Help with some monk changes 3.5

[Santra]

So me and my DM were talking about ways to make the Tier 5 classes a bit more enticing and we wanted your opinion on what we came up with so far. I was hoping to get the input of the playground on how this would effect the monk or multiclassing with monk.

Bonus Feat
At level 1 you get Intuitive attack as a bonus feat even if he does not meet the prerequisites

Intuitive Attack
( Book of Exalted Deeds, p. 44)
[Exalted, Fighter Bonus Feat]
You fight by faith more than brute strength.
Prerequisite - Base attack bonus +1,

Benefit
With a simple weapon of your size or a natural weapon, you may use your Wisdom modifier instead of your Strength modifier on attack rolls.
Special - A fighter may select Intuitive Attack as one of his fighter bonus feats.


Incredible Speed (Ex)
Starting at level 4 you gain the ability to move a distance up to your Unarmored speed bonus and still use your flurry of blows. This movement may be made used before during or after the attack. A five foot step counts as part of this movement.

Pinpoint Strikes (Ex)
At 8th level a monk may declare all his flurry of blows attacks against a single target. If he does resolve all the attack rolls normally but add the damage of each attack together before applying Damage Resistance. He may do this once per day at level 8, 2/day at 12, 3/day at 16, and 4/day at 20

Improved FoB (Ex)
At level 13 a monk gains a bonus +1 to all attack rolls they make with their flurry of blows. This bonus increases again at 17 by another +1 to a total of +2. This bonus applies for 1 round, so it also affects attacks of opportunity the monk might make before her next action.

Sight Unclouded (Su)
At level 14 a monk gains the ability to see things as they truly are. He is considered to have True Sight as the spell. He may activate ore deactivate this ability as a move action.

Dojo (Su)
At level 18 a monk gains the ability to declare a specific place his Dojo. After spending a week in uninterrupted mediation he becomes spiritually bound to a location. Afterwards time spent in his dojo is physically and spiritually refreshing. He may spend another 24 hours in meditation in his dojo at any time. If he does he is constantly under the effect of a Regenerate spell while he remains in his Dojo. In addition a monk automatically succeeds on fortitude saves to prevent level loss due to negative levels while in their dojo. A monk may spend a week in mediation to restore a level lost to energy drain.

A monk may only have one Dojo at a time but he may change his Dojo at any time by spending a week in mediation at the new location. A monk knows instantly if his dojo has been destroyed.

Eternal Body (Su)
At level 20 a monk who is dies may choose to be reincarnated into a new form (as the spell True Reincarnate). If he does his body turns to dust and his new body is formed in his Dojo. but any equipment he carried remains behind. A Monk may use this ability up to 1 year after his death. After which point his soul has lost its connection to the material plane. If he has no Dojo (such as if he never bound himself to one or if it was destroyed) he loses the use of this ability until he establishes a connection to one.

The monk would stay the same other than what is listed above with the exception of them losing Perfect Self at lvl 20 in favor of Eternal body.

[rockdeworld]

Whenever someone says "monk fix," I feel I must bring up Frank&K's Tome Monk (http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/Monk,_Tome_(3.5e_Class)).

Now onto your ideas:
Bonus Feat: It's always good to reduce MAD, so thumbs up.
Incredible Speed: I wouldn't even wait until level 4 to give this to a monk, it's necessary from level 1. Then remove "a distance up to your unarmored speed bonus" and it's gold. Monks need a way to use both their speed bonus and their flurry of blows, if they're going to have both.
Pinpoint strikes: I hate that it's only 1/day at level 8, because I think 1/day is just not enough for any ability (unless it's wildly level inappropriate, and this isn't). And 2/day is silly. I'd just make it 3/day at level 8, and at will at level 12 (when nigh on everything has DR).
Improved Flurry of Blows: +1 is negligible, but it's nice that you're continuing the progression. To affect epic monks, though, you'd have to edit this into regular Flurry of Blows.
Sight Unclouded: Very good.
Dojo: Useless at level 18, when regeneration is cheap (if the campaign lasts that long).
Unkillable body: It's fine, but since it's level 20, it'll probably only see play on a BBEG.

In short: The first two abilities really help synergize the class, so good job on that front. I still don't see any reason to take the class beyond levels 2 or 6 though - the monk still doesn't have good BAB, and it still doesn't deal a lot of damage. Just off the top of my head, I'd rate this high tier 5, maaaybe tier 4.

[Godskook]

So me and my DM were talking about ways to make the Tier 5 classes a bit more enticing and we wanted your opinion on what we came up with so far. I was hoping to get the input of the playground on how this would effect the monk or multiclassing with monk.

I reccomend Jiriku's monk fix (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=150122). Its slightly high-powered compared to low-optimization or primarily low-tiered options, but if you're staying tier 3 or better, it fits in alright, unless you power-game the class too hard(the x-to-y abilities are a little too strong for when you get them if you're only dipping, but work just fine if you invest heavily in the class).


Bonus Feat
At level 1 you get Intuitive attack as a bonus feat even if he does not meet the prerequisites


A good start.


Incredible Speed (Ex)
Starting at level 4 you gain the ability to move a distance up to your Unarmored speed bonus and still use your flurry of blows. This movement may be made used before during or after the attack. A five foot step counts as part of this movement.

Simple wording: Flurry of Blows is a now a standard action.

All your caveats go away, cause the rules already cover them(unless you're wanting to deny synergy with things like Belt of Battle).


Pinpoint Strikes (Ex)
At 8th level a monk may declare all his flurry of blows attacks against a single target. If he does resolve all the attack rolls normally but add the damage of each attack together before applying Damage Resistance. He may do this once per day at level 8, 2/day at 12, 3/day at 16, and 4/day at 20

This is....alright, I guess. I'd make it at least once per enemy per fight, as the ability is rather lackluster most of the time, so the higher access will mostly serve to make the player feel awesome, rather than add significant power. But when he's going against someone with 15/-, its still only as potent as you intended.


Improved FoB (Ex)
At level 13 a monk gains a bonus +1 to all attack rolls they make with their flurry of blows. This bonus increases again at 17 by another +1 to a total of +2. This bonus applies for 1 round, so it also affects attacks of opportunity the monk might make before her next action.

Small flat numeric bonuses are normally rather lackluster as class abilities.


Sight Unclouded (Su)
At level 14 a monk gains the ability to see things as they truly are. He is considered to have True Sight as the spell. He may activate ore deactivate this ability as a move action.

Decent, but its really not a big game changer.


Dojo (Su)
At level 18 a monk gains the ability to declare a specific place his Dojo. After spending a week in uninterrupted mediation he becomes spiritually bound to a location. Afterwards time spent in his dojo is physically and spiritually refreshing. He may spend another 24 hours in meditation in his dojo at any time. If he does he is constantly under the effect of a Regenerate spell while he remains in his Dojo. In addition a monk automatically succeeds on fortitude saves to prevent level loss due to negative levels while in their dojo. A monk may spend a week in mediation to restore a level lost to energy drain.

A monk may only have one Dojo at a time but he may change his Dojo at any time by spending a week in mediation at the new location. A monk knows instantly if his dojo has been destroyed.

This should both come online earlier and with some upgrades. Its an awesome idea, though.


Eternal Body (Su)
At level 20 a monk who is dies may choose to be reincarnated into a new form (as the spell True Reincarnate). If he does his body turns to dust and his new body is formed in his Dojo. but any equipment he carried remains behind. A Monk may use this ability up to 1 year after his death. After which point his soul has lost its connection to the material plane. If he has no Dojo (such as if he never bound himself to one or if it was destroyed) he loses the use of this ability until he establishes a connection to one.

Needs cooldowns and level-loss, and it should otherwise be fine, I think.

[Santra]

I had suggested that flurry of blows become a standard action but he was against it. I will see about trying to talk him into it. As for pinpoint strikes I only suggested an X per day on it at all because I was not sure how good it would be. Improved FoB was added to continue the bonus progression and counter out the negatives of snap kick should it be taken. As for dojo what level would you suggest it be switched to and what upgrades for it would you suggest. We had tossed back and forth if a Dojo should give you the ability to enchant your unarmed strikes but we didn't want to just copy the Kensai class ability. As for Eternal body we did that because we both hated Perfect Self and wanted something a bit more flavorful. He decided that monks should be like a lich but keyed to a certain place.

Also I have asked and asked but he refuses to give monks full BAB

[rockdeworld]

You could tell him the game is actually more balanced if everyone is allowed to full-attack as a standard action. No full-BAB either? I guess he's a believer that martial characters can't have nice things. Nothing you can do about that, except not play a monk.

Also: It seems to me that you should never build a class with options like feats in mind (except the fighter). It's just leads to arguments about how good the class is because it can take those feats/items/spells and do [x]. Like how the bard is a terrific class because you can take Dragonfire Inspiration (no, Dragonfire Inspiration is a good option for the class). Or more accurately: most discussions about the monk class.

And lastly, does your DM actually expect someone to take and get to monk 20? And how long will the campaign actually last beyond that point? I ask because I don't know of many cases where it actually matters what the class's capstone is.

[PurpleSocks]

Personally I wouldn't have the bonus feat in the first two levels, but thats only because a two level monk dip already gives you +3 to all saves, evasion, unarmed strike, wisdom to AC, flurry of blows and two bonus feats.

The last thing you wan't to do is tweak your monk so that you can actually compete with the tier 1's in your party and to then have the party Druid take a dip in your class to take what is arguably your classes best features.

[Santra]

You could tell him the game is actually more balanced if everyone is allowed to full-attack as a standard action. No full-BAB either? I guess he's a believer that martial characters can't have nice things.

Also: It seems to me that you should never build a class with options like feats in mind (except the fighter). It's just leads to arguments about how good the class is because it can take those feats and do [x]. Like how the bard is a terrific class because you can take Dragonfire Inspiration (no, Dragonfire Inspiration is a good option for the class).

And lastly, does your DM actually expect someone to take and get to monk 20? And how long will the campaign actually last beyond that point?
Under another DM we hit 25 before we stopped playing and he intends to run his campaign until epic levels if everyone else is up for it. Its not that he hates melee classes. He says that full BaB should be reserved for a select few classes and Monk is not one of them.

[rockdeworld]

Under another DM we hit 25 before we stopped playing and he intends to run his campaign until epic levels if everyone else is up for it. Its not that he hates melee classes. He says that full BaB should be reserved for a select few classes and Monk is not one of them.
Cool. If you can make the monk class something you want to take, more power to you.

As for full BAB: I'm curious what his criteria are for those classes. I can't think of a single one that would both cover all the classes that have full BAB and also disqualify monk.

[Pechvarry]

No full-BAB either? I guess he's a believer that martial characters can't have nice things. Nothing you can do about that, except not play a monk.

That's... Hyperbolic. Don't mistake the wrongness of clerics getting partial bab with the inter-balance of melee classes (that direction lies the ridiculousness of 2k damage charge attacks considers underpowered). I like rogues to have partial bab, and so I like monks partial as well. This is why I love jiriku's monk.

@op: pinpoint strikes doesn't even need uses/day or even uses/encounter. Just make the stipulation that all attacks are against the same opponent.

[rockdeworld]

That's... Hyperbolic. Don't mistake the wrongness of clerics getting partial bab with the inter-balance of melee classes
It's only exaggerated in the sense that I put "full BAB" in the "nice things" category, since class abilities, or spells, are certainly better. Being able to do hit your opponent for some kind of substantial damage is one of the well-known problems of the monk.

I don't understand what you mean about clerics (or inter-balance of melee classes, for another matter). It seems to me that there's nothing wrong with giving them 3/4 BAB.

[Pechvarry]

I just mean people get so hung up on "melee vs caster" that they tend to overlook the imbalance within melee, such as spiked chain vs sword/shield or 2-handed vs 2 weapons. I don't like homogenization of all melee classes just to help give them a leg up. Having fighters with consistently high attack bonuses, monks a bit lower but with bonus attacks, rogues needing positioning but offset with very high damage potential -- this is a decent goal (not to say it was executed well). Clerics having roughly the same melee potential, and then the divine power spell, skew this. Which makes people think they need full bab on everything else.

[Alienist]

You could tell him the game is actually more balanced if everyone is allowed to full-attack as a standard action.


Better would be a small amount of movement as a swift action.
Oh look, the Monk gets a small amount of movement as a class feature. Put the two together.




No full-BAB either? I guess he's a believer that martial characters can't have nice things. Nothing you can do about that, except not play a monk.


Hitting stuff is not nice things.

Making the Monk better at hitting things, or giving it more attacks simply makes the fighter jealous.

But people say to themselves "What does the Monk do? He punches things!". Making the Monk better at punching things simply makes it sink deeper and deeper into tier 5. The Warblade is not Tier 3 because he can do +100 damage on a single attack, the Warblade is tier 3 because he can do stuff above and beyond attacking things. The Monk is tier 5 because his solution to everything is to punch things, because that's the only solution his class gives him.

Yet again Flurry of Blows distorts the whole discussion. I hate that feature so much, because it prevents anybody from doing anything genuinely interesting with the monk class because everybody is so terrified that the fighter is going to be overshadowed.

People need to wake up and smell the magic. Anything that is based around melee is going to be inherently limited, because people are terrified of breaking that +20/+15+/10+5 mold.

[Gavinfoxx]

I second using the Tome or Remixed Monk. Show him both.

[Namfuak]

I just mean people get so hung up on "melee vs caster" that they tend to overlook the imbalance within melee, such as spiked chain vs sword/shield or 2-handed vs 2 weapons. I don't like homogenization of all melee classes just to help give them a leg up. Having fighters with consistently high attack bonuses, monks a bit lower but with bonus attacks, rogues needing positioning but offset with very high damage potential -- this is a decent goal (not to say it was executed well). Clerics having roughly the same melee potential, and then the divine power spell, skew this. Which makes people think they need full bab on everything else.

But monks don't make more attacks than a fighter. A fighter that takes 2 weapon fighting gets the same number of attacks as a monk at first, by level 6 has one more attack (and a better chance to hit with all his attacks, including the iterative since it actually exists), and by level 11, when a monk gets her second FoB attack, the same fighter has 3 iteratives and 1-3 TWF attacks (if he's gone straight fighter all this time, he's presumably gone down the whole chain). Even discounting TWF, a fighter equals a monk in attacks (with a better to-hit on his first attack, but I suppose the monk has a slightly better chance of both attacks hitting). The point is, monks don't really get more attacks than fighters, they get the same amount but with a worse chance to actually hit the target.

[Phelix-Mu]

A small comment to the OP, something to make sure of.

Strip all exaltedness away from the bonus feat at first level. All exalted feats are [Su], so just stripping out the alignment requirement probably isn't enough. In case you haven't done it already, just make a general feat that reads exactly the same way. And for the love of Pete, take away the +1 base attack pre-req. Talk about a weird/useless pre-req that only makes the feat unusable to those that it was in part intended for. Just like how they mucked up Weapon Finesse for rogues...sheesh.

I will second the notion that allowing the monk to move something like 1/2 speed as a swift action may work better than flurry as a standard action. Plus, more generally useful, and not to mention that straight monk tends to have little if anything to do with his/her swift actions. Make this movement available from first level.

Also, ameliorate the skills problem with some kind of Wisdom over Brawn (a la factotum) or a scaling bonus to the acrobatics skills. Int is often a dump stat for the non-Carmendine/Kung-Fu Genius monk, which means that the monk ends up sucking at stuff they are supposed to be good at, e.g., Jump, Climb, Balance, Tumple, and possibly Escape Artist (by virtue of not enough skill points). Just make it read like Brains over Brawn, frankly, but Wis-modifier to Str/Dex checks and Str/Dex skill checks.

I am currently working on a much bigger monk tweak/rework designed to hit low tier 3, and it is no small project. Good luck to the OP, and I hope these ideas work out.

[Grim Reader]

I have been considering the following changes to give the monk more combat capable options:

Drop alignment restrictions. I never liked the notion that Barbarians have to be Chaotic anyway. 1 level of Lion Totem Barbarian fixes a lot of Flurrys problems. Although you're going to need Extra Rage.

A Swift Hunter based feat. Stacking Skirmish, AC and unarmed damage from Monk and Scout.

For out of combat, halfcaster psionic power progression.

What do you think?