D&D's Monk: Way of the Kensei in 'Xanathar's Guide to Everything'

D&D's Monk: Way of the Kensei in 'Xanathar's Guide to Everything'

Todd Kenreck: The Monk Way of the Kensei focuses their power into their weapons. I talked to Mike Mearls about this new subclass appearing in Xanathar's Guide to Everything.

 

Mike Mearls: This is a monk who uses weapons. Any monk can use weapons but this is the monk who really specializes in them and thinks of the sword or whatever weapon they focus on as really being an integral of their martial arts study. This is a class concept that has been in the game since first edition. It usually bubbles up. It's usually not one of the first things that comes out with the revised edition of D&D, but it's usually one the first things that does come along. We know there's a lot of people that like the idea of playing a monk but using a sword. In Eberron that was a very common thing. A lot of the monastic orders used weapons like the long sword, weapons they didn't normally associate in D&D with a monk. This gives you the space to have that type of character.

The main benefit is this idea that you can pick a limited selection of weapons. To start with, you get one melee weapon, one range weapon. You can't choose anything like a great ax. There are some limits. You can't be two-handed or heavy, if I remember correctly, but the idea is that is a weapon that you can use with your martial arts abilities. You can also channel ki into the weapon to gain some benefits. You can basically make the weapon you're carrying a magic weapon by expending ki. You also get some defensive bonuses when you're using a weapon. The idea is to kind of get across this idea that you're a little tankier maybe than other monks because you're more used to just getting close, mixing it up, and kind of trading, not being focused as much on mobility as other monks maybe and more focused on going toe to toe with an opponent.

The traditional monk is sort of seen as scrimmager, like a rogue with a little bit more of an exotic attack profile who can do stunning fists and things like that depending on your subclass choice. This is a monk who's a little bit more focused on damage rather than control effects and who is a big more focused on being a little tankier than other monks that you might see.

Todd Kenreck: What are some points of inspiration like maybe into cinema alone for that type?

Mike Mearls: Oh. Definitely in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, which had the characters. There was the one fight in the Dojo where the characters going to look for weapons and things like that. I think it's also just this idea when D&D first came on the scene in the '70s, it was kind of a narrow vision of what the monk could be, just a pure unarmed fighter. As Asian cinemas become more common, people have seen more movies, so we're drawing on that tradition. The idea of a monk with a sword isn't strange. I think it's probably if you are a younger player coming into the game and seeing that a monk can't use a long sword, that might seem actually strange, whereas if you came into in the '70s, if you're watching Shaw Brothers movies or whatever, you might think it's weird. You would expect the monk to be unarmed or with the time, just seeing the exotic weapons. I think it's also in some ways D&D kind of catching up with what people might expect generationally to see in a martial artist style character.

It was one of those things where I think the concept people really like. I think there's just a natural thing of I want to play the sword master, the character who is just like the way of the sword. It's not just I train with a sword or study the sword, but swordsmanship, that's my life. That's my focus. I think that's really where that appeal is, that sort of graceful sword fighter whose not wearing armor, whose moving very fluidly and quickly but delivering devastating attacks.

Todd Kenreck: The Monk Way of the Kensei is part of Xanathar's Guide to Everything. That book is available for purchase on dndbeyond.com. If you click on the link in this video description, you can earn pre-order bonuses as well. I'm Todd Kenreck. Thank you for watching.

2

Comments

Posts Quoted:
Reply
Clear All Quotes