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Message: <blockquote data-quote="harpy" data-source="post: 5042065" data-attributes="member: 85243">As an offshoot of a <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/pathfinder-rpg-discussion/269682-monk-tweak-shifting-focus-combat-maneuvers.html" target="_blank">previous thread</a> I made, I wanted to add as consideration another tweak I'm considering for Monks in the Pathfinder system:Iterative Movement (Ex)At 6th level, when a monk takes a full-attack action he may make a 5-foot step between each attack made during the full-round action.  The 5-foot steps granted by Iterative Movement are an exception to the restriction of only one 5-foot step per turn.  The monk may still take a standard 5-foot step in the turn when Iterative Movement is used.Under the Weapons and Armor Proficiency section of the Monk one line should be modified to:When wearing armor, using a shield, or carrying a medium or heavy load, a monk loses his AC bonus, as well as his fast movement, flurry of blows and iterative movement abilities.As with the other thread, I've been mulling over the Monk and how I feel the class is lacking, not simply in pure power in relation to other classes, but also that the flavor of what I think the Monk ought to be about is also not really coming through with the game mechanics.So I'm trying to figure out elegant ways of tweaking the Monk class to draw out the flavor more for the Monk.  In the previous thread it was about trying to expand the versatility of the monk in a unique way, and so I was focusing on making him the “combat maneuver guy.”  One of the other elements that has been repeated over and over again by people who also feel that the Monk is still lacking something is that the mobility of the Monk needs to be stressed more, and that in particular the flurry of blows is mechanically too static of a class feature to really capture the Monk's flavor.Now, one often suggested fix is to give the Monk the pounce ability, which would allow a full-attack on a charge.  It's ok, but for myself it just doesn't quite do it as it creates a strategy for a back and forth alpha strikes.  The monk charges, doles out a lot of attacks, then the next round full withdraws, and then pounces again.  To me that isn't really giving a sense of fluidity of movement.So I've been looking at the notion of iterative movement.  This would be a major exception to the game and is only replicated in rare instances in the larger 3.5 material, such as with the Dervish class in Complete Warrior.  In fact, what I'm proposing is in some ways more powerful than the Dervish class, as the “dervish dance” is limited to a certain number of times per day.The iterative movement feels better to me because it is capturing more of the fluidity of movement that you'd think would be possible for Jackie Chan or Jet Li character would be able to perform, being able to slip through a number of opponents, hitting them all along the way, maybe even tripping or disarming a whole crowd in one sweeping gesture.One of the other things I like about iterative movement is that it is bringing radical exceptions to some core rules of the game (full-attacks and five foot steps) and locking them into a base class.  Rather than having feats that anyone could potentially take, you have to invest in one of the base classes to gain these abilities, which is a much better way of handling the issues of trade-offs in the overall game system.Another thing that I like about this approach is that Nimble Moves and Acrobatic Steps become more potent and desirable feats to take.  I'm rather surprised that these were not included in the list of bonus feats for the Monk, but taking these would further enhance the idea of the Monk as the guy who can really move to wherever you need him to be.The last way in which I've seen the iterative movement fit better with the monk is that one common complaint with the monk is that he doesn't hit hard enough.  Iterative movement doesn't solve this, but instead shifts the emphasis away from the idea that you're supposed to focus all of your attacks on one target and hope for the best.  Instead the flurry of blows becomes more of an “area effect” in that he can run into a crowd of mooks and spread attacks around and hopefully drop a number of them in a single round.  This also helps emphasize him more as the skirmisher, who can run along the outside, smaking guys as he goes, until he gets to the rear where the caster or other important tactical element needs to be dealt with.What about the Dervish?  Well, I'm not all that interested in the Dervish.  I'm trying to focus on Pathfinder without all the 3.5 material.  In terms of design work I enjoy looking at things as close to core as possible, rather than drawing upon a decade of disparate material.What I'm really interested in hearing from others would be if iterative movement somehow breaks the game?  From what I've read of the Dervish, while potent, it doesn't screw up the game by having iterative attacks spread out with movement in between.  What game balance impact does iterative movement have on the system?Lastly, I can anticipate two types of arguments being thrown at this thread:“The monk is fine and doesn't need any changes.”  There are people out there that feel this way.  I disagree and I can't see myself being persuaded otherwise.  I don't like the mechanical feel of the monk and want to see the class' strategy more radical and asymmetric from other classes.The other would be “The monk needs a complete overhaul and these things need to be fixed...” which to these arguments, I generally agree, but what I'm trying to do right now are find elegant little tweaks to the current class, and analyze those tweaks individually to see what works and what doesn't.  Each ought to be modular so that they can be tested separately or together.  Ultimately an overhaul could be done by implementing multiple tweaks.</blockquote>

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