Monk Archetypes/Concepts. Monks don't suck!

[Dimcair]

I had a look at the very comprehensive guide by Revel.


Can anyone share their experiences with certain monk builds and combinations?

There are so many that I am curious for some insider information =). You don't have to be very specific as long as you name the archetype and or combinations + your experiences with them.



Books prefered: Core, APG, UM, UC; no dipping.

[Spore]

Made a Ki Mystic/Qigong Monk. Now he doesn't completely suck but if it weren't for my climb speed we would've never won against that Lich.

[Snowbluff]

no dipping.

Ok, good. The best monk build is Cleric19/Monk1 Archer with some spells poached through Samsaran.

[PsyBomb]

Zen Archer/ Quinggong is awesome for ranged physical.

Martial Artist... Not so much

[Psyren]

Assuming Qinggong in all cases to swap out the more dull class features:

+Hungry Ghost with a few easy Vows for free ki (Chains, Truth and Silence are fun for roleplaying and give an extra 13 ki points combined) can be a passable SLA-based gish.

+ZA has been mentioned.

+Tetori works well as a grappler.

+Maneuver Master works well with Dirty Trick to reliably debuff one or more enemies for multiple rounds, and cause them to use up their standard action clearing it. For tripping however you are better off with something else.

+Master of Many Styles gives you some nice options for free, e.g. Snake Style makes your unarmed strike piercing and gives you substantial touch AC.

[Dimcair]

I am taking from this that the melee role is still a bit underwhelming. Maybe play it in a low-op group then, stick with zen archer and call it a day.

Thank you.

[elliott20]

Where is Giacomo when you need him? That guy has always been the resident monk builder / advocate.

Personally, I would rather just play a swordsage with improved unarmed attack variant. Far more straight forward and far more fun.

[Psyren]

I am taking from this that the melee role is still a bit underwhelming. Maybe play it in a low-op group then, stick with zen archer and call it a day.

Eh, they're no Barbarian but you can still build one that can punch out a Balor. The Tetori can even grapple it and keep it from escaping.

Where is Giacomo when you need him? That guy has always been the resident monk builder / advocate.

B&.

Personally, I would rather just play a swordsage with improved unarmed attack variant. Far more straight forward and far more fun.

If your PF game allows ToB then yeah, that's going to be the better option.

[elliott20]

B&.

What really? Why? Or do I really want to know?

[eggynack]

It looks like it's been roughly four years since he was banned. It's not like he was all that good at monk optimization though. I think Captnq is one of the more ardent supporters of monks nowadays, though most of that argument does rely on unabashed cheesery. I mean, seriously, the man (Sir Giacomo, not Captnq) argued that the major downfall of druids was that someone could cast dominate person on them, and force them to teach druidic.

[Snowbluff]

I mean, seriously, the man (Sir Giacomo, not Captnq) argued that the major downfall of druids was that someone could cast dominate person on them, and force them to teach druidic.

The druids. The ones with the good will progression and literally only needing wisdom and having the resistance spells on their list.

I recently spent a lot of time trying to race a wolverine over a mountain range, too.

[eggynack]

The druids. The ones with the good will progression and literally only needing wisdom and having the resistance spells on their list.

Well, that too. My big problem with it is that you just dominated a druid, and have him under your thrall for days, and the biggest thing you can conceive of doing with that is having him teach you druidic, thus stripping him of his powers? That's just insane. Really, at that point, the downside of falling for teaching druidic is actually a huge upside, because any other character in that situation would be either killed, or made the enemy's eternal servant of destruction. Y'know, sometimes I wish I could go back in time and argue in ancient threads, because looking at them just sitting there, with easy to destroy arguments, hurts my head a bit. It is pretty fun, by contrast, to look at threads I did post in, and be all, "Why isn't anyone saying this argument?" and then noticing that I made the same arguments then that I would now.

[Drelua]

I have a DEX-based Hungry Ghost Qinggong Monk going right now in a pretty high-op group at level 15, and he holds his own pretty well. The other PCs are a wizard, an oracle, and a magus, so they do outpace me in terms of damage, but my defence is quite a bit better than any of theirs. My AC ranges from 52 to 60 depending on what exactly I'm doing that round, and I think my worst save is higher than any of their best saves. Between that and the self-healing from Hungry Ghost, my character can basically only die to a really unlucky save. I've also got Snake Style for a lot of fun abilities like AoOs against anyone that misses me in melee, a better chance to confirm crits, and some help with touch attacks. I actually did get taken out by a colour spray once because I rolled the stone to flesh result and got about a 3 on my fort save, but there's really nothing you can do about rolls that unlucky.

My damage is theoretically pretty good with my agile amulet, but my attack modifier isn't great and I'm the only party member that really cares about full attacks, so it never turns out to be as good as it could be. I usually get a few useful buffs from some of the other characters, like a magic vestment from the oracle and a Greater Magic Fang from the staff-like wand using wizard, but I'm not really dependent on them. Overall, it's a really fun character to play, even if I don't usually contribute quite so much as I could with a more powerful class. At least I don't use up the party gold on healing!

[Psyren]

What really? Why? Or do I really want to know?

Even if I knew the specific catalyst, that's not something we can really discuss here, sorry.

Well, that too. My big problem with it is that you just dominated a druid, and have him under your thrall for days, and the biggest thing you can conceive of doing with that is having him teach you druidic, thus stripping him of his powers? That's just insane. Really, at that point, the downside of falling for teaching druidic is actually a huge upside, because any other character in that situation would be either killed, or made the enemy's eternal servant of destruction. Y'know, sometimes I wish I could go back in time and argue in ancient threads, because looking at them just sitting there, with easy to destroy arguments, hurts my head a bit. It is pretty fun, by contrast, to look at threads I did post in, and be all, "Why isn't anyone saying this argument?" and then noticing that I made the same arguments then that I would now.

I would argue that "do this thing that will make you lose all your powers and be easy prey" would count as "obviously self-destructive" too.

I actually did get taken out by a colour spray once because I rolled the stone to flesh result and got about a 3 on my fort save, but there's really nothing you can do about rolls that unlucky.

Did you mean Prismatic Spray here? I assume they beat your SR?

[Dimcair]

Where is Giacomo when you need him? That guy has always been the resident monk builder / advocate.

Personally, I would rather just play a swordsage with improved unarmed attack variant. Far more straight forward and far more fun.

The upcoming game will be core classes only. (Archetypes are fine though. 15 point buy)

And since there was some complaining that my

Spoiler: Wizard

Show

Conjuration-Teleportation Wizard, prohibited divination and enchantment. Focuses on Control and Summoning Monsters

is too OP, I thought I try a lower 'tier' for the next character, should my wizard die/decide to leave/get banned, to get less hated on.

[magwaaf]

http://www.d20pfsrd.com/classes/core...gry-ghost-monk

that is your answer. they are f'ing awesome plain and simple. they just win

[Drelua]

Did you mean Prismatic Spray here? I assume they beat your SR?

Yeah, prismatic spray. Woops. I actually don't have SR thanks to Hungry Ghost. It was a trap at the end of the dungeon that I figured I could absorb, so everyone else hid while I opened the case. I would have absorbed it fine if I hadn't had such terrible luck.

[eggynack]

I would argue that "do this thing that will make you lose all your powers and be easy prey" would count as "obviously self-destructive" too.

Yeah, that is also a silly aspect of it. It is a rather silly argument overall, really.

[Feint's End]

I'm gonna repeat what others have said.

Generally for melee the best combination (for a flexible melee that is ... some Archetypes like Tetori are better at certain things) is Hungry Ghost Qinggong Monk. My suggestion is going on strength focus and using a Staff with powerattack. You essentially flurry (TWF) with a two handed weapon without any of the drawbacks so this makes a really solid basis for a fightertype. Between Bracers of Armor, Bark's Skin and Wis and Dex to AC your defenses will be ok too.

For Ranged Qinggong Zen Archer Monk is quite good (one of the best out of the box Archers in PF). Nothing really to add here. Grab the usual feats PB Shot, Precise Shot, Deadly Aim, Clustered Shot (one of them you get as a bonusfeat which is nice).

Both work quite well without adding other classes. Nothing compared to a meditant Psywar or Deadly Fist of course but still very workable.

[Dimcair]

May I ask a question that potentially has a very obvious answer?

What aspect of the Hungry Ghost monk is the selling point?

Or is it rather the fact that he does not lose any important class features as other archetypes do + his class features are OK in themselves?
Maybe I am missing something obviously good =)

[deuxhero]

Ability to gain ki on kills/criticals, which naturally combos with Qinggong's ki hungry nature.

[Snowbluff]

They can refresh their ki by critting. This means they can get more spells in a day.

[Feint's End]

They can refresh their ki by critting. This means they can get more spells in a day.

Pretty much this (also by reducing an enemy to less than 0 hp). In and of themselves they are ok but since Qinggong is pretty much reliant on Ki Points and you solve that problem with Hungry Ghost they work together extremely well. Essentially you can spam (as in rebuff / use) your abilities whenever you need them because most of the time there will be enough opportunities to refresh lost ki points.

[Psyren]

The health drain point is important too. If you crit once every round (not impossible on a crit-fishing build with all the attacks you get) you effectively have Fast Healing {your level}, and later that becomes {your level + Wis} thanks to the temp HP from Sipping Demon.

[Ssalarn]

Sensei with the Mantis Style feat chain and Touch of Serenity can make an excellent lockdown specialist who also serves as a decent party buffer.

Tetori is great and possibly the only competent grappler in the game.

Zen Archer is of course the class for competent archer characters.

What else is good....

There's a couple other archetypes that can make for decent characters, like the Sohei (great for mounted combat), the flowing monk (pretty conditional though), the maneuver master (lots of good potential here), and the Master of Many Styles (even this one is most commonly taken as a 2 level dip).

Season any and all of the above with Qinggong of course, to sift out any non-complimentary elements and get the most bang for your buck. As a general rule it's always good to get rid of SR if at all possible because it's utter dreck and more likely to harm than help in most situations.

[Psyren]

Ahh, I forgot Sohei - I love the initiative stuff and the weapon training, but the mount is pretty eh.

Weapon Adept can potentially be nice because it is lightweight and Perfect Strike works with maneuvers.

Tetori is great and possibly the only competent grappler in the game.

The only competent mundane one, surely - both Druids and Summoners can get quite beastly at it. (snerk)

As a general rule it's always good to get rid of SR if at all possible because it's utter dreck and more likely to harm than help in most situations.

I actually disagree - SR helps more often than it hurts. Most buffs and heals happen outside of combat where it doesn't get in the way, plus it also doesn't interfere with your own SLAs; instead, it provides a useful defense against some truly nasty attacks on top of your saves.

In addition, if you did lower it to accept a buff and got hit with something with a duration, you actually get a chance to throw off the effect when it comes back up next turn.

[deuxhero]

Sohei is best as a 1/2 level dip, as it lets you pick up Mounted Skirmisher early

[Ssalarn]

The only competent mundane one, surely - both Druids and Summoners can get quite beastly at it. (snerk)

Truth.

I actually disagree - SR helps more often than it hurts. Most buffs and heals happen outside of combat where it doesn't get in the way, plus it also doesn't interfere with your own SLAs; instead, it provides a useful defense against some truly nasty attacks on top of your saves.

In addition, if you did lower it to accept a buff and got hit with something with a duration, you actually get a chance to throw off the effect when it comes back up next turn

This is kind of an optimization and group cohesiveness thing; I think SR is way more likely to interfere with allies short duration buffs and emergency heals than it is to stop enemy spells, and the Monk's already formidable saves and various bonuses and immunities make the need for SR debatable. I will say that for a smart group with a decent level of system mastery, there is probably a way to make SR work for you more than it works against you.

[Dimcair]

Truth.

This is kind of an optimization and group cohesiveness thing; I think SR is way more likely to interfere with allies short duration buffs and emergency heals than it is to stop enemy spells, and the Monk's already formidable saves and various bonuses and immunities make the need for SR debatable. I will say that for a smart group with a decent level of system mastery, there is probably a way to make SR work for you more than it works against you.

I will make sure to ask the DM if he might houserule the SR issues with beneficial/harmful spells.

[elliott20]

huh, so there's a new core monk now in Pathfinder? I need to take a second look at pathfinder more seriously.