I am sorry for the english mistakes, it's not my maternal language.
Everyone seems to be on a common ground with how this subclass feels: Limited. Limited in many aspects too even with the huge amount of potential this subclass get. Here's are some ideas I've been toying with that doesn't need many changes for the class and go directly to some point that seems to be talked a lot. I tried to think of it with what only exist in the player's handbook, so I can see possible problems and solution with just the basic options.
Ki point limit: They're two ways to go to feel not limited by your ki point amount, and just an economy procedure.
The first way is to boost the amount of available Ki points for this subclass. Explanation of how behind it, is that you learn how the energy(ki) of the world work and how to move along with it. Like the weapon and the monk become one with training, this subclass makes the world around the monk a part of him, and him of the world. Ok, metaphysic aside, giving a new ki point progression like 1 more ki point per 2 level or per 4 level of character or monk would extend your possibility of boosting the abilities and not just using them at their base level. That give a possibility of either 25 or 30 ki points at level 20, but do give the much-needed points at a lower level.
A second way is to reduce the cost of abilities. That's an idea I have a harder time dealing with except to one place. Some of the monk abilities, wich seems to never get chosen are the utility ones. The technique of Shape the flowing river(water to ice and vice versa), Clench of the North Wind (hold person) and a few other technique could come at no ki cost but instead be limited at once per short rest or 2 or 3 per short rest at a higher level of the character. It does require you to think when using them but gives more utilities to this class. But I know, choosing those spells ask you to give up on the powerful attack spells. I wouldn't suggest mixing both ki point increase and reduced cost tho, that might be way too powerful.
Ability list: Hold person at 6th level, nice. But I've been having too much fun breaking the world with Gong of the Summit(shatter). Breaking the floor right under a group of giants making them fall 50 feet high. But however we think of it, the list limit us a lot. Elemental Attunement is a cute cantrip, so I'll count the number of available ability at 16. Still, knowing only 4 ability out of 16 make you only able to touch 1/4 of it all by the end level. The simplest thing would be to double the amount of known technique. that would be 8 at level 17th(20th). Mixed with the reduction ideas of earlier, You could then choose an active(attack) and a passive(effect) technique(spell).
Those are just simple ideas but I still see some of the problems. Boosting the ki amount might make some people go crazy in the flurry of blow and stunning strikes. I know I sometimes do even without those modifications. I still have to try all those ideas in a game, but it seems a solution that could be viable for many.
I like a lot of your ideas. I've played 2 monks now and I enjoyed both of them but neither one was a WoFE and I'm not interested in that path either. Giving the class more Ki points could be unbalancing, but I think that reducing the number of Ki points required to cast the W0FE spells and give the WoFE Monk access to more spells would balance things out. I'd definitely limit the WoFE to only spells associated with Earth, Wind, Air, or Fire though. Nothing that wasn't directly related to one of those elements.
Another way to accomplish this is to simply give the subclass wu Jen disciplines instead of spells, including the focus benefits, and maybe a few psi points, with the ability to convert ki to psi, but not the other way around?
Like Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster for psionics?
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Another way to accomplish this is to simply give the subclass wu Jen disciplines instead of spells, including the focus benefits, and maybe a few psi points, with the ability to convert ki to psi, but not the other way around?
Like Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster for psionics?
Looking through the web at the thread and modification for the WotFE, I found this little document that exactly went along my idea. Tell me all what you think? I leave the document and thread link for you all to read.
i have alot of issues with this class, mostly that way of shadow gets 4 spells and a cantrip at level 3 and it takes til level 17 for the 4elements to get there, yes 4 elements gets damaging spells, but its still a big cost of entry, not to mention shadow gets a free misty step thats double distance when 4 elements is only getting its second spell.
I made a fantastic QoL change by accident, i didnt read the spell section properly where it said you only get 1 feature at 3,6,11,17. So i was playing as having access to the entire list (using the level restrictions in the feature descriptions) and for me that made it way more enjoyable, the Ki cost limits you from being overpowered and the ability to access all of the features gives you enormous versatility, but the ki cost is so high you cant be overpowered, i cant stress that enough. sure you get a bunch of spells, but no more than other casters (wizard gets ~8 spells at level 3 with damaging cantrips, and 4 element monks have 7 'spells' and cant cast as often as the wizard, only 2-4 times a day for the first few levels, plus their other class features cost ki as well). its almost like its designed to be played this way.....
this allows you to have the utility to make it useful outside of combat as well as the crowd control abilities, while not getting ****** or overpowered. and even in doing this i would still consider dropping the ki cost so it was equal to the spells level (eg level 2 spell costs 2 ki instead of 3). I dunno am i crazy?
and when someone pointed out my error i was embarrassed and after playing with only one feature, im considering asking my dm to let me change to way of the shadow, having almost zero elemental utility outside of the 'cantrip' ability is killing me.
One comment. Monks regain their Ki points after every short rest but wizards regain spells after every long rest. That let's monks recharge their available spells a lot more frequently than wizards can recharge their available spells.
One comment. Monks regain their Ki points after every short rest but wizards regain spells after every long rest. That let's monks recharge their available spells a lot more frequently than wizards can recharge their available spells.
Not unlike the Warlock. But the point is not comparing to other classes - it's considering the opportunity cost. Way of Open Hand and Way of Shadow are much more economical in their ki usage, and have powers you can use without any ki at all; the Four Elements Monk ends up more limited in power and barely any more versatile. Nevermind that short vs. long rest frequency depends a lot upon the type of campaign you're in.
Not unlike the Warlock. But the point is not comparing to other classes - it's considering the opportunity cost. Way of Open Hand and Way of Shadow are much more economical in their ki usage, and have powers you can use without any ki at all; the Four Elements Monk ends up more limited in power and barely any more versatile. Nevermind that short vs. long rest frequency depends a lot upon the type of campaign you're in.
I posted a lengthy write-up in another thread explaining the subclass's usefulness. Short version:
Access to magic damage 3 levels before Ki-Empowered Strikes.
Rush of the Gale Spirits (Gust of Wind) is just as economical as Way of the Shadow spells; gives battlefield control for an entire fight for 2 ki points.
Water Whip pulls in flying enemies inside dungeons and works well on high AC enemies, when you've been given disadvantage on attack rolls or when fighting prone would be beneficial (e.g. against a roper). Can also knock enemies prone in a pinch like Open Hand Technique.
Fist of Unbroken Air works well on invisible enemies or enemies that force you to look away (e.g. medusa.) Great way to stop spellcasters with Greater Invisibility; not subject to Shield or Counterspell and does damage even on a failed save. Can also knock prone.
Being able to cast Fly on yourself at level 11+ frees up another party member's concentration when fighting flying enemies.
The other subclasses don't have useful options in any of those situations.
And despite the complaints about the ki point costs, they still get to cast more spells than an Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster, without having to split their ability scores to support spellcasting. I'm assuming your DM doesn't regularly screw you out of short rests, because frankly you can forget about fairness or balance if that's not the case, and either way other subclasses would be affected by not having ki points too.
I'd have to disagree with the validity of most of the points you introduce here.
For magic damage, there should be someone in your party already handling that, and if you are supposed to be the magic damage of your party, then it still isn't going to matter much, since most lower-level enemies don't have immunity to non-magical damage (and if they do your DM is really punishing). Gust of Wind is a concentration spell, and while it is very effective at controlling a battlefield, that makes it impractical for a melee-based class. Not to mention that it's practically useless for you as an individual, since you're pushing away the enemies that you want to beat into a pulp. This makes it more useful for a party in which you're supporting an archer or mage as the dedicated tank/CC specialist, which isn't a bad thing, but is rather niche.
Water Whip is a very good spell, but it's the exception rather than the rule, and will eat up the early-game Ki points, the point where you need the edge they provide the most. Fist of Unbroken Air is exactly the same as Water Whip, just pushing instead of pulling and with a STR Save instead, and again: You won't want enemies to be pushed away from you in most circumstances, you want them right in front of you.
Fly is a support spell that I've honestly never gotten much use out of. Yes, being able to use it is nearly essential for fighting enemies that fly themselves, but you have dedicated magic users who can better stay out of harm's way, where they're less likely to be hit by an attack that breaks concentration and sends you all spiraling to the ground. Hence why most spellsword-type classes tend to shy away from concentration spells unless it's something like the Paladin's Branding Smite, which doesn't really need to stick around for long, or some kind of non-combat utility spell.
And the crux of the entire issue: You only get four Disciplines. That's far less than any other magic-using subclass, you get almost nothing that compares to their cantrips in terms of reliable, cost-free usage (for either damage or utility), and despite the fact that you claim they get more spells than an Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster, that's simply not true. An Eldritch Knight gets 11 spell slots at level 20. A Four Elements monk gets 20 Ki, and each Disciple, with the exception of Fangs of the Fire Snake and Shape the Flowing River, costs at least 2, making a generous estimate of the number you can cast come out as 10. That's before factoring in cantrips for the Eldritch Knight, which are infinite.
The Ability Scores argument is pretty much the only one I can't refute, because that much is true: There's no need to build other attributes besides WIS and DEX to make a Four Elements Monk optimized. Regardless, they still have almost no out-of-combat utility, have relatively little value even in combat when compared to other Monk subclasses, and the versatility they're supposed to have is ****** by both the high cost of the Disciplines, and the fact that you can have 4 of them max, as opposed to Way of the Shadow which gets 5 useful spells and a number of other, very useful class features. If compared to the Eldritch Knight again, the comparison is even more overwhelming: 3 spells for the Knight at level 1 and up to 13 at max, while the monk starts with 1 (technically 2, but the basic starting discipline is worthless), and only scales up to 4. This makes it so they really don't have much versatility at all, since they can't just replace disciplines on the fly the way a Cleric or Wizard could for spells.
In my first 5E game, I had a character using the Four Elements monk where the shtick was that he presented himself as a sterotypical wizard: pointy blue hat and robes with astronomical symbols, a staff with an orb on the end, an owl familiar. To support this, I took the Magic Initiate and Ritual Caster feats. Ritual Caster got me Find Familiar and Unseen Servant; for Magic Initiate, I took thematic Light, Mending, and Magic Missile. Charlatan background, and I'd go from town to town doing corner magic and selling hedge-magic services (a little mending goes a long way). In battle, there would be a surprising amount of hitting people with the "magician's staff".
Overall this was fine, (and the concept was very fun to play) but I definitely felt like this was sub-optimal and considered switching to Shadow for the same basic "monk with magic" effect. But anyway, one way to easily bump up this subclass is to give one or both of these magical-ability feats for free. Choosing elemental options rather than faux wizard seems like a decent way to support what people seem to be looking for here in terms of increased versatility.
Another option: You loose Flurry of Blows in exchange for 3 more ki points.
For magic damage, there should be someone in your party already handling that, and if you are supposed to be the magic damage of your party, then it still isn't going to matter much, since most lower-level enemies don't have immunity to non-magical damage (and if they do your DM is really punishing).
So what if the party already has magic users? Either you kill the monster faster or you save them some spell slots. Are you really trying to argue that there's no benefit to doing more damage?
Gust of Wind is a concentration spell, and while it is very effective at controlling a battlefield, that makes it impractical for a melee-based class. Not to mention that it's practically useless for you as an individual, since you're pushing away the enemies that you want to beat into a pulp. This makes it more useful for a party in which you're supporting an archer or mage as the dedicated tank/CC specialist, which isn't a bad thing, but is rather niche.
So, you're assuming you can somehow keep every enemy at bay, but that's bad because you can't punch things? The party is probably going to win easily by shooting the enemies to death. If there aren't at least 2 party members that can make ranged attacks easily, you have a serious problem, because most spellcasters should be capable of this and monks can at least throw darts.
Water Whip is a very good spell, but it's the exception rather than the rule, and will eat up the early-game Ki points, the point where you need the edge they provide the most. Fist of Unbroken Air is exactly the same as Water Whip, just pushing instead of pulling and with a STR Save instead, and again: You won't want enemies to be pushed away from you in most circumstances, you want them right in front of you.
Yes, Fist of Unbroken Air is exactly the same as Water Whip if you ignore the differences between them: Fist of Unbroken Air works against things you can't see, and the monsters prone to failing STR saving throws are usually tiny/small monsters that make up for it with DEX.
Here's a situation where pushing things back is useful: any time the party creates an area effect that does bad things to monsters, and the monsters want to stay out. Spells like this are dime a dozen.
Fly is a support spell that I've honestly never gotten much use out of. Yes, being able to use it is nearly essential for fighting enemies that fly themselves, but you have dedicated magic users who can better stay out of harm's way, where they're less likely to be hit by an attack that breaks concentration and sends you all spiraling to the ground. Hence why most spellsword-type classes tend to shy away from concentration spells unless it's something like the Paladin's Branding Smite, which doesn't really need to stick around for long, or some kind of non-combat utility spell.
Falling to the ground is a non-issue. By the time you hit level 11, you can reduce falling damage by 55; that's enough to fall 150 feet unscathed. The maximum you can take is 20d6 (~70), and you'll be able to reduce all of that damage by level 14 (which is also when you get Diamond Soul). If you're really concerned about falling, casting Feather Fall is cheap at that level. By the way, falling from that height isn't realistic. If your buddies are still on the ground, the monster's going to have to be closer to the ground so their ranged attacks can reach them.
There's also plenty of easy ways of boost saving throws, including Aura of Protection, Bardic Inspiration, or the Lucky feat (which is useful for any character). Or, with the concentration the wizard no longer has to use on keeping you afloat, they can grant you Haste for the +2 AC and advantage on Dexterity saves, and if you're still worried about falling just spend the 1 ki point to use Dodge as a bonus action every turn.
And the crux of the entire issue: You only get four Disciplines.
You get five. You can and should replace Elemental Attunement at 6th level.
That's far less than any other magic-using subclass, you get almost nothing that compares to their cantrips in terms of reliable, cost-free usage (for either damage or utility), and despite the fact that you claim they get more spells than an Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster, that's simply not true.
You don't need as many spells as a normal magic user. You only need enough to cover a Monk's blind spots: reliance on attack rolls and being able to reach the thing you want to punch.
An Eldritch Knight gets 11 spell slots at level 20. A Four Elements monk gets 20 Ki, and each Disciple, with the exception of Fangs of the Fire Snake and Shape the Flowing River, costs at least 2, making a generous estimate of the number you can cast come out as 10. That's before factoring in cantrips for the Eldritch Knight, which are infinite.
Please read the post I linked to. I explained this there, and went into more detail on all of my points.
A typical adventuring day, as defined in the DMG, has 2 short rests. A DM really shouldn't mess with that number much since it seriously affects not just Monks but also Battlemaster Fighters and Warlocks; but by level 20 they can't really deny you short rests anyways thanks to spells like Rope Trick. So, that's 60 ki points.
Obviously that's already more spells than the Eldritch Knight can cast, but that's not apples to apples since higher level spell slots are worth more. Well, the DMG also has a nifty little variant rule called Spell Points that assigns a point value to slots of different levels. If you convert all their slots to spell points, that's only 38. Other than Gust of Wind, elemental spells use the same point values for the number of ki points a spell is worth, so a Monk's 60 ki points are literally worth at least 60 spell points. Incidentally, a level 20 Paladin or Ranger would have 64.
The Ability Scores argument is pretty much the only one I can't refute, because that much is true: There's no need to build other attributes besides WIS and DEX to make a Four Elements Monk optimized. Regardless, they still have almost no out-of-combat utility...
Look, I can't convince you. If you're going to assume you're always in situations where you can reliably punch things to death, or you don't want to use any strategy that doesn't involve you punching things, there's nothing I can say that'll change your mind. My entire argument is that the subclass shines in precisely the situations where punching things to death isn't easy.
Your whole argument relies on you being a one-man party. That is not the case. In any given party, members should be specializing. The monk, by design, is a close-range fighter. You're fists do far more damage than spells, so what I'm saying isn't that you don't want more damage, but you aren't looking to be another wizard or sorcerer; there's very little point to that unless you already have 2-3 Fighter/Barbarians and just have nothing better to do with yourself. About my comment on CC: I specifically said that it's actually not bad in my post, just that it's a very niche build that doesn't justify the fact that it practically makes you useless as a DPS. I acknowledged that Water Whip is very good and that Unborken Air is very similar, but you again missed the point: The latter makes it harder for you to deal damage since you're primarily a melee fighter. It's still good, but not as good as water whip, especially since most of the enemies you tend to have trouble killing are larger, CON and STR based monsters. It is useful for pushing them into lingering AoE spells, like you said, but it's a circumstantial benefit that really depends on your party having a Wizard with a style that compliments it. As for Fly, you seem to be missing the fact that if your buddies are on the ground and fighting, it probably wasn't need in the first place. If they are with you in the air, then one bad roll and they could die. Yes, you have good saving throws as a monk, but I'd rather my mage just use it from the back, where he's much less likely to be hit, and can still launch most of his/her spells.
Moving on to usability rather than effects, you're right, you do get five. That was an error in my reading of the feature. However, it's still bad design to have ANY subclass that becomes useless once it's resource is used up, which Four Elements does since nearly everything relies on Ki. And the Monk already has most so-called blind spots taken care of: It's damage output is very reliable because they get several attacks per turn, most spells have dependency on some kind of roll anyways so they really aren't any better. As for getting close to enemies: Unarmored Movement is far more useful for that than anything in the Disciplines list already. I'm unsure of where in the DMG you claim that 2 short rests rule is, but I'll give the benefit of a doubt and say it's in there and is a good rule to follow (in the future, when referencing a document, please include the section and/or page numbers. Just a good rule of thumb). That's still gonna vary considerably from session to session, because otherwise things just get to predictable and boring (As both a DM and a player, I've been on both sides of that and it's never fun to have that much of a safety net). As for a spell point conversion, I honestly see no point in it unless you are playing with that particular rule: otherwise, you have to evaluate it by the number of spells castable, in which the Four Elements is lower than any other subclass I can think of off the top of my head, minus those which don't have a spellcasting focus at all, of course.
In summation, my point is this: Four Elements, to most players I've spoken with and very much to myself, feels very weak. Most of what it does is crowd control or spell damage, which would be fine, but the drain on Ki reserves and the small number of them you get actually limits your strategy, not diversifies it, because of the few options and the high resource costs. You may as well just play default Monk without a tradition in many cases for all the good it does you. There are situations where it can be good, such as ones you've described above, but they're few and far apart, or are just really specific in terms of having a party that compliments it. As an individual character and as part of a normal team, it isn't fun to people, hence why this thread exists. If you have fun with the current Four Elements monk, that's awesome; keep on keeping on. But I'd rather have a character that feels practical, plays on it's own strengths, and has it's own time to shine occasionally than a subclass that turns one of the most interesting and versatile fighters in the game into a glorified support with no healing or team buffs. Because that's what most of your argument seems to hinge on: let your mages and rangers do all the hard work while you CC for them.
I'm unsure of where in the DMG you claim that 2 short rests rule is, but I'll give the benefit of a doubt and say it's in there and is a good rule to follow (in the future, when referencing a document, please include the section and/or page numbers. Just a good rule of thumb).
Chapter 3, page 84.
In general, over the course of a full adventuring day, the party will likely need to take two short rests, about one-third and two-thirds of the way through the day.
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Your whole argument relies on you being a one-man party. That is not the case. In any given party, members should be specializing.
Being specialized isn't mutually exclusive with covering your weaknesses so you're presenting a false dichotomy. Hell, the Fighter class is described as a "well-rounded specialist" and the premise of the Eldritch Knight is that they complement their single-target attacks with area spells. Besides, none of the other Monk subclasses make you a stronger melee combatant, so I don't see why you'd expect that of this one.
Sometimes you'll be fighting monsters where your specialization doesn't apply and if you don't have a backup tactic, you're a burden on the party. There's not a whole lot the rest of the party can do if you can't punch a medusa because you're averting your eyes. You don't get to pick when that happens, because the DM controls the monsters.
It's possible the people you talked to played poorly, have a bias or were only ever pitted against monsters with no interesting powers. Perception and reality very often don't line up and I don't trust anyone's gut feelings.
You see, that is why your argument is flawed. D&D is all about the people and the way mechanics work out to make things more interesting, not about hard statistics. Trusting gut feelings is half the fun, and the other half is turning your DM into a blubbering mess as you fight Tiamat and somehow collapse half of Avernus on top of her because he did NOT plan for the barbarian to use one of her severed heads as an impromptu rocket launcher. It's about being a character: one who does things their way. Like I said, if you have fun with Four Elements, go nuts. But all of the other subclasses allow the monk to reach his full potential, and then a little extra, whereas the Four Elements to me feels like it's in conflict with itself, taking away some of that specialized feel that the class inherently has. The point is to control your opponents, wiping them out one after another with your fists and Ki abilities, and here you are squandering all of your Ki points on abilities that push enemies away from you or supporting the other classes.
Which, again, if that's what you want to play, go for it. But if your specialization isn't helping the party at that exact moment? That's fine, there's no need to always be the one to solve a problem. Your time will come, so long as you didn't build something totally useless, like a STR and INT based Sorcerer. Dedicated Melee/CC is what the Monk does best, and while the variety in Four Elements could compliment that well, none of the Disciplines are worth using when Ki could go toward a Flurry of Blows that decimates a small horde of enemies, destroy a boss with Quivering Palm or Touch of Long Death, or create death from a distance with a salvo of Radiant Sun Blot. They're all more efficient on Ki, feel way better in play, and do something unique and interesting. Not to mention all of the subclasses whose features are mentioned above also grant benefits when not expending Ki, so unlike Four Elements they aren't dead weight when you run out.
So no, we (meaning myself, my friends, and the other people on this thread) have no such biases, and as a DM I've pitted my players against some of the freakiest monsters in the Manual and beyond, and they've done the same to me. We just all appreciate good design, and feel that Four Elements isn't designed well at all. It's not useless, of course, it's just not fun to us because of how thinly it's spread, instead of having one thing it's really good at and building on top of that in a new way like practically every other subclass in the game does. And you are perfectly within your rights to disagree with that, keep playing that subclass, and have fun with it. However, if you could not insult other people by saying they're poor players, that they can't look passed (past? Grammar is weird) their biases to make a fair evaluation, or that they can't perceive the game they're playing correctly, I'm sure they would appreciate it.
I think in the end, the subclass just doesn’t do what a lot of players want an elemental monk subclass to do. That is, really, all that matters.
I think I, and many others, wanted and expected an elemental monk to use the elements to enhance their melee fighting, mobility, and defense, with a side of cool tricks and crowd and/or single target control. In that order.
4 elemental stances, each of which provides an always on benefit, with ki powers that can only be used in certain stances, or are stronger in a given stance, would have been a better basic design, IMO.
Fire: your Flurry hits set things on fire, your resistant to fire, and you can spend ki to do some stuff that hits multiple enemies or whatever.
Air: speed increase, unarmed reach of 10 ft, improved Step of The Wind. Ki abilities to do things like Deflect Arrows with attacks against allies with 20ft of you, push enemies around, block some types of spells with air walls, etc
you get the idea.
Spells can work, but they need a more broad toolkit, and some more at-will and/or passive stuff. So you always feel like an Elemental Master.
I think in the end, the subclass just doesn’t do what a lot of players want an elemental monk subclass to do. That is, really, all that matters.
I think I, and many others, wanted and expected an elemental monk to use the elements to enhance their melee fighting, mobility, and defense, with a side of cool tricks and crowd and/or single target control. In that order.
4 elemental stances, each of which provides an always on benefit, with ki powers that can only be used in certain stances, or are stronger in a given stance, would have been a better basic design, IMO.
Fire: your Flurry hits set things on fire, your resistant to fire, and you can spend ki to do some stuff that hits multiple enemies or whatever.
Air: speed increase, unarmed reach of 10 ft, improved Step of The Wind. Ki abilities to do things like Deflect Arrows with attacks against allies with 20ft of you, push enemies around, block some types of spells with air walls, etc
you get the idea.
Spells can work, but they need a more broad toolkit, and some more at-will and/or passive stuff. So you always feel like an Elemental Master.
This is my feeling exactly. I imagine choosing an element and focusing on that, with a number of different abilities to choose form for each (like the martial maneuvers) which means no elemental monks are the same. Air monks would be different and have different abilities than fire, earth etc. With a myriad of options even two air monks side by side would bring different skills to the table.
You could even include the ability to dabble in another (non-opposing) element. Dabble mind you. Perhaps have half as many abilities as your primary element. Different elements could be differentiated by different stances which could switch as a Free Action.
This means you could have an Air/Fire monk vs an Air/Water monk or an Earth/Water monk (etc). A much more elegant system I think. Makes for a larger chunk of the book but it gives players lots of options.
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Hello, it's me again,
Looking through the web at the thread and modification for the WotFE, I found this little document that exactly went along my idea. Tell me all what you think? I leave the document and thread link for you all to read.
Document for the Way: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1pdYIcfHauwNDM2My1XeWFYSDA/view
Thread: https://www.reddit.com/r/dndnext/comments/35yn4u/way_of_the_four_elements_remastered_a/
I personally really like the favour of way of the way of the four elements but I agree that it isn't as powerful as the other monk archetypes
i have alot of issues with this class, mostly that way of shadow gets 4 spells and a cantrip at level 3 and it takes til level 17 for the 4elements to get there, yes 4 elements gets damaging spells, but its still a big cost of entry, not to mention shadow gets a free misty step thats double distance when 4 elements is only getting its second spell.
I made a fantastic QoL change by accident, i didnt read the spell section properly where it said you only get 1 feature at 3,6,11,17. So i was playing as having access to the entire list (using the level restrictions in the feature descriptions) and for me that made it way more enjoyable, the Ki cost limits you from being overpowered and the ability to access all of the features gives you enormous versatility, but the ki cost is so high you cant be overpowered, i cant stress that enough. sure you get a bunch of spells, but no more than other casters (wizard gets ~8 spells at level 3 with damaging cantrips, and 4 element monks have 7 'spells' and cant cast as often as the wizard, only 2-4 times a day for the first few levels, plus their other class features cost ki as well). its almost like its designed to be played this way.....
this allows you to have the utility to make it useful outside of combat as well as the crowd control abilities, while not getting ****** or overpowered. and even in doing this i would still consider dropping the ki cost so it was equal to the spells level (eg level 2 spell costs 2 ki instead of 3). I dunno am i crazy?
and when someone pointed out my error i was embarrassed and after playing with only one feature, im considering asking my dm to let me change to way of the shadow, having almost zero elemental utility outside of the 'cantrip' ability is killing me.
One comment. Monks regain their Ki points after every short rest but wizards regain spells after every long rest. That let's monks recharge their available spells a lot more frequently than wizards can recharge their available spells.
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Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in awhile.
The other subclasses don't have useful options in any of those situations.
And despite the complaints about the ki point costs, they still get to cast more spells than an Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster, without having to split their ability scores to support spellcasting. I'm assuming your DM doesn't regularly screw you out of short rests, because frankly you can forget about fairness or balance if that's not the case, and either way other subclasses would be affected by not having ki points too.
I'd have to disagree with the validity of most of the points you introduce here.
For magic damage, there should be someone in your party already handling that, and if you are supposed to be the magic damage of your party, then it still isn't going to matter much, since most lower-level enemies don't have immunity to non-magical damage (and if they do your DM is really punishing). Gust of Wind is a concentration spell, and while it is very effective at controlling a battlefield, that makes it impractical for a melee-based class. Not to mention that it's practically useless for you as an individual, since you're pushing away the enemies that you want to beat into a pulp. This makes it more useful for a party in which you're supporting an archer or mage as the dedicated tank/CC specialist, which isn't a bad thing, but is rather niche.
Water Whip is a very good spell, but it's the exception rather than the rule, and will eat up the early-game Ki points, the point where you need the edge they provide the most. Fist of Unbroken Air is exactly the same as Water Whip, just pushing instead of pulling and with a STR Save instead, and again: You won't want enemies to be pushed away from you in most circumstances, you want them right in front of you.
Fly is a support spell that I've honestly never gotten much use out of. Yes, being able to use it is nearly essential for fighting enemies that fly themselves, but you have dedicated magic users who can better stay out of harm's way, where they're less likely to be hit by an attack that breaks concentration and sends you all spiraling to the ground. Hence why most spellsword-type classes tend to shy away from concentration spells unless it's something like the Paladin's Branding Smite, which doesn't really need to stick around for long, or some kind of non-combat utility spell.
And the crux of the entire issue: You only get four Disciplines. That's far less than any other magic-using subclass, you get almost nothing that compares to their cantrips in terms of reliable, cost-free usage (for either damage or utility), and despite the fact that you claim they get more spells than an Eldritch Knight or Arcane Trickster, that's simply not true. An Eldritch Knight gets 11 spell slots at level 20. A Four Elements monk gets 20 Ki, and each Disciple, with the exception of Fangs of the Fire Snake and Shape the Flowing River, costs at least 2, making a generous estimate of the number you can cast come out as 10. That's before factoring in cantrips for the Eldritch Knight, which are infinite.
The Ability Scores argument is pretty much the only one I can't refute, because that much is true: There's no need to build other attributes besides WIS and DEX to make a Four Elements Monk optimized. Regardless, they still have almost no out-of-combat utility, have relatively little value even in combat when compared to other Monk subclasses, and the versatility they're supposed to have is ****** by both the high cost of the Disciplines, and the fact that you can have 4 of them max, as opposed to Way of the Shadow which gets 5 useful spells and a number of other, very useful class features. If compared to the Eldritch Knight again, the comparison is even more overwhelming: 3 spells for the Knight at level 1 and up to 13 at max, while the monk starts with 1 (technically 2, but the basic starting discipline is worthless), and only scales up to 4. This makes it so they really don't have much versatility at all, since they can't just replace disciplines on the fly the way a Cleric or Wizard could for spells.
In my first 5E game, I had a character using the Four Elements monk where the shtick was that he presented himself as a sterotypical wizard: pointy blue hat and robes with astronomical symbols, a staff with an orb on the end, an owl familiar. To support this, I took the Magic Initiate and Ritual Caster feats. Ritual Caster got me Find Familiar and Unseen Servant; for Magic Initiate, I took thematic Light, Mending, and Magic Missile. Charlatan background, and I'd go from town to town doing corner magic and selling hedge-magic services (a little mending goes a long way). In battle, there would be a surprising amount of hitting people with the "magician's staff".
Overall this was fine, (and the concept was very fun to play) but I definitely felt like this was sub-optimal and considered switching to Shadow for the same basic "monk with magic" effect. But anyway, one way to easily bump up this subclass is to give one or both of these magical-ability feats for free. Choosing elemental options rather than faux wizard seems like a decent way to support what people seem to be looking for here in terms of increased versatility.
Another option: You loose Flurry of Blows in exchange for 3 more ki points.
So what if the party already has magic users? Either you kill the monster faster or you save them some spell slots. Are you really trying to argue that there's no benefit to doing more damage?
So, you're assuming you can somehow keep every enemy at bay, but that's bad because you can't punch things? The party is probably going to win easily by shooting the enemies to death. If there aren't at least 2 party members that can make ranged attacks easily, you have a serious problem, because most spellcasters should be capable of this and monks can at least throw darts.
Yes, Fist of Unbroken Air is exactly the same as Water Whip if you ignore the differences between them: Fist of Unbroken Air works against things you can't see, and the monsters prone to failing STR saving throws are usually tiny/small monsters that make up for it with DEX.
Here's a situation where pushing things back is useful: any time the party creates an area effect that does bad things to monsters, and the monsters want to stay out. Spells like this are dime a dozen.
Falling to the ground is a non-issue. By the time you hit level 11, you can reduce falling damage by 55; that's enough to fall 150 feet unscathed. The maximum you can take is 20d6 (~70), and you'll be able to reduce all of that damage by level 14 (which is also when you get Diamond Soul). If you're really concerned about falling, casting Feather Fall is cheap at that level. By the way, falling from that height isn't realistic. If your buddies are still on the ground, the monster's going to have to be closer to the ground so their ranged attacks can reach them.
There's also plenty of easy ways of boost saving throws, including Aura of Protection, Bardic Inspiration, or the Lucky feat (which is useful for any character). Or, with the concentration the wizard no longer has to use on keeping you afloat, they can grant you Haste for the +2 AC and advantage on Dexterity saves, and if you're still worried about falling just spend the 1 ki point to use Dodge as a bonus action every turn.
You get five. You can and should replace Elemental Attunement at 6th level.
You don't need as many spells as a normal magic user. You only need enough to cover a Monk's blind spots: reliance on attack rolls and being able to reach the thing you want to punch.
Please read the post I linked to. I explained this there, and went into more detail on all of my points.
A typical adventuring day, as defined in the DMG, has 2 short rests. A DM really shouldn't mess with that number much since it seriously affects not just Monks but also Battlemaster Fighters and Warlocks; but by level 20 they can't really deny you short rests anyways thanks to spells like Rope Trick. So, that's 60 ki points.
Obviously that's already more spells than the Eldritch Knight can cast, but that's not apples to apples since higher level spell slots are worth more. Well, the DMG also has a nifty little variant rule called Spell Points that assigns a point value to slots of different levels. If you convert all their slots to spell points, that's only 38. Other than Gust of Wind, elemental spells use the same point values for the number of ki points a spell is worth, so a Monk's 60 ki points are literally worth at least 60 spell points. Incidentally, a level 20 Paladin or Ranger would have 64.
Your whole argument relies on you being a one-man party. That is not the case. In any given party, members should be specializing. The monk, by design, is a close-range fighter. You're fists do far more damage than spells, so what I'm saying isn't that you don't want more damage, but you aren't looking to be another wizard or sorcerer; there's very little point to that unless you already have 2-3 Fighter/Barbarians and just have nothing better to do with yourself. About my comment on CC: I specifically said that it's actually not bad in my post, just that it's a very niche build that doesn't justify the fact that it practically makes you useless as a DPS. I acknowledged that Water Whip is very good and that Unborken Air is very similar, but you again missed the point: The latter makes it harder for you to deal damage since you're primarily a melee fighter. It's still good, but not as good as water whip, especially since most of the enemies you tend to have trouble killing are larger, CON and STR based monsters. It is useful for pushing them into lingering AoE spells, like you said, but it's a circumstantial benefit that really depends on your party having a Wizard with a style that compliments it. As for Fly, you seem to be missing the fact that if your buddies are on the ground and fighting, it probably wasn't need in the first place. If they are with you in the air, then one bad roll and they could die. Yes, you have good saving throws as a monk, but I'd rather my mage just use it from the back, where he's much less likely to be hit, and can still launch most of his/her spells.
Moving on to usability rather than effects, you're right, you do get five. That was an error in my reading of the feature. However, it's still bad design to have ANY subclass that becomes useless once it's resource is used up, which Four Elements does since nearly everything relies on Ki. And the Monk already has most so-called blind spots taken care of: It's damage output is very reliable because they get several attacks per turn, most spells have dependency on some kind of roll anyways so they really aren't any better. As for getting close to enemies: Unarmored Movement is far more useful for that than anything in the Disciplines list already. I'm unsure of where in the DMG you claim that 2 short rests rule is, but I'll give the benefit of a doubt and say it's in there and is a good rule to follow (in the future, when referencing a document, please include the section and/or page numbers. Just a good rule of thumb). That's still gonna vary considerably from session to session, because otherwise things just get to predictable and boring (As both a DM and a player, I've been on both sides of that and it's never fun to have that much of a safety net). As for a spell point conversion, I honestly see no point in it unless you are playing with that particular rule: otherwise, you have to evaluate it by the number of spells castable, in which the Four Elements is lower than any other subclass I can think of off the top of my head, minus those which don't have a spellcasting focus at all, of course.
In summation, my point is this: Four Elements, to most players I've spoken with and very much to myself, feels very weak. Most of what it does is crowd control or spell damage, which would be fine, but the drain on Ki reserves and the small number of them you get actually limits your strategy, not diversifies it, because of the few options and the high resource costs. You may as well just play default Monk without a tradition in many cases for all the good it does you. There are situations where it can be good, such as ones you've described above, but they're few and far apart, or are just really specific in terms of having a party that compliments it. As an individual character and as part of a normal team, it isn't fun to people, hence why this thread exists. If you have fun with the current Four Elements monk, that's awesome; keep on keeping on. But I'd rather have a character that feels practical, plays on it's own strengths, and has it's own time to shine occasionally than a subclass that turns one of the most interesting and versatile fighters in the game into a glorified support with no healing or team buffs. Because that's what most of your argument seems to hinge on: let your mages and rangers do all the hard work while you CC for them.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
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Thanks, that's helpful.
You see, that is why your argument is flawed. D&D is all about the people and the way mechanics work out to make things more interesting, not about hard statistics. Trusting gut feelings is half the fun, and the other half is turning your DM into a blubbering mess as you fight Tiamat and somehow collapse half of Avernus on top of her because he did NOT plan for the barbarian to use one of her severed heads as an impromptu rocket launcher. It's about being a character: one who does things their way. Like I said, if you have fun with Four Elements, go nuts. But all of the other subclasses allow the monk to reach his full potential, and then a little extra, whereas the Four Elements to me feels like it's in conflict with itself, taking away some of that specialized feel that the class inherently has. The point is to control your opponents, wiping them out one after another with your fists and Ki abilities, and here you are squandering all of your Ki points on abilities that push enemies away from you or supporting the other classes.
Which, again, if that's what you want to play, go for it. But if your specialization isn't helping the party at that exact moment? That's fine, there's no need to always be the one to solve a problem. Your time will come, so long as you didn't build something totally useless, like a STR and INT based Sorcerer. Dedicated Melee/CC is what the Monk does best, and while the variety in Four Elements could compliment that well, none of the Disciplines are worth using when Ki could go toward a Flurry of Blows that decimates a small horde of enemies, destroy a boss with Quivering Palm or Touch of Long Death, or create death from a distance with a salvo of Radiant Sun Blot. They're all more efficient on Ki, feel way better in play, and do something unique and interesting. Not to mention all of the subclasses whose features are mentioned above also grant benefits when not expending Ki, so unlike Four Elements they aren't dead weight when you run out.
So no, we (meaning myself, my friends, and the other people on this thread) have no such biases, and as a DM I've pitted my players against some of the freakiest monsters in the Manual and beyond, and they've done the same to me. We just all appreciate good design, and feel that Four Elements isn't designed well at all. It's not useless, of course, it's just not fun to us because of how thinly it's spread, instead of having one thing it's really good at and building on top of that in a new way like practically every other subclass in the game does. And you are perfectly within your rights to disagree with that, keep playing that subclass, and have fun with it. However, if you could not insult other people by saying they're poor players, that they can't look passed (past? Grammar is weird) their biases to make a fair evaluation, or that they can't perceive the game they're playing correctly, I'm sure they would appreciate it.
"Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both" -- allegedly Benjamin Franklin
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I think in the end, the subclass just doesn’t do what a lot of players want an elemental monk subclass to do. That is, really, all that matters.
I think I, and many others, wanted and expected an elemental monk to use the elements to enhance their melee fighting, mobility, and defense, with a side of cool tricks and crowd and/or single target control. In that order.
4 elemental stances, each of which provides an always on benefit, with ki powers that can only be used in certain stances, or are stronger in a given stance, would have been a better basic design, IMO.
Fire: your Flurry hits set things on fire, your resistant to fire, and you can spend ki to do some stuff that hits multiple enemies or whatever.
Air: speed increase, unarmed reach of 10 ft, improved Step of The Wind. Ki abilities to do things like Deflect Arrows with attacks against allies with 20ft of you, push enemies around, block some types of spells with air walls, etc
you get the idea.
Spells can work, but they need a more broad toolkit, and some more at-will and/or passive stuff. So you always feel like an Elemental Master.
We do bones, motherf***ker!