"For you, melee weapons with that ancestry trait and either the agile or finesse trait gain the monk trait." While Catfolk Weapon Familiarity does give you Trained in the hatchet, the weapon doesn't have the ancestry trait and therefor doesn't qualify for Ancestral Weaponry so it can't gain the monk trait.Catfolk get hatches as well.I was stunned to find out a little while back that there's no real way to use any axes on a Monk. My dreams of a Frozen Shadow viking-ninja were dashed.Ancestral Weaponry, Azarketi Weapon Familiarity and Monastic Weaponry gets you Boarding Axe as a monk weapon [and uses simple], while the same with Grippli Weapon Familiarity gets you the Hand Adze. This means that you can get monk axes by 2nd level.This is also a fine point I really hate
that causes the ancestral weaponry to be AT MOST one weapon per ancestry
and I fall flat on my face when I was considering a rapier wielding elf monk
It really depends on the ancestry: tengu, catfolk and elf have 2. And the flip side of this is that most ancestries have at least 1 weapon that works with it, even orc and dwarf.
What bugs me is the restriction on ranged weapons: only melee weapons can be used with monk abilities/feats. This means I can get Monk on a Thunder Sling but it's meaningless...
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Isn't the value of Monk weapons that they have lots of traits like disarm, trip, grapple, shove, etc? The value here is that 1 shifting rune pretty much gets you an item bonus to any combat maneuver you want to perform without spending feats on stances that have the matching trait.
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Isn't the value of Monk weapons that they have lots of traits like disarm, trip, grapple, shove, etc? The value here is that 1 shifting rune pretty much gets you an item bonus to any combat maneuver you want to perform without spending feats on stances that have the matching trait.
Yah but the stances do too.
Also I find item bonuses to skills to be much more practical, I rarely get weapons for this trait, cause armbands of athleticism give you +2 to maneuvers AND climbing/swimming/jumping.
Then the apex items just give you +3 across board and are am assumed item.
So AT BEST those traits are niche and situational. Stances are better all of the time.
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Elven branched spear monk with an elven curve blade on their back looks amazing though, too bad it costs me 3 feats to match baseline stances and thus I'll never try it.
You know ... If I were to play a Monk one day.
Isn't the value of Monk weapons that they have lots of traits like disarm, trip, grapple, shove, etc? The value here is that 1 shifting rune pretty much gets you an item bonus to any combat maneuver you want to perform without spending feats on stances that have the matching trait.Yah but the stances do too.
But just to be able to get the bonus to trip and grapple costs 2 class feats, often for a stance you will barely ever use. One feat gets you all maneuver traits, even one’s like disarm, that you might only use once a campaign to accomplish some cool thing in combat, that you would otherwise never try. Shove is one that you also would not want to spend a class feat to get, but can be a lot of fun if you can add it to your attack just for one action cost to get a +1 or higher to push some enemy into a trap or off a big cliff.
Edit: you also can’t drop your unarmed attacks to avoid a critical failure
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For unicore, I edited this in:
Also I find item bonuses to skills to be much more practical, I rarely get weapons for this trait, cause armbands of athleticism give you +2 to maneuvers AND climbing/swimming/jumping.
Then the apex items just give you +3 across board and are am assumed item.
So AT BEST those traits are niche and situational. Stances are better all of the time.
Yeah, but getting to drop the weapon on a critical failure can be a lot better than falling prone or instantly being grabbed by your enemy, and you can benefit from this by level 2 or 3 relatively easily just by carrying 2 or 3 weapons, which you can get rid of once you can afford a shifting rune.
Armbands of athleticism are a level 9 item, which is a pretty long time to wait for any item bonus to athletics checks.
I am not saying monastic weapons are any kind of "must buy" option, but multiple class feats for weapon traits is a very expensive character build option for versatility.
Like doubling rings are a level 3 item, so you can get you item bonus to pretty much any combat maneuver by the time you get 1 potency rune and the doubling rings, and if the off hand weapon is unenchanted, dropping it is no big deal at all.
Sure you are probably waiting until level 10 to get a +2 bonus, instead of the level 9 arm bands, but the potency runes are things you are buying/acquiring as soon as you are able, no matter what. Skill boosting items usually take a back seat, and then that is one less level 9 item you need to buy. Sure climbing and forcing open and swimming can be issues as well, but most of those happen outside of combat and can easily be boosted by someone aiding another, and you are not likely to be the person in the party struggling to make those checks as a monk.
Now, is it weird that the best combat maneuver monk is going a monastic weapons route? Absolutely! But it does feel like the design of Monk weapons was "give all the maneuver traits to these weapons" so it feels like it was probably intentional.
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"For you, melee weapons with that ancestry trait and either the agile or finesse trait gain the monk trait." While Catfolk Weapon Familiarity does give you Trained in the hatchet, the weapon doesn't have the ancestry trait and therefor doesn't qualify for Ancestral Weaponry so it can't gain the monk trait.
Catfolk get hatches as well.
/facepalm
I totally overlooked that part of the description of the rule. I just made a catfolk with ancestry weapons and monastic weaponry too (not for the hatchet, but still).| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
Yeah, but getting to drop the weapon on a critical failure can be a lot better than falling prone or instantly being grabbed by your enemy, and you can benefit from this by level 2 or 3 relatively easily just by carrying 2 or 3 weapons, which you can get rid of once you can afford a shifting rune.
Armbands of athleticism are a level 9 item, which is a pretty long time to wait for any item bonus to athletics checks.
I am not saying monastic weapons are any kind of "must buy" option, but multiple class feats for weapon traits is a very expensive character build option for versatility.
Lifting Belt is a level 4 item. Reflective Ripple also gives another +1 circumstance to Trip and Disarm which is very hard to get so likely a much better stance for maneuvers than monastic weaponry.
Also you don't even need proficiency in the weapons to use them for the item bonus and monk definitely have hands left over if using unarmed attacks.
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IMO take a monk weapons for it's athletics' trait is basically a joke!
There's only 2 combinations that's justify them:
1 - The use of a 2h weapon like a Bo Staff or a Kusarigama.
2 - Making a thematically exotic and ugly but mechanically efficient monk using a shield (especially the Tower Shield).
Outside the above situations all monks already have a last a 1d6 finesse agile unarmed weapon with your entire body and a free hand that's allows you to Disarm, Trip and Shove. So there's no justification to have a secondary weapon when your free hand already do this. The only benefit of doing these with a weapon is the choice to drop it in case of a failure but being honest in this case I would use a hero point and re-roll instead.
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2 -Making a thematically exotic and ugly but mechanically efficient monkusing a shield (especially the Tower Shield).
This can be combined with a Pantograph Gauntlet for a 1 handed reach monk weapon with a tower shield [and can still kick someone].
Yeah, but getting to drop the weapon on a critical failure can be a lot better than falling prone or instantly being grabbed by your enemy, and you can benefit from this by level 2 or 3 relatively easily just by carrying 2 or 3 weapons, which you can get rid of once you can afford a shifting rune.
Armbands of athleticism are a level 9 item, which is a pretty long time to wait for any item bonus to athletics checks.
I am not saying monastic weapons are any kind of "must buy" option, but multiple class feats for weapon traits is a very expensive character build option for versatility.
Lifting Belt is a level 4 item. Reflective Ripple also gives another +1 circumstance to Trip and Disarm which is very hard to get so likely a much better stance for maneuvers than monastic weaponry.
Also you don't even need proficiency in the weapons to use them for the item bonus and monk definitely have hands left over if using unarmed attacks.
Putting runes on a weapon you are not proficient in, to get an item bonus to athletics is pretty costly, and you can’t use doubling rings if you are not holding weapons.
So yeah the monk has class feat options to get grapple, or to get trip, or two get trip and disarm, but you are spending multiple class feats to get it, And you are having to spend gold buying athletics skill boosting items. You are also always stuck with the brawling weapons group crit specialization, which isn’t bad, but is still something you can get through weapons. And the ripple stance doesn’t prevent the use of weapons so having a single grappling weapon in that stance lets you tap into all of the bonuses, again without spending gold on an athletics skill item.
All I am saying it that it is clear monastic weapons are about weapon trait versatility and crit specialization versatility. Monks have a way of exploiting that to decent effect if they want, but it is not a “must have build” and there are other ways to similar results, but not cheaper ways that maintain the level of flexibility and versatility, so it is still a niche. Not wanting to build towards that niche is fine, but it exists and that answers the questions being asked in this post: monk weapons are not meant to supersede the attacks from stances because those attacks are costly (character building resources-wise) to pick up and switch between in combat. Monastic weapons does not force a monk into any kind of weapon specialization, and thus the monk is free to switch between weapons with no penalty. Even just 1 d10 monk weapon suddenly opens up monastic weapons being as good or better than picking up 2 or stances.
How do monk unarmed attacks with trip, shove and disarm traits without spending a feat?
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How do monk unarmed attacks with trip, shove and disarm traits without spending a feat?
The point being that having a free hand allows the Monk to do all the maneuvers (as well as Interact, etc.) This of course applies to all PCs, like a one-hand weapon wielder or someone with a Free Hand weapon.
A Stance does not occupy a Monk's hands so... free hand + an Athletics magic item covers all maneuvers. There's no need for any feats at all (though one would be useful).When a Stance has a maneuver trait it means that the Monk's attack bonus from Handwraps can apply to the maneuver. But that's redundant if the Monk already has an item bonus to Athletics. In no way does the Monk need those traits in order to do the maneuver, that is if they have a free hand.
2 -This can be combined with a Pantograph Gauntlet for a 1 handed reach monk weapon with a tower shield [and can still kick someone].Making a thematically exotic and ugly but mechanically efficient monkusing a shield (especially the Tower Shield).
Yep. But is the Pantograph Gauntlet considered as a free hand? I also think how strange is to drop the Gauntlet to avoid a critical failure during a Shove (but as I said probably anyone will prefer to use a hero point to re-roll).
This also remember me. Unless your opponent can do AoO probably is better to fall prone than drop the weapon if you critical fail an athletic maneuver. Because most probably a player will try to do a maneuver with the first attack action to prevent MAP and high critical failure chance so even if you fall you can use other action to rapidly get up before your turn ends.
For those saying: critical specialisation.
Monks don't get auto-critical specialisation, they need to pay a feat for it.
So that just adds to the feat tax.
Imo monastic weaponry and brawling focus should be part of the standard kit.
For those saying: critical specialisation.
Monks don't get auto-critical specialisation, they need to pay a feat for it.
So that just adds to the feat tax.
Imo monastic weaponry and brawling focus should be part of the standard kit.
But choosing a stance doesn't give you crit specialization either, so if getting crit specialization on a monk is something you want, you are paying a feat for it anyway. A fully unarmed monk gets the crit specialization for just weapons in the brawling category. The monastic weapons monk gets it in a great many choices. Crit specialization is better for the weapons monk than the stance monk as a feat.
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Yes but my point was more along the lines of:
It's not a de facto bonus, it's a conditional one, even more so because brawling focus is in the same window as stunning fist.
Yeah, but getting to drop the weapon on a critical failure can be a lot better than falling prone or instantly being grabbed by your enemy, and you can benefit from this by level 2 or 3 relatively easily just by carrying 2 or 3 weapons, which you can get rid of once you can afford a shifting rune.
Armbands of athleticism are a level 9 item, which is a pretty long time to wait for any item bonus to athletics checks.
I am not saying monastic weapons are any kind of "must buy" option, but multiple class feats for weapon traits is a very expensive character build option for versatility.
Lifting Belt is a level 4 item. Reflective Ripple also gives another +1 circumstance to Trip and Disarm which is very hard to get so likely a much better stance for maneuvers than monastic weaponry.
Also you don't even need proficiency in the weapons to use them for the item bonus and monk definitely have hands left over if using unarmed attacks.
Putting runes on a weapon you are not proficient in, to get an item bonus to athletics is pretty costly, and you can’t use doubling rings if you are not holding weapons.
So yeah the monk has class feat options to get grapple, or to get trip, or two get trip and disarm, but you are spending multiple class feats to get it, And you are having to spend gold buying athletics skill boosting items. You are also always stuck with the brawling weapons group crit specialization, which isn’t bad, but is still something you can get through weapons. And the ripple stance doesn’t prevent the use of weapons so having a single grappling weapon in that stance lets you tap into all of the bonuses, again without spending gold on an athletics skill item.
All I am saying it that it is clear monastic weapons are about weapon trait versatility and crit specialization versatility. Monks have a way of exploiting that to decent effect if they want, but it is not a “must have build” and there are other ways to similar results, but not...
Rippling Wave gives both Trip and Disarm trait and an additional +1 circumstance. What monk weapon can give you this? There is also no monk weapon with the grapple trait so monastic weaponry doesn't even help there.
Lifting Belt is also just really easy to get and if you want to protect yourself from falling prone (Kip Up just solves this however) you can just get a weapon you're not trained in and just use the +Athletics item that applies to all maneuvers.
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IMO unless you are a fighter/gunslinger crit specialization isn't a thing specially for Brawling weapons that requires another check to work.
As AlastarOG said it's better take stunning fist. Yet stunning fist is useless if you are facing a small number of opponents once that's almost certain that at last one of the opponents is 1 lvl or more higher than you.
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There is also no monk weapon with the grapple trait so monastic weaponry doesn't even help there.
Fangwire has grapple and with ancestral weaponry it becomes a monk weapon.
...Yeah, but getting to drop the weapon on a critical failure can be a lot better than falling prone or instantly being grabbed by your enemy, and you can benefit from this by level 2 or 3 relatively easily just by carrying 2 or 3 weapons, which you can get rid of once you can afford a shifting rune.
Armbands of athleticism are a level 9 item, which is a pretty long time to wait for any item bonus to athletics checks.
I am not saying monastic weapons are any kind of "must buy" option, but multiple class feats for weapon traits is a very expensive character build option for versatility.
Lifting Belt is a level 4 item. Reflective Ripple also gives another +1 circumstance to Trip and Disarm which is very hard to get so likely a much better stance for maneuvers than monastic weaponry.
Also you don't even need proficiency in the weapons to use them for the item bonus and monk definitely have hands left over if using unarmed attacks.
Putting runes on a weapon you are not proficient in, to get an item bonus to athletics is pretty costly, and you can’t use doubling rings if you are not holding weapons.
So yeah the monk has class feat options to get grapple, or to get trip, or two get trip and disarm, but you are spending multiple class feats to get it, And you are having to spend gold buying athletics skill boosting items. You are also always stuck with the brawling weapons group crit specialization, which isn’t bad, but is still something you can get through weapons. And the ripple stance doesn’t prevent the use of weapons so having a single grappling weapon in that stance lets you tap into all of the bonuses, again without spending gold on an athletics skill item.
All I am saying it that it is clear monastic weapons are about weapon trait versatility and crit specialization versatility. Monks have a way of exploiting that to decent effect if they want, but it is not a “must have build” and there are other ways to
A kobold could get it with a fangwire. But I had misread something and thought there was a weapon with the monk trait and the grapple trait, but you are right it is not there yet.
It is interesting that twin weapons effectively increase in a damage die when used to perform a combat maneuver first and then attack with a second attack, however, the only monk twin agile weapons have disarm as their only combat maneuver trait and that is a pretty limited option.
As the game expands, we will likely keep seeing more new weapons, so I think it makes sense to keep asking for trait combos that you really want to see, and that is one of the good things about a monastic weapons, it is a weapon proficiency category that is bound to grow.
The weirdest part about monk weapons, and what really is the thing that makes me wish that they had done away with the category in PF2, and why it shouldn't be back in any future version of the game, is that the whole category just feels like an uncomfortable partitioning of the old "exotic" weapon proficiency, thrown awkwardly over PF2's simple/martial/advanced categories without a strong sense of lore tied to Golarion and not assumptions about Earth and martial arts training. The inclusion of ancestry weapons is a much welcome break for that, but I would rather just have human ethnicities exist as weapon traits that apply to certain weapons common to those areas and then have unconventional weaponry apply to one of those.
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Just as an aside, I've been playing since this game came out and have only seen Stunning Fist stun something like once or twice. That feat is awful.Yes but my point was more along the lines of:
It's not a de facto bonus, it's a conditional one, even more so because brawling focus is in the same window as stunning fist.
It's good in theory, moreso if you more often fight hordes of weaker creatures. In your typical paizo AP that rarely happens, or is rarely a threatening encounter when it does happen, so its stun rate is going to be super low, especially as you level and fort becomes the most common high save.
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Just as an aside, I've been playing since this game came out and have only seen Stunning Fist stun something like once or twice. That feat is awful.Yes but my point was more along the lines of:
It's not a de facto bonus, it's a conditional one, even more so because brawling focus is in the same window as stunning fist.
In the game I host (11-16) the monk has gotten a crit stun two times and stuns an enemy pretty much every session. Has been really useful for him at least ^^
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Just as an aside, I've been playing since this game came out and have only seen Stunning Fist stun something like once or twice. That feat is awful.Yes but my point was more along the lines of:
It's not a de facto bonus, it's a conditional one, even more so because brawling focus is in the same window as stunning fist.
It's not so bad when you take into account that it has no action cost and it's just an add-on to an action you're going to do anyway [flurry]. It also helps if you more lower level creatures vs higher level than the PC to to incapacitation. It's not the best but not the worst either.
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This is one of those few areas where I think 5e did it best with how they classify "monk weaponry"
It's simple, elegant, and you kinda make it work, and it unlocks exotic monk builds like bare chested samurai or exotically dressed fan girl monk fighter that are simply not viable in 2e.
I might actually homebrew that a bit in my Isekai game since one of the players wants to play a Monk.
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Just as an aside, I've been playing since this game came out and have only seen Stunning Fist stun something like once or twice. That feat is awful.Yes but my point was more along the lines of:
It's not a de facto bonus, it's a conditional one, even more so because brawling focus is in the same window as stunning fist.
I had a monk player in a long running campaign I was GMing with stunning fist and the crit specialization feat. He was getting at least a stun 1 every third round of combat, at a minimum. It a question of attrition though with lots of successful saves, so I could see how it would feel discouraging to some players if it is only happening on about 30-40% of turns. Still, it is a free debuff that is incredibly annoying.
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It would be cool if there were varisian bladed scarf monks, for example.
Just as an aside, I've been playing since this game came out and have only seen Stunning Fist stun something like once or twice. That feat is awful.Yes but my point was more along the lines of:
It's not a de facto bonus, it's a conditional one, even more so because brawling focus is in the same window as stunning fist.
I had a monk player in a long running campaign I was GMing with stunning fist and the crit specialization feat. He was getting at least a stun 1 every third round of combat, at a minimum. It a question of attrition though with lots of successful saves, so I could see how it would feel discouraging to some players if it is only happening on about 30-40% of turns. Still, it is a free debuff that is incredibly annoying.
Pretty much this. Even just a low-ish (and it isn't even that low) chance to stun someone every round is amazing. That chance having essentially no downsides or cost is insane, not to mention that it has a chance to eliminate their entire turn. As a 2nd level feat. Pretty RNG-heavy, but the potential alone puts it right into the top tier of 2nd level feats.
From anecdotal evidence, this thing regularly destroys people.
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This is one of those few areas where I think 5e did it best with how they classify "monk weaponry"
It's simple, elegant, and you kinda make it work, and it unlocks exotic monk builds like bare chested samurai or exotically dressed fan girl monk fighter that are simply not viable in 2e.
I might actually homebrew that a bit in my Isekai game since one of the players wants to play a Monk.
Mind blown. I never considered Monk for a Samurai, I tried to make one out of the Swashbuckler for that Rurouni Kenshin/Samurai Champloo (Jin)/Demon Slayer/enter literally every anime basically with the "ronin" type Samurai (hell even Gintoki from Gintama) in cloth armor walking around with very high speed moves/attacks.
Can you use a Katana as a Monk?
