Monks and AC

[Zelc]

Because I've consistently insisted that using Reach weapons favors the Dex monk because of the increased likelyhood of AoOs, and the Greatspear is the best one available, and as I recently corrected myself, Monks have NO reach weapons in their repetoir. Just using WotC books, its the best weapon to boost their damage at reach.

Then either you burn a feat to gain proficiency (Str Monk takes Improved Initiative), or you suffer a -4 penalty to the AoOs, either of which tips the battle in favor of the Str Monk. Let's stick to WotC for this discussion, OK? There's way too much 3rd party stuff out there for us to account for.

Speaking of which, if there are 4 of them, is the Dex Monk using your spear every round or generating AoOs every round? The enemies should be surrounding it and attacking or 5' stepping to keep up, so it won't be using the spear or taking AoOs.

LIke I said, the Dex Monk is a battlefield control build.
[...]
This is where you need to use your tactical skills. The Dex Monk with a Reach weapon will be positioned in such a way as to make getting to "Squishy the Arcanist" a painful exercise. The Str Monk will get 1 plink try as the foes go by, but the Dex monk will get 4 attempts.

Two problems. First, the Dex Monk doesn't have any ability to force an opponent to not move. They can't take advantage of Improved Trip because of their low strength, and they can't take advantage of Stand Still because of their low damage. Second, the Dex Monk deals negligible damage (7 average, then reduce with miss chance and lower attack bonus). If I'm playing a Fighter against a Dex Monk, I'd soak the AoO without blinking. Oh no, there's a 50% chance of taking 7 damage!

Battlefield control means actually stopping your enemies from moving through a certain area, not just plinking them for low damage as they ignore you and kill the rest of your party. These are battlefield control builds. A Dragonfire Adept with Entangling Breath and Slow Breath is a battlefield control build. A Wizard with walls and fogs is a battlefield control build. A Dex Monk may generate damage off AoOs, but he's not a battlefield control build.

Yes it does, because it makes the Monk's Str bonus less and less important, as does any magic item, spell or effect that boosts Str.

In contrast, there are far fewer items spells or effects that boost Dex.

If you want to introduce buffs, we can try to account for buffs (if my head doesn't explode from the complexity ).

The environment was "target rich," meaning everybody had someone to fight and nobody was available to help out either Monk by melee, ranged or spellcasting.

But then your example with a 4-on-1 like that is not an equal-CR encounter. Why bother optimizing for super-high CR fights you'd probably never face?

 

[eamon]

The core issue that a dex based monk isn't a sufficient threat to keep opponents away from your allies remains, regardless of how long the monk can solo.

Also, although the dex monk will will initiative more frequently, he won't always, so you'd need to take into account the fact that a higher initiative modifier by no means ensures going first.

Can you post the builds (or at least the relevant bits?)

In my experience, many combats are largely decided in the first round - and those that aren't, are decided early. If a dex monk takes longer to deal just slightly more damage, he'll be less use to the rest of the party.

Also, most of the combats my players face involve 5-15 creatures; which is quite a bit by D&D standards. Nevertheless, I've never seen a situation in which everyone's saturated - people are constantly trying to avoid the heavy hitters (making them lose full attacks possibilities), and real swaths of opponents tend to die due to fireballs or get bogged down in entangling effects. Combat reflexes allows for multiple attacks, but characters having it usually only get to use it for a few hits in a combat. It's nice to have, but it's not decisive.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

The only thing a Dex monk really has going for him is extra AC.

Combat Reflexes is a red herring. Surely even most Str monks have a 14 Dex, or eventually do. High Dex is only an advantage here if you believe you are going to get 4 or more AoOs in a single round.

On the offense, you could go down the TWF chain and Dex is a requirement there. But that is a lot of precious feats sunk into a combat style that demands you stand still and fight toe-to-toe -- not really why I would choose to play a Monk.

 

[mvincent]

The only thing a Dex monk really has going for him is extra AC.

And a high reflex save (good synergy with evasion). And monk's skills are predominately dex based (i.e. pulling dex-based stunts is a reason to play a monk rather than a fighter).

you could go down the TWF chain and Dex is a requirement there.

If your DM allows twf'ing with flurry, that can have good synergy (especially if he views that a permanent Greater magic fang affects all of your unarmed strikes), since you don't have to optimize two separate weapons.

stand still and fight toe-to-toe -- not really why I would choose to play a Monk.

So you don't see a big value in flurry either? Having that many attacks can put them on par with fighters in regard to damage. But I agree: that's not a big reason to play a monk. However (as mentioned above) pulling dex-based stunts and flipping all over the battlefield (instead of fighting to-to-toe) can be a big reason to play a monk.

 

[Zelc]

If your DM allows twf'ing with flurry, that can have good synergy (especially if he views that a permanent Greater magic fang affects all of your unarmed strikes), since you don't have to optimize two separate weapons.

TWF is regarded as a suboptimal strategy if you don't have a source of damage that's not from strength.

So you don't see a big value in flurry either? Having that many attacks can put them on par with fighters in regard to damage.

I think Flurry is pretty good, but saying that Flurry puts Monks on par with Fighters for dealing damage is incorrect. I crunched some numbers for E6, and after I gave the level 6 Fighter Greater Weapon Focus and level 6 Monk full BAB as well as a no-penalty Flurry, the Monk was pulling about 80% of the damage of a Fighter. Of course, taking away Greater Weapon Focus will hurt the Fighter's numbers, but probably far less than taking away full BAB and the no-penalty Flurry would hurt the Monk's numbers (I think taking away full BAB and leaving no-penalty Flurry meant the Monk was doing either 2/3 or 1/2 of the Fighter's damage).

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

The only thing a Dex monk really has going for him is extra AC.

Combat Reflexes is a red herring. Surely even most Str monks have a 14 Dex, or eventually do. High Dex is only an advantage here if you believe you are going to get 4 or more AoOs in a single round.

In games where you're fighting Lots and Lots of smaller things, it's probably a good idea. It's likely very good for dealing with waves on waves of goblins.

However, I really don't think it's going to be terribly helpful against the one or two big monsters. I don't know that it's going to be noticeably worse than the standard monk.

Brad

 

[mvincent]

saying that Flurry puts Monks on par with Fighters for dealing damage is incorrect.

Well, it's definitely possible for a monk to be on par with a fighter (assuming the monk is optimized*), but I was actually meaning that Flurry+TWF'ing (if allowed) can bring a monk's damage in line with a fighter's.

In any case, some monk's can be on par with some fighters, and the reason for that will likely be flurry.

TWF is regarded as a suboptimal strategy if you don't have a source of damage that's not from strength.

Yup. That my point: damage from a dex-based monk is pretty much all non-strength damage*.



* 15th level, INA, GMF+5 & Monk's belt = 4d8+5 per hit without any strength, bare-handed.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

So you don't see a big value in flurry either? Having that many attacks can put them on par with fighters in regard to damage. But I agree: that's not a big reason to play a monk. However (as mentioned above) pulling dex-based stunts and flipping all over the battlefield (instead of fighting to-to-toe) can be a big reason to play a monk.

Sure, boosting the Flurry is fine if you are looking for damage, and that is a good thing. Not saying there is anything wrong there. But it is putting a lot of eggs in one niche: Stand still and fight like a tank.

"Flipping all over the battlefield" says Charge attack or Spring Attack to me. Playing for those tactics minimizes the effectiveness of Flurry.

As for skills, Tumble and Balance are Dex-based, while Jump and Climb are Str-based. There is no clear advantage in choosing one over the other, and you are likely to be "good enough" in all four to have your fun (if you so choose) regardless.

In the medium term, even a Str Monk can eventually pick up TWF if it really would be so valuable. Other than AC, the alleged big edge that the Dex Monk gets is ITWF (and GTWF at 15th level).

A 12th level Str Monk with TWF has 5 attacks, at the cost of 1 feat.
A 12th level Dex Monk with TWF & ITWF has 6 attacks, at the cost of 3 feats.

Is that one extra attack at the cost of two feats going to compensate for being behind the damage curve by ~+4 per hit? It is not likely unless you think you can do ~20 damage with that extra hit. That is doable, but not easy.

The math looks a little kinder at low levels, but the costs of those 2 feats is also more painful.

It certainly seems plausible to optimize the Dex Monk for the Flurry. But based on both theory and observation, it is not likely to work out for most people.

For my personal taste, the Str Monk is a better Dex Monk than the Dex Monk because he will have Spring Attack or other funky tactical feats sooner. YMMV.

 

[Victim]

Now, there's been a very important point brought up in this thread:

It's not all about damage output.

I'd like to elaborate on that. First, get Combat Reflexes - but not as the monk bonus feat. You need Stunning fist. Pump your Wis up and go around searching for low-Fort enemies to put out of combat. More often than not, this means spellcasters. Go up to them with your rogue buddy (your best friend in the whole world, by the way) and Stunning Fist that caster. Free Sneak Attack. You do 1d8. Your rogue friend does much more. That caster is now dead, and just because of you and your rogue friend.

DnD works much better when you and your fellow players play to each others' strength.

You're right, it's not about damage output.

If I want to shut down a caster, I'd consider grappling far more likely to succeed than stunning fist which is remarkably unreliable. Even against casters, since arcanists are generally running Con secondary to their casting, and divine types have good Fort. Plus the caster isn't going to be dead - you want to shut down a caster ASAP typically, so the rogue isn't in position to full attack with sneak attack (especially since stunning is unreliable, so the rogue is better off setting up to take advantage of a flank than hoping your stun gamble succeeds). Besides, rogues can sneak attack grappled targets too.

Or how about trips? Dex doesn't work offensively on trip attacks; it only helps on defense.

Emphasizing STR helps the combat support actions a monk can readily take advantage of more than Dex.

Flurry gets you multiple attacks that have full STR bonus to each.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

However, I really don't think it's going to be terribly helpful against the one or two big monsters.

Any time one of my Dex Monks has gone up against more than one opponent, I have gotten somewhere near full value for my AoOs. Even in the final challenge at Dallas Gameday, my Dex Based monk was averaging more than one AoO per round, and we were only fighting 2 opponents.

In addition, I guarantee you that my warrior compatriots rather enjoyed my multiple AoOs when it reduced a whole row of foes to having HP just over one of their average blows- it made Great Cleave really pay off.

Then either you burn a feat to gain proficiency (Str Monk takes Improved Initiative), or you suffer a -4 penalty to the AoOs, either of which tips the battle in favor of the Str Monk. Let's stick to WotC for this discussion, OK? There's way too much 3rd party stuff out there for us to account for.

But for the use of the DCv1 Pole Fighter feat- which I didn't use in my example, mainly because I wasn't using flurry in it- all the feats in my Dex builds were WotC.

And as I stated, despite giving up 2LAs to the party Barbarian, my Githzerai Monk did just fine.

First, the Dex Monk doesn't have any ability to force an opponent to not move.

Fine for the Dex Monk- pass through his 20+ threatened squares- each time you vacate one, you risk a blow from the polearm or his unarmed strike. If the opponent wants to risk [ 4 AoOs + 1 regular attack; 5(7*.5 = 17.5 ] getting past the Dex monk to get to the Wiz, he's risking more than with the same manuever from the Str Monk with only 1 AoO [ 1AoO + 1 regular attack; 2(11*.7 = 15.4].