Yet Another Monk/Wizard Thread. Try to keep it civil?

[Heliomance]

I've read all the threads about why monks are weak. I understand that they can't hold a candle to a well-played wizard. I've even run a fairly high-op all-caster game, so I know what well played casters can do, and how much better they are than non-magical characters.

But the thing is, most people don't play at the optimisation levels that mean the casters obsolete everything. The game I've just finished running was probably the highest optimisation level my gaming society has ever seen, and it was still far short of the ideals espoused by boards like this one. I've seen monks in play a few times, and they've never been useless. There's one in a game I'm in at the moment, and she's the second most reliable damage dealer, after the barbarian (admittedly it's a fairly low op game - other party members are a healbot/buffmonkey bard/cleric, an archer, and me, a wildshape specialist druid with Natural Spell banned). The first campaign I ran also had a monk, and again, he was one of the more consistant damage dealers, invaluable in a fight. And one of the more famous characters played in the society was a VoP monk who was, by all accounts, a combat monster.

So why do monks have the reputation for being one of the worst classes out there? I realise they're not the best, not by a longshot. A wizard has so many more options it's unreal. But using a wizard properly takes dedication and knowhow, and the majority of players don't have that - and don't actually necessarily want to play at that power level anyway. Why, then, are monks regarded as weak in anything other than the highest tiers of optimisation?

[Hirax]

A wizard has so many more options it's unreal. But using a wizard properly takes dedication and knowhow, and the majority of players don't have that.

Well, that's pretty much it. D&D's rules reward system mastery, and there's more in there to benefit casters. Most people in real life go back to realizing it's a roleplaying game at heart once they see all there is to see on TO boards, making power levels largely irrelevant unless a huge disparity exists.

[Wings of Peace]

Well, that's pretty much it. D&D's rules reward system mastery, and there's more in there to benefit casters. Most people in real life go back to realizing it's a roleplaying game at heart once they see all there is to see on TO boards, making power levels largely irrelevant unless a huge disparity exists.

This plus a few letters to meet the board's minimum.

[TroubleBrewing]

Most people in real life go back to realizing it's a roleplaying game at heart once they see all there is to see on TO boards, making power levels largely irrelevant unless a huge disparity exists.

Pretty much this. Once you know a few dirty tricks (Optimizing Intimidate Is Easy, DMM Makes Paladins Feel Bad, Knockback/Dungeoncrasher For Massive Damage, etc.) you can splash them into builds that aren't dedicated to that particular thing and still end up with another arrow in your quiver. Most of the time, you don't need to squeeze every last point of damage out of a build for actual games: using TO exercises as stepping stones is much less likely to get books chucked at you.

[Vowtz]

It's like playing Dan in Street Fighter, you can play, you can have fun, you can even win, but if you want efficiency, Ryu is better.


...I've seen monks in play a few times, and they've never been useless....He is not useless, he is worse.

One thing that is good about the monk is his speed, and that can be emulated by a first level spell, even without that, in the beginning, a barbarian is faster.

The other thing a monk do is to fight, and anyone fights better than the monk.


Why, then, are monks regarded as weak in anything other than the highest tiers of optimisation?
Without optimization:

TO HIT
Monk: bab 3/4 + str + weapon focus + Amulet of Mighty Fists
Fighter: bab full+str+enhancement+weapon focus+melee weapon mastery

DAMAGE
Monk: str+unarmed damage+Amulet of Mighty Fists
Fighter: str*1,5+base weapon+enhancement+weapon spec+m. w. mastery

CA
Monk: sab+lvl/5+dex+Bracers of armor+deflection
Fighter: Armor+enhancement+shield+enhancement+dex+deflectio n

SAVES
Monk: All good
Fighter: Fort good


- The only aspect of combat that a monk is better are his saves.

- A monk usually has more attacks, but a fighter deal more damage/round easily with power attack + a two handed weapon.

- Most of improving items for a monk use the same slot. A monk have to decide if he wants the amulet of mighty fists, amulet of natural armor, amulet of health or a periapt of wisdom.

-VoP can help with some of these magic item problems, but if you do the math you will se that it's not enough.

[Golden Ladybug]

The simplest answer is that a Monk may be casually good, but given a sufficient level of optimization on both sides, the Monk will always be worse off.

They can't fight as well as a Fighter, they can't heal as well as a Cleric, they can't skillmonkey as well as a Rogue and they can't solo encounters as well as a Wizard. Hell, they can't even be as good a Monk as an Unarmed Swordsage.

And thats just using the merest potential of the other classes. The problem with the Monk is that they are flavorfull instead of mechanically competent. As the Optimization of the group increases, the use of the Monk decreases. They have MAD, their class Features are mediocre and don't synergise very well, and whatever power they get from their abilities is negated by the extremely difficult requirements to get it active (Slow Fall), constricted by time frame (Quivering Palm) and whats left is outperformed by everything else at any given level they get it at. Their inability to wear decent armor lest they lose whatever class featuers they have left, and their limited range of weapons, all in all, it just doesn't work out for them.

The Monk is cursed with being decent at some things, horrible at others, and inferior to everyone at the things they are decent at.

[Gnaeus]

Vowtz has it right.



But the thing is, most people don't play at the optimisation levels that mean the casters obsolete everything. The game I've just finished running was probably the highest optimisation level my gaming society has ever seen, and it was still far short of the ideals espoused by boards like this one. I've seen monks in play a few times, and they've never been useless. There's one in a game I'm in at the moment, and she's the second most reliable damage dealer, after the barbarian (admittedly it's a fairly low op game - other party members are a healbot/buffmonkey bard/cleric, an archer, and me, a wildshape specialist druid with Natural Spell banned). The first campaign I ran also had a monk, and again, he was one of the more consistant damage dealers, invaluable in a fight.

OK, I don't know what was sitting at your table, so I can't tell you you are wrong in that case...

But monk AS A CLASS is a terrible damage dealer.

Its Medium BaB makes it less likely to hit than a paladin *. Also, its extreme dependence on 4 stats to be useful in combat means that it has lower strength than a paladin, making it less likely to hit. Also, the higher cost to enchant fists over weapons means it may be another -1 or 2 behind the paladin. Also, flurry of blows tacks on an additional -2. A Paladin fighting things he can't smite will be better than a monk. Frankly, an NPC warrior is likely to be better off for hitting than a monk.

Its unarmed strikes are usually worse than martial weapons for most of its progression for base damage dice. Also, it has a harder time bypassing DR. Also, a 2h weapon gets better returns from strength, power attack, and gold spent on enhancements (and you can put a cheap weapon crystal on it). Also, again, given its many stat needs, monk is likely to have a lower Str. The paladin does more damage (again with no smite).

The monk, in order to get that full attack, is standing next to the enemy. A monk with 18 wisdom, and 18 dex, has a lower AC than a paladin with non-magical platemail and a 12 dex. The paladin can also raise his AC cheaper than the monk. The paladin can also take more damage than the monk. The paladin has his own MAD problems, but if we assume that the monk has the 18 Dex, 18 wisdom needed to have only a slightly worse AC, the Paladin probably has a better con than the monk.

*I use Paladin instead of fighter, because that way I don't have to guess what the fighter spent all his bonus feats on. Also because Paladin is a very defensive class (much like monk), and that core paladin is another tier 5 who stacks up very poorly against comparable classes. I could replace it with CW Samurai, another loser (baring intimidate tricks). And the Paladin, who again is widely regarded as a terrible class, actually has more utility than the monk (like serving as a backup healer with wands).

So monks are bad in combat compared with similar tier classes.

What are the monk's other roles?
Skillmonkey? 4 points per level. Int is probably their 5th or 6th stat. They don't have enough skill points to be a really good skillmonkey.

Survival. The monk's strength. Being hard to kill. Except that...

With his bad ac and hp + reliance on melee, monks are not that hard to kill.

Similar defensive classes, like paladin and knight, are similarly hard to kill, while at the same time doing more damage, with better hp and ac.

Something like a caster with daily buffs up is actually much, much harder to kill than a monk.

And most importantly, hard to kill is a terrible party role. The goal of your adventuring group is usually to defeat the enemy. Monks are bad at that. even if you took their hype at face value and assume that the monk is going to be the guy most likely to survive a combat that went south, you would still be better off replacing him with a character who has the damage output or magical might to keep the combat from turning into a loss in the first place.


And one of the more famous characters played in the society was a VoP monk who was, by all accounts, a combat monster.

1. this lacks enough details to be remotely credible. It isn't math. It isn't even a first hand account. It could be rephrased "Some guys I know had a monk that they said didn't suck".

2. Any character can improve with sufficient optimization. You could give a NPC warrior a valorous lance and a bunch of charge feats and he will be a good damage dealer. That is not an indication of the strength of the warrior as a class. (This is the Class X fallacy. You can use strong feats and items on a monk, and come out with a strong character, but that character will be stronger if you used those same blocks on something that wasn't so weak at start.)


So why do monks have the reputation for being one of the worst classes out there? I realise they're not the best, not by a longshot.

Which classes are they better than? We agree they are below the T1s, which classes do you think are outshined by the monk?

[Psyren]

"Monks have always done well in my games" isn't really meaningful. We don't know the skill level of your players, the equipment/feats they've selected, the spells/tactics the casters are using, etc.

"the highest optimisation level my gaming society has ever seen" is equally meaningless - we have no frame of reference.

[Emperor Tippy]

Can a monk be fun to play and contribute to the party? Sure. I played a monk in one of the more memorably games I've taken part it.

Do you contribute as much as even a Truenamer? No.

Even when optimized to the maximum, a monk is still nothing special.

Unarmed Swordsage makes a far better monk.

[Velden]

Instead of Many Atribute Dependency, I would say a monk is more flexible regarding how one wants to play the class. A monk who focuses on STR, WIS and CON is perfectly viable. Even a monk focused on STR is possible. His saves are already good enough so he can get a negative modifier in any stat.

Also, people tend to ignore the weapons a monk can use (granted, most are useless). The staff can be considered two weapons regarding its bonuses (one end has ghost strike, the other wounding, for example) which can be used in a flurry and even add the unarmed strikes in the flurry (as kicks).
Has a Fighter or paladin higher chances to win in a fight? Ignoring the cost of the gear,sure. I still say the monk is a competent fighter, not the best, but still competent.

The common strategy of the wizard, and why he is a Tier 1, is as I understand:
1)Get more actions (Staying away/Time stop/Teleport)
2)Buffing Time and Crowd Control according to circumstances
3)Cast spells
4)if not dead back to 1 and laugh.:smallbiggrin:

On the other hand, the monk (or any non-magic/non-ToB class):
1)Getting close (Improved movement, magic items, high-level abilities)
2)Negate escape or spells ( Grapple Checks,Trip the target,Sunder spell pouch/magic items, use magic CC items)
3)Attack with flurry, power attack or use magic item.
4)if not dead back to 1 and pray.:smalleek:

But as others, in other threads, already mentioned, Tiers don´t mean much in a real game. Every class is "good enough" (not "great") with the according magic items.

[Heliomance]

Which classes are they better than? We agree they are below the T1s, which classes do you think are outshined by the monk?

I wouldn't say they outshine anyone, but in my experience (I know, the plural of anecdote is not data, etc) they can hold their own among anything other than well-played full casters.

[Gnaeus]

Instead of Many Atribute Dependency, I would say a monk is more flexible regarding how one wants to play the class. A monk who focuses on STR, WIS and CON is perfectly viable. Even a monk focused on STR is possible. His saves are already good enough so he can get a negative modifier in any stat.

Also, people tend to ignore the weapons a monk can use (granted, most are useless). The staff can be considered two weapons regarding its bonuses (one end has ghost strike, the other wounding, for example) which can be used in a flurry and even add the unarmed strikes in the flurry (as kicks).

Compare a monk focused on Str with a paladin focused on Str.

Monk is using a staff for 2 handing, paladin is using a greatsword, so -1d6 damage for monk. Monk has somewhere between -1 and -5 BaB depending on level. Paladin has more hp. Since both are Str focused, paladin has 6 points higher AC or more. The core paladin is made of lose, and he still stomps all over the staff wielding monk.




The common strategy of the wizard, and why he is a Tier 1, is as I understand:
1)Get more actions (Staying away/Time stop/Teleport)
2)Buffing Time and Crowd Control according to circumstances
3)Cast spells
4)if not dead back to 1 and laugh.

The wizard is tier 1, so his strategy is "whatever he chooses for it to be that day". The same wizard could out-melee the monk with polymorph tricks, summon monsters to eat the monk, lock the monk in a box filled with water until he drowns, animate a dead dragon or dominate a fighter to kill the monk, or many, many more.


On the other hand, the monk:
1)Getting close (Improved movement, magic items, high-level abilities)
2)Negate escape or spells ( Grapple Checks,Trip the target,Sunder spell pouch/magic items, use magic CC items)
3)Attack with flurry, power attack or use magic item.
4)if not dead back to 1 and pray.

So the monk's strategy is to attempt tricks (grappling, Tripping, sundering, power attack) that even all the other weakest classes in the game can do better than he can (they benefit from high str and full bab), or hope that his magic items can beat the enemy. Good plan.


But as others already mentioned, Tiers don´t mean much in a real game, every class is good enough with the according magic items.

That is not remotely what most of us said.

Monk can be playable with the right items and in a game with low optimization does not equal Tiers don't mean much in a real game. A druid, without reading any handbooks, who chooses natural spell and picks a bear form and some good spells, and has an animal companion, is simply stronger than a monk even if the monk is heavily optimized.

If you want to play a monk, and not suck compared with other party members, your options are:
1. optimize heavily and hope for good loot and still be prepared to be disappointed.
2. Play only in groups with other low tier classes, and then optimize a little more than they do
3. Get pre-game agreements from the casters to help you with a lot of buffs and to not steal your few opportunities to not be useless.

If you don't think tiers mean anything, try playing a monk next to an unarmed swordsage. Take similar feats and magic items, and bring a box of tissues, because it will be painful.


I wouldn't say they outshine anyone, but in my experience (I know, the plural of anecdote is not data, etc) they can hold their own among anything other than well-played full casters.

Try that again with maths. Show me how a monk is a superior combatant to a CW samurai or a Paladin fighting non-evil enemies. Show me how a melee class with bad AC, BaB, HP and weapon choices "catches up" to to those other classes, bearing in mind that Samurai and Paladin, themselves, suck.

If you can do that, then we can talk about the real melee classes. Things like Barbarian, Totemist, Warblade, Crusader, Swordsage, Wildshape Ranger, etc....

If you cannot show that a monk is equal to tier 5 (and 6!) classes in combat, we have answered your original question:

So why do monks have the reputation for being one of the worst classes out there?
Because they are a fighting class that is bad at fighting.

It is true, a monk isn't a lot worse than Fighter or Paladin. But being only some worse than other trap classes is not a good thing.

[Psyren]

(I know, the plural of anecdote is not data, etc)

As long as you're aware of that, there's not much to discuss. I'm glad monks are working out in your games - whether that is due to the casters holding back, the monk's player(s) being more skilled, or some unknown houserule, I don't know nor does it matter.

[Telonius]

So why do monks have the reputation for being one of the worst classes out there? I realise they're not the best, not by a longshot... Why, then, are monks regarded as weak in anything other than the highest tiers of optimisation?

At least in my case, the answer lies in bitter experience. I played a Monk, 1-20, in a Shackled City campaign way back in the day. He ended up being one of my favorite characters to roleplay, but the absolute weakest in terms of combat. His main role was to flank with the Rogue and draw attention away from our casters. When my Dwarven Defender cohort started reliably outdoing him on damage, it was really the final nail in the coffin for my opinion of the class. After browsing here for a while, I learned the reason why the class was so awful mechanically; but my personal experience preceded the theory.

I should add that I generally don't play at a high optimization level. Neither does the rest of my group. But even with taking reasonably-powered feats, I felt like I was barely contributing to combat. His "face" duties could have been done by any character with a high charisma or any class with Diplomacy as a class skill.

I do think there are a couple reasons why people have a hard time figuring out why Monk is bad. The biggest one is that people really want a kung-fu martial artist-type class to be cool. Whether you take it the Wuxia route or the more Bruce Lee paradigm, people who can knock you out without using a sword are supposed to be badass. The class really does have a whole bunch of things that, in isolation, seem to go towards that, so you expect it to rock. You can move really fast! And hit things faster than anybody else! And you can do a Ryu Hyabusa-jump down cliffs! And you get better the older you are! And can heal yourself!

All that stuff is indeed awesome (EDIT: In terms of fluff and badass-itude, not mechanics), and a Monk ought to have them. But nothing can tie it all together rules-wise, and it's weaker than it first appears. You can either move fast or flurry, not both (unless you go splatbook-diving); lower BAB and MAD issues mean you don't hit as much or as hard; and good luck Power Attacking. The cool abilities are replaceable by magic items. Your own defenses actually end up costing more than they otherwise would, if you sit down and figure it out. So when you take that all together, not only does the class not rock as much as you thought it would, or as much as it really should - but it's actually pretty terrible. I can't think of any other class (except Truenamer) where the reality failed to meet the expectations that badly. I think that gulf between reality and expectations, that sense of disappointment, is another big reason why Monks have such a bad rep.

[Heliomance]

Try that again with maths. Show me how a monk is a superior combatant to a CW samurai or a Paladin fighting non-evil enemies. Show me how a melee class with bad AC, BaB, HP and weapon choices "catches up" to to those other classes, bearing in mind that Samurai and Paladin, themselves, suck.

If you can do that, then we can talk about the real melee classes. Things like Barbarian, Totemist, Warblade, Crusader, Swordsage, Wildshape Ranger, etc....

I really can't be bothered to do the mathscrafting on the matter. That wasn't my point, anyway. I am fully aware that, by the numbers, the monk is inferior. I know the numbers. I know the arguments. But the proof of the pudding is in the tasting, or in this case, in play. And in actual play, every monk I have ever seen or heard of has been a valuable member of the party, has contributed meaningfully, has been just as good at killing things as anyone else. I'm actually more interested in hearing other people's experiences.

The maths has been done over and over again. There's nothing new to be said there. I want to know if, in play, what people experience is the same as what the numbers predict. Have you seen monks being played? Have they worked? Have they not? Have you played a monk yourself? How did it go? Because I suspect that you'll find that the majority of monks people have seen in real play have been viable and useful. How much of that is down to player skill, or DMs being nice, or theorycrafting simply not having a good enough model of real play, I don't know. But I'm more interested in your stories and experiences than your sums and comparisons.

EDIT:
At least in my case, the answer lies in bitter experience. I played a Monk, 1-20, in a Shackled City campaign way back in the day. He ended up being one of my favorite characters to roleplay, but the absolute weakest in terms of combat.


This is the type of thing I want to hear. Actual experience from a real playgroup. More of this please.

[elvengunner69]

Just my opinion but all the uber optimization of classes feels like typing in a cheat code if it was a video game...to me it's fun playing regardless if my class is uber optimized - in fact I think it is more fun if it isn't because it tends to force a little creativity versus absolute pawnage (sic) on baddies.

That said...Druids are awesome. :smallcool:

[Gnaeus]

I really can't be bothered to do the mathscrafting on the matter. That wasn't my point, anyway. I am fully aware that, by the numbers, the monk is inferior. I know the numbers. I know the arguments. But the proof of the pudding is in the tasting, or in this case, in play. And in actual play, every monk I have ever seen or heard of has been a valuable member of the party, has contributed meaningfully, has been just as good at killing things as anyone else. I'm actually more interested in hearing other people's experiences. But I'm more interested in your stories and experiences than your sums and comparisons.

Then your OP was badly written.


So why do monks have the reputation for being one of the worst classes out there? Why, then, are monks regarded as weak in anything other than the highest tiers of optimisation?

Since you know the answer, and you have admitted that you know the answer, I suggest that you start a new thread with a heading like "What are some good stories you have about monks"?

Oh, and I have one. I ran a game where the beatstick player decided to play a monk. He bravely ran into combat, and bravely died. Then, because he was not only a monk, but a level behind, it happened again. And again. Once he was 3 levels behind party average, he gave up monk for a loss.

Now, if I ran that game again, I would probably make the monk better. I would advise a better build, and give more monk specific items. And a monk player would fare better in response. But that doesn't show that monks aren't weak. In fact it would be a direct response to the fact that monks are weak.

[Novawurmson]

When I played a Monk, I enjoyed the roleplaying aspect, but I was significantly weaker than the rest of my party (Wizard, Barbarian, Cleric). The Wizard could summon shadows and drain our enemies' strength, the Cleric was about as proficient in combat as I, plus he had spells, and the Barbarian did ridiculously more damage than I did.

When I DM'ed for a Monk, I had to sit down with him and come up with homebrew feats so that he would be able to contribute meaningfully to the party, but again, he liked the concept of the class and enjoyed roleplaying a Monk.

As a DM, I find Monks make nice bad guys to torment casters with because of their high saves, but I need to use all of my optimization skills to make them a credible threat to the party.

I love the "monk" concept, but I see no reason not to steer a player to Unarmed Swordsage or Psychic Warrior. Pathfinder Monk with multiple synergistic archetypes can work.

[Psyren]

Then your OP was badly written.


Since you know the answer, and you have admitted that you know the answer, I suggest that you start a new thread with a heading like "What are some good stories you have about monks"?

Oh, and I have one. I ran a game where the beatstick player decided to play a monk. He bravely ran into combat, and bravely died. Then, because he was not only a monk, but a level behind, it happened again. And again. Once he was 3 levels behind party average, he gave up monk for a loss.

Now, if I ran that game again, I would probably make the monk better. I would advise a better build, and give more monk specific items. And a monk player would fare better in response. But that doesn't show that monks aren't weak. In fact it would be a direct response to the fact that monks are weak.

I'm really not sure what else the OP wants beyond this.

Even if we get 10 or 20 stories in this thread saying "monks were not bad at my table," ( I mean, we won't, but even if we did), it doesn't change the facts about the class. The theory is there to explain why monk players get the bad results they do, and to allow DMs to identify/repair the parts that need fixing.

[The_Ebolanator]

To contribute to the "how monk managed to work at my table" subject and the "why monk is bad" subject, I'll share my story.

I used to game with a large group of my college friends. This group ran multiple games and multiple campaigns that all of our characters could interchange between, thus creating an entire "world". It was pretty cool. The general consenses was that all characters were gestalt, so it allowed certain things to happen that wouldn't normally happen in a normal game.

Now, as this evolved and separate DMs began to take more creative liberty with their sections, house rules and exceptions started to arise. During these times I played a half-dragon monk on one branch and an amalgamation of ToB and other such insanities on the other. This character was a devestating tier 3 melee engine of death. The reasons why this worked so well was because we would eventually house-rule alternatives to reduce MAD (such as all my ToB classes being based on wis) and because the build allowed me to rock a full BAB. Because of this character, I never experienced a bad monk and therefore, thought monk was actually really good because of my low gear relience.

Now in retrospect, I realize that the reason why this monk worked was because I didn't use the character's monk abilities as much as I used the character's ToB stuff. Subconsiously, I was avoiding the sucky abilities and using the useful ones.

Basically, the monk sucks because in order for it to work as well as it did in this case, I had to used synergized house-rules and ToB material; the actual monk class abilities almost never came into play.

[JaronK]

At low levels of optimization, a Monk often ends up being unable to really hurt the enemies he's supposed to be fighting. At high levels, the casters and such just do so much more that you start to wonder why you're playing.

Responsible groups of course compensate for this by playing the casters in ways that support the party as much as possible while the more experienced Monk player optimizes a lot more than everyone else.

But you can still be accidentally made to feel useless. I've seen someone playing a Monk in a party where the Cleric used Animate Dead (he'd just spotted that spell in the book and thought it would be cool) on a 5 HD Hydra. That Zombie 5 headed Hydra was far better in combat than the Monk, until the DM randomly killed it to rebalance things. But that kind of thing is a serious problem.

JaronK

[Gotterdammerung]

I've read all the threads about why monks are weak. I understand that they can't hold a candle to a well-played wizard. I've even run a fairly high-op all-caster game, so I know what well played casters can do, and how much better they are than non-magical characters.

But the thing is, most people don't play at the optimisation levels that mean the casters obsolete everything. The game I've just finished running was probably the highest optimisation level my gaming society has ever seen, and it was still far short of the ideals espoused by boards like this one. I've seen monks in play a few times, and they've never been useless. There's one in a game I'm in at the moment, and she's the second most reliable damage dealer, after the barbarian (admittedly it's a fairly low op game - other party members are a healbot/buffmonkey bard/cleric, an archer, and me, a wildshape specialist druid with Natural Spell banned). The first campaign I ran also had a monk, and again, he was one of the more consistant damage dealers, invaluable in a fight. And one of the more famous characters played in the society was a VoP monk who was, by all accounts, a combat monster.

So why do monks have the reputation for being one of the worst classes out there? I realise they're not the best, not by a longshot. A wizard has so many more options it's unreal. But using a wizard properly takes dedication and knowhow, and the majority of players don't have that - and don't actually necessarily want to play at that power level anyway. Why, then, are monks regarded as weak in anything other than the highest tiers of optimisation?


Mainly, there are a few inherent flaws with the class that put it behind the curve.

This makes it very easy to make a bad monk. And moderately difficult to make a good one. So when you "ask the audience" you get a large response of "monks suck."

They are very reliant on magic items. This makes them expensive. And limits the cool extemporaneous stuff they can buy.

Many parties lack synergy. Each player makes the character they want to play with little regard to what the other players are doing. And each player does the best they can do on their turn, with little regard to the other players. Notice i did not say ALL parties. I said MANY. In a party that does not work together, they are crap. In a party with synergy, they can be quite awesome.

Synergy of players is often overlooked in TO and the tier system. A tier 1 class in a party of tier 3-5's with great synergy is almost always stronger than a party of tier 1's all trying to take the strongest turns they can take independently of each other.

Another problem is content. When comparing casters to any other class you will see that a large advantage comes from them having around 3 times the book resources.

So in closing, If your GM is loose with the gold and you plan on having plenty to spend then monk is not a bad choice at all.

If your GM allows 3rd party sources for classes behind the curve, you will have fun with monk.

If your party is working together during character building to ensure synergy. And has open communication and brainstorming both in and out of game for the purposes of streamlining the synergy of the party, then you will have a lot of fun with monk.


In my home game based around master specialist, each player is playing one school of magic. A split personality evoker who sometimes is a magic missile specialist mechwarrior and other times is a metamagic nuker, a transmuter who is action economy buffer + debuffer, an abjurer who specializes in severely effective counterspelling against casters and buffer counter vs others, a conjurer who contingency summons fodder and then focuses on party mobility+ dead man zone style battle field control (complete with teleporting enemies back into the deadman zone) and light nuking, and lastly an NPC all seeing eye style diviner who spends his actions in combat buffing the senses of the party and enhancing the power of spells cast by other members. They are 11th lvl now.

The hardest fight this group has had to date was versus 6 scarlet brotherhood monks both at 7thlvl and at 11th lvl.

Now anytime a poster is set on the mission board with the words "Scarlet Brotherhood" on it, they quickly avert their eyes and look for a different poster.

These guys are heavy optimizers with tons of experience and very large and obscure source collections.

I think that speaks volumes to what a monk can do when compared over a whole party instead of just 1 vs 1.

[Vowtz]

And in actual play, every monk I have ever seen or heard of has been a valuable member of the party, has contributed meaningfully, has been just as good at killing things as anyone else.I think the real question should be "what is wrong with the other members of the party?"

[Anarchy_Kanya]

I played a 12th level VoP Monk once. It had huge AC. A decently optimized caster would trash him easily, but overall it did well. Even defeated a horned devil (although a 3e version, I don't know how much weaker it is in comparison to a 3.5 one), solo.

[Lord Ruby34]

Well, here's another piece of personal experience then. My group was playing core, the party was a bard, a fighter, another fighter, and a monk.

The bard healed and buffed the party as best she could, my fighter smacked things, and the other fighter shot things. The monk tried to smack things, but rarely hit, and when she did, he didn't do much damage. Eventually the monk died when we fought the french inquisition (don't ask). The french inquisition, mostly low level fodder with muskets. The monk just didn't have the AC to dodge, or the HP to survive. The player preceded to roll up a paladin next, and that worked quite a bit better.

[NNescio]

I played a 12th level VoP Monk once. It had huge AC. A decently optimized caster would trash him easily, but overall it did well. Even defeated a horned devil (although a 3e version, I don't know how much weaker it is in comparison to a 3.5 one), solo.

Horned devils have flight, at-will teleport, and reach. Plus a DoT, if it wants to kite you.

[GoodbyeSoberDay]

All right, I have some stories.

#1The first time I ever wanted to play a monk was around the beginning of 3.5; before that I had been turned off from monks by a DMPC monk which totally ignored the rules. When I wanted melee in 3.0 I basically stuck to barbarians, so that was my melee benchmark. So I made this core 3.5 monk with 28 pb, and I couldn't get him to be effective at all. His damage was lower than a comparable barbarian, even with two attacks. His to-hit was far lower. The barbarian moved just as fast. His AC was lower. His HP was lower. This was all before rage, even. I dropped that monk and played another barbarian, pronto.
#2I was playing in a short-lived super-railroady campaign. The monk in question was a grappler with some sort of earth feat that let him do more damage in a grapple. Problem was, as a medium-sized dwarf with 16 strength, he couldn't actually grapple anything worthwhile. In the little amount of combat we had before that game dissolved, the player did basically nothing while my wizard and the two clerics held down the fort.
#3My third encounter with monks was a glorious evil campaign where we all worshiped Erythnul (and the monk alignment restriction was houseruled away). Of the six players, I was one of three who had actually made my character on time, so I had to help one person create a TWFer, one person create a Paladin of Slaughter, and one person create... yes... a monk. I was conscripted into crunchetizing these concepts because I was the quickest at it. Because of this, I had some leverage, and I used it to get the DM to agree to some houserules and some minor optimization tricks for the monk.
- He could use and enchant gauntlets that did unarmed damage like his monk progression but also have magical properties. He could use things like INA, SUA, Enlarge Person, etc. to get his fists doing okay damage.
- I didn't optimize the other two too much.
- I was playing a support cleric who used buffs like Recitation and Righteous Wrath to boost all their attacks (those bonuses to hit really help a flurry).
- The only other caster was a sorceress whose main goal in combat was to blast as many mooks with fireball as possible, so she wasn't overshadowing anyone either.
As a group we blended through encounters the DM thought we'd have to run from, and everyone got to shine. Near the end of the campaign, the monk even practically solo'd a much-higher-level cleric, but to be fair it was mostly a support caster who was chucking Flame Strikes at a monk. So yes, monks can contribute with some effort and a cooperative party. This is probably the sort of situation the OP finds himself in. It is a special case. Be grateful.

The only other times I've seen a monk in play were low level PF Zen Archers, which are quite different from a normal monk, so I'll leave it there.

Edit: I think the problem with looking at anecdotal evidence is that there's selection bias going on. Well-organized groups attempt to play at each other's power levels and optimize accordingly. Sure, accidents happen when the Druid flips through the MM2 for cool-looking companions and shapes, but often enough they're smoothed out.

One thing the tier system suggests is that, as long as the higher tier characters aren't playing at or near their potential, the lower tier characters can optimize more than the higher tier characters in order to "catch up" and contribute meaningfully (at least in a niche). This, IMO, happens naturally in some groups. Again, it's a special case.

[Fax Celestis]

The biggest problem with monks isn't their MAD (which is solvable with a lenient DM who'll hand you some extra points, or one who assigns stat arrays to varying tiers, or even with equipment), but with their conflicting and frequently useless class features.

Flurry of Blows requires a full-attack, yet monks are easily the fastest and most mobile class in the game. Generally, they go without armor (so no ACP), havee the speed enhancement, and put points into Tumble. So these two features conflict rather severely: one says "you should skirmish in and out of combat", while the other says "stand still and full attack".

Slow Fall is another class-table-space-filler. Really, they could have given it as one feature and just talked about the progression in the ability. It's not even that useful: you have to be near a wall, which means if someone bull-rushes you off a cliff with something that lets them not follow on a bull-rush (Knockback, brute ring, ring of the ram, couple of maneuvers, the brutal surge property...), you're suddenly 10' away from a wall, and your class feature that is supposed to save you in this instance doesn't function.

Purity of Body is a joke: all of the diseases that matter are supernatural and magical diseases (mummy rot, contagion, ghoul fever...), which this doesn't work against. :smallannoyed:

Wholeness of Body is even more of a joke. 1/day heal $ClassLevel HP? A 750gp wand of lesser vigor is better than this until you hit 12th level. At least Purity of Body works against rats: Wholeness of Body will let you, once a day, pretend that orc barbarian didn't slap you upside the head...accidentally...in a bar.

Abundant Step is okay...or would be, if it was regular teleportation instead of dimension door, and you could use it more than once. Wizards get to teleport 10' as an immediate action 3+INT times a day from first level if you use the right alternate class feature, or take spells like dimension hop and dimension slide.

Diamond Soul is also mediocre: it's a 50% pass chance against evenly leveled opponents, 40% if they have Spell Penetration, 30% if they have Greater Spell Penetration, never mind caster level increases (like the omnipresent orange prism ioun stone--each +1 CL decreases the success rate by 5%). Plus, there's things like assay spell resistance which pretty much make it nonfunctional.

Quivering Palm is too hard to use. At this level, the wizard has weird, wail of the banshee, and finger of death, for starters. All of these are simple saves, with a better DC. Meanwhile the monk has to hit his target to set up the Quivering Palm, and then trigger it afterwards. And while the wizard can use his daily, the poor monk only gets his 1/week.

Timeless Body gives an ability that will never come up in 95% of games: the rest start above 17th level (so the monk advances to venerable for more Wis, but keeps his Str) or go into that nebulous ten-years-later scenario.

Tongue of the Sun and Moon is a slap in the monk's face. Any spellcaster worth his salt has been able to do this for at least ten levels (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/tongues.htm).

Perfect Self is, quite frankly, terrible. The type change means you can no longer benefit from things like enlarge person. The DR is overcome by magic weapons (who doesn't have a magic weapon at 20th? Even magical beasts who have DR/magic get to beat his DR.). The only good things this does is give you proficiency with actual weapons and removes your requirement to eat and sleep--things you could have gotten rid of levels ago with a 2500 gp ring of sustenance.

So, yeah, in my estimation, monks aren't terrible because of their MAD, but because their class features are, by-and-large, garbage. MAYBE it'd be better if you moved Tongue of the Sun and Moon down to second or third level and Timeless Body down to fourth or fifth, to make them relevant (since a game that starts at 6th is common, and it means you can make a venerable human Monk 5 to counteract some of the MAD), replaced Slow Fall with a feather fall SLA usable 1/3 level times per day, removed Flurry of Blows for the Scout's Skirmish progression, gave them the Spring Attack/Bounding Assault/Rapid Blitz feat chain for free at appropriate levels, and made enchanting their primary weapon (their fists) much easier than it is (hell, rob the kensai. That class works), then it might start to be okay.

[Esser-Z]

Well said, Fax.

[The Reverend]

Well....the 4e monk rocks.

My experience with monks in 3.5. I really enjoyed playing them all the way around. Its basically necessary to have access to at Least oriental adventures otherwise feats and etc are thin on the ground and they do need ALOT of optimization.

I like a lot of the homebrew monks, not necessarily the overblown ones and would love to use one in a 3.5 campaign.

As a former and awesome dm said about monks "How can monks not be using a two handed weapon? By the very definition they are using both hands."


It makes sense wizards would have the most stuff and fluff and items...the company is only named WIZARDS of the Coast.

Edit- preach it brother/sister Fax

[Psyren]

Well....the 4e monk rocks.

4e monk is psionic. Psionic Monks rock in general :smalltongue:

PF Monk isn't bad with the right archetypes.

[Qwertystop]

Don't forget about giving them a Good BAB. So obvious you forgot to mention it?

[TroubleBrewing]

Well....the 4e monk rocks.

+1 to this. It's actually my favorite class in 4e, as it's the only one I don't feel the crushing grip of 4e's 'sameness' of everything else.

But yeah, it's Psionic, and as has been stated previously, Psionic monks are cool beans. So no real surprise there.

[Godskook]

So why do monks have the reputation for being one of the worst classes out there? I realise they're not the best, not by a longshot. A wizard has so many more options it's unreal. But using a wizard properly takes dedication and knowhow, and the majority of players don't have that - and don't actually necessarily want to play at that power level anyway. Why, then, are monks regarded as weak in anything other than the highest tiers of optimisation?

In my experience, I've played alongside or ran a campaign for 2 different monks.

In the first case, it was here on these boards, and my party consisted of a Monk, Paladin, Evoker, Cleric, and Myself, a Daggerspell Mage in the making. I joined at level 6. The Monk and Paladin both fancied themselves as 'melee', but the Monk was 2-3 points behind on most relevant d20 rolls(Monk might've had a decent save or two by comparison, but Divine Grace was killing this comparison). In damage, the Paladin was a clear winner with his higher Str score and 2d6 greatsword compared to the monk's piddly d8 unarmed. As the group's skirmish/conjurer type, and well optimized, it was far and away clear that if I wanted to Benign Transposition with one of them, it would be the Paladin if I wanted usefulness and the Monk if I wanted to let someone else take one for the team.

In the second case, it was in the game I'm currently running. The player in question is *NOT* an optimizer, and frequently makes choices that are 'awesome' instead of 'useful'(not that these are always mutually exclusive). His original character was a Warblade, and he loved it. Without any optimization efforts beyond choosing his high stats properly(str/con/int>dex>wis/cha), he did quite well in the party, and felt 'useful'. His monk, well, that lasted about a session before he called and asked for some non-descript help. Given the player, I decided to sub out for Jiriku's monk rebuild, and haven't had problems since, except some of the other players being a little shocked that there's a useful monk in the party.

[Rejakor]

At level 1, monks aren't that bad, since the d20 roll is far, far more important, especially with beginners. I had someone play a monk in a 1st level game as new players and it went all right, he managed to use his ridiculous saves and a bunch of great rolls to leap through an incredibly trapped room and retrieve the macguffin - a massive green emerald.


Tome Monk is the best monk fix i've seen, but it is designed for Tome, and thus isn't balanced for use in T5, T4 parties.

[The Reverend]

Monk in 3.5 was a requirement for my favorite homebrew prestige class ever.........Spell Puncher. Round house Fireball!!!

[hex0]

I had a great time playing a Monk in very early 3.5 Forgotten Realms. We were level sixteen and I was a Half-Orc (in our games they didn't have an INT penalty and also got a bonus fighter feat). We had a prety high PB and I was allowed to use the Martial Arts Mastery bonus from Oriental Adventures. I had Powerful Build and a focus on Grappling.

Rest of the Party:
-Elf Conjurer (focused on summoning)
-Human Paladin
-Dwarf Fighter/Barbarian/Battle Rager

I just remember grappling the crap out of the Demon boss and it was so damn epic. It was so worth it.

I really don't think they are that horrible. If they could flurry on the move it would be a vast improvement though.

[The Reverend]

There is also a nice feat I believe its in the monster manual. It enlarges the dice size of natural weapons. That feat certainly made a difference in my monk play.

[sonofzeal]

In my first real gaming group, the "common wisdom" was that Monk was one of the best classes in the game.

Then someone tried to play one.

He died in the first session.

[Menteith]

Just finished up a campaign that I ran a Monk in, and had fun with. The setting was low fantasy, with magic being very, very rare, and a society terrified by it that would kill any caster on sight and had specialized institutions focused on tracking them down. Players had to have an in game way to learn new feats and spells, which removed a huge amount of built optimization. It was a low power campaign, but certainly enjoyable.

[arguskos]

In my first real gaming group, the "common wisdom" was that Monk was one of the best classes in the game.

Then someone tried to play one.

He died in the first session.
That was the same in one of my early gaming groups. Then we actually played with a few and watched them die like bitches. We stopped playing with monks. Later, I wrote a good monk.

Now, in a game where I'm running said good monk, the party is consistently impressed that I'm doing something useful, cause, you know, monk. :smallcool:

[Heatwizard]

Just because you see a Monk who is doing well doesn't mean the class isn't bad. You can be a Monk, and you can succeed at things. You can do these at the same time, if you want to. But you can find success as a Commoner 20 as well, if you play smart; that's not the class being effective, it's the guy in the driver's seat.

[Dragonsoul]

Monk is awesome! I mean a 2 level Prestige class is really weird, but hey! Two feats, Evasion good saves-What's not to love?

[Killer Angel]

This is the type of thing I want to hear. Actual experience from a real playgroup. More of this please.

OK, you will be served.
I played in a campaign almost monk-centered (a group of evil monk vampires was one of the main BBEG), with a low opt. group (there was a sorcerer with almost only fire spells and no matamegic feats... my dual fighting style ranger, was one of the best and more effective characters.).
One PC was a monk and she was given many advantages above the rest of the party (special equipment, and so on) and still the monk was, by far, the most useless PC. Build to fight in melee, she hit very rarely and with pityful damage, and she ended dying more than all the other PCs put togheter.

[Venger]

fax more or less summed it up. there's not very much I can add to that.

OP, I do understand your point, that when compared to TO tier 1s, the monk falls behind, but so does existence itself, since those are the meteor-chuckers and sun-creators. however, what the others are saying and what I'm agreeing with for the most part is that the monk can be made to feel somewhat redundant even if no one is resorting to these extreme measures largely because the monk's (intended) primary role is melee damage and he isn't very good at it.

that said, I've got a monk in a game that I'm playing in right now. he asked me to help him roll a power ranger luchador and I helped him build an uber grappler, gave him jotunbrud, and introduced him to the joys of pyrokineticist to boost his pissant unarmed damage from monk5. I'm a cleric/malconvoker with the transformation domain and always prepare enlarge person so he can grapple as a huge character and (essentially) automatically deal unarmed grapple damage (monk fist +2d6fire) as long as he can maintain grapples, which is pretty much indefinitely while I spam summons. we were able to demolish a level 12 DMPC with multiple levels of D&Dwiki's dashing swordsman who broke every rule :smallfurious: in 2 rounds with this combination. we were level 4.

monks can definitely be fun, but I wouldn't advise using them outside of a very low-op game (rest of the party is low T3 and below) or else you will feel useless and everyone else will feel guilty.

our party's a paladin (T5), knight(T5), druid (T1 normally) who doesn't know how to cast spells (OOC, not IC), and a beguiler (T3 normally) who doesn't know how to cast spells (OOC) I essentially rolled cleric (T1 normally) so we would have a caster

I pretty much only use summons so no one feels useless and mainly focus on buffing the monk to turn him into 360 degrees of punch. everyone's happy.


Monk is awesome! I mean a 2 level Prestige class is really weird, but hey! Two feats, Evasion good saves-What's not to love?

gotta love that there's no prereqs other than a lawful alignment too :smalltongue:

[Keegan__D]

I see a lot of text to say that the monk is a Jack of all Trades that has no concept of functioning.

[Ossian]

My 2 cents: very often my players are in situations where

a) Open display of magical abilities is pretty dangerous
b) City adventures - walking around donning 40 kg of shining steel with a zweihander strapped on your back is VERY uncool and they don t invite you to party
c) There are legal issues with killing other people (but with fists and kicks is a whole different story)
d) You need to be able to do all of the above and at the same time have some recon abilities (stealth, spot, sense)

For all of the above, and for the fact that they choose to go with their bare knuckles against dragons and trolls, I think monks are pretty cool.

Besides, with a few PrC classes in oriental Adventures or Complete Warrior, they can be really fun to play!

[sonofzeal]

I see a lot of text to say that the monk is a Jack of all Trades that has no concept of functioning.
No. Bard is a Jack of All Trades. So is Factotum. Heck, Druid is too, after a sort.

Monk is a Jack of No Trades. Or one trade - surviving. Monks are pretty good at surviving as long as they aren't trying to actually fight anything in melee. But the fundamental Monk problem is that they're bad at everything. They're not completely hopeless, a competent monk is still able to contribute to the party if played well, but lacking any real strength does not make you a JoAT. Any area they can compete in, they can be reliably out-performed by other characters operating outside their main strength.

Paladins are melee/tanks, but can out-diplomance Monk. Druids are melee/spellcasters, but can out-scout Monk. Rogues are skillmonkeys, and Rangers are scout, but both can out-fight Monks.

That he can do all of those at the same time does not make him a JoAT. You have to be at least competent at a lot of things to earn that title.

[Godskook]

My 2 cents: very often my players are in situations where

a) Open display of magical abilities is pretty dangerous

-Wizards get silent/still spell just fine
-Monks get dimension door, which is going to be fairly blatantly magical


b) City adventures - walking around donning 40 kg of shining steel with a zweihander strapped on your back is VERY uncool and they don t invite you to party

-This is more a concern for fighters, warblades and similar, while wizards do just fine to simply don their scholar's hat and walk around with their books all day.
-Most of the Monk+ options are just as capable of walking around without obvious gold on them.


c) There are legal issues with killing other people (but with fists and kicks is a whole different story)

-Monk+ options(like swordsage, tash, and fists) hit with their fists just fine, often harder than the monk without any extra effort.


d) You need to be able to do all of the above and at the same time have some recon abilities (stealth, spot, sense)

-Swordsage can do it all, but I must add that you're putting on a lot of restrictions for PCs, which normally amount to murderous hobos, and if not, at least amount to powerful mercenaries and/or privateers.

[Fax Celestis]

That he can do all of those at the same time does not make him a JoAT. You have to be at least competent at a lot of things to earn that title.

So he's, what, a Ten of All Trades?

[TroubleBrewing]

So he's, what, a Ten of All Trades?

Nah. He's a Friend of Actual, Real Tiers.

[Tyndmyr]

So why do monks have the reputation for being one of the worst classes out there? I realise they're not the best, not by a longshot. A wizard has so many more options it's unreal. But using a wizard properly takes dedication and knowhow, and the majority of players don't have that - and don't actually necessarily want to play at that power level anyway. Why, then, are monks regarded as weak in anything other than the highest tiers of optimisation?

Because at low levels of optimization, they get outclassed by meleers who are actually good at their role, hitting things.

See, inaccurate, lots'o'attacks builds like flurrying monks or dual wielders are aright at killing lots of low level things. Stuff well below their CR. Punch em all, watch em die. Thing is, those sorts of fights are rarely the dangerous ones.

No, the boss fights tend to have better AC or other defenses and tend to be at or above party level. In these, the guys who hit reliably, and do solid damage when they do, do all the heavy lifting. Monks contribute very poorly to such fights, even at fairly low op levels compared to, say, the barbarian.

[Doug Lampert]

Because at low levels of optimization, they get outclassed by meleers who are actually good at their role, hitting things.

See, inaccurate, lots'o'attacks builds like flurrying monks or dual wielders are aright at killing lots of low level things. Stuff well below their CR. Punch em all, watch em die. Thing is, those sorts of fights are rarely the dangerous ones.

No, the boss fights tend to have better AC or other defenses and tend to be at or above party level. In these, the guys who hit reliably, and do solid damage when they do, do all the heavy lifting. Monks contribute very poorly to such fights, even at fairly low op levels compared to, say, the barbarian.

And if your campaign DOES center completely arround killing large numbers of weak opponents then the monk is still FAR weaker than a real melee class with Great Cleave (normally a very subpar feat) or a Druid.

Seriously, Great Cleave lets you move and then kill 3+ mooks. Monk needs to start his turn surrounded to have any hope of doing that, and even then, he's not really very good at it. (Nor is he good at surviving while being surrounded by a horde of weak foes.)

[Menteith]

Monks have a decent skill selection, an "alright" idea behind Flurry of Blows that didn't pan out as it has no synergy with a high movement class, and a series of disconnected, strange ideas in the place of class abilities (Tongue of Sun and Moon and Timeless Body are level 17 abilities? One of your level 20 abilities is inferior to Feather Fall, and the other one makes it impossible to be buffed effectively and gives you a pointless damage reduction for that level.)

A homebrew rule that's worked out alright for my group (at least in low power/low-mid level games) has been to give Monks the option of taking Spring Attack or Sidestep at level 5, allowing Flurry of Blows to be used as a standard action at level 6. Still a weak class, but at least they can try to run around and stun vulnerable targets without getting torn apart by actual melee classes.