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Well you don't need wisdom at all for monks now, even if you want to use ki powers.
Str monks are definitely fine, and Dex monks don't need str at high levels, but it helps at low levels.
There is a stance so Str monks don't need as much Dex, but using that means they do less damage.
Weapon using monks probably won't be able to do as much damage as unarmed monks.
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They to a big part because the whole combat and character advancement mechanics around them changed. Style wise they stayed similar, I would say. But:
- because of 3 action rounds, the mobile flurry monk is now supported by the rules a LOT better
- all classes have the building-block of class feats design to allow for great customization
- There seem to be STR monk paths
- Yes, KI powers are optional
I think your monkey-peaseants, bruisers and bear-punchers can be pure monk builds. The polearm master would probably better be a fighter multiclassed into monk because the only monk-compatible polearm in the game seems to be the staff.
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So this might be a little mystic for your tastes, but I'm going to share anyway. Last night, the 10th level monk in my playtest game was fighting wvyern riders. He ran up a building and wall jumped off of it to reach and injured wvyern and hit it with a flurry in one turn, slaying it and dropping the rider out of the sky. The other riders took heed of this and gained altitude to 75 feet and started raining arrows.
The next round, the monk combined 2 ki powers to leap 75 feet straight up, landing on a wvyern and flurrying the rider. Another rider flew over to try nd help fight this crazy monk.
The next round, the monk flurries the hurt rider, killing him with a flaming headbutt. Then he reaches over and grapples the other rider, and uses his Whirling Throw feat to toss him off the wvyern and at a huge sized enemy on the ground. At this point, the wyverns don't have their riders, so they just try and buck him off. One succeeded in doing so... but the monk used a grab edge reaction to snag onto the other wvyern. That is where we paused for the night.
Monks are doing pretty good, is what I'm saying. :)
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I played a monk during the play test and it went quite well, it was a Str/Wis monk (Ki powers still need Wisdom, but they’re completely opt-in) and I managed to do the most damage in our party, so they’re QUITE viable. I will say weapon master monks seem a bit on the kooky side looking at just the play test, but apparently there are more monk weapons to make us of, so that’s nice. Also, in regards to your “just punch the bear” character, the Brawler class is what they made to fill that gap that they accidentally made with the Monk, but now baseline monks can do that right off the bat!
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I just want weapons monks to be good
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I just want weapons monks to be good
Bo staff is a solid weapon: d8, reach, parry, trip: it compares well with their stances.
One handed, you have the temple sword: a 1d8 trip is fine there too.
Dex weapon would be the Nunchaku: 1d6, Backswing, disarm, finesse
Ranged is a bit worse IMO: Shuriken main downfall is the 1d4 damage. Other than that it's a pretty good weapon. Agile 20' thrown weapon with a 0 reload isn't bad, though you have to by the return 'enchant' if you're going to use magic ones. I kind of wish they'd have made the weapon exotic instead of martial so they could bump the damage to 1d6.
The rest are kind of meh... Kama can work ok for an off hand weapon [it's agile] so you're trading damage for to hit. The rest are pretty niche.
Overall, decent options IMO.
EDIT: of course this is just from the last playtest. It's possible some of this has changed.
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Logan talked about the monk a little bit on last week's Know Direction, starting here
I never heard of the Brawler class. I'm glad they rolled it in with the monk, though. I love the idea of a Pugilist strait out of a Final Fantasy game.
I kinda figured that warrior monks who specialized in weapons would need to be Fighters. I don't mind, though. If I ever get an urge to make a Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon character I can just make a Fighter and give it some monk feats later on. Kinda lame that they would need to wear armor to be optimal, though.
I'll give that Know Direction link a look. Thank you!
Unless they changed/came out with new abilities, I don't think they rolled Brawler into anything. Yeah there's always been the idea of "Unarmed combatant that isn't Ki Powered" but Brawler was more than just that.
And given that Combat Feats are gone, I don't see how you can have a Class like Brawler anymore.
And given that Combat Feats are gone, I don't see how you can have a Class like Brawler anymore.
Floating class feats? Maybe swap 1/day and give it a focus ability to switch the floating feat to another faster? Plus, if you multiclassed you could pull from another classes class feats.
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And given that Combat Feats are gone, I don't see how you can have a Class like Brawler anymore.Floating class feats? Maybe swap 1/day and give it a focus ability to switch the floating feat to another faster? Plus, if you multiclassed you could pull from another classes class feats.
Pretty much this. Though I think Merlin is right in regards to it being a full class would seem somewhat redundant. I can see it as an MC Archetype, and limit the feats you can grab to ones with the open, press, stance, or attack traits so you don’t have to worry about certain feats being grabbed when they aren’t supposed to. I would probably also limit the class to Martials, but that’s just me.
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And given that Combat Feats are gone, I don't see how you can have a Class like Brawler anymore.Floating class feats? Maybe swap 1/day and give it a focus ability to switch the floating feat to another faster? Plus, if you multiclassed you could pull from another classes class feats.
Pretty sure the fighter have a feature that let him choose, at the start of each day, a class feat that he have for the day. At medium level (don't remember , but I think it was around 10-12)
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And given that Combat Feats are gone, I don't see how you can have a Class like Brawler anymore.Floating class feats? Maybe swap 1/day and give it a focus ability to switch the floating feat to another faster? Plus, if you multiclassed you could pull from another classes class feats.
The multiclass part sounds like it could just ripe for abuse in practice. But they'd(hopefully) figure out how to restrict it a bit. Like Brawler 9/Fighter 1 shouldn't qualify for Certain Strike as a fast example.
But this is more a Monk topic. I just dislike that Brawler is waved off as "Monk without Ki".
Is it the Flurry or the Unarmed damage that makes it so? If it's the latter, there's a lot of archetypes in PF1 that were "Monk without Ki"
Can you even do Unarmed without being a Monk or taking Monk Dedication?
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And given that Combat Feats are gone, I don't see how you can have a Class like Brawler anymore.Floating class feats? Maybe swap 1/day and give it a focus ability to switch the floating feat to another faster? Plus, if you multiclassed you could pull from another classes class feats.The multiclass part sounds like it could just ripe for abuse in practice. But they'd(hopefully) figure out how to restrict it a bit. Like Brawler 9/Fighter 1 shouldn't qualify for Certain Strike as a fast example.
But this is more a Monk topic. I just dislike that Brawler is waved off as "Monk without Ki".
Is it the Flurry or the Unarmed damage that makes it so? If it's the latter, there's a lot of archetypes in PF1 that were "Monk without Ki"
Can you even do Unarmed without being a Monk or taking Monk Dedication?
Last part: Kinda yes, you're just limited to "trained" and base unarmed dmg that doesn'T scale though. But now it's at least something you can try if you must. (It doesn't trigger AoO)
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Oh. Wait, so was Brawler one of those composite classes? I remember they made a few of those, where Ninja was basically a Monk/Rogue and Samurai was a Cavalier/Fighter(?). Did they combine two classes to get Brawler as well?
Also, have dual hook-swords been confirmed? I vaguely remember them being in the first edition.
Brawler was Fighter/Monk, yeah, but Ninja and Samurai were more like "Mega-Archetype" (for Rogue and Cavalier, respectively) that changed too much a class to still be an archetype.
Also, we don't really have any confirmation for non standard weapons in core. But if it was used in PF1, you can be sure it'll come back some times, proabably within the first year in a "Ultimate Equipment" 2.0+
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Pretty sure the fighter have a feature that let him choose, at the start of each day, a class feat that he have for the day. At medium level (don't remember , but I think it was around 10-12)And given that Combat Feats are gone, I don't see how you can have a Class like Brawler anymore.Floating class feats? Maybe swap 1/day and give it a focus ability to switch the floating feat to another faster? Plus, if you multiclassed you could pull from another classes class feats.
Yup he had in the playtest, it was Combat Flexibility, it was at lvl 9 and 15.
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Holy crap, that's so cool and cinematic! Yeah it's a bit mystical but it's a way better portrayal of monks than what I had in mind. I'm starting to feel better about this!
Monks are doing pretty good, is what I'm saying. :)
FWIW we had a more brutish strength monk in Doomsday Dawn who didn't use ki powers. At high levels, when he landed both hits in a flurry he was rolling 10d12, and he was inflicting automatic damage when he grappled and such.
The new flurry and action economy lend themselves extremely well to doing cinematic stunts because you can spend your first two actions on such shenanigans and still throw out 2 attacks with your last one.
Yup he had in the playtest, it was Combat Flexibility, it was at lvl 9 and 15.Pretty sure the fighter have a feature that let him choose, at the start of each day, a class feat that he have for the day. At medium level (don't remember , but I think it was around 10-12)And given that Combat Feats are gone, I don't see how you can have a Class like Brawler anymore.Floating class feats? Maybe swap 1/day and give it a focus ability to switch the floating feat to another faster? Plus, if you multiclassed you could pull from another classes class feats.
It helps but I can't help but feel it was just a small bone/nod to what they learned with Brawler.
Meanwhile Brawler could slide into some Ranged feats for a fight and not be locked into that for the day.
I suppose 2.0 Combat Flex is good if your spellcasters are Scrying.
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I feel like one thing that kind of makes brawler style flexibility less necessary in PF2 is that most combat styles no longer require a massive feat investment to be functional. Like grappling feats are no longer math enhancers that help you successfully grapple, they give you options for things you can do to someone you can grapple. A 15th level fighter with 16 dex and mastery with the longbow should be able to hit a lot of things with arrows without a single archery feat.
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The multiclass part sounds like it could just ripe for abuse in practice. But they'd(hopefully) figure out how to restrict it a bit. Like Brawler 9/Fighter 1 shouldn't qualify for Certain Strike as a fast example.
I'm pretty sure you count your second class 1/2 your main class level for feat prerequisites with multiclass.
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Thanks for the responses guys. I don't believe I have ever been this excited to play a Monk in any variation of the genre. Sounds like there is a good deal of variability as well. Maybe I can finally do a Wuxia scenario and not worry about all the players being too similar in mechanics or play style.
Especially given the multiclass archetypes, an all-monk party could be quite varied
I think you could probably make any single-class party work if the selected class was a martial. All-Wizard, e.g., is more difficult to imagine without the baseline defenses, weapon proficiencies, a hit points you'd get from all-martial. (The exception to this thought would likely be all-Barbarian, just bc of the poor fit between rage and spellcasting).
I know Mark ran an all-Fighter game at PaizoCon that was by all accounts quite successful.
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Thanks for the responses guys. I don't believe I have ever been this excited to play a Monk in any variation of the genre. Sounds like there is a good deal of variability as well. Maybe I can finally do a Wuxia scenario and not worry about all the players being too similar in mechanics or play style.
This is particularly true if you're willing to accept multiclass characters. Giving everyone a free multiclass into Monks (or Monks a free multiclass of their choice) is a pretty solid way to do a wuxia game without restricting character Class directly.
And is very doable in PF2 in a way it wasn't in PF1.
EDIT: Partially ninja'd...by a lot. Computer problems are weird.
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Oh. Wait, so was Brawler one of those composite classes? I remember they made a few of those, where Ninja was basically a Monk/Rogue and Samurai was a Cavalier/Fighter(?). Did they combine two classes to get Brawler as well?
Also, have dual hook-swords been confirmed? I vaguely remember them being in the first edition.
Brawler was Fighter/Monk, yeah, but Ninja and Samurai were more like "Mega-Archetype" (for Rogue and Cavalier, respectively) that changed too much a class to still be an archetype.
Also, we don't really have any confirmation for non standard weapons in core. But if it was used in PF1, you can be sure it'll come back some times, proabably within the first year in a "Ultimate Equipment" 2.0+
Yeah, based off of the Playtest Barbarian, an Animal Instinct Barbarian would make a decent 'brawler' substitute. I would go with either a bull or an Ape for the concept.
I've been theory-crafting a concept of a Lizardfolk Dragon Instinct Barbarian Multiclassed with Monk to grab some things like Flurry of Blows who will focus and using his breath weapon to tenderize his foes, then wade in and tear them up with a flurry of claw strikes.
My own character that was never well supported officially was a scholarly INT monk.
Here's hoping I can pull one off in 2E!
Bard MCA is probably too restrictive for it...
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I feel like one thing that kind of makes brawler style flexibility less necessary in PF2 is that most combat styles no longer require a massive feat investment to be functional. Like grappling feats are no longer math enhancers that help you successfully grapple, they give you options for things you can do to someone you can grapple. A 15th level fighter with 16 dex and mastery with the longbow should be able to hit a lot of things with arrows without a single archery feat.
And yet I would prefer to decide at the start of a fight "Am I going to be grapple based or given that it can fly, should I take some Archery Feats to help me fight it".
That 15th level Fighter can hit things with a bow yes. But he still has to pick "Do I want to be a better Archer or a better Melee today" is the issue. Yes you could just use Brawler to sneak past the Feat Tax problems but being able to pick up 1-3 feats at the start of a fight was really fun and let you choose how to fight that battle. I mean I like Pummeling Style, but I'd like to only have that for DR enemies. I can do that with PF1 Flexing.
And really something that should have it's own topic. Again I just dislike that Brawler seems to be "Ki-less Monk" when it brings it's own style of play to the table.
That aside, I know people want Ki-less Monks for..., flavor or mechanics reasons but what do you DO as a monk if you don't have your Not magic but totally magic powers?
Cause it seems like asking the Spellcaster for buffs is out or at least not as useful.
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Oh yeah, apparently Stunning Fist try to stun the target if you hit both attacks of Flurry of Blows, it's looks really good now.
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My own character that was never well supported officially was a scholarly INT monk.
Here's hoping I can pull one off in 2E!
Bard MCA is probably too restrictive for it...
Well, I don't think there's going to be any direct support for it in core. The monk probably won't have any features running off intelligence. It barely has any that run off Wisdom at this point. But there's no reason you can't make Intelligence one of the four stats you boost regularly, and skill feats will let you add various scholarly abilities to the monk without sacrificing your core combat abilities.
^ Sounds like good material for Monk with Multiclass:Occultist or Investigator.
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I mean in core there's the wizard and the alchemist if you want to start dipping. Mutagens seem good on a monk.
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I mean in core there's the wizard and the alchemist if you want to start dipping. Mutagens seem good on a monk.
Flurry of Bombs?
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My own character that was never well supported officially was a scholarly INT monk.
Here's hoping I can pull one off in 2E!
Bard MCA is probably too restrictive for it...
We had a Monk in the playtest who managed to have good stats in everything but Con (his Con was 10). Going Int over Con and other mental stats seems very viable all things considered.
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Monk seemed fine playtest wise
As people said, decent ammount of weapons
The weapons are about as viable as an unarmed monk with styles
The equipment cost with attack aqnd defense enhancing items is about in line with the other classes while balance wise the monk doesn't have dmg inflation while loosing hut chance
Just one thing about the monk I will probably houserule:
If a character picks his racial weapons prophiciency and the monastic weaponry they can consider their racial weapons as monk weapons, should add a nice spin too it and open some interesting option
Just one thing about the monk I will probably houserule:
If a character picks his racial weapons prophiciency and the monastic weaponry they can consider their racial weapons as monk weapons, should add a nice spin too it and open some interesting option
Expect to see a LOT of elf monks: Flurry with a bow blows the other monk ranged option out of the water and dex elves will love the curve blade. About the only competition for other races is 2 handed dwarf waraxe strength monks for a 1d12.
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I'm hoping there's good options for a ki sage or sensei style of monk, who focuses more exclusively on wisdom and ranged or support powers, or on disabling and maneuvers and not on just dealing damage.
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I'm hoping there's good options for a ki sage or sensei style of monk, who focuses more exclusively on wisdom and ranged or support powers, or on disabling and maneuvers and not on just dealing damage.
Even if there isn't in the corebook, this is very doable with additional Class Feats alone, so it will probably happen eventually.
And even if you can't do it solely with Monk, Cha 14 and a Bard Multiclass seem likely to allow something in this vein for the support stuff.
That aside, I know people want Ki-less Monks for..., flavor or mechanics reasons but what do you DO as a monk if you don't have your Not magic but totally magic powers?
For me is mostly about flavor. I personally like mystical monks as much as I like mortal/brawler monks. I just don't like the idea of not being able to choose the latter.
As for what you do without mystic powers? ...Well, I would hope you do what comes natural and punch bears in their stupid faces. From what I hear they are still very viable as combatants.
And yet at least from what I saw of the playtest, Monk is still very much a trained, drilled, and schooled Unarmed combatant. Put a different way, I can't flavorly make the Brawler I have now(Washed up, half drunk former tavern bouncer who fights well due to his job and the fact he's seen like 50 adventuring parties throw down in a pub and recalls their tricks) with PF2 Monk. If anything, he'd probably be closer to Fighter and even then that's still not close enough.
Monk to me always says "Path of Dedication, Training, and Self Betterment through Practice/Martial Arts". Removing Ki doesn't change that, especially when the other choices seem to be "Pick your School Stance". Monk doesn't seem to a good pick if you want a more Travern Brawler, Street Fighter, or Boxing Master.
Monks without Ki sounds like Sorcerers without Bloodlines. Or Alchemist without Bombs. Or Rogue without Sneak Attack. And everyone complains about Casters doing too much but no one wants Monk to do magic stuff with Ki.
Sure you're still viable but you're going to need some extra help to get over hurdles and from what I understand, Magic isn't as helpful as it was last edition. Well not as helpful to other people, it seems more damage focus/selfish this go around. Why buff you when Spell X can do your damage better?
I'm just confused by PF2 monk and the community.
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Expect to see a LOT of elf monks: Flurry with a bow blows the other monk ranged option out of the water and dex elves will love the curve blade. About the only competition for other races is 2 handed dwarf waraxe strength monks for a 1d12.Just one thing about the monk I will probably houserule:
If a character picks his racial weapons prophiciency and the monastic weaponry they can consider their racial weapons as monk weapons, should add a nice spin too it and open some interesting option
good thing my players go for whats fun to them and not for min-maxing
Organized Play Developer
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So this might be a little mystic for your tastes, but I'm going to share anyway. Last night, the 10th level monk in my playtest game was fighting wvyern riders. He ran up a building and wall jumped off of it to reach and injured wvyern and hit it with a flurry in one turn, slaying it and dropping the rider out of the sky. The other riders took heed of this and gained altitude to 75 feet and started raining arrows.
The next round, the monk combined 2 ki powers to leap 75 feet straight up, landing on a wvyern and flurrying the rider. Another rider flew over to try nd help fight this crazy monk.
The next round, the monk flurries the hurt rider, killing him with a flaming headbutt. Then he reaches over and grapples the other rider, and uses his Whirling Throw feat to toss him off the wvyern and at a huge sized enemy on the ground. At this point, the wyverns don't have their riders, so they just try and buck him off. One succeeded in doing so... but the monk used a grab edge reaction to snag onto the other wvyern. That is where we paused for the night.
Monks are doing pretty good, is what I'm saying. :)
My monk in Seifter's playtest game was STR/CON/WIS and would use Flying Kick (flavored as a flying tackle) to dart into combat, throw down for a bit, and then fly/leap out to safety if things started getting too intense. He'd also unleash big ki blasts whenever there was a group of weak enemies to deal with. I modeled him very much after a combination of Fat Cobra and E. Honda.
His only real weakness was relatively low AC which I was able to compensate for with lots of mobility. In the revised rules I don't need to worry about a low AC nearly as much, so I'm definitely looking forward to revisiting the character.
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Monk multiclassing to fighter sounds so good, Flurry of Blows give an good one action attack to open the Press attacks of fighter.
I really want to try the grab and throw Monk using the fighter Combat Grab, specially because I saw the general feat that let you grab/trip/disarm any size, imagine how awesome would be to throw something huge like Treeraze away.
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If you want a brawler go fighter and take monk dedication or specialize in fist weapons, should both do the trick
as for the 'washed up brawler' - well, I think that is more of a feeling, if you describe your character describe him as you want
don't mention his class, he is a 'fighter' for all the others know
he is skilled with his fists because its bad for business if he stabs people and a bouncer in an armor would not exactly look inviting so he is unarmored too and know how to defend himself either way
as for dmg and fighting styles - of course dragon stance is hitting like a truck but who says that you can't know somewhere else how to do that? name it giant stance, the move giants hammer instead of dragon tail and call it a day - and a dragons roar, well I would take it that a giant can also roar/scream pretty nasty
only you and your dm would know the class (and its not like you have to call out your moves)
of course, players who know the rules well will look through it but I don't think they would care that much
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good thing my players go for whats fun to them and not for min-maxingExpect to see a LOT of elf monks: Flurry with a bow blows the other monk ranged option out of the water and dex elves will love the curve blade. About the only competition for other races is 2 handed dwarf waraxe strength monks for a 1d12.Just one thing about the monk I will probably houserule:
If a character picks his racial weapons prophiciency and the monastic weaponry they can consider their racial weapons as monk weapons, should add a nice spin too it and open some interesting option
Wait, min-maxing isn’t considered fun? O.O
Contributor
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The next round, the monk combined 2 ki powers to leap 75 feet straight up, landing on a wvyern and flurrying the rider. Another rider flew over to try nd help fight this crazy monk.
Was this via Wind Jump? Or some crazy combination of feats and items that increased your Athletics that high?