Changeling Monk

[Talakeal]

I had an idea for a character, a changeling monk with the vow of poverty who would eventually prestige class into war shaper. The idea was a character who did not believe in using equipment of any sort, and would instead use her body to replicate whatever tools were needed for any situation.

I thought this was a cool character concept, but the rest of the group told me that it was purely an exercise in munchkinery, and that I was just trying to make a broken combat monster, and forbid it outright.

This kind of shocked me. I was under the impression that monk was amongst the weakest of classes, and I have never heard of the war shaper being that potent, and although VoP is all right is never seemed significantly better than properly chosen magic items, especially in the type of high wealth game we always play.

So what do you guys think? Is it a really broken build and I am just missing something, or is the rest of my group just overreacted to something new?

[Daftendirekt]

Indeed, a changeling/hengeyokai monk that goes warshaper can be pretty potent if built correctly. Especially if you also throw in Fist of the Forest (and maybe Drunken Master. So fun!)

However, I really can't think of what tools the monk would need to conjure up for situations, especially if you have a rogue and wizard in the party. This doesn't feel like munchkinry at all.

Also, yeah, with VoP taking away all the items that make your monk-ness better, this is most definitely not broken.

[lokoone]

i think its because there is something about the warshapers that don't limit how many natural weapons they can make at once

i think..

[RaginChangeling]

Warshaper is rather poorly written in that technically you can have infinite natural weapons with it. However, if you limit yourself you shouldn't have much of an issue with being overpowered as I assume your hypothetical Monk/Warshaper does not include a way to get pounce? And with vow of poverty you can't get around that restriction with items.

[Flickerdart]

VoP Monk in a high wealth game? There's only one way that can be broken, and that is if you use Black Ethergaunt as your race.

[T.G. Oskar]

Overreaction. Definitely overreaction. Perhaps they're not used to see a monk, or Vow of Poverty, or Warshaper in action.

In the sum of parts, you're still quite behind from the party (especially if it's high wealth as another poster claims) in terms of abilities. Warshaper is indeed very good (bonuses to Strength and Constitution, reach, improved natural weapon INCLUDING your unarmed strikes, fast healing and immunity to critical hits/sneak attacks), but that doesn't mean you reach zero-sum when you mix it with a Monk and enter a Vow of Poverty, since you'll be losing a few important abilities that can be gained through magic items, and what you gain through VoP doesn't compensate for it. Ex: a form of flight (unless your friendly caster is willing to provide with one through spells), or synergy between movement and attack. I'd say it could be decent if you went Tash + Psychic Warrior, or dipped into Psionic Fist (because that way you get stuff like Hustle, Psionic Lion's Charge and other powers that fully complement you).

Also, recall that unless you get Superior Unarmed Strike, your damage will be slightly less than that of a monk, which will be a bit counter-effective when dealing with improving your natural attacks (and remember, you want INA on your unarmed strikes so you can raise your damage potential almost twice; Expansion makes it triple/quadruple plus provides a plethora of benefits). And quite probably you won't delve too far in Monk anyways.

I'd be surprised with, say, a Tash Monk 2/PsyWar 14/Warshaper 4 or a Monk 6/Psionic Fist (of Zuoken) 10/Warshaper 4, with Warshaper gained ASAP, and probably replacing Evasion with Invisible Fist to gain Invisibility alongside the other benefits. But without a way to cover for Monk weaknesses (of which Vow of Poverty clears only half, if less than that), the end result is a slightly more powerful Monk; quite distant from munchkinery.

Hence, I think they're scared of seeing all the benefits of Vow of Poverty coupled with the initial reaction to Monk. Still, there IS a good reasoning behind that which could be downplayed from a "combat monster": consider that Monks gain good Spot and Listen checks, which if you stretch a bit makes you a phenomenal scout (I mean, you'd be a scout that can handle yourself on your own), even going as far as using your change shape ability to blend in with most humanoids (and with Expanded Knowledge: Metamorphosis, with most creatures actually). Mix with stuff like Invisible Fist, and you can have a character that requires virtually nothing to do his (or her, it's like that for changelings) job. However, recall that you have the poverty thing hanging above you, plus you MUST be both Lawful AND Good, so you can't be that deceptive.

Still, if your group doesn't accept it, better to leave it as-is: you don't want you treating your character as if a Paladin on a world that just wants to see him fall, right? We're just telling that it's not an act of munchkinery. Though, what they said about "combat monster"; Stormwind Fallacy, perhaps?