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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Elder-Basilisk" data-source="post: 979949" data-attributes="member: 3146">Here's the difficulty with this route. Your AC is NOT good. Until someone casts mage armor on you, it's "don't power attack me" not "you won't hit me." And even after you get mage armor cast, your enemies will still hit you on halfway decent rolls.Your monk is AC 18/19 (dodge) or 22/23 with mage armor. A fighter with fullplate, a large shield, a 12 dex, and the dodge feat is AC 21/22 (dodge). If he has +1 fullplate and a +1 shield (not hard to come by at 4th level), that's AC 22/23 or 23/24. And he's hardly unhittable.At 4th level, standard opponents are things like:-Human fighter Str 16, weapon focus, mwk weapon: +9 to hit. (he needs a 9 to hit you if you're not dodging him, a 10 if you are and a 14 if you've got mage armor and are dodging him)-Orc barbarian 4 Str 18, weapon focus, mwk weapon, rage: +12 to hit--he needs a 6 to hit you (worst case for you) or an 11 to hit you (best case for you).-Troll (CR 5) +9/+9/+4. You probably won't be rended, but he'll hit you nearly every round--mage armored or not.-Ogre (CR 2) +9 to hit IIRC. Without mage armor, he will hit you quite regularly. And, even with Mage Armor, he doesn't need to roll particularly well to hit you.Maybe you're in a campaign where you're facing nothing but mooks with +4 attack bonusses, but it won't last. In two levels, you will almost certainly be facing creatures like those I outlined. And your monk's AC will not impress any of them. And, contrary to your assertion, your AC isn't likely to go much of anywhere. You can get a ring of protection, amulet of natural armor, and that's about it. Bracers of armor won't be better than Mage Armor for quite a while and rings of Force Shield are rather expensive too. By the time you can afford to get an AC above 26, your opponents will typically have attack bonusses in the neighborhood of +14-+20 so you won't really have improved your situation much.[bI'm not so sure he'll be ripping apart anyone in melee--even wizards and archers. Your attacks will deal 1d6 damage unmodified. Now, your standard 3.0e wizard has an AC of 16-23 (mage armor, and dex plus possibly shield). So, if you attack once, you have a 65-30% chance of dealing 1d6 damage to him and if you flurry, it'll be a two 55-20% chances of dealing 1d6 damage. At best, that's an average of 2.275 damage/round with one attack and 3.8 damage/round with a flurry. At that rate, a third level wizard (hp 16-19) will last 5 rounds, 5' stepping away from you and casting his spells. About the only thing he has to worry about is your stunning fist. And if he has shield up, he doesn't really even need to worry about that (because it will probably miss).The archer is in a better situation. (War 3; hp 21, AC 18 (Chain mail+buckler+dex), Point blank shot, rapid shot, precise shot; Atk +7 (1d8+2 mwk mty longbow with mwk arrows) or +6 (1d8+2 mwk longsword). Let's say you tumble up to him and start flurrying away. He'll last 7 round. Now, if he draws his longsword and starts attacking you, he'll deal 20.475 points of damage before he goes down (assuming no mage armor and that he's your dodge target; if you have mage armor, you'll take an average of 11.375 damage). You win the fight of course, but it's hardly decisive. (And that's against a CR 2 NPC class archer with elite array stats--if you are put up against a 4th level (or higher) PC class archer with PC-level stats, your halfling monk is probably going down). Alternately, the archer could choose to ignore you and keep shooting your friends. 5' stepping away from the halfling and killing your friends so his friends can kill you for him is probably his best strategy.If you want to be the terror of the enemy's rear lines, you should run a half-orc monk with an 18 strength (str 18, dex 14, con 14, int 8, wis 16, cha 6 is doable under 32 point buy) or a 16 strength human monk. Your attack bonus will be slightly lower and your AC will be significantly lower (but you weren't going to be close to unhittable anyway) but you'll deal a LOT more damage and will actually be able to take down the wizard before he runs out of spells or take out the archer before the combat is over.Without sneak attacks, the halfling monk doesn't deal enough damage for the bad guys to worry much about whether or not he hits them.</blockquote>

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