Do we really need Monks?

[BryonD]

As I said before, the monks have stolen the unarmed combat niche. Since WotC hasn't done unarmed combat very well (unlike D20 Modern) it's next to impossible for another class to take the role, or for a new class to take the role. A lot of people don't like this aspect of the monk.

This is a very good point.

Actually, you made numerous good points.

However, to me, they are more to D&D outside the monk than the monk itself.
Yes, the monk is spoon-fed a bunch of stuff. And in the RAW if you want to be the unarmed guy then you WILL be the fast, SR, Dim-door, etc.. guy.
But that doesn't make the monk bad. It makes D&D unarmed combat bad because the only way to really get there is to be dim-door guy.

Which gets back to Psion's point. Which I agree with. Though I still think the monk works fine as-is. D&D just could really use some more options for establishing other unarmed archetypes. I'm fairly content with large numbers of distinct core classes.

Of course none of this really makes the case that the monk doesn't fit in a typical D&D setting, but I don't see that you were really aiming for that point.

 

[Samuel Leming]

That's not going to happen.

I'm making it happen.

WotC doesn't do unarmed combat feats or make light fighters viable. Any time they do, it's always a new prestige class, never a feat. Someone else is going to have to do it, and make it widely available.

Doing it. I'm confident in my design talents, but my writing leaves much to be desired. For example: see the cliche I just used. Someone other then I would have to make these kind of feats widely available.

Sam

 

[hong]

This is better than most attempts I've seen. It also looks to be contrary to your initial response to my post. Your martial artist is just as unmonky as the Defender.

Well, again, it really depends on what you mean exactly by a "monk". If those mystical powers are a key component in what you consider to be the monk's schtick, then it won't meet your requirement. However, I'm not sure there really are that many people who place a great deal of emphasis on said mystical powers. Mostly the emphasis seems to be on bashing up monsters with your fists (or open hands), not wearing armour, zipping around the place, etc. For this sort of thing, the class should be a reasonable monk substitute. I didn't write up that many specialist unarmed combat feats (because I prefer to focus on the _unarmoured_ part of the class), but there's plenty of WotC and third party material that should do the job.

Why didn't you list weapon specialization as a martial arts feat or allow it in the general list?

To protect the fighter's schtick. They're the only class that gets Wpn Spec (at least until the psywarrior came out), and I didn't want to take that away from them. One of the things that people writing monk replacements sometimes do (or did) is turn them into uber-classes that can overshadow everyone else. Not something I wanted to duplicate.

 

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

To protect the fighter's schtick. They're the only class that gets Wpn Spec (at least until the psywarrior came out), and I didn't want to take that away from them. One of the things that people writing monk replacements sometimes do (or did) is turn them into uber-classes that can overshadow everyone else. Not something I wanted to duplicate.

The 3.5 psychic warrior doesn't have Weapon Specialization anymore.

Samuel Leming, good luck

 

[fusangite]

D00d, you're babbling.

Ah... the reasoned, careful response I've come to expect of you Hong.

Take away the specifics,

So, it's okay for you to discuss what a class is generally like, minus a whole bunch of specifics such as the magic the class uses, the weapons the class uses and nearly every other one of its features besides how it does melee combat. But when I suggest a general resemblance between two things, it's "babbling."

Make up your mind. Either people can compare things generally or they have to make comparisons using every single specific detail. The position you are taking in this debate is that people who agree with you are entitled to make general comparisons but people who disagree with you are not.

and the monk is simply an unarmed combatant with a bunch of super powers.

Yeah -- and that's a surprisingly rare thing in European myth and literature.

It may have a bunch of flavour text dealing with ki and oddball names for its powers, but hey, if "a thousand faces" doesn't bother you when it comes to the druid,

What gives you the sense this doesn't bother me? All I have indicated is that the other classes in the PHB can be fitted into a mythic Europe framework and the monk cannot. This is not because the other classes are 100% perfect; it is because they are good enough.

Besides, if everything besides a class's melee attack abilities are just "flavour text," doesn't this make discussing any class with you pretty problematic?

I'm sure it won't bother you when it comes to the monk. The class is no more (or less) out of place in the D&D context than a druid, drow, beholder, or any other of a ton of other D&Disms.

The fact that many things in D&D are, to one degree or another, out of place in a mythic Europe setting does not mean that these things are equally out of place. Druids and dark elves, while more out of place than paladins are still nowhere near as out of place as monks.

Now why don't you start talking about D&D, and stop talking about some strange pseudo-medieval-European game that you've cooked up in your mind?

Well, it's a pleasure to correspond with so many people on ENWorld who share my delusion. How do you account for so many people having the same misinterpretation of D&D as I have?

The only thing authentically medieval European about D&D is that they all speak English.

Is this the point in the thread where you try to make it look like your other recent factual errors are also tongue-in-cheek statements like this?

Well, again, it really depends on what you mean exactly by a "monk".

Well, the dictionary seems like a good place to start. Tell us, hong, does the dictionary define a monk as "an unarmed combatant with a bunch of super powers"? If that definition were to show up in any dictionary or encyclopedia, wouldn't it be much more likely to appear next to a term like "Superman" or "Batman"?

If those mystical powers are a key component in what you consider to be the monk's schtick, then it won't meet your requirement. However, I'm not sure there really are that many people who place a great deal of emphasis on said mystical powers. Mostly the emphasis seems to be on bashing up monsters with your fists (or open hands), not wearing armour, zipping around the place, etc.

So, why do you suppose that D&D chose to use the word "monk" to signify someone who does this? Might it be that the centre of the class is not its melee attack progression but the fact that it represents an Oriental "monk"?

By the way, I was quite impressed with your unarmed fighter class substitute for the monk. It looks well-balanced and well-designed.

 

[JVisgaitis]

Perhaps this is true if your campaign is Euro-centric. I hate to break it to you, but D&D RAW is not necessarily European. But it's egotistical to unilaterally declare that monks have no place in D&D just because they have no place in your D&D.

My campaigns are as far from Euro-centric as possible. I mostly run playtest games of Violet Dawn, so I don't even have any of the core races in use. I wrote monks into our campaign setting and even though they now have a place, something about the monk in general as a class just bugs me. For the record, I think monks should stay core, but need a revamp to make them more generic.

Wouldn't this class have to have variable BAB, HD & saving throw progressions based upon what was being modelled?

I'd love to discuss this further, but I hate mile long responses and I anticipate I'll be writing a lot. They wouldn't all have the same stats. The class is designed so you could taylor him to suit the type of Monk you wanted kinda like the Totem Warrior in AU.

I think creating new feats so the fighter and any other class can gain these abilities if the player wants them bad enough would be a more productive route.

Agreed. I have created a bunch of new unarmed feats, but I've made changes/additions to the Monk as well. I didn't make all of the Feats available to everyone, to me that's like making Weapon Specialization available to Rangers or Paladins.

I must agree here. Druids, paladins, even bards have as much cultural baggage as the monk class.

Historically speaking yes. In game? Druids can easily be clerics of a nature goddess, paladins can be knights of the realm. Much easier then trying to justify a Monk. Bards are so ingrained throughout all of history in every culture that I strongly disagree. Every culture originated with oral traditions and story telling. How many of you have met the charismatic person that rattles off countless stories and jokes in modern times? I know a few.

I stand by my point: Monks are harder to work into a campaign then any other class. If they were stripped of all of their supernatural abilities and were replaced by a class that could branch out along their career path into other areas (wrestling, brawling, etc.), they would be far easier to incorporate into a game and would satisfy the segemt of gamers that dislike the current Monk as is.

 

[JVisgaitis]

JVisgaitis gets it, but disagrees with me.

No I don't. I just have a big beef with the current Monk and went on a tangent. There definitely needs to be a bigger influence on unarmed combat via the Feat route. We are doing that and "fixing" the Monk as well. ;-)

http://www.zipworld.com.au/~hong/dnd/martialartist.htm

This is cool and I like the rationale behind the feats especially Light Step. Having this be the warrior that is fast is neat, but I think he needs more unique abilities to stand out from the other core classes. You need to build abilities around the theme that this guy is fast.

I'm doing it. I'm confident in my design talents, but my writing leaves much to be desired. Someone other then I would have to make these kind of feats widely available.

So are you going to post it, or are you just going to be greedy and hoard it?

 

[Darkness]

If [monks] were stripped of all of their supernatural abilities and were replaced by a class that could branch out along their career path into other areas (wrestling, brawling, etc.), they would ... satisfy the segemt of gamers that dislike the current Monk as is.

They would also satisfy me, even though I like the monk. 'cause I could often use a good unarmed combat class.

Swashbuckler3/FtrX/[some Prestige Class] is an adequate substitute but an actual class with the monk's unarmed combat abilities but a Good BAB would be much better.
(Swashbuckler3 'cause it allows you to add your Int mod on unarmed damage rolls. Doesn't help orc brawlers much, of course.)

 

[Turanil]

Monks are a good class if you play in an oriental-like setting, but I find ridiculous to see them allowed in Dragonlance, where Paladins aren't (okay, it's because of the Knightly prestige classes, but even like that...).

My main concern is that this class should be renamed "Martial Artist" (not Monk, which is inappropriate even in an Asian setting), and have variants so it could be integrated into a Western setting easily (such as the Coraiocht Wrestler of the d20 Celtic Age book).

 

[Samuel Leming]

Mostly the emphasis seems to be on bashing up monsters with your fists (or open hands), not wearing armour, zipping around the place, etc. For this sort of thing, the class should be a reasonable monk substitute.

I'll just pretend you you said 'alternative' rather than 'substitute.'

This class suffers from some of the same 'asianism' that the monk does, so it wouldn't satisfy everyone. I'm not one of the guys that worries about that though. What gets me is the class doesn't match the more free wheeling swashbuckling character concepts I've see for unarmed combatants. If you want to play a Jacky Chan character, rather then Kwai Lo Kane*, the monk really isn't for you.

Your martial artist class would have been a sufficient sollution to the problem. Had WotC provided something like this rather than the rigid monk, I wouldn't have developed my present philosophy on the subject. Now I want a complete solution rather than a stopgap.

Why didn't you list weapon specialization as a martial arts feat or allow it in the general list?

To protect the fighter's schtick. They're the only class that gets Wpn Spec (at least until the psywarrior came out), and I didn't want to take that away from them. One of the things that people writing monk replacements sometimes do (or did) is turn them into uber-classes that can overshadow everyone else. Not something I wanted to duplicate.

I think I saw one of those uber-classes. I remember something really wretched being put out by a company called Chainmail Bikini.

I see your point on the fighter's schtick though, but if the fighter isn't a martial artist does he even deserve to have the weapon specialization feat? That feat, and weapon focus, represent the character treating his weapon use as a martial art. What's the difference between the fighter class and the warrior NPC class? A few hit points and the additional martial feats.

Sam

*They should have got a chinese guy to star in that old Kung Fu show! I mean, really...