What to gestalt a monk with

[Sejs]

You're a monk, you're VoP'd which means you're Lawful Good and eschew possessions, giving stuff away to those in need instead...


Yeah, I'd go cleric of Ilmater. The two archtypes just fit together so perfectly. Just ask your DM if instead of a holy symbol of a pair of hands with red cords around the wrists, if that instead you can just have some red cords around your own wrists that act as your holy symbol. The cords would fall under basic clothing and be okay with VoP. And I'd really look into picking up the Eschew Materials feat.

 

[Ice man]

So, I know what "gestalt" usually means - what does it mean here?

gestalt is a rule variant out of Unearthed Arcana...basically 2E multiclass...take all abilities of both classes, best HD and saves and advance both simultaneously: ie. when have enough xp to advance a level both classes advance...very powerful rule variant...in my campaign we impose a 30% xp penalty because not all the players wanted to gestalt so to make up for the single class characters and keep CR/EL roughly even we agreed on a penalty.

 

[Zimri]

isn't eschew materials Epic or am I thinking of another feat.

As an example a fighter/wizard gestalt gains the fighters bab/fort save/ bonus feat/hd and the wizards will save/ and spell progression

 

[Zimri]

gestalt is a rule variant out of Unearthed Arcana...basically 2E multiclass...take all abilities of both classes, best HD and saves and advance both simultaneously: ie. when have enough xp to advance a level both classes advance...very powerful rule variant...in my campaign we impose a 30% xp penalty because not all the players wanted to gestalt so to make up for the single class characters and keep CR/EL roughly even we agreed on a penalty.

The choice we got was all of us do or none of us do. The Cleric of Kelemvor wasn't present but was played by another person. She should be back by next game session.

The only issue I can see with her is she is a cleric of the god of death she isn't supposed to come back ... according to her. I say when the Hebdomad and Ilmater show up and offer you the choice they have pretty much cleared it with your deity.

If she refuses I suppose she'll just roll up a new gestalt character or something.

 

[Sejs]

Heh, she says she's not supposed to come back - what if Kelemvor, when she showed up on his doorstep, told her that no, she's not due there yet. Not only can she go back, but she's under orders to do so. She's not carrying out the works of Kelemvor if she's dead, after all. Get up! Get back to work! Nice job with the fallen parcel of celestia - keep that momentum going. I'll come for you when it's your time; you can rest then.

 

[Zimri]

Yeah and all we had to do to avoid the TPK was just 1) not attack the Rakzasha that had brought her back to life once before after a near tpk (he decided to play with us because he knew we would do something "sickeningly noble" that would help him) who was also involved in slave trading and had slain my mentor, and had nefarious plans for the three illithid babies we had handed over to my mentor.

"Don't attack" he said , "you'll die" he said "that wasn't very nice" he said after snatching the blessed crossbow bolt out of the air, then imploding our Psychic Warrior.

So we Evac'd to the plane with a judicious casting of plane shift from a scroll

Where we healed up then he waltzed in.

"Okay humiliating you once wasn't enough, you eliminated my competition for ruler of my people but you attacked me. Tell ya what hand over the plane to me and I'll resurect your friend and let you go free"

Yeah like that was gonna happen. So I prayed and ilmater said "don't be afraid to martyr yourself for a worthy cause"

Sure but I am not going to ask my party to lay down their lives

"Get out" said I. "Go Home" said I. "Not bloddy likely" said they.

we woke up over our corpses and equipment laid out in burial arrangements in a cathedral with the hebdomad and Ilmater offering to let us pass on or allowing us to return to our home and continue the struggle.

Well we had promises to keep and miles to go before we get to sleep.

 

[Nightingale 7]

Are you kidding?Of course you should go cleric!The fact that healing is covered by the other members is not a deterrent,but a boon.Now your cleric can be no holds barred,and use all those tasty combat buffs and utility spells.Sure,leave the True Res to others.You're going to be Gating Solars,or whatever .
Forget about going Fighter.You do not get anything substantially useful.Since you play 3E your Cleric can be unstoppable with Extended Bull's Strength,Cat's Grace,Owl's Wisdom,Divine Favour.
PsyWar is good,but whatever he can do,the Cleric can do better.
Sorcerer is very good,both thematically and powerwise,but you don't want to tie your spellcasting to Cha when you're already playing a M.A.D. class,and with only a 15 in Cha you weren't getting to the big spells,unless you handed out big cash for Cha enhancers.Why not tie your spellcasting with the most important monk stat.Take that feat (Intuitive Attack?) from BOED and you can have your AC,spellcasting and AB linked to one stat!

 

[Delemental]

isn't eschew materials Epic or am I thinking of another feat.

Eschew Materials is a core feat (as of 3.5 - in 3.0 it appeared in Tome and Blood). It allows you to cast spells without material components as long as they have no significant cost (so you don't need bat guano to cast fireball, but you still need the 100 gp pearl for identify).

There is a similar feat in the ELH (which I believe has Eschew Materials as a prereq) that allows you to forego all material components or foci, even expensive ones. I can't recall the name of the feat, though (Ignore Components?)

 

[blargney the second]

Can you take core classes from other books? Complete Warrior's swashbuckler could be interesting for you. The core classes in Oriental Adventures are pretty snazzy as well, and you've already got some asian style with your monk. Nobody's mentioned the ranger yet - would two-weapon fighting stack with flurry of blows?

If you want to simplify spellcasting, find one or two spells that you really like and just fill up all your slots with them. Remember that you can memorize a lower level spell in a higher level slot.

All that being said, I'd have to say go with cleric of Ilmater. You prayed to him just before you died and he answered your prayer! Story reasons are always the best reasons to do things.

-blarg

 

[sparxmith]

Naw if I were going divine caster I would go with cleric.

*sigh* I never wanted to multi or even prestige class because I felt the monk gave up too much by way of damage dice and armor bonuses.

I think you are making a big mistake by not even considering the Druid.

Here's my Character:

Semmemon LN Male Human Monk/Druid 7 of Nobanion

Str: 15 (+2)
Dex: 14 (+2)
Con: 13 (+1)
Int: 14 (+2)
Wis: 20 (+5)
Cha: 13 (+1)

AC w/o buffs: 25 AC w/ buffs: 33
Unarmed Strike: +9/+9 (1d8+5)
Fort: +7
Ref: +8 (+10 when under Cat's grace)
Will: +11

Feats & Class abilities:

Sacred Vow, Vow of Poverty, Exalted Animal Friend,Touch of Golden Ice, Natural Spell, Extra WildShape, Spontaneous Healing, AC +6, Endure elements, Exalted Strike +1/magic, Sustenance, Resistance +1, Deflection +1, Ability Score increases: Wisdom +2, Improved Grapple, Deflect arrows, Animal Companion, Nature Sense, Wild Empathy, Woodland Stride, Trackless Step, Resist Nature's Lure, Wild shape 3/day, Improved Disarm, Wholeness of Body,

Usual Spells Memorized: Call Lightning, Wind armor (+4 deflection bonus to AC--Book of all Spells), Bull's Strength, Cat's grace, Speak w/ Animals, Entangle, Flame Strike, Barkskin

Tactics: Shapeshift into an Eagle to scout for the party (+8 racial bonus to spot checks), take out plenty enemies using Call lightning and Flame Strike even before the party knows there is an enemy to fight (extra XP!!!). When in combat, I can be a front line fighter, or I can stand back and blast the enemies with spells.

Next level, I will gain the ability to shapechange into a grizzly bear which will increase my damage output in melee combat.

We have a Monk/Cleric of Helm in the party. I regularly deal more damage than him in combat. I take less hits because my AC is generally 5 points higher than his. In a sparring match, I bested a Paladin/Cleric and the Cleric/Monk.

At later levels, the wildshaping into Huge and larger things, as well as Elementals will make you even more versatile. Need to swim, Dire shark swims at 90 ft per round. Need to fly, an Air elemental flies at 150 ft. per round. In melee combat, Huge Earth Elementals + flurry of blows= death to enemies. Need spells, the druid commands all the forces of nature. =-)

But that's just my two sparx,

Sparxmith