from his other abilities.
I view the monk as a secondary physical damage dealer. He does not compete with the fighter, barbarian, paladin, or ranger. Or any of the Full BAB classes.
That's certainly true, except that he isn't a secondary damage dealer, very often he's a tertiary damage dealer. The problem with the DPR tests was they focussed on the stated AC for a CR-appropriate threat without DR; reality bites when you face a higher AC target in the more serious fights and this is where the monk's poor accuracy causes their DPR to plummet.
The monk competes with the secondary classes like the Inquisitor, Rogue, Magus, and Bard.
No, he's behind all of them save the rogue, and the rogue has a clear non-combat role to play that he can fulfil, the monk does not. The Inquisitor, Magus, and Bard are all 2/3 casters that can self-buff to a huge extent, making THEM the secondary damage dealers in addition to all the other things they do to help the party.
As for the rogue, he's the monk's main competitor for "weakest class in Pathfinder" - and the rogue still comes second.
The difference between the monk and those classes is the monk is back-loaded. It's weaker at low levels and much stronger at high levels. Just the other day my 9th level monk with Blessing of Fervor and a Temple Sword hopped into combat attacking six times with a ki point and extra attack from Fervor annihilating the regular mooks. No one in my part at 9th level gets six attacks.
Did you actually hit with any of them, though? A fighter that hits with two out of three attacks is still doing better than a monk hitting with two out of six.
Even if you did, you are going the route of the iconic unarmed class functioning better when armed, which kind of defeats the point.
My AC is one of the highest in the group. Even if a creature manages to bypass my AC, I have a single deflection from Crane Style that also gives me another attack.
Monks can be defensively very strong, no argument.
If Paizo were to improve the monk, they should do so for the low levels. That is where the monk is weak.
Wrong, at least in my experience. Low levels is where the monk can utilize maneuvers to stay on top of the fight and contribute effectively. Levels 2-8 are where the monk performs the strongest, until magic weapons force his accuracy behind the rest of the party and larger/non-humanoid monsters reduce the effectiveness of maneuvers.
I completely agree with your complaints up to about level 5 or 6. I think most people playing monks don't get to see how good they are at higher level. They are very good. My hungry ghost monk heals himself and recovers ki with every crit, which is quite often at lvl 9. I rarely run out of ki and I don't need healing mid combat.
Above 10th level is where monks really start to fall seriously behind the pack. Last monk I played I went from 1st to 14th, I really do speak from experience here - and that monk was reasonably optimised.
Monks are also one of the few classes able to cast restoration as a standard action spell-like ability. I don't obtain that until lvl 12. If I should start to get drained of ability points or negative levels, I will shrug them off with a restoration.
If they are a Qingong monk they may, and it's a nice ability, but using it in combat isn't always a good idea and out of combat you should save the ki and have the cleric use a scroll.
Once again these are all abilities a monk doesn't get until higher level.
And, I will point out, levels after those SLAs are available to casters as spells.
If you're going to argue, then the argument should be that monks should get some abilities early on that make them more viable in combat. So they don't have to suffer the first five or six levels compared to the barbarians, paladins, and all that.
I don't agree they are inferior at higher level. They are quite powerful as you rise gaining abilities or access to abilities that other classes do not. They do quite a bit of damage when they get to play ginsu blade against opponents.
Monks are a little behind at low level, but they can make up for it with maneuvers. They fall further behind at higher level, they don't catch up unless you are using an archetype like the sohei.
I understand why Paizo is so careful giving monks upgrades. They are powerful class with balanced defense and offense.
No, they are not. They are a weak class, and that's according to Paizo themselves, with good defence but poor offence and little or no ability to assist the party.
Give them too much and they will outshine everyone. They have to be careful with monk upgrades. Though I do think they need to tighten up the stats so a monk doesn't need four stats and improve their low level damage dealing.
This I fully agree with. Monk's are defensively strong, they need to be made offensively stronger but not so much to outshine the other martials. They should be looking to be on the same playing field, not the star of it.
Something along the lines of "Strength with the Spirit" allowing them to do wisdom damage instead of Strength might be a nice improvement or Wisdom damage stacking with Strength damage. That might be too much as well.
It would be. Wisdom to hit makes much more sense because it reduces MAD for the monk, allowing more options in balancing them out. Automatic enhancement of the unarmed strike would then allow the monk to compete on a more level playing field.
You might want to take a look at the changes I proposed in this thread, they outline not just the changes I would make (which are small tweaks) but detail how I'm play-testing them as well.
As far as the monk at high level, they don't need much of anything but the ability to bring to bear the full force of their fists. That would only require an improvement of the Amulet of Mighty Fists allowing it to match a regular weapon.
Which isn't going to happen, I think the AoMF is as good as it will get.
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Let me point something out. I joined this forum 2 years ago, and in that time, I've participated in many Monk threads. I also skip many of them because they have the same title and questions as the 5 threads I argued in the week before.
As far as I can tell, Dabbler posted about Monks in EVERY Monk thread. He's basically seen and countered Every Argument Out There when it comes to Monks. The only time you can really throw something his way he hasn't come across, is when a new rule book comes out with all kinds of new shinies.
Even then, each one of those rule books will Never address the core problems with the Monk. Why? Paizo doesn't want to invalidate the Core Rule Book.
It took years of complaints, arguments, discussions, builds, calculations, and antagonization just to get Paizo to change the Amulet of Might Fist to something that can be worked with.
1 item.
It took years to change 1 single item in the CRB when it pertained to Monks. Years of basically harassment by some people to get them to do something.
Monks are a touchy subject with problems that never got fixed in the conversion to Pathfinder. Paizo inherited the problem, and admittedly, they've done a pretty damned fine job fixing what they can. However, some of the biggest problems for the Monk, isn't simply the Monk, it's the core elements of the game.
Standard action, Move action, Full-Attack.
Half of the Monks abilities are built to be an in-and-out skirmisher. The other half are meant to be a front-line fighter. With the combat system as it is, these two halves clash and can't be fixed without a major overhaul.
Tangent, but the point being is Dabbler has been discussing the Monk, his strengths, weaknesses, DPR, optimization, builds, purpose, everything, for a Very, Long, Time. Keep that in mind before you take the discussion further.
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100 DPR is hardly incredible for 12th level and don't forget that Dex monks are useless until 5th level when they can afford an agile amulet of mighty fists so dex monks are hardly an argument for monks being balanced with the rest of the martial classes.That is the strength monk. I ignore the hard numbers because I don't like playing a monk that does not fit my image of what a monk is meant to do. The strength monk stands in one spot and hits hard. It ignores 90% of the fun stuff that Raith Shadar mentioned.And it has already been proven in other threads that an optimized monk can match an optimized fighter in both offense and defense.
It has also been proven that people ignore even hard numbers when they are contrary to personal belief.
Strength monk?
The last "Monk's Suck" thread had unarmed DEX build monks with high AC and saves dealing > 100 DPR at 12th level. Without using an archetype.
100 DPR was comparable to the fighter and barbarian builds being posted at the same level. The fighter was actually lower DPR unless he started dumping defenses and saves.
Monks SHOULD be the Pathfinder unarmed combatants par excellence . . . but they are not. Any fighter, barbarian, or ranger that chooses to focus on unarmed combat will quickly leave the monk behind; especially with some of the new magic items/properties (brawling, I'm looking at YOU).
They will hit more often, for more damage, than the monk. While wearing armor and having more hit points.
The sad thing is, almost any primary BAB class can be built to out-monk the monk; NOTHING that the monk does or has cannot be duplicated by an array of magic items.
MA
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It really sticks in my craw that as written Brawling doesn't go on Bracers of Armor.
"Oh no! The Monk might actually get an item that makes Unarmed Strikes slightly better!"
"Better make it so if he tries to use it he loses all his class features!"
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If I am not optimizing at least some of the Monk-class abilities, why did I pick the Monk class in the first place? Many flavors of monk roleplaying work better by building the monk in another class and then roleplaying the character to act like a monk. For example, a barbarian also has Fast Movement and I could roleplay his rage ability as a meditative state that lets him tap his inner ki. That is just as fun as having given the character the Monk class.Do you play your monk super boring? As in do you not take chances with jump, not pick a martial style, not explore the archetypes and their abilities, constantly look at the other guy's damage total with envy, not stealth around with the rogue, and basically look to optimize compared to the other characters. Monks aren't going to do as much damage as a fighter or full BAB class all the time. Some rounds they will, some rounds not. They can be effective if you build them so.
Having to go with a strength build isn't a huge negative. Most melees have to go with a strength build. They stand there and hit people. I don't understand why this is some kind of negative. If you want to build a ranged attacker, then make a Zen Archer. They are quite powerful.
Monks get plus 60 feet of movement for a total of 90 feet. No barbarian is coming close to that. This also affects jump distance. I use jumping to flip around a battlefield at full speed jumping over the heads of my enemies. I can literally leap from behind the party to the flank position of my enemies at lvl 9.
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Not sure what you're doing, but a barbarian cannot do what a monk does. And vice versa. No matter how you try to roleplay it. Maybe you don't average as high a level a I do in campaigns. I know any campaign I play in with my group I'll make level 12 or greater. Monk gets much better as you level. If you're playing only 1 to 5 or something like that, you're most likely not enjoying the better aspects of the monk. They are not a front loaded class like many of the melees.
Raith Shadar, I said that I like to have my characters with some optimized abilities, and you ask me whether I play my monks super boring? You have mistaken me for some other player.
My 3rd edition monk believed in daring jumps that put her in a risky position for the right shot. My Pathfinder monk/ranger preferred to scout in stealth, except that the death of the party's fighter forced him into the front line to protect the spellcasters. He was wonderfully versatile. He was both a Ki Mystic and a Monk of the Four Winds, helping the party with his skills as much as with his fists. He had no combat style feats or Qinggong abilities because I retired him at 8th level before Ultimate Magic and Ultimate Combat were published.
Optimize does not mean enormous DPR. Optimize means that my character's special abilities are well worth using. My own view of the monk is that his role is not DPR.
True, a barbarian cannot do exactly what a monk does. But remember the theme of this thread: "Monks - What do you think they're truly mean to be?" If the barbarian fits my mental image of a monk better than the monk does, then I will build a barbarian of serene composure whose backstory is that he was trained in a monastery. The difference between moving 40 feet per round and 90 feet per round is not important to my view of a monk. If I wanted to create the blind tutor monk Master Po from the Kung Fu TV series, I would probably make him an oracle with Clouded Vision curse and chose monk-like spells and revelations.
You say a monk grows powerful starting at 12th level. What about the monk is amazing at that level? Every class should have something amazing, even if the amazing stunt is nothing more than sneaking past a keen-eyed guard to open the gate.
I would have expected a 12th level monk to have a reliable Stunning Fist, to walk through the air with Cloud Step, and to tap into his ki pool for utility effects, such as lighting fires. Instead the 12th level monk seems awfully mundane (except the Qinggong monk does get the cool ki pool effects). Jump and slow fall are dull when the wizard and his buddies are flying around. Good saves, AC Bonus, Improved Evasion, Purity of Body, Wholeness of Body, and Diamond Body could leave the monk as the last one standing, but at 75% party kill the game will be over, regardless. Abundant Step at 12th level is cool, I admit, but the arcane spellcasters casting Dimension Door long before that rob it of some luster. The monk stopped being great at stealth, because his skill points did not keep up with the bard and rogue.
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I figured out exactly what the monk is supposed to be. I read the AD&D Players Handbook and realized, that with the stats you need to qualify for the original Monk, this is meant to keep you from being overpowered if you roll ridiculous stats. This class seems to be what the Dungeon Master tells his player to play on the off chance that his player rolls all 18's in stats. The Monk is so ridiculously hard to optimize because it truly seems like the only way to make it work is with Maximum stats. Paizo nerfed the Monk in pathfinder to keep this tradition for those who still roll stats.
Oriental Adventures had a good take on the monk class. There should have been a hard | soft | hard/soft style focus so you have the heavy-hitting variant (hard), the super-controller (soft), or MMA (hard/soft). Having the monk gain a "pounce" like ability at later levels would have helped immensely.
Heck, IMO, all martial classes should lose at most one iterative when attacking as a standard action.
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I wish they would change the AOMF from a +5 to a +10 item. That's the only thing that will hurt my Monk/Druid in the long-run from what I can see. :(
I'm pretty happy with the Monk class otherwise. Although, I do roll with a 12/18/12/10/18/5 Stat Arrangement and Weapon Finesse/Weapon Focus. He's a squirrelly little thing and is pretty boss at avoiding damage. However his skills are lackluster, but you really only need 1 skill monkey in the group. His damage is of course pitiful until I get Agile enchant on AOMF and get into my Snake Style suite/tree.
A low level monk should be Bruce Lee. Amid to upper-level monk should be Brother Shuyun (Initiate Brother/Gatherer of Clouds by Sean Russel). A monk's capstone should be to become Lu Tze (sundry Diskworld books by Terry Pratchett).
I thought it should be more: Jason Statham-->Bruce Lee-->Ryu-->Domon Kasshu. :)
They should totes import that one PrC from 3.5. The one where Monks could literally punch someone into next Tuesday at higher levels.
And he still loses, except possibly against the rogue. In my opinion, he actually loses harder in that lineup than when he's compared to the fighter, paladin and barbarian.I view the monk as a secondary physical damage dealer. He does not compete with the fighter, barbarian, paladin, or ranger. Or any of the Full BAB classes.
The monk competes with the secondary classes like the Inquisitor, Rogue, Magus, and Bard.
That is not my experience. The other classes take too long to buff up whereas the monk can go immediately with no buffing. One greater dispel puts all those classes back at buffing up, while the monk keeps on fighting.
As a DM I use dispel magic a lot. I rip buffs off parties like peeling onions. Major enemies do not allow buffed parties to attack them. The Inquisitor is very reliant on being buffed to do their damage. The Magus not as much, but it still helps given they are kind of squishy without buffs.
If a Monk goes in with no buffing he's likely to die.
He's already underbuffed as far as permanent effects go (Can't have armor, weapon enhancement for IUS is likely to be lower, on top of the 3/4 BaB/d8 HD thing).
An unbuffed Monk competes with an Unbuffed Magus or Inquisitor, though still loses since Dispel Magic can't get rid of Bane/Judgement and can't stop the Magus from doing his Shocking Grasp thing expect as a readied action.
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You know what. You guys are right.
Monk's offense is too weak right now. Magus and Inquisitor are ridiculous.
I'm running a Magus right now. He regularly averages 70 plus points a round at 9th level when shocking grasp works.
I played an Inquisitor of Gorum up to lvl 14. I was a two-handed greatsword wielding Inquisitor. When I was fully buffed with Greater Bane and Judgment going with a Vicious Greatsword using Power Attack while raging with haste I was averaging something like 70 to 90 points a hit. I was hitting so hard the opponents were targeting me rather than the fighter. I got my butt handed to me a few times because the enemy unleashed on me. But after I whacked him a few times, he was near dead anyway. The Inquisitor does nutty damage at high level.
The rogue does quite a bit of damage as well. His hit rolls drop as he rises.
Before the existence of the Magus and Inquisitor, monk and rogue were somewhat on par with each other. Now with Magus and Inquisitor monk and rogue seem like chumps. They are not competitive with either of those two classes.
Paizo should re-design both classes to be competitive with Magus and Inquisitor. It's kind of BS that they think the monk and rogue are reasonable options when their overall abilities pale in comparison to the Inquisitor and Magus.
To me the Inquisitor is even sicker than the Magus. I can basically do everything. I can use Perception to search for traps at range with sift. I can do massive physical damage when buffed up. I can sit back and cast dispels to strip buffs or remove conditions. I can heal myself. I can turn invisibility. I can bane as needed against enemies. I have friggin Cleric domain powers, which can be quite powerful. I can track. I can sense all types of alignments making it hard for anyone to trick me. I have a bonus on Sense Motive that allows me to see through any people bluffing given I'm a wisdom based class.
I gotta admit. The monk compared to the Inquisitor or Magus is like a man compared to a child.
Monk is fun to play. I don't mind it so much. I definitely don't play a monk to have power. I play it because I like the flavor. If I want power as a secondary damage dealer, I play a Inquisitor or Magus favoring the Inquisitor. That class can do about everything. Give them a level of rogue and they can do everything.
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I had to sit down and think about it some. I'm running a couple of monks right now. They're doing fine in the campaigns I'm running them in. I'm having fun playing them, which is the primary purpose of playing any class.
That being said, the monk does pale in comparison the Magus in the group as far as damage dealing. I know from experience playing an Inquisitor that a monk can't hang with them dealing damage. Then again, not many classes can. A high level, fully buffed Inquisitor with all his power going is a sight to behold.
Pain in the behind to track every bonus. But incredibly effective.
I was enlarged as well. My bonuses were crazy.
3d6 Large Greatsword
4d6 Greater Bane
2d6 Vicious
1d6 Precision Strike (Teamwork feat for 1d6 damage)
+12 26 Strength raging, Enlarged with magic items
+4 damage Divine Power
+2 from Greater Bane for increased enhancement
+9 Power Attack
+3 base sword
+5 judgement
+3 from other spells
Average damage per hit: 10d6 (35 points) +38 =73 per hit. If I crit, I did 121 points with my Greatsword.
I hit with highest BAB bonus for two of my three times a round. My bonus to hit was huge as well with all the buffs. I was averaging 219 points of damage a round. Far more if I crit.
I had a hard time keeping track of every single bonus. That is far more than I do with my monk or will do with my monk. I pounded right through DR.
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100 DPR was comparable to the fighter and barbarian builds being posted at the same level. The fighter was actually lower DPR unless he started dumping defenses and saves.
There were a lot of problems in those threads, and one was the insistence among some to make the fighters get built to try and be like monks with lots of save-boosters rather than the fighters concentrating at what they are good at: dealing damage. Plus those DPRs were worked out against CR-equal foes without DR. Go to CR +2 and CR +4, add some DR, and the story changes radically thanks to the fighter's way better attack bonuses.
The whole point, though, is not to out-damage fighters. It's to be doing something effective at all, and that doesn't happen unless you can cast a spell on the enemy or hit them, and monks don't have spells. That leaves hitting things.
Monks SHOULD be the Pathfinder unarmed combatants par excellence . . . but they are not. Any fighter, barbarian, or ranger that chooses to focus on unarmed combat will quickly leave the monk behind; especially with some of the new magic items/properties (brawling, I'm looking at YOU).
They will hit more often, for more damage, than the monk. While wearing armor and having more hit points.
The sad thing is, almost any primary BAB class can be built to out-monk the monk; NOTHING that the monk does or has cannot be duplicated by an array of magic items.
Pretty much, and the situation became worse when the Master of Many Styles appeared, a class tailor made for other martial classes to dip.
That is not my experience. The other classes take too long to buff up whereas the monk can go immediately with no buffing.And he still loses, except possibly against the rogue. In my opinion, he actually loses harder in that lineup than when he's compared to the fighter, paladin and barbarian.I view the monk as a secondary physical damage dealer. He does not compete with the fighter, barbarian, paladin, or ranger. Or any of the Full BAB classes.
The monk competes with the secondary classes like the Inquisitor, Rogue, Magus, and Bard.
Actually many of their buffs last minutes, so they can pre-buff, and the good old magus can use his arcane pool to self-buff as a swift action - and unlike the monk, his self-buffing abilities last several rounds, not just one.
One greater dispel puts all those classes back at buffing up, while the monk keeps on fighting.
Some of the most effective monk builds I have seen rely heavily on buffing through using potions (potions of mage armor particularly), so this nerfs them badly as well. As I mentioned, some of those classes can buff as a swift action, and even without buffs they can be effective.
As a DM I use dispel magic a lot. I rip buffs off parties like peeling onions. Major enemies do not allow buffed parties to attack them. The Inquisitor is very reliant on being buffed to do their damage. The Magus not as much, but it still helps given they are kind of squishy without buffs.
Yes, as squishy as the monk.
I gotta admit. The monk compared to the Inquisitor or Magus is like a man compared to a child.
Pretty much, because unlike all the other 3/4 BAB classes but one, the monk is not a caster.
Monk is fun to play. I don't mind it so much. I definitely don't play a monk to have power. I play it because I like the flavor. If I want power as a secondary damage dealer, I play a Inquisitor or Magus favoring the Inquisitor. That class can do about everything. Give them a level of rogue and they can do everything.
I love the monk as well, and I'm glad we're able to reach agreement. People accuse me of being a 'hater' but the truth is I really love the class. My frustration is that it just doesn't work the way it was conceived, and it's hard to enjoy being a hero when your total contribution to the party success was providing flanking and needing to be healed while every other class did the heavy lifting. I want the monk to work, and so I have and will continue to advocate changes in the monk - something Paizo have left the door open to, and I hope they take note: Good work so far, guys, but it still needs work.
The reality is that after the introduction of the Inquisitor and Magus Paizo needs to get over the whole "Don't give monks unarmed strikes a way to be as effective as a weapon." It doesn't apply any longer. If they don't realize this, they really don't realize how powerful Inquisitor and Magus are. I know from experience they can dish far more damage than Mr. Monk even if his fists were as good as a +5 sword with additional enchantments.
The reality is that after the introduction of the Inquisitor and Magus Paizo needs to get over the whole "Don't give monks unarmed strikes a way to be as effective as a weapon." It doesn't apply any longer. If they don't realize this, they really don't realize how powerful Inquisitor and Magus are. I know from experience they can dish far more damage than Mr. Monk even if his fists were as good as a +5 sword with additional enchantments.
It never did apply, but it wasn't as obvious before a whole swathe of 3/4 BAB semi-casters came out that really showed the monk up for how weak it truly was.
The reality is that after the introduction of the Inquisitor and Magus Paizo needs to get over the whole "Don't give monks unarmed strikes a way to be as effective as a weapon." It doesn't apply any longer. If they don't realize this, they really don't realize how powerful Inquisitor and Magus are. I know from experience they can dish far more damage than Mr. Monk even if his fists were as good as a +5 sword with additional enchantments.It never did apply, but it wasn't as obvious before a whole swathe of 3/4 BAB semi-casters came out that really showed the monk up for how weak it truly was.
Easy Fixes
give the Rogue Bardic Spellcasting Progression Wholesale
give the Monk Psychic Warrior Manifesting Wholesale
now, you no longer need the ninja
give the Cavalier/Samurai Paladin Spellcasting
Give the Fighter Ranger Spellcasting
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Yeah.
The Monk is an insanely fun class to play, I don't think anyone was disputing that (especially since it's kinda hard to dispute a subjective statement).
The problem comes when you actually play a few of 'em.
You play one, and of course it sucks because YOU suck. You don't know what Feats to pick, when to use your abilities, and so on.
So you give it another shot once you're better because despite the suckage there is almost nothing more fun than being the guy who beats the s@+# out of people barehanded when everyone else is wearing plate armor and swinging swords and axes.
And the second time you do a bit better. You hit that sweet spot between 5 and 7 or 8, and everything starts to gel. You're doing good, scouting around, dealing solid damage, being untouchable compared to your companions, and laughing at Will saves.
But then it all kinda goes downhill. Somebody brings in a Ranger, and now suddenly you've got a guy that can scout as well as you, deals more damage at a more consistent to-hit, and is almost as hard to hit as you are because he got to buy an enchanted breastplate this level.
And you're like "Okay, that's fine. We'll work as a team scouting ahead, and it'll be cool. I've still got great saves, fast movement, and I can dish it out okay I guess."
And it was alright for a while, until you realize the Barbarian took Superstition this level. Now, suddenly, somebody has saves almost as good as yours.
And you still have fun, but you have this nagging feeling in the back of your head that you're not bringing anything to the table.
And you're not, really, except another body on the field. The Barbarian deals more damage and has great saves, the Ranger does too and he's a better Scout, the Cleric can heal and annihilate undead, and the Magus...well the Magus didn't do much because his player wasn't very good at building characters (his last char was a caster Druid with Wis 13).
So you ask the GM if you can take your Monk for a rebuild, for both character and mechanical reasons, and you do so, and a few weeks later you bring him back into the game (having played a Sorcerer in the meantime), and all is well. You're matching the Barbarian in damage, are mobile, and are a good scout still. Of course, it took 3 levels of Brawler and some GM leniency (Gloves of Dueling and Brawling on Bracers of Armor, all aboard the damage train), but you don't give a damn because you're killing vampires in one round when it's not even your turn (Snake Style is the most fun thing in existence, don't let anyone tell you otherwise)...
And then the game collapses after that session for a reason I won't go into here and you realize that you'll probably never find a GM who'll allow those tweaks/magic items required to make your character so good again, and you get very sad and run some numbers and realize that without said items, even with the 3 Brawler levels your Monk is still only slightly better than he was before.
And then you spend a lot of time on the forums very sad about said experiences backed up by math later on, and start thinking of ways to improve the class
Ideal would be to split it in two, Full BaB/D10 HD martial artist with a lot of the physical abilities (High Jump, Slow Fall, etc.) made worthwhile and few of the blatantly mystical ones (Wholeness of Body, Spell Resistance, etc.), and 3/4 BaB/D8 HD half-caster with the mystical abilities made worthwhile (Spell Resistance not beinga gimp is a good start) and few of the physical ones.
Or at the very least made a pseudo-caster with a big whopping Ki Pool and a bunch of abilities, like Qinggong on steroids, kinda like Psionics.
But people don't believe the class sucks because they have FUN with it. Which is kinda understandable (nobody likes to admit that something they like sucks, it makes them seem like they have bad taste) but it's also detrimental to trying to improve the class.
And so here we are in Monk thread #181981.
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Easy Fixes
give the Rogue Bardic Spellcasting Progression Wholesale
This is called a Bard.
give the Monk Psychic Warrior Manifesting Wholesale
now, you no longer need the ninja
Ashiel suggested this in another thread and here's the revised thread
give the Cavalier/Samurai Paladin Spellcasting
This is called the Paladin
Give the Fighter Ranger Spellcasting
This is called the Ranger.
Easy Fixes
give the Rogue Bardic Spellcasting Progression Wholesale
This is called a Bard.
give the Monk Psychic Warrior Manifesting Wholesale
now, you no longer need the ninja
Ashiel suggested this in another thread and here's the revised thread
give the Cavalier/Samurai Paladin SpellcastingThis is called the Paladin
Give the Fighter Ranger SpellcastingThis is called the Ranger.
giving everyone under the sun spellcasting is not the answer
giving everyone under the sun spellcasting is not the answerEasy Fixes
give the Rogue Bardic Spellcasting Progression Wholesale
This is called a Bard.
give the Monk Psychic Warrior Manifesting Wholesale
now, you no longer need the ninja
Ashiel suggested this in another thread and here's the revised thread
give the Cavalier/Samurai Paladin SpellcastingThis is called the Paladin
Give the Fighter Ranger SpellcastingThis is called the Ranger.
giving everyone under the sun a series of worthwhile supernatural talents past 5th level is the answer. spellcasting, is merely the laziest form of supernatural talents.
think of Wuxia movies, Anime, and Mythology for feats a 6th level or higher martial character should accomplish.
The Tome of Battle is by many considered "the fix" to the 3.5 fighter, paladin and monk by replacing them with the warblade, the crusader and the (unarmed) swordsage.
When I introduced that book to my old 3.5 table about four years(?) back, the players that played the martial classes it was supposed to 'fix' didn't care for it. Too much complexity, too many 'spells' (maneuvers) to keep track of, that kind of thing.
The guy who played Wizard was delighted and promptly took the Leadership feat to pick up a Warblade bodyguard.
Thing is that some people really do enjoy playing classes that don't have all that much planning and prep to them - I have people at my tables who happily play fighters or barbarians specifically because they can go "RARBRGH SMASH THINGS" instead of poring over spell lists.
Making sweeping changes like the ToB or giving every class in the book spell lists will be a good step towards bringing balance to the for... game, but it will also alienate those people who play classes specifically because they don't get spells.
In the end I wound up making smaller changes, that the players were happy with, to the 3.5 martial classes. Fighters got more skill points, Paladins got a (much) more relaxed code, that kind of thing. I also took steps to frequently stud the dungeons with items that would help them keep up with the casters. In those games the martials were still linear and the casters still quadratic, but the players were happy and ultimately that was all I wanted.
I doubt that'd be an issue now since pouring over a Rage Powers list is hardly different from looking for spells known (for Spontaneous casters especially).
I doubt that'd be an issue now since pouring over a Rage Powers list is hardly different from looking for spells known (for Spontaneous casters especially).
First of all keep in mind that a fighter gets no rage power options at all.
A barbarian picks one rage power every two levels, while a ranger/paladin (the examples used earlier) get roughly 50 new spells added to their list every three levels.
Is there actually a class that gets paladin/ranger spell progression but casts spontaneously? It'd be interesting to see the spells known progression.
Making the spell list akin to the Quinggong might work, but I'm still not entirely convinced...
I doubt that'd be an issue now since pouring over a Rage Powers list is hardly different from looking for spells known (for Spontaneous casters especially).First of all keep in mind that a fighter gets no rage power options at all.
A barbarian picks one rage power every two levels, while a ranger/paladin (the examples used earlier) get roughly 50 new spells added to their list every three levels.
Is there actually a class that gets paladin/ranger spell progression but casts spontaneously? It'd be interesting to see the spells known progression.
Making the spell list akin to the Quinggong might work, but I'm still not entirely convinced...
a Fighter has to pore through hundreds of feats every 2 levels and decide which one to take
that is no different from picking spells known
a Ranger has to pore through 50 new spells every 3 levels
a Fighter has to choose one Combat Feat from a list of like 1,000 or more feats every 2 levels
Every character has to pick feats, no exceptions. Feats are also a lot easier to pick because you generally pick them along a theme.
Two-handed Pounder
Sword Shield
Dual Wield
Archery
Mobility
Etcetera, etcetera. Each build has a theme of feats that goes a long with it. Picking Feats isn't hard. When you have only 1 or 2 spell slots, picking spells can be hard because you have use the right one at the right time.
Feats are usually an 'always on' kind of choice. You pick Weapon Focus, you always get the benefit as long as you have your weapon. Spells might be amazing, or worthless depending on the play session. Say a character brings Charm and Dominate expecting social encounters as they're 'going shopping' that day. Instead, a Zombie Horde attacks. Charm and Dominate will be basically useless.
Now, granted, most Feats are used for combat, and out of combat scenarios means those combat feats weren't being used. But you'll never convince a Fighter that choosing Power Attack wasn't a good choice unless Power Attack was completely outside his fighting style.
Also, a lot of less experienced players tend tower 1 of 2 types when it comes to magic. Hoarding the spells 'incase they need it' or they blow the spells early. Martials don't have to worry about that. Only a few Feats, like some of the Greater Save boosters, have a limited use effect. Weapon Focus, Weapon Finesse, Persuasive, Iron Will, Dodge... those feats almost never turn off. You can't blow their useage, like you can a Spell.
First of all keep in mind that a fighter gets no rage power options at all.
But he gets a Feat every level. There are a LOT of Feats.
A barbarian picks one rage power every two levels, while a ranger/paladin (the examples used earlier) get roughly 50 new spells added to their list every three levels.
And once they look it over and find the roughly 4 that are worthwhile at each spell level it's not an issue.
Is there actually a class that gets paladin/ranger spell progression but casts spontaneously? It'd be interesting to see the spells known progression.
Nope.
The Gifted Blade Archetype for the Soulknife (Psionic class by Dreamscarred press) is basically that though.
Making the spell list akin to the Quinggong might work, but I'm still not entirely convinced...
Not entirely convinced of what?
Personally I'm not entirely convinced that we shouldn't improve a class just because some small number of people would be too lazy to read over a spell list every couple of months.
That said though, I'm also not convinced all classes precisely need spellcasting, they just need something that can rival spellcasting in usefulness and narrative power.
Every character has to pick feats, no exceptions. Feats are also a lot easier to pick because you generally pick them along a theme.
Two-handed Pounder
Sword Shield
Dual Wield
Archery
MobilityEtcetera, etcetera. Each build has a theme of feats that goes a long with it. Picking Feats isn't hard.
Separating the wheat from the chaff in each of those specialties is the hard part, and you have to pore over the list many times before you can easily put together a build in a certain specialty.
Spells are no different. Once you've picked 'em a few times you know which are good all rounders and which will be good for your specialty.
Feats are usually an 'always on' kind of choice. You pick Weapon Focus, you always get the benefit as long as you have your weapon. Spells might be amazing, or worthless depending on the play session. Say a character brings Charm and Dominate expecting social encounters as they're 'going shopping' that day. Instead, a Zombie Horde attacks. Charm and Dominate will be basically useless.
Which is why you don't load up on all of one spell if you're a smart caster, especially not ones which common enemies are immune to.
And really, it's no different than speccing for Grapple or Trip and then coming across an enemy with immunity or great resistance to them.
Only a few Feats, like some of the Greater Save boosters, have a limited use effect. Weapon Focus, Weapon Finesse, Persuasive, Iron Will, Dodge... those feats almost never turn off. You can't blow their useage, like you can a Spell.
They're also never as good as a spell either.
giving everyone under the sun spellcasting is not the answer
I agree. Turning every class into a spell-caster is no fun for those that do not want to be spell-casters.
You don't have a fighter any more, you have a swordmage. Conceptually, if I want to play a fighter then a swordmage doesn't cut it. Indeed, giving non-casters spells is not the answer anyway, because classes like the magus needed special abilities to make the combat-caster concept work.
Tome of Battle was hailed by some as The Answer to poor martials in 3.5 and lambasted Paizo for not taking the idea and running with it. Personally I am glad that they didn't, because I like that everyman hero with nothing more than his sword and his courage, and not a shred of magic save in his gear. It doesn't matter what others can do, if he can contribute, and the same is true of the monk: he has to bring something to the table to contribute to the party success, not just be a body on the field that is hard to hit but doesn't otherwise do much - and it doesn't have to be done by making him a caster.
It's worrying to see how some people jump all over you the second you voice a dissenting opinion - even when you've previously (in the same thread, no less) been arguing for the same point of view.
I sincerely hope I don't need to explain how picking a feat when you level up is different from having an extensive list to prepare spells from.
Think about it like this.
A: Casters and non-casters play differently.
B: Some people like to play casters. (I'm one of them)
C: Some people like to play non-casters.
D: Making non-casters casters in the name of balance would alienate the players who do not enjoy playing casters.
E: Those players stop having fun, and then stop playing.
I'm not saying you shouldn't take steps to improve the mundane classes. I'm saying you need to consider what those steps should be very carefully. Adding prepared spellcaster spell lists to the mundanes is a quick fix, but it's hardly a good one.
Finally, I think name calling is unnecessary for people who avoid playing classes that are more complex and/or require more time to prepare. Not everyone has the same amount of time to dedicate to their hobbies, nor the same head for rules.
There is a fine line between "dissenting opinion" and "bad idea" and it is highly subjective. Further, every idea should be subjected to rigorous testing anyway. Otherwise what you think is a "bad idea" can't be shown to not be one.
For what it's worth I was referring to Rynjin and Lumiere coming down on me for suggesting that spell lists might not be the best fix for the fighter, not you ^^
When did I ever "come down on you"?
Disagreeing =/= "Coming down on"
Personally I'm not entirely convinced that we shouldn't improve a class just because some small number of people would be too lazy to read over a spell list every couple of months.
Mostly I was thinking of language such as this - which was also why I asked in my previous post that we avoid name-calling :)