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View Full Version : D&D 5e/Next Theory-crafting a wisdom-focused Monastic Tradition...



samcifer
2019-07-25, 12:54 PM
never mind, I guess. Sorry I tried.

Talsin
2019-07-25, 02:48 PM
Lets do this one at a time



Lv. 3

Know One's Enemies -

As a Bonus Action, you may spent 2 Ki points. For the next 1 minute, you may add your Wisdom modifier to the damage of your attacks.

This is a pretty significant buff. Compare this to a Warlock bread-and-butter of Hex, or Ranger's Hunter's Mark... Same bonus action cost, but this (on average) will kick out a lot more damage over one minute. It can kick out 20 extra damage on round 2 on a flurry. This is strong at lower levels, and maintains strength at higher levels too while competing for that bonus-action economy. It may be more balanced for "Unarmed strikes" or "Monk Weapons & Unarmed Strikes"rather than all attacks, encouraging a specific play style, and prevent mutliclass dips with fighters.


Lv. 6

Enhanced Battle Senses -

Your mental focus grants you improved defenses. When you would take damage from a melee attack, you may use your reaction to reduce the damage you take by half.

Different flavor on rogue's same mechanic. Very useful for survivability. Why not have this simply be the same name though?


Lv. 11

Wisdom of Past Warriors -

As you grow in the wisdom of your monastic practice, you gain a new, hightened awareness of your surroundings and possible dangers. You may now add your wisdom modifier to your initiative rolls and you have advantage on any check or save that relies on Wisdom.

So, advantage on Wisdom saves, initiative rolls, perception rolls, insight rolls, NOTHING WILL ESCAPE YOUR VIEW. This is a very strong buff, and seems to give advantage on all initiative rolls while also adding in wisdom. (Though I like the idea of wisdom being for initiative instead of dex...)


Lv. 17

Wisdom of the Grandmasters -

Your keen awareness has reached perfection, granting you awareness of all weaknesses of your foe and allowing you to strike with incredible force. When you hit an opponent with a melee attack, you may spend 3 Ki points to force your opponent to make a Wisdom save. If they fail, they are instantly knocked unconscious. If they pass their save, they have disadvantage to their next attack roll against you as they struggle to recover from the force of your blow.

This is arguably better than quivering palm. It does not take an additional action, can be set up multiple times if it fails the first time, and still carries a rider if they succeed on the save.



Summary: Overall, I think this is too strong. Too much combat focus, and the abilities add up to some real power. Not to mention, higher level abilities are very strong, not only improving monk at lower levels but giving a major buff at the high end too.

Trickery
2019-07-25, 03:06 PM
Seems to be too strong, but my main concern is the flavor. From reading the description, I was expecting a Monk with enhanced perception and insight checks, perhaps detect thoughts as a Ki ability, ability to use wisdom instead of dexterity for attacks, that sort of thing. I wasn't expecting a Monk who beats things up. That's basically what the Kensei does.

samcifer
2019-07-25, 03:06 PM
Lets do this one at a time




This is a pretty significant buff. Compare this to a Warlock bread-and-butter of Hex, or Ranger's Hunter's Mark... Same bonus action cost, but this (on average) will kick out a lot more damage over one minute. It can kick out 20 extra damage on round 2 on a flurry. This is strong at lower levels, and maintains strength at higher levels too while competing for that bonus-action economy. It may be more balanced for "Unarmed strikes" or "Monk Weapons & Unarmed Strikes"rather than all attacks, encouraging a specific play style, and prevent mutliclass dips with fighters.



Different flavor on rogue's same mechanic. Very useful for survivability. Why not have this simply be the same name though?



So, advantage on Wisdom saves, initiative rolls, perception rolls, insight rolls, NOTHING WILL ESCAPE YOUR VIEW. This is a very strong buff, and seems to give advantage on all initiative rolls while also adding in wisdom. (Though I like the idea of wisdom being for initiative instead of dex...)



This is arguably better than quivering palm. It does not take an additional action, can be set up multiple times if it fails the first time, and still carries a rider if they succeed on the save.



Summary: Overall, I think this is too strong. Too much combat focus, and the abilities add up to some real power. Not to mention, higher level abilities are very strong, not only improving monk at lower levels but giving a major buff at the high end too.

I took your suggestions and made a few changes. The lv 3 ability now does not work when using weapons, the lv. 11 ability now only works on saves and I increased the lv. 17 ability to cost 4 ki instead to avoid over-using it. The tradition is indeed primarily combat-focused, thus the nature of the abilities granted being combat-focused to reflect this.

Frozenstep
2019-07-25, 03:10 PM
I'm not a fan of the design as for the most part, you're just playing a base monk except you added your wisdom modifier to some parts of your character sheet. Know one's enemies strikes me as poor design because it feels required because it's really good, but also eats the ki points that make a monk have options and decisions without really being an interesting option or decision on its own.

samcifer
2019-07-25, 03:24 PM
I'm not a fan of the design as for the most part, you're just playing a base monk except you added your wisdom modifier to some parts of your character sheet. Know one's enemies strikes me as poor design because it feels required because it's really good, but also eats the ki points that make a monk have options and decisions without really being an interesting option or decision on its own.

I mostly came up with this as a way to compensate monks at low levels who tend to do less damage until they get enough ki points to try for multiple stuns. The theory is that as you spend ASIs to increase Wisdom, you slowly increase the damage, save bonus and initiative bonus. This would only be overpowered when a player uses die-rolling for stats and gets really good high rolls. In point buy I see this as being a bit more balanced on damage. Also, imo, monks don't really get to do much outside of combat that doesn't involve rp-ing, so I focused on making this a combat-focused sub-class for players who only want to focus on fighting as a monk.

Frozenstep
2019-07-25, 03:36 PM
I mostly came up with this as a way to compensate monks at low levels who tend to do less damage until they get enough ki points to try for multiple stuns. The theory is that as you spend ASIs to increase Wisdom, you slowly increase the damage, save bonus and initiative bonus. This would only be overpowered when a player uses die-rolling for stats and gets really good high rolls. In point buy I see this as being a bit more balanced on damage. Also, imo, monks don't really get to do much outside of combat that doesn't involve rp-ing, so I focused on making this a combat-focused sub-class for players who only want to focus on fighting as a monk.

I mean, plenty of the monk classes have all or most of their features contributing to combat, but when they give you options for spending ki it's not just "oh yeah, and you do +x damage on your attacks now". It's something like way of open hand allowing your flurry of blows to do some minor CC which can be used in many ways, or way of shadow providing spell options that can have many tactical applications. It doesn't expand on or give you new options.

Amechra
2019-07-25, 04:45 PM
I mostly came up with this as a way to compensate monks at low levels who tend to do less damage until they get enough ki points to try for multiple stuns. The theory is that as you spend ASIs to increase Wisdom, you slowly increase the damage, save bonus and initiative bonus. This would only be overpowered when a player uses die-rolling for stats and gets really good high rolls. In point buy I see this as being a bit more balanced on damage. Also, imo, monks don't really get to do much outside of combat that doesn't involve rp-ing, so I focused on making this a combat-focused sub-class for players who only want to focus on fighting as a monk.

Know Your Enemies: Low level Monks do not need help dealing damage. They need help later on, which is why the classic "let's deal more damage" subclass for Monks (the Kensei) gives them relatively minor bumps at 3rd and 6th, and then a big boost at 11th.

Also, hilariously, it opens up a three-level "dip" into Monk for Wisdom casters, since it would apply to their spell attacks...

Uncanny Dodge: Call a duck a duck. In any case, this is... OK, I guess? If you're being hit by a melee attack, you've done a poor job with your Monking, in my opinion. That aside, it might be a little strong - Rogues can't Dodge as a bonus action, so potentially stacking those is... hrn.

Wisdom of Past Warriors: This feature is honestly pretty dull. It's functional and pretty strong, but it's also very bleh.

Wisdom of the Grandmasters: Oh wow. Oh wow. If you made the unconsciousness temporary, I could see this being OK... but one of the things a Monk does fantastically well is forcing people to make (and potentially fail) saving throws. We're talking "use Stunning Strike on things with Legendary Resistance" good.