Monk To Hit- I don't get it, weak?

[ValhallaGH]

I see the problems with this thread.

1. No pc should be expected to hit a soldier 6 levels higher than they are. That is simply a dm mistake

1. That's not a problem with the thread. That's a campaign issue.
2. It seems to be working great for all the other PCs. I don't see how, but I'll take the OP's word for it.
3. This post was in no way helpful.



To the OP:
What are the attack bonuses for the rest of the PCs? Because they should be between +17 and +19 for an optimized party.
5 (level) + 6 (ability) + 3 (enhancement) + 2/3 (proficiency) + 1 (expertise) + 1 (class feature: optional) = 17 to 19.
The Dagger Rogue would have been on the +19 side, making him one of the most accurate; assuming AC 28-32, he needs 9 to 13 to hit (60% - 40% hit rate). The Fighter should be at the same bonus, with the rest a point or two behind. Since your player's Monk doesn't have Expertise, he's 1 away from his maximum attack bonus of +15 (+18 when he gets his "weapon bonus"); this would make him a hair behind the Rogue (crazy class feature) for hitting consistency.

With typical FRW of 25-28, your Monk (+14 hit) needs to roll 11 to 14 to hit (50% - 35% hit rates). That's tough but not as bad as you're describing. So something is off with what you've shared.

 

[Piratecat]

Coming into a forum with a problem with your game, and not having the solid numbers on the situation (chance to hit on problematic encounters, number of times rogue has hit over the monk.) and then using anecdotal evidence to decide a house rule is utterly necessary is misguided.

Flipguarder, please back off. This isn't a test, and someone asked for advice and opinions. That doesn't mean they need to meet some sort of standard you're imposing on them. I appreciate that you're trying to keep the Rules forum focused, but if you don't find the thread to your taste, there's no problem with just going on to the next one.

Oh, and the whole "That's not a rule! That's a house rule!" thing? We really don't care for it.

Thanks; PM me with any questions. And carry on, folks.

 

[CovertOps]

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&D Character Builder ======
level 10
Elf, Monk
Monastic Tradition: Centered Breath

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 10, Con 11, Dex 22, Int 8, Wis 18, Cha 10.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 10, Con 11, Dex 18, Int 8, Wis 14, Cha 10.


AC: 25 Fort: 17 Reflex: 23 Will: 20
HP: 68 Surges: 7 Surge Value: 17

TRAINED SKILLS
Stealth +16, Thievery +16, Acrobatics +16, Perception +16

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Arcana +4, Bluff +5, Diplomacy +5, Dungeoneering +9, Endurance +5, Heal +9, History +4, Insight +9, Intimidate +5, Nature +11, Religion +4, Streetwise +5, Athletics +5

FEATS
Level 1: Melee Training (Dexterity)
Level 2: Weapon Proficiency (Parrying dagger)
Level 4: Two-Weapon Fighting
Level 6: Two-Weapon Defense
Level 8: Weapon Focus (Unarmed)
Level 10: Coordinated Explosion

POWERS
Monk at-will 1: Dragon's Tail
Monk at-will 1: Five Storms
Monk encounter 1: Drunken Monkey
Monk daily 1: Whirling Mantis Step
Monk utility 2: Harmonious Discipline
Monk encounter 3: Dance of Swords
Monk daily 5: Deadly Cobra Strike
Monk utility 6: Purifying Meditation
Monk encounter 7: Strike the Avalanche
Monk daily 9: Strength to Weakness
Monk utility 10: Iron Dragon Defense

ITEMS
Monk Unarmed Strike, Magic Ki Focus +3, Iron Armbands of Power (heroic tier), Parrying dagger
====== Copy to Clipboard and Press the Import Button on the Summary Tab ======

This build has 3 strong at-will attacks.


Melee Basic Attack
+17 vs. AC 1d8+11

Dragon's Tail
+14 vs. Fort 1d6+11 and knock prone

Five Storms
+14 vs. Ref 1d8+11
Burst 1

The biggest challenge in running the Monk is knowing when to use which power AND how this is dependent on the DM. Creature types play a HUGE role in this decision.

Soldiers - All around high defenses. All attacks will be about even, but there may be some variation.
Brutes - Avoid Fort attacks as this is always higher than their AC. Combine a 3 point lower attack bonus vs. a higher defense (let's say 2 points) and suddenly you're making at-will attacks at -5 compared to the other party members attacking AC (or even your own attacks vs. AC).
Artillery - Avoid Ref attacks as these types are usually archers or casters with high Dex/Int. Fortunately these types usually also have low Fort so use that or AC attacks.
Skirmishers - Also avoid Ref attacks for the same reason as above.

My apologies if my memory of creature types and their general defenses is not spot on, but the general idea is there in that you have to know what creature types have which better defenses.

 

[Goonalan]

I see the problems with this thread.

1. No pc should be expected to hit a soldier 6 levels higher than they are. That is simply a dm mistake

2. You seem to absolutely have to have a houserule. This is the Rules section, meaning we will try to explain your problem or fix it with the allowed rules rather than give you house rule section.


My thought is the same as others.

1. Rogues have higher to hit than others, including monks, they lose out against monks in the areas of choosing the defense they attack and mobility.

2. Luck can do wonky things (however if you throw +6 soldiers at the party, this just no longer matters.)



Coming into a forum with a problem with your game, and not having the solid numbers on the situation (chance to hit on problematic encounters, number of times rogue has hit over the monk.) and then using anecdotal evidence to decide a house rule is utterly necessary is misguided.

Okay, my bad- I'll live with that.

However I've been throwing +6 level creatures at the party for the best part of 6 months, and we've had no problem so far.

So let me go and search out the numbers, you've gotta remember here I play pretty much in isolation, I play via Maptools because I can't get a 4e game or group for love nor money in Grimsby. Believe me I've tried.

So I've no idea if other people are having the same experience or not- which was initial enquiry, alongside how to fix it.

I'm not sure what info you need but here goes-

For an At Will Power for the Players in game at present-
Fighter #1 +17 vs AC
Fighter #2 +17 vs AC
Cleric +16 vs AC
Assassin +15 vs Fort
Mage +15 vs Ref
Monk +14 vs Ref

Which seems to be okay, sure he's on the bottom rung of the ladder but...

Part of the problem is perhaps the Rogue which he replaced was at the top of the ladder-

Rogue +18 vs AC

Last fight was in the Pyramid of Shadows-

Charnel Lord 15 Elite Soldier AC/F/R/W 30/32/26/29
Over a dozen Charnel Rats 12 Minions 26/23/26/25
And throw in a Level 12 Elite Obstacle (Trap)

Anyway 6075 XP Level 14 Encounter

They wiped the floor with it- five rounds, lots of bloodied, a daily or two got used but they all kicked ass- save the Monk, who failed to hit, sure he was in a pit with the Otyugh but so were three of the others.

Fight before that

Gharash Vren, Dragonborn Soldier Level 15 Soldier 32/27/24/27
3x Human Archers Level 12 Artillery 24/23/24/22
3x Human Outlaws Level 13 Soldiers 29/26/25/24
And a Level 13 Elite Blaster Trap

Total 7300 XP Level 15 Encounter

Guess what, five rounds to rip apart, although Gharash surrendered when he was bloodied and the last bad guy standing.

I've thrown Level 17 encounters at the group (3 of them to be exact- I keep copious notes down to every last XP point I've dished out, every creature they've met and interacted with, or simply fought and/or vanquished- an Excel spreadsheet with lots and lots and lots of info- I'm a Higher Education (Degree/Masters) level lecturer by trade with +10 in anally retentive).

So sorry for not having the data to hand- I was at work for the other posts.

So in game we've had a number of other players/classes during the campaign; I think we've been through-

1 Cleric, 1 Barbarian, 1 Druid, 1 Monk, 1 Assassin, 1 Paladin, 2 Wizards, 3 Fighters and 3 Rogues.

Each time a new player and/or PC joined then there's always a transition period, getting used to powers, new character, new tactics etc.

But the Monk is giving us real problems that we've not encountered with any of the above.

As I say for four sessions 20+ hours play then he hits 25% of the time- now that might be a mixture of bad luck, poor choices, bad play etc. But it's getting to be worringly consistant, last session four combat encounters and he hit once.

The players are mostly veterans of the game, including the Monk player, he's been in the campaign almost from the beginning, which is 59 sessions old, we know each other- the players help each other out, particularly the Monk as in-game he's such a nice fellow, particularly compared to the players previous incarnation the Rogue who was an out-and-out bastard, and a killing machine.

So I just thought I'd ask if other people had encountered the same problem, the encounter difficulty level hasn't spiked- it's been a steady gradient all along, the players have always been ahead of the curve, hence tougher encounters.

Also we House Rule damage, the PCs do an extra Half Level on a hit, that's just because we play via Maptools and the communication is not always great with peoples lives going on around them (kids, cats, wives etc.). Therefore we want to get through the combats a little quicker.

I also play the monsters according to their Int, so the rats try to scarper and give AoO etc. as do less bright creatures on occasion which leads to lots of AoO (Marked) from the Fighters. As I say we want to get through the combat in good time, it still takes between 40 mins and an hour though- once again Maptools and Skype are issues.

Thanks for helping.

PS I'm an excellent DM, or at least the players seem to think so, they also keep asking if their mates can join the game. I map everything for Maptools, find lovely images, do daft voices, type up all the conversations onto macros et al, same room descriptions- and generally organise everything. Sure I make mistakes, all the time, but at the moment I can't see what's going wrong- unless it is just bad play, bad luck etc.

There have been a few Level 16 bad guys but on reflection not as many as I thought when I was at work, now I have the data, there have been lots of level 15 creatures however.

Cheers Paul

 

[Prestidigitalis]

There are several things that could be happening, possibly in combination, and it's not (completely) clear from what the poster has written which one(s) it is:

1. The creatures being fought all have very high FRW scores such that the benefit of attacking a non-AC defense disappears, and the creatures are all so high level that the monk needs (I'm guessing) a 19 or 20 to hit and the other characters only a 15 or so.

2. The character is seriously unoptimized relative to the other characters, e.g. by race, ability score, weapon choice or feat choice.

3. The monk's player has been consistently rolling much lower than all of the other players.

4. The monk is attacking different enemies than the other characters.

5. The monk is never getting situational bonuses such as CA or power bonuses such as that from Righteous Brand, but the other characters are.

6. Someone is screwing up the mechanics and computing things incorrectly.

7. The description of the situation is exaggerated, presumably due to selective memory of what happened.

I make no judgments, either technical or moral, on the poster, the players, or any commenters. I just don't see any way to make sense of what we have been told that doesn't involve one or more of those options.

 

[Mengu]

Really bad luck. That's all I can say. When the monk seems to need 10-12 to hit (8-10 with combat advantage, 6-8 with a power bonus from cleric, 2-4 with Righteous Brand from cleric), and he's hitting only 25% of the time, the math doesn't add up.

 

[SabreCat]

3. The monk's player has been consistently rolling much lower than all of the other players.

Since this is an online game, do you have logs of the dice rolls? If so, you could look through them to see if this is the case. A triple-check on the dice macros and token stats wouldn't hurt either--I've seen very subtle typos that could hamstring a character if not detected.

 

[Goonalan]

This build has 3 strong at-will attacks.


Melee Basic Attack
+17 vs. AC 1d8+11

Dragon's Tail
+14 vs. Fort 1d6+11 and knock prone

Five Storms
+14 vs. Ref 1d8+11
Burst 1

The biggest challenge in running the Monk is knowing when to use which power AND how this is dependent on the DM. Creature types play a HUGE role in this decision.

Soldiers - All around high defenses. All attacks will be about even, but there may be some variation.
Brutes - Avoid Fort attacks as this is always higher than their AC. Combine a 3 point lower attack bonus vs. a higher defense (let's say 2 points) and suddenly you're making at-will attacks at -5 compared to the other party members attacking AC (or even your own attacks vs. AC).
Artillery - Avoid Ref attacks as these types are usually archers or casters with high Dex/Int. Fortunately these types usually also have low Fort so use that or AC attacks.
Skirmishers - Also avoid Ref attacks for the same reason as above.

My apologies if my memory of creature types and their general defenses is not spot on, but the general idea is there in that you have to know what creature types have which better defenses.

That's brilliant, I'll copy & paste it to him- top work that man/person/dungeoneer.

Cheers Paul

Already sent to the player, again- ta.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

Beyond anything else, assuming that no one else is fudging rolls to consistently hit the 13+ needed to hit many of these regularly, it sounds like the monk player is having astoundingly bad luck and possibly poor target selection.

Brad

 

[CovertOps]

About monster levels let me suggest this:
http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/254630-stalker0s-guide-anti-grind.html

The general idea is to use more creatures instead of higher level creatures.