Monk Balancing

[Aero Silver]

Most of the discussion here pertains to Dex Monks and Epic Dodge. Does that mean that Str Monks are undesirable?

Also, Monks have interesting multiclass options, such as Fighter, Rogue, WM, Ranger, SD, or Druid. They can handle themselves well in PvE. But truth is, PvP is a whole different bag of popcorn.

[Seven Sons of Sin]

I thought the only downside of monks was their multiple-attribute-dependency (like paladins). Don't you kind of need 14 in everything, save CHA?

[Hunter548]

Most of the discussion here pertains to Dex Monks and Epic Dodge. Does that mean that Str Monks are undesirable?

Also, Monks have interesting multiclass options, such as Fighter, Rogue, WM, Ranger, SD, or Druid. They can handle themselves well in PvE. But truth is, PvP is a whole different bag of popcorn.

Strength monks are fairly bad. You don't gain that much damage, and basically write off any real ability to survive to gain said tiny amount of damage.

[yellowcateyes]

I thought the only downside of monks was their multiple-attribute-dependency (like paladins). Don't you kind of need 14 in everything, save CHA?

MAD isn't a big issue for unarmed monks. If you go full on DEX, have decent CON and refrain from treating WIS as a dump stat, you're fine. Having enough INT for expertise suffices to give you all the skills you need.

Monks benefit from secondary attributes, but they don't depend on them. Contrast with Paladins who effectively have two primary attributes (STR and CHA) while still wanting high CON, enough INT for expertise, and possibly some WIS for spellcasting.

[Lorkas]

Kama v. Unarmed: A dual kama monk will enjoy 2 more APR than an unarmed monk, at a loss of 2 AB. A kama monk will also have +1 to two stats and +2 to several skills, from the glove slot. However, a dual kama monk also loses deflect arrows, stunning fist, and monk unarmed damage. Deflect arrows is basically epic dodge against ranged opponents, stunning fist can be very powerful against low fort enemies, and monk unarmed damage goes a long way towards making up for the lesser APR: Starting at level 16, an unarmed monk would do 10.5 base damage, while a kama monk does 3.5. Again, these trade-offs feel reasonably balanced to me.

Quarterstaff monks will tend to have 4 more AB than kama monks, usually. The main benefit of taking kama over quarterstaff is that you can unlock an extra attack per round by using flurry of blows, but that applies -2 AB, while quarterstaff gets +2 AB from wielding a two-handed weapon.

Also adding in here: my recent game experience has mostly been on a monk character that was pure monk until level 21. He was small sized (less damage on an already low-damage class), my only offensive feat was weapon finesse, I wore just DEX/hide/MS gear until about level 18 or 19, and I used basin +1d4 +1d4 +1d4 damage gloves until around the same level.

The only point at which I felt like my character was weak was from levels 3-6 or so, and those are the levels when almost any build that isn't an armored STR based full BAB class feels weak and slow to me. I know that my character was, in fact, weak at every point, but he didn't feel weak.

When you win initiative there are even times when you are so fast that you can zoom in, get a flurry of attacks in, and back off before your enemies get a return flurry. It's a slow way to fight of course, getting only one flurry every round, but holy cow it's fun to play a constantly mobile character who (if you can pull it off) doesn't even give enemies a chance to try to hit them. Speed is an advantage in this game in ways that I didn't realize before playing a character with lots of monk levels (previously I have had a lot of monk-dip characters, but never a monk main).

[Sockss]

Yeh, Monks are crazy good.

No monk speed, or at least capping it out at 50% and having it not stack with haste, would pave the way for changes to them. Rather than having a class which excels at, essentially, exploiting mechanics.

That aside, re: weapon choice:

Kama's fantastic if you've got a sneak drop on someone, since you can grab 4 attacks in your first flurry. Which will generally equate to much more effective AB. (Espescially if you're dropping combat after that first flurry and zooming off so there's no possibility of retaliation)

Quarterstaff gives you an extra 2AB, which is useful if someones AC outmatches yours. (Although, in PvP it's less useful as you'll be chugging TS pots anyway)

Unarmed is fantastic because stun fist.

An optimal monk would use unarmed to stun things, then switch to Kama's to DPS when they've stunned someone.

All the weapon choices are viable, for monks.

[Astral]

Monks are crazy good in all points of the game. Their damage however, is scaling so again, slooooow soloing in low lvls, not all classes have even start. Everything is else is perfectly fine with this class. Monks with kamas usually don't bother with more than 3 or 6 monk lvls and focus on sneaks so they don't get to sneak AND zoom out as easily. And monks with unarmed strike who want to kite back and forth will not have 16+ rogue lvls for these 100 damage sneaks so it, honestly, feels balanced all around.

If anything, I'd hope to see monk-only items and a change to Wholeness of Body because it's bs. But the class itself is probably one of the most balanced classes we got. Also, monk-only items could be exactly the 'fix' some of the posters here refer to. When you want to make a class have an easier start but you don't want to buff it's late game you simply add monk-only items who will not be relevant in epics.

[Ork]

Monks are heavily gear dependent. If you're playing a monk and think "why am I not doing well," it's probably time to upgrade the gear.

[Iceborn]

While I do love the monk speed, the truth is that it's a mechanic unique of monks in NWN, and there's nearly no way to counter it short of a Time Stop scroll to the face, and even then it may not be even enough to get through the AC and epic dodge that monks tend to have in most cases.

I am all in for monks getting some tweaks to their skills and a slight rebalancing, but if that's gonna happen, the speed has to be crippled. And I'm okay with that.

What if they were to get full speed bonus out of combat, but in combat the bonus drops to, say, 1/4?

Actually, I think I can write a rather large list of all that I'd like to change for monks, and most of it is somewhat related to their multiclass combinations. Druids, namely.