Monk Feedback

[Jack Oat]

Just wondering what stacks for Dr penetration on unarmed. Will a level 20 monk with ki strike 4 and 5 and +3 gloves hit +7 for Dr?

No, only +5. It goes based on the top source.

Cant a swashbuckelr monk dip achieve the same insane ac epic dodge AND higher ab? Best part is they dont have to gear optimize till their monk dip and can wear light armor till then.

A 26 Swashbuckler/4 Monk caps out at around 46 AB, compared to a Monk 30's 47 or 48. That same 26/4 gets 55 AC (57 w/ Shield pot, 61 Hasted, 71 in Imp Exp) compared to a Monk's AC as posted in the previous response (54/56/60/70).

Both builds get Epic Dodge.

26/4 loses Mind Immunity, 50% permanent movespeed increase, and the Empty Body bonus as well as the DR pen from Ki Strike +5.

[Seven Sons of Sin]

The incentive of Epic Dodge certainly undercuts the idea of going STR-based. And I always thought a str-based monk was already intentionally gimping themselves. Maybe Str-Monks need some sort of cool piece of equipment or something?

[Void]

The incentive of Epic Dodge certainly undercuts the idea of going STR-based. And I always thought a str-based monk was already intentionally gimping themselves. Maybe Str-Monks need some sort of cool piece of equipment or something?

Ki strikes are also locked behind wisdom, which will affect dex based monk with low wisdom investment.

[malcolm_mountainslayer]

Just wondering what stacks for Dr penetration on unarmed. Will a level 20 monk with ki strike 4 and 5 and +3 gloves hit +7 for Dr?

No, only +5. It goes based on the top source.

Cant a swashbuckelr monk dip achieve the same insane ac epic dodge AND higher ab? Best part is they dont have to gear optimize till their monk dip and can wear light armor till then.

A 26 Swashbuckler/4 Monk caps out at around 46 AB, compared to a Monk 30's 47 or 48. That same 26/4 gets 55 AC (57 w/ Shield pot, 61 Hasted, 71 in Imp Exp) compared to a Monk's AC as posted in the previous response (54/56/60/70).

Both builds get Epic Dodge.

26/4 loses Mind Immunity, 50% permanent movespeed increase, and the Empty Body bonus as well as the DR pen from Ki Strike +5.

Sorry, im a bit confused here shouldnt a swash dipping into monk be able to get all the same ac as a pure monk gets with dex wis and equipment AND extra 5 ac from swashbuckler(please let ke know what i am missing)?

Also the monk's competing ab relies on soft bonuses so swashbuckler can do more with a truestrike potion for knock down maneuvers on top of having more apr and int to damage and intentions if you want to mentioned the capped speed capped SR and permanent mindblank potion.

[Jack Oat]

Sorry, im a bit confused here shouldnt a swash dipping into monk be able to get all the same ac as a pure monk gets with dex wis and equipment AND extra 5 ac from swashbuckler(please let ke know what i am missing)?

Also the monk's competing ab relies on soft bonuses so swashbuckler can do more with a truestrike potion for knock down maneuvers on top of having more apr and int to damage and intentions if you want to mentioned the capped speed capped SR and permanent mindblank potion.

I prioritized higher INT for the INT to damage route and did 12 base WIS instead of 16 like I would a Monk. You could add 2 more AC if you want to those numbers, yes.

I also did Headband of Protection for the Swash version and Addy for the Monk.


As for the APR and INT to damage, yes. Those are a thing. You can get up to +11 damage from Swash with that assuming you do 16 INT base, if memory serves. 26/4 gets 1d8 Fists + 11 Swash + 6 Gloves + 4 Perm + 1d6 Temp Essence for a total of 29 damage per hit on average. A 30 Monk gets 1d20 Fists + 6 Combat Mastery + 4 Ki Strike 4/5 + 6 Gloves + 4 Perm + 1d6 Temp Essence for a total of 34 per hit on average.

And yes, soft-boosts to AB mean that Swash can get higher AB by 5 on a Truestrike.

At this point though, we're talking about basically two different builds. One uses maneuvers, and while it has Monk APR and AC from WIS it doesn't get the other various Monk boons.

The other is Monk, which gets all the Monk boons and is-- on its own-- now a viable class.

[malcolm_mountainslayer]

Sorry, im a bit confused here shouldnt a swash dipping into monk be able to get all the same ac as a pure monk gets with dex wis and equipment AND extra 5 ac from swashbuckler(please let ke know what i am missing)?

Also the monk's competing ab relies on soft bonuses so swashbuckler can do more with a truestrike potion for knock down maneuvers on top of having more apr and int to damage and intentions if you want to mentioned the capped speed capped SR and permanent mindblank potion.

I prioritized higher INT for the INT to damage route and did 12 base WIS instead of 16 like I would a Monk. You could add 2 more AC if you want to those numbers, yes.

I also did Headband of Protection for the Swash version and Addy for the Monk.


As for the APR and INT to damage, yes. Those are a thing. You can get up to +11 damage from Swash with that assuming you do 16 INT base, if memory serves. 26/4 gets 1d8 Fists + 11 Swash + 6 Gloves + 4 Perm + 1d6 Temp Essence for a total of 29 damage per hit on average. A 30 Monk gets 1d20 Fists + 6 Combat Mastery + 4 Ki Strike 4/5 + 6 Gloves + 4 Perm + 1d6 Temp Essence for a total of 34 per hit on average.

And yes, soft-boosts to AB mean that Swash can get higher AB by 5 on a Truestrike.

At this point though, we're talking about basically two different builds. One uses maneuvers, and while it has Monk APR and AC from WIS it doesn't get the other various Monk boons.

The other is Monk, which gets all the Monk boons and is, on its own, now a viable class.

I guess the current monk boons capped are just very unexciting to me as a personal player . I care little for uncapped speed mind immunity (already have good saves and got mindblank and they can always target things i dont have immunity too). Monk also seems really boring as is unless dip 3 or fully geared and epic.

I brought up swash because the super high acs were viewed as a problem, and a swash who prioritizes stats the same can still have ridiculously high ac. It also completely ruins a lot of my subpar but fun concepts and i feel monk shoukd be flexible like swash buckler for non dip 3 builds. As mentioned in other thread, i been wanting to discuss a rework of how ubab works for a while now.

[Might-N-Magic]

All I'll say is every "update" my monk gets worse and I'm wondering why I'm not playing a spellblade or mage like 90% of the rest of the server is.

[RedGiant]

Since we have two monk feedback threads, my comments from the other thread in short are:

What about STR Monks? This was a questionable build-choice before, but now those with a heavy monk investment are in the toilet. I lost 5 AC with the only meaningful thing to gain being unpurgeable empty body.

I could live with this if the stat allocation goes so far as to allow STR to turn into DEX, but the update thread didn't seem to indicate this?

On par, I do like most of the changes....but, as it stands, this change almost writes heavily invested STR Monks off the map.

[The1Kobra]

Truthfully, the changes from what I can see hit traditional monk builds pretty hard, and I'm not sure it's a good change. They already had the speed capped, but more and more monk seems like it's best for a splash class. They get a lot for those first three levels, the monk APR and the WIS AC, but I've found that on Arelith, getting a high AC is largely about having a large amount of buffs up, which leaves non-caster melees relatively worse off and now monks are in even worse shape.

To elaborate,
In regards to getting defensive roll at L18, well, a lot of DEX monks splashed SD anyways for it, and it's a dip that synnergizes well, so it's not all that different than opening up a touch more build flexibility. Losing 6 AC on a pure build, and about 4 on a splashing build? That hurts.
The speed buff? Well dex rogues/assassins/SDs get blinding speed on a reduced cooldown so are generally just as fast and get epic dodge and a lot of other buffs. Monks get AB/Damage buffs but they still don't compare to dedicated tank classes, who if they're using haste wands they are just as fast.
The SR buff to not be breachable? 32 SR, their cap, can't consistently protect them from hostile spellcasting. Given the 27 SP if not buffed is very common, not to mention NPCs that have higher CLs around. If anything it protects them from lower level spellcasters, but since that can be handled by an art crafting helmet, that's largely a moot point. They could raise SR with feats but that takes expensive feats which is going to leave them shafted elsewhere.
Empty body not removable with invis purge, I didn't think it was removable in the first place, so that's a good thing. Regardless monks aren't unique here. Displacement isn't removed by invis purge, though monks have it more easily accessible. Still, it's not enough to rely on for sure.
Ki Strike being more readily available is nice, but then again there's plenty of classes now that can get +5 weapons, spellsword, ranger, paladin, fighter, list keeps growing here.

In summary, I really don't see what dedicated monks (monks with 16+ levels, that is) have going for them right now, nothing that differentiates them or improves on what other classes can offer a character. If I wanted a dedicated 'monk' now I might as well go for a 11/6/13 Rogue/Monk/Shadowdancer character, they offer a lot more interesting options and I don't see what I'm really missing from monk by going that route, unless I really wanted to go with fists, but dual kamas especially with the disciple's kamas can work just as well here.

[Opustus]

I don't mind the change from a balance perspective; Monk30, Monk18, Monk16, and Monk20 remain as viable stops for several Dex-builds. I also like the fact that monk has more options now, since it self-sufficiently qualifies for epic dodge.

I do agree with sentiments for capping either Monk AC or UBAB or both, although I too dread the sheer volume of builds slapped down by this and wonder if it's worth it.

And lastly, I think the strength monk is such an important category, and balance aside, I have a slight feeling it was either disregarded here due to an overemphasis on balancing the Dex monk, or that it was deliberately cut down as an unimportant category of monk builds. For Str monks, and I can't possibly tell you how prevalent they are but they do exist, the Monk AC was what pushed them to the realm of viability, while I understand it was simultaneously problematic for the balancing of the Dex monk. The most viable Str monk currently is the dip monk that switches between fullplate for defence and monk weapon + unarmoured for carnage, and this doesn't really enforce the Str monk theme as well as the imaginary many would like.

Also, as the new monk builds rely on capitalising on the +2 AB, +4 Damage, and Premonition pierce from Ki strike feats, I'd imagine a great deal of existing monk builds have started with Wis14 and won't qualify for those feats without some drawback to their builds. I might have even considered just prereq'ing Ki strike with Wis14 to cater to these builds; I don't see it making a difference in terms of balance, though I might be missing something.

[Biolab00]

From my personal observation, there's always mixed review when Monk class gets touched.
Before the very first update, almost everyone agree that Monk need a buff.

After the 1st update, majority feels that it's overpowered and hence, many people request for a nerf.
After it's nerfed, many monk players get upset ( which of course, because it's toned down ) and the argument on the degree of the nerf is based on both "After the overpowered update" and "Original Monk NWN" which makes discussion starting to get messy.

And now, I also actually agree that this update is a boost despite the less 6 AC because usually, if you dip Monk classes, you will only get between 4AC to 5AC which based on the overall picture ( With improved expertise on ), doesn't make much difference once your AC crosses 70. But the boon to AB is seriously good. True strike pots is usually meant for PVE only because i will never stand still when people drink a True strike pots in front of me.

And now, i get to see a review on boost to Str build monk. Even in the Original NWN concept, it's possible to go STR Monk but it's simply not the route for a monk to go. It belong to the Unorthodox style.
If the monk is as described in being a super martial art expert with super movement speed, super dodging skill, super damage strike, super resilient to Magic, as those immortal master, I'm going to facepalm.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

As a player who leans almost entirely to caster concepts, I'm happy that monk SR can no longer be breached into insignificance. A pure monk leaning into improved SR should make me quake in my boots, and now it can. Thanks for this.

[Seekeepeek]

How would you spread out the ability score now on a lvl 1 human monk with 2 stat gifts? (if your going for epic dodge) - thanks

just to help people people out, so they don't get any regrets over their relevel and ability points moved with DM help.

[Tathkar Eisgrim]

I would be disappointed if the changes weaken the viability of a STR based monk.

Perhaps an agreed upon base-line of performance needs to be reached (which slightly underperforms) with further path functionality representing different martial art styles? (Drunken Master, Animal Schools, etc) which flesh different routes out?

[AstralUniverse]

How would you spread out the ability score now on a lvl 1 human monk with 2 stat gifts? (if your going for epic dodge) - thanks

just to help people people out, so they don't get any regrets over their relevel and ability points moved with DM help.

I'm not jack but as a human you dont have that many options. You /need/ 16 wisdom and 25 dex eventually.. so...

12 str
16 dex +2 gift
12 con
14 wis +2 gift
14 int
8 cha
can take 10 str and 14 con *shrugs*
Its basically the same build as the previous dex focus spread, except you start with 12 con and 16 wisdom, instead of the opposite.

[Jack Oat]

what Astral said, or drop STR to 9 and boost DEX to 17 base so you can end on 26 DEX.

[Flower Power]

I think pure/majority-level monks are in a really good place right now, epic dodge is a very serious boost to survivability, and heavy-monk builds get enough free AB cookies that they aren't hurting that much in that regard either. The ability to go "haha magic go brrrrrt" should never be underestimated either.

If anything, I'd say the class just needs one more tweak: gating almost all of its bonuses, especially UBAB and Wis-to-AC, behind having the majority of your class levels in monk. There is no other class that I'm aware of, save for BG/Paladin (who I'd also agree with capping CHA-to-Saves based off total class levels) that gives you this much raw power in a 3-class dip, to the point where monk is the single most powerful dip class for basically any DEX build, no questions asked.

[AstralUniverse]

I'll give it to you guys because I'm not ending up with that build due to RP reasons, but for newly build unarmed monks, the absolutely most optimized unarmed monk I (along with several others like Jack and Barkky) have came up with is 20 monk, 6 fighter and 4 cot (and if you dont mind delaying powerspikes when you level, take 15 monk, 4 fighter and 1 cot pre-epic for EVEN MORE saves). Eventually you end up with 45-46 ab (6 base apr), +13 damage from monk/spec/ki and absolutely superb saves that you'll never need to gear further. 500 maxed hp and whatever ac any unarmed monk would get now anyway. Have fun.

[underowl]

Sorry, im a bit confused here shouldnt a swash dipping into monk be able to get all the same ac as a pure monk gets with dex wis and equipment AND extra 5 ac from swashbuckler(please let ke know what i am missing)?

Also the monk's competing ab relies on soft bonuses so swashbuckler can do more with a truestrike potion for knock down maneuvers on top of having more apr and int to damage and intentions if you want to mentioned the capped speed capped SR and permanent mindblank potion.

I prioritized higher INT for the INT to damage route and did 12 base WIS instead of 16 like I would a Monk. You could add 2 more AC if you want to those numbers, yes.

I also did Headband of Protection for the Swash version and Addy for the Monk.


As for the APR and INT to damage, yes. Those are a thing. You can get up to +11 damage from Swash with that assuming you do 16 INT base, if memory serves. 26/4 gets 1d8 Fists + 11 Swash + 6 Gloves + 4 Perm + 1d6 Temp Essence for a total of 29 damage per hit on average. A 30 Monk gets 1d20 Fists + 6 Combat Mastery + 4 Ki Strike 4/5 + 6 Gloves + 4 Perm + 1d6 Temp Essence for a total of 34 per hit on average.

And yes, soft-boosts to AB mean that Swash can get higher AB by 5 on a Truestrike.

At this point though, we're talking about basically two different builds. One uses maneuvers, and while it has Monk APR and AC from WIS it doesn't get the other various Monk boons.

The other is Monk, which gets all the Monk boons and is-- on its own-- now a viable class.

I dont understand how you are getting insightful strike damage on fists? Last i tested it doesnt work with unarmed?

And to the monk changes, as a char who is playing a dex level 30 monk the changes do make the character worse as losing that 6AC is very drastic when surrounded by mobs. I think it discourages going pure as ironically you now need to start looking at dips for either more AC or other goodies to give mostly monk builds a boost. COT/fighter mix does seem the way to go from my attempts to rebuild. My suggestion would be to keep some of the AC buffs for monk levels but maybe start them at 15 monk and every 5 thereafter. That would strength monks a chance and have +4ac for pure at 30 rather than +6. Or could just do +1 AC every 10 levels of monk as an alternative.

[AstralUniverse]

Yes. Going pure is no longer the most optimal monk because you can get so much value from classes with feats but note that these bonus feats from other classes dont include improved SR, improved ki and epic dodge. So pure monk still has it's place in the meta (aka, 6 epic feats - epic weapon focus, improved ki 4 and 5, epic dodge and improved sr x2, you end up with 40% chance to deflect spells against 27 caster lvls). Going pure also still gets the highest ab among all monk builds so its at least one more situation where pure monk has advantage over other builds.

[Jack Oat]

Yes. Going pure is no longer the most optimal monk because you can get so much value from classes with feats but note that these bonus feats from other classes dont include improved SR, improved ki and epic dodge. So pure monk still has it's place in the meta (aka, 6 epic feats - epic weapon focus, improved ki 4 and 5, epic dodge and improved sr x2, you end up with 40% chance to deflect spells against 27 caster lvls). Going pure also still gets the highest ab among all monk builds so its at least one more situation where pure monk has advantage over other builds.

Or Armor Skin/Epic Prowess for sweet, sweet AC/AB instead of SR I & II.

[AstralUniverse]

Yes. Going pure is no longer the most optimal monk because you can get so much value from classes with feats but note that these bonus feats from other classes dont include improved SR, improved ki and epic dodge. So pure monk still has it's place in the meta (aka, 6 epic feats - epic weapon focus, improved ki 4 and 5, epic dodge and improved sr x2, you end up with 40% chance to deflect spells against 27 caster lvls). Going pure also still gets the highest ab among all monk builds so its at least one more situation where pure monk has advantage over other builds.

Or Armor Skin/Epic Prowess for sweet, sweet AC/AB instead of SR I & II.

For those feats I would prefer the 20/10 because you can pick them on fighter bonus feats, and eventually ending up with better apr, higher damage, and only -2 ab compared to pure monk, so I think the pure is more suitable for anti-mage concept. But still, you're right in that pure gets higher ab too and same ac, so its not bad by any means.

[Jack Oat]

I dont understand how you are getting insightful strike damage on fists? Last i tested it doesnt work with unarmed?

Oh, right. So Swash doesn't get really any of that extra damage. You could do it with a Kama still. Change the damage die from a 1d8 to a 1d6.

And to the monk changes, as a char who is playing a dex level 30 monk the changes do make the character worse as losing that 6AC is very drastic when surrounded by mobs. I think it discourages going pure as ironically you now need to start looking at dips for either more AC or other goodies to give mostly monk builds a boost. COT/fighter mix does seem the way to go from my attempts to rebuild. My suggestion would be to keep some of the AC buffs for monk levels but maybe start them at 15 monk and every 5 thereafter. That would strength monks a chance and have +4ac for pure at 30 rather than +6. Or could just do +1 AC every 10 levels of monk as an alternative.

Addressing your first point, you are worse as an AC tank now than you were before, yes. That is the one nerf that was made. That was the one thing we all sat down and went, "Hmmm. This right here is what's preventing us from making other changes that allow Monk to be a competent melee class." So it was removed.

Now you're forced to make choices that boost those pesky other numbers like AB and Damage (curse those things).

As for Pure? AstralUniverse pointed out above that Pure is still the highest AB iteration. This will continue to be the case. You can dip Fighter or CoT too, yes, and that will drop your AB usually by 1 or 2 while giving you an APR, some saves (if CoT), and I think 3(?) extra damage. And possibly +1 AC. I don't remember all those numbers off the top of my head.


We spoke about possibly offering a modicum of that AC back, but the decision was not to. We don't want to broach the memery of high-AC, high-AB, E-Dodge, Blinding Speed, high-damage nonsense Monks again and we feel that even giving them +3-ish AC back would move us in a poor direction toward that.

[AstralUniverse]

As for Pure? AstralUniverse pointed out above that Pure is still the highest AB iteration. This will continue to be the case. You can dip Fighter or CoT too, yes, and that will drop your AB usually by 1 or 2 while giving you an APR, some saves (if CoT), and I think 3(?) extra damage. And possibly +1 AC. I don't remember all those numbers off the top of my head.

1-2 ab, depending on if you pick prowess on your pure monk over something like armor skin, which you shouldnt, and if you pick prowess on your fighter multi, which you shouldnt also. So assuming 2 ab difference. 45 and 47 for human 26 dex. (calculated with 1 great dexterity feat.)

Ac is the same if both pick Armor skin. There's really no ac difference between 20 and 30 monk.
edit 2: Sorry, there's +1 ac from 5th fighter. So there 1 ac advantage to multiclass.
EDIT:
Damage difference is 3.
Pure monk gets 3 damage at 20, 3 at 28 and 4 from ki feats = 10.
fighter dip gets 3 from 20 monk, 6 from epic spec, and 4 from ki feats = 13.

[Baseili]

If doing 20 monk / 10 fighter you gain 1 AC, two pre epic feats to use, an extra APR and a soft +1 to dex/str all at the cost of 20 skill points and 1-2 AB.