D&D 5E Monks Suck

[Rofel Wodring]

No, the guidance is not wrong. If the DMG recommends doing something a particular way and the DM decides to ignore that guidance, they should know there's going to be a problem. Which stunningly enough, there is.

Yeah, and that's the fault of the game designers, not the DM. The game designers should not force the DM to make a choice between breaking the fourth wall, throwing out a common and plausible adventure design, or hurting game balance. It's a choice that was never appropriate for the game to present, and understandably a lot of DMs are going to decide on 'there isn't going to be an hour of downtime between killing the evil king's generals and confronting the evil king in their throne room'.

Now: this is not even really a big problem for most classes. Except for the monk. A Warlock or a Fighter can still go on if they have to do two or even three combats without a short rest. The monk's the only class that makes it a big problem, rather than an annoyance. If the monk had more ki points or long rest resources to tap into, it'd just be an annoyance more impactful for some classes than others, rather than a game balance issue.

 

[Weiley31]

Weird idea I know, but the Neverwinter Nights PC game introduced the idea of Monk Armor that monks could wear. Basically it's like the idea of Monk weapons, but with armor instead that didn't disable the Monk's Unarmored Defense in the 3.0(3.5 )ruleset the game used. Granted it's only light armor and there was no Monk Armors that were heavy. I'd have no probs introducing and using that idea but every time I think of having it scale off of Wisdom or Dex ala light armor, we still fall under the "Wis/Dex needs to be high" camp for AC again. If not for defense than for offense via Monk Weapon/Dex scaling.

Other ideas I wouldn't mind introducing would be Diadems that Monks could wear that offer bonus Ki and Magic Gauntlets/Greaves that can be classified as Monk Weapons so the Martial Arts can be used.

 

[Dausuul]

2) For the non-DPR things it does do, it doesn't do them well. If Stunning Strike targeted INT instead of CON saves, that would be itself completely change the dynamics of the class even with its other weaknesses. But it doesn't. In the long run, it's not a particularly reliable form of control due to its limitations (requires a hit with a low-damage melee weapon and forces a failed CON save).

This is precisely what I mean by "waving off all other factors as irrelevant." Where are your calculations to estimate the value of Stunning Strike compared to raw DPR? You don't even try. You just say things like "doesn't do them well" and "not a reliable form of control." That's not analysis. It's anecdotal evidence based on your personal experience. Which is fine, but it totally invalidates your claim to be offering more than anecdotes.

If you want to claim your position is backed up by the numbers, you have to run all the numbers. No short cuts--or, at least, only short cuts that both sides agree are reasonable. FrogReaver did some of the work on this by calculating the impact of a stun effect on party DPR. It doesn't account for the value of action denial, which is the most important part of stun, so it's far from the whole picture, but it's headed in the right direction.

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

Yeah, and that's the fault of the game designers, not the DM.

....

If the monk had more ki points or long rest resources to tap into, it'd just be an annoyance more impactful for some classes than others, rather than a game balance issue.

No, it's certainly the fault of the DM. Because the DM knows how the game is designed, and instead of trying to figure out a simple way to make it work is instead aggressively screwing over classes that don't fit the DM's narrative vision.

1. Make short rests five minutes, or at-will up to 2x per long rest.

2. Give the monk 3x the ki, and let the ki recharge on a long rest.

See? That is what a DM should do. Instead of saying that the DM's narrative demands that the DM cannot either follow the rules or accommodate the players.

 

[Flamestrike]

Yeah, and that's the fault of the game designers, not the DM. The game designers should not force the DM to make a choice between breaking the fourth wall, throwing out a common and plausible adventure design, or hurting game balance.

Umm.. dude the designers dont do that.

Like the CRB (DMG) expressly has options to change rest variances to suit the narrative.

If you want 5 minute (or shorter) Short rests, go for it. If you want 1 week (or longer) long rests, then also go for it.

Whatever suits your narrative.
It's literally right there in the DMG.

Heck you could grant a short rest recharge every 2 encounters with every 3rd such recharge rest a long rest recharge if you wanted.

So it IS the fault of the DM. He obviously didnt read his own Guidebook on how to run the game, or if he did, he ignored what was written there, or is an idiot.

 

[Esker]

If I had to summarize this thread, I would identify two general groups (with exceptions in both cases, of course):

People with charts and graphs who say monks suck.

People with experience playing monks who say they are fine.

It's a bad look if the argument is, "Look, I don't care about your data --- I have my gut feelings!"

If you want to have any hope of having an objective comparison, you need to start with a common reference point, and that means using some kind of quantitative analysis. Otherwise the conversation can't progress, because people will just keep talking past each other insisting that their experience (colored by confirmation and availability bias) is representative.

The specific quantities analyzed and assumptions going in, those are fair game to disagree about. But the way to respond to an analysis that you think uses unhelpful assumptions and focuses on the wrong things is to do your own analysis that emphasizes the right things, while being up front and transparent about your assumptions. Not just keep moving the goalposts and waving your hands (I'm using 'you/your' here in a generic way, not specifically talking about you, Elfcrusher). Frogreaver did that, and contributed something useful to the discussion as a result --- for instance, the that the indirect damage from stunning strike is likely in the ballpark of the direct damage from flurry of blows, and so comparing to an optimal monk should probably assume most ki is used for stun attempts, rather than extra punches.

 

[Asisreo]

We're all flawed in our logic here. There's numbers and anecdotes and predictions flying here, there, and everywhere but nobody wants to put in the time to obtain hard, statistical data.

Not DPR, not AC, not charts or graphs about predictions.

What we need are experiments. Not just combat experiments, either. We need to bring playtest adventures to the table and create a log on exactly everyone's effectiveness. That means a literal step-by-step analysis on what a character and DM is doing. Only then can we be conclusive about whether monks do or do not suck.


The relevant variables would include but not be limited to:

Damage taken
Damage given
Short rests taken
Long rests taken
Fun for players
Fun for DM's
Feature used
Spells used
Spell slots consumed

And there can be more variables. But to be frank, I'm sick of these estimations being lauded as facts when nobody has really done anything scientific to back up their claims. We've all just been pretending we really know how useful or useless any given feature is.

 

[Asisreo]

It's a bad look if the argument is, "Look, I don't care about your data --- I have my gut feelings!"

If you want to have any hope of having an objective comparison, you need to start with a common reference point, and that means using some kind of quantitative analysis. Otherwise the conversation can't progress, because people will just keep talking past each other insisting that their experience (colored by confirmation and availability bias) is representative.

The specific quantities analyzed and assumptions going in, those are fair game to disagree about. But the way to respond to an analysis that you think uses unhelpful assumptions and focuses on the wrong things is to do your own analysis that emphasizes the right things, while being up front and transparent about your assumptions. Not just keep moving the goalposts and waving your hands (I'm using 'you/your' here in a generic way, not specifically talking about you, Elfcrusher). Frogreaver did that, and contributed something useful to the discussion as a result --- for instance, the that the indirect damage from stunning strike is likely in the ballpark of the direct damage from flurry of blows, and so comparing to an optimal monk should probably assume most ki is used for stun attempts, rather than extra punches.

But your quantifiable data is faulty, since it distills the natural variables of a game. We need experimentation and playtesting. Not charts and numbers.

 

[Flamestrike]

It's a bad look if the argument is, "Look, I don't care about your data --- I have my gut feelings!"

No, it's just you're measuring the wrong data (DPR).

That's not the Monks thing.

 

[Rofel Wodring]

This is precisely what I mean by "waving off all other factors as irrelevant." Where are your calculations to estimate the value of Stunning Strike compared to raw DPR? You don't even try. You just say things like "doesn't do them well" and "not a reliable form of control." That's not analysis. It's anecdotal evidence based on your personal experience. Which is fine, but it totally invalidates your claim to be offering more than anecdotes.

Do you want me to get you tables of tables of average saving throws and then put together plausible DC progressions of Stunning Strike? Something like rows of levels that compared average monster ACs and saving throws versus their likelihood of being stunned if Stunning Strike is used 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 times?

We can do that. If you have an objection to my proposed experiment (i.e. it doesn't account for mixed encounters of medium and low CRs) let me know.

And while you're protesting my claim of 'doesn't do them well', do you mind telling me the other things that monks bring to the table and why we should care about it? Like I said, the monk doesn't heal, throw things onto the battlefield, buff allies, etc.. I want to know what I'm not accounting for besides DPR.