So, me and a fellow D&D friend were discussing the newest Unearthed Arcana, and he had mentioned that, though the subclasses themselves were quite well made, he wished that they were for better classes than the Monk and Ranger. Say what you will about the Ranger, but I've never really heard much about the 5th Edition Monk being a "bad class", aside from Treantmonk.
Is there something that I'm missing?
Edit: Yea, this thread is long-gone. Scroll down at your own risk.
Other than the Way of the Four Elements (which has some major design flaws) the Monk has great class features and subclasses for both combat and exploration. Not sure what he's talking about.
Treantmonk's old biases aside, there's nothing wrong with the monk or ranger classes. Power games don't like them because they can't put up the ludicrously high numbers to down the Tarrasque in one round, is all.
For Monks, you need to pay more attention to your starting stats because so much of their combat effectiveness depends on having high DEX and WIS. It's not so much that they are a terrible class but that they are squishy at low levels unless you choose races that give you particular advantages, like V. Human for the Mobile feat, Tabaxi for Feline Agility, or Tortle for extra (non-armor) AC. If your campaign starts after level 4, this is less of a concern because you have more Ki that you can use for both dodging and attacking.
Just hit level 8 in Curse of Strahd with my Open Hand Monk and I am loving playing him. I'm using the Blood Spear from the module and doing quite well. 3-4 chances at doing damage each round mixed with good AC and stunning strike is making him pretty effective. Also I am far faster than anyone else in the party. Lots of fun.
Just hit level 8 in Curse of Strahd with my Open Hand Monk and I am loving playing him. I'm using the Blood Spear from the module and doing quite well. 3-4 chances at doing damage each round mixed with good AC and stunning strike is making him pretty effective. Also I am far faster than anyone else in the party. Lots of fun.
Open hand and Shadow are the most viable options due to the fact they get cool subclass abilities that do not require Ki.
The latest UA is amazing for this same reason...they get uses of their subclass ability without spending Ki which is what Monk's need desperately.
Right now its really hard to justify using Ki for anything other than stun...its just inferior 98% of the time not to.
My first D&D character ever was an Aarakocra Way of the Sun Soul Monk. I had so much fun flying around, shooting light lazers at all of the baddies that got in our party's way. Too bad he died by Disintegration Ray from a Beholder Zombie at Level 6.
My Open Hand monk had Bane spell from a feat. More than once I cheesed the fluff out of an encounter by Bane-ing the bad guy then Stun-locking them (it's amazing what -1d4 to saves can do, especially when you have 4 attempts a turn, as long as you have Ki). Turned "Deadly" encounters into cakewalks. And that's before I could use the "instant drop to zero hp or 10d10 necro dmg" feature.
I had tons of fun with my Shadow Monk / Assassin Rogue. Rush in, ambush,, attack twice with advantage auto-crit with bonus sneak attack, stun enemy. If stun failed, bonus to teleport away to safety. Or, if already in the combat, shadowport to enemy, attack with advantage and run away if stun fails. And getting the drop on enemies was easy with Shadow Arts. Stacking Pass Without Trace with Silence? Surprise for days. Lots of fun. I kinda miss that lil stabby kitty (he was a Tabaxi).
And people rag on the Four Elements Monk but I had fun with that too. It was a nice epic moment when I decided to sod being cautious, burn all my ki and punt a dragon across a room for over 100 damage. Even completely out of Ki, still continued beating the crap out of it. Another Deadly encounter rendered into an easy victory thanks to a monk.
And nothing is more epic/anime than running across water or up walls like it was effortless. I have a fond memory of my FE Monk when we teleported into a plane of water and had to swim to the nearby island - the party were struggling to swim at half-speed while my monk just goes "see ya" and step o' winds away running across the surface at 195 ft a round.
I prefer spellcasters, but of the non-spellslinger classes (as focus) the Monk is my fave.
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There are no bad classes in 5E, unless you equate "not as good as some other classes" to "bad". The fact that the two top threads in the monk forum currently are one about the class possibly being bad and another about it possibly being overpowered probably says all there is to say on the matter.
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There are no bad classes in 5E, unless you equate "not as good as some other classes" to "bad". The fact that the two top threads in the monk forum currently are one about the class possibly being bad and another about it possibly being overpowered probably says all there is to say on the matter.
Overall if you look at surveys they consistently rank Monk as "good but not great" which is my feelings on it. It has a very high floor but a low ceiling.
Stun spam is your best bet for efficiency 99% of the time but you can have fun if you don't care about doing the most with your turn every turn. The thing is that other classes get more than 1 impactful choice to do on a turn while monk feels like it has 1 amazing one and like the rest are meh...
There are no bad classes in 5E, unless you equate "not as good as some other classes" to "bad". The fact that the two top threads in the monk forum currently are one about the class possibly being bad and another about it possibly being overpowered probably says all there is to say on the matter.
Overall if you look at surveys they consistently rank Monk as "good but not great" which is my feelings on it. It has a very high floor but a low ceiling.
Stun spam is your best bet for efficiency 99% of the time but you can have fun if you don't care about doing the most with your turn every turn. The thing is that other classes get more than 1 impactful choice to do on a turn while monk feels like it has 1 amazing one and like the rest are meh...
High Wis and Dex give some good options to find out-of-combat skills to become proficient in, more than the other non-magical warrior classes anyway, which for me helps to save the class somewhat. On the other hand, Cha and Int are unlikely to be particularly good. Otherwise it’s a pretty bland class to me. Doesn’t necessarily mean bad or underpowered, more just less interesting. You can make interesting, cool characters with any class, monks just (to me) seem less suited to mechanically support character qualities outside combat and physical stuff than most others. They can fairly easily become able outdoorsmen, sure.
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Just a similar issue to rangers in terms having unique abilities, but those unique abilities not being as rewarded by the game or as focused as other class’ abilities. Monk is still a valid option, but it could have been made to get away with a lot more without coming close to being broken.
In the previous editions monks had cool ideas but a ton of problems. 5e I think has fixed most of those though perhaps a few remain. Due to monks inability to wear armor you kinda have to prioritize Dex and Wis even if you didn't want to min max the character. Dex also because the monk uses it to attack and deal damage. You probably should have a high stat in Con too due to the monks kinda poor hit die so s/he won't get knocked out so much. Perhaps the monk should've had a d10 hit die or Con instead of Wis for the other AC, so high Con could double as AC and the needed extra hp. Though yes I know Wis also plays into the saves. Also if you'd want to have the monk be a successful grappler and take that feat you can't ignore Strength either, probably can't or shouldn't ignore anyway... though thankfully you no longer have to take a feat to be able to use Dex for attack as you did in previous editions (and even then the damage had to be counted with Str). So more often than not Int and/or Cha probably end up being dumb stats. So I think the monk still has a weakness for being somewhat more MAD (multiple attributes dependent) than other classes but it is a very good improvement over the previous editions and a viable class even as it is. Some of the stuff I mention could maybe be houseruled depending on the DM, like I might houserule the Grappling thing so that the monks could use Dex instead of Str for it, I could see it reasonable, even a bit realistic, I practiced martial arts that involved grappling for a while and while strength wasn't irrelevant I found speed to be much more important I remember losing bouts to practitioners who were definitely weaker than me but a lot faster.
I made a homebrew subclass Way of the Closed Fist a bit more aggressive offshoot of the Way of the Open Hand where I also tried to address some of this stuff. Here is a link if anyone is interested and I'm always happy to hear suggestions https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/class-forums/monk/51764-way-of-the-closed-fist
I currently have a level 12 Shadow monk leveled all the way from 1. Here are my thoughts on the whole monks are a "bad class" idea. First, Treantmonk is overly critical and fails to consider the one major thing that the monk has going for it. Options. In any given round, the monk can either be a very competent tank with Patient Defense and other defensive abilities, a very competent damage dealer with fury of blows, a very competent source of crowd control with stunning strike, or be outrageously mobile to get into a more favorable position. A different class may be able to do one of these things better than a monk. However, the fact that monk can do all these things well is what makes it interesting and a good class.
There is a damage output issue from levels 11-16 (and beyond depending on subclass - more on that later) where monks are doing noticeably less damage than other classes. This is for one major reason, there is no feat that they can take to drastically up their damage output the way Great Weapon Master or Sharpshooter can. However, outside that range, 1-10 and 17-20, they do fairly well. Treantmonk uses a warlock casting hex and eldritch blast with Agonizing blast as his baseline to decide if a build does good damage or not. From levels 1-10, monk wins. Levels 11-17, warlock wins. Level 17+ depends on what subclass the monk takes. Will a monk be doing the most damage possible per round? No. But their damage is just one facet of what makes a monk a good class.
Stunning strike is a very good ability that can both almost ensure a target is stunned or can blow through some legendary resistances. In one round after level 5, they can force an enemy to make up to 4 con saves or be stunned. Granted, at level 5, that can only happen once. At later levels, doing this on a round becomes a more reasonable option. Recently my party went up against a beholder. It passed the first two Con saves, but failed the third. I've also blown through a vampires legendary resistances in 1 turn. These moments of glory meant an otherwise difficult encounter become very manageable. The Open Hand monk furthers this by giving it fantastic battlefield control options. Consider this, the monk attacks a creature, stuns it, then uses open hand technique to push the creature off a cliff or into some other obstacle. The stunned effect causes the saving throw to automatically fail. Even more interesting, there is no restriction on size for Open Hand Technique. The feature works on fury of blows attacks, meaning you can do this twice on a turn. Open hand technique makes the open hand monk an outstanding battlefield controller. Granted, there are better options for battlefield control than a monk, but it's just one of many useful things in their kit.
Monks typically have fairly high AC with Dex and Wis contributing to thier AC. Add to that the ability to take dodge as a bonus action, they become very tanky. But that's not all. They also get evasion to help with dex saves, immunity to poison and disease, and even eventually proficiency in ALL saving throws and the ability to spend a ki point to reroll a failed save. All these things combined mean the monk is very difficult to deal with. Charming and fear don't do a ton either because they can use an action to remove these effects (Treantmonk goes out of his way to discredit stillness of mind with an incorrect interpretation of the rules for Stillness of Mind).
Monks are insanely mobile. This shouldn't be news. But what can a monk do with all that mobility? Hit an run tactics work well for the monk. Positioning near squishy targets is amazing. My monk is a Variant Human with the mage slayer feat. This isn't necessarily the best feat but generally I'm not an "optimancer." I personally like solving problems in a variety of interesting ways, not necessarily always trying to do the most damage possible, something that the monk does very very well. What I do like about Mage Slayer though is that I can use the crazy high mobility to position myself near an enemy spell caster and ruin their day. This is situational but a lot of fun when it works. My Monk is a shadow monk and the ability to teleport 60ft is amazing. Recently, our DM through an encounter at us where everything was difficult terrain and things were quite spread out. Most people were moving 15 feet per round, or 30ft max with dash. I was teleporting around 60 ft (we were in darkness) without hinderance and still able to move 25-50 feet. When the barbarian was able to, he did more damage than I did. However, I was in range much more often so over the course of the encounter, I did more damage. The BBG was also a spell caster that I was able to manage fairly well.
All that said, there are some issues with the monk some of which can be mitigated by a good DM.
First, there are no amazing feats for the monk to majorly up their damage like GWM and SS (as I mentioned). Personally I think mobile is redundant but I know a lot of people like it on their monk. I like mage slayer and sentinel though because it gives you damage options on your reaction among other things. (Shadow Monks already get a reaction attack at 17, but combine that with one or both of those two feats and it all but ensures you'll be having a reaction attack every round). This is good for added damage but also for another chance to stun. Example; a wizard casts a concentration spell, gets wacked by the Monk with mage slayer, stunned, and immediately loses concentration. That mage's turn is over.
Second, and probably more importantly, there are no amazing weapons for monks. The Staff of Striking is arguably the best but it only modifies 2 of the 3 or 4 attacks a monk will be making every round. There is some item that turns natural weapons into +1 weapons as well. That's about it though as far as official content. My advice to a GM is make sure there are cool weapons for their monk players that modify those unarmed attacks too. That will help close the damage gap that monks will see in the mid-late parts of the game.
Third, there are some very bad choices for subclasses. Way of the Four Elements, for example. Before you read it and understand the mechanics, you might be super excited about it because it objectively sounds cool (Who doesn't want to be Aang?). The reality is this is in the running for the worst subclass in the game. Most of the options are ok. Shadow and Open hand are my personal favorites.
If I were to rank all the classes from best to worse, Monks would be in the bottom half. However, if I were to give them a grade in terms of the mechanics (assuming the player doesn't take a bad subclass), I would probably give it a rating of B. It's a very good and fun class. If you're looking to put up the most damage in a round, pick a barbarian and take GWM. Monks aren't for you. If you're looking to have interesting and effective options in combat but still want to play a martial class, monk is a very good and fun option.
fails to consider the one major thing that the monk has going for it. Options.
I'd argue the monk's options only ever bring them to parity with other more well rounded martial classes in one category. And that is at the expense of resources, and still choosing which category to be among the worst in.
Other martials get on average 1-2 more AC at early levels, and can generally just buy a bit more? Use patient defense (but deal less damage than any other martial class that turn).
The other martial classes achieving more damage on average? Use Flurry of blows (but be defensively inferior to any other martial class)
If the options are "which single category am I not going to be deficient in," they are bad options.
Monks should be a bit stronger (d10 hit dice, martial arts dice getting bigger faster, maybe even more ki points, another ASI, or a third attack at 11) and wouldn't be broken for it.
From levels 1-10, monk wins.
Part of Treant Monk's point is that Monk only just barely wins after level 5, and basically never gets any better even using all its resources. And anytime the monk isn't using flurry of blows, they lose badly to that benchmark.
Part of Treant Monk's point is that Monk only just barely wins after level 5, and basically never gets any better even using all its resources. And anytime the monk isn't using flurry of blows, they lose badly to that benchmark.
And Treantmonk has something of a one-track mind when it comes to how certain things should function. Flurry of Blows simply isn't a feature that a monk should be using every single turn. And any white room scenario which says they should ought to be defenestrated.
Part of Treant Monk's point is that Monk only just barely wins after level 5, and basically never gets any better even using all its resources. And anytime the monk isn't using flurry of blows, they lose badly to that benchmark.
And Treantmonk has something of a one-track mind when it comes to how certain things should function. Flurry of Blows simply isn't a feature that a monk should be using every single turn. And any white room scenario which says they should ought to be defenestrated.
Sure, but that just makes the monk's deficiency in terms of dealing damage even greater. They exchange so much in terms of being an all around better class in favor of having options. So those options should really be a question of "what area will the monk excel in", rather than "what area will they pay to be less deficient in."
Part of Treant Monk's point is that Monk only just barely wins after level 5, and basically never gets any better even using all its resources. And anytime the monk isn't using flurry of blows, they lose badly to that benchmark.
And Treantmonk has something of a one-track mind when it comes to how certain things should function. Flurry of Blows simply isn't a feature that a monk should be using every single turn. And any white room scenario which says they should ought to be defenestrated.
Sure, but that just makes the monk's deficiency in terms of dealing damage even greater. They exchange so much in terms of being an all around better class in favor of having options. So those options should really be a question of "what area will the monk excel in", rather than "what area will they pay to be less deficient in."
I think you're looking at this from the wrong perspective. The monk isn't paying anything to be less deficient. Dealing damage is not the be-all-end-all of playing the game. What the monk excels in is mobility, getting in and out of the fray, and supporting their allies. It's the only "martial" class that is guaranteed to deal magical damage. It can stun, which is rare. Its numerous archetypes offer a wide variety of control. And we're haven't even gotten into its defensive abilities.
fails to consider the one major thing that the monk has going for it. Options.
I'd argue the monk's options only ever bring them to parity with other more well rounded martial classes in one category.
And that's why you're always wrong; the purpose of the Monk is not to excel in any one of your choice of categories, of which you only seem to have one (damage). Monks excel at speed, and they're really versatile, easily the most versatile of the martial classes (spellcasters can be more versatile, but that's kind of their entire thing). But you seem to place no value at all on anything that isn't damage, that's your problem, not the Monk's.
How many times do you have to be told this before you either listen, or just finally stop wasting everybody's time (including your own) by making the same flawed arguments over and over again? Also, Treantmonk is not an authority on which class is best; he doesn't seem to understand how Monk's work at all (and very likely has never played as one), and just repeating his arguments only makes it clear you've never tried to play one either, yet you waste hours and hours whining about them anyway.
Seriously dude, just stop it already.
And it's a silly argument in the first place; if your argument is that Monks can be as good as other martial classes at what those classes are designed to be best at, then your argument is actually that Monks are the best martial class in the game 😝
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So, me and a fellow D&D friend were discussing the newest Unearthed Arcana, and he had mentioned that, though the subclasses themselves were quite well made, he wished that they were for better classes than the Monk and Ranger. Say what you will about the Ranger, but I've never really heard much about the 5th Edition Monk being a "bad class", aside from Treantmonk.
Is there something that I'm missing?
Edit: Yea, this thread is long-gone. Scroll down at your own risk.
Other than the Way of the Four Elements (which has some major design flaws) the Monk has great class features and subclasses for both combat and exploration. Not sure what he's talking about.
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Treantmonk's old biases aside, there's nothing wrong with the monk or ranger classes. Power games don't like them because they can't put up the ludicrously high numbers to down the Tarrasque in one round, is all.
For Monks, you need to pay more attention to your starting stats because so much of their combat effectiveness depends on having high DEX and WIS. It's not so much that they are a terrible class but that they are squishy at low levels unless you choose races that give you particular advantages, like V. Human for the Mobile feat, Tabaxi for Feline Agility, or Tortle for extra (non-armor) AC. If your campaign starts after level 4, this is less of a concern because you have more Ki that you can use for both dodging and attacking.
Just hit level 8 in Curse of Strahd with my Open Hand Monk and I am loving playing him. I'm using the Blood Spear from the module and doing quite well. 3-4 chances at doing damage each round mixed with good AC and stunning strike is making him pretty effective. Also I am far faster than anyone else in the party. Lots of fun.
Open hand and Shadow are the most viable options due to the fact they get cool subclass abilities that do not require Ki.
The latest UA is amazing for this same reason...they get uses of their subclass ability without spending Ki which is what Monk's need desperately.
Right now its really hard to justify using Ki for anything other than stun...its just inferior 98% of the time not to.
My first D&D character ever was an Aarakocra Way of the Sun Soul Monk. I had so much fun flying around, shooting light lazers at all of the baddies that got in our party's way. Too bad he died by Disintegration Ray from a Beholder Zombie at Level 6.
My Open Hand monk had Bane spell from a feat. More than once I cheesed the fluff out of an encounter by Bane-ing the bad guy then Stun-locking them (it's amazing what -1d4 to saves can do, especially when you have 4 attempts a turn, as long as you have Ki). Turned "Deadly" encounters into cakewalks. And that's before I could use the "instant drop to zero hp or 10d10 necro dmg" feature.
I had tons of fun with my Shadow Monk / Assassin Rogue. Rush in, ambush,, attack twice with advantage auto-crit with bonus sneak attack, stun enemy. If stun failed, bonus to teleport away to safety. Or, if already in the combat, shadowport to enemy, attack with advantage and run away if stun fails. And getting the drop on enemies was easy with Shadow Arts. Stacking Pass Without Trace with Silence? Surprise for days. Lots of fun. I kinda miss that lil stabby kitty (he was a Tabaxi).
And people rag on the Four Elements Monk but I had fun with that too. It was a nice epic moment when I decided to sod being cautious, burn all my ki and punt a dragon across a room for over 100 damage. Even completely out of Ki, still continued beating the crap out of it. Another Deadly encounter rendered into an easy victory thanks to a monk.
And nothing is more epic/anime than running across water or up walls like it was effortless. I have a fond memory of my FE Monk when we teleported into a plane of water and had to swim to the nearby island - the party were struggling to swim at half-speed while my monk just goes "see ya" and step o' winds away running across the surface at 195 ft a round.
I prefer spellcasters, but of the non-spellslinger classes (as focus) the Monk is my fave.
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There are no bad classes in 5E, unless you equate "not as good as some other classes" to "bad". The fact that the two top threads in the monk forum currently are one about the class possibly being bad and another about it possibly being overpowered probably says all there is to say on the matter.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
Overall if you look at surveys they consistently rank Monk as "good but not great" which is my feelings on it. It has a very high floor but a low ceiling.
Stun spam is your best bet for efficiency 99% of the time but you can have fun if you don't care about doing the most with your turn every turn. The thing is that other classes get more than 1 impactful choice to do on a turn while monk feels like it has 1 amazing one and like the rest are meh...
High Wis and Dex give some good options to find out-of-combat skills to become proficient in, more than the other non-magical warrior classes anyway, which for me helps to save the class somewhat. On the other hand, Cha and Int are unlikely to be particularly good. Otherwise it’s a pretty bland class to me. Doesn’t necessarily mean bad or underpowered, more just less interesting. You can make interesting, cool characters with any class, monks just (to me) seem less suited to mechanically support character qualities outside combat and physical stuff than most others. They can fairly easily become able outdoorsmen, sure.
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Just a similar issue to rangers in terms having unique abilities, but those unique abilities not being as rewarded by the game or as focused as other class’ abilities. Monk is still a valid option, but it could have been made to get away with a lot more without coming close to being broken.
In the previous editions monks had cool ideas but a ton of problems. 5e I think has fixed most of those though perhaps a few remain.
Due to monks inability to wear armor you kinda have to prioritize Dex and Wis even if you didn't want to min max the character. Dex also because the monk uses it to attack and deal damage. You probably should have a high stat in Con too due to the monks kinda poor hit die so s/he won't get knocked out so much. Perhaps the monk should've had a d10 hit die or Con instead of Wis for the other AC, so high Con could double as AC and the needed extra hp. Though yes I know Wis also plays into the saves. Also if you'd want to have the monk be a successful grappler and take that feat you can't ignore Strength either, probably can't or shouldn't ignore anyway... though thankfully you no longer have to take a feat to be able to use Dex for attack as you did in previous editions (and even then the damage had to be counted with Str). So more often than not Int and/or Cha probably end up being dumb stats.
So I think the monk still has a weakness for being somewhat more MAD (multiple attributes dependent) than other classes but it is a very good improvement over the previous editions and a viable class even as it is. Some of the stuff I mention could maybe be houseruled depending on the DM, like I might houserule the Grappling thing so that the monks could use Dex instead of Str for it, I could see it reasonable, even a bit realistic, I practiced martial arts that involved grappling for a while and while strength wasn't irrelevant I found speed to be much more important I remember losing bouts to practitioners who were definitely weaker than me but a lot faster.
I made a homebrew subclass Way of the Closed Fist a bit more aggressive offshoot of the Way of the Open Hand where I also tried to address some of this stuff.
Here is a link if anyone is interested and I'm always happy to hear suggestions
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/class-forums/monk/51764-way-of-the-closed-fist
I currently have a level 12 Shadow monk leveled all the way from 1. Here are my thoughts on the whole monks are a "bad class" idea. First, Treantmonk is overly critical and fails to consider the one major thing that the monk has going for it. Options. In any given round, the monk can either be a very competent tank with Patient Defense and other defensive abilities, a very competent damage dealer with fury of blows, a very competent source of crowd control with stunning strike, or be outrageously mobile to get into a more favorable position. A different class may be able to do one of these things better than a monk. However, the fact that monk can do all these things well is what makes it interesting and a good class.
There is a damage output issue from levels 11-16 (and beyond depending on subclass - more on that later) where monks are doing noticeably less damage than other classes. This is for one major reason, there is no feat that they can take to drastically up their damage output the way Great Weapon Master or Sharpshooter can. However, outside that range, 1-10 and 17-20, they do fairly well. Treantmonk uses a warlock casting hex and eldritch blast with Agonizing blast as his baseline to decide if a build does good damage or not. From levels 1-10, monk wins. Levels 11-17, warlock wins. Level 17+ depends on what subclass the monk takes. Will a monk be doing the most damage possible per round? No. But their damage is just one facet of what makes a monk a good class.
Stunning strike is a very good ability that can both almost ensure a target is stunned or can blow through some legendary resistances. In one round after level 5, they can force an enemy to make up to 4 con saves or be stunned. Granted, at level 5, that can only happen once. At later levels, doing this on a round becomes a more reasonable option. Recently my party went up against a beholder. It passed the first two Con saves, but failed the third. I've also blown through a vampires legendary resistances in 1 turn. These moments of glory meant an otherwise difficult encounter become very manageable. The Open Hand monk furthers this by giving it fantastic battlefield control options. Consider this, the monk attacks a creature, stuns it, then uses open hand technique to push the creature off a cliff or into some other obstacle. The stunned effect causes the saving throw to automatically fail. Even more interesting, there is no restriction on size for Open Hand Technique. The feature works on fury of blows attacks, meaning you can do this twice on a turn. Open hand technique makes the open hand monk an outstanding battlefield controller. Granted, there are better options for battlefield control than a monk, but it's just one of many useful things in their kit.
Monks typically have fairly high AC with Dex and Wis contributing to thier AC. Add to that the ability to take dodge as a bonus action, they become very tanky. But that's not all. They also get evasion to help with dex saves, immunity to poison and disease, and even eventually proficiency in ALL saving throws and the ability to spend a ki point to reroll a failed save. All these things combined mean the monk is very difficult to deal with. Charming and fear don't do a ton either because they can use an action to remove these effects (Treantmonk goes out of his way to discredit stillness of mind with an incorrect interpretation of the rules for Stillness of Mind).
Monks are insanely mobile. This shouldn't be news. But what can a monk do with all that mobility? Hit an run tactics work well for the monk. Positioning near squishy targets is amazing. My monk is a Variant Human with the mage slayer feat. This isn't necessarily the best feat but generally I'm not an "optimancer." I personally like solving problems in a variety of interesting ways, not necessarily always trying to do the most damage possible, something that the monk does very very well. What I do like about Mage Slayer though is that I can use the crazy high mobility to position myself near an enemy spell caster and ruin their day. This is situational but a lot of fun when it works. My Monk is a shadow monk and the ability to teleport 60ft is amazing. Recently, our DM through an encounter at us where everything was difficult terrain and things were quite spread out. Most people were moving 15 feet per round, or 30ft max with dash. I was teleporting around 60 ft (we were in darkness) without hinderance and still able to move 25-50 feet. When the barbarian was able to, he did more damage than I did. However, I was in range much more often so over the course of the encounter, I did more damage. The BBG was also a spell caster that I was able to manage fairly well.
All that said, there are some issues with the monk some of which can be mitigated by a good DM.
If I were to rank all the classes from best to worse, Monks would be in the bottom half. However, if I were to give them a grade in terms of the mechanics (assuming the player doesn't take a bad subclass), I would probably give it a rating of B. It's a very good and fun class. If you're looking to put up the most damage in a round, pick a barbarian and take GWM. Monks aren't for you. If you're looking to have interesting and effective options in combat but still want to play a martial class, monk is a very good and fun option.
I'd argue the monk's options only ever bring them to parity with other more well rounded martial classes in one category. And that is at the expense of resources, and still choosing which category to be among the worst in.
Other martials get on average 1-2 more AC at early levels, and can generally just buy a bit more? Use patient defense (but deal less damage than any other martial class that turn).
The other martial classes achieving more damage on average? Use Flurry of blows (but be defensively inferior to any other martial class)
If the options are "which single category am I not going to be deficient in," they are bad options.
Monks should be a bit stronger (d10 hit dice, martial arts dice getting bigger faster, maybe even more ki points, another ASI, or a third attack at 11) and wouldn't be broken for it.
Part of Treant Monk's point is that Monk only just barely wins after level 5, and basically never gets any better even using all its resources. And anytime the monk isn't using flurry of blows, they lose badly to that benchmark.
And Treantmonk has something of a one-track mind when it comes to how certain things should function. Flurry of Blows simply isn't a feature that a monk should be using every single turn. And any white room scenario which says they should ought to be defenestrated.
Sure, but that just makes the monk's deficiency in terms of dealing damage even greater. They exchange so much in terms of being an all around better class in favor of having options. So those options should really be a question of "what area will the monk excel in", rather than "what area will they pay to be less deficient in."
I think you're looking at this from the wrong perspective. The monk isn't paying anything to be less deficient. Dealing damage is not the be-all-end-all of playing the game. What the monk excels in is mobility, getting in and out of the fray, and supporting their allies. It's the only "martial" class that is guaranteed to deal magical damage. It can stun, which is rare. Its numerous archetypes offer a wide variety of control. And we're haven't even gotten into its defensive abilities.
Monks are viable.
And that's why you're always wrong; the purpose of the Monk is not to excel in any one of your choice of categories, of which you only seem to have one (damage). Monks excel at speed, and they're really versatile, easily the most versatile of the martial classes (spellcasters can be more versatile, but that's kind of their entire thing). But you seem to place no value at all on anything that isn't damage, that's your problem, not the Monk's.
How many times do you have to be told this before you either listen, or just finally stop wasting everybody's time (including your own) by making the same flawed arguments over and over again? Also, Treantmonk is not an authority on which class is best; he doesn't seem to understand how Monk's work at all (and very likely has never played as one), and just repeating his arguments only makes it clear you've never tried to play one either, yet you waste hours and hours whining about them anyway.
Seriously dude, just stop it already.
And it's a silly argument in the first place; if your argument is that Monks can be as good as other martial classes at what those classes are designed to be best at, then your argument is actually that Monks are the best martial class in the game 😝
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