Monk: multiple rules clarifications

[HurinTheCursed]

Hello fellow players,

I'd like to get some clarifications before I try to help a member of my group who WANTS a S10 L20 monk with 2 level adjustements and a few dead feats. I probably have too many questions to put them all in the Q&A at once or to keep spamming it with my questions one by one.

Flurry of Blows (Ex)
When unarmored, a monk may strike with a flurry of blows at the expense of accuracy. When doing so, she may make one extra attack in a round at her highest base attack bonus, but this attack takes a -2 penalty, as does each other attack made that round. The resulting modified base attack bonuses are shown in the Flurry of Blows Attack Bonus column on Table: The Monk. This penalty applies for 1 round, so it also affects attacks of opportunity the monk might make before her next action. When a monk reaches 5th level, the penalty lessens to -1, and at 9th level it disappears. A monk must use a full attack action to strike with a flurry of blows.

When using flurry of blows, a monk may attack only with unarmed strikes or with special monk weapons (kama, nunchaku, quarterstaff, sai, shuriken, and siangham). She may attack with unarmed strikes and special monk weapons interchangeably as desired. When using weapons as part of a flurry of blows, a monk applies her Strength bonus (not Str bonus × 1½ or ×½) to her damage rolls for all successful attacks, whether she wields a weapon in one or both hands. The monk can’t use any weapon other than a special monk weapon as part of a flurry of blows.
Decisive Strike (Ex)
If you select this class feature, you do not gain flurry of blows (or any later improvements to that class feature.)

Benefit: As a full-round action, make one attack with an unarmed strike or special monk weapon, using your highest base attack roll but taking a -2 on this attack roll. If the attack hits, it deals double damage (as does any other attack you make before the start of your next turn). If you use this strike to deliver a stunning attack, increase the save DC to resist the stun by 2.
Holy Strike (Su)
Replaces: This benefit replaces the ki strike (magic) class feature.
Benefit: When you hit an evil creature with your unarmed I strike attack or with a monk melee weapon, your attack is considered good-aligned for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction and deals an extra ld6 points of damage.
Snap Kick
When you make a melee attack with one or more melee weapons (including a standard attack, full attack, or even a strike maneuver), you can make an additional attack at your highest attack bonus. This attack is an unarmed attack that deals damage equal to your base unarmed attack damage + 1/2 your Str bonus. You take a -2 penalry on all attack rolls you make this round.

1) If he doesn't have flurry of blows, can a character use the two weapon fighting rules for striking with his fists while holding two weapons or does he have to use a real weapon in his secondary hand ?

2) If he doesn't have flurry of blows, can a character who holds a weapon use his fist for some of his attacks and his weapon, in the same hand, for some others ?

3) Can special attacks (grapple, trip, disarm) be used with snap kick, flurry of blows, decisive strike ?

4) When using decisive strike, what is multiplied if a character holds a +1 holy weapon and have holy strike by exemple ? Same rules as for critical ?
Multiplying Damage
Sometimes you multiply damage by some factor, such as on a critical hit. Roll the damage (with all modifiers) multiple times and total the results. Note: When you multiply damage more than once, each multiplier works off the original, unmultiplied damage.
Exception: Extra damage dice over and above a weapon’s normal damage are never multiplied.

5) Using decisive strike, what is considered base damage for a crit ?

6) If a character tries to disarm an opponent what are the bonuses taken in to account for both of them ? +4 prone, -4 prone, charge, favored ennemy, bane, iterative malus...

Thanks by advance if you contribute to make him more useful by clearing some questions.

[tyckspoon]

1: Unclear, ask your GM. The most restrictive and least-RAW-troublesome answer is no- in order to TWF you need at least two weapons, and Unarmed Strike is only one weapon. (I favor saying yes, you can TWF with just one unarmed strike if you're willing to accept the penalties. This creates an exception for Unarmed Strike, but Unarmed Strike is basically *made* of exceptions to other standard weapon rules already, so whatever. Just be aware that this is not definitively how it works.)

2. No, you can't Unarmed Strike with a limb/hand that is occupied holding something (unless you drop the weapon before you start making the Unarmed Strikes. Usually not a good idea.) However, you can still attack in the fashion you described- Unarmed Strikes are not restricted to being delivered with a hand. Your Unarmed Strike could be an elbow blow, a knee strike, a kick, a headbutt, or any other kind of violent motion with your body; it's very difficult to have your Unarmed Strike be 'occupied' in such a fashion that you can't attack with one.

3. Yes, anything that says 'as a melee attack' or 'you can use a melee attack to' can be substituted for any normal attack (contrast with Bull Rush, which says 'as a standard action.' You can attempt a Trip/Disarm/Sunder as any of your Flurry attempts, as your extra Snap Kick attack, as an AoO, or even as your Decisive Strike blow, although the benefit of that last one is limited.

4. Yup, just work it like a critical. Bonus dice don't count, static numeric bonuses do.

5. You'd use the D&D Math(tm) rules for combining multipliers; subtract one from every multiplier after the first and then add all the multipliers together. So a Decisive Strike crit would do x2 (normal crit multiplier for an unarmed strike) + x1 (x2 Decisive Strike - 1 stacking multiplier math) = x3 damage.

Note those rules only apply to game-rule numbers for damage and healing and things like that; if you're dealing with what would be a real world quantity- a weight or a distance or just a number of actual things- then 2x2 = 4 like you would expect it to.

[Pickford]

Hello fellow players,

I'd like to get some clarifications before I try to help a member of my group who WANTS a S10 L20 monk with 2 level adjustements and a few dead feats. I probably have too many questions to put them all in the Q&A at once or to keep spamming it with my questions one by one.

Flurry of Blows (Ex)
When unarmored, a monk may strike with a flurry of blows at the expense of accuracy. When doing so, she may make one extra attack in a round at her highest base attack bonus, but this attack takes a -2 penalty, as does each other attack made that round. The resulting modified base attack bonuses are shown in the Flurry of Blows Attack Bonus column on Table: The Monk. This penalty applies for 1 round, so it also affects attacks of opportunity the monk might make before her next action. When a monk reaches 5th level, the penalty lessens to -1, and at 9th level it disappears. A monk must use a full attack action to strike with a flurry of blows.

When using flurry of blows, a monk may attack only with unarmed strikes or with special monk weapons (kama, nunchaku, quarterstaff, sai, shuriken, and siangham). She may attack with unarmed strikes and special monk weapons interchangeably as desired. When using weapons as part of a flurry of blows, a monk applies her Strength bonus (not Str bonus × 1½ or ×½) to her damage rolls for all successful attacks, whether she wields a weapon in one or both hands. The monk can’t use any weapon other than a special monk weapon as part of a flurry of blows.
Decisive Strike (Ex)
If you select this class feature, you do not gain flurry of blows (or any later improvements to that class feature.)

Benefit: As a full-round action, make one attack with an unarmed strike or special monk weapon, using your highest base attack roll but taking a -2 on this attack roll. If the attack hits, it deals double damage (as does any other attack you make before the start of your next turn). If you use this strike to deliver a stunning attack, increase the save DC to resist the stun by 2.
Holy Strike (Su)
Replaces: This benefit replaces the ki strike (magic) class feature.
Benefit: When you hit an evil creature with your unarmed I strike attack or with a monk melee weapon, your attack is considered good-aligned for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction and deals an extra ld6 points of damage.
Snap Kick
When you make a melee attack with one or more melee weapons (including a standard attack, full attack, or even a strike maneuver), you can make an additional attack at your highest attack bonus. This attack is an unarmed attack that deals damage equal to your base unarmed attack damage + 1/2 your Str bonus. You take a -2 penalry on all attack rolls you make this round.

1) If he doesn't have flurry of blows, can a character use the two weapon fighting rules for striking with his fists while holding two weapons or does he have to use a real weapon in his secondary hand ?

2) If he doesn't have flurry of blows, can a character who holds a weapon use his fist for some of his attacks and his weapon, in the same hand, for some others ?

3) Can special attacks (grapple, trip, disarm) be used with snap kick, flurry of blows, decisive strike ?

4) When using decisive strike, what is multiplied if a character holds a +1 holy weapon and have holy strike by exemple ? Same rules as for critical ?
Multiplying Damage
Sometimes you multiply damage by some factor, such as on a critical hit. Roll the damage (with all modifiers) multiple times and total the results. Note: When you multiply damage more than once, each multiplier works off the original, unmultiplied damage.
Exception: Extra damage dice over and above a weapon’s normal damage are never multiplied.

5) Using decisive strike, what is considered base damage for a crit ?

6) If a character tries to disarm an opponent what are the bonuses taken in to account for both of them ? +4 prone, -4 prone, charge, favored ennemy, bane, iterative malus...

Thanks by advance if you contribute to make him more useful by clearing some questions.

1) TWF always requires a second weapon. Flurry of Blows is not TWF. That is to say: TWF and Flurry of Blows stack for extra attacks. (Indeed, it's possible to stack TWF, Flurry, and Rapid Shot.)

2) Fists holding things can't be used to hit, unarmed strikes are made with any part of the body so even if the character was holding two items they could use flurry of blows or unarmed strike. Remember, unarmed strikes are attacks made without a weapon.

3) Yes, those are attacks, the feats/abilities you mention simply give additional attacks.

4) The weapon deals double damage. If additional damage does not normally get multiplied, this wouldn't do that either. (i.e. additional dice don't get multiplied)

5) Crit damage would be twice the double damage (so, x4)

6) Answered on PHB pg. 155 under the disarm section. Any attack roll modifiers apply in addition to those listed. A monk wielding a quarterstaff 2h would get a +4 on their roll, a sai +0 (+4 cancels out the -4 for light weapon), nunchaku -2 (+2 and -4 for light weapon). This may seem odd, but it allows the monk to disarm wielding a light weapon at basically no penalty for the sai's. Given that the bonuses just said disarm while wielding these items, there's no actual restriction on wielding a two sai's and getting a +8 total bonus.

[HurinTheCursed]

Thanks to both of you for your answer.
5) Seems still discuted but it looks like it could be an exception to the usual double double = triple

Anyway, the monk player botched his RP and since he had trouble contributing to the party, he prefered changing PC. I didn't even have a chance to show him some improvements possible.