Unarmed or Quarterstaff for 20/10 Monk?

[RollerToaster]

The cookie cutter guide says to take Unarmed Focus, but would Quarterstaff be better? Since you can enchant the Quarterstaff and you won't use Flurry of Blows much.

[Baron Saturday]

I love quarterstaff monks, but in this case, fists are gonna be better. An essenced masterly damask quarterstaff is gonna get you the same AB, 7 attacks, and less base damage (12.5 avg). In comparison, essenced adamantine gauntlets get 5 attacks but more damage (18.5 avg). That extra damage is going to be important, as higher-level enemies often have some form of DR or DI. At the end of the day, however, your offensive capabilities are gonna be pretty bad no matter what you do.

The 20/10 Monk is also pretty tight on feats, so getting Ambidexterity, TWF and Impr. TWF would mean giving up Toughness, Dodge, and Great Fort. Not the end of the world, but also not ideal.

Lastly, I'm seeing conflicting reports about quarterstaves working with monk UBAB and finesse (viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1808), so if your heart is set on a quarterstaff, you might want to confirm that it's working properly now.

[Opustus]

Are we talking about Monk20/Rogue10? With the rogue weapon finesse feat, if you can squeeze in the dualwield feats with only losing Toughness, Dodge, and Great fort, I'd say it's better to go quarterstaff. The more SA you have and the more you rely on stealth in combat, the better it is to have more attacks per burst. Also, quarterstaff frees up the gloves slot, which makes up a bit for losing a few basic feats.

Naturally, though, fists are way kewler than quarterstaff and there's a dearth of good old fisting monks in Arelith.

[Tourmaline]

The cookie cutter guide says to take Unarmed Focus, but would Quarterstaff be better? Since you can enchant the Quarterstaff and you won't use Flurry of Blows much.

I'd suggest a quarterstaff monk doesn't need 20 monk levels and would do better with fighter in the mix.. Maybe something like 12 Monk/5 Fighter/13 Rogue.

[Fionn]

From my testing confirmed by DMs the Finesse and unarmed attack bonuses are not working for quarterstaff. No ETA

[msterswrdsmn]

Really? Weapon finesse is working just fine with me on Mifune. He has 10 STR, so it would be super noticable if weapon finesse wasn't working.

As for the original question; you can still enchant gloves the same way you'd enchant a quarterstaff. If anything, equipment maintenance would be easier with gloves, as a tailor monk can fix everything except their helmet, whereas quarterstaves, even the metal ones, need carpentry ranks to fix.

If you're going heavy monk, i'd recommend unarmed personally, as monks unarmed abilites improve with more monk levels. Specifically, their base damage with fists (1d20 at level 20), quivering palm, and the number of stunning fist attacks they can use per rest (the DC is tied to character level, but the use per rest=monk levels)

[Opustus]

I'd say Monk16/Fighter4/Rogue10, Monk15/Fighter5/Rogue10, and Monk20/Rogue10 are the best candidates, if you want the character to be monk heavy. For rogue heavy, Rogue19/Fighter5/Monk6 is one of the best builds I've ever played.