Soulmeld Ideas

[Sinfire Titan]

As I'm going the full meldshaper route with this fix, I've kinda come across a snag...


I have no idea what soulmelds to give this class. I want to make new ones, but I can't come up with any names or ideas for some of them. My goal is 7 soulmelds for each chakra slot; 4 that all Monks can use, and then 3 that are restricted access. I've been sifting through the PrCs and ACFs, but haven't found much that I want to use.

The idea is that there are three styles of Monk, each with their own meldshaping abilities (all three share a universal meld list, but get access to special soulmelds based on style). I know that from a flavor standpoint it doesn't make much sense to have them be a meldshaper class, seeing as Dispel Magic effectively makes them useless for a few rounds, but its the way I want to roll with this.

Style 1 is a Tank.
Style 2 is a "Blaster".
Style 3 is traditional.

Here's a breakdown of what I've got:

Crown 4 total
The Crystal Helm. Restricted
A named Soulmeld, but with no effect so far (probably going to use a class feature for this one). Universal
A Soulmeld that grants a +2 Armor bonus to AC, +2/essentia. Every time you get hit, essentia gets removed from the soulmeld until you're at the base value. May want to tweak this one. Universal
A Soulmeld that grants Deflect Arrows, and can be improved with Essentia. Because the original ability sucks. Restricted


Feet 3 total
The Impulse Boots Universal
A soulmeld that grants the Monk's speed bonus. Chakra binds will grant alternate movement forms and Dimension Step. Universal
A Soulmeld that restricts enemy movement to help the Monk be a tank replacement. Restricted

Hands 4 total
A soulmeld that grants Energy damage on unarmed strikes (1dX, haven't decided yet) 1/round. Universal
A soulmeld that grants Stunning Fist/Decisive Strike. Restricted
A Soulmeld that grants Flurry of Blows. Restricted
A soulmeld that grants a ranged version of Flurry of Blows, but can't attack the same target twice in one round. Restricted

Arms 3 total
Nothing except for the last three in the Hands section.

Brow 2 total
A named soulmeld with no effects so far. Not sure here. Universal
A soulmeld that grants Darkvision. Chakra Binds will grant Ghost Step abilities ala Ninja, but not as sucky. Restricted

Shoulders 2 total
A named soulmeld with no effects so far. Again, don't know. Universal
A Soulmeld that acts like Lightning Mace. Not sure if I want this to stay or to be a different effect. Restricted

Throat 2 total
A Soulmeld that adds elemental damage to attacks.Universal
The Apparition Ribbon. Restricted

Waist 2 total
The soulmeld that grants Darkvision from above.
The Soulmeld that grants the speed bonus from above.

Heart 5 total
A soulmeld that grants Tumble and Hide bonuses. Universal
The Spellward Shirt. Universal
A Soulmeld that acts like a fusion of Wholeness of Body, the Apparition Ribbon's Throat Bind, and the Vitality Belt. Universal
The soulmeld that restricts enemy movement from above.
A Smite-esque soulmeld. Restricted

Soul 5 total
The Soulmeld that grants the Armor bonus to AC from above.
A named soulmeld with no abilities so far. Universal
The Wholeness of Body soulmeld from above.
The Fellmist Robe. Restricted
A Soulmeld that lets you reroll damage on one attack every 10 rounds. Essentia reduces the wait time. Restricted


Any ideas?

[Glimbur]

It's really weird to have a soulmeld that loses essentia as you get hit, because you can fully redistribute your essentia as a swift action. So the effect will be that it gets easier and easier to hit the monk until he gets a turn again.

How do you want the tank to tank? One common path is to increase reach and take lots of AoO's and trip and such. So an arm meld to increase effective reach could be... interesting but somewhat hard to balance.

Are you sure you want Deflect Arrows on the Crown, not the Arms or Hands or maybe Shoulders? It's a strange chakra for it.

What else would be cool/useful for the monk to have, as you see it? I've been interested in something like Knowledge Devotion to show how the training and knowledge of their foes helps monks.

[Sinfire Titan]

It's really weird to have a soulmeld that loses essentia as you get hit, because you can fully redistribute your essentia as a swift action. So the effect will be that it gets easier and easier to hit the monk until he gets a turn again.

Its an inverted version of Pearl of Black Doubt from Tome of Battle. The class is all ready going to be relying on its Swift action, mostly for Essentia, but for a few other effects too.


How do you want the tank to tank? One common path is to increase reach and take lots of AoO's and trip and such. So an arm meld to increase effective reach could be... interesting but somewhat hard to balance.

One of their soulmelds will prevent enemy movement. I've got more effects planned out, and their main offense is Stunning the opponent.


Are you sure you want Deflect Arrows on the Crown, not the Arms or Hands or maybe Shoulders? It's a strange chakra for it.

Its because of how early a Monk gets that ability. The Chakra Bind effect grants something along the lines of Deflect Rays from Complete Mage. They get that ability fairly early. I admit, it is strange, but its more for the level.


What else would be cool/useful for the monk to have, as you see it? I've been interested in something like Knowledge Devotion to show how the training and knowledge of their foes helps monks.

I've all ready seen fit to give them the Knowledge skills, so he can just take the feat. There's a few PrCs that have some nice abilities, like the Tattooed Monk or Elocator that I want to incorporate.

[Draken]

One suggestion I would give for a Hands/Arms soulmeld would be one that allowed the character to make his unarmed attacks at a range in his turn (so no large AaO threat radius), 30 feet +5 feet/essentia for a max final reach of 60 feet (considering two capacity increases as class features) or 70 feet (with feat and magic item + class features)

Chakra bind could give the 5 feet/essentia of reach on AaOs with unarmed attacks maybe.

[Sinfire Titan]

One suggestion I would give for a Hands/Arms soulmeld would be one that allowed the character to make his unarmed attacks at a range in his turn (so no large AaO threat radius), 30 feet +5 feet/essentia for a max final reach of 60 feet (considering two capacity increases as class features) or 70 feet (with feat and magic item + class features)

Chakra bind could give the 5 feet/essentia of reach on AaOs with unarmed attacks maybe.

Doing that all ready. One of the options for the Arms/Hands chakra is an AoE-esque attack against a certain number of enemies.


A soulmeld that grants a ranged version of Flurry of Blows, but can't attack the same target twice in one round.

The idea behind it is 1 melee attack against anyone within 30ft. Essentia allows additional attacks, but none can be against the same target. The Chakra Binds will improve the number of attacks.

The normal Flurry of Blows is 1 attack/essentia invested. The Decisive Blow replacement is just one attack (with Chakra Binds adding more), but it Save or Stuns. The Decisive Blow one also gets a Combat Reflexes variant and ways to make enemies provoke attacks (hence the Tank design).

The AoE version is a minor Glass Cannon (capable of tanking for a few rounds, but can't really defend itself easily). Its more for mobility and hit-and-run combat than the other two. The Flurry of Blows one is more traditional, but with better class features than the original Monk.