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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Leatherhead" data-source="post: 8649491" data-attributes="member: 53176"><h3>Martial Arts Adept (VGtM)</h3>The Martial Arts Adept is not a Monk, despite punching things, and having unarmored defense, and deflect missiles.  This is likely an oversight, as the flavor text paragraph for this entry states they are Monks. But for whatever reason, they lack both “Monk'' in their name and the Monk tag. While this is easily houseruled, it shouldn’t have to be this way. For those of you who need a refresher, a creature is only supposed to get a class tag if their class isn’t part of their name. This mostly just allows them to use magic items that are class restricted, but it can also be used to denote NPCs that you could use as teachers (which is perhaps the most useful for wizards who need to get spells). For some reason, martial NPCs don’t normally get a class tag, even if they are clearly trying to emulate a class. Really, they should have just included a class tag regardless of the name, as it's just good practice, and would make it far easier to enter into their newly acquired D&D Beyond database. #standardizeyourtagswotcCan you tell there isn’t that much to talk about when discussing NPCs? NPCs are always a bit hard to talk about because they are intended to be generic mechanical frameworks for you to stretch a character over.  To make up for this deficiency, the Martial Arts Adept has a table to describe their tattoos. Most of these entries easily track to some subclass or another, but I am curious as to what subclass could inspire the “Constellations on the palm of each hand” tattoo. As far as I’m aware, there is no Star-Monk, or even a Far-Realm-Monk. Though those would be rad I have to admit.Despite whatever flavor you settle for, the Martial Arts Adept functions most like an Open Hand Monk, being able to make a push or prone attempt for free whenever they land a punch. Prone is generally the preferred option, as it will grant advantage on subsequent attacks, but pushing someone off a cliff is always a fun time. On the other hand, short ranged combat is where they are deceptively deady. Despite only using darts for ranged combat, they can toss out 5 of them (perhaps in a nod to Dart specialists of old), giving them a higher DPR than using unarmed strikes (unless you are adding in that prone condition). And they can also use their Deflect Missiles reaction, giving them slightly longer longevity. In the changeover, the Martial Arts Adept was heavily nerfed. Previously, they could toss out up to three stuns per turn, or three prones, or three pushes.  Now they can only push or prone, and only once per round no matter how many unarmed strikes they land. On the upside, their Dart attacks were increased from 3 to 5.</blockquote>

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