Classes that advance uses of stunning fist

[daremetoidareyo]

So, I'm making a 12th level villain "monk". I thought that it would be fun to play off the synergy of pharoahs fist (all adjacent enemies to your stunning target need to make saves against it too or be stunned), ring the golden bell (1+ wis times per day make your unarmed attack a ranged attack), paralyzing fist (if stunned 2x in a round, you are then paralyzed for 1d2 rounds). To make it work, I need to spam rapid stunning as a feat, and I planned to be able to cover the gaps with extra stunning and then riding out the build in a monk prestige class.

I figured monk 2/fighter 4/monk prestige X

Then I looked into it. I'm counting a total of 5 prestige classes for monks that advance the number of stunning fist that you can use per day, two of which are kalashtar only, and 3 of which are designed for "class theurging".

Kalashtar: Haztaratain, Fist of Dal Quor
Theurge:
Swordsage: Shadow sun ninja,
truenamer: disciple of the word,
arcane: Enlightened fist

If kalashtar isn't allowed/appropriate, that leaves you with three classes, only two of which are useful because enlightened fist is only useful to make magic users suck more.

Why did Wizards hate monks so hard?
There is no ascetic fighter feat despite making both the fighter and monk extremely modular. You can't get the number of stunning fist uses up to an adequate number for any real utility.

So the real questions are: Are there any other prestige classes that advance a monk's stunning that I missed? What items can I use to increase the number of stuns per day?

[Kelvarius]

I don't have any answer to your specific questions. But I would say just homebrew the Ascetic Fighter feat. There's precedent for similar feats, and it would be simple to do for that very reason.

Alternatively, homebrew a PrC specifically for this guy. That one would take a bit more work, though.

[ShurikVch]

2 levels dip in Snake Shen PrC (Dragon #319) will give you +1 use (and move DC from Wis to Int)

And it's apparently it...

How about the usual Uncanny Trickster/Legacy Champion route?

[daremetoidareyo]

2 levels dip in Snake Shen PrC (Dragon #319) will give you +1 use (and move DC from Wis to Int)

And it's apparently it...

How about the usual Uncanny Trickster/Legacy Champion route?

Yeah, that's about it. Maybe over the next few weeks I'll spend some time in the homebrew forum coming up with what is necessary to bridge the gap. From what I see the following combo/niches are missing:

Class niches
Monk & fighter
Monk & hexblade
-----------------------> Probably can be melted together into a decent prestige class
Monk & divine
Monk & warlock
Monk & incarnum

Race Niches
Monk Dwarf
Monk Elf

Feat Needs
Monkey grip type feat to increase unarmed damage die by a size
Ascetic Fighter
Ascetic warlock
Stunning fist to activate a charged magic item
Companion/familiar monk class skill sharing

[Necroticplague]

Feat Needs
Monkey grip type feat to increase unarmed damage die by a size
Ascetic Fighter
Ascetic warlock
Stunning fist to activate a charged magic item
Companion/familiar monk class skill sharing

The first already exists. It's called Improved Natural Attack.
The second is kinda....odd, because Fighter doesn't really have any class features for the monk part to advance.
The third already exists in the form of Eldritch Claws+Beast Strike.

[ShurikVch]

I just noticed...

RAW of Stunning Fist says "equal to her monk level", but there are some PrCs with "monk" in a name:
Arcanopath Monk
Monk of the Enabled Hand
Monk of the Long Death
Shintao Monk
Sun Soul Monk
Tattooed Monk
(and, arguably, Monkey Shen :smallamused:)

My assumption may be supported by the "Monk Prestige Classes" rule in Oriental Adventures: it says monk-y PrCs also progress all features of base Monk; it don't mentioned Stunning Fist, but SF is not a CF, it's a feat
(Also, Henshin Mystic don't have "monk" in the name, but specifically mentioned in the "Monk Prestige Classes" rule)

[daremetoidareyo]

I just noticed...

RAW of Stunning Fist says "equal to her monk level", but there are some PrCs with "monk" in a name:
Arcanopath Monk
Monk of the Enabled Hand
Monk of the Long Death
Shintao Monk
Sun Soul Monk
Tattooed Monk
(and, arguably, Monkey Shen :smallamused:)

My assumption may be supported by the "Monk Prestige Classes" rule in Oriental Adventures: it says monk-y PrCs also progress all features of base Monk; it don't mentioned Stunning Fist, but SF is not a CF, it's a feat
(Also, Henshin Mystic don't have "monk" in the name, but specifically mentioned in the "Monk Prestige Classes" rule)

Well then. That might work. The OA rule specifically omits stunning fist uses. But OA is 3rd edition, where stunning fist was a class feature, it seems like this may have been on purpose. The question becomes, logically speaking, do monk prestige classes advance being a "monk" as far stunning fist uses granted by the feat is concerned. Is that list of monk prestige class features exhaustive? I think it might be, at least on a RAW theorycraft sense.


"the henshin mystic, the Shintao monk, and the tattooed monk—that are natural choices for monk characters, allowing them to continue improving their unarmed attacks, unarmed damage, Armor Class, and speed."

The text goes on to describe how to calculate all of those features. Calculating stunning fist is easy uses = levels of monk + 1 for every other 4 levels of non monk. But in the switch between editions, it appears that stunning fist is no longer a class feature of monks, and thus, is not included there. So you may be correct only because the designers neglected to address exactly this.

---



The second is kinda....odd, because Fighter doesn't really have any class features for the monk part to advance.


It's the advancing of some monk features while you take fighter levels that I'm interested in. Namely, uses of stunning fist. Also, the ability to return to take monk levels. What could also be thrown in there, to make it worthy of a feat slot, is allowing the monk AC bonus and runaround skills to also apply to fighter monks who wear light armor up to the 10th -12thlevel. And then medium armor at 11th/13th-20th level. Maybe, for golden points, you could allow monk levels to count as fighter levels as far as weapon specialization is concerned. That synergizes the two classes, opens up stunning fist optimization, and gives your monk some more defensive options. Probably call it warrior monk because armor is totally not an ascetic thing.

The problem is that going monk to fighter is that you can't take the extra stunning feats with fighter bonus feat slots, so it has to happen on your normal level up feat slots, which you need for other better feats than fighter bonus feats (reach optimization, skill optimization, etc.) The problem that I have with that is feats are awesome, and you can make 3 or 4 different warrior monks that differ in feats and they would play so dramatically differently.

[mabriss lethe]

Technically, anything advances Stunning fist at a rate of 1/4 levels, and there's also the Extra Stunning feat from CW to grab another 3 uses.

[ShurikVch]

Technically, anything advances Stunning fist at a rate of 1/4 levels, and there's also the Extra Stunning feat from CW to grab another 3 uses.Good point!
Core Fighter who spent all regular feats on Extra Stunning will get 26 uses of Stunning Fist at level 20;
Core Monk will get only 20.
(Yes, Monk can take Extra Stunning too, but at the price of don't taking any other feats: Fighter at 20 level will have 10 bonus feats; Monk will have 3 + Unarmed Strike)

[darkdragoon]

Increase your effective Monk levels, Monk's Belt is the easiest. Everything else is generally more expensive and can have arguments about stacking.

[KillingAScarab]

If you use a bloodline (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/races/bloodlines.htm), your bloodline level(s) stack for determining your class level. You just need to find or make a better bloodline (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?208703-3-5e-Bloodline-Guide-What-in-the-Nine-Hells-is-a-Bloodline&p=11487854#post11487854) than what's in Unearthed Arcana.