Help with Monk/X gestalt build

Here's the question tho. Are you planning on focusing melee, or more of a support character? You mentioned the PRC Soldier of Light, but I'm personally not familiar with that class.

If you're focusing on melee, more than likely you're not going to be spending rounds casting spells anyway, except perhaps one or two prior to combat. Instead you'll be in the thick of battle, unleashing flurry of blows. In that case, using and giving up a spellcasting progression isnt that big of a deal.

If you're want it to be more of a caster, you're melee attack abilities are'nt all that important anyway, and its the monk's mobility and defensive advantages that are your main concern.

Make this decisions before you chose a class to pair with.

In my current Eberron game, one player is running a gestalt monk/fighter. There's a feat for the setting that allows the longsword to be considered a monk weapon for purposes of flurrying, and he's going for the TWF+Flurry combo that really needs lots of feats to be viable, so the Fighter class is the natural choice.

Alternatively, if your goal to be hit only rarely in combat, a gestalt monk/psychic warrior with good stats and Combat Expertise can really make life miserable on the DM.

Cheers,
Vurt

Monk/Druid kicks and allows the druid to retain the +wis to AC when wildshaped. At lower levels a monk with Produced flame can tag an opponents for additional fire damage and can also deal with being unarmed. My advice is go Monk1/DruidX, as the PC can fill any roll the party needs, from healer to blaster to buffer to summoner to melee front lines to wizard killer. Too bad I killed that PC, I would have liked to have tested out the possibilities.

Now I have a PC that is Monk1/Cleric9 and the abilities are great. The AC can easily be boosted with Magic Vestment and others to match what you might be missing from magic armor and a shield. We are in a lower magic/lower tech setting so an unarmed cleric works well. With the amount of touch spells available, it makes the dual class worth it while still retaining mobility to deliver them. I thought about taking another level of monk, but since my PC's dex=10 the Combat Reflexes feat wouldn't help too much. I would also have added more to the Dex, as right now she has AC=19 - not exceptional for 10th level. However, with Divine Power, Righteous Might and Bull's Str, Str goes from 12 to 26, BAB jumps from 6 to 10, taking an unarmed strike from +7/+2 (flurry +5/+5/+0) to +18/+13 (flurry +16/+16/+11). The AC is maintained even though the PC is now enlarged and has reach (again, combat reflexes would have worked well with the reach). On top of this, the PC can turn undead with alarming effectiveness.

As far as game play, a cleric not dressed in full plate may have their faith questioned until they can show they don't need to rely on such worldly possessions - they are protected by faith, baby, faith.

cignus_pfaccari said:

Monk/Rogue = Ninja! And gobs of damage when you flip out and kick them in the kidneys. Plus, metric boatloads of skill points! OTOH, you pretty much have to wear black pajamas.

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For a Monk/Rogue gestalt, don't forget that if you stun an enemy with the first attack in a flurry of blows, the rest of the blows do sneak attack damage. See if they're still laughing at your black pajamas after that, grasshopper!

A spring attacking Monk/Scout could also work well.

Bye
Thanee

Monk/Rogue = Flurry of Sneak Attacks. This is cool, and by cool, I mean totally sweet.

Monk/Psion = better Wuxia than a regular Monk, and full spellcasting. ZUPER-KOOL!

Monk/Cleric & Monk/Druid have been covered. They're both great.

-- N

Help me see the Future

Thanx for all your replies, all. While I considered a Monk/Rogue and Monk/Fighter, the last character I played was in fact a reg. rules Fighter/Rogue so I din't want to use either of those classes. After seeing the cool combos possible, I've narrowed it down to Monk/Druid, Monk/Psywar or Monk/Psion.

The next thing I'd like to ask for will require a bunch of work, but I'm hoping someone would be willing to oblige.

I haven't played any of the above mentionned classes in 3.5 as of yet. I'm trying to plan out a decent advancement for feats/skills, but having no experience seeing any of the classes in action, plus with the larger amount of options, I feel blind. My character concept is that of an urban 'detective', working for a newly built city.

The city was constructed with the help of dwarves to act as a refugee camp for persons fleeing the oncoming tide of war; with the different races/classes/personalities of the area all cramped together, there is bound to be some tempers and possible skirmishes among the gathered peoples. My PC is the divinely birthed (like baby Jesus) son of the mayor, who is actually my semi-retired PC priestess of the Sun. He is to be assigned to the city watch to learn morality and 'cut his teeth'; later, he is to take on the Solider of Light PrC (ignoring alignment restrictions) as a symbolic warrior for his Goddess against a tide of demons and undead.

I am curious to see what the first 3, 5, or even 10 levels of any of the three classes might look like, givne that I want to design a character who is good in social situations, great on the battlefield, and have just the right amount of quirkiness. I realize that it's quite intangible what I'm really looking for, but I'd like to see at least one possibility. For argument's sake, if you need ability scores, assume [15,14,13,12,10,8] and work from there.

So, to sum up, I'd like to see a possibility for a Monk/Druid, Monk/Psywar or Monk/Psi. Any help would be appreciated.

refined suggestions...

Well to start, I don't think that a Monk/Druid would be the optimal character for a city environment (unless you want to go with an urban druid [blah]). So I think your options are further narrowed to the Monk/Psy Warrior and Monk/Psi...

I think that the Monk/Psi has more of a chance as a diplomat the setting you described. I don't see this character participating in difficult melee combat situations unless specifically tailored to do so (the character would lose a lot of versatility...).

The Monk/Psy Warrior on the other hand, I think could cover both the diplomatic and melee combat aspects and still retain its versatility and quirkiness. Depending on the build, I think that this is the best choice for you to get what you want out of your character and gaming experience.

I haven't worked anything out character wise yet...But I will soon and get back to you.

Hopefully others will see what I am talking about and flesh out some other character builds/concepts for ya!

Thanee said:

How about Paladin?

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Splendid idea. That way, we get rid of the last dump stat for that monk. Now you need decent str dex con int wis cha.

Monk/Ninja -- the class features synergize quite well, and you end up getting x2 the normal Wis bonus to AC (since the bonuses provided by both classes are untyped).