D&D 4E Should 4e martial artists have "monk" flavor?

[TerraDave]

There is absolutely no connection between the medieval Christian monk and the Shou Lin monk upon whose archetype the D&D monk is built.

WHAT? There are all kinds of conections. Or at least analogies and similarities.

Just not the things that matter much in play.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

I voted for the shaolin type option.

For some reason, an unarmed, unarmored combatant in a world of plate armor, shields and longswords, seems to me to need some explanation for his effectiveness. Mastery of kung fu is an explanation.

Someone could probably come up with another explanation that would also satisfy me, but I haven't seen it yet.

Agree.

I'd really like to know how a stock heroic humanoid can hope to usefully fight non-humanoid monsters with unaugmented fists. Punching dragons just doesn't seem like it'd work unless it's backed by magic and intensive training.

Brad

 

[Steely Dan]

There are celtic heroes who often fought with bare hands.

And Vikings too, there is a real world story of Vled Vleksen (sp?) who could kill men with his bare hands at the age of about 10, IIRC.

 

[Wyrmshadows]

WHAT? There are all kinds of conections. Or at least analogies and similarities.

Just not the things that matter much in play.

The similarities I am referring to are martial, not that they are both aescetic, spiritual archetypes.



Wyrmshadows

 

[Lurks-no-More]

So do you think monks should have a psionic power source? I can see it, as to me, Ki/Chi is a sort of cross between martial and psionic.

...

Yeah, I think I do. Esoteric body control abilities, meditation, psi-tattoos, and the occasional flashy ki blast... It could work very well.

 

[Scarbonac]

I want a class that can be tooled into a savate savant, an akido adept, a bare-knuckle brawler, a kung fu expert, a judo master, a karate combatant, a sweaty wrestler, or any other kind of unarmed fighter as the player sees fit.

I also would like to see a Shaolin-style Monk who gets all the flowery mystic powers along with decent unarmed combat skillz.

 

[Steely Dan]

...

Yeah, I think I do. Esoteric body control abilities, meditation, psi-tattoos, and the occasional flashy ki blast... It could work very well.

So maybe:


Monk = psionic striker

Psion = psionic controller

Psychic Warrior = psionic defender

Ardent = psionic leader

…?

 

[Don21584]

So an Unarmed Combatant class (who would be a striker, btw, according to R&C), could go Mystic, Brawler, or (Something).

Assassin or Ninja, like the old 1E Monk that used the Thief abilities, maybe?

 

[jasin]

I could see a Bloodguard vibe working nicely.

What does that mean?

 

[Steely Dan]

What does that mean?

Bloodguards are from the Thomas Covenant series. They are basically the ultimate bodyguards – they never sleep, and always fight unarmed, but are completely non-eastern in flavour.