Monk SR vs. Cleric SR

[Shiki]

Druids can cast Nature's Balance, which has a scaling breach effect with abjuration foci, and then spell down a monk.

You want to be in arms reach of something that can Improved Knockdown you, when you could instead be a rock monster but yes, the effect with 3 feats would be the same as a mordenkainen's breach, but not dispel, on anything within 5 meters.

Self-Concealment

We agree.

I don't believe ignoring level 30 caster builds as a point of balance around which Diamond Soul, a class perk specifically meant to make monks resistant to casters, in favor of the more common 27/3 dip, is appropriately balanced for the sake of the feat, nor for thematic immersion. 27/3 is a case of "cake and eat it, too." If you want to penetrate the resistance of a monk with 5 epic feats spent on Improved Spell Resistance, you should be okay needing to be a level 30 caster to do it somewhat reliably.

I didn't ignore level 30 caster builds, I specifically pointed out what your True Flame is (or can be) capable of, including the math. To be more thorough, the math for a level 30 wizard is the same, d20+30+spellpen versus 42 Spell Resistance. If spellpen feats are not taken, that's an average 41 on a d20 die. That means you need to roll a 12 or better to cast a spell at a monk without breaching them. Are you actually trying to argue that a greater than 50% chance of ignoring your spells as a full level 30 is not resistant to spells?

If you are, then we disagree.

Speaking of somewhat reliably- there are a variety of spells that I can think of for use against a monk that spent 5 epic feats on Improved SR that render their SR somewhat moot in the first place- great thunderclap, for one (ignores SR), damage shield spells for two (they're certainly going to hit you- a lot- for low damage, compared to your damage shield hitting them back likely as hard or harder while you heal through it), and this doesn't touch upon the summons a caster that isn't locked out of conjuration can produce- although I would put my buffed Mordenkainen's Sword up against an SR focused monk any day- to pound on said monk which focused all their epic efforts on... resisting spells.

Also, Acid Fog, Cloud Kill, and Stinking Cloud.

These things exist. Many of them target saves. or AC, neither of which a Monk is going to be particularly vulnerable to, since the monks saves are likely hilarious. None of them are affected by, or affect, SR, and so aren't really applicable to the argument for giving Monks their crazy SR back that made them a problem, and was rightfully adjusted. These things existed when that SR was a problem, and didn't solve that problem then, either. I'm curious why you think they would be a counter to it now?

Black Blade of Disaster doesn't have the AC or iteratives to stand up to a defensive monk, and would probably not be dangerous to the kind of AC such a monk can have anyway, buffed or not. - Edit: BBoD can't be hurt. Its iteratives still aren't compelling, but without the ability to get rid of it, it has uses. The fact remains that's not a counter to monk SR. It simply isn't affected BY SR. Monks shouldn't have more SR because there are ways to attack them that don't attack SR.

Why shouldn't a 27/3 fail to penetrate a 30 monk's SR most of the time? Isn't that literally meant to be the opportunity cost of multi-classing (for mages)? My casters are most equipped to deal with the high SR monk because they're designed as level 30 casters, not because of their evocation focus. If anything, their lack of conjuration hurts more than it helps. The SR monk gets to have his cake or eat it- why shouldn't casters be the same?

Because the difference between 30 and 27 is 3, and the way a d20 works, that's precisely 15%, or 3/20. The effect is small, but statistically noticeable. A 27/3 thus IS less capable of penetrating a 30 monk's SR at ALL times. By precisely 15%. If you're paying attention, that means a 15 or higher to bypass monk SR without breaching them. After breaching, that means a 5+, instead of a 2+.

I realize you're arguing for this as some way to put a roadblock in the way of full casters. Presumably, wizards. The problem is that previously when this was not nerfed, the people least affected were wizards, clerics, and I imagine, druids, who all have various means of attacking outside of using a spell that relies on saves, or that can be resisted by spell resistance. There are other casters, and they are not so lucky as to have a wide range of options. Which was why there was a brief heyday for monks.

This is not the way to nerf wizards indirectly. Monks don't need this buff. I think you should pay attention to what I write, and you should do some math.

[malcolm_mountainslayer]

Right now a lvl 27 caster needs to roll 5 against 32 sr monk - both characters with 0 feat investement in sr or SR.pen. This is not balanced and not okay.

Now, the monk invests 1 epic feat into epic weapon focus and 5 more epic feats into SR, reaching 42 sr while tossing a lot of their combat effectiveness away - lvl 27 caster now needs to roll 15, without any SR pen investment yet. This is not balanced and not okay.

Anyone saying this is balanced is wrong. This isnt balanced. Casters are already broken in this server. A monk that cripples themselves down to 40-42 ab for the sake of resisting spells SHOULD be much better at resisting spells than how things are now. THAT, or removing the cap and removing the improved SR feats entirely. Something needs to change in favor of monks here.

Abd you did not even include how low they need to roll after they breach you.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

Are you actually trying to argue that a greater than 50% chance of ignoring your spells as a full level 30 is not resistant to spells?

If you are, then we disagree.

I am arguing that before those 5 epic feats, with zero spell penetration, a 27/3 needs to roll a 5 or better, giving them a 80% chance to ignore the 30 monk's SR, which caps at 32. Diamond Soul is an iconic ability of the class, and it should be better than that.

A spellcaster with ONE pre epic feat and 27/3, can successfully land, presently, 85% of all spells cast against a 30 monk with 5 epic feats after a disjunction. Do you believe one spell should take 5 epic feats of investment and destroy its return by such a margin?

A level 30 caster with one spell penetration feat pre-epic, can ignore *all* monk SR, even with Improved SR 5 (bringing it to 42), so long as they disjoin first. <--- This category covers the casters I play, and I believe it ridiculously unfair that any single spell should bring a monk's 5 epic feats to literally mean nothing against me in the field of Spell Resistance, where monks are thematically meant to reign supreme over all other sources of SR.

I'm also ambivalent to the sense of alarm about a monk fully kitted for SR being able to reliably just shut down a caster, since I'll be the first person to admit almost every other build barring divine save builds can be picked apart at will with the right spells, and I think an SR monk provides a much needed scissors to the paper dynamic of a caster.

I'm entirely unsympathetic to the thought that monks would be immune to item-based magic- they should be, IMO.

Edits for mathematical mistakes aplenty.

[Apokriphos]

Doesn't potion of lesser restoration remove the entire spell resistance debuff at half round speed? Seems like quite an easy counterplay to mords or spell breaches. Mages run with one or maybe two of that spell at a time. How many potions can a monk carry?

---

Most spellcasters I know play the 27/3 kind. It's rare to see the 30th unless a wild mage, and even then, most wild mages take the dip to get discipline, umd, or in the case of a sorceror, the extremely extremely powerful Paladin perks.

I honestly think the problem here is IGMS. Remove that spell from the mages playbook and all the fogs in the world wont stop a monk with a lesser breach wand from killing a mage. What would happen if IGMS had a save?

Monks have amazing saves, since all three categories are high saves. Monk hybrid builds are some of the strongest, if not the strongest, well rounded melee builds on the server when properly geared with 5% items. If the argument is monks need more goodies, you have to be clearly realistic about what they already have.

[malcolm_mountainslayer]

Doesn't potion of lesser restoration remove the entire spell resistance debuff at half round speed? Seems like quite an easy counterplay to mords or spell breaches. Mages run with one or maybe two of that spell at a time. How many potions can a monk carry?

---

This is news to me and probably a lot of players if true and really important to this discussion. (And should be made known in monk update)

Can we get a confirmation?

[Nitro]

I'm also ambivalent to the sense of alarm about a monk fully kitted for SR being able to reliably just shut down a caster, since I'll be the first person to admit almost every other build barring divine save builds can be picked apart at will with the right spells, and I think an SR monk provides a much needed scissors to the paper dynamic of a caster.

Monks definitely don't need a buff, they're strong as it is, especially against casters since they get the movement speed to stick on them, defensive stats to ignore most summons, saves to laugh off save-or-die spells and SR that doesn't take a gear slot and will range from nullifying a spell now and then to shutting down a significant portion of incoming spells depending on investment. Add to that the fact that monks don't need to multiclass for scroll usage anymore and their builds a lot more lenient than they were previously.

If casters are paper right now, then monks definitely are scissors. Giving them the carte-blance to ignore the majority of spells would be lighting the scissors on fire and pouring gasoline over everything that isn't a scissor.

[Shadowy Reality]

Several people have said that monks have great saves. This is far from correct. They get +17 Base saves at level 30. Add in 3 or 4 from stats (looking at you Constitution), Maybe 6 from cross class spellcraft and +spellcraft on gear and that is still only +27.

If that is all you have, that is bad. Divine builds have far better saves. They can get another +7 from high end runed items to +34, still not great, those level 9 spells still stand a good chance of doing something.

[chris a gogo]

The only kind of monk that is viable right now is one that has taken the class as a dip.

Do not take more than 21 monk levels and that's only if you really want the glowing eyes and mind immune if you can live without them you can stop at very low numbers and be a more mechanically effective "monk" than a level 30 one.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

If casters are paper right now, then monks definitely are scissors. Giving them the carte-blance to ignore the majority of spells would be lighting the scissors on fire and pouring gasoline over everything that isn't a scissor.

I don't understand how this is the case. Are you stating that a 30 monk is going to win in melee against a 20/7/3 fighter/wm/rogue, or even a 30 fighter or 30 rogue? I'm not at all convinced this is the case, and again, especially not in the case of a monk who sinks five epic feats into Improved SR.

Monks were never OP because they could ignore spells. No one said they were OP back in the day before the monk got a ton of free things that were later taken away (and in fact, IIRC, they were viewed as under-powered, which is why they got a bunch of free stuff.) ----> Monks were OP because they could ignore spells and they suddenly became able to have a ton of free combat-oriented feats on top of it, putting their AB bonuses closer to a fighter's. Taking away the free feats made sense- kicking diamond soul in the crotch was unnecessary, and the perks provided do not make up for it.

I would rather play a vanilla monk, honestly, and agree with the sentiment I've heard uttered by others that in its current iteration taking monk beyond 6 levels is a waste of build space.

[Baseili]

I'd tend to disagree, what we have now is far more enjoyable than the vanilla even with the speed and SR reductions, especially for unarmed. The new Wholeness of body on its own far outshines any vanilla bonus in my eyes (healing + restoration on a 10 minute cooldown). Empty Body being on a 5 minute timer is nothing to shake a stick at either, Weapon Focus in unarmed at level 2 and Uncanny Dodge at 12? All solid additions then you have the AB and damage increase via Combat Mastery on top.

The loss of the SR isn't a game breaker but it does severely waterdown what is clearly indicated to be a Monk's main role, the anti-caster. (High movement speed, better across the board saves, two abilities that directly target fortitude and of course the spell resistance.)

[Izaich]

The loss of the SR isn't a game breaker but it does severely waterdown what is clearly indicated to be a Monk's main role, the anti-caster. (High movement speed, better across the board saves, two abilities that directly target fortitude and of course the spell resistance.)

Many of a monk's tools appear great on paper, but fall short in practice . With the exception of better saves (read Shadowy Reality's post above to see why this isn't the case) and qpalm (which wasn't viable to begin with), the tools you list have all been nerfed significantly.

[MissEvelyn]

I personally miss the vanilla Monk as well. Both Monk Speed and Monk SR are worse than they are in NWN vanilla.

And Uncanny Dodge is great, but not that hard to get with a dip, so I don't feel like that justifies gutting the monk.

The other monk features severely needed to be better to get on par with all most classes on Arelith, which have also been improved. But while the other classes have seen improvement - a wizard, for example, getting extra benefits from spell foci - Monk is unique in that it was also nerfed in other areas. No, not just nerfed, completely gutted. Monk Speed is a shadow of it's former glory, and Monk SR is... well, this entire thread sums up nicely how it's been torn down.

Going by the wizard example, that would be the equivalent of giving us cookies with spell foci while also removing the ability to cast an extra spell while Hasted.

[Izaich]

I personally miss the vanilla Monk as well. Both Monk Speed and Monk SR are worse than they are in NWN vanilla.

And Uncanny Dodge is great, but not that hard to get with a dip, so I don't feel like that justifies gutting the monk.

The other monk features severely needed to be better to get on par with all most classes on Arelith, which have also been improved. But while the other classes have seen improvement - a wizard, for example, getting extra benefits from spell foci - Monk is unique in that it was also nerfed in other areas. No, not just nerfed, completely gutted. Monk Speed is a shadow of it's former glory, and Monk SR is... well, this entire thread sums up nicely how it's been torn down.

Going by the wizard example, that would be the equivalent of giving us cookies with spell foci while also removing the ability to cast an extra spell while Hasted.

Two lesser known nerfs are that Stunning Fist was reduced from 3 rounds to 1 (Beamdog's doing, not Arelith), and Empty Body's super-secret-FOIG advantage was removed.

[Zavandar]

how is haste literally doubling a caster's actions at all comparable to the loss of sr and speed...

The speed nerf needed to happen because it was too easy to exploit initiative

the sr nerf also was a good choice because while a melee can keep swinging, a caster only has so many spells. having the base sr gives you the ability to not gear it. monks also have a lot of ac, and get it really easily now that monk gear has been made. You're literally immune to mind effecting, monks have good base saves, and fort/ref are easy to get to good levels by capping your con, dex, and gearing. Adding these flat chances to also just resist spells on top of needing to beat saves makes it get silly

monks are a good DEFENSIVE class and that really cant be argued. where they lack is offense, and they got a few minor buffs in that department compared to vanilla

[Wrips]

A traditional pure 30 monk can reach 47 AB and 64 AC before Expertise. They are solid all around, my only suggestion is to increase their unarmed damage to 1-30 at 28, instead of capping it at 1-20 at level 20.

[AstralUniverse]

I deeply agree with all of those who miss the vanila monks. I've said in many threads that the movement speed needs to be nerfed but in my worst nightmeres and didnt have it nerfed to 150% movement speed cap of a normal character. It was a real sadness to find that out when I logged in on the lvl 30 monk I played when the first update came in and demolished my character (and made pure monks a meme).

What we got:
Some more damage and ab
reworked WoB
+2 wisdom gear options (negated by nerf to Owl's Insight)

What we lost:
All of the movement speed advantage we had in combat, ALL OF IT wtf.
Access to Owl's insight with umd.
SR.

I'm sorry but this trade is a daylight robbery. I'd feel MUCH better if everything was reverted to vanila and then the movement speed would be nerfed again but less brutally and uncapped. I will be bold here and say confidently that most if not all players who liked the vanila monk and played monks before 2019, would agree with me.

[Nitro]

That's a very bold assumption of you. I wouldn't go back to the old monk if I was paid to do so. New monk is better in pretty much every single way, but can't abuse uncapped movement speed to exploit NWN combat.

[the grim yeeter]

aside from the mspeed cap, vanilla monk is much worse than current monk, dude, lol

and the mspeed cap was very necessary, because a monk could just kite all the time (but it'd still be really bad offensively otherwise)

+2 wisdom gear options (negated by nerf to Owl's Insight)

also, it's the other way around: sadly, the owl's insight nerf was negated by the ridiculously powerful monk gear that got added shortly after to make up for the necessary owl's insight nerf

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

That's a very bold assumption of you. I wouldn't go back to the old monk if I was paid to do so. New monk is better in pretty much every single way, but can't abuse uncapped movement speed to exploit NWN combat.

I will pay you in the form of a 100$ donation to Arelith if you can find me 5 actively played level 22+ monks created during their current iteration by the end of June that have taken improved SR 5 and don't hate their lives or roll the character for something better. Amadeo also shouldn't count, because he's a champion and he's stuck with the monk train as long as I've known Arelith is a thing (props for that), but you can use him for free as long as he doesn't roll before then and he isn't taking one of his breaks.

It's been a while since I donated anyway, so even if I win, I'll still donate - but that's beside the point.

There are only two things that scale in a worthwhile manner in the monk's kit past level 20; stunning fist uses/day (DC continues to progress regardless of what other classes you take), and combat mastery. The UA combat mastery looks pretty nice - I'd say that's my favorite part of the current monk path.

I also think it goes a bit excessively high, but I think this because the documentation is unclear- is the +5 ab/+6 damage at level 28 like the fighter AB bonus that stacks with gear for piercing DR, or is it just a soft bonus that counts to the +20 cap? If the latter, this renders the bonus nice, but subpar, since it won't affect the actual upper reach of your AB, it'll just get you there easier, and in which case, I revert to my opinion that dipping 3-6 monk and picking up Kama, Sais, or a Naginata with a hardier martial-based class will get you more mileage than diving into the class.

Which means the only reason left to take monk past 20 is increased wholeness of body (not terrible, but replaceable with a heal potion or kits), and increased uses of stunning fist/day. SR used to continue scaling, and it was the single most convincing reason to take a monk into epic levels, IMO.

I'm not saying monk hasn't always been a heavily dipped class. I'm saying there's less reason to not dip now, unless monks with +1ab gloves are now piercing /+6 DR.

[AstralUniverse]

That's a very bold assumption of you. I wouldn't go back to the old monk if I was paid to do so. New monk is better in pretty much every single way, but can't abuse uncapped movement speed to exploit NWN combat.

I will pay you in the form of a 100$ donation to Arelith if you can find me 5 actively played level 22+ monks created during their current iteration by the end of June that have taken improved SR 5 and don't hate their lives or roll the character for something better. Amadeo also shouldn't count, because he's a champion and he's stuck with the monk train as long as I've known Arelith is a thing (props for that), but you can use him for free as long as he doesn't roll before then and he isn't taking one of his breaks.

It's been a while since I donated anyway, so even if I win, I'll still donate - but that's beside the point.

There are only two things that scale in a worthwhile manner in the monk's kit past level 20; stunning fist uses/day (DC continues to progress regardless of what other classes you take), and combat mastery. The UA combat mastery looks pretty nice - I'd say that's my favorite part of the current monk path.

I also think it goes a bit excessively high, but I think this because the documentation is unclear- is the +5 ab/+6 damage at level 28 like the fighter AB bonus that stacks with gear for piercing DR, or is it just a soft bonus that counts to the +20 cap? If the latter, this renders the bonus nice, but subpar, since it won't affect the actual upper reach of your AB, it'll just get you there easier, and in which case, I revert to my opinion that dipping 3-6 monk and picking up Kama, Sais, or a Naginata with a hardier martial-based class will get you more mileage than diving into the class.

Which means the only reason left to take monk past 20 is increased wholeness of body (not terrible, but replaceable with a heal potion or kits), and increased uses of stunning fist/day. SR used to continue scaling, and it was the single most convincing reason to take a monk into epic levels, IMO.

I'm not saying monk hasn't always been a heavily dipped class. I'm saying there's less reason to not dip now, unless monks with +1ab gloves are now piercing /+6 DR.

So... The bonus ab to /weapons/ at lvl 23, 25, and 28 should stack with weapon ab in regards to DR penetration. The bonus ab to unarmed does not count for DR penetration.

I'm starting to understand that we should just embrace the team's vision. Monk was an awkward class for many years. Now it is average and still has it's unique niche. By increasing it's ab and damage drastically for monks who did not multiclass (and dont have epic dodge, weapon spec, umd, etc) and removing the things that kept them from being fixable - potential magic immunity and broken movement speed. Its definitely not what I liked about monks, and I might not like monks with how they are, but it's more functional and on par with the rest of Arelith.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

So... The bonus ab to /weapons/ at lvl 23, 25, and 28 should stack with weapon ab in regards to DR penetration. The bonus ab to unarmed does not count for DR penetration.

If this is the case, I cannot think of a compelling reason to not go cleric24/26/27-mnk3/4/6 - cast greater magic weapon on a bronze version of your desired weapon, still get finesse (sorry, was thinking about rogue again) grab finesse, advance your dex mostly, bump your wisdom to 20, cast divine power/favor/bless/aid/prayer/battletide. Gain one extra attack at your highest modifier during flurry from divine power over the non-clerical version, still get a +5 EB weapon instead of a +6 AB one, throw on a perm/temp essence, and get vastly more bonus damage from spells that are more than reasonably difficult to dispel and some unbreachable wards.

I'm starting to understand that we should just embrace the team's vision. Monk was an awkward class for many years. Now it is average and still has it's unique niche. By increasing it's ab and damage drastically for monks who did not multiclass (and dont have epic dodge, weapon spec, umd, etc) and removing the things that kept them from being fixable - potential magic immunity and broken movement speed. Its definitely not what I liked about monks, and I might not like monks with how they are, but it's more functional and on par with the rest of Arelith.

I understand this change was a lot of work and that it came from a good place, and I don't necessarily think the change is disastrous or balance-shattering. I do, however, now think that monk SR builds are completely worthless against a dedicated caster in the wake of a single disjunction- and that rubs me the wrong way, as a caster player. I think I should have a much harder time with them than is currently prescribed or possible, and while hurray for my mages that I won't, it feels lame. Granted that my TF can't just chuck a disjunction, he has to get a friend involved, but my wizard...

Well, let's just say I've never envisioned a world where I'd laugh as a wizard when a monk walked up to me believing it was a credible threat, and I'm sorry, but I just don't see a 30 monk as a credible threat to any 30 wizard that doesn't throw the fight - not even if they took ISR 6 instead of 5.

That's really what this is all about, for me. That shouldn't be a thing. I play a mage, and I know it shouldn't be a thing. How anyone else can possibly argue it should be a thing startles me, since "casters are op" is a sentiment of time immemorial, and this change literally achieves nothing of consequence other than making monks easier for casters to beat. Did we not already have an easy enough time?

I feel like I don't have a whole lot more to say without rehashing things I've already said, so thanks for the feedback, and please feel free to continue!

[Biolab00]

Actually, it's just my personal opinion.

The main idea for this monk nerf to 32SR which i believed, is to avoid having Monk being highly combative and also incredibly resilient to Magic to the point of almost being immune.

However, it is not possible now IF they don't cross-class because Monk do not have anymore free combat feats which comes with the earliest update. No more weapon foc, epic weapon foc, epic dodge, weapon spec, improved crit feats etc.
And perhaps, the most important for Cross-class is simply to have an additional attack per round at 16/13/10/7/4/1 to a maximum of 6 attacks per round compared to 5.

I am simply just suggesting that to have one, one must forsake some.
Hence, why not simply script such that Diamond Soul Feat will be disabled once monk cross-class, while the original Diamond Soul feat does not change and remains the original NWN setting rather than the current adjusted one.
This will retain the authentic reason for being a Pure Monk such that having cross-class, means that they lose, even a little bit, their original faith hence, their Soul is not longer as pure and fully dedicated [ Really just for RP purpose explanation ].

I have removed out the last paragraph.

[AstralUniverse]

To answer some comments above, I did speak to many long time monk players during the series of updates and listened to their opinions from a neutral perspective at the time. Most of them would rather be a magic immune noodle that cant kill anything and defiles physics, as they were for so many years.. but that's beside the point now.

Probably the last thing I have to say in this thread. Just a summery of the numbers and a following simple suggestion.

Monk lvl 22 vs mage lvl 27

27 cl + 1d20 vs 32 sr = 20% magic immunity. Can be further breached.

Monk invests 6 epic feats into ISR to become full anti-mage, mage invests 2 pre-epic and 1 epic feats on SR penetration and goes pure as well:

36 ECL + 1d20 vs 44 sr = 35% magic immunity. can be further breached.

In my opinion, because it can be further breached, in the first scenario it should be 50% and in the second scenario it should also be around the 50%. Perhaps Epic Spell Penetration should be buffed to +4 to match a buff (or rather, reduced nerf) to SR. Most simple solution would be to make it unbreachable as it should be, because.. you know.. it's not a spell.

All and all, I dont want to see monks stand in the middle of mages and warriors without taking damage from anything but the reaction to that situation was a bit extreme.

[Zavandar]

and then the wizard gets kd'd because you went pure and dont have disc

did people like, forget how busted 30 monks with all that sr were? c'mon guys

[Zaphiel]

30 monk was busted because of tons of free feats. Current monk is not busted at all. And it is even barely played. SR nerf was unnecassary just because of they got some melee capabilities. Need to reverted to back.