Good Monk Build...

[TheCountAlucard]

A friend of mine told me that he's gonna be in another DM's "Heavens vs. Hells" campaign. He wants to be aware of a good build for a Monk character that'll probably be fighting evil outsiders. At the moment, he'll only be first-level, but it's good to have plans for one's character.

[Lord Lorac Silvanos]

It is always helpful to know which books are allowed and to what degree multiclassing out of monk fits his character concept (People will come along shortly and recommend he plays something else if they have not already).

I can also recommend a search or skim of older threads, since this issue has come up before.

[Lord Lorac Silvanos]

It is always helpful to know which books are allowed and to what degree multiclassing out of monk fits his character concept (People will come along shortly and recommend he plays something else if they have not already).

I can also recommend a search or skim of older threads, since this issue has come up before.

[sonofzeal]

BoED has a lot of good feats for monks that are fighting evil outsiders. Vow of Nonviolence only applies against Humanoids and Monstrous Humanoids, and boosts your Stunning Fist DC by 4, some of the Ravages are good, and there's ones that give you bonus damage against evil things. Monks lack any remotely defence offense anyway, so Vow of Peace will put his defenses through the roof and let you use Trip, Grapple, Stunning Fist, and Stand Still for battlefield control, safe in the knowledge that he's probably one step away from immortal. If he's starting at lvl1, Vow of Poverty is actually a pretty good bargain and provides substantially better AC for the monk. It ceases to be a good bargain around level... 5-7, I'd say, so it depends how far you expect the campaign to go and whether you'll have a designated crafter ally. If you'll be trapped in enemy territory with no shops for long periods of time, it's a decent long-term investment too, just remind the DM that you can still use Tomes and Manuals (or Wish and Miracle) for high-level rewards.

[Mr. Friendly]

Good Monk Build....

Swordsage 20

[sonofzeal]

Good Monk Build....

Swordsage 20

Specifically, "Setting Sun"-focused Unarmed Swordsage Variant.... but yes, can't believe I didn't mention that.


Edit: To the OP - "Monk" is concidered one of the most drastically underpowered classes in the game. They're good at surviving, but lack any sort of offensive punch due to poor BAB (nerfs full-attack and grapple), poor weapons (no reach or two-handed), and generally poorly thought out abilities. Swordsages on the other hand are one of the three Tome of Battle classes, and generally devistatingly powerful and can keep pace (more or less) with spellcasters even in high level games. The Swordsage in particular has a very "Monk" flavour, and the book itself describes the "unarmed swordsage variant" which, for all intents and purposes, IS a Monk with a different (and far superior) set of combat options. Check it out if at all possible.

[Indon]

Good Monk Build....

Swordsage 20

Wizard 20 is better. Just tattoo your spellbook on yourself and Bam! You're a tattooed monk, which is even awesomer.

[Fenix_of_Doom]

yeeee another monk thread, words can't describe how much I longed for another one.

[SamTheCleric]

A monk that fights evil outsiders?

How about...

Monk 2/Ranger 5/Fist of the Forest 3/Sacred Fist 10

Using Ascetic Hunter feat and a liberal application of Favored Enemy (Evil Outsider)... you'd be fairly effective... and have a bunch of ranger-y spells (like Swift Haste)

[Telonius]

Touch of Golden Ice, Sanctify Ki Strike, and Holy Ki Strike from BoED.

If you go the Exalted route, I'd suggest the Ascetic Knight feat from CAdv. Monk3 - Pal 4 - Monk 13. At 20th level that will get you an extra attack, Divine Grace, Lay On Hands (for any undead), Smite Evil 1/day, a couple extra hit points, and most likely a few first-level spells per day, at the cost of some skill points and saving throws.

Normally VoP wouldn't be worth it. But if you know for certain that you're going to be fighting mainly evil outsiders, it's worth a look. You get the most benefits from it if you take it from first level. Note that you may run out of useful feats; try to beg the DM to let you take other reasonable feats in place.

[Kurald Galain]

I'd recommend taking one level in monk and all the rest in Druid.

[Solo]

I'd recommend taking one level in monk and all the rest in Druid.

That's far too overpowered.

[Solo]

A friend of mine told me that he's gonna be in another DM's "Heavens vs. Hells" campaign. He wants to be aware of a good build for a Monk character that'll probably be fighting evil outsiders. At the moment, he'll only be first-level, but it's good to have plans for one's character.

If you must play a monk, read these

http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=48573

http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=978174

[TheCountAlucard]

I can't be certain what books are available until I have a chance to talk to him again.

[sonofzeal]

I'd recommend taking one level in monk and all the rest in Druid.

Heh, a VoP Saint Monk1/Druid17 with Draconic Wildshape.... good times, good times, especially for the WLD.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Gloura 9 / Paladin 3 / Sorcerer 1 / Monk 1 / Hellreaver 6 with a high charisma and a ton of divine feats is one Charisma synergistic monster for the purposes of fighting demons.

No, OP, the radio crackered, you are the demons.

And the Monk was a zombie.

[Solo]

My my. Where is Sir Giacomo when you need him?

We need to be enlightened by the OMFGWTFBBQ Ultimate Monk Build.

[Illiterate Scribe]

My my. Where is Sir Giacomo when you need him?

We need to be enlightened by the OMFGWTFBBQ Ultimate Monk Build.

Don't tempt fate, Solo. Savour each minute as it last before your peace can come to an end.

[SamTheCleric]

I would like to point out that I actually tried to contribute to the request.

[Avor]

Pure monk, Vow of poverty.

Badassness, good aligned attacks, and free exalted feats.

[Illiterate Scribe]

Pure monk, Vow of poverty.

Badassness, good aligned attacks, and free exalted feats.

Rebuttal in 3 ... 2 ... 1 ...

[Kurald Galain]

Pure monk, Vow of poverty.

Badness, mediocre aligned attacks, and free exalted feats.

Fixed that for you

I'll leave the rebutting to the usual rules squad.

[TheCountAlucard]

From what I heard from him, his DM's not being too intelligent about it anyway - he's letting another player play a Hound Archon (again, they're supposed to all be 1st level).

[Reel On, Love]

Pure monk, Vow of poverty.

Badassness, good aligned attacks, and free exalted feats.

Uh-huh. And how do you... hurt things?
Or... attack flying things?

VoP:

[Telonius]

Like I said, normally VoP isn't worth it. But, in this particular case, he knows the campaign is going to be Evil Outsider-heavy. A lot of the Exalted feats are tilted specifically to giving extra damage, damage dice, and effects against Evil things in general and Evil Outsiders in particular. This would probably be the only time I would ever recommend VoP.

For flying things, I believe there is a tab somewhere in the DMG (away from books at the moment) that allows you to take an improved mount if you have a high enough Paladin level. I know that a friend of mine was able to get a Hippogriff mount in that way. You'd need at minimum 5 levels of Paladin to get a mount at all, and probably a few more on top of that to qualify for a better mount. A multiclassed Monk/Paladin could make use of that to hit flying targets. But otherwise, yeah, you'd need to beg your party Wizard to cast Fly on you.

[brant167]

Assuming your party doesn't concist of a bunch of power gamers. There are a few fun monk prestige classes, when added in conjunction with some minor tweaks to the class you could have a lot of fun and be able to keep up with the party.
My first suggestion would be to drop the first level bonus feat and pick up the Draconic Fist variant from dragon magic pg. 12. Extra elemental damage(acid) as a swift action to your attack.
Second suggestions would be to look into a way to making yourself larger. there are a few ways to do this mainly paying a mage to cast persistence(enlarge) on you.
Third would be prestige class out of monk as soon as you can. There are a lot of interesting prestige classes that still carry your monk abities up (yes draconic fist will count for this) My favorite (flavor wise) being a Zerth Cenobite from complete psi pg 43. You can take this at low level (starting 6th) and pick up to 4th level powers from the psi warrior power list. Sure it might just be 5 powers. But the right 5 powers can be amazing in conjunction with a monk. Just focus on powers that last for a long time so you don't have to self buff. However if you don't want to go the master of temporal combat flavor there is always drunken master.
Forth I agree that a vow of poverty would be rocking against evil outsiders (again assuming your party doesn't concist of power gamers who buy magic items like they were candy.)

[TheCountAlucard]

I can see the benefits Vow of Poverty would give, but what about the ability to overcome the Demons'/Devils' Damage Reduction?

[Telonius]

The "Sanctify Ki Strike" feat overcomes it; one of the VoP powers might also overcome it (away from books at the moment).

[TheCountAlucard]

I talked to the player about it; not even HE knows what books the DM is using (always a bad sign, there). He decided to look up the Swordsage after I showed him this thread.

[SurlySeraph]

You will take Touch of Golden Ice. Period.