I play a lvl 8 wood elf shadow monk. My Dex is 20(+5), Wis 18(+4) and Con 15(+2), my AC at 19 and HP at 58. The campaign I am playing in is Storm Kings Thunder and we have just defeated the first Evil Giant Lord and since we are playing milestone achievement the whole party just leveled up to 8. I am having a hard to time deciding if I want to take the ASI to boost my Wis to get max AC and max my stunning strike or choose a feat. The two feats im looking at are Crusher and Mobile.
I like Crushers knock back ability and the +1 to constitution but in combat im still mainly using a weapon (a spear d8 damage) because right now its more damage output than just my fits and I usually only use my one bonus action to deal bludgeoning damage or I spend a ki point to take the dodge action because how how squishy I am. Also because we are fighting giants would crushers knock back ability work since it only applies to creatures one size bigger than me?
Mobile I really like because my walking speed would jump up to 60ft and I could dance around our parties two tanks on the front lines and help deal damage to the enemies and disengaging without having to spend a ki point. This seems like it would help free up my action economy so I can burn ki points Stunning Strike, Flurry of Blows or my monk spells to help the party. I have a chronic issue of acting as a front line party member when I should focus on being the parties scout. This seems like it would help me stay alive on the front line.
I am also looking at Tough purely because how how low my HP is.
Please let me know what y'all think, I'm pretty stumped as to which direction I should go.
With your stats I would definitely go for a feat instead of an ASI. With point buy a Monk would have to get ASIs at level 4 and 8 to get your stats.
If you are looking for survivability I would go for Mobile. Since you have other front liners in your party it should let you get where you need to be to do damage and get out. So long as your front liners and other party members can keep the enemy from chasing you the enemy will be forced to use ranged attacks of they want to target you. Between Patient Defense, cover if available, and Deflect Missile you should be really good at soaking ranged attacks.
Crusher is a really good offensive option and is residually good for you because it rounds out your Constitution. As for using a spear, that isn't really a problem so long as you don't have a magical weapon yet because you can just switch to using a Quarterstaff. Also with the number of attacks a Monk gets the on crit effect will trigger more often. And making all attacks against a target have advantage will vastly boost your parties DPR against that target.
You could also take Eldritch Adept to get the Devil's Sight invocation. This would let you see inside any magical darkness, like from your Shadow Arts feature. You have to be careful with this one though, as trapping an enemy in magical darkness can be good for you but bad for the rest of your party.
I would increase wisdom to 20 or alert feat Stunning strike will give your party advantage with attacks Extra damage from smite, great weapon, sharp shooter upcasting spells etc is combat changing.
Eldritch Adept wouldn’t be possible since the shadow monk does not have the spell casting class feature that is required. But I do agree mobile would be a good choice. Getting 20 Wis is tempting but I would probably put that off until 12th level and go with the feat. The difference in +1 on the DC for stunning strike with a 20 Wis doesn’t beat the better survivability with mobile, imo.
Howdy y'all,
I play a lvl 8 wood elf shadow monk. My Dex is 20(+5), Wis 18(+4) and Con 15(+2), my AC at 19 and HP at 58. The campaign I am playing in is Storm Kings Thunder and we have just defeated the first Evil Giant Lord and since we are playing milestone achievement the whole party just leveled up to 8. I am having a hard to time deciding if I want to take the ASI to boost my Wis to get max AC and max my stunning strike or choose a feat. The two feats im looking at are Crusher and Mobile.
I like Crushers knock back ability and the +1 to constitution but in combat im still mainly using a weapon (a spear d8 damage) because right now its more damage output than just my fits and I usually only use my one bonus action to deal bludgeoning damage or I spend a ki point to take the dodge action because how how squishy I am. Also because we are fighting giants would crushers knock back ability work since it only applies to creatures one size bigger than me?
Mobile I really like because my walking speed would jump up to 60ft and I could dance around our parties two tanks on the front lines and help deal damage to the enemies and disengaging without having to spend a ki point. This seems like it would help free up my action economy so I can burn ki points Stunning Strike, Flurry of Blows or my monk spells to help the party. I have a chronic issue of acting as a front line party member when I should focus on being the parties scout. This seems like it would help me stay alive on the front line.
I am also looking at Tough purely because how how low my HP is.
Please let me know what y'all think, I'm pretty stumped as to which direction I should go.
With your stats I would definitely go for a feat instead of an ASI. With point buy a Monk would have to get ASIs at level 4 and 8 to get your stats.
If you are looking for survivability I would go for Mobile. Since you have other front liners in your party it should let you get where you need to be to do damage and get out. So long as your front liners and other party members can keep the enemy from chasing you the enemy will be forced to use ranged attacks of they want to target you. Between Patient Defense, cover if available, and Deflect Missile you should be really good at soaking ranged attacks.
Crusher is a really good offensive option and is residually good for you because it rounds out your Constitution. As for using a spear, that isn't really a problem so long as you don't have a magical weapon yet because you can just switch to using a Quarterstaff. Also with the number of attacks a Monk gets the on crit effect will trigger more often. And making all attacks against a target have advantage will vastly boost your parties DPR against that target.
You could also take Eldritch Adept to get the Devil's Sight invocation. This would let you see inside any magical darkness, like from your Shadow Arts feature. You have to be careful with this one though, as trapping an enemy in magical darkness can be good for you but bad for the rest of your party.
I would increase wisdom to 20 or alert feat Stunning strike will give your party advantage with attacks Extra damage from smite, great weapon, sharp shooter upcasting spells etc is combat changing.
Eldritch Adept wouldn’t be possible since the shadow monk does not have the spell casting class feature that is required. But I do agree mobile would be a good choice. Getting 20 Wis is tempting but I would probably put that off until 12th level and go with the feat. The difference in +1 on the DC for stunning strike with a 20 Wis doesn’t beat the better survivability with mobile, imo.
EZD6 by DM Scotty
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/397599/EZD6-Core-Rulebook?