The Sensei Monk Archetype's Mystic Wisdom

[Sir Chuckles]

At 6th level, a sensei may use his advice ability when spending points from his ki pool to activate a class ability (using the normal actions required for each) in order to have that ability affect one ally within 30 feet rather than the sensei himself.

Suppose a DM allows the archetype with an Unchained Monk and rule that all Ki Powers that expend Ki can be used with it, what Ki Powers would be most useful?

[Geddy2112]

It really depends on your party composition. A party with strong will saves or fear immunity won't need diamond mind, nor will a party with strong fort saves/immunity to poison need diamond body.

Abundant step is pretty useful for most groups, as free Ddoor is never bad. Diamond soul is okay if the party casters have already thrown up the buff spells or you don't have a lot of buff casters. Sudden speed is pretty good because it uses a swift action and lasts all combat. Unless your group had zero healing, wholeness of body is awful. Using a standard action to heal such a small amount in combat is worthless, and out of combat a wand of cure light wounds does the job. Heck, it is barely better than treat deadly wounds. If you have a mounted character, ki mount is okay but it is iffy to burn a known ki power on this unless there are multiple mounted party members. Furious defense and diamond resilence will be useful in almost every party/ game.

The real money to be made is in the quinggong powers. Free barkskin and true strike every combat are great, but the best is when you get restoration on any party member without material components. Absolute steal.

[Serafina]

You CAN use it with the Qinggong Monks Ki-powers, and the really crazy combination there would be on the offensive powers IFthose don't take any extra action from the party members who benefit from it - so at 10th levle, you can multiply their effect. So you activate Scorching Ray as a standard action - and then it fires from you and from every ally within 30 feet, for absolutely devastating damage.

Of course, it'd be very sensible for the GM to rule that your allies also have to spend a standard-action to activate those offensive effects, because that'd be really strong.
In this case, you can still grab a bunch of useful support powers - say, using Shadowstep to teleport your allies as well as yourself.

[Psyren]

I don't see why they wouldn't have to activate it; you're sharing the ability, not using it for them. It's like if you shared High Jump - your allies aren't going to suddenly spring into the air, they need to actually jump (using whatever action as normal) in order to use it.

[Talieth]

And don't forget that ninja get some talents that make use of ki (group invisibility as a quick action ?)...

[CharonsHelper]

Suppose a DM allows the archetype with an Unchained Monk and rule that all Ki Powers that expend Ki can be used with it, what Ki Powers would be most useful?

I will say - while Sensei mixes with Qinggong well (ALL base monks should take Qinggong in addition to whatever else - it was a stealth buff of the base monk) no GM worth their salt should allow Sensei to mix with Umonk.

A lot of what Sensei gives up with Flurry, ending up stuck with mid BAB rather than getting the pseudo full BAB. Umonk gets actual full BAB, so losing flurry wouldn't hurt NEARLY as much.

As to which Qinggong powers are most useful...

Barkskin is pretty handy, especially if you combined Sensei with Drunken Master for infinite ki. Basically you'd be freeing up the neck slot and saving a bunch of gold for the entire party (and probably a couple AC higher than they'd be with an AoNA).

At 10 the Sensei can affect multiple allies.


At 10th level, a sensei may affect all allies within 30 feet rather than himself (spending points from his ki pool only once, not once for each target).

This makes True Strike awesome, especially if you have a buddy or two who use maneuvers.

Cold Ice Strike also becomes pretty great to give to the whole party, especially if they aren't using swift actions much.