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I am making a character for a homebrew game. We are 30 Pt buy and we are using the following amendments to monk proposed and tested by Dabbler
1) 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, and 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.
2) 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. 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 5 pts of hardness (wood), at 7th level 8 pts of hardness (stone), at 10th level 10 pts of hardness (iron and steel), at 13th level 15 pts of hardness (mithral) and at 16th level 20 pts of hardness (adamantine).By spending 1 point from his ki pool, a monk can make one additional attack a round at his highest attack bonus when making an attack. In addition, he can spend 1 point to move 20 feet in a swift action.”
3) Monks are proficient with all monk weapons
This is the build I have come up with (Currently 6 level)
HumaN Monk (Qigong monk/ Ki Mystic) 6
Str 13
Dex 14
Con 14
Int 12
Wis 20
Cha 8
Feats
H- Power Attack
M1- Deflect Arrows
1- Mantis Style
M2- Improved Grapple
3-Combat Reflexes
5- Vicious Stomp
6- Improved Trip
My question I have is is going into 2 maneuvers viable? Should I focus on one? I kinda want to stick with the archetypes I chose. What is good feat progression? Also is stunning better (getting Medusa wrath at 10 level) than elemental fist ( Monk of the 4 winds, Djinni Style). Here is the feat advancement I would use for MO4W
Feats (If Monk of 4 winds)
H- Power Attack
M1- Deflect Arrows
1- Combat Reflexes
M2- Improved Grapple
3-Vicious Stomp
5- Djinni Style
6- Improved Trip
TLDr- I need help making an effective monk with changes listed above. Is stunning (with Medusa Wrath) or elemental fist(MO4W and Djinni Stlye) better? What is a good feat advancement? 2 maneuvers or 1 (I would rather grapple to shut down casters, DM is kinda focusing on them a little)
Thanks for all the help
Bump
No advice at all??
It's hard to offer advice with the homerules, because I have never played with those changes.
Honestly, I don't see a lot of use out of two maneuver trees, unless you are planning on tag-teaming with other allies, and that's a whole different question.
Between Medusa's Wrath and Elemental Fist, uh, either? Elemental fist can do more reliable if not battle-ending effects as stunning fist. Those are more of a flavor option to me.
The modification to the Ki pool is powerful, but honestly, with a 30pt buy and the auto proficiency with monk weapons, you'll nova any enemy to death. Just focus on Strength and two-hand a 7 branched sword or a nine-ring sword. Again, it's a 30pt buy, so using wisdom as a substitute, rather than actual Str or Dex, for attack seems unnecessary.
On the other hand, Wisdom does increase your stunning fist DC, which can be great if it works, but I wouldn't base your character concept on.
If you choose Medusa's Wrath, consider Cornugon Stun, given the weapon proficiencies allowed. You can two-hand flurry with a weapon for super damage, use your stunning fist, and then kick/headbutt/knee/etc the mook for your extra unarmed strikes.
The final answer is, as with any character, focus on getting a few things right, and maybe doing some other things okay. Trust your party to cover your weak spots. If you feel your monk will be better suited for battlefield control, grab more maneuvers (and maybe a kusarigama). If you want to stop the casters by violent dismemberment, do that instead.
I do not know what advice to give you without changing the things you want staple.
If you are going after maneuvers, the maneuver master is your best bet. In this case, dirty trick is the best maneuver to focus.
But, if you want to invest in trip, then the flowing monk does it best. With Vicious Stomp and greater trip, yiu will be able to provoke two AoOs when you trip someone and make him save twice or get flat-footed. As a result, it is probably better to continue with a class that grants sneak attack like the Ninja, that also progresses your ki pool. A 3-4 lvl dip in lore warden will also be useful for the CMB boost.
Ki mystic is not a particularly good archetype, if what you want is more ki, drunken master does it better.
Than being said, ki mystic stacks with weapon adept, and if you rule that you can use perfect strike with a temple sword it is a good choice. You can take back stunning fist with a feat and take the cornugon stun feat so that you can use it through your weapon.
I would avoid specializing in grappling, unless you take the Tetori archetype. That being said, having improved grapple as a bonus feat is not a bad move, it is just very situational (mainly useful against casters). Trip is great when it works, but it does not work universally enough IMO. Also, unless you are a maneuver master (or a tetori for grappling), you will not have enough bonus to CMB so that your maneuvers can be regularly effective against the BBEGs, unless you are satisfied with a 50/50 chance at best. So the investment that you have already done in maneuvers is enough and you should not focus more on them, unless you run out of options.
Stunning Fist is definately better than Elemental fist for a high Wisdom build.
Actually my best proposal is to take advantage of your high point buy and the easy wisdom-to-attack/damage and multiclass with Paladin into the Champion of Irori PrC.
I guess I wasn't clear. I am not married to the ideas but I just like the idea of unarmed fighting. I like monk weapons but the idea of not ever having to worry about weapons is cool to me. I have never really made a monk and I know the changes are different but have been tested to show not a huge but positive effect on play style. Mainly what I want to know is what is a better investment- elemental fist and monk of 4 winds or stunning fist (and as mentioned) Druken ki. I did grab grapple for the caster situation bc our dm likes casters. I am not sure about my trip feats I took. Any other suggestions for that maybe?