It's no surprise that an Unchained Monk with unarmed strikes is going to be better than a Monk/Paladin hybrid using Core. It's more useful to compare Unchained Monk with Unarmed Strikes vs. Unchained Monk with, say, the Sansetsukon. With what information I have the Sansetsukon Monk sounds quite a bit better, though the touch attack on unarmed strikes sounds pretty promising.It still kinda leaves unarmed monks out to dry. I mean, my next monk is going to use a nine-section whip regardless (because hell yeah improved proficiencies) but the monk should be pretty good at punching people.Last year I played a monk 4/paladin 7 (hit 8th level about halfway through) all the way through Ruby Phoenix Tournament in a PbP on the boards. She could flurry with a glaive, made most saves on a 2+, and pretty much soloed a non-evil dragon (no smite) shortly after leveling up.
My Dragon Fist Style test unchained!monk has more attacks for more damage at better attack bonuses, has way better AC, more maneuverability and every once in awhile can just punch people as a touch attack because he feels like it. Oh, and his saves? -1 Fort, +1 Ref, -2 Will to hers. Not exactly character-breaking.
The sturm und drang about the poor poor monk is rather seriously overblown from where I am sitting.
One Touch takes a Standard, so not very promising, really.
One Touch takes a Standard, so not very promising, really.
So if you encounter a foe in heavy armor (or with heavy natural armor, or whatever) with an AC so high that you can't reliably hit him with a flurry, you can instead move around to get flanking (possibly for a flurry next turn) and use one touch to hit his touch AC this turn?
...that is AWESOME!
EDIT: No, wait. Does it stack with Vital Strike? An englarged, two handed power attack using impact weapon with one touch and vital strike would be an awesome fall back to a flurry if you either had to move or couldn't hit regular AC that turn. If it's unarmed only, you could do the same thing with dragon style and an impact bodywrap of mighty strikes.
One Touch takes a Standard, so not very promising, really.So if you encounter a foe in heavy armor (or with heavy natural armor, or whatever) with an AC so high that you can't reliably hit him with a flurry, you can instead move around to get flanking (possibly for a flurry next turn) and use one touch to hit his touch AC this turn?
...that is AWESOME!
You can use it at will and also add half your monk level to damage (which you can double for 1 ki if you like).
You can use it at will and also add half your monk level to damage (which you can double for 1 ki if you like).
Wow! Even without the tweeking that's pretty neat. An ability like that does a lot in situations where you're forced to be mobile and can't rely on flury. That, combined with flying kick, does a lot!
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Would it be too broken to let the monk enhance his fists with his ki like a mugus enhances his weapons with arcane pool?
Or just have ki-strike be an enhancement bonus, as I have house-ruled, and it works just fine.
As I mentioned previously, they never play-tested the original monk, and they didn't play-test this one. That's probably why both suck so bad.Hey Dabbler, as I mentioned in another thread too, over my time on the forums, we've chatted in various threads and I've always respected your tendency for strong analysis, whether we agreed or disagreed. The rest of your post is opinion, but in this one quoted section, you state fact incorrectly. As someone who agrees with you that both playtesting and running math are important, we did playtest the Unchained monk, and run a bunch of mathematical analyses too. I'm wondering, did you? I assume yes because from other threads I know you pretty much always do, but some of your assertions this time seem contrary to the math, which they have never been before (you previously said that the Unchained monk that isn't expending ki is worse at dealing damage than a paladin that also isn't expending limited resources, which I believe is strictly provable not to be correct by math, unless I am mistaken). So I'd be interested if you could share them.
I beg your pardon, you didn't do a public play-test. The thing is, when you do a public test you invariably get someone that does or thinks of something you never thought of.
I did a LOT of number crunching on the original monk, as well as playing (and in fact more playing than crunching, truth be told) and came up with several results:
MAD
First, that MAD was the monk's biggest single problem. The original monk needs the physical stats as much or more than the other full BAB classes. He needs Strength as much as them for the same reasons; he needs Con even more than them for d8 hid dice; he needs Dex because he can't wear armour (many full BAB builds can skimp on either Dex or Str, the monk struggles trying to do this). On top of that, he needs Wisdom for his monk abilities and to compensate for his lack of armour.
Now the Unchained monk reduces the need for Con with d10 hit dice, but it increases the need for Wis with a low Will save and more ki demands through switching "always active" abilities for ki-powered options. So the Unchained monk is still struggling with MAD, which will either reduce his to-hit score or else make him seriously weak elsewhere, or demand a fierce feat-tax. You haven't fixed MAD, you just shuffled the problem around a little, but it won't go away.
My own house-ruled solution to this issue was to use Wisdom as the monk's hitting stat for monk weapons and unarmed strikes. It worked well, as now like every other martial class the monk only has to worry about one maxed-out stat instead of several. Also it's thematic for the monk: he's a spiritual warrior, it makes sense that he would be fighting with his spirit, not just his muscles.
Enhancement
The monk's unarmed strike can only be enhanced by one item, the amulet of mighty fists, and that is capped at a +5 maximum of enhancement bonus and equivalent features, quite aside from it's expense. Enhancement bonus is very important to martial characters: it improves accuracy (and if you do not hit, you do not do anything), it gets through DR, it gives you a static bonus to damage. The problem with the AoMF is that with that cap, if you want any properties, you lose on the enhancement. It's a big issue for many monk players, and I know Paizo have been vexed by it before, but there are good reasons not to improve the AoMF.
Now as you noted, Mark, I do a lot of number crunching. One thing I crunched numbers on was the soulknife for Dreamscarred Press. An issue I was concerned with was that because the soulknife didn't have to spend resources on a magic weapon (a huge expense for a martial character), he would have an overabundance of other gear that could make the class unbalanced with regard to other martials. It turned out not to be the case - the soulknife's ability to have the perfect weapon for any occasion (or as near as dammit) and his psychic strike didn't completely make up for his lack of a "mojo" ability such as the other martials have: paladin's smite, fighter's weapon training, barbarian's rage, etc. So I know that giving a free enhancement on a weapon will not break the game.
That's why I couldn't understand why a qinggong power was never greater magic fang as a swift action. I certainly don't get why the unchained monk couldn't have an enhancement bonus as part of the ki-strike. I've tried it in my own games, and it doesn't break them.
I'm beginning to think that it's possible that this will be like the hunter, where on release there were a fair number of people who were worried about the class, but since then it has been proven to be pretty solid. If so, it's not unexpected, in that we had a lot longer in the book's development cycle to run math and playtest than folks have had since getting subscriber copies, so even if the collective forums are a more powerful organ overall for such endeavors (which I believe they are, over time, if sometimes one with signal/noise to work out), it hasn't had time to sort itself out.
The monk is supposed to be a spiritual warrior, a master of discipline and focus. Yet there is no mechanic other than the ki-powers to represent this. Worse, the monk's focus and discipline don't make him stringer against mental threats any more. It always used to be argued that the monk was a great mage-killer because of his saves, but that's no longer true.
If I was going to nerf a save, because full BAB and all good saves is too good (although I don't actually think it is - the monk was the only class to have all good saves regardless of BAB) then Fortitude was the one to nerf. After all, the monk gets abilities early in the game that compensate for it anyway, and it represents the ascetic rather than material warrior concept more appropriately.
I really do like a lot of the strikes and powers, and some of the monk's offensive problems have been somewhat (but not completely) addressed with full BAB and the new flurry, but I'm disappointed that the monk hasn't had some of the other issues he has addressed. Worse, I feel that the Unchained monk actually steps away from the monk's true concepts. You've made him more like the brawler and less like, well, a monk. Not only that, but you've made that spiritual concept of the monk much, much harder to attain. I mean with the old monk, he might suck on the attack but at least he had his spiritual defence. No more.
So for me this monk doesn't cut it. I won't use him for a monk, for the same reason I won't substitute a brawler for a monk. Sorry Mark, I know you guys did a lot of work, but you've missed the target. That's why I really think this should have had a public play-test, to get that different input of what a monk means to different players. I know it would have been a pain, but I think it would have been worth it.
Even inasmuch as this is true, the math should be the same for everybody. Yet it seems to be getting ignored this time, or being stated flat-out incorrectly (I noted another flaw in Dabbler's math elsewhere on the forums too); it's rather odd for the theorycrafting crowd around here, who tend to be pretty good with mathematical assessments.
I'm not a "theorycrafter", I use theorycraftuing to prove a point but it's not my forte. I'm happy to be corrected, but I'm satisfied that we've proved in the past that the monk was the most MAD class in the game, and he suffered for it, and that enhancement was equally important to all martial classes - and the monk had less than the others. If these issues are not addressed, or if work-arounds are not provided, then they will remain problems.
Like I said, the Unchained monk is offensively better than the original monk, and synergy is better, but it's defensively worse and the offensive improvements are not sufficient to put it on the same par as the other martial classes. As I also explained, thematically...the Unchained monk doesn't have the spiritual strength any more, and to me that is what makes a monk.
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MAD
First, that MAD was the monk's biggest single problem. The original monk needs the physical stats as much or more than the other full BAB classes. He needs Strength as much as them for the same reasons; he needs Con even more than them for d8 hid dice; he needs Dex because he can't wear armour (many full BAB builds can skimp on either Dex or Str, the monk struggles trying to do this). On top of that, he needs Wisdom for his monk abilities and to compensate for his lack of armour.
I will say - getting an Agile AoMF ASAP and dumping Str solves this somewhat - though the 1.5x strength for two-handing flurry makes strength builds more viable unchained.
Enhancement
The monk's unarmed strike can only be enhanced by one item, the amulet of mighty fists, and that is capped at a +5 maximum of enhancement bonus and equivalent features, quite aside from it's expense.
As I mentioned a few pages back - this can be solved somewhat with an Allying cestus. Worst case (vary by DM) - you basically give up an iterative attack to give the weapon's enhancement bonus to your fist. Especially useful with the pummeling feats.
Now - I'm not ripping on your whole post (in large part I agree) - just nitpicking a bit. ;P
Now - I will say - it does sound like the unchained monk will be easier to make pretty solid. One problem with the base monk is that while it can be made pretty solid (though a bit weak offensively) it takes mixing and matching archetypes, feats, and items from across different books. It certainly sounds like the unchained monk doesn't require that.
One Touch takes a Standard, so not very promising, really.So if you encounter a foe in heavy armor (or with heavy natural armor, or whatever) with an AC so high that you can't reliably hit him with a flurry, you can instead move around to get flanking (possibly for a flurry next turn) and use one touch to hit his touch AC this turn?
...that is AWESOME!
It's good, certainly, but I wouldn't call it awesome. You can't really build around it to any great degree.
Does have the distinction being one of...two? Ki Powers with no cost though.
An in-depth reply to Cat-thulhuYou've either missed the point, or decided to counter it by taking the post seriously. Cat-thulhu was making a comically exagerated list (almost all of which have been suggested in this thread to one degree or another) to underline the fact that we've spent waaaaay too long focusing on the will save issue. That horse was dead 10 pages ago.
Cat-thulhu's post was brilliantly absurd and funny as hell. And his point was spot on.
Considering how many people on PF boards all over the internet unironically fall back on the "you just like/don't like this thing because you want an invincible character" argument I elected to take him at his word. Maybe you've never gotten into arguments against that the Slayer is the most overpowered thing EVAR that clearly has no purpose except to be the perfect be-all end-all murderhobo, which people only like because it's objectively the best at killing things, but I have.
I dunno about you, but "oh, just give everyone 9th-level casting, then. There, problem solved" type sarcasm was never particularly funny to me, particularly when it's used to dismiss a somewhat valid point that the Monk had to lose one of the more unique things about it, being the only class that didn't have a save weakness, to be brought in line with other combat classes. I'm not a fan of trying to browbeat someone into swallowing their concerns about a change in the class by painting them as a whiner because they don't agree with the design philosophy that brought it about.
For the record, I don't agree with the idea of being too negative about the NuMonk before play has confirmed or denied the theory spinning around it, and I think Mark's hopeful attitude is the proper one for exploring this new, experimental, and optional material. THAT BEING SAID, I feel like people have the right to say what they damn well please about the product when they're not satisfied. Some people feel that the...
This needs to be quoted for the sake of its awesomeness.
Soon my copy will come in today and I'll be able to build an analyze myself. I for one am very optimistic. The old monk is okay at my table due to third party products (3pp master race) so Unchained Monk probably has a good place if it's stronger. It would probably be a bigger problem if it was too strong.
Last year I played a monk 4/paladin 7 (hit 8th level about halfway through) all the way through Ruby Phoenix Tournament in a PbP on the boards. She could flurry with a glaive, made most saves on a 2+, and pretty much soloed a non-evil dragon (no smite) shortly after leveling up.
My Dragon Fist Style test unchained!monk has more attacks for more damage at better attack bonuses, has way better AC, more maneuverability and every once in awhile can just punch people as a touch attack because he feels like it. Oh, and his saves? -1 Fort, +1 Ref, -2 Will to hers. Not exactly character-breaking.
No argument that the monk (old and new) can be optimized into a very respectable combatant. But saying that a monk 4 / paladin 7+ has no save issues even with a low Will save on the monk is not exactly going to surprise anybody.
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As to the monk, if it was Reflex, then people would be complaining (rightly) that the evasion ability has become much weaker, since you get no use out of it if you fail a Reflex save. If it was Fortitude, it would be that a monk's body is perfected, a weapon, and that failed Fort saves can kill you or turn you stone. I know this because these are the discussions we had when Jason came in floating various options. We said all of these things, including the things on this thread about meditation and the mind when the option was Will. In the end, I'm glad he picked Will and not the others. Evasion still works, and the d10 hit dice means you can drop your Con and have the same number of hit points but Wisdom is still as important as ever, so mechanically I'd rather have weak Will progression and have a solid but not stellar Will instead of a horrifically low Fort (and thematically, weak Fort made the least sense of the three). So Jason definitely didn't make the decision flippantly; of all four classes, the monk took him the longest (he thought it would be the summoner) and went through the most iterations.
You could argue all of them, but there's no reason that the monk couldn't have all of them, is there? Other than "Well, that makes him a full BAB class with all good saves." It seems there is some consensus that thematically speaking, Will was the WORST save to nerf, if you had to nerf one, even if technically it was the easiest.
I appreciate the worries about dipping, but I'm afraid for the monk that's shutting the monastery door after the Master of Many Styles has bolted (an archetype perfectly made for other martials to dip). Dipping will happen, just as it happens with every class. So what if a lot of players decide they want a little of the monk's disciplined mind in their fighter? Is that actually a problem?
You don't see lots of Strength>Wisdom>Dexterity monks? I've seen quite a few. I guess if you usually see monks with pretty low Wisdom, I can see why the low Will would be particularly bad in that meta.
Sadly we do see these monks. I mean, the monk concept is inspired by the Shao Lin priest, a little guy in safron with great discipline and mental fortitude, but the only way to make a monk that is actually effective in combat in Pathfinder is to have hulking pile of muscle - and that, for many, is a problem. It's simply the way the combat system works: you need a high hitting stat first for a combat class, and that means Strength for a monk unless you pay the feat-tax for Dexterity and suck up poor damage output until you can get an agile amulet of mighty fists.
This was something that many people hoped you would fix, as it was certainly highlighted as a problem for many people on the forums as counter-intuitive for "their" monk concepts.
As for the "Well house-rule it!" if that was an answer Unchained was a waste of a book - you could claim every problem Unchained set out to fix was a "house-rule it" situation, so why produce the book?
Well, I think a lot of people would have been happier with keep your d8 hit die and your good will save than the hit die buffed to d10 but with a poor will save.
Absolutely.
One of the reasons I put in qinggong power (there were several) is to create a useful backdoor. I've seen new qinggong powers in various books, after all, and I figured that with that backdoor, a book, even one that wasn't supposed to be about the Unchained classes, could release new qinggong powers to create more ki powers. I am sneaky occasionally.
That was a very good move!
As an aside on enhancement cost, I definitely recommend using Automatic Bonus Progression in general to negate the need for Big 6, and if you do, it essentially gives the monk the cheaper enhancement cost.
IF your DM plays it, it's great! But relying on optional rules is not really good game design. Indeed, if I was playing a soulknife or a bladebound magus in a game with that rule I'd be a tad miffed as they automatically get an enhanced weapon as a class feature...
I know, I'm playing devil's advocate. But you don't make a good design by looking at the positives, you make a good design by taking your design and trying to break it.
As another aside, lot of these previews for Unchained monk have been leaving out the fact that Unchained flurry does not give any attack roll penalty. In terms of damage output, that +2 is worth a considerable amount; it's pretty important, and it's being overlooked.
I certainly haven't, and I rate the new flurry as an upgrade in the monk's offensive power. However, we worked out on one thread that the monk at mid-to-high levels was between +2 and +4 behind the other combat classes before they factor in their mojo (due mainly to MAD and the restrictions on the AoMF). This changes it to +0 to +2 behind them, so he's still behind. If you compare him to the fighter, for example, from 5th level the fighter is +1 better than the monk's (thanks to weapon training) and by 20th level the fighter is +8 better with exclusive feats and items as well as his abilities. So compared to that, the monk's flurry is -8 to -10 to hit...so an enemy that challenges the fighter to hit it will still prove nigh-impossible for the monk using just his flurry to hit it. I'm not saying the monk should be that accurate, but you can see now why I feel that MAD and enhancement are issues to be tackled.
The old monk was defensively good (the paladin is the best defensive class by a whisker), he needed improved offence and some synergy. You went halfway with the offence, all the way with the synergy, and then reduced the defences (and ruined the theme for me!).
I will say - getting an Agile AoMF ASAP and dumping Str solves this somewhat - though the 1.5x strength for two-handing flurry makes strength builds more viable unchained.
I agree, and it's my preferred build, but you are paying a one- or two-feat tax to pull it off, and losing +1 enhancement off your AoMF permanently.
As I mentioned a few pages back - this can be solved somewhat with an Allying cestus. Worst case (vary by DM) - you basically give up an iterative attack to give the weapon's enhancement bonus to your fist. Especially useful with the pummeling feats.
Again, using some kooky items to work around a limitation...works, but it feels a bit like cheating, and it's not perfect. What if you would have preferred some deliquescent gloves for a bit of extra damage?
Now - I will say - it does sound like the unchained monk will be easier to make pretty solid. One problem with the base monk is that while it can be made pretty solid (though a bit weak offensively) it takes mixing and matching archetypes, feats, and items from across different books. It certainly sounds like the unchained monk doesn't require that.
Unless you want the strong-willed spiritual warrior, which is my concept of the monk...sorry.
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Again, using some kooky items to work around a limitation...works, but it feels a bit like cheating, and it's not perfect. What if you would have preferred some deliquescent gloves for a bit of extra damage?
The deliquescent glove works. Just put a glove on your right hand and use the cestus in your left. (I'm not even sure a cestus uses up your hand slot.) Unless I'm a TWF character - I always share out one of my deliquscent gloves anyway. (unlike most gloves - no mention is made of needing to wear both for the effect.)
Unless you want the strong-willed spiritual warrior, which is my concept of the monk...sorry.
I meant purely from a power level perspective, not a fluff one.
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No argument that the monk (old and new) can be optimized into a very respectable combatant. But saying that a monk 4 / paladin 7+ has no save issues even with a low Will save on the monk is not exactly going to surprise anybody.Last year I played a monk 4/paladin 7 (hit 8th level about halfway through) all the way through Ruby Phoenix Tournament in a PbP on the boards. She could flurry with a glaive, made most saves on a 2+, and pretty much soloed a non-evil dragon (no smite) shortly after leveling up.
My Dragon Fist Style test unchained!monk has more attacks for more damage at better attack bonuses, has way better AC, more maneuverability and every once in awhile can just punch people as a touch attack because he feels like it. Oh, and his saves? -1 Fort, +1 Ref, -2 Will to hers. Not exactly character-breaking.
I don't think I was quite clear. I'm saying that that an unchained!monk 12 has comparable saves across the board to a core!monk 4/paladin 8. And yes, no one is surprised that a monk/paladin has good saves. I'm just pointing out that the unchained monk can do the same, despite all the teeth-gnashing over the poor Will save progression.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.
Hey.
Personally I like the introduction of ki powers as selectable class abilities (akin to rage powers and rogue talents); as this in theory allows monk-specific support in Paizo publications. It's kind of what I've done in my reinvention of the monk (Monk Unfettered). The specific implementation that was done in Unchained, however, is unattractive. Previously free powers now cost (a lot) of ki. Some powers are fairly good, some are still exorbitant (wholeness of body!).
The Ki Range power is probably in need of errata. As written there is no duration; so in principle a monk could "charge up" his shuriken until it had a range increment of 2000 ft.
Overall I think a better design approach for Ki Powers would have been a constant effect for having the ki power, and an activatable ki-based kicker. For example:
- "Wholeness of Body" could have absorbed purity of body as a constant effect and allow 1 ki as a swift action to heal monk-level in hit points.
- "Diamond Soul" would grant constant spell resistance and allow 2 ki as standard action to allow harmless spells to bypass spell resistance for 1 minute
- "Diamond Resilience" grants DR 2/- at 12th level, increasing by +1 every four levels. By spending 1 ki as a standard action the DR is doubled for 1 minute.
- "Abundant Step" grants +4 dodge bonus against AOOs caused by moving, and the monk can spend 2 ki as a move action to dimension door
- "Feather Balance" allows the monk to always take 10 when making a balance check, by spending 1 ki as a swift action he gains a +10 bonus to balance checks for 1 minute
But, that said, I think in terms of finding a sweetspot of buffing the monk and keeping the traditionalists happy the best decision would be to take the Style Strikes class feature and apply it on top of the original Core monk.
Edit: ...and perhaps replace Core flurry with Unchained flurry. It's just a neater way to handle flurries (and also a little bit like what I did in Monk Unfettered).
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So what would people say is the main identifying parts of the Monk now? Before I'd say the monk was Flurry (getting to attack better than his actual BAB) and all good Saves (a little shout out for movespeed). To me this was the monk. Ki didn't do much worth using except getting the extra attack in a flurry. And all the other things were underwhelming. The problem of the monk was gear, you couldn't use most of it and you needed special gear.
Now? From these posts the monk is Flurry and strikes for a flurry. Its saves are no longer a unique and identifying aspect of this monk.
I feel this is more of an alternate class to the brawler than a monk. Just take a look at rogue -> ninja, add a ki pool and ninja tricks for rogue tricks. Same for brawler -> monk. You're trading feats and wearing armor for a ki pool, ki abilities and a little better version of 2WF.
This is why I've stopped trying to think of the Unchained monk as a monk, but instead as a new class, the other version of the Brawler.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.
Well I'll just compare you to my level 12 monk
Hmmmm. All your saves are lower. Your flurry hits less often and deals less damage than my flurry, but you do have smite and divine bond. Your AC is 8 points lower. Your health is lower, but you have means to regain health as a swift action. Your skills are more diverse, but my 4 are higher. Your CMB is lower by 4 points. Your CMD is lower by 1 point. Your speed is 30ft lower.
All in all, your character is probably functional. But it does not seem to be blowing base monk out of the water.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.
How are you getting the Unchained monk close to a base 16 will save? As you don't have a cloak of resist at all on your monkadin and you calculated his will save wrong, it should be a 16. It starts with a 4 + wisdom so even if it's a +5 (two higher than your monkadin) that's a 9. iron will for 11. so spending a feat and investing even more in wisdom is getting you to a -5 from your monkadin. If you monkadin had 10's for wisdom and cha his will save would still be one point higher than the UC!monk with a +5 wis mod.
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Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.Well I'll just compare you to my level 12 monk
Hmmmm. All your saves are lower. Your flurry hits less often and deals less damage than my flurry, but you do have smite and divine bond. Your AC is 8 points lower. Your health is lower, but you have means to regain health as a swift action. Your skills are more diverse, but my 4 are higher. Your CMB is lower by 4 points. Your CMD is lower by 1 point. Your speed is 30ft lower.
All in all, your character is probably functional. But it does not seem to be blowing base monk out of the water.
Uh...that's a core monk/paladin. His point was that Unchained Monk was better than it in just about every way (slightly worse saves). So...that's not the build he said was blowing core monk out of the water.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.Well I'll just compare you to my level 12 monk
Hmmmm. All your saves are lower. Your flurry hits less often and deals less damage than my flurry, but you do have smite and divine bond. Your AC is 8 points lower. Your health is lower, but you have means to regain health as a swift action. Your skills are more diverse, but my 4 are higher. Your CMB is lower by 4 points. Your CMD is lower by 1 point. Your speed is 30ft lower.
All in all, your character is probably functional. But it does not seem to be blowing base monk out of the water.
It looks Like Asha is a Core Monk + Paladin. But I would like to point out in the comparison that gear does make a difference. For instance Rhedyn you character has a Cloak of Resistance, Asha does not seem to have one of those. I'd compare the two but the google doc is a bit messy on my screen.
EDIT: Ninja'd by deadmanwalking
How are you getting the Unchained monk close to a base 16 will save? As you don't have a cloak of resist at all on your monkadin and you calculated his will save wrong, it should be a 16. It starts with a 4 + wisdom so even if it's a +5 (two higher than your monkadin) that's a 9. iron will for 11. so spending a feat and investing even more in wisdom is getting you to a -5 from your monkadin. If you monkadin had 10's for wisdom and cha his will save would still be one point higher than the UC!monk with a +5 wis mod.Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.
I agree, there's something pretty fundamentally wrong if you think an Unchained Monk 12's Will Save is comparable to a Core Monk 4/Paladin 8's Will save. Either your calculations are off, or you not telling us something pretty important about your Unchained Monk 12.
Uh...that's a core monk/paladin. His point was that Unchained Monk was better than it in just about every way (slightly worse saves). So...that's not the build he said was blowing core monk out of the water.Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.Well I'll just compare you to my level 12 monk
Hmmmm. All your saves are lower. Your flurry hits less often and deals less damage than my flurry, but you do have smite and divine bond. Your AC is 8 points lower. Your health is lower, but you have means to regain health as a swift action. Your skills are more diverse, but my 4 are higher. Your CMB is lower by 4 points. Your CMD is lower by 1 point. Your speed is 30ft lower.
All in all, your character is probably functional. But it does not seem to be blowing base monk out of the water.
I was just comparing his numbers to a decently optimized monk (you can make a monk that is far stronger, but it is beyond my splat-fu)
If his point was that the unchained monk was better than his build, then that is not saying much since an old monk can be built with better non-smite numbers.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.Well I'll just compare you to my level 12 monk
Hmmmm. All your saves are lower. Your flurry hits less often and deals less damage than my flurry, but you do have smite and divine bond. Your AC is 8 points lower. Your health is lower, but you have means to regain health as a swift action. Your skills are more diverse, but my 4 are higher. Your CMB is lower by 4 points. Your CMD is lower by 1 point. Your speed is 30ft lower.
All in all, your character is probably functional. But it does not seem to be blowing base monk out of the water.
It looks Like Asha is a Core Monk + Paladin. But I would like to point out in the comparison that gear does make a difference. For instance Rhedyn you character has a Cloak of Resistance, Asha does not seem to have one of those. I'd compare the two but the google doc is a bit messy on my screen.
EDIT: Ninja'd by deadmanwalking
Mine is exactly WBL.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.
So, 13/12/15 16. I'm kinda having a hard time seeing how this "passed every save except on a 1", as you claimed. It's nowhere near that for level 12.
If that's your benchmark for "stellar" (rather than simply "good") I'm not sure we can continue this conversation.
Plus, an Unchained Monk would still be behind you on Will, as we've been saying. Without a Cloak he'd be at around 11/11/9 (with a 20 Wis, 16 Dex, and 16 Con). I'd hardly call a 7 point deficit only a little behind.
So they're not comparable in any case, unless I'm missing something?
You're missing that the Monk you're looking at doesn't have a Cloak of Resistance. As I'm unsure what game the character is played in it may have an impact on what items they have available to them.
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I agree, there's something pretty fundamentally wrong if you think an Unchained Monk 12's Will Save is comparable to a Core Monk 4/Paladin 8's Will save. Either your calculations are off, or you not telling us something pretty important about your Unchained Monk 12.
Well, lesse, by dropping Cha to, say, 10, the listed character goes up to Wis 18, and saves 6k (from dropping Cha from the headband) for a Cloak of Resistance +2, and grab Iron Will with one of the Feats unneeded by an unarmed build. That'd give +11 Fort, +13 Reflex, and +12 Will. That's not quite on par, but it's not notably lower, and if you make the Cloak +3, that ups it to +12 Fort, +14 Ref, +13 Will, and -1, +2, -3.
In short, it being on par is an artifact of having no Cloak of Resistance on the Monkadin, but very plausible, and an average of +13 or so on Saves at 12th level are decent (if not stellar) saves.
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Actually, my point was that switching to the unchained monk was doing nothing to harm my saves as compared to a solid 12th level character with good saves that I had handy to compare it to - and that I wasn't having to give up combat functionality to keep the Will save respectable.
(Although Chess Pwn is totally right about my Will calculation being off on Asha, which annoys me because I went through the whole smurfing mod with that missing point.)
For that matter, I'm not even necessarily saying that Asha or my test monk are objectively awesome - but I do know that the one is more than serviceable in an actual game, so she's a decent touchstone to compare the theorycraft test monk against, and I also know that, since they were made by the same guy, the level of optimization-fu is going to be about the same in both cases.
Long and short of it: the unchained monk does its job, by the yardsticks I have relatively easy access to.
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Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.
Since everyone's tearing my build apart (always the result of posting one in discussions like these, of course), I did have a couple of points about yours. I don't see where you could legally get Power Attack at 1st level - unless you retrained, I guess? The ability to take Weapon Focus or Power Attack at 1st is actually one of the things I like about the unchained monk vs the core version. Your unarmed damage looks like it's too high too - I'm only coming up with 2d6+15 or 2d6+12, not 2d8+17/+14.
In general, though, this looks a whole lot like my test monk.
Did you take into account Dragon Style, Shisumo?
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Did you take into account Dragon Style, Shisumo?
Unless I'm calculating it wrong, yes. With Str 22 she should be getting 2d6 + 6 (Str) + 3 (Dragon Style) + 3 (Dragon Ferocity) + 3 (enhancement) = 15 on the first attack and the same minus Dragon Style on the rest for a total of 12. (Plus you have to be 16th level to get 2d8 base damage, or have a spiffy robe.)
EDIT: Sorry, there's just a typo in her Dragon Roar damage, it looks like. My mistake.
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I have finally read the monk, and I am utterly dumbfounded how people can think this is anything but a huge upgrade for the class. A number of abilities people begged for in the Beta made it into this class, which I found very interesting.
It really seems that people are kneejerk reacting to the lower Will save, and greatly blowing that out of proportion than what it's truly worth. I'm going to be running the numbers on that later on. I do recall that when people were saying the monk was weak, they were running numbers against CR equal foes, so I'll take their lead and use that as the benchmark. That's only fair.
Are you factoring in the bits about almost all the class features it had previously being gutted to be selectable and require Ki to use?
And as a minor thing, Quivering Palm got nerfstomped into the Pit of Rovagug.
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In for a penny, in for a pound, I suppose.
This is a 20 point buy character. Starting stats were Str 15 (+2), Dex 14, Con 13, Int 10, Wis 15 (+2), Cha 8. Level ups went to Str (4th), Wis (8th) and Con (12th). The listed stats include a pre-cast barkskin (since it lasts for two hours at this level) and being in Dragon Style stance.
Dragon Fist monk
LN Medium humanoid (human)
Init +2; Senses Perception +21
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DEFENSE
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AC 31, touch 21, flat-footed 30
(armor +3, Dex +2, dodge +1, monk +4, natural +5, Wis +6)
hp 106 (12d10+36)
Fort +14, Ref +14, Will +16; +2 vs enchantments, paralysis, sleep, stunning
Defensive Abilities evasion, improved evasion, purity of body, still mind; Immune disease
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OFFENSE
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Spd 70 ft., wind jump
Melee +3 unarmed strike +22 (2d8+15, 19-20/x2) and +3 unarmed strike +17/+12 (2d8+12, 19-20/x2) or
flurry of blows +22 (2d8+15, 19-20/x2) and +22/+17/+12 (2d8+12, 19-20/x2)
Special Attacks Elemental Fist 12/day (3d6), flurry of blows, ki strike (cold iron, magic, lawful, silver), Stunning Fist 13/day (DC 22), style strike (flying kick, hammerblow)
Spell-Like Abilities (CL 12th):
1 ki - barkskin
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STATISTICS
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Str 22 (+6), Dex 14 (+2), Con 14 (+2), Int 10 (+0), Wis 22 (+6), Cha 8 (-1)
Base Atk +12; CMB +18 (+20 grapple); CMD 41 (43 vs grapple)
Feats Combat Reflexes, Dodge, Dragon Ferocity, Dragon Style, Elemental Fist, Improved Critical (unarmed), Improved Grapple, Improved Unarmed Strike, Iron Will, Power Attack, Stunning Fist, Weapon Focus (unarmed)
Skills Acrobatics +17 (+45 jumping), Climb +14, Knowledge (religion) +8, Perception +21, Sense Motive +21, Stealth +10, Swim +14
Languages Common
SQ ki pool (12 pts), ki powers (high jump, one touch, qinggong power – barkskin, sudden speed, wind jump)
Combat Gear none; Other Gear amulet of mighty fists +3 (36,000 gp), belt of giant’s strength +4 (16,000), bracers of armor +3 (9,000), cloak of resistance +4 (16,000 gp), headband of inspired wisdom +4 (16,000), monk’s robes (13,000 gp), 2,000 gp in various useful items.
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It makes no sense. If the a good class is worth 10 points and the Monk is worth 5, why would you add 4 points and them remove other 3, making the final result barely any better than it was?Because the whole is different than the sum of its parts, and that's always been one of the big problems with the monk class ever since 3.0, the monk looked good on paper (so many special abilities, such good defenses, etc) but just didn't come together in actual play, and, in particular, a class can have enough overall stuff to be balanced in its amount of abilities, but if too much is defense and it doesn't have something useful to contribute, then the rest doesn't matter.
Let's use the rogue as a case study. Upthread, people have stated that even if the normal rogue got all three strong saves (let's call it the save rogue), the Unchained rogue would still be better because the normal rogue is too wimpy, so surviving doesn't matter if you can't do anything in the first place. In that regard, people said upthread that they would prefer the Unchained rogue (with its only good Ref) to the save rogue. The rogue's issue in a fight was that it combined poor defense with offense that was situational at best.
In that vein, consider also a hypothetical class called "Turtle" that basically had the ability to turn all attacks against it into auto-misses and auto-succeeded at all saves, but literally could do nothing except sit around on its turn. This class is terrible! It's probably the weakest class in the game. If we were trying to fix the turtle class, we would need to add some ability to do something, for sure. Let's give it effective offense commensurate to a combatant PC. But once we make the turtle useful at fighting, we definitely need to weaken those auto-win abilities I mentioned earlier, even though it was the weakest class in the game before we added the offense. Sometimes, something can be a bad sum of its parts while having enough parts, and be made into something really fun by rearranging, rather than adding.
However, that Turtle example is an extreme that doesn't really represent the Monk situation. Monks have always had good defense,s but they were never impregnable and certainly weren't anywhere close to "auto-win"... Even their saves suffered because of MADness. A rearranging might be enough if the Core Monk were just a little weaker than most classes... That wasn't the case.
You could have literally just given them Full BAB, proficiency with all Monk weapons, a little more mobility and maybe a simpler/better FoB (which, let's be honest, are all really freaking obvious changes that I've seen implemented by dozens of GMs) and the Monk still wouldn't be even close to OP.
The Monk nerfs were unnecessary and anti-thematic. Jason (or whoever did it) went overboard trying to "balance" the Unchained Monk. The nerfs hurt the class' theme and effectiveness and don't really improve game balance. Specially when some of the most glaring problems with the class went completely ignored.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.
Your Monkadin has the base saves of +10/+6/+10.
Unchained Monk has base saves of +8/+8/+4.Core Monk has base saves of +8/+8/+8.
Unchained Monkadin has base saves of +10/+6/+7
I'm assuming Asha is a Dual Talent Human with a 20 pt buy of Str 14, Dex 13, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 14 and Cha 14 as that's the only way I could get the point buy to work.
Both Monkadins will use the same stats Asha already has, those being:
Str 22, Dex 16, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 16, Cha 16
The Unchained Monk/Core Monk will be a little different. They don't need Charisma, so we'll drop that to 10, and bump Wisdom to a 16. To keep her magic items roughly the same, she'll have a +2 Dex Ioun stone and +2 Wisdom headband instead of the Headband of Mental Prowess. This means her stats, after level ups and magic items, for the Unchained Monk and Core Monk are as follows:
Str 22, Dex 18, Con 12, Int 10, Wis 18, Cha 10
As a Monkadin, she would have saves of +14/+12/+16
As an Unchained Monk she would have saves of +9/+12/+8
As a Core Monk she would have saves of +9/+12/+12
As an Unchained Monkadin she would have saves of +14/+12/+13
I think these numbers paints a fairly good picture of things. The Unchained Monk is -4 to the Core Monk (meaning a 20% increase in failing those Will saves), where as the Unchained Monkadin is only -3 (15% increase in Will save failure) compared to the Core Monkadin.
However, that speaks more for the Paladin than anything else. It's worth noting that the 8 levels of Paladin is providing a total of +12 bonus to her Will saves. That's right, the 8th level Paladin has an equal Will save to that of the Core Monk.
In the future, I would advise not trying to use a build with levels in Paladin because the Paladin is the most defensively powerful class in the game. Even more so now.
*sigh*
I'll stop ranting... It's pointless, anyway. The ship's sailed. No need to annoy Mark any longer.
The unchained Monk is disappointing, but workable... It's still a step up from the normal Monk, even if only slightly so. As with any book, there's good and bad in PFU... At least the new Rogue is pretty cool from what I've seen.
One minor detail - Asha is wearing a snakeskin tunic, which among other things grants a +2 bonus to dexterity.
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I think these numbers paints a fairly good picture of things. The Unchained Monk is -4 to the Core Monk (meaning a 20% increase in failing those Will saves), where as the Unchained Monkadin is only -3 (15% increase in Will save failure) compared to the Core Monkadin.
Your percentages are low. It's just like how Weapon Focus gives more than a 5% accuracy increase.
For example - with your '20%' unchained vs core, in a situation where the core monk would pass their save 50% of the time, the unchained monk would pass only 30% of the time. This would be a 40% decease in pass rate. The higher the DC, the more of a difference the unchained monk's low save will be. (and vica versa)
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One minor detail - Asha is wearing a snakeskin tunic, which among other things grants a +2 bonus to dexterity.
Yeah, she wasn't dual talented. No reason she couldn't have been, though - I certainly wouldn't need Performance Combat in any game other than the specific one I built her for. That lets Tels move her ioun stone over to Constitution and boost her Fort save.
Also, Tels, if you want something more specifically relevant to this thread to tear up, I posted an unchained monk at the same level a few posts up.
Somehow I doubt that, unless you neglected your Cha. Gimme some numbers on your Monkadin.Hey.Since everyone's tearing my build apart (always the result of posting one in discussions like these, of course), I did have a couple of points about yours. I don't see where you could legally get Power Attack at 1st level - unless you retrained, I guess? The ability to take Weapon Focus or Power Attack at 1st is actually one of the things I like about the unchained monk vs the core version. Your unarmed damage looks like it's too high too - I'm only coming up with 2d6+15 or 2d6+12, not 2d8+17/+14.
In general, though, this looks a whole lot like my test monk.
Oh yeah PA doesn't work at first level. It drops the to hit too low for me to even notice that (as in I didn't use it when I ran this monk against some players).
Dragon Roar, or Power attack would have to be moved to a later level.
Dragon Roar, or Power attack would have to be moved to a later level.Did you use Dragon Roar? Because I'm pretty iffy on it - I wound up dropping it out of my test monk. Be interested to hear a different perspective.
It is an AOE will save for half. Against foes impossible to hit otherwise, it is some damage rather than no damage.
That is probably the one to go.
I have finally read the monk, and I am utterly dumbfounded how people can think this is anything but a huge upgrade for the class.
I'm in total agreement with you there.
I'm going to be running the numbers on that later on. I do recall that when people were saying the monk was weak, they were running numbers against CR equal foes, so I'll take their lead and use that as the benchmark. That's only fair.
Totally looking forward to seeing that.
It's just like how Weapon Focus gives more than a 5% accuracy increase.
First I've heard that. How do you figure?
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It's just like how Weapon Focus gives more than a 5% accuracy increase.First I've heard that. How do you figure?
He's describing the difference between percentages and percentage points.
Say you have an attack bonus such that, against AC X, you hit 50% of the time - so, in 20 attacks, you'd expect to hit 10 times. If you get a +1 bonus, that increases to 55%, or 11 attacks out of 20. 11/10 is a 10% increase, not a 5% increase, even though your attack percentage increased by 5 percentage points.
Dragon Roar, or Power attack would have to be moved to a later level.Did you use Dragon Roar? Because I'm pretty iffy on it - I wound up dropping it out of my test monk. Be interested to hear a different perspective.
I ran it at high levels for a while (on the character I posted up above), and it wasn't super useful. Got one decent use out of it against a group of Leukodaemons, but that's about it.