Confusion in Monk's Belt

[James McMurray]

IMO 13K is too cheap for an item that grants an unbounded bonus to AC, whether you have unlimited theoretical resources or DMG standard wealth levels. Having seen the belt in high level and epic games, my experience backs up my opinion. Sure, you can get a higher bonus out of mithral full plate and an animated tower shield, but that's a lot more expensive and restrictive, and doesn't help against touch attacks that are so frequent at high levels.

 

[Slaved]

Describe the Trapped Magic Items you've used.

A bit more general list is glyphs, cursed items, poison, dye, custom made magic items, spells, hired creatures, people of influence, and so forth.

Custom made magic items were pretty much that though, custom made. Most all were tuned to a certain character and anyone not that character would suffer in some way. Often with one of the above working in conjunction such as slipping a cursed ring onto someone, giving them some poison, making their skin turn a different color, alerting someone/something to the problem, and so on.

I liked the belt of many pouches modification where one of them was actually a bag of devouring. If someone who was not the wearer reached into one it was always the bag of devouring.

Glyphs are obviously easy and should not need any explination.

Although not a trap there is also the magical contract that binds those who sign on it in some way. This is an item that can be fairly expensive but sometimes necissary for the party to actually function. It also is worth nothing as loot. Something similar could be tied to a few items that function like little traps, if they deem that you were somehow responsible for another characters death that is wearing one it does something bad to you, like explode.

Sometimes it is even worth it to pay a bit extra and get an item enchanted so that it works for you and no one else. Especially if this is known to others. Having it be cursed for anyone but yourself is even more expensive but if you are knocked unconscious and people take your cloak of fun happy slaughter time only to find out that while they are wearing it they are drained of health while you gain it, perhaps even acting as a carpet of smothering it can make for a good time.

In a party with mixed races if you are the odd man out having the item work for your race while giving anyone else who holds it a negative level makes it pretty safe as well.

Items to keep from having to sleep as heavily or as long are common as well. Once the party of player characters has enough for everyone these lose their value as well.

Depending on the character in question just about anything is possible. Whatever makes sense and for people who are unlikely to trust one another some sort of precautions are very likely.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

Need I point out that a Sorcerer/Wizard loses absolutely nothing by equipping a Monk's belt, and easily gains several points of AC?

Unless they've got a Wis of 8.

And, honestly, most mages really should have a Wis of 8.

Brad

 

[Nail]

A bit more general list is glyphs, cursed items, poison, dye, custom made magic items, spells, hired creatures, people of influence, and so forth....

I'd love to respond, but that would be a serious hijack of this thread. My apologizes to the OP.

 

[evilbob]

Until I read this thread, I had never even considered the fact that the "AC bonus" from a monk's belt might include the monk's wisdom bonus. The monk has two bonuses to AC: one from her wisdom bonus, and one that is called an "AC" bonus, which gives them an untyped +1 bonus to AC every 5 levels (that works against touch attacks and stacks with anything else in the game).

However, going back and re-reading the whole thing, I can completely understand how that interpretation could come about. And honestly, I'd be fine with it. The bonus only works when you have no armor, no shield, and no more than a light load. It's also based off wisdom, which is not important to any class that doesn't normally use armor or shields (except a monk, of course). As someone else said it's also the only item that can increase your unarmed strikes, but at the same time there are no classes that would wear no armor and get close enough to melee to use their unarmed strikes (except a monk). (Especially since the thing doesn't grant the Improved Unarmed Strike feat - AoOs are just too risky in that situation.)

I think 13k seems cheap for that kind of utility, but I don't think it's overpowered because no one (other than a monk) is going to be using all of its abilities at once. Someone might use it for improving their unarmed strikes, but they will probably be wearing armor. Someone else might use it to gain a little more AC, but they probably won't be in melee. It seems ok to me. Overall, I'd say the most suspect part of the whole thing is the guarenteed +1 untyped bonus to AC that works against touch attacks - that's a pretty sweet deal all around (although you're paying somewhere between a +2 and +3 natural armor amulet or ring of protection to get it).

(As for the AC bonus, it could be useful for a spellcaster since they could also wear a robe or bracers that granted an armor bonus, but I think it'd be most useful to a ranger: they don't need much armor and probably have some wisdom bonus to boot. Still no reason to resort to unarmed strikes, though.)

 

[moritheil]

Another PC and I had a discrepency on a Monk's Belt. He said that as the DMG is worded you get the "AC Bonus" as written in the PHB. If you look at the monk description, it specifically says "AC bonus(EX)" for an entry, which would then entitle his character to the Wisdom bonus as well as the +1 to AC every 5th level.


I said no. You just get the +1 AC to bonus based on every 5th level because the second paragraph of the PHB "AC bonus" entry says.... blah blah... "These bonuses" denoting two separate bonuses and the DMG goes to say that the belt treats you as a 5th level monk for purposes of determining AC Bonus/Unarmed damage and the PHB refers to two bonuses: One based on level(The +1 every 5th level) and one not based on level (Wisdom bonus).


It's poorly phrased in places, but an answer would be appreciated.

This happened in my game. I didn't say no. I pulled out about 10 monster entries and asked if the PCs were okay with those monsters getting an additional +5 to +10 to AC from wearing such an item.

Sanity prevailed.

 

[Slaved]

This happened in my game. I didn't say no. I pulled out about 10 monster entries and asked if the PCs were okay with those monsters getting an additional +5 to +10 to AC from wearing such an item.

There are a lot of monsters that would become much fiercer if you were to pick different feats for them or give them more appropriate gear and magical items. This item is not unique there and if someone was to do the same with other gear there are lots of items which would be banned by similar reasoning.

 

[Hypersmurf]

Until I read this thread, I had never even considered the fact that the "AC bonus" from a monk's belt might include the monk's wisdom bonus. The monk has two bonuses to AC: one from her wisdom bonus, and one that is called an "AC" bonus, which gives them an untyped +1 bonus to AC every 5 levels (that works against touch attacks and stacks with anything else in the game).

Out of curiosity, what do you consider the class feature that allows the monk to add Wis bonus to AC to be called?

-Hyp.

 

[Moon-Lancer]

Need I point out that a Sorcerer/Wizard loses absolutely nothing by equipping a Monk's belt, and easily gains several points of AC?

mythril armor +1 with a + buckler gives a quick 7 points to ac. and thats only 5000 gold. 9000 if you at twilight to the mythril for 0 asf. this leaves room for a +1 ring of protection and +1 amulets of natural armor. so thats and ac of +9 in order for the monks belt to be better then that for a sorcerer that would half to have a wis of 26. Really its only good for a cleric and maybe a druid, But keep in mind, a claric gets fullplate, and a druid can make wild breast plate and shield for sexy natural armor in wildshape. So who exactly breaks the game with the wis to ac? its only broken if you dont use the monk limitations thats required to get the armor.

so i do think a wizard or sorcerer does loose something when it could get about the same ac for half the price. However in a very high level game a monks belt along with bracer's of armor is a very nice. A monks belt may be a bit on the cheap side for adding wis to ac, but its way too expensive if it doesn't.

 

[James McMurray]

Your numbers are (as so many others tend to do) ignoring that it turns your hands into d8 weapons and gives +1 stunning fist per day. Not very useful for a sorceror, but you can't ignore them when pricing the item.