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Message: <blockquote data-quote="James Gasik" data-source="post: 9063400" data-attributes="member: 6877472">Yeah, the classic Fighter's "job" was to protect weaker party members, even if they had no specific ability to do so- AD&D rules were such that once you got into melee you basically stayed there, and by being the first to enter a room in a dungeon, you could pretty much guarantee Fighters took the brunt of attacks.That it took decades before any game designer thought to actually give Fighters some ability to actually force enemies to attack them to justify their high hit points and armor is somewhat astonishing; equally astonishing is how many people claim to hate having such abilities built in to a character class!One of the strangest criticisms of 4e was people not wanting to play Defender Fighters; they wanted their Fighters to be superbly tough Strikers...er, excuse me, "damage dealers", and wouldn't accept any other class unless their character sheet said "Fighter", a situation that mostly persists to this day.The fact that the Monk doesn't really have a traditional role, and even in 4e, when it was a Striker, it's damage output was inferior to the Barbarian or the Ranger, instead emphasizing stances and combat maneuvers, is really a huge factor in what's wrong with the class today- nobody can agree on what the class should do in combat, despite the class having an arguably stronger identity than most.If the Monk can outperform another class in any way, it tends to have a very limited ability to do so.  It doesn't need weapons- but there is almost always a weapon that is better than what a Monk can use.It doesn't need armor- but only at very high levels can it match the defensive ability of armor.It can attack multiples per round- but only as long as it has ki, and at the cost of it's other powers.  Also, the Fighter eventually gets better at this anyway.It can weave in and out of combat- but only as long as it isn't using ki to make a bunch of attacks, and also, it can't do this at will like a Rogue could.It can heal itself- but not as effectively as a Paladin (who can also heal others).It has a hard control power- limited by ki and an unfavorable Con save, and is arguably only as good as a 1st-2nd level spell.And so on.  Any attempt to buff almost anything the Monk does will have some people crying that "this one time, a Monk totally dominated my game, nerf Monks plz".  Others will decry that the idea of a character who isn't motivated by finding better gear and doesn't use clearly superior weapons and armor violates their idea of what D&D fantasy is, and such a character should always be hamstrung as a result.Never mind that early D&D has psychic powers, aliens, spaceships, robots, and eldritch horrors- get that kung fu guy in the pajamas out of my dungeon!</blockquote>

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