Cleric/Monk

[Banosby]

Ya, not a lot of apparently synergy there. This is the probably the last 3.X game I'll be playing in for a while and I've always wanted to try out a cleric/monk. The original reason for wanting to has been lost to me, but the desire remains. The apparent lack of synergy is why I'm coming to you guys; hopefully you'll come up with some ways to make him moderately bad instead of horrible, at least mechanically.

Yes, I'm looking to buff up and then head in, possibly delivering some touch attack spells via fists.

The party looks like a rogue, a ranger and a something else. Probably either a barbarian, a sword and board fighter, a bard or a sorcerer. That player's just a little indecisive.

 

[Runestar]

Sacred fist is not necessarily a bad choice, but its effectiveness also depends on how your DM interprets the spell progression table.

If he goes for text over table (meaning that your SF gets full divine spellcasting progression), than take all 10 lvs by all means. But if he is a stickler for the table (and the sample example npc), then you likely want to take only the 1st 6 lvs before prc'ing again.

2 possible builds involve

Race: Human
Alignment: LN or LG
Monk 1/ Cloistered Cleric 3/Church Inquisitor 3/Divine Oracle 2/Sacred Fist 10/Contemplative 1
Feats: 1) Combat Casting
Human) Combat Reflexes
Monk) Improved Unarmed Strike
Monk) Stunning Fist
Domain Bonus) Extend Spell (Planning Domain)
Domain Trade) Knowledge Devotion
Domain Trade) Strength Devotion
3) Skill Focus (Knowledge {Religion})
6) Persist Spell
9) DMM (Persist Spell)
12) Beast Strike
15) Shape Soulmeld (Totem Avatar)
18) Improved Natural Attack (Slam)

Domains: Planning and Hunger (Contemplative)

Items: Monk's Belt, Gauntlets of the Talon (Sacrifice a 5th level spell slot), Might Arms Warforged Graft, Battlefist, Fanged Ring, Necklace of Natural Weapons (or Amulet of Mighty Fists)

**Beast Strike is a feat from Dragon Magazine #355 p.76. It requires Improved Unarmed Strike, Base Attack Bonus +5, and a claw or slam attack. When making an unarmed strike, you may add your claw or slam damage to the attack.
Base Unarmed Strike Damage: 2d10->12d8(Giant Size)->16d8(Fanged Ring)->24d8(Battlefist)->32d8(totem avatar) *Note: Giant Size is acquired via Miracle.
Base Slam Damage: 2d6->8d6(Giant Size)->12d6(Imp. Natural Attack)->16d6(totem avatar)

Full attack Routine is five unarmed strike+slam damage via flurry, a slam as an off-hand attack and a bite as an offhand attack.

*Note, this build does not use flaws. Suggestions for flaws are to take Power Attack and Move Skill Focus up so you can take another feat later.

and

Monk 1/ Ardent 2/ Cleric 3/ Psychic Theurge 10/ xxxx 4 = any full spellcasting progressing class

can be of any race, but if it doesnt have "Any" or "Cleric" as favored class, you need to take one of the following feats to avoid xp penalties:

Mark of Hleid
Blessed of Tem-et-Nu

Both give Cleric as an ADDITIONAL Favored class


Feats:
Practiced Manifester(Ardent)
Monastic Training(Psychic Theurge)(monk Bonus feat)
Tashalatora(Psychic Theurge) ...allows Psychic Theurge to Progress monk Abilities(Unarmed Damage,AC,FLURRY of Blows)

after that feel free to take any feats to customize as you like:

Improved Natural Attack
Intuitive Attack
Reserve feats
Domain Feats
DMM(Persistant) path also works well

everything is based on Wis ..... and can have BAB of Fighter(Divine Power) 17th lvl cleric, 20th lvl monk

More info can be found here.
The 3.5 Cleric Handbook

 

[blargney the second]

Got it. Check out the Dragonscale Husk variant in Dragon Magic.
-blarg

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

I'm going to go against the tide here and say, "wear armor!" All you lose is Wis to AC, which won't be higher than 10 (plate+shield) for most if not all of your career, and some extras like Flurry of Blows. Take Superior Unarmed Strike and Improved Natural Attack and wear a monk's belt. Your unarmed strikes will do lots and lots and lots of damage. Try it, it's fun!

This works better if you are either a warforged (and can use a battlefist) or your DM interprets the rules text of gauntlets to let a monk use on with her unarmed strike damage ("This metal glove lets you deal lethal damage rather than nonlethal damage with unarmed strikes. A strike with a gauntlet is otherwise considered an unarmed attack;" "A monk also deals more damage with her unarmed strikes than a normal person would").

I suggest monk 3-4/cleric X. If you go at least monk 3, with all the feats and equipment I suggest you'll be doing 3d6 (as a human) or 4d6 (as a warforged).

This is all open to interpretation; some people don't think INA should apply to monk attacks, some people don't think a monk can use a gauntlet with her unarmed strike damage, and some people don't think monk's belt and Superior Unarmed Strike stack. If you go my way, make sure your DM's ok with it! Hope I was helpful

 

[Starbuck_II]

This is all open to interpretation; some people don't think INA should apply to monk attacks, some people don't think a monk can use a gauntlet with her unarmed strike damage, and some people don't think monk's belt and Superior Unarmed Strike stack. If you go my way, make sure your DM's ok with it! Hope I was helpful

Irregardless (not a word but sounds funny) that the rules say they do, they can, and they will?
FAQ and Sage at least said so.

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

Which one were you talking about? I wasn't aware that the SUS/monk's belt or gauntlet issues had been ruled on. Either way, some folken take the Sage's rulings as evidence against whatever position he takes. I don't care one way or the other; I allow all in my games.

 

[Shin Okada]

The party looks like a rogue, a ranger and a something else. Probably either a barbarian, a sword and board fighter, a bard or a sorcerer. That player's just a little indecisive.

Then your party need a cleric IMHO. Cleric spell list is too critical for solving various problems and removing various conditions.

So Monk 2/Cleric 4/Sacred Fist X seems to be a way to go. Take Practiced Spellcaster for giving you better caster level. Then, if you like to buff for melee, take Quicken Spell and Divine Metamagic (Quicken). Maybe Extra Turning, too. In my experience, a buff-and-melee cleric often finds that spending 1 round for casting a buff-spell is not practical in actual game play.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

I'm going to go against the tide here and say, "wear armor!" All you lose is Wis to AC, which won't be higher than 10 (plate+shield) for most if not all of your career, and some extras like Flurry of Blows.

This depends on the rest of the party. Because you're forgetting that for 750 gp, he can get 50 hours of +4 armor bonus. Yup, wand of mage armor. Even better if MIC is allowed, Eternal Wand of Mage armor. Two hours/day for 820 gp, no use limit other than the 2/day. At the very least, a rogue is confirmed, he can UMD the wand on a 20. If the indecisive player picks sorcerer, he can use either with no check. If he picks bard, he can UMD a regular wand and automatically use the eternal wand (all it requires is being an arcane caster). If you do use MIC, eventually it is worth shelling out for an eternal wand of greater mage armor (Spell Compendium spell, level 3, same deal but +6 bonus). Since that's CL 5, this will then cover you for 10 hours/day. You could also just buy up bracers of mage armor, but that's more costly and takes up a nice body slot.

Another trick: Magic Vestment (cleric 3) lets you give regular clothing an armor enhancement bonus. This is fine on its own, but ask your DM to let you enhance bracers of armor as if it were armor, so you can get bracers of armor +1 and eventually enhance it each day higher on your own. You could then use the bracers of armor to pick up nifty special abilities instead, like fortification.

Really, having a sorcerer in general (or wizard) in the party would help you tons. A Monk's unarmed strike counts as manufactured or natural, whatever's most useful for you in any situation. So the level 3 spell Greater Magic Weapon can be a huge help to circumvent the criminally overpriced Amulet of Mighty Fists (and save the slot for wisdom boosters), if you had a party member to cast it for you. Otherwise, it's also a level 4 cleric spell. Other GREAT sorc/wiz spells for buffing the monk:

Girallon's Blessing - Spell Compendium, level 3, 10 min/level. Gives some extra arms for additional attacks and all hands grow claws, allowing for rending.
Greater Mighty Wallop - Races of the Dragon (I think), Level 3, HOUR/level. This is like greater magic weapon (including a +1 min/level 1st level version), except the +1/4 CL bonus applies not to enhancement bonus, but increases the effective size of a bludgeoning weapon! Doing damage as a collosal creature is just fun.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

If Races of Destiny is allowed, there's a race in there that's given lots of detail called Illumian that may be useful for your character. For one thing, they can explicitly multiclass in and out of paladin and monk as much as they like. Another nice boon if you're going Monk 2 / Cleric x / Sacred Fist 10 (and your DM agrees sacred fist is full prgression casting) is that one of your options for the race (the "krau" power sigil) is to get +2 to CL (up to character level), making Practiced Spellcaster unnecessary. You get two such power sigils, which combine to give another bonus depending on which sigils you pick. All the other sigils give +2 to ability/skill checks using one of the six ability scores, so you should probably pick based on which combine for the most useful "illumian word." Though, the dex sigil would add to initiative checks and the charisma sigil to turn undead checks, so maybe lean towards one of those.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

First, check out:http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/221182-monk-database-now-added-detail.html?pp=15

(one of these days, I'm going to have to put it in my sig...)

In there you'll find (among other things)

1) Feats that let you use different weapons with FoB- mostly from DCv1, but also certain ones from Eberron sourcebooks. (Look for the Feats listed after "Weapon Focus.") For the record, Monks who FoB with reach weapons ROCK!

2) The Shiba Protector PrCl from OA, which gives your PC a Wis bonus to Att & Damage rolls.

3) The Shou Disciple which is a 5 level Armored Monk PrCl that eventually lets you FoB with any weapon...and actually doesn't require any monk levels at all.

4) Mention of other OA classes that might be more use to you, like the Sohei (which has an ability called Ki Frenzy that combines Rage and FoB), or the Shaman, a full divine caster who has martial arts abilities similar to the Monk's (esp. after Wyatt's own 3.5 update of the material in Dragon #318). The OA Shaman or Sohei could either sub for Monk or Cleric in your build.

5) Feats like Ring the Golden Bell, which lets the monk use his Unarmed Strikes at a range based upon his wisdom. (He can thus also deliver touch attacks this way.)

6) Certain Monk variant base classes and feats that allow things like different or expanded weapon choices, or different or non-existent multiclassing penalties. In particular, the Broken Ones from Champions of valor may freely multiclass with Clerics (and other classes). The OA version of the Monk has no MC restrictions whatsoever, and has a broader list of Monk Weapons.

7) "Wildcard" feats like Spellfire or Wild Talent that could open up unexpected abilities for your PC. Monks who absorb spells and heal with a touch or who have levels in one of the Kineticist classes can be quite the surprise.