Zen Archer Monk Flurry of Blows Vs Rapid and Many Shot

[Koshimo]

As the title alludes to, my question here is why would (especially before unchained) a Zen Archer Monk take rapid and manyshot (since they are on his bonus feat list) instead of simply flurrying every time his BAB goes up he saves two feats and at the end of the day he ends up with 2 extra attacks on a full attack so what gives?

FOB ends up with 7 attacks RMS ends up with 5 it makes no sense why any ZA would take them so why are they there?

[Ms. Pleiades]

Even some of the best archetypes in the game have trap options.

[Chengar Qordath]

I suspect they didn't put much thought into the Zen Archer bonus feat list beyond "Just replace the default list with a grab-bag of archery feats."

[Errant Mercenary]

The Unchained monk does get less attacks than old monks, so if you are converting perhaps you could let them use one of those feats with it. However, archers dont really need help as it stands.

[Thac20]

Monks can take the Manyshot feat without prerequisites. Manyshot works fine with Flurry of Blows.

[Gwen Smith]

I suppose you could use Rapid Shot or Manyshot as prerequisites for other feats you wanted (like Stabbing Shot or Snap Shot) and skip the some of the prerequisites.

Manyshot does let you throw out an extra arrow without taking the iterative attack penalty, so I suppose you could pick it up without Rapid Shot for those corner cases when you want to shoot twice without the extra -2 for either Rapid Shot or flurry.

It might be theoretically useful for people who are multiclassing and not going all the way up the Zen Archer tree. (Level 7 is my favorite exit point for multiclassing monks.)

Or maybe Chengar's right and they needed more feats for the list and said, "Here, these have bows in them".

Those are my best guesses. Didn't say they were "good" guesses.

[Chess Pwn]

Well, you can take a dip as a fighter or bloodrager or something and get those feats and boost your saves. Two levels gives a lot for a monk.

[Melvin the Mediocre]

Thac20 wrote:

Monks can take the Manyshot feat without prerequisites. Manyshot works fine with Flurry of Blows.

you might be thinking of the Sohie monk. Unfortunately, the Zen Archer has this stipulation:

SRD wrote:

A zen archer cannot use Rapid Shot or Manyshot when making a flurry of blows with his bow.

[Imbicatus]

Rapid Shot and Manyshot should not be taken with bonus feats if you are staying single class Zen Archer. However, if you are multiclassing then it's an excellent way to pick up the feats as they will be more effective than flurrying.