[PF] Which tier is Pathfinder monk with the right archetypes and what are those?

[Feint's End]

Hello Playground. Now I might get the chance to play in a 3.P game in some weeks and thought about running a PF Monk since I heard good things about it with the right Archetypes.
Now I was wondering is there an especially powerful archetype combination I could use? Qinggong is obviously in, but are there any other Archetypes which are good options in a combination?

Also I was wondering which tier a PF Monk with the right Archetypes is. Is it possible to reach low t3 or are you stuck as a t4 (not a bad thing per se but I'm curious about it)?

If it turns out to be too unflexible I might go with a Meditant Psywar (selfbuffing "monk"? Yes please).

[Kudaku]

By default I believe the vanilla PF monk is considered tier 5.

Quinggong combined with the right archetype moves it up to tier 4.

While there are some very good archetypes available (Sohei, Martial Artist, Zen Archer, Tetori etc) for the monk, I don't think any of them make it to tier 3.

[Psyren]

Qinggong can indeed get to T3 - it can do a variety of things regular monks and even some other T4 classes can't do, such as flight, teleportation, divinations, and healing/restoration. Qinggong can also skip to the end of lengthy feat chains, giving its build more flexibility.

[Feint's End]

Qinggong can indeed get to T3 - it can do a variety of things regular monks and even some other T4 classes can't do, such as flight, teleportation, divinations, and healing/restoration. Qinggong can also skip to the end of lengthy feat chains, giving its build more flexibility.

Any Archetypes it can be combined with for even greater flexibility? Or is Qinggong best used alone. I'm not sure if there are any other ones worth it to use with it tbh because of them seem to give up the same things you can use to get spells/feats/etc from Qinggong. So if there is an Archetype it had to be worth losing some flexibility from Qingong.
Maybe Hungry Ghost Monk?

I looked for some advice on google but the only handbook I found (by treantmonk) doesn't have any suggestions on Archetypes in it (even though it is a really solid guide otherwise).

edit: I figured that an Archetype for more Ki Points or a way to restore them (namely Hungry Ghost) might be very powerful and very versatile.

[Novawurmson]

Correct. Qinggong is a given. It's just a big-ol' list of alternate class features that you can choose from, a significant number of which are far superior to the original abilities. It can also be combined with basically every monk archetype in the game (because you can pick and choose each applicable level).

Zen Archer is considered one of the best archers in the game - and archers are great in PF to begin with.

Tetori is one of the best grapplers in the game, and one of very few with a way of dealing with freedom of movement.

The big draw of Martial Artist, from what I know, is its ability to multiclass with Barbarian, and its immunity to fatigue. These two together allow it to "rage cycle" - that is, use its "once per rage" abilities multiple times per encounter.

I'll throw in a suggestion for Master of Many Styles; it can get you a lot of fun feats that you'd normally have to wait quite a while for.

If your group allows DSP psionics, I'd also suggest the Deadly Fist (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/classes/soulknife/archetypes/dreamscarred-press/deadly-fist) Soulknife. D10 HD, full BAB, a free scaling enhancement bonus to your unarmed strikes (instead of needing to spend gold on an amulet + it's stronger than the amulet ever gets), its ability to combine with the Gifted Blade archetype (mini-manifesting, like a ranger or paladin's spellcasting), a ranged attack...it's really what the Monk should have been.

Edit: Yes, Hungry Ghost is great. It gives you a way to recharge PP, which is amazing with Qinggong.

[Drelua]

I don't know about tier, but my level 14 Hungry Ghost Qinggong Monk with Snake Style is basically invincible against most enemies, to the point that he usually comes out of a fight with more health than he went in with, even in fights that nearly killed other party members. He has no trouble contributing in a party of a Myrmidarch Magus, a Battle Oracle and blaster wizard, though to be fair the other characters, apart from the Magus, aren't too heavily optimized. One thing that helps a lot is taking Weapon Finesse and getting an agile amulet of mighty fists if you can so you aren't so MAD.

[Psyren]

Any Archetypes it can be combined with for even greater flexibility?

Hungry Ghost is good, as are some vows if your DM is light on the penalties. Basically you want as much ki as possible.

Zen Archer is good too because then you can focus even more on Wis, and not worry about your physical stats as much.Master of Many Styles and Tetori work great as well if you prefer melee. Flowing Monk is okay for small dextrous types but falls behind in damage.

Qinggong can be combined with any of these.

[Kudaku]

While Quinggong certainly helps the monk gain more general utility, I'd personally still peg them at about the same level as the PF Paladin. That said, the gap between high tier 4 and low tier 3 can be quite narrow -your mileage may (and probably will) vary.

[deuxhero]

Sensei can also share Quinggong's abilities and Sensei/Quinggong/Hungry Ghost is legal (though you may be hurting for ki powers to trade out)

[StreamOfTheSky]

Monk is tier 5, probably low tier 5, on its own.

With the Zen Archer and/or Qinggong archetypes, it moves up to comfortably tier 4 (like where other archer martial classes are). Other archetype combos that exclude those two can get to high tier 5 or possibly low tier 4, but 4 is the best a monk will ever get in PF. Barring heavy multi-classing, because using your Monk 1 / Synthesist 19 build to showcase how awesome monk is...is just pointless.

Qinggong is nice in that it's just a bunch of free options. But sadly, almost all of them completely suck (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?308138-Guide-to-the-Qinggong-Monk-(Ultimate-Magic)), so there's no way in hell it's moving monk all the way up to tier 3. All of the feat options are not really worth it due to having to blow ki and the class feature just to get them for ONE ROUND per use. And re-gaining monk class features is obviously not a good use. There's just a few very specific spell-like ability goodies to pluck (gaseous form, true strike [if and only if you take Quicken SLA on it to use with combat maneuvers], no-materials self-only restoration, ki leech [which, if you're evil enough to retain "living punching bags" as prisoners and have a permissive DM, is basically infinite ki]) and while they're nice, they are far from enough to push monk to tier 3. And the best one will almost certainly not be allowed in most games between "cheesiness" and the group not being evil. And even if it is allowed....it's still not enough.

EDIT: I should revise the Feather Step ranking down, now that it's a cheap pair of boots...

[Kudaku]

If you're using the "punching bag" approach you can save the Quinggong slot for something more useful and use a Wyroot (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/equipment---final/special-materials#TOC-Wyroot) weapon. Wyroot is not ideal for in-combat accumulation of Ki though, since it requires you to use a wooden weapon - most monks prefer to use unarmed strikes.

[Psyren]

The problem with your ratings Stream is that they assume a full party, and so the redundant options are underrated. For instance, your ratings of Augury and Neutralize Poison both say "leave it to the Cleric" while your rating of Spit Venom says "no-save blind is great, but leave it to the casters! 2 stars!"

But that's actually not how tiers work. A high-tier class is one that can function as autonomously as possibly, or at the very least independently of what the other PCs in the party choose to be. In JaronK's original thread, he illustrates a Factotum being T3 by describing a situation where the Factotum is separated from the party and needs to regroup with them, all the while contrasting it with how difficult it would be for a rogue to succeed in the same situation. He doesn't say "oh, your Factotum can polymorph/invisible/gaseous form? Well the wizard can just cast it on you, so don't bother."

In short, yes, if a cleric is around you probably won't need augury or spit venom. But that doesn't change the fact that monk can nevertheless get these abilities, and that they can be quite useful if the monk is alone, or separated, or nobody else in the party has them. So when you compare QM to other T5 and T4 classes, like rogues and barbarians, and they are capable of pulling off tricks that so many of those other classes simply cannot do, it's disingenuous to lump them all together in the same pot simply because casters can do this stuff too.

[StreamOfTheSky]

The game is played with a party. It's reasonable to assume you have a party with you, and you're not building a one-man-army for arena fights that covers everything himself.

And...those options are pretty gimpy. Augury isn't something a sorcerer or oracle would bother to learn and sorc/oracle gets several times as many known spells as Qinggong Monk gets Ki Powers. Spit Venom *IS* a pretty lame blinding effect by the time^ a QM can actually get. Neutralize Poison is ridiculously situational and costs a lot of ki on top of coming online late.
It's not just that I expect to have other people around to cover their own jobs better than my monk could. It's the fact that even w/o them...the options really suck. And you only have a small eclectic handful of them, it's not nearly enough breadth to actually approach "utility."

Earliest is level 11, right about the time the full BAB martials are able to pick up Dazing Assault. Daze 1 round is more potent than blind 1 round and the fact that DA has a save is largely negated by it a) not costing daily resources and b) being able to be spammed on a full attack and all AoOs rather than just 1/round all while actually doing damage to the foe and not just wasting your turns to waste his.

[Psyren]

The game is played with a party. It's reasonable to assume you have a party with you, and you're not building a one-man-army for arena fights that covers everything himself.

I'm aware of that, but the tier system does not assume a party - it ranks each class in a vacuum, with the base assumption being "how can this perform alone?" And since tiers are what we're discussing here, the QM's ability to do certain things solo is relevant.

I don't think no-save blind, even for 1 round, is ever lame. Blindness sucks, a lot.

Also, given that they added more options for Qinggong in ARG, the archetype has nowhere to go but up as far as usefulness as they create more material.

[StreamOfTheSky]

I'm aware of that, but the tier system does not assume a party - it ranks each class in a vacuum, with the base assumption being "how can this perform alone?" And since tiers are what we're discussing here, the QM's ability to do certain things solo is relevant.

I don't think no-save blind, even for 1 round, is ever lame. Blindness sucks, a lot.

And if you're all alone, giving up your action to make a foe maybe waste his and pay a daily resource for the privilege is pretty sucky, too. You just said tiers are based on performance ALONE.
You can't have it both ways. Either you're for-sure using up your turns to do nothing to end the fight so your singular foe (hopefully it's just one foe, or this strategy really falls apart!) has a much lesser chance (but still > 0%, so better than you) of harming you. Or you're in a group, almost surely with someone who can do the whole shtick way better than you and from a much earlier level.


Also, given that they added more options for Qinggong in ARG, the archetype has nowhere to go but up as far as usefulness as they create more material.

I didn't know they added stuff in ARG, I'll check it out later.


...the archetype has nowhere to go but up as far as usefulness as they create more material.

...That sounds an awful lot like a sales pitch for swamp land in Florida. :smalltongue: "Limitless potential and growth opportunities!"

I'm sure there are, but not going to hold my breath until the potential materializes into something useful.

EDIT: Also, I just realized how silly it is to use Neutralize Poison ki power as a utility example for solo challenges when the vanilla unanimously-agreed tier 5 monk gets outright immunity to poison at about that level anyway. There's no party, who's he supporting?

[Psyren]

And if you're all alone, giving up your action to make a foe maybe waste his and pay a daily resource for the privilege is pretty sucky, too. You just said tiers are based on performance ALONE.

Depends on what you're trying to do. Blinding a dangerous archer, or someone you're trying to chase down, or before moving away from something dangerous (blind creatures can't AoO) are all viable uses. Not every challenge is about doing the most damage every round after all.

And even if you are with a group, there's still the question of who you're with; not every class can do this after all, just as not every class can augur for advice or transport the party long distances. Even using your assumption of being in a party, nothing mandates that there has to be a T1 or T2 along for the ride in that party.



EDIT: Also, I just realized how silly it is to use Neutralize Poison ki power as a utility example for solo challenges when the vanilla unanimously-agreed tier 5 monk gets outright immunity to poison at about that level anyway. There's no party, who's he supporting?

I didn't just say alone, I said independent too. If you're with a gunslinger and a barbarian for example, who is curing the poison in that bunch?