Building a halfling monk

[Technik4]

I would suggest Elven instead of Halfling. It still keeps with the style you are going for (dex over strength) but an elf may offer better advantages for this type of character.

Your strength? As EB pointed out, merely gaining magic items and keeping your dex high won't make you unhittable (or even only hittable on a 18-20). For your level, you WILL be hit, you have to play smart enough for you to be the guy the enemy ignores, until you screw him over. This is not hard to do, as you are an unarmored, mostly bare thin humanoid, hardly what most monsters/npcs would consider threatening.

Your advantage is your saves. Always pump your saves, you will be the most reliable one in the party, and eventually NPCs may even avoid casting singe-target spells against you because they know (at that point) that the crazy bare-chested no-weapon-wielding guys are the ones who do not get held, etc.

AC is your other advantage, not in straight up scores, but by using tactics. Fight defensively, dont be afraid to take a full-out defense (which may still move you as far as the fighter in full-plate), and tumble for all your heart is worth. Use mobility, get in AND out of combat, then get back IN. Irritate monsters and intelligent opponents by being there one second, gone the next. Use ready actions and delay actions to maximize trying to stun your enemies. If youre playing 3.0e and you have access to them, buy some ki straps.

Once again, be careful of your role. Many high-movement rogues and monks make the mistake of thinking that due to their high movement they should rush into battle. Totally wrong (imo). In fact, most of the time try and use your sneaking skills to not even be with the main group. Be off to the side with the rogue, or play safety and hang in the back, after all you can get to the front if necessary.

Appeal to your group to let you play the medic, meaning taking quite a few of the potions. You should be the go-to guy if someone falls, you can get in, avoid AoOs, and heal someone faster than anyone else (probably). Those healing potions are also going to save your skin on multiple occasions.

Use potions almost to the point of recklessness. Potions are cheap, and they improve you quite a bit. Appeal for buff spells for yourself, and always make yourself useful. The rogue will be your best friend as you will go sneaking and flanking together, but you can build friendships with mages (by readying actions to stun enemy mages, or grapple them) and other members of the party.

You will always outshine the party against an incorpereal foe (who uses touch AC as its basis for attacks), make sure to taunt them so you are the target.

Finally, a quick sum up:

Halfling vs Elf

-Same Dex
-Similar penalties (Str and Con)
-Elf is better at grappling and faster
-Halfling is better at sneaking (+4 racial hide) and slightly better saves, attacks and AC (+1 to all better than elf)
-Elf has arguably better saving throw bonus, and definitely better proficiencies (make use of bows! they aren't restricted and it is sort-of an eastern tradition)
-Elf has better vision (which in turn, helps sneaking and just in general).
-Halfling has more skill bonuses, and a bonus to thrown weapons (applies to shuriken)
-Elf has better unarmed damage

Once again, I reccomend elf.

Technik

 

[MarauderX]

Elder-Basilisk: Very good points, and thanks for the numbers. At AC=18 I would have the best in the party, but as you pointed out it doesn't mean it's going to prevent me from getting hit. With the low amount of damage he would do, I imaginee it would take a while to carry on a fight, but would be able to survive much longer, although you pointed out that may not be the case in a tough fight.

Camarath: OA didn't arrive today and I can't wait for it to get here to see how I can apply these good feats to my PC.

spunky_mutters & Hawkeye: Thanks for the input, I was hoping there were a few out there that could share from actual experience. I am not sure about which race to go with now, although I did have a cool story in the works for a halfling.

Now it's back to the drawing board...

 

[spunky_mutters]

Don't get me wrong, I like my halfling monk. I've got the best AC in the party, and once you I got weapon finesse I could actually hit things. My saves are the best, and I've even got the best magic weapons in the party. The problem is that I can't compete in combat (I don't have the hit points, the damage dealing ability, or the to-hit), I don't have good out of combat skills (except for hide and move silently), and I don't have much else I can do except keep myself alive (assuming I don't get hit too badly). I always feel like he will grow into something special, but he never really feels like he's there. Half the time I just tumble into position so my allies can flank.

 

[Camarath]

If your looking for a powerful monk build I suggest you play as Half-Ogre (LA+1). The most powerful monk I have ever played was a Half-Oger with Earths Embrace, Choke Hold, Improved Grapple(OA), and Improved Grapple(UE). On a 32 point buy you could get a Str 24 Dex 10 Con 12 Int 8 Wis 14 Cha 8. The Half-Ogre is Large and has a Natural Armor of +4. OA lets you trade out Stunning Attack and Deflect Arrows for feats so you could have all 4 feats when you start you character. You would have grapple bonus of +17.

 

[Arc]

I've always wondered why the monk class used size as a determinant in damage dealt, speed etc. The minor benifits (+ 1 or 2 to AC and attack) of small size are a hit that is static, meaning that as a character increases in level, those benifits soon become marginalized. However, for monks, the negatives (low speed and damage) scale upwards, meaning that small feel their negatives scale upwards as they level. This goes against the basic balance of the system, and basically makes small monks impossible to play as effectively as medium or large monks. Maybe that's what the designers were aiming for.

Personally, I always house rule that size is irrelevant when dealing with monk unarmed damage and speed. All the martial arts films I've seen show the hunched over, tiny old man dealing out far more whoop-ass than the normal sized martial artists.

It also prevents min/maxing by creating a giant that does 2x more damage than a human monk of his level, simply because of his size.

 

[Darklone]

If I were you, I'd wait a few more days and build a 3.5 monk? They changed a lot!

 

[MarauderX]

If I were you, I'd wait a few more days and build a 3.5 monk? They changed a lot!

Yeah, well, unfortunately we won't be adopting 3.5 until the whole thing is approved by our DM, which hasn't been a problem until now.

Technik4: Thanks for the suggestion, the elven monk is a nice 1/2 way point between halfling and human, and remains a viable choice with the medium damage and speed.

spunky_mutters: I feel the same about damage dealt out, and that why I was thinking the character would be tumbling behind the lines to deal with the spell tossers instead of going toe-to-toe with any fighter types on the front lines. His secondary job will be to flank, of course.

Camarath: We aren't allowed to play anything beyond the normal races, which is also unfortunate, but nice to see that the larger you go the more you can keep up with the fighters.

Arc: I agree with you wholeheartedly, but unfortunately the rules are the rules in our campaign. I will be thinking about taking weapon finesse and power attack to at least deal some damage per blow if I keep the halfling 'template'.

I worked up a Half-Orc monk with maxed out Str (as Elder Basilisk had built above) to take a look at AC, saves and HP. The drawbacks are huge to me; take a look at the comparison below. One thing I started to realize is that the monk has 4 stats that are all vitally important to having a guy that can, well, be a good monk - Str (to grapple, add to damage or BAB, trip), Dex (AC, finesse attack, reflex), Con (need the extra HP to add to d8/level, fort save), and Wis (AC, DC bonuses for special attacks). Spreading out the 32 points over these 4 seems more like an art of sacrificing certain aspects instead of maxing out the PC for the most benefits.

Keep in mind, this is a 4th level monk at point buy=32, and assuming my numbers are correct.

_______Halfling____Half Orc
Str----------12-------------18
Dex---------18-------------12
Con --------12-------------12
Int ---------10-------------10
Wis---------16-------------16
Cha---------8---------------6
AC----------18-------------14
HP--------15-36---------15-36 (Average ~24)
Fort--------+6-------------+5
Reflex------+9-------------+5
Will----------+8-------------+7
BAB melee--+9*----------+7**
BAB ranged--+8-----------+4
Damage----1d6+1**----1d8+5**
Feats---Weapon finesse-----Power attack
-----------Power attack-----------Cleave

* with weapon finesse added
** power attack bonuses not included

I dunno... same hit points, one has a much better AC, who do you think will last longer?

edit: prettied it up good enough to read

 

[Rel]

My one suggestion would be this: Going back to an earlier suggestion by E-B about taking one level of Rogue, if you do that, you and the "real" Rogue in the party will become best friends. He'll want somebody to help him team up with to Flank anyway and your mobility will be excellent for that.

For you, the payoff is when you get to Tumble into Flank and do a Flurry. Then your attacks will do 2d6+1 each instead of 1d6+1.

Also, the skillpoints from the level of Rogue (especially if you take it at 1st level) will help add some interesting diversity to the character. And the story behind it is very plausable: Born on the mean streets, I had to learn to take care of myself and I became the typical Halfling Rogue. But one day I tried to pickpocket Mr. Miagi. Rather than send me to the local magistrate, he insisted that my pennance be coming to be educated at the monastery...

 

[MarauderX]

My one suggestion would be this: Going back to an earlier suggestion by E-B about taking one level of Rogue, if you do that, you and the "real" Rogue in the party will become best friends. He'll want somebody to help him team up with to Flank anyway and your mobility will be excellent for that.

For you, the payoff is when you get to Tumble into Flank and do a Flurry. Then your attacks will do 2d6+1 each instead of 1d6+1.

Also, the skillpoints from the level of Rogue (especially if you take it at 1st level) will help add some interesting diversity to the character. And the story behind it is very plausable: Born on the mean streets, I had to learn to take care of myself and I became the typical Halfling Rogue. But one day I tried to pickpocket Mr. Miagi. Rather than send me to the local magistrate, he insisted that my pennance be coming to be educated at the monastery...

The drawback to taking a level in rogue is dropping the damage die back to 1d4. Perhaps I shouldn't worry about it as it will come right back with one more level in monk. Another bonus is being able to do +1d6 sneak attack damage. Must weigh the numbers...

 

[Rel]

The drawback to taking a level in rogue is dropping the damage die back to 1d4. Perhaps I shouldn't worry about it as it will come right back with one more level in monk. Another bonus is being able to do +1d6 sneak attack damage. Must weigh the numbers...

I'm a bit of a skill junky myself, so I'd consider it worth the tradeoff to wait an extra level for the (on average) 1 point of damage. Also consider the AC implications if you max out Tumble. Not only are you not suffering too many AoO's for movement, but the AC bonus for Fighting Defensively goes up to +3 and Total Defense goes up to +6.

My Halfling Rogue I'm currently playing has been known to use those techniques against some big baddies (ones that I couldn't sneak attack anyway, like a giant zombie snake) to buy time for the heavy hitters to take them down.

With your great Dex and Wis, combined with Small size, you would make a perfect companion for the Rogue on scouting missions too. Your extra skill points put into Hiding and Move Silently as well as Spot and Listen will mean that you and the Rogue can work well together stealthily. If you get caught or if you discover a lone adversary, you are the perfect duo to get off Sneak Attacks on the Surprise Round (possibly from range) and then win initiative (high Dex coming into play again) and execute another round of Sneak Attacks. If there's anybody still standing after that, you guys can always flank them.