Bypassing fighter feat prerequisites as a monk?

[S_Grey]

Just a few days ago I was reviewing some monk stuff in Dragon310 and noticed something interesting.

There's a variant called "Martial Monk" that exchanges 1 skillpoint/level with the ability to pick monk bonus feats from the fighter bonus feat list. ("Gain: Fighter bonus feat list to choose monk bonus feats (at 1st, 2nd, and 6th")

Obviously this is only interesting because it doesn't say anything about needing the prerequisites for these feats taken in the variant and the default for monk feats states that a character need not have the prerequisites in order to benefit from the feats taken at 1, 2, and 6.

What do you think?

[Phelix-Mu]

Yes, it's pretty widely known that this is a good way to boost the melee power of a monk by a good bit, by ignoring feat pre-reqs and taking some fighter stuff earlier than normal.

Sadly, without dipping into epic feats, the power boost from high-level fighter feats isn't that impressive later in the game. So it's a rather front-loaded boost.

It can rather markedly improve the utility of Monk1-2 level dips for builds, though. Which is about 90% of what monk constitutes on the forum, aside from Tippy's rather awesome challenge (the cosmic monk thanks Tippy for redeeming his reputation).

[Jigokuro]

Martial Monk is an optimizing staple. It is a great way to get things like Shock Trooper early.
Your thoughts are correct, but not new. :/

Edit: Swordsage'd :smallsigh:

[Karnith]

This is a relatively well-known trick, and yes, it does let you ignore feat pre-reqs entirely. Epic feats can be a lot of fun, and getting things like Weapon Supremacy is nice as well.

EDIT: Swordsage'd.

[Emperor Tippy]

For extra fun, Infinite Deflection and Exceptional Deflection are Fighter Bonus Feats.

An Epic Fighter is still a fighter and those feats are then on the Fighter Bonus Feat list.

How would you like a one level dip of Martial Monk to get Perfect Two Weapon Fighting? It actually makes TWF good.

And two levels of Monk to become immune to all ranged attacks is great.

Without epic feats though it is just moderately nice.

[S_Grey]

How often is something like this actually allowed in a game?

Nevermind. I forgot where I was for a second there.

[Phelix-Mu]

Actually, it's pretty kosher. A DM might sensibly deny access to epic feats as a condition of allowing it, but, eh, even with them, ranged attack immunity is hardly the end of the game.

A monk of mine is currently using it in an irl game. It's a pretty high-op epic game, but if our DM was running any kind of game and had green-lighted Dragon Magz, then I think he'd probably allow it.