Monk - Way of the Empty Bottle

[Halflens]

Hey everyone!

First time posting here, so sorry if I'm missing something. Anyway.

I recently got into 5e with some friends, and we realized the monk needed some sort of drunken archetype. in a brief burst of inspiration I came out with this. It turned out being essentially a defense-focused tradition, centered around the unpredictability of the movements of a drunken monk, making it harder to hit.

I have never done something like this before, so I'm really looking forward for tips and all. I'l be taking notes.

Way of the Empty Bottle

Misstep Stance
Starting when you choose this tradition at 3rd level, you gain the ability to consume a pint of alcohol as a bonus action, to gain the benefit of this stance. When in this stance, you can use your reaction to impose disadvantage to a single attack roll against you.
This stance lasts for 1 minute. lt ends early if you are knocked unconscious.
Once you have used this stance twice, you must finish a long rest before you can use it again.
At levels 6, 11 and 17 you gain an additional use of this stance. Moreover, at the same levels you gain an additional reaction while in this stance, that can be used only in the aforementioned way.

Strenght of Spirit
At 6th level, the monk can expend one use of Misstep Stance as a bonus action to get a new saving throw on an ongoing effect for which he failed a previous save.

Dance of the Drunken Devil
At 11th level, if an attack misses the monk because of Misstep Stance, you can expend your reaction to make a single melee attack against an enemy within reach.

Salamander's Spite
At 17th level, you can use the Sweeping Cinder Strike tecnique, as per the Way of the Four Elements. Moreover, you can expend one or more uses of Misstep Stance to increase the level of the spell by 2 while you cast it. This doesn't count against the maximum level you can achieve by expending Ki points.

So, here it is. Couldn't resist adding the flamespitting technique How does it look and how can I make it viable?

[Ninja_Prawn]

Welcome to the playground! The concept is solid, and the name is spot on.

I'm not a huge fan of using "uses of a stance" as a transferable resource like superiority dice or whatever. It's clumsy and doesn't really make sense.

I would:

• Make Misstep always-on (so it doesn't have limited uses or require a bonus action).
• Get rid of the extra reaction. Mainly because it feels wrong.
• Make Strength of Spirit straight-up once per short rest.
• Package the Dance... into the Misstep, so the whole thing costs one reaction.
• Change Salamander's Spite into an actual, cone-shaped breath weapon, like the dragonborn's (with the numbers re-balanced as appropriate)

[Bruno Carvalho]

Rules of RPG Monkiness:
"There shall not be a monk option in your game without a drunken monk possibility"


Kidding :D

Other than that, your tradition looks great, and Ninja_Prawn gave good advice, but I still would love to see some more alcohol-related goodies. Drink almost feels like just fluff.

Oh, and if you really want to roll with multiple reactions, why not rule that this monk can trade actions? Like doing 2 reactions and a move action in a turn (by not doing his standard action) or something like that?

[Arkhios]

How about tying some of the reactionary abilities to the use of ki? Just a thought. Like the drinking giving you extra ki points which must be spent before next rest, or they (and maybe monk too? xD) would end up getting wasted otherwise. Limiting those to the number of two before long rest, increasing by level.
All in all, this looks solid. I'd like to play one myself! :P

[Ninja_Prawn]

Another suggestion: homebrew some alcohol-based magic items! The worlds of D&D already have a ton of named alcohols, and it would make sense for some of them to have magical properties.

[Halflens]

First of all, thank you all for the help!

Second: ok, let's look at the current state.

1) the drunken dude may be a liiiiitle to "tanky", getting to up to 5 dodge reactions per turn by level 17. I actually wanted the idea of getting better and better ad stepping outside of attacks, just maybe getting all of them with just a bonus action could be a bit too much.
Also, you will have noted the low request of ki compared to the other traditions. So, here may be a tweak: you may "dodge" an extra attack, even if you've already used your reaction, by spending 1 ki point. Sounds better?

2) Use of "charges" may be liked or not. I actually dig it. Moreover, i worded in "uses of stance" to clarify the ruling, but I obviously intended that you have to chug down a pint. Just pointing it out.

3) Strenght of spirit could actually be 1/long rest. Still thinking about it though.

[Ninja_Prawn]

In that case, you should give them a jug that holds x amount of sake, and they can only refill it once per long rest. Then every use of an ability costs 1 swig from the jug! I could see that working.