A simple, brilliant fix for the Monk

[Tyrion]

Thanks very much for the comments, everyone (and sorry for taking so long to reply; I was out of town).

A common suggestion seems to be to implement a mechanic to force the monk to diversify his ability scores a bit, rather than dumping them all into one stat. This is a good suggestion.

However, I actually deliberately wanted to give players the option of specializing completely in one stat, if they so choose. Why? For flavour, customizability, and power/game balance. Let me elaborate on each:

Flavour: The devoted student, pouring everything into improving himself in one area, is quite a common trope. Sure, you can get strong fighters and supergenius wizards, but when you want to find the wisest master in all the land, or a hermit with inhumanly quick reflexes, or any exemplar of human physical/mental perfection, a monk should be the one you seek. The monk as written seems like a grab bag of lots of abilities without too many strong, unifying themes. My goal is to give the monk a very strong role without pigeonholing him...an ability score master (just like fighters are direct combat masters, clerics the healing masters, rogues the skill masters, and so on) seems like it would add definition and role-playing opportunities to the monk.

Customizability: Forcing monks to spread their abilities around would arguably hurt customizability a little bit. Say four distributions of +2 each were allowed; I think you'd see an awful lot of monks with boosts to Str, Dex, Wis, and Con, and very few with Int or Cha. By contrast, allowing monks to pour their abilities into whatever stats they choose will yield a wide variety of different builds, IMO--I can easily see different concepts based around maxing Wisdom (for monk abilities like Stunning Fist), or Strength (for damage), or Dex/Wis (for AC), or whatever.

Power/Game Balance: I made a conscious effort to keep the ability score low enough to prevent the monk from becoming overpowered in any area, even with dumping everything into one stat. For example, even if a monk puts all of his points into strength, he'll only get a +4 to hit and damage. Excellent, yes, but still inferior to a straight fighter, considering the monk's weaker BAB, armour usage, and so on. And of course, you'll be neglecting your other ability scores at the same time.

That's my reasoning, anyways--what does everyone think? I do kind of like Imp's idea to at least split the score bonuses between "mental" and "physical" stats, simply because mental stats might be badly neglected...on the other hand, I can see 90% of monks simply putting all of their mental points into Wis anyways.

 

[Tyrion]

One more thing--some people have commented on the somewhat aesthetically unpleasing and lumpy progression of getting each ability score boost. I've made an attempt to change that below:

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Mastery of Self (Ex): The monk's training has allowed him to hone an aspect of himself to a higher level of functioning. This self-improvement can be physical, mental, or spiritual. Whenever this ability is gained, the monk may add a +1 Monk bonus to any ability score, or increase any existing Monk bonus by +1.

This ability is gained at level 2, and every 2 levels thereafter.
---

This change looks more powerful at first (the monk gets 10 extra points instead of 8), but it's very easy to customize to your campaign: simply start the ability later (at level 4, 6, 8, or as far back as you want), or cut it off earlier (perhaps at level 18). Comments?

Also, I finally got a chance to extensively playtest this version of the rule, from level 1-20 in an accelerated series of fights and encounters. The 10 point bonus seems perfect (the player put 5 points into Strength, and 5 into Wisdom) combined with the normal 5-point bonus that all characters get (the player put 3 of these into strength and 2 into Wis). The monk became radically more useful, but didn't outshine any of the other characters--the fighter was still better at combat, for example, despite the monk's combat focus.

 

[Paraxis]

With high stats a monk is far better than a fighter of equal level after level 6 when he can get Improved Natural Attack. Think of this a Monk 19/Fighter 1 (this is done for the +1 BAB and Feat) , with out stat mods or magic he is getting +16/+16/+16/+11/+6/+1 with his full str bonus to damage on all hits, thas 3 attacks that should hit versus a Fighter with +20/+15/+10/+5 that should hit twice. When he does hit he does 3d8 per hit versus 2d6 great sword. Magic items for both can add alot give the monk a monk's belt and it goes to 4d8 (in eberron play a warforged and have batlefists as well and go to 6d8). That all gets multiplied when he crits unlike all the extra damage on the the fighters 2d6, now the fighter crits on 17-20 and monk 19-20(assuming both have improved crit) but still something to think about, with all your stat increases I would be able to take two-weapon fighing and improved two-weapon fighting for base +14/+14/+14/+14/+9/+9/+4/-1 now half of those are going to miss but the same for a dual wielding fighter, I sink all your stat bonus and my normal ones into Str (+10) that makes up for the BAB difference in straight fighter and I get +5 damage per hit than he does. Monks dont need fixing just need to use all rules given like any other class.

Side note something I did to add flavor in my game (because I don't allow the above cheese most of the time) was to make a feat a monk can take.

Ki Boost: prereqs(Ki Strike Magic), stunning fist, wis 15
The monk spends a stunning fist attempt for the round and he gains a +1 to hit and damage to his unarmed attacks per 4 monk levels.

This makes them equal to the fighter most of the time but not all the time in BAB.

Before people post with how monks can't take two-weapon fighting and improved natural attack read the Wizards FAQ, they can.

 

[ValhallaGH]

A note on math. A Monk 19 has a BAB of 14. A Fighter one has a BAB of 1. 14 + 1 = 15. A Monk 19/Fighter 1 has a BAB of 15. You need at least four levels in a full BAB class to get BAB 16 before epic levels.

 

[Paraxis]

True enough, my bad. But concept still holds true a straight 20 monk then would be down one BAB would not need monk's belt, or take 4 levels of in fighter and take weapon focus and specialization like the fighter would have to balance out those bonuses as well.

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[Tyrion]

Thanks for that analysis, Paraxis. That monk does seem quite good, but isn't it still inferior to a straight Fighter in raw combat ability? Don't forget the fighter's better armour, hit points, shield use, feats, and, most importantly, the fighter-exclusive Weapon Specialization feats, which add a whopping +4 to damage. If you throw in multiclassing, like you did with your monk, the fighter can get stuff like Rage that'll boost him even more.

 

[Stalker0]

Paraxis, your analysis doesnt' really take into account magic items, which at 20th level is the bulk of your character's power.

A 20th level fighter is going to have a +5 sword, if not a +6 or +7...combine that with weapon focus, GWF and the like and his first few attacks will be hitting far more often than the monks.

The fighter may have a +3 flaming/shocking weapon, that's 4d6 +3 per swing right there, which outweighs the monk.

I agree, without equipment monks are much better than fighters, but thats' some of the point of the monk. However, give the fighter his appropriate equipment, and he will quickly outdo the monk.

Another thing to consider is balance analysis at 20th level isn't all that effective. Characters abilities very so widely at that level, especially with magic gear, that its very hard to make a comparison. In addition, many groups never even get close to 20th level.

 

[ValhallaGH]

Monk Weapons: In the hands of a monk they do more damage.
Something along the lines of 1d6 nunchuks end up doing 4d8 in the hands of a monk that deals 2d10 with his unarmed strike. The 1d4 Sai 'only' does 2d10 base damage for the same monk.

I'm not sure what language to use to make that come out correctly, but just have the monk weapons scale with class level the same way unarmed strikes scale with class level. That will be a huge power boost for monks and give them a reason to keep using weapons as they go up in levels.

 

[Paraxis]

As far as magic items go, the monk has the same money the fighter does and benifits from all the same stuff expect weapons and armor as far as armor goes he has two stats to increase to give him bonus where fighter has only one that is limited by the type of armor he wears and monks get bracers, as far as weapons 3 times the cost for amulet of might fists is not bad since a dual wielding fighter has two weapons to spend money on. My amulet of mighty fists +2, with flaming , shocking, holy is real nice too, thats why I left magic items out of equation.

For the magic weapon idea, let monks use their unarmed damage with any weapon that has the Ki weapon bonus on it. I would make him alternate attacks or buy two weapons so he just doesn't use one kama and get all his attacks with it. Make sia do damage as one size category smaller since its a thrown weapon.

 

[szilard]

Monk Weapons: In the hands of a monk they do more damage.
Something along the lines of 1d6 nunchuks end up doing 4d8 in the hands of a monk that deals 2d10 with his unarmed strike. The 1d4 Sai 'only' does 2d10 base damage for the same monk.

I'm not sure what language to use to make that come out correctly, but just have the monk weapons scale with class level the same way unarmed strikes scale with class level. That will be a huge power boost for monks and give them a reason to keep using weapons as they go up in levels.

One thing I have considered is to give monks a damage boost akin to Skirmish or Sneak Attack that works unarmed (or - possibly less effectively - with Monk weapons) instead of increasing unarmed damage.

-Stuart