Unpopular Opinion: Replace or Remove the Monk

[Dreams]

I really enjoy playing monks. They have weird mechanics and people seem obsessed with pointing out that they're OP based on previous versions of monks on this server, but mechanical stuff aside: Monk roleplay can be really fun and interesting. There are great stories to tell around different types and styles of monks, and they are extremely varied between individuals depending on cultural and regional backgrounds across Faerun.

I enjoy playing monks so much that I play one IRL.

[Haroshia]

I really rather see this class, in it's current state, nerfed into oblivion than removed. It offers so much utility it can be weaker than this and still really fun.

Agreed. My issues with monk are mostly mechanical. Setting wise I don't see them as particularly harmful.

[LovelyLightningWitch]

You're right, it's not.

but the thing is....it is.

Though, I would agree that it's more more 'Medieval World' than 'Medieval Europe',

Take a position Irongron. Either it is medieval Europe or it's not. You appear to concede that it's not. Unarmed martial artists exist in medieval times, in East Asia, so I see no disagreement here.

Honestly, my issue has less to do with monks than the insistence that Arelith simulate medieval Europe. That's a totally contrived idea of what the setting is that isn't reflected in FR lore. Parts of the setting resemble medieval Europe, and other parts don't. The setting intentionally draws from a grab bag of different influences so that there can be something available to satisfy a wide variety of players.

Honestly, Forgotten Realms is not even a medieval world, much less medieval europe.

Even Cormyr, the closest you get to a medieval european culture - is more like 17th century France than anything medieval. Baldur's Gate feels a fair bit like Renaissance Venice with its elected patricians calling themselves dukes. Waterdeep likewise.

Gender-relations are egalitarian except for evil cultures where specifically noted. Candlekeep even has its female members cross-dress or use illusion magic to interact with male visitors who might be lecherous to avoid unwanted attention.

And this is just human society. Elves are incomparable to anything on Earth with their Communalist/Mutualist economic system, liberal theocracy and massive social liberty.

Dwarves use 19th century metallurgic techniques with what seem to be described as blast furnaces.

Gnomes (Lantan) are literally steampunk magientists.




And onto things that are tangible on server itself:


Technology is well late 16th century considering we have people wearing full plate (the kind of full plate IG is more of a renaissance thing than medieval), using rapiers (rather than sideswords, and even sideswords are very late medieval. Arming would be the only pure medieval), using arbalests, using caravels. We even have cannons now, altho they could pass as medieval-ish due to how unreliable they are.

[-XXX-]

Purely from business perspective, it's in the WotC's best interest to keep the lore and background of their settings as culturally ambigous as possible, so that they could market their product to the wider audience.

All they ever provide us with are vibes and themes that are usually grasped subjectively and can be interpreted in various ways.
I can't recall any canon D&D setting explicitly stating "this is intended to be seen as 12th century England, or 17th century Italy".

Just thought that I might point that out before this thread devolves into headcanon warfare.

[Waldo52]

I want to make one thing perfectly clear: in terms of aesthetics and fantasy worlds there are no right or wrong answers. I see an attitude here of people trying to disprove or vehemently argue against other peoples' points based off some perceived expertise in the true cannon or history of the game.

At least one poster responded that he loved anime and Marvel. These are things I utterly abhor, but neither of us is "right". I have a preference for slightly dryer low magic medieval/Renaissance European settings, but this doesn't make me a gatekeeper of "real" fantasy. I think it's better to compare and contrast our views on the monk rather than try to prove that other people are misguided.

After all, D&D is an utterly schizophrenic cannon. If we're being all-inclusive, this is absolutely a franchise of science fiction and stone age fantasy and ninjas and robot buttlers fighting moon beasts on horse back. In my opinion it's a good thing that Neverwinter Nights and Arelith have not been all inclusive of D&D lore because that will never be my preferred setting.

Based off this preference for conservative and largely European fantasy (and I reiterate that I can not be proven or disproven in a matter of personal taste) I have certain negative opinions regarding things that I feel stick out in an absurd or jarring way.

Before I found Arelith I thought it was inevitable that players on Neverwinter Nights servers would always be perma-hasted guys with stoneskin and dragon wings surrounded by magical orbs and glowy things running eighty miles an hour at all times. Luckily for me this server just looks a lot better, as efforts have been made to keep the look and feel of the world a bit more conservative than standard Neverwinter. I don't see as much perma-haste or even running. Glowy things exist but aren't quite as common. It's almost impossible to play a dragon disciple.

I really appreciate all these changes, the fact that this isn't a world of ultra high speed glowy things running into dungeons with dragon wings flapping. I really appreciate that on Arelith you see a lot of regular Joes with swords. And this is where monks come in. They are humorously fast anime/Marvel characters that beat rock golems to death with their bare fists and just kind of troll the setting in my view.

I like that changes are planned and I'd love to see what a monk looks like with the option to move at a normal human speed and fight with a wider array of weapons.

[Duchess Says]

I think of the setting as kind of Renaissance over medieval considering how much education and travel and trade is going on. But you can't pinpoint any specific time. If anything, maybe it's like what happens if science wasn't pursued in the 1000s to 1800s because magic exists.

Anyway even in real world history you see that westerners have always been obsessed with the philosophies, cultures and yes weapons and martial arts of the mysterious east so it would completely make sense that they'd establish monasteries that blended European and Asian concepts. In a way they're very, very fancy versions of the karate dojo you see in every American strip mall.

[Ninjimmy]

I like that changes are planned and I'd love to see what a monk looks like with the option to move at a normal human speed and fight with a wider array of weapons.

Purely curiousity, and I'm interested to know where your thinking is with this, but if you remove unarmed fighting, the high mobility and the mystical elements you don't seem to like but add in more weapons... what makes a Monk different from a fighter? Or even if we just cut the mystic elements, different from a Swashbuckler if we're going dexterous weapon fighter who's mobile.

[Archnon]

It's like you all have run into an entry on centaurs and your trying to say it should either be a horse or a human. Fantasy settings exist to cobble together disparate things simultaneously. Monks can be both eastern and western, or some weird centaur like combination.

If you want monk removed make an argument for balance not aesthetics. Is it powerful, sure. But I don't think it is too powerful. Perhaps capping wisdom ac to monk levels divided by some modifier so it ends up around 8 ac for a pure monk. Or make it dodge ac. Otherwise the abilities are about on par with everything else. There are lots of super powerful builds out there and lots of counters to the standard monk builds.

[Curve]

This thread makes me think of this from a while back,

I really hope we can stop endlessly rebalancing classes, and with the upcoming skill update I think we can.

[Watchful Glare]

don't be obtuse

Here we go.

It combines way too much into way too little

You mean mechanically, or lore-wise? If you mean mechanically, then that point is irrelevant to the debate over lore. If you mean lore-wise, how? You make this claim, but you offer no argument for it.

and offers no explanations or lore

Where does the obligation to provide lore for the existence of a class begin and end? Is there an explanation for why fighters exist in FR? What about rogues?

beyond uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh shrug i guess haha tis just fukn qi yknow like the actual literal philosophy anyway YOU'RE AN OUTSIDER NOW AND YOUR HANDS ARE MACHINE GUNS

First: are you a ninth-grader? Have some class here, friend. Write like an adult.

Second, I don't think anyone other than you is saying this. And furthermore, it's false; it's established within FR lore that monks manipulate and channel ki energy, which gives them their abilities.

You're right, it's not.

but the thing is....it is.

Though, I would agree that it's more more 'Medieval World' than 'Medieval Europe',

Take a position Irongron. Either it is medieval Europe or it's not. You appear to concede that it's not. Unarmed martial artists exist in medieval times, in East Asia, so I see no disagreement here.

Honestly, my issue has less to do with monks than the insistence that Arelith simulate medieval Europe. That's a totally contrived idea of what the setting is that isn't reflected in FR lore. Parts of the setting resemble medieval Europe, and other parts don't. The setting intentionally draws from a grab bag of different influences so that there can be something available to satisfy a wide variety of players.

Monk is a bad class. Objectively.

You mean subjectively. You're complaining about the class because it doesn't reflect your personal idea of what the Forgotten Realms setting is supposed to be, an idea that is contradicted, at face value, by the fact that monks exist in Forgotten Realms lore....

So you're either arguing for one of two things here. Either monks don't fit with FR lore (false) or you don't like FR lore and think it should be modified to fit your tastes. Take a position, but please be honest here; you're not going to win this debate by appealing to Forgotten Realms Lore.

Also, I like Marvel, and Anime. There is a lot of entertaining, well written material within this respective franchise and medium that can serve as the inspiration for a character, and so I'm not sure I see the issue. If the issue is that there aren't supposed to be super-powered martial artists running around, it was already established in the first post that the FR is a setting in which people boast supernatural and superhuman abilities. There's really no argument on offer here beyond "Monks, I don't like em." Every other point that has been made in support of that argument has failed.

I agree with what you said here, I find Monks for the most part unappealing to me. I have roleplayed one, a pure monk, I have seen others to do it. They're alright. But if they suddenly were removed, I wouldn't care.

I think it's a mixture of the culture clash (Most people being aesthetically traditional fantasy with armor, weapons and so such; and there's that one guy that can naruto run at 80mph and speaks with foreign words and it can feel out of place) and that mechanically monk seems to be have been the superior option for many a dip, much like div dip. Almost to the point where it was a game changer.

Therefore, you'd see said knights using modified farming implements simply because it was mechanically the superior option. It's like if they implemented a conic tinfoil helmet that gives you +9 AC. And then everyone is wearing it. And these characters are not from any FR East Asian culture, described as belonging to any matching ethnicity or that culture being a significant part of the character. So it does feel like a traditional fantasy person (low or high) except for some reason everyone is using modified farming implements as weapons.

I have only seen one person so far (that matched my playtime at least) playing an eastern character as a central part of their character, and they used a quarterstaff at that. It seemed justified enough for me that I didn't think it was a little bit out of place, and their roleplay was quite engaging about it as well.

Arelith has been the only server so far where I've observed this. It has a lot of cool options, but only a few are 'mechanically optimal' and thus you see those around much more often than their counterparts.

Maybe it could do well to have a 'Western' version of it so it doesn't clash like that?

[ActionReplay]

[Dr. B]

How is punching a stone golem into pieces any less realistic than killing it with a longsword?

[Archnon]

How is punching a stone golem into pieces any less realistic than killing it with a longsword?

How is a stone golem realistic?

[Dr. B]

Exactly! There were no stone golems in Medieval Europe.

[Waldo52]

Exactly! There were no stone golems in Medieval Europe.

I understand the point about using a sword to kill a golem being somewhat silly, and I don't intend to start a flame war but I think I should point out that people really respond well to being heard and understood, especially if there's a fundamental disagreement.

There are roughly two sides to this discussion: low fantasy traditionalists and high fantasy free spirits. Sure, there's a lot of nuance and subtlety, and all of us fall somewhere in between the two extremes. But if you want to ridicule the other side I'll join in and do it too. I'll ridicule both sides!

MAKING FUN OF CAMP 1:

Hey traditionalist close minded xenophobe anime hating scum, let's turn this game into a medieval combat simulator to better suit your ignorant, boring worldview. Ow, you got a papercut! Roll fortitude or die of an agonizing blood infection. If you ever hit level thirty you'll have the privilege of perma-dying for your feudal lord in a pointless war between nobles.

MAKING FUN OF CAMP 2:

Hey open minded nü fantasy types! I've got the game for you! There are space monsters and robots and wizards and more! This is a fun game where everyone's a winner! Computer? What computer?! We're gonna run out in the backyard and play magic wands with the neighbor's kids because there are no rules and anything goes! It's Harry Potter versus Goku versus The incredible hulk! Yay!

CONCLUSION:

Clearly there's no one here who's pathologically deep into camp one or two. Let's stop using straw man arguments and trying to prove that the other posters are idiots. I have too much faith in the player base to insult my fellow nerds, and I invite you to extend the courtesy.

[LovelyLightningWitch]

And on issues of punching things...


In Epic D&D, stacking 2 feats that allow you to add int to damage,
https://dndtools.net/classes/swashbuckler/ (level 3 in this)
http://dnd.arkalseif.info/feats/complet ... index.html (this feat on top)


You can get a person with 8 con, 8 strength and 30 intelligence punch someone so hard, they lose 20 + 1d3 HP.

Monks aren't the only class that can punch people.


Just on the server alone, as a Swashbuckler, I can punch people for (assuming 50 parry modifier): 15 (parry) + 1d3 + 2 (str) damage.

That 18-20 damage punch is enough to kill the average soldier in the setting (level 4 fighter) in 2-4 strikes. While they're fully armoured.


Monks just do the above way better.

[Dr. B]

There are roughly two sides to this discussion: low fantasy traditionalists and high fantasy free spirits. Sure, there's a lot of nuance and subtlety, and all of us fall somewhere in between the two extremes. But if you want to ridicule the other side I'll join in and do it too. I'll ridicule both sides!

My point in making that comment is to point out an inconsistency in the argument people who agree with you are making. They're arguing against the monk on the grounds that Arelith should be a low-magic, earth-like setting, and when plastered with counterexamples they brook yet still insist that monks should go without really explaining why they don't belong in FR lore.

Mechanically they've long been an issue, but setting-wise, people are going to want to play unarmed martial artists. It's a fantasy trope, and fantasy tropes are the constituents of the FR setting and what the designers traffic in. That's not an opinion, or a matter of taste, on my part; it's a fact.

I believe the FL server existed to cater to the more conservative tastes. Whatever happened to the FL server, anyway?

[Duchess Says]

I have a 1st edition AD&D players handbook from the late 1970s and monks are already a base D&D class. Bards barely are (they're some weird rogue/druid afterthought in the appendix) and fantasy stalwarts like barbarian and sorcerer don't even yet exist. So it's not like monks are some controversial homemade Arelith addition here, they've been part of D&D for 40+ years now.

Clearly they are a D&D staple in no small part because the game is not about emulating European history exclusively. It's fantasy and encountering "mysterious warriors from the East" is a very common 20th century fantasy trope, usually with some problematic Orientalism attached but that's another discussion.

Also- but not least- Forgotten Realms is also very much about planar activity. Monks become outsiders (ostensibly, I know not everyone plays that way) when they get their eye glow and many planar beings are best represented by the monk class, especially divine powers and creatures like Githzerai. So it's not just about being "from the East" with real world Asian mysticism thrown in, but also about drawing power from planar sources having nothing to do with those stereotypes.

[Good Character]

With the recent nerfs to monk's UBAB, I feel monks are in a decent spot. While only capable of being STR or DEX variants of themselves, it's fine enough with me. Why? The lore is interpretive. I may be alone in this, but they are the broadest class in how they can be viewed and in turn roleplayed. Classes like hexblades and warlocks and druids and even barbarians to some extent are shoe holed into their tropes or purposes whereas monks aren't.

I really should play monks more than I have.

[VibeKings]

This is probably the first monk thread ever that isn't about the mechanics.

[Party in the forest at midnight]

I think monks are fine and fit into the setting perfectly. I've met a number of monks who RP being part of various orders in Faerun, and the characters are great to RP with. Often thought provoking and leave my character introspecting to find new meanings about themself. They do the wise thing very well. The monk concept might have roots in old kung foo movies, but the way players handle the concept does it justice and shows why martial artists exist in Faerun.

[Beard Master Flex]

I've never really understood the argument that Monks dont fit the aesthetic of DnD.

They're one of my favorite classes in that they are the route of power through ultimate self mastery. Mechanically there isn't really an alternative. And if you were to introduce a mental path for the Fighter to cover this we're essentially back where we started so why bother?

I think its kind of weird to suggest they don't fit because of Asian influences. I've never really drawn inspiration from that and tend to see monks as the route to a Batman or Daredevil like character within the Forgotten Realms.

In a world where there is divine magic, arcane magic and psionic magic I don't find anything hard about reconciling that some man or woman shrugged off earthly comforts to go live in a forest or mountain somewhere punching rocks, stretching and strengthening their mind through so much discipline the scale almost spins back around again to inhuman savagery.

[MRFTW]

Helm Hammerhand fit into Tolkien's world, killing with his bare hands.

On the basis of this and this alone, all unarmed combatants are valid in all fantasty settings.

[Kenji]

This is to be the new monk replacement:
Tonsure haircut is required.

[AstralUniverse]

I just love how it's turning into a meme thread... by our staff.