If you played as a DMPC, I doubt you had the time to focus solely on the character and having more fun with that rather than worrying about how mechanically viable the class is.
BS. Absolute BS. You don't know me, so don't come into this thread and say "You haven't even play the class!" and then when I have told you that I have played the class and alongside one, don't tell me "that's not actually playing it!!!"
My DMPCs are added to be actual characters that participate in the campaign. It was in a one-on-one campaign that had 5 DMPCs over the course of the campaign (not at once, only 3 at a time, replacing retired/dead ones throughout the campaign). The DMPCs had fully fleshed out backstories, personalities, goals, motivations, and everything else a PC needs, including the Monk.
This is the whole "Powergamers/Minmaxers can't roleplay!" claim that is absolutely untrue. The Monk DMPC was cool, fun, and had an interesting personality and character arc. My grievances with the class have nothing to do with the roleplay potential, but everything to do with how they are played in the game. I played it for about 10 levels of play, for about a 2 year campaign.
Don't tell me that my experiences are invalid because I was at the DM at the time of playing the character. I experienced all of the play of the character and know its strengths and faults as well as anyone else that has played it for 10 levels.
(The rest will be in a later post. This is more important than the rest and deserves its own post.)
Never said that you weren't "actually playing the class" I was speaking from my own experience with DMPCs. Never said your DMPC wasn't a character, I just said that you were probably more focused on mechanical viability rather than having fun with the class. I specifically said that I doubt you were "solely" focused on fun. Never, not once, said that you didn't actually play the class. The point is that maybe the monk is less satisfying to you because your main experience with it came with the burdens of DMing (and i've dmed so let's not act like dming is always fun and games). If you say that you know all of its strengths and faults, then sure. But what you just did sounds alot like the "strawmaning" you were complaining about earlier.
You said that I didn't play the class, then said that I didn't find the experience with the monk class good because I was also DMing. I addressed that. I don't need to focus "solely" on anything to appreciate the mechanics of it or have a good experience with it.
My experience having a Monk DMPC was a valid experience with it. Stop trying to make my experiences with the class seem lesser than yours.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Monks are awesome. Difference of 1% of players playing monk vs every other class other than Fighter, Rogue, Wizard, and Druid isn't that big. Walk into a room with 20 tables going at once and you might find one more Paladin than Monk, that's what that means.
Also, please don't use that data to tell a story that it doesn't -- all that shows is how common those classes are, not how satisfying they are. There could literally be 0 correlation between the two, you don't know. As others mentioned, there are probably more one-time DND players than repeat players, and one-time players are probably going to gravitate to the archetypes they know and love (Fighter, Rogue, Wizard). That will skew things, and that says nothing about whether they actually liked playing those classes.
Monks by-and-large are melee fighters who, unlike nearly every other melee fighter, cares more about consistency of damage and mobility than amount of damage and tanking. Crit fishing isn't what they should be doing at all. What they should be doing is acting as a different kind of support character -- ending concentration, pushing opponents towards/away from their party members, stunning opponents so their stronger teammates can do the heavy damage, etc.
Not all monks play the same, no more so than all Paladins or all Rogues do. (Casters, this can be different, but only because spell choice is the most customizable thing in DND.) Check this link. Rangers take Sharpshooter at nearly a 2-to-1 rate over Monks taking Mobile. Every class, just about, has a single feat that they take approximately as often as Monks take Mobile. To me, that means that lots of classes have "stereotypical builds", and Monks are not unique here.
If Monks got a d10 hit dice, no one would complain about any of this. Somehow Monks needing CON (when literally every class does, for the exact same reasons mostly, too) makes them "too MAD" when classes like Barbs and Paladins are not "too MAD" despite CON being their third stat as well (though admittedly Barbs can go without DEX a lot of the time).
Playing as a DMPC (especially when playing multiple DMPCs) is not going to give the same experience as going straight PC. That's all I'll say about that.
I think I said it before but I want to point out as part of NV's thing that Monks are not really big on crit fishing. Their Consistent Damage is not exactly low when they are built well. And it doesn't require outright min-maxing and figuring out how to stick the largest weapon possible in their hand to do that. Even with purely their martial arts they can be very effective at doing a decent amount of rather consistent damage. It's perceived as low because all people see is a bunch of low numbers when they look at the monk and a smaller amount of higher numbers when they look at the Paladin or the Ranger or sometimes even the Warrior. But they aren't usually doing much more, if any, than 20-25 damage with real consistency with nothing more than a +3 or +4 modifier which i have quite a bit of experience managing with a monk in the tier 1 and tier 2 range of play (so it's not like I'm even talking about major minmaxing to get these numbers). Their numbers are just obfuscated under other abilities as often as not.
You said that I didn't play the class, then said that I didn't find the experience with the monk class good because I was also DMing. I addressed that. I don't need to focus "solely" on anything to appreciate the mechanics of it or have a good experience with it.
My experience having a Monk DMPC was a valid experience with it. Stop trying to make my experiences with the class seem lesser than yours.
If you think that's what I did, then I can't really say much other than go off I guess.
Having played a monk I can say it was a bit of a one trick pony to me...but I was in a group that really needed me to do the "best" thing at the given moment as I was the only one really optimized in a meaningful way.
We had casters that wanted to do the fun spells and what not but would get really stressed if they were hurt badly. I pretty much had to focus on stunning strike as it was the best way for me to ensure the party succeeded. Ultimately it was a playstyle issue more so than a monk issue....but I can see monk falling into that A LOT.
The opportunity cost for monk is just too high....and the features you get are mostly self-serving. Timeless Body and Diamond Soul keep YOU alive but do not confer a great benefit to the party like spells or auras would.
Fighter/barb suffers from this as well but honestly they have a more narrow focus even yet unless you get into the defender subclasses.
Monk (sans Mercy) really does not offer a party friendly option to help readily beyond Stunning Strike. The closest is Shadow Monk with Pass without Trace and other spells...but that niche can be filled with other spell casters and costs the monk precious ki points that could be used for Stunning Strike.
Monk (sans Mercy) really does not offer a party friendly option to help readily beyond Stunning Strike. The closest is Shadow Monk with Pass without Trace and other spells...but that niche can be filled with other spell casters and costs the monk precious ki points that could be used for Stunning Strike.
i mean depends on the context in wich the spells are used and the pace of the game, if you can expect that the next hour will not have any combat threats in them it should be a no-brainer, since you can later take a short rest and regain all ki you spent to cast the spell it would arguably be less taxing on party resources
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
i am soup, with too many ideas (all of them very spicy) who has made sufficient homebrew material and character to last an thousand human lifetimes
People say its good to dodge as BA...but its better to just shut down the creature altogether than just have disadvantage to hit you
i mean there is nothing stopping you from using stunning strike and patient defense in the same turn, plus some creatures have legendary resistance, magic resistance and high will saves
also think it is generally interesting how this thread went from "these two class features stand out among class features given at similar levels" to "is the monk as a whole a good class", guess that is what happens when you mention "monks" and "balance" in the same sentence
...or i mean any class and the word balance in the same sentence, is there really any class that is not steriotypically seen as unbalanced? clerics, wizards and paladins are steriotyped as OP, druids and barbarians (and to a lesser degree rouges) as completely impossible to kill, rangers, monks and to a much lesser degree sorcerers and bards are seen as weaker than average, fighters are seen as boring and so on and so fourth, yes it is always impossible to please everyone and many of these complaints are either just nitpicks or memes, i donno what i am trying to say here really
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
i am soup, with too many ideas (all of them very spicy) who has made sufficient homebrew material and character to last an thousand human lifetimes
Monk (sans Mercy) really does not offer a party friendly option to help readily beyond Stunning Strike. The closest is Shadow Monk with Pass without Trace and other spells...but that niche can be filled with other spell casters and costs the monk precious ki points that could be used for Stunning Strike.
i mean depends on the context in wich the spells are used and the pace of the game, if you can expect that the next hour will not have any combat threats in them it should be a no-brainer, since you can later take a short rest and regain all ki you spent to cast the spell it would arguably be less taxing on party resources
Fair point I am mostly saying that Monk does not confer a subclass (sans Mercy) that offers much in combat defense that is party focused. Also their offensive output is fairly low comparatively so your best bet is almost always just to...Stun.
It tends to make your play fairly 1-D despite the interesting tools given to you.
Having played a monk I can say it was a bit of a one trick pony to me...but I was in a group that really needed me to do the "best" thing at the given moment as I was the only one really optimized in a meaningful way.
We had casters that wanted to do the fun spells and what not but would get really stressed if they were hurt badly. I pretty much had to focus on stunning strike as it was the best way for me to ensure the party succeeded. Ultimately it was a playstyle issue more so than a monk issue....but I can see monk falling into that A LOT.
The opportunity cost for monk is just too high....and the features you get are mostly self-serving. Timeless Body and Diamond Soul keep YOU alive but do not confer a great benefit to the party like spells or auras would.
Fighter/barb suffers from this as well but honestly they have a more narrow focus even yet unless you get into the defender subclasses.
Monk (sans Mercy) really does not offer a party friendly option to help readily beyond Stunning Strike. The closest is Shadow Monk with Pass without Trace and other spells...but that niche can be filled with other spell casters and costs the monk precious ki points that could be used for Stunning Strike.
the group your describing you would have had that problem with a lot of classes. Even if you catered to just tending to their needs through healing or something else you'd have felt entirely one trick. That says more about your party makeup than the monk class or really most classes in general. I have seen this kind of complaint repeatedly made on almost any class but most particularly full martial or partial martial classes. Many of which actually have less tools to deal with such issues than the monk does.
I think that's brushing the issue aside too much. Just because fighters can have similar issues doesn't make the problems the Monk has just magically go away (and while one dimensional, at least those types of Fighters get to be obscenely good at their one trick).
I mean, monks can get access to tons of abilities that can double as battlefield control. I think the issue is that people view the "best" monk subclasses (Shadow and Kensei), see that they don't actually do a ton in terms of party help, play pretty straightforward in combat, and decide that all monks are like that.
Try out 4E Monk sometime (with at least minor changes -- I recommend just lowering every ki cost by 1 and that solves tons of issues). They get battlefield control in myriad ways, can do some pretty nice nova damage, and still get access to the standard monk control stuff like Stunning Strike.
I think that's brushing the issue aside too much. Just because fighters can have similar issues doesn't make the problems the Monk has just magically go away (and while one dimensional, at least those types of Fighters get to be obscenely good at their one trick).
This exactly....fighters are mostly about damage but they do it VERY well. Monks do a lot of things fairly well and one thing very well (stun) but the fact that all of your stuff keys off the resource that does your one really good thing is terrible design IMO. It means you have to justify using basically anything over Stunning Strike which is very hard to do.
I mean, monks can get access to tons of abilities that can double as battlefield control. I think the issue is that people view the "best" monk subclasses (Shadow and Kensei), see that they don't actually do a ton in terms of party help, play pretty straightforward in combat, and decide that all monks are like that.
Try out 4E Monk sometime (with at least minor changes -- I recommend just lowering every ki cost by 1 and that solves tons of issues). They get battlefield control in myriad ways, can do some pretty nice nova damage, and still get access to the standard monk control stuff like Stunning Strike.
I had a 4E monk in a short campaign (10ish sessions) and I can honestly say it was the second worst subclass I have ever seen perform. The nova damage output was terrible compared to a full caster and they had less battlefield impact than the ancestral barbarian. Overall they asked me to change the subclass about 8 sessions in but I knew we were ending soon so I just had them pull it out to the end...I still think that was a mistake on my part.
4E with changes could serve as a better battlefield controller for sure but I have not had a chance to try it again and basically the group as a whole is soured on the subclass to try again.
They still found themselves wondering if pulling an enemy with Water Whip was worth it when a stunning strike would do the same effect ultimately but everyone got advantage to hit them the next turn (even the sharpshooter ranger who loved it when they stunned people) and the creature was effectively out for a full turn.
Fist of Unbroken Air was about the only one to really compete as it pushed and proned with a potential to do 6d10 bludgeoning (albeit somehow non-magical).
The problem was there you are spending 3 ki to do the extra damage...but only doing 1 point on average more damage than a Spear Attack and Flurry of Blows.
Now I think Tasha's helped them out a bit as they can now use their BA to do a single attack which helps with the damage output for the Fist. However if you can stun with the first attack you are doing more damage with the Spear/Flurry combo due to the advantage you proc.
Overall its a little more balanced now but ultimately you are still mostly equal or better to just stun the target in the vast majority of circumstances.
Try out 4E Monk sometime (with at least minor changes -- I recommend just lowering every ki cost by 1 and that solves tons of issues). They get battlefield control in myriad ways, can do some pretty nice nova damage, and still get access to the standard monk control stuff like Stunning Strike.
at first i thought you meant the monk from 4th edition and that you suggested reducing the cost of ALL your ki abilities by 1, something that would be absolutely terrifying, imagine at-will doge, imagine constant flurry of blows and constant stunning strikes with each attack you make
i'd also say that casting 1st spells for 1 ki point can likely get a bit out of hand
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
i am soup, with too many ideas (all of them very spicy) who has made sufficient homebrew material and character to last an thousand human lifetimes
Fist of Unbroken Air was about the only one to really compete as it pushed and proned with a potential to do 6d10 bludgeoning (albeit somehow non-magical).
Can't argue with the rest of your points, but just wanted to point out that all Elemental Disciplines are magical: "You learn magical disciplines..." is literally the first four words of the subclass ability.
Something being an opinion doesn't make it fact either, you're not objectively right. The point is that "the monk is one of the least satisfying subclasses" is strictly subjective, but you act like you're objectively right. You're not. I mean the way you phrase that doesn't even make it sound like a matter of opinion. But whatever. Also you've clearly never heard of paraphrasing.
I didn't say it made it fact, but you were pointing to my opinion as if that were a debate closer. It's your opinion that the monk isn't "one of the least satisfying classes to play", and just because you're on the other side of the argument doesn't make you right.
I have heard of paraphrasing (ad hominem here), but there are ways to paraphrase that aren't strawman arguments. Before you paraphrase, you say "and I'm paraphrasing here", or "correct me if I interpreted this incorrectly". You should not paraphrase something incorrectly and then back it up by saying "but I was paraphrasing!!!", like you did. (I'm paraphrasing here, just to let you know.)
There is a huge difference between paraphrasing and purposefully misrepresenting what someone else said. I said "one of the least" and you misrepresented that as "the least", which is a strawman, especially due to the fact that you kept trying to back up your use of that language.
I didn't retype your exact words because I'm not wasting my time copy and pasting stuff. And now you're accusing me of using strawman arguments but go off I guess. Also none of that entire paragraph actually matches the point I made? Even if many monks use a spear or quarterstaff, many don't considering every new subclass provides new playstyles.
Also that is just a bad argument.
No, it's not. Good debate form is to try to show the person you are debating and the spectators that you are arguing in good faith. If you think it's a waste of time to quote my exact words in a site and platform that literally allows you to find and quote my exact words in a process that takes about 3 seconds, you're either arguing in bad faith or aren't truly willing to have a proper debate.
"It doesn't prove it, but it supports it. One would imagine that the more satisfying classes to play would end up being played the most. The monk is one of the least played classes, so this would suggest that it is one of the least satisfying classes to play.
Yes, there may be other factors influencing how often a class is played, but that does not discredit that one major factors of choosing a character would depend on how "satisfying" it is to play it."
This point doesn't work at all. How "satisfying" a class is to play is very often not what factors into the choice of new players. It's often about what trope the class appeals to. Even moreso, that is a false equivalency. Less played could generally indicate that a class is less satisfying, but you haven't provided any actual evidence that this is the case here. You're just making a vague assumption. And I doubt that reasoning holds up for the classes below the monk.
I didn't say that there wouldn't be other factors, but I'm certain none of the other factors would negate the significance of the satisfaction granted by a class to a point that makes it invalid to bring up. How often a class is played will surely be at least partially dependent on how satisfying it is to play a class.
And the monk is being played less than the other classes (as the graph clearly showed) my point is that relatively, the gap is not large enough to treat it as though the monk is vastly behind any other class in terms of player enjoyment. Again, how many people playing =/= how fun the class is to play. You're clearly not considering that most dnd players don't actually get to play that many characters as campaigns rarely last long enough to provide a definitive experience. So a lack of people playing monk (which, again, is not far behind most of the other classes by a relatively large amount, not when any of the others can be compared to the fighter just as much as the monk) could easily be more that people are only getting to play a few characters and are more quick to choose classes based on archetypes they recognize among other various factors.
The difference is pretty big when compared to the most played class, which is played almost twice as often as the Monk according to the evidence I provided.
How many people are playing is not directly equivalent to how fun/satisfying the class is to play, but the first factor isn't irrelevant.
The monk's abilities also split clearly between defense, utility, and offense. While I do agree that refining the class's concept and style would be better for future versions of the monk, you're still very focused on damage output when that isn't the point. Nor does it necessarily factor into how "satisfying" the monk is. Not everyone is fishing for high damage rolls. The other classes can do that well enough. Many don't play the monk that way or for that reason, and what the monk does provide still allows creative players to rp their martial artist fantasies. Also, the monk isn't made for strength so i'm not sure why not being able to make a strength based monk is relevant? That's like wanting to make an intelligence based barbarian.
Utility? There's not really many utility features in the Monk class. The only "utility" features seem to be Tongue of the Sun and Moon and Empty Body, which both come very late game. To call them a class that gets utility features seems like a stretch. It would be like saying that the Druid class gets "buffs to resisting magic". I mean, sure, that's technically correct due to them being un-counterspell-able at level 20 while Wild Shaped, but it comes pretty late game and barely counts as "buffs to resisting magic".
Also, why should I not be focused on damage? Damage should be the focus of all classes that focus on martial combat.
A strength based monk is relevant for the same reason that a Dexterity-based Paladin. Sure, the class isn't specifically designed for those types of characters, but they are capable of filling that type of character while still being mechanically effective in every important way. Monks aren't like that. They're much more restricted into the lock of Dex and Wis than Paladins are to Strength and Charisma. Paladins can be just as effective with Dexterity and Charisma as they can with Strength and Charisma. Monks can't be just as effective with Strength and Wisdom as they can be with Dexterity and Wisdom (Rangers have this problem, too).
Never said the monk would use the stunning strike to "crit fish" and comparing it to a greataxe is pointless. I said that because a monk potentially getting crits on more than one of their attacks against a stunned mage would be devastating, even if it didn't kill the mage instantly. Crits are crits, they help regardless of how they compare for one class to another.
Crit fishing is when you try to get more critical hits to get more damage/automatic hits. You mentioned using Stunning Strike to get more critical hits in order to kill an enemy, so I thought you were talking about crit fishing.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Fist of Unbroken Air was about the only one to really compete as it pushed and proned with a potential to do 6d10 bludgeoning (albeit somehow non-magical).
Can't argue with the rest of your points, but just wanted to point out that all Elemental Disciplines are magical: "You learn magical disciplines..." is literally the first four words of the subclass ability.
Fist of Unbroken Air was about the only one to really compete as it pushed and proned with a potential to do 6d10 bludgeoning (albeit somehow non-magical).
Can't argue with the rest of your points, but just wanted to point out that all Elemental Disciplines are magical: "You learn magical disciplines..." is literally the first four words of the subclass ability.
Overall its still marginally better than stunning at a potentially higher cost.
That's why I am a proponent of lowering ki cost for those things. Four Elements Monks can be pretty good at battlefield control by 6th level (Water Whip, Fist of Unbroken Air, and then either Hold Person/Clench of North Wind or Thunderwave/Fist of Four Thunders), and if you don't make those things so exorbitantly costly then it's an actual tactical decision between that and Stunning Strike.
Sometimes when people discuss the Monk, it all just feels like circular logic. (I'm not saying that about our current conversation, Optimus, just noting an observation I've had.) The argument is that they are boring, because all they can do is Stunning Strike, but then you point out other things they can do, but then it is noted that they all cost ki, which then takes away from Stunning Strike. It always feels like the biggest detractors argue that Stunning Strike is SO GOOD that it makes the class boring and therefore SO BAD.
That's why I am a proponent of lowering ki cost for those things. Four Elements Monks can be pretty good at battlefield control by 6th level (Water Whip, Fist of Unbroken Air, and then either Hold Person/Clench of North Wind or Thunderwave/Fist of Four Thunders), and if you don't make those things so exorbitantly costly then it's an actual tactical decision between that and Stunning Strike.
Sometimes when people discuss the Monk, it all just feels like circular logic. (I'm not saying that about our current conversation, Optimus, just noting an observation I've had.) The argument is that they are boring, because all they can do is Stunning Strike, but then you point out other things they can do, but then it is noted that they all cost ki, which then takes away from Stunning Strike. It always feels like the biggest detractors argue that Stunning Strike is SO GOOD that it makes the class boring and therefore SO BAD.
I'm playing my first monk character at the moment, and in the first few sessions, I was finding myself thinking that I'd picked the wrong one, and trying to think of ways to kill him and bring in a new character. But I persevered with it and re-did how I played the monk.
Funnily enough, I haven't used Stunning strike all that much (probably to my/the party's detriment) but I chose to use the ki points in other ways (playing a halfling shadow monk) so I actually found it better to use my points to avoid hits etc as I'm a little "squishy" :) but I also used ki points throughout the campaign to assist with the non-combat stuff.
Anyway to sum up, I think it's about balance - if you're looking at just one thing the monk can do (say Stunning Strike), and ignoring the rest it does seem to be be not great. But my experience is if you balance out all of the things a monk can do, it makes it more interesting. I think it all comes down to how you approach it (plus I found rp'ing the monk to be fun in my own way). And it certainly makes you think more about how you enter a situation when you're pretty much at risk of copping the big one a fair % of time (yes, by choosing a halfling to be my monk I did stack those odds against me). But it's doable - had one major fight with only 8 of my 50odd HP against significant odds. Everyone was expecting my character to buy the farm, but ended up coming out alive.
Could I have picked a better character? Maybe. Have I had fun playing the monk - yes.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Odo Proudfoot - Lvl 10 Halfling Monk - Princes of the Apocalypse (Campaign Finished)
Fist of Unbroken Air was about the only one to really compete as it pushed and proned with a potential to do 6d10 bludgeoning (albeit somehow non-magical).
Can't argue with the rest of your points, but just wanted to point out that all Elemental Disciplines are magical: "You learn magical disciplines..." is literally the first four words of the subclass ability.
Overall its still marginally better than stunning at a potentially higher cost.
While Magic is a distinction that is important if the opponent has resistance to non-magic. Or to magical damage (which is extremely rare). It's more important to note from his words that while it is magical it is not actually a spell to use Fist of the Unbroken Air, Fangs of the Fire Snake, or even Water Whip. Which helps when it comes to certian things. Like they are usable without counterspell being effective.
There are also some useful tactics with these abilities that should be kept in mind. Fire Snake is good for reach and can be potentially devestating against things that have spells or aura's that attack you back. Though the fire damage can be a detriment at times. I ran into this against a pair of fire elementals on my 4e monk but it's true against some other creatures as well. While I did the bulk of the damage to both of them. I was actually murdering myself faster than the fire elementals could try to do from backlash. Overall however the tactics here are pretty basic and general and easy to understand. Just keep in mind it builds damage on the idea of many smaller hits equaling a solid total rather than just one or two large numbers like Paladins or Rogues when it comes to damage. Even the way it adds on Additional Damage at the cost of ki is built upon this as you spend a ki for each hit to add an additional 1d10 damage to each hit you spend that 1 additional ki for. It probably is one way that Monks might actually find some value in crit fishing.
Unbroken Air is another one that the tactics are overall easy to understand. This is a strong way to deal damage and push people around. It synergizes well with Druids and Wizards, as well as some bards and others because it works well to shove people into AoE's of various kinds and away from the squishies. So still easy to understand once you get used to thinking about that kind of play. It fits some playstyles better than others and it's probably going to be a bit more useful in a mixed or ranged heavy party to help create space when it's not being used to toss things into aoe's.
Water Whip is Unbroken Air's opposite. It's more useful in pursuit situations and in Melee heavy parties. It's ability to pull is great for keeping your Melee people relatively centralized. For pulling in ranged and squishies to a certain extent and to concentrate your melee fire power better. It's knockdown aspect if you use that instead is great for giving all those melee guys advantage or limit people's movements through forcing them to get back up from prone meaning they have a hard time escaping the melee's or getting to your ranged people. And it has the added benefit for Melee's that they get advantage on attacks on the creature while it's prone.
Then there is other tactics to bring into things. Clench of the North wind Example. Most people are going to look at it and go "hold person is so bad", But Hold Person is potentially a multiple turn Stunning strike on an enemy you may want to keep locked down. It has some drawbacks like you don't do damage to do it and it's concentration (and it's actually casting a spell). But if your built with Saves in mind (which you should be if you rely fully on stunning strikes anyway). There is potential to get your ki's worth out of this ability and then some because it has some advantages over it as well. For the 3 ki and the downsides you actually inflict Paralyze instead of just Sunned when it works which means on top of other effects of stun any close melee attack that hits the target auto crits now. and with a little bit of luck it lasts a lot longer. This ability is also up-castable as you increase in level. At 17th level your locking down 4 people with this effect. But I'd argue that you don't necessarily need to get 3 turns out of using this ability to justify it against Stunning Strike. Depending on the group you have to take advantage of the extra effect of paralyze I'd say it pays for it's ki cost in just two turns of effectiveness if the gamble pays off and surprasses having to stunning strike the same target if you get 3 or more turns out of using it. it's also a different kind of Save than Stunning Strike so it's potentially useful on enemies that Stunning strike would not be.
Thunder Wave is basically Fist of the Unbroken Air but with a damage type change and for doing a little less damage and not being able to push quite as far is now a small scale AoE. the one downside is the wording that you cast the spell. So by RaW it's subject to counterspell unlike Unbroken Air.
Also on top of some of these example tactics that can be done with this subclass in particular. I want to point out that it's kind of unfair to Compare 4 elements blasting power against full casters. This is not a full Caster. This is a half caster at best. Something more akin to the Eldritch Knight or the Arcane Trickster which also do not have the raw blasting power of a full caster class and suffer considerably when you compare them to such.
And i want to say in general for the monk. The Mentality that Damage and Tanking hits is all that matters is a problem. Even if unintentionally this is a Toxic mentality to treat the Class with. this is as bad as saying Caster classes can only be healers or Blasters and there is no other way to play them. Yes the Monk is a Martial Class but the Monk is more of a Battlefield Controller than it is a Blaster(DPS) or a Tank. It's value is not in raw damage and taking endless hits in the face but in the way it can affect the flow of battle. This is a valuable tool even for Martial characters and it should be treated as such rather than saying only ranged characters or only casters can do such things. it's because of this Controller style of character that most players feel like Stunning Strike is too strong to do anything else.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
To post a comment, please login or register a new account.
Never said that you weren't "actually playing the class" I was speaking from my own experience with DMPCs. Never said your DMPC wasn't a character, I just said that you were probably more focused on mechanical viability rather than having fun with the class. I specifically said that I doubt you were "solely" focused on fun. Never, not once, said that you didn't actually play the class. The point is that maybe the monk is less satisfying to you because your main experience with it came with the burdens of DMing (and i've dmed so let's not act like dming is always fun and games). If you say that you know all of its strengths and faults, then sure. But what you just did sounds alot like the "strawmaning" you were complaining about earlier.
You said that I didn't play the class, then said that I didn't find the experience with the monk class good because I was also DMing. I addressed that. I don't need to focus "solely" on anything to appreciate the mechanics of it or have a good experience with it.
My experience having a Monk DMPC was a valid experience with it. Stop trying to make my experiences with the class seem lesser than yours.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
Monks are awesome. Difference of 1% of players playing monk vs every other class other than Fighter, Rogue, Wizard, and Druid isn't that big. Walk into a room with 20 tables going at once and you might find one more Paladin than Monk, that's what that means.
Also, please don't use that data to tell a story that it doesn't -- all that shows is how common those classes are, not how satisfying they are. There could literally be 0 correlation between the two, you don't know. As others mentioned, there are probably more one-time DND players than repeat players, and one-time players are probably going to gravitate to the archetypes they know and love (Fighter, Rogue, Wizard). That will skew things, and that says nothing about whether they actually liked playing those classes.
Monks by-and-large are melee fighters who, unlike nearly every other melee fighter, cares more about consistency of damage and mobility than amount of damage and tanking. Crit fishing isn't what they should be doing at all. What they should be doing is acting as a different kind of support character -- ending concentration, pushing opponents towards/away from their party members, stunning opponents so their stronger teammates can do the heavy damage, etc.
Not all monks play the same, no more so than all Paladins or all Rogues do. (Casters, this can be different, but only because spell choice is the most customizable thing in DND.) Check this link. Rangers take Sharpshooter at nearly a 2-to-1 rate over Monks taking Mobile. Every class, just about, has a single feat that they take approximately as often as Monks take Mobile. To me, that means that lots of classes have "stereotypical builds", and Monks are not unique here.
If Monks got a d10 hit dice, no one would complain about any of this. Somehow Monks needing CON (when literally every class does, for the exact same reasons mostly, too) makes them "too MAD" when classes like Barbs and Paladins are not "too MAD" despite CON being their third stat as well (though admittedly Barbs can go without DEX a lot of the time).
Playing as a DMPC (especially when playing multiple DMPCs) is not going to give the same experience as going straight PC. That's all I'll say about that.
I think I said it before but I want to point out as part of NV's thing that Monks are not really big on crit fishing. Their Consistent Damage is not exactly low when they are built well. And it doesn't require outright min-maxing and figuring out how to stick the largest weapon possible in their hand to do that. Even with purely their martial arts they can be very effective at doing a decent amount of rather consistent damage. It's perceived as low because all people see is a bunch of low numbers when they look at the monk and a smaller amount of higher numbers when they look at the Paladin or the Ranger or sometimes even the Warrior. But they aren't usually doing much more, if any, than 20-25 damage with real consistency with nothing more than a +3 or +4 modifier which i have quite a bit of experience managing with a monk in the tier 1 and tier 2 range of play (so it's not like I'm even talking about major minmaxing to get these numbers). Their numbers are just obfuscated under other abilities as often as not.
If you think that's what I did, then I can't really say much other than go off I guess.
Having played a monk I can say it was a bit of a one trick pony to me...but I was in a group that really needed me to do the "best" thing at the given moment as I was the only one really optimized in a meaningful way.
We had casters that wanted to do the fun spells and what not but would get really stressed if they were hurt badly. I pretty much had to focus on stunning strike as it was the best way for me to ensure the party succeeded. Ultimately it was a playstyle issue more so than a monk issue....but I can see monk falling into that A LOT.
The opportunity cost for monk is just too high....and the features you get are mostly self-serving. Timeless Body and Diamond Soul keep YOU alive but do not confer a great benefit to the party like spells or auras would.
Fighter/barb suffers from this as well but honestly they have a more narrow focus even yet unless you get into the defender subclasses.
Monk (sans Mercy) really does not offer a party friendly option to help readily beyond Stunning Strike. The closest is Shadow Monk with Pass without Trace and other spells...but that niche can be filled with other spell casters and costs the monk precious ki points that could be used for Stunning Strike.
i mean depends on the context in wich the spells are used and the pace of the game, if you can expect that the next hour will not have any combat threats in them it should be a no-brainer, since you can later take a short rest and regain all ki you spent to cast the spell it would arguably be less taxing on party resources
i am soup, with too many ideas (all of them very spicy) who has made sufficient homebrew material and character to last an thousand human lifetimes
i mean there is nothing stopping you from using stunning strike and patient defense in the same turn, plus some creatures have legendary resistance, magic resistance and high will saves
also think it is generally interesting how this thread went from "these two class features stand out among class features given at similar levels" to "is the monk as a whole a good class", guess that is what happens when you mention "monks" and "balance" in the same sentence
...or i mean any class and the word balance in the same sentence, is there really any class that is not steriotypically seen as unbalanced? clerics, wizards and paladins are steriotyped as OP, druids and barbarians (and to a lesser degree rouges) as completely impossible to kill, rangers, monks and to a much lesser degree sorcerers and bards are seen as weaker than average, fighters are seen as boring and so on and so fourth, yes it is always impossible to please everyone and many of these complaints are either just nitpicks or memes, i donno what i am trying to say here really
i am soup, with too many ideas (all of them very spicy) who has made sufficient homebrew material and character to last an thousand human lifetimes
Fair point I am mostly saying that Monk does not confer a subclass (sans Mercy) that offers much in combat defense that is party focused. Also their offensive output is fairly low comparatively so your best bet is almost always just to...Stun.
It tends to make your play fairly 1-D despite the interesting tools given to you.
the group your describing you would have had that problem with a lot of classes. Even if you catered to just tending to their needs through healing or something else you'd have felt entirely one trick. That says more about your party makeup than the monk class or really most classes in general. I have seen this kind of complaint repeatedly made on almost any class but most particularly full martial or partial martial classes. Many of which actually have less tools to deal with such issues than the monk does.
I think that's brushing the issue aside too much. Just because fighters can have similar issues doesn't make the problems the Monk has just magically go away (and while one dimensional, at least those types of Fighters get to be obscenely good at their one trick).
I mean, monks can get access to tons of abilities that can double as battlefield control. I think the issue is that people view the "best" monk subclasses (Shadow and Kensei), see that they don't actually do a ton in terms of party help, play pretty straightforward in combat, and decide that all monks are like that.
Try out 4E Monk sometime (with at least minor changes -- I recommend just lowering every ki cost by 1 and that solves tons of issues). They get battlefield control in myriad ways, can do some pretty nice nova damage, and still get access to the standard monk control stuff like Stunning Strike.
This exactly....fighters are mostly about damage but they do it VERY well. Monks do a lot of things fairly well and one thing very well (stun) but the fact that all of your stuff keys off the resource that does your one really good thing is terrible design IMO. It means you have to justify using basically anything over Stunning Strike which is very hard to do.
I had a 4E monk in a short campaign (10ish sessions) and I can honestly say it was the second worst subclass I have ever seen perform. The nova damage output was terrible compared to a full caster and they had less battlefield impact than the ancestral barbarian. Overall they asked me to change the subclass about 8 sessions in but I knew we were ending soon so I just had them pull it out to the end...I still think that was a mistake on my part.
4E with changes could serve as a better battlefield controller for sure but I have not had a chance to try it again and basically the group as a whole is soured on the subclass to try again.
They still found themselves wondering if pulling an enemy with Water Whip was worth it when a stunning strike would do the same effect ultimately but everyone got advantage to hit them the next turn (even the sharpshooter ranger who loved it when they stunned people) and the creature was effectively out for a full turn.
Fist of Unbroken Air was about the only one to really compete as it pushed and proned with a potential to do 6d10 bludgeoning (albeit somehow non-magical).
The problem was there you are spending 3 ki to do the extra damage...but only doing 1 point on average more damage than a Spear Attack and Flurry of Blows.
Now I think Tasha's helped them out a bit as they can now use their BA to do a single attack which helps with the damage output for the Fist. However if you can stun with the first attack you are doing more damage with the Spear/Flurry combo due to the advantage you proc.
Overall its a little more balanced now but ultimately you are still mostly equal or better to just stun the target in the vast majority of circumstances.
at first i thought you meant the monk from 4th edition and that you suggested reducing the cost of ALL your ki abilities by 1, something that would be absolutely terrifying, imagine at-will doge, imagine constant flurry of blows and constant stunning strikes with each attack you make
i'd also say that casting 1st spells for 1 ki point can likely get a bit out of hand
i am soup, with too many ideas (all of them very spicy) who has made sufficient homebrew material and character to last an thousand human lifetimes
Can't argue with the rest of your points, but just wanted to point out that all Elemental Disciplines are magical: "You learn magical disciplines..." is literally the first four words of the subclass ability.
I didn't say it made it fact, but you were pointing to my opinion as if that were a debate closer. It's your opinion that the monk isn't "one of the least satisfying classes to play", and just because you're on the other side of the argument doesn't make you right.
I have heard of paraphrasing (ad hominem here), but there are ways to paraphrase that aren't strawman arguments. Before you paraphrase, you say "and I'm paraphrasing here", or "correct me if I interpreted this incorrectly". You should not paraphrase something incorrectly and then back it up by saying "but I was paraphrasing!!!", like you did. (I'm paraphrasing here, just to let you know.)
There is a huge difference between paraphrasing and purposefully misrepresenting what someone else said. I said "one of the least" and you misrepresented that as "the least", which is a strawman, especially due to the fact that you kept trying to back up your use of that language.
No, it's not. Good debate form is to try to show the person you are debating and the spectators that you are arguing in good faith. If you think it's a waste of time to quote my exact words in a site and platform that literally allows you to find and quote my exact words in a process that takes about 3 seconds, you're either arguing in bad faith or aren't truly willing to have a proper debate.
I didn't say that there wouldn't be other factors, but I'm certain none of the other factors would negate the significance of the satisfaction granted by a class to a point that makes it invalid to bring up. How often a class is played will surely be at least partially dependent on how satisfying it is to play a class.
The difference is pretty big when compared to the most played class, which is played almost twice as often as the Monk according to the evidence I provided.
How many people are playing is not directly equivalent to how fun/satisfying the class is to play, but the first factor isn't irrelevant.
Utility? There's not really many utility features in the Monk class. The only "utility" features seem to be Tongue of the Sun and Moon and Empty Body, which both come very late game. To call them a class that gets utility features seems like a stretch. It would be like saying that the Druid class gets "buffs to resisting magic". I mean, sure, that's technically correct due to them being un-counterspell-able at level 20 while Wild Shaped, but it comes pretty late game and barely counts as "buffs to resisting magic".
Also, why should I not be focused on damage? Damage should be the focus of all classes that focus on martial combat.
A strength based monk is relevant for the same reason that a Dexterity-based Paladin. Sure, the class isn't specifically designed for those types of characters, but they are capable of filling that type of character while still being mechanically effective in every important way. Monks aren't like that. They're much more restricted into the lock of Dex and Wis than Paladins are to Strength and Charisma. Paladins can be just as effective with Dexterity and Charisma as they can with Strength and Charisma. Monks can't be just as effective with Strength and Wisdom as they can be with Dexterity and Wisdom (Rangers have this problem, too).
Crit fishing is when you try to get more critical hits to get more damage/automatic hits. You mentioned using Stunning Strike to get more critical hits in order to kill an enemy, so I thought you were talking about crit fishing.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
Fair! JC agrees as well: https://www.sageadvice.eu/2017/03/08/are-the-way-of-the-four-element-monks-disciplines-spells/
Overall its still marginally better than stunning at a potentially higher cost.
That's why I am a proponent of lowering ki cost for those things. Four Elements Monks can be pretty good at battlefield control by 6th level (Water Whip, Fist of Unbroken Air, and then either Hold Person/Clench of North Wind or Thunderwave/Fist of Four Thunders), and if you don't make those things so exorbitantly costly then it's an actual tactical decision between that and Stunning Strike.
Sometimes when people discuss the Monk, it all just feels like circular logic. (I'm not saying that about our current conversation, Optimus, just noting an observation I've had.) The argument is that they are boring, because all they can do is Stunning Strike, but then you point out other things they can do, but then it is noted that they all cost ki, which then takes away from Stunning Strike. It always feels like the biggest detractors argue that Stunning Strike is SO GOOD that it makes the class boring and therefore SO BAD.
I'm playing my first monk character at the moment, and in the first few sessions, I was finding myself thinking that I'd picked the wrong one, and trying to think of ways to kill him and bring in a new character. But I persevered with it and re-did how I played the monk.
Funnily enough, I haven't used Stunning strike all that much (probably to my/the party's detriment) but I chose to use the ki points in other ways (playing a halfling shadow monk) so I actually found it better to use my points to avoid hits etc as I'm a little "squishy" :) but I also used ki points throughout the campaign to assist with the non-combat stuff.
Anyway to sum up, I think it's about balance - if you're looking at just one thing the monk can do (say Stunning Strike), and ignoring the rest it does seem to be be not great. But my experience is if you balance out all of the things a monk can do, it makes it more interesting. I think it all comes down to how you approach it (plus I found rp'ing the monk to be fun in my own way). And it certainly makes you think more about how you enter a situation when you're pretty much at risk of copping the big one a fair % of time (yes, by choosing a halfling to be my monk I did stack those odds against me). But it's doable - had one major fight with only 8 of my 50odd HP against significant odds. Everyone was expecting my character to buy the farm, but ended up coming out alive.
Could I have picked a better character? Maybe. Have I had fun playing the monk - yes.
Odo Proudfoot - Lvl 10 Halfling Monk - Princes of the Apocalypse (Campaign Finished)
Orryn Pebblefoot - Lvl 5 Rock Gnome Wizard (Deceased) - Waterdeep: Dragon Heist (Deceased)
Anerin Ap Tewdr - Lvl 5 Human (Variant) Bard (College of Valor) - Waterdeep: Dragon Heist
While Magic is a distinction that is important if the opponent has resistance to non-magic. Or to magical damage (which is extremely rare). It's more important to note from his words that while it is magical it is not actually a spell to use Fist of the Unbroken Air, Fangs of the Fire Snake, or even Water Whip. Which helps when it comes to certian things. Like they are usable without counterspell being effective.
There are also some useful tactics with these abilities that should be kept in mind. Fire Snake is good for reach and can be potentially devestating against things that have spells or aura's that attack you back. Though the fire damage can be a detriment at times. I ran into this against a pair of fire elementals on my 4e monk but it's true against some other creatures as well. While I did the bulk of the damage to both of them. I was actually murdering myself faster than the fire elementals could try to do from backlash. Overall however the tactics here are pretty basic and general and easy to understand. Just keep in mind it builds damage on the idea of many smaller hits equaling a solid total rather than just one or two large numbers like Paladins or Rogues when it comes to damage. Even the way it adds on Additional Damage at the cost of ki is built upon this as you spend a ki for each hit to add an additional 1d10 damage to each hit you spend that 1 additional ki for. It probably is one way that Monks might actually find some value in crit fishing.
Unbroken Air is another one that the tactics are overall easy to understand. This is a strong way to deal damage and push people around. It synergizes well with Druids and Wizards, as well as some bards and others because it works well to shove people into AoE's of various kinds and away from the squishies. So still easy to understand once you get used to thinking about that kind of play. It fits some playstyles better than others and it's probably going to be a bit more useful in a mixed or ranged heavy party to help create space when it's not being used to toss things into aoe's.
Water Whip is Unbroken Air's opposite. It's more useful in pursuit situations and in Melee heavy parties. It's ability to pull is great for keeping your Melee people relatively centralized. For pulling in ranged and squishies to a certain extent and to concentrate your melee fire power better. It's knockdown aspect if you use that instead is great for giving all those melee guys advantage or limit people's movements through forcing them to get back up from prone meaning they have a hard time escaping the melee's or getting to your ranged people. And it has the added benefit for Melee's that they get advantage on attacks on the creature while it's prone.
Then there is other tactics to bring into things. Clench of the North wind Example. Most people are going to look at it and go "hold person is so bad", But Hold Person is potentially a multiple turn Stunning strike on an enemy you may want to keep locked down. It has some drawbacks like you don't do damage to do it and it's concentration (and it's actually casting a spell). But if your built with Saves in mind (which you should be if you rely fully on stunning strikes anyway). There is potential to get your ki's worth out of this ability and then some because it has some advantages over it as well. For the 3 ki and the downsides you actually inflict Paralyze instead of just Sunned when it works which means on top of other effects of stun any close melee attack that hits the target auto crits now. and with a little bit of luck it lasts a lot longer. This ability is also up-castable as you increase in level. At 17th level your locking down 4 people with this effect. But I'd argue that you don't necessarily need to get 3 turns out of using this ability to justify it against Stunning Strike. Depending on the group you have to take advantage of the extra effect of paralyze I'd say it pays for it's ki cost in just two turns of effectiveness if the gamble pays off and surprasses having to stunning strike the same target if you get 3 or more turns out of using it. it's also a different kind of Save than Stunning Strike so it's potentially useful on enemies that Stunning strike would not be.
Thunder Wave is basically Fist of the Unbroken Air but with a damage type change and for doing a little less damage and not being able to push quite as far is now a small scale AoE. the one downside is the wording that you cast the spell. So by RaW it's subject to counterspell unlike Unbroken Air.
Also on top of some of these example tactics that can be done with this subclass in particular. I want to point out that it's kind of unfair to Compare 4 elements blasting power against full casters. This is not a full Caster. This is a half caster at best. Something more akin to the Eldritch Knight or the Arcane Trickster which also do not have the raw blasting power of a full caster class and suffer considerably when you compare them to such.
And i want to say in general for the monk. The Mentality that Damage and Tanking hits is all that matters is a problem. Even if unintentionally this is a Toxic mentality to treat the Class with. this is as bad as saying Caster classes can only be healers or Blasters and there is no other way to play them. Yes the Monk is a Martial Class but the Monk is more of a Battlefield Controller than it is a Blaster(DPS) or a Tank. It's value is not in raw damage and taking endless hits in the face but in the way it can affect the flow of battle. This is a valuable tool even for Martial characters and it should be treated as such rather than saying only ranged characters or only casters can do such things. it's because of this Controller style of character that most players feel like Stunning Strike is too strong to do anything else.