I will say if I am comparing a Monk DIRECTLY to a fighter I want to compare it to THIS fighter.
This fighter starts with 17 strength, 16 Dex, and 14 Constitution. THIS fighter has the Archery Fighting Style and dueling fighting styles (the second style from first level feat). By level 11 it has polearm master, bumping strength to 18, GWM bumping strength to 19 and shield master bumping strength to 20. Giving it a +5 to attack in melee +5 to attack at range, capable of going 2 handed with pole arm and polearm master and capable of going full defense or ranged if needed.
I do this because flexibility is a type of power as well being able to flex from round to round is important. This fighter is able to do 29-59 per round (without counting mastery from the particular polearm). When focusing on Defense the fighter would have 20 AC + shield master effects. Damage average would be 21-45 (again not including mastery, if you take defense fighting style instead damage drops to 18-39 with an AC of 21). Finally, if they cant get into melee because of distance this fighter still has a +5 to attack and can do 12-33 (again no mastery).
Compared to the current monk. If it is focusing FULL on attack using ki 24-60 (no mastery from melee attacks AC same as when the fighter isn't using a shield and polearm). So less than the fighter, and that is without the fighter using its resource. Compare both going on the defensive, The monk uses patient defense and does 12-30 points of damage, just outright worse, defense wise AC is 18, but the opponent has disadvantage so slightly harder to hit than the fighter, but MUCH less damage in this route. Finally, the monk needs to use dash to get in and out of range again 12-30, just worse than the fighter using a bow to make up for the lack of mobility.
This is kind of the issue. This fighter has just as much flexibility as the monk + can be equal or better the monk in all situations WITHOUT using resources while still having resources to spend. Flexibility is a type of power, but so is raw specialized power. Imagine this fighter starts adding MORE feats later to bump that dex with sentinel and athletics at level 12 and 14, at 16 bump dex to 20 and then 19 bump strength to 22.
So if you focus a Fighter on raw damage it can do more damage? But still can't move further, have numerous support options, and other benefits that it gains innately from its class and subclass, on top of whatever feats you choose for the Monk? Because you know, Monks also get feats?
You literally have no argument but "Fighters do more damage". They better flipping well do more damage regularly, because that's their niche among the "warrior" group. Barbarians are tanky, Monks are agile and have support options, Fighters hit things the best.
(Incidentally, why is it always the Fighter that Monk Bad folks always compare to? Is it because they're well aware that Monk outperforms other martial-types in attack damage, save for specifically "the one martial that hits the most" and does none of the stuff Monk does other than "hitting stuff the most"?)
We use the fighter because we are trying to be fair and not comparing it to classes that have spells.
Also Monks DO NOT get feats. They use ASI to keep up with their Wisdom and Dex because they need both for AC and for their to hit and their DC for their only 1 possible thing they have. IN ADDITION, there are 0 feats that are good for monks in general.
Monk Feats are ASI at level 4 to take Dex to 18, ASI at level 8 to take Dex to 20, ASI at level 12 to take Wis to 18, ASI at level 16 to take wis to 20 and ASI at level 19 to take Dex to 22. they have 0 room For feats and the only combat feat they even qualify for is grappler the rest require proficiencies that the monk lacks
Edit: If you add in subclasses with fighter, because you seem to assume that the subclass does nothing, you have battle master that adds battle manuevers, eldritch knight that adds spell casting, you have psionics that allow double movement speed flying and moving objects with their mind. If we want to talk BASE Fighter NO subclass we still add all the new stuff with tactical mind... AND MOST IMPORTANTLY Tactical Shift You get health back AND get to disengage at half speed, so you can use your bonus action to move 15 feet no Opportunity attack and then move 30 more feet. So the idea that "fighter has no mobility" is just wrong.
Yup. Agree with most of Aquilontune's post. Only big difference is that I do think Mobile is a great feat for Monks in general. Maybe it should be baked into the base class at level 5?
And to mention that Psi Fighter is basically the devs giving up on making a better Monk base class, so put Monk features onto a Fighter subclass instead. Unsurprisingly, they prioritize the enjoyment of Fighter fanbase before the fun of Monk fanbase. And now with their rollout of OneDnD, they are about to repeat the pattern by giving even more flexibility to the Fighter while wringing their hands about "backward compatability" with the Monk base class so they're afraid of making any big changes to what is quantitatively the weaker class (outside of a few niche situations). What a joke.
Just as a note they did change the mobile feat in the expert playtest to the "speedster" feat I think it was, but point was they removed the auto disengage aspect of the mobile feat. Which was the 1 reason to take it on monk.
I just finished watching crawford talk about upcoming monk changes.
So they agree discipline is too restrictive and prevents you from playing the fantasy of the monk. Thats good. At least they are aware.
The fixes he talked about were:
1) looking for features where they could lower discipline point cost.
2) looking for features where they could remove discipline point costs altogether.
3) features that had both a discipline cost and a separate restricted number of uses per day would have one of those limitations removed.
He did not specify what features they were looking at but its a good bet they are looking mainly at subclass features here and not core features like flurry, sotw, SS, or patient defense.
He said nothing about increasing the number of starting discipline points so anyone who was hoping for that......forget about it.
I think what this all means is we will just see more subclass features that are used wisdom or dex modifier times per long rest without a discipline cost. Like perhaps shadow monk could potentially cast darkness wisdom modifier times per long rest without any discipline. I would be fine with that.
he also mentioned the core monk class and open hand subclass are likely the only two coming back for another UA. Although he left it open that could possibly change. Warrior of shadow and elements scored high enough that they dont need to come back for another round of testing.
he also mentioned the core monk class and open hand subclass are likely the only two coming back for another UA. Although he left it open that could possibly change. Warrior of shadow and elements scored high enough that they dont need to come back for another round of testing.
This makes me cynical that we'll see any substantive changes and that Monk will remain the worst class in the game, both of these subclasses are only mediocre. Shadow has fantastic flavour and style but is not powerful at all, and Elements has that terrible Burst feature...
This may well be because Ive read/watched countless discussions about monk balancing at this point, but I dunno if adding a bunch of discounts to the various existing monk features will really excite me. Dont get me wrong, Im all for the monk being able to use their abilities more often, but It feels like the monk changes wont really go beyond changing a few numberes here and there.. Itd be nice to see a more radical approach. .. I wouldnt mind entirely scrapping the existing system in favor of something with a bit more oomph.
Also, if they arent going to remove some of the nerfs to stunning strike ( The duration is the most obvious imo ) Id rather see it entirely removed if it means we can get an impactful feature they feel more confident in balancing. If they believe the existing feature was bad for the game, and yet at the same time thought by many players to be underwhelming in actual play.. why are we trying to salvage something that is broken?
...he also mentioned the core monk class and open hand subclass are likely the only two coming back for another UA. Although he left it open that could possibly change. Warrior of shadow and elements scored high enough that they dont need to come back for another round of testing.
in the video they also discuss 'quartets' of subclasses. if there were four in the revised PHB, what would be the fourth?
Warrior of the Elements // Warrior of Shadow
Warrior of the Hand // Warrior of the... Foot? (🥷🐢🐢🐢🐢🐀🥷)
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: providefeedback!
Rewatching video and JC does say that the two of the least played classes was Druid and the Monk. So for those who complain about the “monk bad” people, there are some actual numbers behind that.
Now is it as bad as some make it out to be? Probably not. But there are so many play styles out there you can’t just say one side is 100% right or wrong.
Just had to put that out there so maybe the tone, on both sides, can come down a notch or 12.
he also mentioned the core monk class and open hand subclass are likely the only two coming back for another UA. Although he left it open that could possibly change. Warrior of shadow and elements scored high enough that they dont need to come back for another round of testing.
This makes me cynical that we'll see any substantive changes and that Monk will remain the worst class in the game, both of these subclasses are only mediocre. Shadow has fantastic flavour and style but is not powerful at all, and Elements has that terrible Burst feature...
Their mediocre to you. Their overall satisfaction with respondents is high enough they don't need another round of public testing. This does not mean what we last saw will be 1:1 what's in the 2024 PH.
Do I have laundry list of ideas of how to improve the Monk, yes. Do we all have different ideas on how the monk should play, yes. If you could only make 2 changes to the UA6 base monk to improve its play, what changes would you make?
For me I would have unarmored defense include a mini disengage:
1ST LEVEL: UNARMORED DEFENSE While you aren’t wearing any armor or wielding a Shield, your base Armor Class equals 10 plus your Dexterity and Wisdom modifiers. Additionally while unarmored, as bonus action you can select one creature within 5ft of you to be unable to make Attacks of Opportunity against you until the end of your turn.
This could also instead be done as part of Martial Arts, working similarly to the mobile feat or swashbuckler’s fancy footwork. My fear there is giving an action economy free disengage makes step of the wind useless and is something the drunken master does with its FoB.
I would also make sure Monk didn’t lose its additional attack when it chooses to do something other than FoB:
Flurry of Blows. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to make two Unarmed Strikes as a Bonus Action.
Patient Defense. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to take the Dodge action as a Bonus Action. You may also make one Unarmed Strike as part of this bonus action.
Step of the Wind. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to do 2 of the following as a Bonus action: use the Disengage action, use the Dash action and your jump distance is doubled for the turn, or make one Unarmed Strike.
Honestly if I just got those changes I could be content. I have a whole rewrite with a new strike system to give options other than stunning strike, but it’s far beyond the scope of what WotC is going to do for the Monk. Honestly looking at my response to Lilith post earlier I requested more changes in that post than they are probably willing to do. So if you only get 2 changes, what are they?
We use the fighter because we are trying to be fair and not comparing it to classes that have spells.
Also Monks DO NOT get feats. They use ASI to keep up with their Wisdom and Dex because they need both for AC and for their to hit and their DC for their only 1 possible thing they have. IN ADDITION, there are 0 feats that are good for monks in general.
Monk Feats are ASI at level 4 to take Dex to 18, ASI at level 8 to take Dex to 20, ASI at level 12 to take Wis to 18, ASI at level 16 to take wis to 20 and ASI at level 19 to take Dex to 22. they have 0 room For feats and the only combat feat they even qualify for is grappler the rest require proficiencies that the monk lacks
Edit: If you add in subclasses with fighter, because you seem to assume that the subclass does nothing, you have battle master that adds battle manuevers, eldritch knight that adds spell casting, you have psionics that allow double movement speed flying and moving objects with their mind. If we want to talk BASE Fighter NO subclass we still add all the new stuff with tactical mind... AND MOST IMPORTANTLY Tactical Shift You get health back AND get to disengage at half speed, so you can use your bonus action to move 15 feet no Opportunity attack and then move 30 more feet. So the idea that "fighter has no mobility" is just wrong.
Yup. Agree with most of Aquilontune's post. Only big difference is that I do think Mobile is a great feat for Monks in general. Maybe it should be baked into the base class at level 5?
And to mention that Psi Fighter is basically the devs giving up on making a better Monk base class, so put Monk features onto a Fighter subclass instead. Unsurprisingly, they prioritize the enjoyment of Fighter fanbase before the fun of Monk fanbase. And now with their rollout of OneDnD, they are about to repeat the pattern by giving even more flexibility to the Fighter while wringing their hands about "backward compatability" with the Monk base class so they're afraid of making any big changes to what is quantitatively the weaker class (outside of a few niche situations). What a joke.
Just as a note they did change the mobile feat in the expert playtest to the "speedster" feat I think it was, but point was they removed the auto disengage aspect of the mobile feat. Which was the 1 reason to take it on monk.
If they bake it into the core Monk class, I would not mind that they got rid of the Mobile feat, since at least that gives Monk something tactically unique. But otherwise, I agree with you that the revised feat is a downgrade overall.
Rewatching video and JC does say that the two of the least played classes was Druid and the Monk. So for those who complain about the “monk bad” people, there are some actual numbers behind that.
Now is it as bad as some make it out to be? Probably not. But there are so many play styles out there you can’t just say one side is 100% right or wrong.
Just had to put that out there so maybe the tone, on both sides, can come down a notch or 12.
While I do think that Monk is one of the weakest overall classes in the 5E (and will probably stay so into OneD&D), I would caution about using large aggregate numbers of what is popular or not popular to tell us what is good or bad about any specific class. I mean, aren't the Artificer numbers actually the lowest? Without proper context statistics can be manipulated to suit almost any angle of argument you want.
I certainly think the Monk is playable. It just has substantially less flexibility and survivability than most of the other melee, non-caster classes given their niche of moving fast and breaking mages (the most efficient use of Stun). And they are overall too dependent on better HD party members to tank the big hits at early levels. So with the right party composition and a friendly DM who doesn't shortchange the Monk player when passing out magical goodies, it's okay. Not extraordinary or great. Just okay with a few too many poorly built sub-classes.
But I'm not holding my breath that anything said on this or any other UA forum is going to lead to new "chassis and drive train" for the Monk vehicle. The PHB base version of the class is too far from the standard Classic Core templates, so as long as they stick mostly of the PHB Monk, it will keep being the situational glass bullet that it is now. I guess that just gives Monk fans more of an incentive to play Pathfinder 2 instead. *shrug*
You are correct that being one of the least played classes does not necessarily mean that players are also unsatisfied with the monk. We never did hear the survey results on the monk in general. Did it score in the 60’s? 70’s? We don’t know. Just that Elements went fro 11% in the 2021 PHB survey to in the 70’s.
Do I have laundry list of ideas of how to improve the Monk, yes. Do we all have different ideas on how the monk should play, yes. If you could only make 2 changes to the UA6 base monk to improve its play, what changes would you make?
For me I would have unarmored defense include a mini disengage:
1ST LEVEL: UNARMORED DEFENSE While you aren’t wearing any armor or wielding a Shield, your base Armor Class equals 10 plus your Dexterity and Wisdom modifiers. Additionally while unarmored, as bonus action you can select one creature within 5ft of you to be unable to make Attacks of Opportunity against you until the end of your turn.
This could also instead be done as part of Martial Arts, working similarly to the mobile feat or swashbuckler’s fancy footwork. My fear there is giving an action economy free disengage makes step of the wind useless and is something the drunken master does with its FoB.
I would also make sure Monk didn’t lose its additional attack when it chooses to do something other than FoB:
Flurry of Blows. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to make two Unarmed Strikes as a Bonus Action.
Patient Defense. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to take the Dodge action as a Bonus Action. You may also make one Unarmed Strike as part of this bonus action.
Step of the Wind. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to do 2 of the following as a Bonus action: use the Disengage action, use the Dash action and your jump distance is doubled for the turn, or make one Unarmed Strike.
Honestly if I just got those changes I could be content. I have a whole rewrite with a new strike system to give options other than stunning strike, but it’s far beyond the scope of what WotC is going to do for the Monk. Honestly looking at my response to Lilith post earlier I requested more changes in that post than they are probably willing to do. So if you only get 2 changes, what are they?
This is a tough one, but my two changes would probably be:
Make the Monk less MAD. So probably have AC calculation start at 13+DEX and scale up to 15+DEX. Discipline DC based on DEX.
Bring back Monk weapons and they would be: All Simple weapons and Martial Weapons that have the Light Property. This opens up martial feats access (plus not needing to focus so much on WIS means you can actually use your ASI's on feats) and additional Martial Weapons, including Heavy/Reach weapons be the purview of the Kensei.
But other options I would like to see in addition to the above:
As you mentioned above, when spending a DP for Patient Defense or Step of the Wind, you can make one unarmed strike as part of that BA. SotW would be either Dash or Disengage for that 1 DP.
When you hit with an Unarmed Strike you can choose two options from the Unarmed Strike options (Damage, Grapple, Shove)
Heightened Metabolism be part of Martial Discipline at level 2. But you only gain DP back (either all or maybe half your level, rounded down in DP, if all is too much). Then at level 7 or elsewhere, you get the benefits of the SR, like in UA6. Or something akin to Sorcerer's Sorcerous Restoration, where you gain back DP based on your level/5 or level/4 or whatever, when you roll initiative. But I prefer the modified Heightened Metabolism.
for Shadow monk:
You can alter the size of your Darkness sphere at the time of casting and as part of moving it: 15 foot radius (default), 10 foot radius, or 5 foot radius.
Elements monk:
Empowered Strikes (part of Elemental Epitome) is moved to an earlier level. Probably level 11.
Elemental Burst might need a damage boost or DP reduction (possibly remove DP cost and add a limit to number of times per LR, like JC talked about in the latest video). It's the same damage as Shatter, which is 2nd level, but with a larger radius. Or an option to scale it up. Either by monk level or additional DP
Hand monk:
Open Hand Technique needs an overhaul since 2 of the 3 options are covered by weapon masteries now. I had thought of maybe having the Unarmed Strike as part of the same BA for PD/SotW (that I mentioned above) be part of Hand monk instead of all monks. And, similar to Shocking Grasp, in UA8, allow them to take away the Opportunity Attack from a creature they hit. Or, once on your turn, you can add an additional roll of your MA die (kind of like Colossus Slayer from Hunter Ranger)
Level 11, a feature that builds on the revised Open Hand Technique.
Not having these are not deal breakers for me. But I do think there is room for improvement.
Do I have laundry list of ideas of how to improve the Monk, yes. Do we all have different ideas on how the monk should play, yes. If you could only make 2 changes to the UA6 base monk to improve its play, what changes would you make?
For me I would have unarmored defense include a mini disengage:
1ST LEVEL: UNARMORED DEFENSE While you aren’t wearing any armor or wielding a Shield, your base Armor Class equals 10 plus your Dexterity and Wisdom modifiers. Additionally while unarmored, as bonus action you can select one creature within 5ft of you to be unable to make Attacks of Opportunity against you until the end of your turn.
This could also instead be done as part of Martial Arts, working similarly to the mobile feat or swashbuckler’s fancy footwork. My fear there is giving an action economy free disengage makes step of the wind useless and is something the drunken master does with its FoB.
I would also make sure Monk didn’t lose its additional attack when it chooses to do something other than FoB:
Flurry of Blows. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to make two Unarmed Strikes as a Bonus Action.
Patient Defense. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to take the Dodge action as a Bonus Action. You may also make one Unarmed Strike as part of this bonus action.
Step of the Wind. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to do 2 of the following as a Bonus action: use the Disengage action, use the Dash action and your jump distance is doubled for the turn, or make one Unarmed Strike.
Honestly if I just got those changes I could be content. I have a whole rewrite with a new strike system to give options other than stunning strike, but it’s far beyond the scope of what WotC is going to do for the Monk. Honestly looking at my response to Lilith post earlier I requested more changes in that post than they are probably willing to do. So if you only get 2 changes, what are they?
My two changes
1) Step of the wind. Spend 1 discipline point WHEN YOU START YOUR MOVEMENT to gain the benefit of the dash or disengage action and your jump distance is doubled.
2) move the monks bonus action unarmed strike to the attack action. FOB adds one unarmed strike to the attack action.
i think unclogging the bonus action is probably the easiest way to get the most bang for your buck to help the monk.
I would also add wisdom midifier to starting ki if i could puck a third.
...he also mentioned the core monk class and open hand subclass are likely the only two coming back for another UA. Although he left it open that could possibly change. Warrior of shadow and elements scored high enough that they dont need to come back for another round of testing.
in the video they also discuss 'quartets' of subclasses. if there were four in the revised PHB, what would be the fourth?
Warrior of the Elements // Warrior of Shadow
Warrior of the Hand // Warrior of the... Foot? (🥷🐢🐢🐢🐢🐀🥷)
Funny enough the foot clan was a parody of marvel comics the hand(ninjas)
...he also mentioned the core monk class and open hand subclass are likely the only two coming back for another UA. Although he left it open that could possibly change. Warrior of shadow and elements scored high enough that they dont need to come back for another round of testing.
in the video they also discuss 'quartets' of subclasses. if there were four in the revised PHB, what would be the fourth?
Warrior of the Elements // Warrior of Shadow
Warrior of the Hand // Warrior of the... Foot? (🥷🐢🐢🐢🐢🐀🥷)
Funny enough the foot clan was a parody of marvel comics the hand(ninjas)
Which was a part of the reference to the origin story … the radioactive waste the made the turtles also made Daredevil.
The Elements hand is gameplay polarity an mercy shadow is thematic polarity.
I actually think it makes more sense for Kensei to be the opposite of open hand monk.
That is because you are thinking weapon vs unarmed instead of martial vs magical. It is sorta opposite in theme with martial aspect vs mystical aspect and very opposite in playstyle with melee vs ranged.
Since the big theme of this edition is weapon mastery, it would be interesting if they update the kensei monk.
I think the Kensei was actually a Fighter variant back in 1E. It was called the "Kensai" and was published in the "Oriental Adventures" book, wherein it had the very few skills and was quite distinct from the Monk class, also printed in the same book. In 3E, the Kensai got reprinted and was grouped in the Complete Warriors supplment. Again, it was distinct from Monks.
Just as a note they did change the mobile feat in the expert playtest to the "speedster" feat I think it was, but point was they removed the auto disengage aspect of the mobile feat. Which was the 1 reason to take it on monk.
I just finished watching crawford talk about upcoming monk changes.
So they agree discipline is too restrictive and prevents you from playing the fantasy of the monk. Thats good. At least they are aware.
The fixes he talked about were:
1) looking for features where they could lower discipline point cost.
2) looking for features where they could remove discipline point costs altogether.
3) features that had both a discipline cost and a separate restricted number of uses per day would have one of those limitations removed.
He did not specify what features they were looking at but its a good bet they are looking mainly at subclass features here and not core features like flurry, sotw, SS, or patient defense.
He said nothing about increasing the number of starting discipline points so anyone who was hoping for that......forget about it.
I think what this all means is we will just see more subclass features that are used wisdom or dex modifier times per long rest without a discipline cost. Like perhaps shadow monk could potentially cast darkness wisdom modifier times per long rest without any discipline. I would be fine with that.
he also mentioned the core monk class and open hand subclass are likely the only two coming back for another UA. Although he left it open that could possibly change. Warrior of shadow and elements scored high enough that they dont need to come back for another round of testing.
Thoughts?
This makes me cynical that we'll see any substantive changes and that Monk will remain the worst class in the game, both of these subclasses are only mediocre. Shadow has fantastic flavour and style but is not powerful at all, and Elements has that terrible Burst feature...
This may well be because Ive read/watched countless discussions about monk balancing at this point, but I dunno if adding a bunch of discounts to the various existing monk features will really excite me. Dont get me wrong, Im all for the monk being able to use their abilities more often, but It feels like the monk changes wont really go beyond changing a few numberes here and there.. Itd be nice to see a more radical approach. .. I wouldnt mind entirely scrapping the existing system in favor of something with a bit more oomph.
Also, if they arent going to remove some of the nerfs to stunning strike ( The duration is the most obvious imo ) Id rather see it entirely removed if it means we can get an impactful feature they feel more confident in balancing. If they believe the existing feature was bad for the game, and yet at the same time thought by many players to be underwhelming in actual play.. why are we trying to salvage something that is broken?
in the video they also discuss 'quartets' of subclasses. if there were four in the revised PHB, what would be the fourth?
Warrior of the Elements // Warrior of Shadow
Warrior of the Hand // Warrior of the... Foot? (🥷🐢🐢🐢🐢🐀🥷)
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
Rewatching video and JC does say that the two of the least played classes was Druid and the Monk. So for those who complain about the “monk bad” people, there are some actual numbers behind that.
Now is it as bad as some make it out to be? Probably not. But there are so many play styles out there you can’t just say one side is 100% right or wrong.
Just had to put that out there so maybe the tone, on both sides, can come down a notch or 12.
EZD6 by DM Scotty
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/397599/EZD6-Core-Rulebook?
Their mediocre to you. Their overall satisfaction with respondents is high enough they don't need another round of public testing. This does not mean what we last saw will be 1:1 what's in the 2024 PH.
It is
Mercy/shadow
Elements/ hand.
The Elements hand is gameplay polarity an mercy shadow is thematic polarity.
Since the big theme of this edition is weapon mastery, it would be interesting if they update the kensei monk.
Do I have laundry list of ideas of how to improve the Monk, yes. Do we all have different ideas on how the monk should play, yes. If you could only make 2 changes to the UA6 base monk to improve its play, what changes would you make?
For me I would have unarmored defense include a mini disengage:
1ST LEVEL: UNARMORED DEFENSE
While you aren’t wearing any armor or wielding a Shield, your base Armor Class equals 10 plus your Dexterity and Wisdom modifiers. Additionally while unarmored, as bonus action you can select one creature within 5ft of you to be unable to make Attacks of Opportunity against you until the end of your turn.
This could also instead be done as part of Martial Arts, working similarly to the mobile feat or swashbuckler’s fancy footwork. My fear there is giving an action economy free disengage makes step of the wind useless and is something the drunken master does with its FoB.
I would also make sure Monk didn’t lose its additional attack when it chooses to do something other than FoB:
Flurry of Blows. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to make two Unarmed Strikes as a Bonus Action.
Patient Defense. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to take the Dodge action as a Bonus Action. You may also make one Unarmed Strike as part of this bonus action.
Step of the Wind. You can spend 1 Discipline Point to do 2 of the following as a Bonus action: use the Disengage action, use the Dash action and your jump distance is doubled for the turn, or make one Unarmed Strike.
Honestly if I just got those changes I could be content. I have a whole rewrite with a new strike system to give options other than stunning strike, but it’s far beyond the scope of what WotC is going to do for the Monk. Honestly looking at my response to Lilith post earlier I requested more changes in that post than they are probably willing to do. So if you only get 2 changes, what are they?
If they bake it into the core Monk class, I would not mind that they got rid of the Mobile feat, since at least that gives Monk something tactically unique. But otherwise, I agree with you that the revised feat is a downgrade overall.
While I do think that Monk is one of the weakest overall classes in the 5E (and will probably stay so into OneD&D), I would caution about using large aggregate numbers of what is popular or not popular to tell us what is good or bad about any specific class. I mean, aren't the Artificer numbers actually the lowest? Without proper context statistics can be manipulated to suit almost any angle of argument you want.
I certainly think the Monk is playable. It just has substantially less flexibility and survivability than most of the other melee, non-caster classes given their niche of moving fast and breaking mages (the most efficient use of Stun). And they are overall too dependent on better HD party members to tank the big hits at early levels. So with the right party composition and a friendly DM who doesn't shortchange the Monk player when passing out magical goodies, it's okay. Not extraordinary or great. Just okay with a few too many poorly built sub-classes.
But I'm not holding my breath that anything said on this or any other UA forum is going to lead to new "chassis and drive train" for the Monk vehicle. The PHB base version of the class is too far from the standard Classic Core templates, so as long as they stick mostly of the PHB Monk, it will keep being the situational glass bullet that it is now. I guess that just gives Monk fans more of an incentive to play Pathfinder 2 instead. *shrug*
You are correct that being one of the least played classes does not necessarily mean that players are also unsatisfied with the monk. We never did hear the survey results on the monk in general. Did it score in the 60’s? 70’s? We don’t know. Just that Elements went fro 11% in the 2021 PHB survey to in the 70’s.
EZD6 by DM Scotty
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/397599/EZD6-Core-Rulebook?
This is a tough one, but my two changes would probably be:
Make the Monk less MAD. So probably have AC calculation start at 13+DEX and scale up to 15+DEX. Discipline DC based on DEX.
Bring back Monk weapons and they would be: All Simple weapons and Martial Weapons that have the Light Property. This opens up martial feats access (plus not needing to focus so much on WIS means you can actually use your ASI's on feats) and additional Martial Weapons, including Heavy/Reach weapons be the purview of the Kensei.
But other options I would like to see in addition to the above:
for Shadow monk:
Elements monk:
Hand monk:
Not having these are not deal breakers for me. But I do think there is room for improvement.
EZD6 by DM Scotty
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/397599/EZD6-Core-Rulebook?
My two changes
1) Step of the wind. Spend 1 discipline point WHEN YOU START YOUR MOVEMENT to gain the benefit of the dash or disengage action and your jump distance is doubled.
2) move the monks bonus action unarmed strike to the attack action. FOB adds one unarmed strike to the attack action.
i think unclogging the bonus action is probably the easiest way to get the most bang for your buck to help the monk.
I would also add wisdom midifier to starting ki if i could puck a third.
Funny enough the foot clan was a parody of marvel comics the hand(ninjas)
I actually think it makes more sense for Kensei to be the opposite of open hand monk.
Which was a part of the reference to the origin story … the radioactive waste the made the turtles also made Daredevil.
That is because you are thinking weapon vs unarmed instead of martial vs magical. It is sorta opposite in theme with martial aspect vs mystical aspect and very opposite in playstyle with melee vs ranged.
I think the Kensei was actually a Fighter variant back in 1E. It was called the "Kensai" and was published in the "Oriental Adventures" book, wherein it had the very few skills and was quite distinct from the Monk class, also printed in the same book. In 3E, the Kensai got reprinted and was grouped in the Complete Warriors supplment. Again, it was distinct from Monks.
its a monk subclass now.