Advice needed on tactics

[Amal Shukup]

Can't get three high ones that way. Unless you roll really well in standard char creation you won't get 3 high ones normally in other ways, either.

Great Goopy Bovine Puckies! See, this is an artifact of a 'Good' Stat MUST be an 18 mentality. Because your Monk gets to Stack his Wis and Dex for AC, you can afford (and get even more from) three 'Good' stats with the same 'Point Buy' you'd use to get one or two Very Good Stats:

25 Point Buy gets you: STR 15, DEX 14, CON 11, INT 10, WIS 14, CHA 8. Perfectly Playable - even Munchkinny. And nicely advanceable at 4th/8th

32 Point Buy gets you: STR 16, DEX 15, CON 10, INT 10, WIS 16, CHA 8. +5 to AC, +3 to Hit/Damage... +8 in combat mods for only 28 points (and getting better at 4th too).

This several good vs. one great math is true later as well: you can get FOUR +2 Stat boosting items for the cost of ONE +4 item, so boost that Con while you're at it...

A'Mal

 

[Plane Sailing]

Right. It's perfectly possible to take Rogue levels, but you can't go back.

I'd love to find the playtesters who insisted that be written in for the monk and paladin and hit them with a nerf bat.

Hard.

Did you say that your DM had ruled out the Complete Adventurer feats like 'ascetic rogue' which would allow true multiclassing between monk and rogue?

Cheers

 

[Hypersmurf]

I'd love to find the playtesters who insisted that be written in for the monk and paladin and hit them with a nerf bat.

Hard.

"Wait a minute, these mallet things are padded with foam rubber. What's the point?"
"They work much better without the padding, Doc..."

I heard a rumour it was all Piratecat's fault.

-Hyp.

 

[two]

I don't buy it

Great Goopy Bovine Puckies! See, this is an artifact of a 'Good' Stat MUST be an 18 mentality. Because your Monk gets to Stack his Wis and Dex for AC, you can afford (and get even more from) three 'Good' stats with the same 'Point Buy' you'd use to get one or two Very Good Stats:

25 Point Buy gets you: STR 15, DEX 14, CON 11, INT 10, WIS 14, CHA 8. Perfectly Playable - even Munchkinny. And nicely advanceable at 4th/8th

32 Point Buy gets you: STR 16, DEX 15, CON 10, INT 10, WIS 16, CHA 8. +5 to AC, +3 to Hit/Damage... +8 in combat mods for only 28 points (and getting better at 4th too).

This several good vs. one great math is true later as well: you can get FOUR +2 Stat boosting items for the cost of ONE +4 item, so boost that Con while you're at it...

A'Mal

I'm dissin' Monks, and it's not because I require them to have 3 18's.

Your 25 point Point-Buy monk has AC 14 at first level. And 8 hit points. At 2nd level, he's got an AC of... 14. And 12 hit points. At 3rd level, he's got an AC of 14. And 16 hit points. I'm sure you see where this is going. At 10th level, for example, assuming two "+4s" to Dex and Wisdom, the Monk has an AC of 20. It's a touch AC of 20 -- granted. But still, 20. Spend cash on other bonuses to AC if you like (deflection, nat. armor). You still lag far behind even a rogue with mirthral shirt. And the monk has terrible hit points because of low constitution. And fists that do 1d10+3 (or 4) damage at 10th level. As you said -- perfectly playable. Yes. But I can also play a Str=5, Con=5 fighter. The question is: is it fun, and is it what the player expects from a monk? Your point buy isn't an effective melee combatant at all at 10th level, period.

The 32 point buy is getting better, granted. By level 4, with a boost to Dex from level ups, the monk's AC is 16. Well, I take it back. That's really not that much better. And the 32 point monk STILL has a con=10.

Simply put: neither of these point buy builds is gonna compete at all, from level 1 to level 20, as melee combatants. Their mediocre AC (at best), low-to-middling damage output, and terrible hit points insure this. Great saves, good movements, good touch ac. All very fine. But these builds are not viable melee builds, barring some insane min-max tweaking (grappler master, etc. other specialized build) via magic and feats.

As many people have pointed out, however, Monk work OK as team-helpers. Helping the rogue flank. Helping the fighter hit harder via. power attack (aid other). Helping to kill the enemy wizard. Scouting, etc. Monks can be fine team-helpers. They also are very hard to hurt via magic.

The trouble is, for a lot of people who play monks, their first impulse isn't "how can I tumble into position to interfere with the wizard and / or facilitate my rogue friend doing 25 points of damage in one strike?" It's more like "I'm gonna tumble through X jump off the wall Y and start spanking the Orge's hiney". After which GM: "Ok make your tumble check" Player "I succeed" GM "Ok do your attack against the ogre" Player "I hit! I do 6 points of damage!" GM "Ok. Next round the Ogre full attacks the monk -- hitting 3 times -- doing 51 points of damage" Player: "oops"

I'm not dissing Monks as effective party members -- if they know their role and niche and work that angle. I'm dissing them as effective ranged or melee combatants -- as always, barring specialized high-strength low-AC builds.

I honestly wish Monks could do more of that crazy off-the-wall (literally) flying leaps upside down strikes etc. etc. There are some feats that help, but feats only go so far.

I think if I revised the Monk class I would double the "base" monk bonus to AC, starting a level 1, and remove the "wisdom to AC" bonus. It just puts too much pressure on stats, and removing Wisdom as a big monk stat might help in a lot of ways.

Something like:
Level 1 - 1
Level 2 - 1
Level 3 - 2
Level 4 - 2

i.e. half your Monk level + 1 divided by two (rounding down). So a Monk20 has an AC bonus of 10. I like that. Throw in a good Dex and magic, and the Monk20 will have a very effective AC. This Monk10 would have an AC bonus of 5 (equivalent of a Wisdom=20) but without requiring the Wisdom 20. So those points could be put into another stat, or racheted down some.

Using this system, Dex=16 or Dex=14 is pretty viable even at level 1, giving the Monk1 an AC of 13 or 14 (same as the 25 point buy monk). Yeah, that might work.

Sorry, rambling. I'll throw it out to my players as an option.

(let's see, using my monk AC system, a 32 point buy can get you:
STR 16, DEX 14, CON 16, INT 10, WIS 12, CHA 8. That's a little better as melee goes)

sorry...rambling

 

[kmdietri]

If your looking to increase your melee output you might want to think about Kensai from Complete Warrior.

Grants a big Str boost and turns your hands into magic weapons of increasing power.

 

[Nail]

Just another perspective: Our party's Monk 14 has Vow of Poverty, from the Book of Exalted Deeds.

He works pretty well...as long as the cleric buffs his AC. The main problem is hit points - the monk simply doesn't have enough of them to stand more than 2 rounds in a toe-to-toe fight. When the player built the monk, he maxed out the "big three" stats: Str, Dex, Wis. That left precious little for Con. Hence: low HPs.

Our cleric works hard to make sure the Monk's AC is in the stratosphere....otherwise we have to scrape him off the floor after each combat.

"Where did that monk's arm go? ....Did you see which way it was splattered?"

"It was hard to see through the cloud of aerosolized monk-gore. Next time remind me to bring some goggles."

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Simply put: neither of these point buy builds is gonna compete at all, from level 1 to level 20, as melee combatants. Their mediocre AC (at best), low-to-middling damage output, and terrible hit points insure this. Great saves, good movements, good touch ac. All very fine. But these builds are not viable melee builds, barring some insane min-max tweaking (grappler master, etc. other specialized build) via magic and feats.

I emphathy, two. I really do. I am the one who declared that I would rather have a Warrior (NPC class) PC in my party than a low level 3.0 Monk in some threads long ago.

What do you mean by "compete"?

Can a Ranger compete in melee? Against a favored enemy, yes. Otherwise, no.

Can a Paladin compete in melee? Against Evil, almost. On his special mount, yes. Otherwise, no.

Can a Cleric compete in melee? If buffed out and built carefully, yes. Otherwise, no.

Can a Rogue compete in melee? No.

Can a Bard compete in melee? No.

Can a Monk compete in melee? About as well as a Ranger not fighting his favored enemy IMO.

If you add weird abilities to a class you must take away something. The Monk has a lot of defensive abilities. To have that offense the character needs to carefully build his up his tactics.

 

[Amal Shukup]

neither of these point buy builds is gonna compete at all, from level 1 to level 20, as melee combatants. Their mediocre AC (at best), low-to-middling damage output, and terrible hit points insure this. Great saves, good movements, good touch ac. All very fine. But these builds are not viable melee builds, barring some insane min-max tweaking (grappler master, etc. other specialized build) via magic and feats.

'Melee Builds'. Look, you want the best 'Melee Build'? Build a Fighter and start getting ready to whine every single time he fails a Will Save... "My apples aren't orange, so they suck!" is getting old.

I've both played and played with hugely 'competitive' Monks. If you can't make them fun and competitive, that's perfectly cool, just play something else.

The trouble is, for a lot of people who play monks, their first impulse isn't "how can I tumble into position to interfere with the wizard and / or facilitate my rogue friend doing 25 points of damage in one strike?" It's more like "I'm gonna tumble through X jump off the wall Y and start spanking the Orge's hiney".

Then they aren't playing to the Monk's strengths and should stop whining when they don't seem very strong. It's a team game - stop trying to steal the Fighter's Schtick...

After which GM: "Ok make your tumble check" Player "I succeed" GM "Ok do your attack against the ogre" Player "I hit! I do 6 points of damage!" GM "Ok. Next round the Ogre full attacks the monk -- hitting 3 times -- doing 51 points of damage" Player: "oops"

Spring Attack. Well worth the investment if you want to go after the biggies. See, in the ubiquitous 'Ogre combat' (a leveled Ogres, a bunch of Orcs and an Orc Cleric), the Monk (6th level) in one of our games came from the far side of the board, using Spring Attack to ignore the AOOs altogether, TRIPPED Ogre 1 (yes, got a baggy roll), got a free whack, and moved (Post Attack) to the far side of Ogre 1 - setting up the Sneak Attack that put him down for good. Failed to Trip Ogre 2, but she got her fair share of whacks in AND set up Flanking for both the Fighter and the Rogue (enabling another 2 points of Power Attack plus of course the Sneak Attack damage).

Thiink she took a piece out of that Cleric too. I know she was making saves pretty much full time that combat (unlike, say, my character )

How heroic do you need? She's also the Spot, Listen, Sense Motive Monster. Incredibly useful character.

But if you put your Monk face to face with an equally skilled Greatsword Wielder and make him duke it out toe to toe, then he's going to LOSE. As he bloody well should. Bruce Lee would lose that fight too...

I'm dissing them as effective ranged or melee combatants -- as always, barring specialized high-strength low-AC builds.

You know who really sucks at ranged and melee combat? Wizards... Barring, of course, specialized high INT, 'Magic-based 'builds'. Yeesh - why do you think Monks get access to all those Monk Feats and Abilities?

A'Mal

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

I would not have put it so sharply, but Amal's point is correct.

If it were easy for a Monk to compete in melee why play a Fighter at all?

 

[silentspace]

Monks have great synergies when combined with melee-focused twf attacking rogues. The problem is most rogues are not built that way.