modifying the monk class. balanced?

[infernuspetrefax]

so heres the deal, i want to play a changeling monk (mmIII) who was created by some powerful wizard (or something) to serve as the perfect assassin. his natural shapechanging would let him infiltrate almost any humanoid city and get close to his mark, he can then kill his target (unarmed) maybe after impersonating someone close to them and maneuvering into a situation where both parties are unarmed. after his mark is down he has the option of imitating the dead man and possibly influencing local politics or what have you.

the issue i am running into is that he is trained more for unarmed combat than any of that spiritual perfection of self monk stuff. so i want to modify the monk class to be more martial and less spiritual (also i really want high BaB)
so do you think there is any way to do this and make sure its balanced? it really needs to be balanced or im gonna catch boatloads of flak from my gaming buddies.

ablilities that i might be too spirit-y for the character include:
still mind?
ki strike
purity of body?
wholeness of body
diamond body
abundant step - i would really like to keep it but it just doesnt fit. sad face.
diamond soul
timeless body
tongue of sun and moon?
empty body
perfect self

if possible i would like help finding an equal trade for d10 HD, and high BaB accounting for flurry of blows,

and if its not too tall an order maybe some help thinking of what to replace all these other things with, if not just going for the cop-out fighter bonus feats choice

--> I guess an easier way to say all this is: do you think 3-4 or more bonus feats would = 3/4 -> 1:1 bab? <-----------------------------

P.S this is 3.5....4= -_-...

 

[On Puget Sound]

I'm not finding most of this in my 4E monk rules, so I'm guessing it is 3rd edition? You might want to tag it as that.

 

[yesnomu]

Don't even worry about overpowering the monk. Give it literally every boost you can think of, and then some.

Here are some ideas:
-Full BAB
-d10 hit dice
-Flurry is a standard action. This is key.
-Improved Grapple (the one bears get) as a bonus feat somewhere along the line. Level 5, maybe?
-Free bonuses to grappling. Make Monks the best dang grapplers ever.
-They can fly. Level, oh, 10. Maybe earlier.

Boom, there you go, a monk that can pretend to be close to a fighter, if not a spellcaster. A one-trick pony (charge, flurry and grapple), but better than 3.X/PF's no-trick pony.

EDIT: If you give him this stuff, you can ditch most of the monk's usual features. Slow fall wasn't doing anybody any good anyway.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

First, what books do you have access to? Second, how much do you know about RW martial arts?

I ask because there are all kinds of monk variants out there in WotC and 3PP sources- see the link in my sig- that you could use to crib from.

One unlikely starting point to consider would be the Shou Disciple PrCl from Oriental adventures. It is open to any PC who has the prereqs- not just Monks. It is an armored monk who can eventually FoB with any weapon.

Another PrCl to look at would be the Kensai.

Among the base classes, the Sohei (OA- note, don't forget to look at the OA 3.5 update in Dragon #318) is pretty good, though it is structured something like a Paladin.

The Battledancer (DCv1), Harrier (Iron Heroes) and the Iron Kingdoms Monks (Order of Keeping, Order of the Fist/Fist of Menoth) bear examination as well.

You may just want to play a Ninja (CompAdv).

The AU/AE Oathsworn, while well done, is probably still too mystical for your goals.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Improved Grapple (the one bears get) as a bonus feat somewhere along the line. Level 5, maybe?
-Free bonuses to grappling. Make Monks the best dang grapplers ever.

The same could be said of ImpTrip.

-They can fly. Level, oh, 10. Maybe earlier.

I wouldn't do that. Give them ungodly Jump bonuses and Leap Attack as a bonus feat even if they don't qualify for it.

Slow fall wasn't doing anybody any good anyway.

I wouldn't agree with that- I've seen monks that were saved by that ability. Besides, it is something that goes back to the dawn of the class.

However, in accord with what yesnomu suggested, you could simply scour the PHB, CompWar & OA and set up an expanded set of bonus feats for Monks...and restructure the class so they can actually take a significant number of them.

For example, one of the most effective Monk builds I've run was a Dex/Wis/Str build, taking Pole Fighter (or Pole Master), and the Combat Reflexes feat tree (Hold the Line/Stand Still/Deft Opportunist, etc.)...usually gaining some way of increasing size along the way. With a host of AoOs and a Reach weapon, the Monk actually starts to control the battlespace. People simply can't get past him with any ease.

 

[yesnomu]

Any melee class needs to be able to fly by about level 10 anyway, since beyond that point about everything else can. Let the monk not have to spend money on it--the wizard doesn't after all.

I wouldn't agree with that- I've seen monks that were saved by that ability. Besides, it is something that goes back to the dawn of the class.

If they can fly, and they need to eventually, then slow fall is useless.

And keeping with tradition is what has made the monk suck so much in every single edition. Hell, even the 4e monk isn't good at his job!

 

[infernuspetrefax]

i remember hearing at some point that monks were more powerful than the other classes (3.0 maybe?), i dunno
i guess that has changed? or i was misinformed in the first place dunno

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Any melee class needs to be able to fly by about level 10 anyway, since beyond that point about everything else can. Let the monk not have to spend money on it--the wizard doesn't after all.

See, here we have a playstyle disagreement.

You say "need," I say, its nice but not neccessary. Jump bonus + Leap attack fits the class. "Fly" doesn't.

Heck, most PC classes can't fly- that's one major reason why we have spellcasters. They enable others to do things or survive things they normally couldn't (a.k.a. buffing).

I've been playing D&D since '77- the only PCs of mine who can fly without using magic items are the spellcasters...and not even all of them can do it.

 

[Turtlejay]

Strange, I thought a ton of this thread was sarcastic, but everyone is keeping a remarkably straight face.

So, you want to take full BAB and increased hit die, and turn in some other monk features that you don't use? Fighters get full bab and d10 hit die, all they get is a list of feats they can take. If you decided that is the way to go, you are now *better* than a fighter (since you get flurry, and unarmored bonus, speed bonus, etc) I think you might be asking a bit much.

If you want something with d10 hit die and full bab with some bonus feats, go fighter. See if your DM will let you take some extra feats or give you some other bonus in exchange for the armor and weapon proficiencies.

By the way, I once tried this with a Ranger. I thought that spellcasting and his pet were lame, the real meat of the class was the combat style and favored enemy. My proposed list of replacements might have looked like they were pulled from the barbarian, but what my DM and I worked out was actually a little more fair for everyone. Too bad I didn't get to play him much...(and then 4e came along and pretty much proved my point for me).

Jay

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

So, you want to take full BAB and increased hit die, and turn in some other monk features that you don't use? Fighters get full bab and d10 hit die, all they get is a list of feats they can take.

To be fair, they also get proficiency with virtually every weapon and armor in the game and Bonus feats every other level.