trying to find some cool classes (3.5e)

[leeooo]

heyo, as the title says, i've been trying to find some cool, monk-esque classes for 3.5e, they don't really have to be monk-y at all, just have their main focus be punching yer enemies thanks in advance to anyone who helps! :D

[EisenKreutzer]

Natural attack Totemist?

[leeooo]

woah, that was a quick response. mind linking that to me, dawg?


..also, i should've probably said so before, but pugilist/brawler-esque classes would be super great, if anyone knows of any

[EisenKreutzer]

The Totemist is found in Magic of Incarnum, and here's a guide for it (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=2943.0).

[Inevitability]

Unarmed swordsage!

[leeooo]

woah, you guys reply super fast!

anywho, thanks you two! i'll be sure to check both of those out and possibly use one of 'em in a campaign. thanks again! :D

[Gruftzwerg]

have a look at my monk-gish build in my signature.

monk/warlock/enlightened fist/monk of the enabled hand

the base build relies on Eldritch Claws feat. It's a simple build with pure dmg focus. you don't need to max. it like in the build. At later lvls most stuff dies instantly once you hit em.

[Uncle Pine]

The best monk is the barbarian! Start from the City Brawler Barbarian ACF from Dragon Magazine #349. This will let you dual wield unarmed attacks (something the monk can't do) as well as giving you a bunch of unarmed feats for free.
There's also the Pugilist, a Warrior ACF from Dragon Magazine #310 that can combo his unarmed attacks to get average attack bonuses (i.e. +7/+7 instead of +10/+5, or +12/+12/+12/+12 instead of +20/+15/+10/+5) among other goodies. It's less powerful than the City Brawler Barbarian in my opinion, but your mileage may vary.

The Bear Warrior PrC from Complete Warrior with the Beast Strike feat* (Dragon Magazine #355) can also help you dish out some nice damage.
EDIT: *This also works great with the Eldritch Claws Warlock build suggested above.

[Jormengand]

I'm a fan of the psionic fist (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/prestigeClasses/psionicFist.htm) for actually having a psychic power progression. Alternatively, you can play a duskblade (Player's Handbook II) or psychic warrior (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/psionic/classes/psychicWarrior.htm) with the Superior Unarmed Strike feat from Tome of Battle, which gives you the monk's unarmed strike damage, only slightly less so (but given that you're using your spells/powers to buff your damage right back up anyway, it shouldn't matter too much).

Another possibility is to take the concept of "Monk" back into the west and play a cleric (or a favoured soul from Complete Divine - make sure your deity's favoured weapon is the unarmed strike). With the ability to increase your strength up by 10, and add more bonuses to your attack and damage roll, your unarmed attacks can make a mess of things (although you'd be better off wielding a real weapon up until Superior Unarmed Strike's damage exceeds that of most weapons.

As for race, Superior Unarmed Strike's damage doesn't scale up or down with size, so if you ever wanted to play a Jermlaine (MM II - for reference, they get -8 STR, +6 DEX, -2 CON, -2 INT, +6 WIS, -6 CHA, so get weapon finesse and dexterity-to-damage sharpish) or Muckdweller (Serpent Kingdoms - -6 STR, +6 DEX, -2 WIS, -2 CHA), now's your chance. If you're really feeling silly, a hairy spider (Player's Guide to Faerun - -10 STR, +4 DEX, no INT, -8 CHA) is a fine-sized creature which was given LA 0 in the web enhancement, allowing you to deal d4s of damage - more at higher levels - as a near-unhittable spider, though you will need an awaken spell to actually be able to learn feats, so this may be taking it too far.

[John Longarrow]

An almost core only option would be to play a ranger but grab improved unarmed strike at 1st and superior unarmed strike (ToB) at 3rd. This gives you a very effective unarmed combatant who's able to walk into a fight wearing light armor while still using TWF. This also works fantastically well with single level dips into barbarian and sword sage (for shadowblade).

I've worked out several different melee-only builds that are statistically better in a fist fight than the monk. Ranger only or barbarian only with access to Superior unarmed strike work out best if you want to stick to one class only and are not otherwise using ToB.

If ToB is on the table, Any initiator is going to pound a monk quickly.

[GilesTheCleric]

Here's the Totemist <link removed>, and here's a guide for it (http://brilliantgameologists.com/boards/index.php?topic=2943.0).

You might want to give the forum rules another spin.

[Uncle Pine]

An almost core only option would be to play a ranger but grab improved unarmed strike at 1st and superior unarmed strike (ToB) at 3rd. This gives you a very effective unarmed combatant who's able to walk into a fight wearing light armor while still using TWF. This also works fantastically well with single level dips into barbarian and sword sage (for shadowblade).
You can't use TWF with two unarmed strikes unless you're a city brawler Barbarian. On the other hand (pun not intended) you can use TWF with unarmed strike and another weapon just fine.

[EisenKreutzer]

You might want to give the forum rules another spin.

Damn, I'm so used to Pathfinder that I forget all 3.5 material isn't available legally online.

Mea culpa, I have edited my post.

[Kelb_Panthera]

You can't use TWF with two unarmed strikes unless you're a city brawler Barbarian. On the other hand (pun not intended) you can use TWF with unarmed strike and another weapon just fine.

Note that this is an interpretation. It takes as granted that a humanoid character has only one unarmed strike representing attacks with any part of his body. An alternative interpretation is that each extremity can be used as a separate unarmed strike; making the use of TWF a simple matter.

It's only in PF that Uncle Pine's interpretation is the official rule.

[flappeercraft]

Mea culpa, I have edited my post.

I guess maybe you should check them again.


Also for the purpose of the thread, Tashalatora feat is pretty useful. Start out with any psion then take the tashalatora feat and take a single level dip into monk. Then just do whateverr you want but preferably keep taking levels in the psionic class as due to the Tashalatora feat, levels there stack with monk levels for some of the Monk's coass features.

[leeooo]

woaah, so many rad suggestions and posts after less than two hours of me starting the thread! thanks a lot you guys! i'll be sure to have a proper look at each and every single one of those (and maybe try a few of 'em out) whenever i have the time, thanks again! :D

[EisenKreutzer]

I guess maybe you should check them again.

What do you mean?

[Karl Aegis]

woaah, so many rad suggestions and posts after less than two hours of me starting the thread! thanks a lot you guys! i'll be sure to have a proper look at each and every single one of those (and maybe try a few of 'em out) whenever i have the time, thanks again! :D

There's been a post about once a week trying to get a monk build for several years. Usually on Mondays. Most advice goes to trading out ~all of your monk class features for actually useful things until you can get to level 6 and Prc out. Core monk isn't more reliable at unarmed strikes than a core fighter is and the damage isn't that good. Have you seen the sample NPCs in the Dungeon Master's Guide? Even the level 20 monk is using a +5 weapon most of the time because their unarmed strikes don't actually hit anything (+18/+18/+18 vs +33 of the same level fighter iirc)

[flappeercraft]

What do you mean?

The mea culpa is an infraction IIRC

[EisenKreutzer]

The mea culpa is an infraction IIRC

How is saying "it's my fault" in latin an infraction? I use that expression all the time.

EDIT: Ok, so I reviewed the rules. Simply saying "mea culpa" is not an infraction.

What is ment, as far as I can tell, by the "mea culpa infraction" is to violate the rules and attempting to excuse it by admitting that you are violating the rules.

Thats not what I did.
I unwittingly broke the rules (not realizing that the material I linked to was not legal), and then apologized using the (pretty common) phrase "mea culpa" while also immediately editing out the offending material from my post.