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View Full Version : Is there a deity with unarmed strike as a favored weapon?



Deel
2007-05-31, 10:58 PM
I can't seem to find one. Any. Though I'd like it to be non-evil, and preferable more neutral than good.

I was just thinking of making a Favored Soul/Sacred Fist, but couldn't find a deity for it. Considering the campaign it would be for is homebrew, it wouldn't really be hard to just make a deity for it, it just seems odd that there isn't one, at least not that I can find.

Jasdoif
2007-05-31, 11:15 PM
Ilsensine's favored weapon is the unarmed strike. For her non-illithid followers, anyway.

EDIT: Sorry, its non-illithid followers.

Droodle
2007-05-31, 11:22 PM
Ilmater, but that's Forgotten Realms. He's a Paladin20/Monk20 whose fists are treated as +5 holy vorpal weapons.

Deel
2007-05-31, 11:27 PM
Vorpal hands sound awesome. How does that work anyway? Karate chop through their neck? It sounds incredibly badass however it works.

Sadly, setting specific and obviously lawful good, better than nothing though.

Jack Mann
2007-05-31, 11:37 PM
From the Greyhawk deities (used as the standard list):

Annam (N creator deity of giants)

Beltar (CN [CE] deity of malice and caves)

Iallanis (NG deity of good giants)

The aforementioned Ilsensine (LE deity of mind flayers)

Yurtrus (NE orc deity of disease)

Zodal (NG deity of mercy and hope)

Zuoken (N demigod of physical and mental mastery)

ZeroNumerous
2007-05-31, 11:46 PM
Beltar (CN [CE] deity of malice and caves)


All hail the Cave God!

Seriously though, if you want to go with a Favored Soul / Enlightened Fist, look at the Superior Unarmed Strike from ToB. You can get a short, albiet bad, unarmed strike progression before you start those enlightened fist levels. And at that point, you're treated as a monk five levels higher for your unarmed attacks.

Renegade Paladin
2007-06-01, 12:13 AM
Well, from the Forgotten Realms there's the aforementioned Ilmater, as well as Talona and Yurtrus. Talona is the chaotic evil goddess of plagues, poison, and disease, while Yurtrus is the neutral evil orc god of disease and death, so I doubt they fit either.

Jasdoif
2007-06-01, 12:16 AM
Wait...Favored Soul/Sacred Fist? Are you aware that Knowledge (religion) is cross-class for Favored Soul?


Seriously though, if you want to go with a Favored Soul / Enlightened Fist, look at the Superior Unarmed Strike from ToB. You can get a short, albiet bad, unarmed strike progression before you start those enlightened fist levels. And at that point, you're treated as a monk five levels higher for your unarmed attacks.Superior Unarmed Strike lets you deal unarmed damage as a monk of four levels higher. It's a monk's belt that does five levels higher.

kpenguin
2007-06-01, 12:21 AM
Not exactly a deity, but the Path of Light from Eberron has unarmed strike as its favored weapon.

Deel
2007-06-01, 12:34 AM
Well, I'll obviously be dipping into monk for a couple levels first, free Improved Unarmed Strike, free Stunning Fist, free Combat Reflexes, all prereqs of Sacred Fist, and it has Knowledge(Religion).

On second thought though, I might just go with cleric instead anyway, being able to pick up the turning/domains sounds really useful(I might pick up Vow of Poverty too, with a house ruled in hand-carved holy symbol. I had a character I planned on using for another campaign that never came together like this, monk stuff for martial art prowess, and magic to cover stuff the vow leaves out, Travel especially helps with that, what with flying and such.) I probably won't cheese out with DMM Persistant Spell, but I may go DMM Quicken Spell, seems like it'd be useful for quickly buffing while running to battle. Just need to get over my innate fear of needing to plan my spells ahead of time.

Call Me Siggy
2007-06-01, 01:04 AM
From the Greyhawk deities (used as the standard list):

Annam (N creator deity of giants)

Beltar (CN [CE] deity of malice and caves)

Iallanis (NG deity of good giants)

The aforementioned Ilsensine (LE deity of mind flayers)

Yurtrus (NE orc deity of disease)

Zodal (NG deity of mercy and hope)

Zuoken (N demigod of physical and mental mastery)

If I'm not mistaken, Zuoken's favored weapon is the nunchaku...or is Complete Divine wrong on that one?

ZeroNumerous
2007-06-01, 01:16 AM
I would HIGHLY suggest against dipping into Monk for more than one level. One level nabs you free Stunning Fist, free Improved Unarmed Strike, and Knowledge(Religion). Be a human and grab Able Learner. Then grab your Knowledge(Religion) ranks and pick up Combat Reflexes with your 1st level feat.

So your progression should look something like this:

Monk 1: Improved Unarmed, Stunning Fist, Able Learner(Human), Combat Reflexes.
Favored Soul 2
Favored Soul 3: (Whatever you feel like: Extend Spell might be good here since you won't have to deal with pre-battle buffing)
Favored Soul 4
Favored Soul 5
Favored Soul 6: Superior Unarmed Strike
Sacred Fist 7

This way you're fighting as if you were a 15th level monk, thus not losing out on your unarmed attack progression, and you still retain the casting of a 12th level Favored Soul when you finish out Sacred Fist. I suggest continuing Favored Soul after that and grabbing a Monk's Belt to finish out your unarmed strike.

And I cannot stress enough that you should not dip Monk for longer than one level. It's horrifically crippling for a caster.

Jack Mann
2007-06-01, 01:35 AM
If I'm not mistaken, Zuoken's favored weapon is the nunchaku...or is Complete Divine wrong on that one?

Living Greyhawk gives him unarmed strike.

Call Me Siggy
2007-06-01, 01:38 AM
Living Greyhawk gives him unarmed strike.

Ahh, I see.

Deel
2007-06-01, 01:53 AM
Hmmmm... yeah. I like that setup for the Favored Soul/Sacred Fist. Seems like a good progression into sacred fist.

Also, speaking of Zuoken, how is a Monk/Fist of Zuoken? I've never played a Psionic character before, so I might consider trying that out instead, if our group has another willing divine caster.

TheOOB
2007-06-01, 02:50 AM
Living Greyhawk is the source for greyhawk gods. Also it should be noted that Zodal is like an uber pacifist and anyone who attacks(be it unarmed or otherwise) isn't following the true word of Zodal, so the favored weapon kinda doesn't count.

Deel
2007-06-01, 02:59 AM
Living Greyhawk is the source for greyhawk gods. Also it should be noted that Zodal is like an uber pacifist and anyone who attacks(be it unarmed or otherwise) isn't following the true word of Zodal, so the favored weapon kinda doesn't count.

It'd fall in pretty easy with the Book of Exalted Deeds. Sounds like it'd make a nice deity for a (cleric or favored soul)/monk/sacred fist that wants to pick up the Vows of Poverty, Non-violence, and peace, since you can still deal nonlethal damage, and doing it unarmed has no penalty due to monk, with divine magic to keep you alive. Sadly, most parties will hate you for this, unless you are in an extremely high diplomacy campaign.

TheOOB
2007-06-01, 03:19 AM
Even non-leathal damage is a little bit of a stretch for a follow of Zodal. Zodal is the god that expects you to negotiate and try to redeem that balor that just killed all your friends and is about to kill you.

Deel
2007-06-01, 03:45 AM
BoED is pretty damn restrictive, but probably not to that extent, though I can only assume(or hope) that you are exaggerating. Honestly, I don't see how a deity of protection and benevolence wouldn't let you make a judgement call to stop a balor from killing a bunch of people, especially in a way that doesn't kill it and would only allow you to more easily attempt to convert it.

In the BoED, you are much recommended to never kill unless absolutely necessary, but you can still take action with force if non-violence doesn't work(only non-lethal with Non-violence/peace vows), because otherwise, you'd lose your exalted status anyway, by just letting something kill a bunch of people, which is hardly good.

Belkarseviltwin
2007-06-01, 07:02 AM
There's Zarus from Races of Destiny, but he's evil.

ZeroNumerous
2007-06-01, 07:15 AM
Off-topic: I've never understood why people say that "Balor" when the Pit Fiend is a lot more dangerous..

Either way.. As I said before, I highly suggest against Monk level 2. Ever. You can get just as good unarmed damage by just using a feat and a Monk's Belt.

Closet_Skeleton
2007-06-01, 07:58 AM
Off-topic: I've never understood why people say that "Balor" when the Pit Fiend is a lot more dangerous..

In 3.0 the Pit Fiend had four lower CR despite its uber poison. Also demons are more inconic than devils.

AtomicKitKat
2007-06-01, 08:42 AM
Because Devils can be bargained with. Demons on the other hand...

the_tick_rules
2007-06-01, 09:04 AM
i don't remember if it's his favored weapon but rei from the egyptian pantheon in deities of demigods has the divinve monk divine ability so his fists are just like illmater mentioned above.

Person_Man
2007-06-01, 10:03 AM
Hmmmm... yeah. I like that setup for the Favored Soul/Sacred Fist. Seems like a good progression into sacred fist.

Also, speaking of Zuoken, how is a Monk/Fist of Zuoken? I've never played a Psionic character before, so I might consider trying that out instead, if our group has another willing divine caster.

Sacred Fist is great. But if you go into it, I suggest Monk 2/Cleric 4/Sacred Fist X, or Monk 1/Cleric 6/Sacred Fist X if you want 1 more caster level and you're willing to spend a feat (Combat Reflexes, which you'd otherwise get for free from Monk 2) and delay your entry into the PrC by 1 level in order to get it. Or you could just be a Human Cleric 6/Sacred Fist X with a Monk's belt, and lose no caster levels, but spend all of your feats on the entry requirements. But this is only a good idea if you're playing a high level game, where your magic buffs will clearly outweigh the benefits of a few extra feats.

As others have pointed out, Favored Soul is a poor choice for this build because it lacks Knowledge Religion and has a slower caster progression.

Fist of Zuoken (or Psionic Fist (http://www.systemreferencedocuments.org/35/sovelior_sage/psionicFist.html), as its known on the SRD) is generally a weak PrC. I've played it before, and it was really frustrating. You're stuck with the Monk's mediocre BAB, hit points, and damage output. You can't Flurry with Claws of the Beast. You're a still better off then a standard Monk, thanks to Inertial Armor, Expansion, Psionic Lion's Charge, Hustle, and similar powers. But your power progression is just too far behind your enemies, and your manifester level is screwed. It's somewhat playable if your DM allows you to use the Practiced Manifester feat from the Complete Psionic, but its such a piss poor book that many DMs I know (including me) have banished it. But if you want to play a similar psionic class, the Warmind is a much better idea, especially with the right combo.

Also, its pretty much required that whenever a poster mentions the Monk, someone has to mention the Swordsage, which is the "fixed" Tome of Battle version of the Monk.

Deel
2007-06-01, 06:43 PM
Well, considering the starting level will be around six, I'll probably just take the Monk 2/Cleric 4 route. Losing a caster level isn't going to cripple me, and I do like the extra feats to use on combat/magic feats. I might even go with Divine Metamagic Persistant if my DM will allow it, though he probably won't, and at the very least he'll disallow Nightsticks, which means destroying the fuel. Still, it'd mainly be for the very useful near permanent self-buffs, and maybe Mass Lesser Vigor, for free healing all day, as I recall it can be used with that, so I can make due with a decent charisma and taking Extra Turning a couple times.