The biggest improvements since release of the 2024 PHB is that Monks are now signifcantly more durable and don't have to spend quite as much Ki F.P. to do basic stuff that the Rogue has been able to do since the first 5E PHB was release 10 years ago. The other major change is that their action economy is bit smoother what with the change to language around the Attack action and Flurry of Blows not having to rely on doing the Attack action first. Positive direction in several ways.
Still just as Multi-Attri-Dependent as before.
A slightly bigger choice of feats.
Stunning feels ... less like actual stunning. Workable, less OP. Fine.
No weapon masteries for Monk. What did I say about Monks not Getting Nice Things? Well, that's true in this case. I guess the devs thought that keeping track of your F.P. is the best part of playing a Monk, cause they sure drove that point home by making sure Monks could not have any free control abilies. No sirreeeeee, Bobski.
No more communicating with the all the fishies and furries, etc. at high level. While some people said that was purely a ribbon feature, I thought it was cool (if a bit weird) for a base class feature.
But.... it seems that the devs put so much into the base class update that the subclasses seem, ummmm, really boring.
Like, Open Hand 2024 is almost exactly the same as previous Open Hand but better basic mobility, which is fine but uninspiring.
Shadow Monk 2024 is a sort of upgrade. Seeing thru your own Darkness spell w/out a feat or multiclassing is solid. Everything else is ... okay. This was already one of the most efficient users of D.P. of the official Monks, so the change of short-term invisibility at 11th level by making it into a 17th level ability that lasts longer with a bit of offense added for free costing 3 P.S. points looks like an upgrade but really doesn't feel celebration-worthy since almost nobody plays to level 17 anyway.
War of Mercy 2024. A reprint of the Tasha's version, basically. No comment on this one.
War of the Elements is soooo boring. Elemental damage boosts here, resistances there. Some push/pull abilities are useful. Okay, so more playable than the Way of the Four Elements, which was just badly designed in so many ways. Gawd. But this.... this is... just dull. Efficient but dull, like a lot marriages after 4 years. No ability to set things on fire, no creating stony cover for your Rogue or spellcaster friends, no ability to change terrain or feel like an actual Bender of the Elements. I guess flight is nice, but there are sooooo many flight options since Tasha's came out that their 11th level feature is just another "Oh, you too?" instead of "OMG! I totes want to try that too!!" IOW, "Where's the passion here, dahling?" Not here, that's for sure. Four out of Five Snoozies.
Fresh off of playing my new 2024 Monk last night, and it was not boring at all for me. Curious: do you find martials boring in general? I'd say Monks are generally less boring of the martials, no?
1. Ability to engage: Between the mobility, multiple attack options, and the better action economy, I was able to open with a dash as a BA (for free now) to cover the gap to get an attack off. I also could have used a ranged weapon, and dodged as a BA to prepare for any ranged attacks. Also their improved damage dice rewards getting into melee a bit more, which relates to:
2. Deflect Attacks: a huge improvement on 2014's Deflect Missiles, which only did ranged weapons. Now it works on any B/P/S damage, reducing it by d10 + Dex mod + Monk lvl. At level 3, that is already 7-16 damage reduction once per turn. That is huge early on, really mitigating their squishiness and thus freeing you up to be bolder to get into melee, where Monks need to be to shine.
3. Focus Points freer: With fewer things costing Focus Points, that frees up the Monk to use them more often and use their free abilities of course. That is fun! Also recovering all FPs with Uncanny Metabolism absolutely freed me up to use them when I needed, knowing I'd be able to get them back for the next battle. Fun.
4. Grappling: I hear you on weapon masteries, but I think Grappling is Monk's de facto mastery now, especially with the new & improved Grappler feat, which allows you to Grapple freely as part of an unarmed attack and gives you Advantage on your attacks against them. Sure that costs a feat, but the 2024 version now also boosts your DEX or STR. So it's a natural first feat for Monks. Who also can now use their DEX to Grapple (for the DC).
That all is pretty fun to me, and that's just the base class at early levels. You don't seem to care for the new subclasses, which is fine. I'm not super familiar with them, but have seen mostly positive reviews. My subclass is Way of Mercy, which still absolutely slaps.
4. Damage Boost: Mercy's Hand of Harm is like a mini-smite for the Monk: extra Martial Arts die + WIS dmg. At level 3, that's d6 + 3. Finished off a tough guy, and still confident I'll have more FPs for next combat thanks to aforementioned Uncanny Metabolism.
5. Healing: Mercy's Hand of Healing allows me to do more than just damage and sprint around. Keeping allies up is especially fun, cuz teamwork is fun! This replaces one attack in your Flurry of Blows, so at level 3, you can heal someone for d6 + 3 and still get two attacks off, for 1 FP. That's pretty good. And the Monk's mobility means they can more easily get to allies that need it.
Battlefield dynamism and greater freedom to use class features so far has this feeling pretty fun. At level 3. When I look forward to Monk's class features and Mercy's subclass features, they all look to build on what I want to do as a Mercy Monk: stun & auto-poison enemies, heal allies' conditions, dragging allies & foes across the battlefield, stronger resiliency to stay in the game, etc. Little waste in my eyes.
I have to agree. 24 Monk is much more dynamic than 14. I was playing Elements, which got the biggest upgrade. Now, instead of theoretically interesting powers I might use once per short rest, and most of which the group's casters do better, I have unique abilities that I can use all the time.
Also, I don't really get the "no weapon masteries" complaint. I don't use weapons anymore. Admittedly, that's partly because I'm elements, and my staff doesn't get the reach and other benefits.
I have to agree. 24 Monk is much more dynamic than 14. I was playing Elements, which got the biggest upgrade. Now, instead of theoretically interesting powers I might use once per short rest, and most of which the group's casters do better, I have unique abilities that I can use all the time.
Also, I don't really get the "no weapon masteries" complaint. I don't use weapons anymore. Admittedly, that's partly because I'm elements, and my staff doesn't get the reach and other benefits.
I also think there has been a significant improvement compared to the 2014 monk. I also think that the monk doesn't need weapon mastery, as in many cases the monk has abilities that work better with unarmed attacks than armed ones.
What's missing, however, is improving the rules of unarmed combat and making them as interesting as weapon mastery. I agree that the monk has advantages in grappling, but not everyone likes grappling strategy and not everyone likes to push as some monk subclasses do.
It would be nice if unarmed combat also had the option to choose its style. When you see other warrior classes that have a choice between weapons and weapon techniques, in comparison, the monk can only push because it is a subclass ability, and if it wants to do something different, it has to sacrifice damage in order to push 5 feet, or grab, or knock down, which is a bit envy-inducing.
The monk lacks freedom of customization. The semi-magical classes have spells, the fighter has the option of different feats, fighting styles, and weapon mastery, and the rogue and barbarian have weapon mastery.
Yeah I also don't think I miss Weapon Mastery on a Monk, due to the combo of grapple/push easily available via subclasses/feats, plus debuffs like Stunning Strike, Mercy Monk’s auto-poison, etc.
To me, it makes sense Thematically & structurally for more weapon-oriented classes like Fighters to get Weapon Masteries. Some kind of masteries for unarmed attacks would certainly be cool, though I think there is enough equivalence already.
Re: customization, Monks certainly have less because they seem to put more features of weight into the class and subclasses themselves. So the customization moment, per se, is more picking Monk and picking the subclass in the first place.
Fighter is kind of designed to be most customizable from the extra feats. But also being less MAD. Monks are certainly pretty restricted on feats since they need so much ASI love. That changes a bi if you roll for stats though.
The biggest improvements since release of the 2024 PHB is that Monks are now signifcantly more durable and don't have to spend quite as much
KiF.P. to do basic stuff that the Rogue has been able to do since the first 5E PHB was release 10 years ago. The other major change is that their action economy is bit smoother what with the change to language around the Attack action and Flurry of Blows not having to rely on doing the Attack action first. Positive direction in several ways.Still just as Multi-Attri-Dependent as before.
A slightly bigger choice of feats.
Stunning feels ... less like actual stunning. Workable, less OP. Fine.
No weapon masteries for Monk. What did I say about Monks not Getting Nice Things? Well, that's true in this case. I guess the devs thought that keeping track of your F.P. is the best part of playing a Monk, cause they sure drove that point home by making sure Monks could not have any free control abilies. No sirreeeeee, Bobski.
No more communicating with the all the fishies and furries, etc. at high level. While some people said that was purely a ribbon feature, I thought it was cool (if a bit weird) for a base class feature.
But.... it seems that the devs put so much into the base class update that the subclasses seem, ummmm, really boring.
Like, Open Hand 2024 is almost exactly the same as previous Open Hand but better basic mobility, which is fine but uninspiring.
Shadow Monk 2024 is a sort of upgrade. Seeing thru your own Darkness spell w/out a feat or multiclassing is solid. Everything else is ... okay. This was already one of the most efficient users of D.P. of the official Monks, so the change of short-term invisibility at 11th level by making it into a 17th level ability that lasts longer with a bit of offense added for free costing 3 P.S. points looks like an upgrade but really doesn't feel celebration-worthy since almost nobody plays to level 17 anyway.
War of Mercy 2024. A reprint of the Tasha's version, basically. No comment on this one.
War of the Elements is soooo boring. Elemental damage boosts here, resistances there. Some push/pull abilities are useful. Okay, so more playable than the Way of the Four Elements, which was just badly designed in so many ways. Gawd. But this.... this is... just dull. Efficient but dull, like a lot marriages after 4 years. No ability to set things on fire, no creating stony cover for your Rogue or spellcaster friends, no ability to change terrain or feel like an actual Bender of the Elements. I guess flight is nice, but there are sooooo many flight options since Tasha's came out that their 11th level feature is just another "Oh, you too?" instead of "OMG! I totes want to try that too!!" IOW, "Where's the passion here, dahling?" Not here, that's for sure. Four out of Five Snoozies.
Fresh off of playing my new 2024 Monk last night, and it was not boring at all for me. Curious: do you find martials boring in general? I'd say Monks are generally less boring of the martials, no?
1. Ability to engage: Between the mobility, multiple attack options, and the better action economy, I was able to open with a dash as a BA (for free now) to cover the gap to get an attack off. I also could have used a ranged weapon, and dodged as a BA to prepare for any ranged attacks. Also their improved damage dice rewards getting into melee a bit more, which relates to:
2. Deflect Attacks: a huge improvement on 2014's Deflect Missiles, which only did ranged weapons. Now it works on any B/P/S damage, reducing it by d10 + Dex mod + Monk lvl. At level 3, that is already 7-16 damage reduction once per turn. That is huge early on, really mitigating their squishiness and thus freeing you up to be bolder to get into melee, where Monks need to be to shine.
3. Focus Points freer: With fewer things costing Focus Points, that frees up the Monk to use them more often and use their free abilities of course. That is fun! Also recovering all FPs with Uncanny Metabolism absolutely freed me up to use them when I needed, knowing I'd be able to get them back for the next battle. Fun.
4. Grappling: I hear you on weapon masteries, but I think Grappling is Monk's de facto mastery now, especially with the new & improved Grappler feat, which allows you to Grapple freely as part of an unarmed attack and gives you Advantage on your attacks against them. Sure that costs a feat, but the 2024 version now also boosts your DEX or STR. So it's a natural first feat for Monks. Who also can now use their DEX to Grapple (for the DC).
That all is pretty fun to me, and that's just the base class at early levels. You don't seem to care for the new subclasses, which is fine. I'm not super familiar with them, but have seen mostly positive reviews. My subclass is Way of Mercy, which still absolutely slaps.
4. Damage Boost: Mercy's Hand of Harm is like a mini-smite for the Monk: extra Martial Arts die + WIS dmg. At level 3, that's d6 + 3. Finished off a tough guy, and still confident I'll have more FPs for next combat thanks to aforementioned Uncanny Metabolism.
5. Healing: Mercy's Hand of Healing allows me to do more than just damage and sprint around. Keeping allies up is especially fun, cuz teamwork is fun! This replaces one attack in your Flurry of Blows, so at level 3, you can heal someone for d6 + 3 and still get two attacks off, for 1 FP. That's pretty good. And the Monk's mobility means they can more easily get to allies that need it.
Battlefield dynamism and greater freedom to use class features so far has this feeling pretty fun. At level 3. When I look forward to Monk's class features and Mercy's subclass features, they all look to build on what I want to do as a Mercy Monk: stun & auto-poison enemies, heal allies' conditions, dragging allies & foes across the battlefield, stronger resiliency to stay in the game, etc. Little waste in my eyes.
I have to agree. 24 Monk is much more dynamic than 14. I was playing Elements, which got the biggest upgrade. Now, instead of theoretically interesting powers I might use once per short rest, and most of which the group's casters do better, I have unique abilities that I can use all the time.
Also, I don't really get the "no weapon masteries" complaint. I don't use weapons anymore. Admittedly, that's partly because I'm elements, and my staff doesn't get the reach and other benefits.
I also think there has been a significant improvement compared to the 2014 monk. I also think that the monk doesn't need weapon mastery, as in many cases the monk has abilities that work better with unarmed attacks than armed ones.
What's missing, however, is improving the rules of unarmed combat and making them as interesting as weapon mastery. I agree that the monk has advantages in grappling, but not everyone likes grappling strategy and not everyone likes to push as some monk subclasses do.
It would be nice if unarmed combat also had the option to choose its style. When you see other warrior classes that have a choice between weapons and weapon techniques, in comparison, the monk can only push because it is a subclass ability, and if it wants to do something different, it has to sacrifice damage in order to push 5 feet, or grab, or knock down, which is a bit envy-inducing.
The monk lacks freedom of customization. The semi-magical classes have spells, the fighter has the option of different feats, fighting styles, and weapon mastery, and the rogue and barbarian have weapon mastery.
Yeah I also don't think I miss Weapon Mastery on a Monk, due to the combo of grapple/push easily available via subclasses/feats, plus debuffs like Stunning Strike, Mercy Monk’s auto-poison, etc.
To me, it makes sense Thematically & structurally for more weapon-oriented classes like Fighters to get Weapon Masteries. Some kind of masteries for unarmed attacks would certainly be cool, though I think there is enough equivalence already.
Re: customization, Monks certainly have less because they seem to put more features of weight into the class and subclasses themselves. So the customization moment, per se, is more picking Monk and picking the subclass in the first place.
Fighter is kind of designed to be most customizable from the extra feats. But also being less MAD. Monks are certainly pretty restricted on feats since they need so much ASI love. That changes a bi if you roll for stats though.