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<blockquote data-quote="1Mac" data-source="post: 5644964" data-attributes="member: 48998">Yes, I misunderstood. Thanks for the clarification!I guess I'm saying that &quot;alright&quot; saves are alright. Every other class has at least one &quot;alright&quot; save.It sounds like you are saying that a monk needs higher saves than anyone else because it doesn't have spellcasting or high HD. It seems like there are other sorts of features you could use than making Constitution an utterly useless ability.If you follow my suggestion, and make it so that Con swaps to Wisdom for HP, but not for Fort, then a monk still doesn't need Con. He has an &quot;alright&quot; Fortitude score and enough hit points so that he can stay standing in a fight. His Fortitude won't be as good as his Will or Reflex, but that's okay. It will still be higher than the average Wizard's or Rogue's, for example.My biggest problem with this design decision is that it goes beyond what we normally think of as a dump stat. Even the classic Fighter with dumped Cha is losing the ability to Intimidate. A sorcerer with dumped Intelligence is giving up skill points. A Charisma fighter may not be optimized, but it's a plausible build for certain players that at least has some roleplaying benefit. With this design, you've given no reason for a monk to have good Con, ever. He loses nothing at all (except for a certain amount or resilience against Constitution-draining attacks that I think rounds down to zero in terms of overall utility) for dumping Con, and a player who happens to want a mid-to-high-Con monk will derive no benefit from it, however miniscule. Even a Charisma 8 Fighter loses more than this.Not everyone builds their character with optimization in mind (as I think you understand), but even sub-optimal builds ought to get something unique for their concept. You've taken a fine concept (a monk who is a little beefier than Mr Miyagi) and essentially declared it off limits, by making it mechanically indistinct in all ways.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="1Mac, post: 5644964, member: 48998"] Yes, I misunderstood. Thanks for the clarification! I guess I'm saying that "alright" saves are alright. Every other class has at least one "alright" save. It sounds like you are saying that a monk needs higher saves than anyone else because it doesn't have spellcasting or high HD. It seems like there are other sorts of features you could use than making Constitution an utterly useless ability. If you follow my suggestion, and make it so that Con swaps to Wisdom for HP, but not for Fort, then a monk still doesn't need Con. He has an "alright" Fortitude score and enough hit points so that he can stay standing in a fight. His Fortitude won't be as good as his Will or Reflex, but that's okay. It will still be higher than the average Wizard's or Rogue's, for example. My biggest problem with this design decision is that it goes beyond what we normally think of as a dump stat. Even the classic Fighter with dumped Cha is losing the ability to Intimidate. A sorcerer with dumped Intelligence is giving up skill points. A Charisma fighter may not be optimized, but it's a plausible build for certain players that at least has some roleplaying benefit. With this design, you've given no reason for a monk to have good Con, ever. He loses nothing at all (except for a certain amount or resilience against Constitution-draining attacks that I think rounds down to zero in terms of overall utility) for dumping Con, and a player who happens to want a mid-to-high-Con monk will derive no benefit from it, however miniscule. Even a Charisma 8 Fighter loses more than this. Not everyone builds their character with optimization in mind (as I think you understand), but even sub-optimal builds ought to get something unique for their concept. You've taken a fine concept (a monk who is a little beefier than Mr Miyagi) and essentially declared it off limits, by making it mechanically indistinct in all ways. [/QUOTE]

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