Monk Fix - Not Homebrew

[Gorfnod]

First I want to get it out there that I have been playing 3/3.5/PF since 2002 and am absolutely embarrassed that this just occurred to me but I have to put it out there. I have a player that wants to play a monk but is well aware that the monk sucks so we were talking about making a homebrew version for PF that could be sweet. So at the time I say, “maybe I will just let you throw some archetypes on for free” and he seemed pretty happy about it. Fast forward to a couple hours later and I am thinking about it a little harder and start to come up with some ideas involving giving the monk more ki points and a bigger list of ki abilities and all of a sudden it just punched me in the face.

THE MONK FIX IS AN UNARMED PSYCHIC WARRIOR.
Power points, nope, refluff that as ki pool. Psionic powers, nope, monk abilities. I called him up and he loved it.

How did I not see it before.....

[DarkSonic1337]

The Tashalatora feat is a nice way to go about it. It's got a prereq of monastic training (psychic class)

Your Psychic class levels (in this case psychic warrior) stack with your monk levels for unarmed damage, flurry of blows attacks, and AC bonus. Monk/Psychic warrior is one of the better unarmed fighter guy builds.

[Captnq]

Well, it's not so much as they suck as you really need to dumpster dive to find what works.

See, the monk has one thing nobody else does.

A normal Improved Unarmed strike guy just has fists.

A Monk has two fists, two feet, two elbows, two knees, and his forehead.

So with a Necklace of natural weaponry (that you can put MULTIPLE weapons in the same amulet) I will give myself:

L. Elbow: +5 Defending, Spellblade (disintegrate), Flying
R. Elbow: +5 Spellstrike, Spellblade (Whatever), Flying
L Knee: Spellblade (Whatever), Flying, Jumping
R Knee: Spellblade (whatever), Flying, smoking,
L Hand: +5 Assassination, Sizing, Viper (Turn my left hand into Huge Snake that does 1d6+1d4+4 damage and DC 19 1d6/1d6 on strike, Flying.


Look I could go on. Notice how I keep buying FLYING over and over? Because each time I do it turns that body part into an animated object. It gets a free attack at BAB 0. Plus I can order my body to do things when I'm out cold or dead like, "Find a cleric".

Everytime I buy spellblade I am immune to a new spell. I can be immune rp to 9 spells. I can have 9 BAB 0 attacks on top of my monk attacks.

BTW, with my bracers of striking I'm going to buy speed, off-hand attack, raking, and serpent tooth.

Needless to say, you need to slowly build up to it, but over time you can have like, 13 extra attacks with your magic items, get TWF, get some ward cestus, layer things and you got a potential for upwards of +43 enhancement bonuses and weapon special abilities layered into two different fists who punch like 40 times a round. I don't care what your AC is, I'm gonna roll that natural 20 sooner or later. Most likely sooner.

And there is an argument that each "flying" body would each get 1 AoO a round should any one provoke an AoO from me.

And then you got 8 other weapons "at the ready" giving you all sorts of other perks.

See, if you let a monk do what a monk is supposed to do, which is twist the rules into a pretzel, they can do some really strange stuff. If you stick with core and don't let them use BoS or NoNW, well, yeah, they are gonna suck.

Although I have not seen a monk go more then 11th core. The almost always start some sort of PrC.

[Beardbarian]

A Monk has two fists, two feet, two elbows, two knees, and his forehead.

And other classes are just Medium sized snakes

[Augmental]

See, if you let a monk do what a monk is supposed to do, which is twist the rules into a pretzel, they can do some really strange stuff. If you stick with core and don't let them use BoS or NoNW, well, yeah, they are gonna suck.

Where'd you get the idea that the monk is "supposed to" twist the rules into a pretzel?

[Rebel7284]

I thought it was the unarmed swordsage?

Regardless, yes, you can get very monk-like flavor with other classes.

I do love the invisible fist though.

[AstralFire]

Am rusty on 3.5, but I seriously doubt that monks are allowed to circumvent the normal limit of two weapons available to a human.

[Psyren]

How did I not see it before.....

Psychic Warrior, Swordsage, and now Deadly Fist Soulknife are the most commonly suggested base-class-20 monk fixes.

Deadly Fist is nice for getting Wis to attack, damage and AC without any dips.

[FullStop]

Am rusty on 3.5, but I seriously doubt that monks are allowed to circumvent the normal limit of two weapons available to a human.

Probably an extrapolation of how Flurry of Blows is worded (in that you can slip unarmed strikes into your flurry despite whatever weapons you happen to be wielding).

[Spore]

For future consideration: This is called a work-around, not a fix. :)

[Curmudgeon]

See, the monk has one thing nobody else does.

A normal Improved Unarmed strike guy just has fists.

A Monk has two fists, two feet, two elbows, two knees, and his forehead.

So with a Necklace of natural weaponry (that you can put MULTIPLE weapons in the same amulet) I will give myself:

L. Elbow: +5 Defending, Spellblade (disintegrate), Flying
R. Elbow: +5 Spellstrike, Spellblade (Whatever), Flying
L Knee: Spellblade (Whatever), Flying, Jumping
R Knee: Spellblade (whatever), Flying, smoking,
L Hand: +5 Assassination, Sizing, Viper (Turn my left hand into Huge Snake that does 1d6+1d4+4 damage and DC 19 1d6/1d6 on strike, Flying.
You realize this is all house rules, right? Every character using unarmed strikes has more than "just fists", and every Monk has exactly the same properties for all their unarmed striking surfaces (knees, elbows, and whatever).

[Gorfnod]

I thought it was the unarmed swordsage?

I have used the unarmed swordsage before but my PF group doesn't use ToB. Maybe the new Dreamscarred Press ToB clone will change their minds.


Psychic Warrior, Swordsage, and now Deadly Fist Soulknife are the most commonly suggested base-class-20 monk fixes.

Deadly Fist is nice for getting Wis to attack, damage and AC without any dips.

I haven't seen the deadly fist archetype before, I'll have to look in to it. I don't remember seeing it in your soulknife guide.

Have I ever mentioned before how much I like that guide...

I really would like to see another guide from you... maybe the Occultist....:smallsmile:




For future consideration: This is called a work-around, not a fix. :)

Can I call it a fix if I ripped the monk pages out of my book and stapled the psy warrior in?

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Gorfnod
Can I call it a fix if I ripped the monk pages out of my book and stapled the psy warrior in?

Thank you for the riotous laugh this gave me. If I ever start having a sig, this will be it.

[Kuulvheysoon]

Can I call it a fix if I ripped the monk pages out of my book and stapled the psy warrior in?

Only if you ripped out the relevant pages in Secrets of Sarlona as well.

(The relevant pages being the ones including Monastic Training and Tashaltora):smallbiggrin: