# Why does nobody complain about the monk?



## xXxTheBeastxXx (Aug 12, 2010)

I've looked to see if this topic was covered, but didn't find anything. I'm a gamer who came from 3.5 and always wondered...what the hell's up with the monk? How does a class get away with 7 attacks, 2d10 unarmed damage, 90+ foot movement speed, a minimum of +5 to their AC (plus wisdom, and because of that, I don't think you can bitch about lack of armor), three high saving throws, the ability to understand and speak any language, the ability to slow fall any distance, a ki pool that grants you a plethora of abilities, a self-healing ability, near-immortality, and Quivering Palm: one of the few (especially few in PF) save or die abilities.

Why does nobody complain about this? It seems that people all whine about CoDzilla (which can be nasty, I admit), whilst ignoring the Monk. I don't think it even needs a -zilla at the end. It's bad enough on its own.

Also the Paladin.

-The Beast


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 12, 2010)

I can't help but think this is a trolling attempt...

But to answer your question, no one here complains about the monk because the people on this forum have actually seen the monk in play.


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## Gorbacz (Aug 12, 2010)

Because the Monk is weak 

In 3.5, Monk was a joke class. His flurry attack bonus and damage couldn't at any rate get anywhere near an optimized Fighter, mostly due to inability to use any serious magic weapon (and in consequence, overcome any serious DR). His speed and uber jumping becomes irrelevent the moment fly/boots of flying enter the scene, and the only thing he was really good at was grappling casters before they get a chance.

Immortality, tiny self-healing, slow fall and speaking any language are very fun and flavorful, except they don't do you much good if a dragon is trying to eat your head.
  Now, PF kinda fixed some problems. The weapon situation was finally fixed (brass knuckles from APG), the Monk archetypes are really nice, and there are several new monk-friendly feats. So you can say that in PF the Monk finally becomes game-worthy.


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## Cor_Malek (Aug 12, 2010)

And paladins would be nice if not for the existence of clerics, who can do all they can + more, and better. A melee optimized cleric fights better than an optimized paladin and he can still heal and buff others. Hence, no one claims paladin to be overpowered.

Not to mention that the very point of CoDzilla is not only being better at X than characters supposedly great at it (ie: wizards by default, and clerics with help of wands - can emulate about every "special" ability of monk), but at the end of the day - he's still good at his own role.

Are we done here?


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## Gorbacz (Aug 12, 2010)

Actually, the Cleric > Paladin point was valid for 3.5, but isn't for Pathfinder. Pathfinder Paladins are simply awesome and are stepping on the Cleric's toes in the healing department (not to mention leaving them in dust in the melee role). Pre-smite errata the Paladin was simply too good to be true. Now it's just good to be true. Best class update in PF, hands down.

Now, Monk ...


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## Kaiyanwang (Aug 12, 2010)

I have a monk player now in my current campaing. Level 12. Does fine, does not beat enemies like a fighter, but mobility, saves and special things make him flavourful and useful.

PF fixed some of the issues (level to CMB is a great thing).

The class is indeed far from being overpowered. Is not even weak, I found that people that find it weak are those who would play it like a barbarian or a fighter.


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## jefgorbach (Aug 12, 2010)

Depends how he's equipped/feated.

"A monk’s unarmed strike is treated both as a manufactured weapon and a natural weapon for the purpose of spells and effects that enhance or improve either manufactured weapons or natural weapons." (SRD) meaning HE can be enchanted/use augmentation crystals like any other fighter without the worry of dropping or having his weapon permanently Sundered. 

Since he can be enchanted with weapon properties, is it unreasonable to presume he should likewise be able to do the same with armor/shield properties?

Equipment-wise, he's on par with the fighter. 

However his base natural weapon damage improves over levels whereas the fighter's sword remains 1d6. However start taking Improved Natural Weapons once he reaches +4 bab to boost his base damage die progression - raising a pure 4th level monk from a base 1d8 x2 to 2d6 x2 before enchantments/modifiers.


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## Gorbacz (Aug 12, 2010)

Err, you're reading the rules wrong. It counts as weapon for spells and effects (Su, Ex, Sp) - so you can, say, cast magic weapon on it. But you can't slap +2 or flaming or viscous on your fists in 3.5ed. If that was the case, there would be one less problem with 3.5 monk.

Pathfinder APG fixes it by introducing brass knuckles, which are a monk weapon that scale with his unarmed damage, can be flurried and are a normal weapon that can be enchanted.


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## xXxTheBeastxXx (Aug 12, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> I can't help but think this is a trolling attempt...
> 
> But to answer your question, no one here complains about the monk because the people on this forum have actually seen the monk in play.





Sorry, not an attempt to troll. I was just looking at the monk from a technical standpoint which, apparently, I shouldn't have. You said that no one complains because they've seen it in play. I suppose the problem I've had is that everyone in my troupe saw the monk's abilities as overpowered and didn't ever want to play one. 

Sorry for the confusion.

-The Beast


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## Gorbacz (Aug 12, 2010)

Just looking at abilities and the level progression table tells very little about the class. A Wizard takes his power from the spell list, and the Fighter draws his strength from feats, weapon enchantments and dozens of Small Things that add up to form his respectable damage potential.


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## gamerprinter (Aug 12, 2010)

I think the monk is still too weak, another too weak class is the bard. I've got no complaints on the Paladin its better, and for Codzilla with the nerf of heavy armor he's better, but doesn't run in circles around the paladin.

GP


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## Maidhc O Casain (Aug 12, 2010)

jefgorbach said:


> Depends how he's equipped/feated.
> 
> "A monk’s unarmed strike is treated both as a manufactured weapon and a natural weapon for the purpose of spells and effects that enhance or improve either manufactured weapons or natural weapons." (SRD) meaning HE can be enchanted/use augmentation crystals like any other fighter without the worry of dropping or having his weapon permanently Sundered.
> 
> ...




Also, I _think_ Mr. Jacobs has said that Improved Natural was never intended to be used w/ the Monks Unarmed Attack.


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## JRRNeiklot (Aug 12, 2010)

I have a monk in my game and he is by far the weakest character in the party.  Granted, they are only 5th level, but he is not enjoying the class right now.  He can't hit anything, does crappy damage when he does hit,everything always saves against stunning fist, and he has the lowest ac in the party except for the sorceror.  But he can slow fall and he can move as well as the 2nd level barbarian henchman.   

The monk has wonderful flavor and I want to love it, but I find it sadly underpowered.


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## Kaisoku (Aug 13, 2010)

The monk takes far too many ability scores to be great at all the things he's supposed to be great at.

Want good defense? You'll need good Dex, Wis and Con.
Want good damage? You'll need good Str (and Dex if you go with weapon finesse).

A Fighter can focus on two ability scores and be awesome: Str and Con.
The fact that a Monk needs to have a good Wisdom score (to get his AC, Stunning Fist DC, Ki and a few class abilities all within the realm of "worth while"), makes for a hard class to build.
The fact that you probably need to focus on Dex to get a decent AC, which means you are likely going to have to give up on something somewhere to remain relevant, and give up some Strength.. and that 2d10 seems so far away, and not quite as big as before.

In PF, Bards, Rogues and Rangers get save or die attack abilities, as well as the Assassin, so the Monk isn't exactly unique in this aspect.

Until the APG and the brass knuckles, it was costly and limited to get weapon enhancements on unarmed strikes. And even with the brass knuckles, it removes some of the benefits of the unarmed strike (it can be sundered, only applies to that weapon and not "any limb/body part", etc).

Having lots of movement is great... until you realize that it is completely out of synch with his combat ability (flurry of blows has more attacks and a higher BAB, but requires a full attack, so no movement during the same round).

A lot of the abilities they get are just to make up for the fact that they aren't using regular equipment. While Pathfinder's Ki points really helped boost versatility, it doesn't really help that the Monk can jump 20 feet vertically at a level where people need flying...

They are certainly better off now than they were in 3.5e... but they are not game wrecking nonsense. Not even the theorycraft supports the overpowered slant, and actual playtesting reveals just how hard it is to pull off the stuff touted in theory.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 13, 2010)

Kaisoku said:


> They are certainly better off now than they were in 3.5e... but they are not game wrecking nonsense. Not even the theorycraft supports the overpowered slant, and actual playtesting reveals just how hard it is to pull off the stuff touted in theory.




I haven't seen the PF monk in play, but I think it may actually be weaker than in 3E.  They didn't really fix any of its problems, took away the single greatest thing 3E monks had going for them (ability to take Improved Natural Attack), and buffed other melee classes, especially the Paladin and Fighter, much much more noticeably, even though IMO monk was THE weakest core class in 3E.


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## gamerprinter (Aug 13, 2010)

I've played one, the Ki Pool helps, but not much - monk is still pathetic.

If I limited it to Spring Attack and Stunning Fist or similar, I could cause some damage and not get killed, and I could run far and fast, but mostly, meh...

GP


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## grizzo (Aug 13, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> I haven't seen the PF monk in play, but I think it may actually be weaker than in 3E.  They didn't really fix any of its problems, took away the single greatest thing 3E monks had going for them (ability to take Improved Natural Attack), and buffed other melee classes, especially the Paladin and Fighter, much much more noticeably, even though IMO monk was THE weakest core class in 3E.



Not if you take the dragonborn option from Races of the Dragon and Vow of poverty.


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## renau1g (Aug 13, 2010)

Gorbacz said:


> Err, you're reading the rules wrong. It counts as weapon for spells and effects (Su, Ex, Sp) - so you can, say, cast magic weapon on it. But you can't slap +2 or flaming or viscous on your fists in 3.5ed. If that was the case, there would be one less problem with 3.5 monk.
> 
> Pathfinder APG fixes it by introducing brass knuckles, which are a monk weapon that scale with his unarmed damage, can be flurried and are a normal weapon that can be enchanted.




Funny enough this is how we solved the monk issue in 3e, back when I had a player who really wanted to play a monk for RP purposes but knew how much they sucked compared to the other classes. I suggested a set of brass knuckles and after competing in a Mortal Kombat-style tournament he won them as a "trophy". +1 flaming fist on one hand and he ended up getting a +1 cold (frost?) knuckles for the other. He was nick-named Icy Hot.



grizzo said:


> Not if you take the dragonborn option from Races of the Dragon and Vow of poverty.




Don't get me started on VoP.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 13, 2010)

renau1g said:


> Funny enough this is how we solved the monk issue in 3e, back when I had a player who really wanted to play a monk for RP purposes but knew how much they sucked compared to the other classes. I suggested a set of brass knuckles and after competing in a Mortal Kombat-style tournament he won them as a "trophy". +1 flaming fist on one hand and he ended up getting a +1 cold (frost?) knuckles for the other. He was nick-named Icy Hot.




All you needed to do was give a monk a simple item to enhance his unarmed strike like any other person can enhance their weapon at the regular costs, and the problem is "solved."  Since the monk's entire body is a weapon and part of his singular "unarmed strike," I was always the most partial to making it a robe slot item.



renau1g said:


> Don't get me started on VoP.




I'll start.  It's an extremely weak option for a monk along with basically every class, and even if it didn't cost two of your precious feats (it gives you free exalted feats back, but with only a few exceptions, exalted feats are garbage), I'd still not take it as a monk unless I expected the game to drastically deviate from the expected wealth by level (on the low end).


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## jefgorbach (Aug 13, 2010)

Gorbacz said:


> Err, you're reading the rules wrong. It counts as weapon for spells and effects (Su, Ex, Sp) - so you can, say, cast magic weapon on it. But you can't slap +2 or flaming or viscous on your fists in 3.5ed. If that was the case, there would be one less problem with 3.5 monk.




Perhaps, but game-mechanically isnt "slapping a spell" onto an existing masterwork sword what gives it the +2 flaming wounding properties? Therefore the clearly(?) worded implication is monks should be allowed to permanently enchant their attack with the same abilities as other players such that +2 flaming wounding fists are legal per RAW provided the monk 
has the resources and access to people with the correct spells, the same as any other player. 

As I see it, the main difference is the monk has to be present throughout the enchantment process instead of simply wandering into the local Magic Mart unlike most fighters/etc.


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## renau1g (Aug 13, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> All you needed to do was give a monk a simple item to enhance his unarmed strike like any other person can enhance their weapon at the regular costs, and the problem is "solved."  Since the monk's entire body is a weapon and part of his singular "unarmed strike," I was always the most partial to making it a robe slot item.




Robe is a good idea, my player came up with the brass knuckles idea so we ran with it.


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## Gorbacz (Aug 13, 2010)

jefgorbach said:


> Perhaps, but game-mechanically isnt "slapping a spell" onto an existing masterwork sword what gives it the +2 flaming wounding properties? .




It is something different. Enchanting a weapon via creation feats =/= making it a subject of an effect from a spell/ability.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 13, 2010)

renau1g said:


> Robe is a good idea, my player came up with the brass knuckles idea so we ran with it.




My problem with that is, unarmed strike is supposed to be the same, whether you punch, kick, elbow, knee, head-butt, butt-butt, etc...  It's all the same "weapon" with the same damage die, bonus to hit, etc...  With your flaming brass knuckle thing, did you let him get the benefit of flaming on a kick?  Or was he basically restricted to flavor how he attacks based on which appendages he had magic item enhancements on?  I guess it works both ways, as it's cheaper to have say... one +1 flaming dragon bane knuckle and another +1 frost evil outsider bane knuckle than to have a singular item with all of those properties...but I don't like the implications of that, and I think it's overall a worse deal for the monk than just having an option to enhance his entire body as a single weapon, like the fighter can his greatsword.  And not at Amulet of Mighty Fist's obscene prices.  That item should be renamed "Amulet of Hydra striking," cause that's the kind of creature that actually benefits from it for the cost...


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## renau1g (Aug 13, 2010)

Well the benefit of a specific weapon was that he could have a flaming one, a frost one, he eventually also got an acidic one. Kind of like how many fighters have a "golf bag" of weapons (one of the problems I had with 3e), the monk had his adamantite one, and a cold iron one, etc. 

We had the knuckles spread the effect to his body so he could describe it however he wished. Again for us it was a way to help out the poor monk relative to the other classes. So if he Snap kicked someone in the head, the flames (or frost) flared along his arms down to his foot and helped his attacks. It was a bit silly, but we didn't care, we had fun.

This player 95% of the time just described his attacks as a punch, he wasn't great for the different descriptions during a fight.


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## zen_hydra (Aug 13, 2010)

I think some sort of enchanted tattoos, or ritual scars, might be a good way to go.  I don't think that it would be that unbalancing for them to not take up a typical magic item slot either.  Thematically speaking, enchanted tattoos work better for having the monks entire body manifest the weapon enhancements, IMO.


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## gamerprinter (Aug 13, 2010)

I agree that tattoos fit better, but I never like the fact that you had to take a class in 3.5 Tattoo Monk to get those benefits, it would seem you could pay an arcane tattooist (with the Create Tattoo, item creation feat) to apply a specific tattoo on you. Having to take a prestige class seems 'expensive' to gain a magic item benefit.

In my Japan analog setting, Kaidan, the only problem here is that tattoos at least to the Japanese was a very low class thing to do - so monks would never put tattoos on their body. In Japan, tattoos are a yakuza thing, therefore rogues guild, which is from the lowest caste of society. It causes a problem for my flavor.

GP


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## Dannyalcatraz (Aug 13, 2010)

Gorbacz said:


> > Perhaps, but game-mechanically isnt "slapping a spell" onto an existing masterwork sword what gives it the +2 flaming wounding properties? .
> 
> 
> 
> It is something different. Enchanting a weapon via creation feats =/= making it a subject of an effect from a spell/ability.




OTOH, the Kensai PrCl clearly considered it to be equivalent to a manufactured weapon for its Weapon of Choice enhancement ability, so I don't really see this as an unreasonable reading of the language in the Monk class description.  "Spirit of the rules" and all that.

And if you still have a problem with that, you can always import the Hands as Weapons Feat from Monte Cook's AU/AE game.


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## NotZenon (Aug 14, 2010)

Monk - the class for people who watched to much "kung fu" and "kung fu the legend continues" on late night tv.


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## Dannyalcatraz (Aug 14, 2010)

_*raises hand*_

And I *love* to play that class, baby!


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## Shazman (Aug 14, 2010)

With a fighter's CMB and BAB (while flurrying) plus ki points and brass knuckles, I think the monk should be able to hold his own.  All those attacks should let him do some decent damage.


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## Shazman (Aug 14, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> All you needed to do was give a monk a simple item to enhance his unarmed strike like any other person can enhance their weapon at the regular costs, and the problem is "solved."  Since the monk's entire body is a weapon and part of his singular "unarmed strike," I was always the most partial to making it a robe slot item.
> 
> 
> 
> I'll start.  It's an extremely weak option for a monk along with basically every class, and even if it didn't cost two of your precious feats (it gives you free exalted feats back, but with only a few exceptions, exalted feats are garbage), I'd still not take it as a monk unless I expected the game to drastically deviate from the expected wealth by level (on the low end).




I've seen Vow of Poverty break a game.  It can get pretty bad at higher levels.


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## jefgorbach (Aug 14, 2010)

Gorbacz said:


> It is something different. Enchanting a weapon via creation feats =/= making it a subject of an effect from a spell/ability.




Not really. 
Look at ANY magic item, be it armor, weapon, ring, rod/staff, or wondrous item. Each lists what the device does and what spells are involved in the enchantment process along with how experienced the corresponding spell caster/scroll needs to be to properly generate those effects. 

For instance to create a Holy weapon, one needs the desired masterwork weapon, someone who knows how to prepare it for enchanting, and a cleric of at least 7th level with access to the Holy Smite spell. 

Since its acceptable under RAW to purchase the base weapon to be enchanted, it seems reasonable to allow the above cleric perform whatever prayers/etc he would ordinary use when imbuing that weapon with Holy Smite to instead imbue that power into the monk since his unarmed strike qualifies as the manufactured masterwork weapon per RAW.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 14, 2010)

Shazman said:


> I've seen Vow of Poverty break a game.  It can get pretty bad at higher levels.




Yes, actually.  It does tend to suck more at higher levels than lower levels.


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## Werebat (Aug 14, 2010)

OK, quick and dirty fix for the monk -- give it full BAB.  That's what I did in 3.5.

Too good?  Not enough?

   - Ron   ^*^


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## Starbuck_II (Aug 14, 2010)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> OTOH, the Kensai PrCl clearly considered it to be equivalent to a manufactured weapon for its Weapon of Choice enhancement ability, so I don't really see this as an unreasonable reading of the language in the Monk class description. "Spirit of the rules" and all that.
> 
> And if you still have a problem with that, you can always import the Hands as Weapons Feat from Monte Cook's AU/AE game.



 If you give out everybody that ability: you take away power/ability from the Kensai class.
It'd be like stealing all Fighter Bonus feats and giving to monk: why play a Fighter if Monk gets its abilities?

So be a Kensai if he wants to enhance his arms.


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## Dannyalcatraz (Aug 14, 2010)

Starbuck_II said:


> If you give out everybody that ability: you take away power/ability from the Kensai class.



Not quite.

The Kensai does it intrinsically as a class feature- without having to invest in craft magic arms and armor or meeting the spell requirements or XP costs- every other monk has to pay for that privilege unless he is also multiclassed as a spellcaster or has a PC in the party willing to do all that for free.

IOW, the base monk is prepped for the procedure, but he still has to go through all the other stuff any other PC would to get a custom magic weapon, a cost the Kensai doesn't pay.

Or to put it another way, it is my opinion that but for the language in the monk class saying that the monk's unarmed strikes can be considered a manufactured weapon for purposes of spells & effects, the Kensai would not be able to choose a monk's unarmed strikes as his weapons of choice.


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## billd91 (Aug 14, 2010)

For the OP:
The monk is the classic example of a weakness of theorycrafting. When the 3.0 rules debuted, there was a lot of discussion that the monk was too good based on reading the stats. That he was broken. Turned out to be a bit too weak in play.

If you and your friends read the monk in PF and thought he was too strong, withhold judgement until he's been actually tried at a few points in his progression.


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## ffanxii4ever (Aug 15, 2010)

I like the monk, but as many have said, the Core monk is hardly overpowered.

Now with the APG out, there are more than a few nice little goodies for the monk, and one of them is particularly attractive: The Zen Archer

Why you ask?   Well, its got a number of nice goodies (such as Weapon Specialization, Reflexive Shot, Trick Shot, and Ki Arrows), but there is one ability that outshines them all: *Flurry of Bows!*


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## Azmyth (Aug 15, 2010)

I have not yet player a Pathfinder build of the monk, but I have judged many of them at Society tables. They are not terribly over powered. 
With an advanced to expert player at the helm, they are formidable in combat (but then any class should be a player of that level).
I would echo Bill D's sentiment of, "withhold judgement until he's been actually tried at a few points in his progression."


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## mxyzplk (Aug 15, 2010)

1.  Because complaining is for wusses.

2.  Because monks don't hit for crap.  We have players play monks reasonably frequently.  They have the highest ACs and CMDs of anyone, but just don't deal the damage.  It's called "flurry of misses" for a reason, and stunning fist DCs are a joke.  And it's a lot harder/more expensive to magic up the to-hit roll with unarmed.


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## Walking Dad (Aug 16, 2010)

mxyzplk said:


> 1.  Because complaining is for wusses.
> 
> 2.  Because monks don't hit for crap.  We have players play monks reasonably frequently.  They have the highest ACs and CMDs of anyone, but just don't deal the damage.  It's called "flurry of misses" for a reason, and stunning fist DCs are a joke.  And it's a lot harder/more expensive to magic up the to-hit roll with unarmed.




1. Yes

2. No, Full bab for flurries helps. And the Brass Knuckles in the APG solve the lack of cheap enhancement problem.
How you get the high AC? I mean, for a melee class, I put my highest stat in Str and cannot ignore Con. So Dex second best and wis forth?
If you shortchange your main combat stat for better AC, there has to be a disadvantage.

BTW, I like your storyhours!


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## Darkthorne (Aug 16, 2010)

I would do Wis over Dex as this helps flat-footed AC, your Ki abilities & your DC's. I've built high/ac accurate monks and they never dished out any real damage. Also the flurry of blows is *EXTREMELY *better now as it is based off of full BAB, however for the most part you have to remain static on the battlefield. Zen Archer looks awesome, but you do give up a lot of abilities I like.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 16, 2010)

Walking Dad said:


> And the Brass Knuckles in the APG solve the lack of cheap enhancement problem.




You know what would have helped solve that problem?  Giving a fair price on the amulet of mighty fists from the start. *generic enraged smiley face*


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## Kaisoku (Aug 17, 2010)

Despite the name ("mighty fists" indeed), the magic item was priced assuming a worst case scenario: an animal or wildshaped druid with numerous natural attacks.

They really should have had an item that gave a bonus to "unarmed strike" and another for "natural attacks". Unarmed strike is, by default, limited... unlike natural attacks (which can have many, ex: Dragons).

Even them, the item was limited to a +5 bonus. Even with Pathfinder's change to allow enhancement effects (without the +1 requirement), allowing you to stack greater magic fang or weapon with an amulet, it still was more limited than a regular weapon.

Creating a weapon that could take on the unarmed strike damage circumvents most of the issues involved (including the other end of the spectrum: brass knuckles can be sundered if needed).


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## gamerprinter (Aug 17, 2010)

One way I think to improve the Monk class is expanding the Ki powers, right now its bypassing some DR, and some maneuver abilities. I've been working on a ninja variant for my Kaidan setting and think to emulate psionics in the form of limited selections as ki powers, like combat maneuvers at distance, special movement like 'running up walls', passing through walls, walking on water, blink and phasing similar to Ethereal Jaunt, a form of Wraithstrike and metabolic powers to increase strength, AC bonuses, etc.

I planned to develop five different Ninja houses with specific flavor and different available sets of Ki powers, feats, and weapon preferences.

This same concept could easily be applied to Monks giving that class the boost it needs to be more powerful and more fun to play.

GP


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## Glade Riven (Aug 18, 2010)

gamerprinter said:


> ...emulate psionics in the form of limited selections as ki powers, like combat maneuvers at distance, special movement like 'running up walls', ... etc.




Maybe. If I wanted to play a monk like that, I'd probably ask the DM if I could play a monkified swordsage from Bo9S (swap the proficiencies to monk for weapons and armor, drop in the monk's unarmed proficiancies).

Adapting Pathfinder's anybody-can-craft-magical-items feat to a tattooist would be easy, and the concept of magical tattoos to add enhancements is cool. Trying to pump both offense and defense through that method would get pricy, but locking up a monk's portion of the treasure into his tattoos would allow for a certaint type of flavor to be maintained.

If I played as a monk, I'd go dwarf, trollkin (Iron Kingdoms), or warforged (Eberron). A warforged monk would be nasty between an enchanted body and warforged feats (Eberron Player's Guide implies that Adamantine Body is a work-around for class abilities that don't work while wearing armor).


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## billd91 (Aug 18, 2010)

Kaisoku said:


> Despite the name ("mighty fists" indeed), the magic item was priced assuming a worst case scenario: an animal or wildshaped druid with numerous natural attacks.
> 
> They really should have had an item that gave a bonus to "unarmed strike" and another for "natural attacks". Unarmed strike is, by default, limited... unlike natural attacks (which can have many, ex: Dragons).




I sort of agree with the cost of the amulet of mighty fists being too high. However, the unarmed strike is not really limited. I suppose you could say that you get a limited number of them in any single round, but there's no limit to what that unarmed strike can be. It can be a punch, a kick, a head butt, a hip check, a knee, whatever. That means it can never truly be disarmed and, though it has a weak base damage for most PCs, it's something to be considered. It should be more expensive to enchant, but probably only by a moderate flat amount to reflect non-disarmability and high situational flexibility.


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## Kaisoku (Aug 18, 2010)

"Limited" meant, you had one attack (or it could be used for iteratives). This is unlike the term "natural attacks", because that includes bites, claws, hooves, wings, tentacles, whatever.

It really was about the "number of attacks". The cost of the amulet was at 2.5x the normal costs (ie, assuming using _more _than two weapons... bite + clawx2 is a fairly normal natural attack routine).
Weapons can be protected against disarming (locked gauntlet) and sundering (adamantine), but having an attack routine that includes a half dozen extra attacks?

Unarmed Strike and Natural Attacks really are two different beasts when it comes to the value and costs compared to normal weapons.
I'd probably price an item boosting unarmed strikes at a 1.5x cost, or a flat cost (~5k?).

The Brass Knuckles suffers sundering normally (although I think disarming is harder), and it locks you into using that one fist to make your attacks, so it brings unarmed strike down to weapon levels. Perfectly fine at a normal enhancement cost.


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## Odhanan (Aug 19, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> I can't help but think this is a trolling attempt...
> 
> But to answer your question, no one here complains about the monk because the people on this forum have actually seen the monk in play.



Basically. 

There are some heavily mitigating aspects to playing a Monk character. None of crippling for the smart player and DM (who includes stuff like the brass knuckles alluded to earlier in this thread and similar items), but all in all, it is not an easy class to play under typical circumstances.


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## Azmyth (Aug 19, 2010)

posted to wrong thread.


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## mxyzplk (Aug 20, 2010)

billd91 said:


> I sort of agree with the cost of the amulet of mighty fists being too high.




I don't really, and strongly disagree with the brass knuckles form the APG, because the poor to-hit is what balances them.  When they have full BAB and can enhance, then they become like a fighter that is using a weapon that does 2d10 points of base damage...


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## Holy Bovine (Aug 20, 2010)

JRRNeiklot said:


> I have a monk in my game and he is by far the weakest character in the party.  Granted, they are only 5th level, but he is not enjoying the class right now.  He can't hit anything, does crappy damage when he does hit,everything always saves against stunning fist, and he has the lowest ac in the party except for the sorceror.  But he can slow fall and he can move as well as the 2nd level barbarian henchman.
> 
> The monk has wonderful flavor and I want to love it, but I find it sadly underpowered.




Reminds me of the one 3E game we played to about 16th level.  Had a player in that play a single classed monk all the way from 1st.  The running jokes were "I use Flurry of Blowing (missing every attack)" and "I hit and do....Monk damage!" (meaning less than 10 points, this one started at 8th level).  If the player hadn't made his PC so much fun to have round th rest of the group would have killed him out of mercy.  (and the guy never missed a skill check - I mean freaking never!  he couldn't hit the broadside of a barn but need a history check done?  nat 20!)


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## billd91 (Aug 20, 2010)

mxyzplk said:


> I don't really, and strongly disagree with the brass knuckles form the APG, because the poor to-hit is what balances them.  When they have full BAB and can enhance, then they become like a fighter that is using a weapon that does 2d10 points of base damage...




I'm guessing you really don't have much experience with the 3.0/3.5 monk. They're *really* hampered by the lowered BAB, in my experience, which is why they get to use their monk level to determine their BAB from their monk levels while flurrying and calculating CMB in Pathfinder.
Getting an easier and less expensive magic bonus to hit is the main goal that monks need to reach with the amulet of mighty fists and brass knuckles. The extra magical properties, considering they still have fairly hampered critical hits, won't put them past the fighter even with the 2d10 base weapon at highest levels.


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## Kaisoku (Aug 20, 2010)

mxyzplk said:


> I don't really, and strongly disagree with the brass knuckles form the APG, because the poor to-hit is what balances them.  When they have full BAB and can enhance, then they become like a fighter that is using a weapon that does 2d10 points of base damage...




If you compare to the 3.5 Fighter, yeah.. it's too good to be true.

The thing is, the Pathfinder Fighter has Weapon Training bonuses along with his class-only feats. In a one-to-one comparison build (TWF vs Flurry) he more than makes up for the damage loss, and still has higher attack bonus.
Since we are comparing end caps (2d10 damage), Weapon Mastery makes the Fighter immune to disarm attempts anyways.
On top of that, he can decide to go a different route if he wanted, and has additional unique feats that give extra potential (DR piercing feats, apply two crit feats at once, etc).

There's a good thread on the Paizo boards called the "DPR Olympics" that tries to hash out the different classes and builds potential at combat damage. They did a pretty good job of keeping the comparison at a realistic level (comparing vs monsters and not each other, reasonable levels, etc).
The Fighter is fairly universally considered "the best" now at dealing damage, although that's from a pure powergaming point of view.

Giving the Monk the brass knuckles, while a major fundamental shift in his equipment allocation, is not a game breaking problem when put into practice. Keep in mind that he doesn't even get double digit damage dice (say that 5x fast) until he hits 12th level, and most of his gaming life will be spent playing with 2d6 or lower damage dice.


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## Walking Dad (Aug 20, 2010)

Darkthorne said:


> I would do Wis over Dex as this helps flat-footed AC, your Ki abilities & your DC's.
> ...



But Dex gives Initiative and helps to tumble (or jump) into flanking position.


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## Kaisoku (Aug 20, 2010)

The monk class already gets a level bonus to Acrobatic checks, and can spend a Ki point (that higher Wisdom gives more of) to get a +20 bonus to Acrobatics.

Really, Initiative and Ranged combat are what Monk will want to focus on Dex for... and they don't have Sneak Attack so "going first" isn't quite as critical as it is for other classes.


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## amethal (Aug 23, 2010)

Mowgli said:


> Also, I _think_ Mr. Jacobs has said that Improved Natural was never intended to be used w/ the Monks Unarmed Attack.



As I remember it ...

Initially James said monks couldn't take the feat. 

When it was explained that lots of people thought they could (I remember one of those epic length threads on ENWorld about it in 3.5; I'm not sure whether it is more clear cut in Pathfinder) he said that made the feat too good as all monks would take it.

Then he discussed it with Jason Bulmahn and the result was it was errata'd so monks definitely couldn't benefit from the feat. (Per Bestiary errata, add "(not an unarmed strike)" to the end of the first sentence in the feat description.)

There is no question of nerfing Natural Spell however; presumably not all druids take that particular feat.


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## Werebat (Aug 23, 2010)

"There is no question of nerfing Natural Spell however; presumably not all druids take that particular feat."

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!

<Wipes eyes>

Seriously, though, WHY didn't they take care of that little problem when they had the chance?

"Sucks to be YOUUUU!!!" (in a birdlike caw) is a running joke at our gaming table when the druid turns into a bird to fly around lobbing spells all combat, leaving his groundling companions to soak all attacks from the enemy...


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## jasin (Aug 23, 2010)

Werebat said:


> OK, quick and dirty fix for the monk -- give it full BAB.  That's what I did in 3.5.
> 
> Too good?  Not enough?
> 
> - Ron   ^*^



Hey, Ron!  How's things?

The Pathfinder monk effectively has good BAB when flurrying (and two-weapon fighting feats).

My quick and dirty fix for 3.5: make the additional flurry attacks usable at all times, regardless of whether the monk is moving, full attacking, attacking with a non-monk weapons. Encourages mobility, allows wuxia swordsmen, gives a combat boost, all in one!

Doesn't really work in Pathfinder, since flurry isn't just bonus attacks, but a whole new BAB...


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## Kaiyanwang (Aug 23, 2010)

I consider myself a fan of Pathfinder but the IUS thing makes me headscratch. If you add to this that there is a druid spell in the APG that increases a natural attack by 2 dice, I feel like there's some disparity in treatment.

On the flipside, if a druid casts such spell (since is ot personal) on the monk, jump from 2d6 to 4d6, or from 4d8 to 6d8 before enlarge person is reeealy nice. Another way could be UMD.

Said this, talking about druids.. I cannot IMAGINE a druid that does not take natural spell.


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## jasin (Aug 24, 2010)

Walking Dad said:


> And the Brass Knuckles in the APG solve the lack of cheap enhancement problem.



If indeed they do (I haven't seen what they do, but I'm betting "treated as a weapon, your unarmed strikes are now lethal"), they're the stupidest item ever.

If they thought monks should be able enhance their fists at the same cost as normal weapons, they should've just let monks enhance their fists at the same cost as normal weapons. No need to reduce what should be wuxia Shaolin kung fu masters to using brass knuckles like back alley thugs.


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## Werebat (Aug 24, 2010)

jasin said:


> If indeed they do (I haven't seen what they do, but I'm betting "treated as a weapon, your unarmed strikes are now lethal"), they're the stupidest item ever.
> 
> If they thought monks should be able enhance their fists at the same cost as normal weapons, they should've just let monks enhance their fists at the same cost as normal weapons. No need to reduce what should be wuxia Shaolin kung fu masters to using brass knuckles like back alley thugs.




This.

Something about monks having to use brass knuckles to compete just... bugs me.

Again, how would just giving them full BAB work?  That's been my quick and dirty fix for a while now.

   - Ron  ^*^


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## jasin (Aug 24, 2010)

Did you miss my post earlier... or are you just up to your old tricks? 

Pathfinder monks get full BAB + TWF when flurrying. That's what flurry is in Pathfinder.


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## Werebat (Aug 24, 2010)

"Old Tricks"?  Does your last name begin with a "Z"?  :^)

I hadn't seen your post, no, and am in India at the moment so haven't been able to access my own books (or the internet with much regularity) lately...  And I've never actually PLAYED PF.  So it's just a case of ignorance on my part.  :^)

   - Ron   ^*^


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 24, 2010)

jasin said:


> If indeed they do (I haven't seen what they do, but I'm betting "treated as a weapon, your unarmed strikes are now lethal"), they're the stupidest item ever.
> 
> If they thought monks should be able enhance their fists at the same cost as normal weapons, they should've just let monks enhance their fists at the same cost as normal weapons. No need to reduce what should be wuxia Shaolin kung fu masters to using brass knuckles like back alley thugs.




Just as I said.  I continually find it ironic that monk is the only class that can have his weapons enhanced by pretty much any caster in the game, and yet he pays MORE for enhancement items, not less.  So logical!



jasin said:


> Pathfinder monks get full BAB + TWF when flurrying. That's what flurry is in Pathfinder.




They could've just given monks full BAB...always.  Clerics and Druids still share the d8 HD, Rogue and Bard got bumped up to it, and Ranger got upgraded to d10.  Would it really step on the martial classes' (heh, I'm making it sound like monk isn't a martial class...not sure if that's entirely inaccurate...) toes if he had a full BAB?

I'd rather buff monk in other ways (see my sig for some things I'm thinking of giving them) and leave him with medium BAB, but if you're going to leave him a gimped class, at least let him always hit things easily.


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## billd91 (Aug 25, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> They could've just given monks full BAB...always.  Clerics and Druids still share the d8 HD, Rogue and Bard got bumped up to it, and Ranger got upgraded to d10.  Would it really step on the martial classes' (heh, I'm making it sound like monk isn't a martial class...not sure if that's entirely inaccurate...) toes if he had a full BAB?




No, it wouldn't step on their toes, but it would mess with backward compatibility, which was the reason given for not changing the monk's BAB. Giving them a bonus for conditional uses of their abilities does not because it doesn't affect entry into prestige classes nor gaining feats like changing the BAB would.


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## jasin (Aug 25, 2010)

Werebat said:


> "Old Tricks"?  Does your last name begin with a "Z"?  :^)



Indeed it does! 



> I hadn't seen your post, no, and am in India at the moment so haven't been able to access my own books (or the internet with much regularity) lately...  And I've never actually PLAYED PF.  So it's just a case of ignorance on my part.  :^)
> 
> - Ron   ^*^



One never knows with you, does one? 

What have you been up to, D&D-wise? Thinking of trying Pathfinder?


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## jasin (Aug 25, 2010)

billd91 said:


> No, it wouldn't step on their toes, but it would mess with backward compatibility, which was the reason given for not changing the monk's BAB. Giving them a bonus for conditional uses of their abilities does not because it doesn't affect entry into prestige classes nor gaining feats like changing the BAB would.



That's a very weak reason. Not many (if any?) monk prestige classes use BAB as the limiting requirement, precisely because monks have medium BAB. Feats would be available sooner, but it would hardly shatter backward compatibility if monks could get, say, Improved Critical at 9th instead of 11th.


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## Werebat (Aug 25, 2010)

jasin said:


> Indeed it does!
> 
> 
> One never knows with you, does one?
> ...




Running an E6 3.5 game set in Eberron, where the PCs are playing orcs and goblinoids (the native peoples of Khorvaire) trying to prevent the re-entry of the Daelkyr from Xoriat.  They're at 6+10 now, so things should be wrapping up sometime this year.

As I mentioned elsewhere, I'm playing a regular 3.5 game (also set in Eberron; the DM is running us through Age of Worms).  Playing a creepy Blue (goblin) warlock in that one.

Continuously adding to my music files for gaming...  Got an iPhone now.  At this point I back up so much it would take a house fire to get rid of my library entirely, and even then I'd be able to get MOST of it back...  Complete loss would require a nuclear war or some such.

And you?


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## billd91 (Aug 25, 2010)

jasin said:


> That's a very weak reason. Not many (if any?) monk prestige classes use BAB as the limiting requirement, precisely because monks have medium BAB. Feats would be available sooner, but it would hardly shatter backward compatibility if monks could get, say, Improved Critical at 9th instead of 11th.




Nevertheless, it was a reason cited by the Paizo team. They're content with some numbers changing when DMs update previously published stat blocks. They're content with the behavior of certain feats changing. They didn't want the when they become available changing.

Besides, it's not just about monk-oriented prestige classes, but also fighter-oriented ones as well. Many of those *would* be available to a monk character sooner because they do rely on a minimum BAB.


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## jasin (Aug 25, 2010)

billd91 said:


> Nevertheless, it was a reason cited by the Paizo team.



Nevertheless, it's very weak.



> Besides, it's not just about monk-oriented prestige classes, but also fighter-oriented ones as well. Many of those *would* be available to a monk character sooner because they do rely on a minimum BAB.



That's true, and I admit I hadn't considered that.

Now that I have, I still think it's a very weak reason.

(I'm not challenging you, just saying that I don't agree with Paizo's reasoning. )


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## jasin (Aug 25, 2010)

Werebat said:


> Running an E6 3.5 game set in Eberron, where the PCs are playing orcs and goblinoids (the native peoples of Khorvaire) trying to prevent the re-entry of the Daelkyr from Xoriat.  They're at 6+10 now, so things should be wrapping up sometime this year.



In "present day" or in the time when goblinoids ruled Khorvaire? I seem to remember you talking about the latter.

How is E6 working out that far beyond 6th? 6+10 means they got 10 "levels" beyond 6th, right? Which translates to, what, 10 feats, spells, abilities unavailably by 6th? What's the power level of 6+10 character, compared to a 6th-level character, or a CR 6 monster?



> As I mentioned elsewhere, I'm playing a regular 3.5 game (also set in Eberron; the DM is running us through Age of Worms).  Playing a creepy Blue (goblin) warlock in that one.



Age of Worms was nice, even if it did cement Paizo's image in our minds rules lawyerly sadists. How far along are you?



> Continuously adding to my music files for gaming...  Got an iPhone now.  At this point I back up so much it would take a house fire to get rid of my library entirely, and even then I'd be able to get MOST of it back...  Complete loss would require a nuclear war or some such.



Eh. This just reminded me I recently noticed that DVD you sent me has become unreadable. 



> And you?



Been playing primarily 4E for the last two years or so, with a bit of other stuff like Savage Worlds or Vampire on the side. A 3.5 Eberron PbP game on Circvs Maximvs reminded me how much more a I enjoyed 3E, and soon after it ended I started running Kingmaker, and I'm loving it. I'd like to play some 3E/Pathfinder again, though.

I'm also, in theory, looking to expand my horizons with some of the RPGnet darlings: FATE, Mouse Guard, Burning Wheel. Still haven't actually gotten around to it.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 25, 2010)

billd91 said:


> Besides, it's not just about monk-oriented prestige classes, but also fighter-oriented ones as well. Many of those *would* be available to a monk character sooner because they do rely on a minimum BAB.




AFAIK, there were at least two things Paizo generally acknowledged and used as guiding prinicipals:

1) Noncasters needed help to level the playing field with casters.

2) Base classes in general needed better stuff, especially past the first few levels, to make prestige classes and multiclassing less attractive than they were in 3E.

Going with that, if Paizo had just buffed the Monk base class enough to compete with these awful, despised "broken" 3E prestige classes (which were still leagues below most casters in power, go figure), would it even matter if it was a little easier to get into some prestige classes?  It's ok for any other martial character to take Imp. Unarmed Strike and possibly some other things, and trump the monk at his own game and possibly really add salt to the wound by being able to enter "monk" prestige classes early due to full BAB...but not ok for the monk to be able to enter there prestige classes at the same level the full BAB martial classes can already?

I know you're just stating Paizo's supposed arguments and they're likely not your own opinion.  But...it's just so wrong.


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## billd91 (Aug 25, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> I know you're just stating Paizo's supposed arguments and they're likely not your own opinion.  But...it's just so wrong.




I just think you have to consider their point of view and goal for high backward compatibility so people could continue to use their old 3.5 stuff. If you assume that prestige classes and feats that weren't part of the 3.5 core (splatbook and 3rd party) were designed with the abilities of the core classes in mind, then they were built with the assumption that monks had a medium BAB and that may have affected they way they were designed or balanced. Giving the monk high BAB changes that assumption. The end effect may not be very significant... or it might depending on the resources the DM and players are using. And Paizo decided they didn't want to go to the effort to go there. I understand and empathize, given their goal of backward compatibility which I think is still a good goal for them to have had.

Without that goal in mind, I'm sure giving the monk a full BAB would have been on the table. Enough of the monk's special abilities (combat maneuvers and flurry) work around the difference that I'm convinced just going out and giving full BAB would have been considerably easier from a design point of view.


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## Cor_Malek (Aug 27, 2010)

Um... I dunno why no one mentioned this one before, but what about enhancing protectors for hands and feet, something like bandages?

We used to have a lot of monks in our group, as one of friends was national champion in karate (juniors), and he liked to play monks in MERPG, and he continued to play them at first in DnD. It was a rather low-magic world though, so most of the time we were confined to what we could make or find. He had enhanced wrappings made of exotic materials (for the base cost requirement), at first awarded via quest by our DM, but we quickly picked up the idea, to boost him up a bit. 
Even then though, the class appeared a lot weaker than what MERP made us used to (monk in Rolemaster is a damn crit-machine), and less powerful or versatile than other PC's in DnD. But at least he didn't run around with knuckles and tulips ;-)


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## Voadam (Aug 27, 2010)

billd91 said:


> I just think you have to consider their point of view and goal for high backward compatibility so people could continue to use their old 3.5 stuff. If you assume that prestige classes and feats that weren't part of the 3.5 core (splatbook and 3rd party) were designed with the abilities of the core classes in mind, then they were built with the assumption that monks had a medium BAB and that may have affected they way they were designed or balanced. Giving the monk high BAB changes that assumption. The end effect may not be very significant... or it might depending on the resources the DM and players are using. And Paizo decided they didn't want to go to the effort to go there. I understand and empathize, given their goal of backward compatibility which I think is still a good goal for them to have had.
> 
> Without that goal in mind, I'm sure giving the monk a full BAB would have been on the table. Enough of the monk's special abilities (combat maneuvers and flurry) work around the difference that I'm convinced just going out and giving full BAB would have been considerably easier from a design point of view.




I'm having trouble conceiving of a monk prc that would go from acceptable to overpowered by lowering the minimum entry level by two or even three. Can you think of any from WotC, Dragon, or anything OGL? Nothing from Complete Fighter, Quintessential Monk, or Beyond Monks comes to mind as the first three monk resources I thought of. Also throw in the fact that to take advantage of this prc the character would have to forego the 1/1 BAB monk levels for that level.


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## BryonD (Aug 27, 2010)

Voadam said:


> I'm having trouble conceiving of a monk prc that would go from acceptable to overpowered by lowering the minimum entry level by two or even three.



I agree.  And even if you did, just agreeing that you needed the character level based on the old BAB should be a completely reasonable solution.



> Beyond Monks



Woo Hoo


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## coyote6 (Aug 29, 2010)

Werebat said:


> This.
> 
> Something about monks having to use brass knuckles to compete just... bugs me.




As Cor_Malek said -- make 'em hand-wraps. Or hand & foot wraps, with bonus headband.


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## Aus_Snow (Aug 29, 2010)

For my own tastes, the best answer is to scrap "Monks" altogether. Unarmed combatants should not be able to compete with armed combatants. Not without bringing in definite (and probably obvious) _supernatural_ forces. Same thing goes for armour.

Unarmed fighting was a core component of the training of a "knight", sure, but it was only there as a fallback, and/or as something to add in here and there (e.g., wrestling-style moves to unbalance a foe, etc.) See Improved Trip, et al.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Aug 29, 2010)

coyote6 said:


> As Cor_Malek said -- make 'em hand-wraps. Or hand & foot wraps, with bonus headband.




While mechanically a monk could spend an entire campaign doing no other attack than a straight punch with his right hand thousands of times, I'd rather not have a magic item setup that forces you to flavor him as only attacking with that one specific appendage.  That's not what unarmed strike is.  Again, why can't monk just pay 1x cost on the amulet and enhance his entire unarmed strike.  All one of it, since it's all considered the same weapon.


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## Cor_Malek (Aug 29, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> While mechanically a monk could spend an entire campaign doing no other attack than a straight punch with his right hand thousands of times, I'd rather not have a magic item setup that forces you to flavor him as only attacking with that one specific appendage.  That's not what unarmed strike is.  Again, why can't monk just pay 1x cost on the amulet and enhance his entire unarmed strike.  All one of it, since it's all considered the same weapon.




The enhancement had to be spread appropriately. Just as monks whole body is treated as one weapon, whole set (bandages for hands, headband and tabi for feet (also bandages at first IIRC)) of protector wrappings were treated as one enhanced weapon. *Just as giving turbo only to front, rear, left or right wheels in 4x4 will make it _worse_ to drive(as in massive difference, not balancing), wearing only hand-wrappings would give slight (+1/2) bonus to damage and _massive_ penalty to hit. He could use right jab exclusively, but even to do that, he'd have to wear the whole thing (not that it mattered, playing with him taught me a lot about various ways of hitting things. Only then I've learned that ryuken was real, and quite common way of punching (you put your middle finger forward, which focuses the force in that point; useful when hitting soft spots like kidneys)).

Getting them on was a whole thing as well - I don't remember how long it took, but it was quite substantial (not plausible to change during a fight) since he had to go through some monkish mojo, which helped us to avert the warrior weapon golf bag syndrome (though quite unwittingly on our part, never had problems with that. For different reasons but pretty much all of us were bonded with our weapons of choice).
This increase of needed material helped out with raw material cost as well - we didn't have to cramp all the GP's into one hand, but rather the whole set. But that said, what boosted material cost wasn't the amount of it, or even it's quality, but peculiarity (like being soaked in dragons blood).

*Truth to be said, we kind of understood what the deal was between DM and us, so this "+dmg -hit without whole set" thing - I invented for convenience of people who need to have it written down ;-)

[edit]:


Aus_Snow said:


> For my own tastes, the best answer is to scrap  "Monks" altogether. Unarmed combatants should not be able to compete  with armed combatants. Not without bringing in definite (and probably  obvious) _supernatural_ forces. Same thing goes for armour.
> 
> Unarmed fighting was a core component of the training of a "knight",  sure, but it was only there as a fallback, and/or as something to add in  here and there (e.g., wrestling-style moves to unbalance a foe, etc.)  See Improved Trip, et al.




Um, not quite. Short of static blocks, which are fencers euphemism for "I f  up, damn, damn", when you parry - you divert opponents blade, and same  goes for unarmed fighting. It's in the very nature of fencing, that 99%  of the time you train against the very same or similar weapon that you  use, as most of it that actually needs any skill is the work on the  blade (when both weapons are touching eachother). The most sure way to  harm unarmed opponent with a blade are x swings. And cutting people just  lacks stopping and killing power of a stab (which is the main reason,  why there was so many more deaths in XVII-XIX c. duels in west than in  east Europe - one preferred stabbing and the other slashing weapons).

It's the curse of police officers, that in a fight between someone with a  gun and with a knife - the outcome is clear only to a layman. Your gun  needs helluva stopping power to halt the attacker before he cuts you up  (and in close range, all you have is essentially a blunt object ).  Sure, one shot might kill him. But until he drops from blood-loss, he'll  either faint right away(no matter whether you even hit him in ~60% of  cases) or... not notice for about 1.5-2 minutes. In which case, you're  in trouble. That's actually the beauty of shotguns - it's not  necessarily more lethal, but the hydrodynamic force and multiple pain  recipients halt the target in place.

To be clear: I'm not advocating that it's preferable or even on par to  fight unarmed against people using weapons, but that there's sure a lot  of space for suspension of disbelief


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## Pezmerga (Sep 23, 2010)

What I do with monk in my games to make them less MAD is this...
I just let them add Wisdom to Attack and Damage. Kind of like a mind over matter approach. . Maybe just do that and restrict it to single class monks so you dont abuse the Wisdom?

Or maybe do Dex to hit and Wisdom to damage if you dont want a "God stat".


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## Dannyalcatraz (Sep 23, 2010)

Pezmerga said:


> What I do with monk in my games to make them less MAD is this...
> I just let them add Wisdom to Attack and Damage. Kind of like a mind over matter approach. . Maybe just do that and restrict it to single class monks so you dont abuse the Wisdom?




FWIW, there is a PrCl in Oriental Adventures that does exactly that.


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## kalani (Sep 24, 2010)

Personally, I take a page from the 4E monk, and allow monks to get enchanted ki straps which (for all intents and purposes) allow the monk to add magic weapon properties to their unarmed strikes (takes up the bracer slot).

I really don't see how a pair of +3 flaming ki straps is that much different to a fighters +3 flaming weapon, once you consider the fact that the enhancement is being applied to the classes primary "weapon".

As far as the MAD issue goes, I use a simple house rule.

"Intuitive Attack" (BoED) is no longer considered an Exalted feat (I never could figure out why that feat was exalted in the first place, psionic perhaps, but definately not exalted). In addition, I allow monks to take "Intuitive Attack" as a monk bonus feat (at 1st level or above).


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## TanisFrey (Sep 24, 2010)

kalani said:


> Personally, I take a page from the 4E monk, and allow monks to get enchanted ki straps which (for all intents and purposes) allow the monk to add magic weapon properties to their unarmed strikes (takes up the bracer slot).
> 
> I really don't see how a pair of +3 flaming ki straps is that much different to a fighters +3 flaming weapon, once you consider the fact that the enhancement is being applied to the classes primary "weapon".
> 
> ...



No need to import from 4ed D&D when the Pathfinder Advanced Players Guide induces the Brass Knuckles and the Cestus.  Both are simple weapons that are monk special weapons.  The Monk's unarmed damage is used if it is greater than the listed 1d3 x2 or 1d4 19-20/x2 damage.  Being weapons, feel free to enchant as you wish.


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## Voadam (Sep 24, 2010)

kalani said:


> Personally, I take a page from the 4E monk, and allow monks to get enchanted ki straps which (for all intents and purposes) allow the monk to add magic weapon properties to their unarmed strikes (takes up the bracer slot).
> 
> I really don't see how a pair of +3 flaming ki straps is that much different to a fighters +3 flaming weapon, once you consider the fact that the enhancement is being applied to the classes primary "weapon".




Amulet of mighty fists but in the bracers slot instead of amulet slot?


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## StreamOfTheSky (Sep 25, 2010)

Even giving monk wisdom to hit instead of strength for FREE (ie, not as a bonus feat option) won't do jack to solve their MAD.  They still need strength for damage and combat maneuvers.  At least...considering the whole martial arts "angle" and all the bonus feat options they have related to the maneuvers, I thought they were supposed to be good at them.  Maybe I'm crazy.

Look at what Pathfinder did to help out the Paladin's MAD (which, IMO, was never even as bad as a monk's anyway: You only really need Wis 14, not like an extra spell slot or 2 will matter much; dex and int are fairly safe dump stats).  Paladins completely and utterly dumped wisdom from their "good abilities to have" list.  Nothing, nothing at all other than will saves (which got bumped to good progression anyway) and some class skills use it any more.  Wisdom is actually a major dump stat for a PF Paladin IME.  That's what monks need.  Pick a stat, and realign the class features to make that stat completely unimportant, so you can focus your ability scores on "only" 3 major areas.  I wouldn't mind seeing strength become unimportant for a Monk, both to stand out from every other high str melee brute and to better fit the "mystical" superhuman wuxia image.  To do that, you need to make str irrelevant on attack, damage, and combat maneuver checks, at a bare minimum.  And it should NOT cost feats.  I believe I posted my basic idea for shifting these to wisdom-based rolls earlier in this thread...



TanisFrey said:


> No need to import from 4ed D&D when the Pathfinder Advanced Players Guide induces the Brass Knuckles and the Cestus.  Both are simple weapons that are monk special weapons.  The Monk's unarmed damage is used if it is greater than the listed 1d3 x2 or 1d4 19-20/x2 damage.  Being weapons, feel free to enchant as you wish.




And we come full circle again...

*I do not like having to restrict my attack descriptions as a monk to ONLY punches, kicks, or wherever the magic trinket happens to reside.  The whole freaking point of unarmed strike is it encomapsses your whole body, your body itself is the weapon, no matter which portion of it you happen ot be striking with.  I get that mechanically there's no real difference, but I still hate it.  Why can't there just be a robe, or a fairly priced amulet of mighty fists, or whatever?  Why is that so much to ask for?!  Did Paizo have a change of heart and see the light with the printing of the APG, that monks deserve fairly priced magic enhancements?  Why can't they just admit they were wrong and errata the bloody amulet, then?  WotC implicitly admitted Fighter sucked by printing Warblade so we could use that instead, rather than just tweak the Fighter.  Spellthief sucked, so instead of boosting the class, they "patched" it with the Master Spellthief feat to make the class palatable.  And so on...  Why is Paizo following in those terrible footsteps?*
/bolded anger text



Voadam said:


> Amulet of mighty fists but in the bracers slot instead of amulet slot?




And sanely priced, hopefully.


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## Pezmerga (Sep 25, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> Even giving monk wisdom to hit instead of strength for FREE (ie, not as a bonus feat option) won't do jack to solve their MAD. They still need strength for damage and combat maneuvers. At least...considering the whole martial arts "angle" and all the bonus feat options they have related to the maneuvers, I thought they were supposed to be good at them. Maybe I'm crazy.
> 
> Look at what Pathfinder did to help out the Paladin's MAD (which, IMO, was never even as bad as a monk's anyway: You only really need Wis 14, not like an extra spell slot or 2 will matter much; dex and int are fairly safe dump stats). Paladins completely and utterly dumped wisdom from their "good abilities to have" list. Nothing, nothing at all other than will saves (which got bumped to good progression anyway) and some class skills use it any more. Wisdom is actually a major dump stat for a PF Paladin IME. That's what monks need. Pick a stat, and realign the class features to make that stat completely unimportant, so you can focus your ability scores on "only" 3 major areas. I wouldn't mind seeing strength become unimportant for a Monk, both to stand out from every other high str melee brute and to better fit the "mystical" superhuman wuxia image. To do that, you need to make str irrelevant on attack, damage, and combat maneuver checks, at a bare minimum. And it should NOT cost feats. I believe I posted my basic idea for shifting these to wisdom-based rolls earlier in this thread...
> 
> ...



How about adding Dex to hit and to Combat Maneuvers  when using a monk Unarmed, Temple Sword, etc., and Wis to Damage (instead of Str.)? That solves the MAD a bit. Only have to worry about WIS, DEX and CON then...New Paladin has to Invest in STR, CHA, and CON. Seems fair to me. Not saying its the best fix, but it works without totally redoing the class...Personally I think the Monk has too much fluff, which is his problem. On paper he looks great at first glance. Then you make one...


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## AdmundfortGeographer (Sep 25, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> . . . And so on...  Why is Paizo following in those terrible footsteps?



Maybe Paizo believes monk is a class for people who are keen to play class below par but want to play that theme anyways? In a way like how 3.x Toughness was designed as a subpar feat that system mastery folks would discover its suckage, and feel that glow inside when they "go it" and now knew enough to skip over it, and then someday they would play a character who would take the feat knowing it was a subpar feat because it fit the character.

The game within the game within the game within the . . .


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## StreamOfTheSky (Sep 26, 2010)

Last night I was actually thinking... with the elimination of the concentration skill (which most monks never had a use for anyway), just how much does Con really affect things for a monk?  Might be interesting to replace that and have a Str, Dex, Wis class.

HP: For every HD you gain as a monk, you can use wisdom instead of Con for bonus hp.
Fort saves: Not sure this needs a replacement, monks already get the good base save.
Death and Dying: Problematic, since in PF you die at -Con Score and the stabilization roll is con-based.  Not sure the best way to replace this, probably just use wisdom or something.



Eric Anondson said:


> Maybe Paizo believes monk is a class for people who are keen to play class below par but want to play that theme anyways? In a way like how 3.x Toughness was designed as a subpar feat that system mastery folks would discover its suckage, and feel that glow inside when they "go it" and now knew enough to skip over it, and then someday they would play a character who would take the feat knowing it was a subpar feat because it fit the character.
> 
> The game within the game within the game within the . . .




Toughness in 3E was a feat to take for a 1st level character in a one-shot core-only game, which are not entirely uncommon.  Given those parameters, Toughness can actually rise to the level of a "good" feat, even.

In any case, a crappy feat is not the same as an entire class sucking.  PF was a re-do of 3E, I'm not very sympathetic that they left the monk a sub-par class still.


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## Starbuck_II (Sep 26, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> Last night I was actually thinking... with the elimination of the concentration skill (which most monks never had a use for anyway), just how much does Con really affect things for a monk? Might be interesting to replace that and have a Str, Dex, Wis class.
> 
> HP: For every HD you gain as a monk, you can use wisdom instead of Con for bonus hp.
> Fort saves: Not sure this needs a replacement, monks already get the good base save.
> Death and Dying: Problematic, since in PF you die at -Con Score and the stabilization roll is con-based. Not sure the best way to replace this, probably just use wisdom or something.



Instead of con use Wisdom? Great idea actually.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Sep 26, 2010)

Sure, why not?  Death and dying rules use wisdom, and perhaps to make up for the fort saves, give monks something like the Battle Fortitude the Scout class had in 3E.

I like the idea of a frail looking monk who's toughened himself through meditation and inner ki.  I also am totally in favor of dethroning Dwarf as the best core monk race, a fact I find displeasing.


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## Votan (Sep 27, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> Sure, why not?  Death and dying rules use wisdom, and perhaps to make up for the fort saves, give monks something like the Battle Fortitude the Scout class had in 3E.
> 
> I like the idea of a frail looking monk who's toughened himself through meditation and inner ki.  I also am totally in favor of dethroning Dwarf as the best core monk race, a fact I find displeasing.




One does have to worry about removing all mechanical features from a stat or it will be dumped (very, very low).  Battle fortitude plus a good fort save and WIS for death/dying plus hit points would make the cost of 6 CON very, very low.


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## Voadam (Sep 27, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> And sanely priced, hopefully.




After seeing that you can get magic fang and greater magic fang permanent via a 5th level spell for a few thousand gold the mighty fists price increase seems a little more explicable.


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## Dannyalcatraz (Sep 28, 2010)

> ...just how much does Con really affect things for a monk? Might be interesting to replace that and have a Str, Dex, Wis class.




Actually, that's pretty much the only stats I mess with for my Monk builds, though, counter to most people, I make mine Dex/Wis/Str.

Con, though, is the 4th highest stat.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Sep 28, 2010)

Votan said:


> One does have to worry about removing all mechanical features from a stat or it will be dumped (very, very low).  Battle fortitude plus a good fort save and WIS for death/dying plus hit points would make the cost of 6 CON very, very low.




And ever since the PF changes to Paladin, I've yet to see a Paladin with higher than 8 Wisdom.  So what?  It's still no where near as abusive as the Str, Wis, Cha 7 wizards I see all the time (natural 18 Int, everything else to Con and Dex) in pathfinder.  And the only way to have a 6 Con in PF with point buy is to be an elf.  And elf is a pretty godawful choice for monk, possibly one of the worst core races for it, in fact.  If you're not using point buy...rolls can turn out lots of ways anyway.  In either case, I'd still dump charisma with higher priority than Con even with all of those changes as a Monk, so I don't see how this would ever truly escalate into a "problem."


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## Otakkun (Oct 6, 2010)

> Str, Wis, Cha 7 wizards I see all the time...




Now why am I not surprised? Shame you can't do the same with the sorcerer, who besides STILL being punished with one less caster level than the wizard for some occult reason I've never really understood, can't really afford a Int 7 unless you're planning to have a character with almost cero skills.

Level 6 for 3rd level spells ... big pet peeve of mine.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Oct 6, 2010)

Per RAW, I think the favored class skill point comes after int penalty, I'm pretty sure you're MEANT to get a benefit out of it, no matter what.  Whether human's bonus point qualifies or not is probably more up for debate, but you could theoretically be an int 7 sorc and have decent skill points...

Course. with the release of the APG, any sorc is an idiot (even below int 7) to pass up the human variant favored class bonus for extra spells known, at least once you can get 1st level and higher ones.  But, that's a whole other issue...


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## Newt (Nov 4, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> Even giving monk wisdom to hit instead of strength for FREE (ie, not as a bonus feat option) won't do jack to solve their MAD.  They still need strength for damage and combat maneuvers.  At least...considering the whole martial arts "angle" and all the bonus feat options they have related to the maneuvers, I thought they were supposed to be good at them.  Maybe I'm crazy.
> 
> ...
> 
> I wouldn't mind seeing strength become unimportant for a Monk, both to stand out from every other high str melee brute and to better fit the "mystical" superhuman wuxia image.  To do that, you need to make str irrelevant on attack, damage, and combat maneuver checks, at a bare minimum.  And it should NOT cost feats.  I believe I posted my basic idea for shifting these to wisdom-based rolls earlier in this thread...




I remember a feat from a non-core WotC book somewhere giving you Wis to attack instead of Str, can never remember the name of it when I'm in "build a Monk" mood though, which I currently am.  Or it could have been Wis instead of Con.. Probably in one of the pisonic books, they got more love than Monks ever did.

I do like the idea of needing Dex, Wis, Str, Con though. More for the theme than mechanically, theme wise it's brilliant. The elite of the elite, above mere mortals. Mechanically it's a b***h. Could leave them for a high powered game where people start with better than normal stats? Or one of those "roll 4d6 6 times, take out the lowest number for each", generally gives at least one 18 and no low scores, even better when you can move points around at a 1:1 ratio. 18 Wis, 18 Str, 16 Dex, 14 Con, 12 Int, 10 Cha? 10 Int if Human, and could completely drop Cha realistically.

My perfect Monk is gestalt with Fighter, Rogue, Assassin, possibly Hellbreaker levels anyway. And a class that gives Dimension Door more than once.. Still looking for that. Mental movie turns into thought experiment turns into quite a bit of reading. 

About to get highly off topic, but the one character where MAD fits thematically is Monk. Save them for NPC's and high powered games. Or start reading non-core books and don't do an unarmed Monk.  Especially after that no Improved Natural Attack rubbish.


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## Newt (Nov 4, 2010)

Aus_Snow said:


> For my own tastes, the best answer is to scrap "Monks" altogether. Unarmed combatants should not be able to compete with armed combatants. Not without bringing in definite (and probably obvious) _supernatural_ forces. Same thing goes for armour.
> 
> Unarmed fighting was a core component of the training of a "knight", sure, but it was only there as a fallback, and/or as something to add in here and there (e.g., wrestling-style moves to unbalance a foe, etc.) See Improved Trip, et al.




Knights had plate gauntlets. Although Samurai had a style of Ju Jitsu according to people I've met who claim to know something. Whether it's true or not is another matter entirely. 

But taking on an armored combatant is realistic. Strap an iron bar to your forearm, from elbow to below wrist on the outside of your arm (outside with hands down), and you can now deflect blades. Not hard to attach, two bits of string, material/ties/etc for a less constrictive feel. You don't stop force with greater force if you can avoid it, you deflect that force. From martial arts training varying from Tae Kwon Doe to Fencing, don't do that X-Men thing where Wolverine punches the dudes fist and breaks it, you bat it to the side. Although if you're an elite monk you'd probably punch it.

Some points unarmored has over armored is speed and agility, the speed to dodge a blow then get in and hit, and the agility for that whole dodging thing. Two things that can equalize in a fight quite nicely.

DnD Monks don't have to fight unarmored though, they simply lose most of their AC.  And they can use weapons other than their body, even with Flurry of Blows.

Although you shouldn't lose AC (Dex at the very least) and Speed bonuses with an Armor Check Penalty of 0 or negatives. Can't get negatives I know, but if it would end up like that.) Think.. Dread Commando (Heroes of Battle) with Shadowweave (... Tome of Magic? I think.. Has some shadow items anyway). That would give you no ACP, heavy armor proficiency (although Shadowweave is leather tops I think), 2d6 Sudden Strike, and you would get bonuses to hide in shadows. Mix with Monk of the Long Death and you have a really nice armored assassin.

But again, that's assuming that Monks can use Armor if it has no ACP. Still need to check that


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## Dannyalcatraz (Nov 4, 2010)

An unarmored foe can still twist certain joints on an armored foe to breaking or grapple someone to immobility...and if the environment permits, a grapple can be turned into suffocation.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Nov 5, 2010)

Newt said:


> I remember a feat from a non-core WotC book somewhere giving you Wis to attack instead of Str, can never remember the name of it when I'm in "build a Monk" mood though, which I currently am.  Or it could have been Wis instead of Con.. Probably in one of the pisonic books, they got more love than Monks ever did.
> 
> I do like the idea of needing Dex, Wis, Str, Con though. More for the theme than mechanically, theme wise it's brilliant. The elite of the elite, above mere mortals. Mechanically it's a b***h. Could leave them for a high powered game where people start with better than normal stats? Or one of those "roll 4d6 6 times, take out the lowest number for each", generally gives at least one 18 and no low scores, even better when you can move points around at a 1:1 ratio. 18 Wis, 18 Str, 16 Dex, 14 Con, 12 Int, 10 Cha? 10 Int if Human, and could completely drop Cha realistically.
> 
> ...




The feat you're thinking of is Intuitive Attack.  It is an exalted feat, so in addition to spending a feat, you have to be super duper double-plus good to qualify.  And even then, it only helps attack rolls.  Not damage, grapple, or anything else a monk needs strength for.

As for MAD fitting thematically...if monk were the best class in the game, maybe it'd be ok if only the elite of the elite could be one effectively.  Not my cup of tea for game balance, but whatever.  But...even if you got many 16s and 18s and no one else had nearly as good stats (I use point buy, myself)...you'd STILL be merely equal to the next worst core class, Fighter.  If they have the same stats as you?  You still suck the most.

Thread's kind of old, I'd just like to add that with each passing day I seem to find new examples of "holy crap, Pathfinder's designers *HATE* monks!"  I didn't even notice until two weeks ago...all physical stats are on a single item now and cost MORE to get multiple different boosts of (ie, 10k for str and dex +2, instead of 8k, can't do str +4 and dex +2, either, have to upgrade all at once).  There's no text anywhere I can find for the +50% in wrong body slot and +100% for no body slot rules, either.  Sure sucks to be a MAD class...

And yes, it can't be said enough.  The designers actually going in after the fact to add completely contradictory errata specifically to screw monks out of Improved Natural Attack is total bs.  I think I'll add that sentence to every single post I make in this thread from now on, in fact.  It really bears repeating...


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## Dannyalcatraz (Nov 6, 2010)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> > Quote:
> > ...just how much does Con really affect things for a monk? Might be interesting to replace that and have a Str, Dex, Wis class.
> 
> 
> ...




I forgot one exception- if I'm planning on a Monk/Kensai build, Con is the third highest stat.

This is because the Kensai PrCl has a power that grants a +8Str bonus, reusable as many times as you make a Concentration check (of increasing difficulty).  This is quite handy- my Dex/Wis/Con monks routinely get a couple extra uses out of it.


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## Celtavian (Nov 8, 2010)

*re*

Like others I haven't found the monk to be a problem.

Fighters are such damage beasts now that all other classes barely compare to them in terms of raw damage.

The defensive abilities of the monk help him stay alive without as much aid from the casters. But give the fighter some caster support, his damage beastliness still makes the monk look like he's throwing pebbles.

The Paladin can be beastly when smiting. But on average the fighter still hammers harder than the paladin.

Ranger and barb pretty much same thing.

It depends on the levels as well. But as you progress, the fighter is the clearly superior damage dealer to all other classes. Fighters are so beastly dealing damage that all other classes pale in comparison to them. The additional special abilities make for great flavor and do help the other classes shine in a lot of situations. But when it comes to beating stuff down, the fighter is on average the top guy. 

And this game is all about killing stuff. Survival can help, but you have clerics to keep you alive. When it comes down to it, specialzed damage dealers like the fighter are so unbelievably beastly no one can compare to them.


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## Walking Dad (Nov 8, 2010)

Celtavian said:


> ...
> 
> Fighters are such damage beasts now that all other classes barely compare to them in terms of raw damage.
> 
> ...




Really? They made a DRP Olympics on the paizo board, but nerved all selfbuffs for being egoistic, or some casters and pet classes would have blown him out of the water.


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## pawsplay (Nov 10, 2010)

When I was working on the Martial Artist, I pulled apart the monk class and figured out that the only reason they have medium BAB is legacy. Between their overly complicated flurry of blows mechanic and full CMB, they are a full BAB class in all ways except:

- About 1 less hit point per level
- A lower attack bonus on a standard attack or a single attack

Monks need and deserve a full d10. Further, the latter seems to actually discourage their schtick, which is mobility. For instance, Spring Attack + Stunning Fist should be awesome, but for a monk raises accuracy issues.

Now, based on their damage, a monk could be considered, in a certain light, to be a high damage, low accuracy class. In a certain sense, I can understand how monks would have more trouble hitting heavily armored foes. However, the reality is that a focused fighter can out-damage the monk bare-handed. So I think the flavor works fine, but the monk needs help. W Focus (unarmed strike) is shockingly efficient, of course.

But really, the monk needs to be able to take Improved Critical (unarmed strike) at about the same time as the other martial classes, and needs some kind of scaling to-hit bonus, like a fighter's weapon training, paladin smite, ranger's favored enemy, barbarian's escalating Str bonus. If I were absolutely committed to legacy medium BAB, I would take a peek at 3.0 and modify the concept thusly; full BAB on attacks when fighting unarmed or using any monk weapon, period (full or standard attack). Then, with the high damage, is it as if the monk had a scaling to-hit bonus and traded it in for an inherent Power Attack type bonus. 

I think the amulet of mighty fists type item is correctly priced at a higher level; it affects all limbs, and affects multiple attacks (primarily natural attacks or flurry attacks). Further, the monk with, say, a +3 item when the fighter has a +5 is consistent with the theme, lower accuracy with more effects (stunning, high damage, etc.). 

The knuckles are not a good idea. Apart from the street fighter stylistic problems, slapping an enhancement bonus on top of monk damage at the higher rate leads to somewhat inflated numbers. In other words, everyone goes straight for the knuckles, and that's not what I want monks to do in my campaigns. Brass knuckles shouldn't be a superior option to nunchaku or a quarterstaff. There are very few real world styles that teach them, for that matter. And it really doesn't go into detail about readying, disarming, or sundering brass knuckles.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Nov 10, 2010)

pawsplay said:


> For instance, Spring Attack + Stunning Fist should be awesome, but for a monk raises accuracy issues.




I disagree.  The reason to use Spring Attack is defensive: you dart in and out and make only one attack to keep the enemy from full attacking you, or even reaching you if you have the speed.  If your Stunning Fist is actually working each round and stunning the person, you don't need to hit and run to protect yourself; he's just as much a non-threat to you stunned in melee as he is stunned 30 ft away.  Better to beat the tar out of the enemy with a full attack at that point.



pawsplay said:


> W Focus (unarmed strike) is shockingly efficient, of course.




No it's not.  It doesn't let my monk take Vital Strike at level 6, Improved Crit at 9 (as you noted), etc...



pawsplay said:


> I think the amulet of mighty fists type item is correctly priced at a higher level; it affects all limbs, and affects multiple attacks (primarily natural attacks or flurry attacks).




It's priced correctly for a monster with many natural weapons.  Not for a monk.  As I said before, mechanically it doesn't matter if a monk attacks with hands, feet, head, etc...  *It's all the same unarmed strike*.  Yes, it can never be disarmed or neutralized (short of paralysis), but that's part of the inherent benefits of unarmed combat.  For some of the inherent drawbacks, consider enemies with reach weapons, enemies you don't want to touch, enemies resistant or immune to bludgeoning damage...



pawsplay said:


> Further, the monk with, say, a +3 item when the fighter has a +5 is consistent with the theme, lower accuracy with more effects (stunning, high damage, etc.).




It's not consistent with anything.  Monk's paying the same price for lower attack AND damage.  Unless the theme you want to maintain is monk sucking at melee combat.  Then the disparity expands that theme wonderfully.



pawsplay said:


> The knuckles are not a good idea. Apart from the street fighter stylistic problems, slapping an enhancement bonus on top of monk damage at the higher rate leads to somewhat inflated numbers. In other words, everyone goes straight for the knuckles, and that's not what I want monks to do in my campaigns. Brass knuckles shouldn't be a superior option to nunchaku or a quarterstaff. There are very few real world styles that teach them, for that matter. And it really doesn't go into detail about readying, disarming, or sundering brass knuckles.




Brass Knuckles are superior to the amulet because the amulet is highway robbery.  And because once more, mechanically *it doesn't matter what appendage you use for your unarmed strikes*.  I like the flavor of mixing up kicks, knees, etc...  But I'm not paying tens of thousands of extra gold for artistic license.  You also seem to have a problem with unarmed strike being better than weapons when all else is equal (touching the monster won't burn your hand, you don't need a different damage type, etc... as mentioned above).  Monk is the designated unarmed fighting class, whether you like it or not, that's it's purpose (or a portion of it).  It's ideally supposed to do unarmed combat well enough to fare roughly equally well with someone using armor and weapons.

Brass knuckles wouldn't need any more readying or be subject to disarm anymore than gauntlets would.  It's ultimately just an excuse to let the monk magic up his fists because the designers realized they erred anyway.


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## pawsplay (Nov 10, 2010)

StreamOfTheSky said:


> I disagree.  The reason to use Spring Attack is defensive: you dart in and out and make only one attack to keep the enemy from full attacking you, or even reaching you if you have the speed.  If your Stunning Fist is actually working each round and stunning the person, you don't need to hit and run to protect yourself; he's just as much a non-threat to you stunned in melee as he is stunned 30 ft away.  Better to beat the tar out of the enemy with a full attack at that point.




If you hit. If they are stunned. In fact, those are two things which may not be likely at all. If you can only make one attack, and your opponent has a decent Fortitude, then medium BAB just isn't going to cut it. Even a more straightforward monk who simply tumbles past opponents to make a Stunning Fist attack is giving up a substantial amount of accuracy. Yet by design, shouldn't the monk be encouraged to do exactly that, rather than encouraged to stand in place and make a full attack?



> Brass knuckles wouldn't need any more readying or be subject to disarm anymore than gauntlets would.




So how long does it take to ready a gaunlet? It doesn't usually come up for gaunlets, because gaunlets, by design, don't interfere with anything. How long does it take to shuck a pair of knuckles? If you take them off, what do you do with them? Where does it say knuckles aren't any more subject to disarm attempts than gauntlets?

Why do knuckles allow monk damage, and gauntlets don't? Or do they?... gauntlets are specified as simply making unarmed strikes lethal.



> It's ultimately just an excuse to let the monk magic up his fists because the designers realized they erred anyway.




That's a big assumption. It appears that the monk was originally designed under the assumption that they would fight unenhanced with their firsts, occasionally using monk weapons when they needed something with special properties. The problem is that the AC benchmarks ended up, seemingly, a lot higher than would be practical for an unenhanced warrior to hit regularly. That leaves monks as medium BAB characters using weapons in toe to toe combat. 

Conceptually, I would rather make monks more capable without loading them down with magical doodads for their fists. Some kind of enhancement (via amulet or whatever) is acceptable, but should not be mandatory, and knuckles should be an option, but not THE option. Rather than building in a fighter-type "unarmed training" the most direct route would be to increase BAB, either generally, or when making unarmed strikes.


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## ruemere (Nov 11, 2010)

I do not really think that there is any hope for a Monk class in its current shape. And so fixing it, in my not so humble opinion, is like painting walls of a ruin.

Latest example: quite a few opponents in Legacy of Witchwar adventure (PFRPG module, 17th level characters recommended) damage creature striking them. And so lightly hitting opponents with multiple melee attacks are a bit, shall we say, inefficient.

One of my earliest attempts to rebuild the class was to get rid of close combat dependency, increasing the number of available options and fitting it with abilities capable of meshing with those of base classes.

Hmm. Aww, let me share a few notes just in case someone finds it useful:

-----

1. Monk is a spellcaster class based on Bard (just change the name, class skills and spells, also strip class abilities). Spellcasting statistic is Wisdom.

2. Class spell list features maneuvers - specialized Monk spells, which require either Swift Action, Immediate Action or Free Action to cast. Some spells come with prerequisites - they can be cast only in a succession (i.e. spell B can be cast only after spell A was cast).
Note: Maneuvers include all standard Monk abilities and then some.

3. The spells cast by Monk are subject to Monk spell template:
- does not provoke attack of opportunity
- does function in a Dead Magic/Antimagic area if the Monks makes a caster level check
- identifying them with spellcraft is subject to -5 penalty
- spells cast by Monk are considered to be arcane and are subject to arcane spell failure rules (i.e. wearing armor imposes chance of arcane failure)

4. In addition to base spell list, the Monk may learn spells from Bard and Sorcerer/Wizard spell list. However, there is a hard limit to the number of such spells equal to the sum of Wisdom bonus and Monk class level.
Such spells are still cast with Monk spell template.
Note: Monk's spell progression is similar to that of a Bard - the class will never gain access to arcane spells beyond 6th spell level).

5. Special class features:
- all old class abilities are converted to spells, available at spell levels corresponding to old class levels
- the spell Monk template allows the Monk to cast spells in combat
- Monk's learn attack patterns of their opponents - if fighting the same opponent for more than a single round, Monks gain special bonus which can be applied to attack, damage, armor or saves. The bonus can be also applied as Damage Reduction or Resist Elements against the opponent. The number of applications (and the size of the bonus) to be used simultaneously grows with Monk level

6. Monk spells last only several rounds.

7. Monk spells include:

- single and mass debuffs (several different spells applying penalties to attack, saves, armor class)
- inflict conditions on single targets and crowds, 
- simple ranged damage spells (rays, lightning bolts, firebolts, fireballs... incidentally, ninjas of Naruto series were inspiration for this)
- pounce (i.e. full attack after move action)
- rake (additional damage applied automatically after several attacks hit)
- flurry (additional melee attacks)
- death attack (as per assassin)
- expending Attacks of Opportunity to parry or dodge opponent attacks 
- Acrobatics skill buff
- movement enhancements
- personal attack and damage buffs

Consequently, Monk would be a skirmisher with high number of options, able to lock down opponents, create unfavorable conditions. Its main limitation would be number of spell slots available... as per this rule: "you're a king as long as you have spells to cast".

----

Well, that was as far as I got. Eventually, the idea was abandoned as no one wanted to be a Monk.

Regards,
Ruemere


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## StreamOfTheSky (Nov 11, 2010)

pawsplay said:


> If you hit. If they are stunned. In fact, those are two things which may not be likely at all. If you can only make one attack, and your opponent has a decent Fortitude, then medium BAB just isn't going to cut it. Even a more straightforward monk who simply tumbles past opponents to make a Stunning Fist attack is giving up a substantial amount of accuracy. Yet by design, shouldn't the monk be encouraged to do exactly that, rather than encouraged to stand in place and make a full attack?




Flurry is the primary class feature and requires a full attack, so it's just a core problem of the monk that it's very mobile but must stand still to fight anywhere near respectfully.  PF if anything made the problem worse by giving monk full BAB, but only during flurry.  At least before it was just a bunch of extra attacks.  In PF, after a certain point, even with hte -2 flurry penalty, you're actually losing accuracy if you don't flurry.  To solve this?  I think PF monks should just plain have full BAB, the current set up is really silly, and the reasoning for not doing so ("backwards compatibility") is complete bs when other core classes destroyed 3E compatibility, like the barbarian's rage mechanic.

In my own thoughts for fixing monk I give them the eventual ability to chain flurry attacks onto ANY attack, turning them into devastating spring attackers, and even pretty scary at AoOs with the right feats/gear.  That's still a work in progress, though.




pawsplay said:


> So how long does it take to ready a gaunlet? It doesn't usually come up for gaunlets, because gaunlets, by design, don't interfere with anything. How long does it take to shuck a pair of knuckles? If you take them off, what do you do with them? Where does it say knuckles aren't any more subject to disarm attempts than gauntlets?




It doesn't say, I'm just using common sense and the closest item related to the knuckles that do exist for an idea of how the knuckles should work.  I don't think the knuckles by design interfere with anything either. 



pawsplay said:


> Why do knuckles allow monk damage, and gauntlets don't? Or do they?... gauntlets are specified as simply making unarmed strikes lethal.




Gauntlets are still an unarmed strike, so they should work, they're just wonky because they force you to do lethal and more importantly...monk's aren't "proficient" with them and they aren't a monk weapon, so by RAW you'd take a -4 to hit and be unable to flurry with them, I think.  The knuckles avoid these issues by specifically being called out as a special monk weapon they're proficient with, so they're well thought out in that regard, at least.




pawsplay said:


> Conceptually, I would rather make monks more capable without loading them down with magical doodads for their fists. Some kind of enhancement (via amulet or whatever) is acceptable, but should not be mandatory, and knuckles should be an option, but not THE option. Rather than building in a fighter-type "unarmed training" the most direct route would be to increase BAB, either generally, or when making unarmed strikes.




So...make the amulet cost the same as any other weapon, the knuckles become the idiot pointless novelty they should be, and everyone's happy?  Even with full BAB, monk still deserves affordable magical enhancements if other warriors have them.  And again, I find it to be rather sick irony that if you have buff casters or wand users available, monk becomes the *easiest* class to buff his weapon, since it counts for magic weapon AND fang, but suddenly when you get to permanent magic items the tables are turned.  No monk player that looked into the numbers ever got the amulet, in 3E or pathfinder, you just got a wand for the mage to use.  It IS useful in that you can put a +1 property on it without it having an enhancement first, but I don't think that was its intended use...


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## Pezmerga (Nov 12, 2010)

Too bad they couldn't just take the Swordmage, rename it monk, and use that for the core "monk"  Problem solved.


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## Sorrowdusk (Nov 15, 2010)

What book is APG? I'd like to take a look at it.



Gorbacz said:


> Because the Monk is weak
> 
> In 3.5, Monk was a joke class. His flurry attack bonus and damage couldn't at any rate get anywhere near an optimized Fighter, mostly due to inability to use any serious magic weapon (and in consequence, overcome any serious DR). His speed and uber jumping becomes irrelevent the moment fly/boots of flying enter the scene, and the only thing he was really good at was grappling casters before they get a chance.
> 
> ...


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## Walking Dad (Nov 16, 2010)

Sorrowdusk said:


> What book is APG? I'd like to take a look at it.




http://paizo.com/store/downloads/pathfinder/pathfinderRPG/v5748btpy8fo1&source=top


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## Aus_Snow (Nov 17, 2010)

Cor_Malek said:


> Um, not quite. Short of static blocks, which are fencers euphemism for "I f  up, damn, damn", when you parry - you divert opponents blade, and same  goes for unarmed fighting. It's in the very nature of fencing, that 99%  of the time you train against the very same or similar weapon that you  use, as most of it that actually needs any skill is the work on the  blade (when both weapons are touching eachother). The most sure way to  harm unarmed opponent with a blade are x swings. And cutting people just  lacks stopping and killing power of a stab (which is the main reason,  why there was so many more deaths in XVII-XIX c. duels in west than in  east Europe - one preferred stabbing and the other slashing weapons).



Um, sure. Fencing is not the same as full-on, anything goes, _armoured_ combat. Let alone factors such as multiple opponents, a variety of weapons, or whatever else.




> To be clear: I'm not advocating that it's preferable or even on par to  fight unarmed against people using weapons, but that there's sure a lot  of space for suspension of disbelief



No, there isn't. All else being equal... just no.

Weapons beat no weapons. Again, all else being equal. So yes, experience (e.g., as represented as levels, etc.) matters a great deal also. But there is no way in hell a sane person would _choose_ to fight unarmed against armed - *especially armoured* (this is the killer of all killers) - foes.


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## StreamOfTheSky (Nov 17, 2010)

Aus_Snow said:


> Weapons beat no weapons. Again, all else being equal. So yes, experience (e.g., as represented as levels, etc.) matters a great deal also. But there is no way in hell a sane person would _choose_ to fight unarmed against armed - *especially armoured* (this is the killer of all killers) - foes.




Except it's fantasy, so you CAN have it set up that some people would choose to do so -- and excel at it -- just as you can have fireballs and silly charging knight builds that think real medieval armies fought wars like they were jousts.


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## Walking Dad (Nov 17, 2010)

The old problem:

Scholars flinging fireballs... sure. it is fantasy.

Someone unarmed taking out an armed knight... that is so unrealistic.


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