D&D Next: Monkeying With The Monk

The removal of Martial Damage Dice, and thereby the monk’s Flurry of Blows, marked a downturn for Melissa’s enjoyment of the class. I can understand why: while other classes could use an action to attack one monster, the monk bucked trends by being able to at least try to punch more than one monster at a time.  Now? It just punches things in a manner and frequency identical to every other weapon-wielding class.

Oh hi there 3rd Edition monk!

Every time she would complain about how boring it is, or how she feels she is not contributing enough, I would reminisce about the 4th Edition monk, also known as the only monk I have ever liked. Where 3rd Edition’s monk could run a bit faster and make two attacks at a penalty if you did not move, this monk actually evoked many of the things that I had come to expect and enjoy from the depiction of the fantasy martial artist in movies like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Kung Fu Hustle.

Though my point of view might be blinded by too much awesome.

Though its default mode is punch-with-an-auto-damage-followup (which itself has a variable effect depending on your tradition), there are a variety of disciplines to choose from at the get-go: you can leap insanely far, attack every nearby enemy, throw them on the ground without having to rely on a convoluted and often insurmountable opposed check, hit them into other enemies…the list goes on, and this is just some of the 1st-level stuff; at higher levels it gets even crazier.

I am not saying that the monk needs to be able to do all of this stuff at the start, but she should have some kind of always-on benefit that at least helps differentiate her from other monks. As it is each monk tradition gives you all of one thing you can do, and only once per day at that. Even worse is that aside from three, count ’em, three tradition specific features every monk gets the same thing at the same level.

Were I do redesign the monk—and pretty much every other class—I would lean heavily towards 4th Edition’s approach to classes, giving you exactly what you need to function and letting the player choose the rest. Since all the monk really needs is the ability to function without weapons or armor (but still make weapons a viable choice), this leaves a lot of room for customization.

For starters, why not have Monastic Tradition give you something passive in addition to a ki-fueled daily ability? For example, The Path of Four Storms could give you a boost to your speed that scales as you level. Say, every 4-5 levels, so that there is more incentive to stick with the class and that level 20 has something extra for you, while The Path of Stone’s Endurance could let you reduce all damage you take by 1 or 2 points if you do not move during your turn.

As you level up you could pick from a list of generic monk features, and your tradition would give you access to exclusive features (though there might be some conceptual overlap between traditions). Like, maybe at 2nd-level you can opt to have advantage on jump checks. Maybe The Path of the Phoenix lets you spend ki to spend Hit Dice during combat if you are dropped. To make it easier on new players, each tradition could have a list of recommended thematic features, similar to how feats and Specialties work (at least for now, anyway).

Another benefit of this model is that you provide better control for players to determine character complexity, as well as how “magical” they want their monk to be. If they do not want to think about too much stuff they can stick to more passive features. If they want to fire blasts of energy or create hand-shaped impact craters from a distance, then they can pick stuff with ki-costs (since those basically act like more flexible spell slots).

Legends & Lore: This Week in D&D

The newly focused Legends & Lore debut topics include Weather & Warriors, with a few paragraphs at the end about rules complexity and future packet updates.

If and how I use the weather can vary quite a bit from adventure to adventure. Usually it functions as window dressing, but sometimes I throw in rain or snow to limit visibility (which can work in the characters’ favor), or make it difficult to climb (or even move, in the case of ice).

I tend to emphasize it more in Dark Sun, what with its focus on survival due to the inhospital everything and lack of food and water. I am a fan of tables, and have used random weather before, I just prefer that its mechanical impact does not require too much bookkeeping.

Of greater interest is the plan to change fighter maneuvers so that they are an additive to damage, instead of forcing you to choose between dealing damage–generally considered the more optimal option, as it tends to be the fastest track towards the dead condition–or doing something interesting. The small paragraph on how this works reminds me of the warblade from 3rd Edition’s Book of Nine Swords, where you had a list of maneuvers that you could use once, but you could use a standard action to make a normal, run-of-the-mill melee attack to refresh them all.

The summary here is that you get a pool of dice that represents skill and energy, which you to perform maneuvers, and can use an action to take a break and regain some of it. I am curious that if scaling damage is going to become its own thing, why they have to use dice at all? I do like the mention of spending an action just to regain some of it, as opposed to all, as it forces the player to choose how much energy she wants to use at a given time. I am curious if the fighter will still get to make an attack (like the warblade), if you get a defense bonus, or what.

I wonder if there will be any class features or feats that let you regain expertise, such as by defeating a monster, parrying an attack, landing a critical hit, etc.

As for the bit on spending feats to open up maneuvers, I am not sure what to think: most 3rd Edition feats that I remember were pretty meh, often giving you a small numerical boost to something (Weapon/Spell Focus), or giving you access to a highly situational ability (Cometary Collision), though some, like the Reserve feats from Complete Mage, were pretty cool.

To be fair 4th Edition had its share of boring, arguably mandatory math-boosters (such as anything Expertise), but there were also many more that shook up both your race and class features (such as Agile Superiority and Defensive Bluff for fighters and halflings respectively), as well as let you combine certain races and classes in thematic ways (such as Distracting Challenge for gnome paladins).

At the least 5th Edition has more hits than misses for me (I wish Arcane Dabbler let you choose your cantrips). Granted there are not many to choose from, and it is still in its playtesting phase, so hopefully we will avoid an insurgence of +x to y feats, and whatever maneuvers you end up being able to purchase are worth the cost (or trap choices).

The last part mentions rules, rules complexity, DM styles, stuff that we have already heard about plenty of times by now. As I have said before I like the idea of being able to set the bar on rules complexity, but am still waiting for an actual example to see how they are implementing it. Hopefully when we get the exploration rules that they come with a “dial’ for people to mess with.

D&D Next: Mud Sorcerer’s Tomb

First things first, if you are looking to run The Mud Sorcerer’s Tomb, you might as well get the Dungeon magazine supplement from the 3rd Edition update: you get the maps, neater-looking handouts, and some art to go along with it.

Since Josh did not show up for our Dungeon World campaign, we tried giving this a shot with just two people: Melissa as a dwarf monk, and Kamon as a human rogue. Past editions seemed to require parties of 3-4, so it would be interesting to see how two fared (especially lacking the traditionally mandatory healer).

We had just under two hours to play, and in the interest of trying to gather something resembling playtest feedback I skipped the backstory, motivation, and initial contrived word puzzle, starting them inside the dungeon.

So it was a little irksome when, immediately after they walked into the first room and I wrapped up the read-aloud text, they got hung up on the fact that I guess green marble is not a thing that exists. I initially took it at face value, because in a world with wizard-based animal hybrids and fantastic extra-planar metal, the realistic colors of marble seem like a pretty inconsequential thing to argue about.

Of course, Wikipedia seems to disagree.

Fast forward 1d6 + 3 minutes and they are actually exploring the room. It consisted of four pillars, two 80-foot long pools, a small square pool at the eastern end, and an iron bell. They overlooked the pillars entirely (which had mud sorcerer runes on them or some such), instead asking about the long pools. I said that the water looked clear, but that they were filled with hundreds of bleached bones.

This marked the second time-sink of the session as a combination of skepticism and paranoia ran rampant. Were the pools filled with bleach? Acid? How was the water still clear after who knows how long? Oddly, none of these theories included what, from my experience, would be the more common concern of “animating and attacking”, or approached anywhere close to the actual truth: they were merely “ritually prepared so as to prevent magical tampering”.

Melissa threw in some hair to see what would happen, and when it neither turned blonde nor dissolved went over to punch the bell without hesitation. I found this strange, because normally percussion instruments are triggers for traps or monstrous reinforcements. No inspection, no skills, just violence. Fortunately for them it only caused the square pool to drain, which revealed a black key stuck at the bottom.

Personally I always assume that pits are harbors for traps, hazards (molds are a favorite), and/or monsters like oozes or undead that happened to fall in, so I was both surprised and concerned for their sense of self-preservation when Melissa lowered Kamon down to get the key with, again, nary a Search check in sight. Anywho, with key in hand it was off to the next room…

…which had acid-weeping, eye-covered walls. Oh, sure, there was also a hidden door but with the entry fee pegged at a DC 25 Intelligence check there was no way that they were going to find it unless Kamon rolled very, very well on both dice (he did not). This is about the time I wished that there were rules for taking 10 and 20. Not wanting to call the game on account of not being able to locate the single hidden door that would let them keep having fun, I just told them where it was and had them take the acid damage to open it. Truly I doth giveth and taketh away.

The fourth room contained four statues of humanoids with various animal heads, a black pillar, and three sealed iron doors. The very simple trick is that you rotate the elephant statue in the middle of the room so that it points at a door, which causes it to open (presumably accompanied by a Legend of Zelda chime). They figured this out pretty quickly, giving each door the finger in turn so that they could check out what was on the other side, before deciding where they would go.

Since the first two doors lead to small rooms, they investigated them first. Door number one had a stone face, beyond which they could see a passage through a 1-diameter opening. Unable to squeeze through or find any way to open it, they eventually left it alone. The second door had a patch of bare earth, which Melissa eagerly dug into. Her efforts were reward with a coffin, which contained a corpse clutching a letter that I read to them despite no one knowing Taalese, and some treasure that they would never get to spend because it was just a playtest run.

They were about to leave when I, in a fit of wanting to see how they fared against some actual monsters, reminded them about their black key and the black pillar. Melissa searched the statues, giving the cat-headed female the Indiana Jones treatment, while Kamon found a keyhole in the pillar and gave it a spin. This activated the statues, causing a moment of hilarity where, from Melissa’s character’s point of view, the statue lashed out at her seemingly due to her unwanted attention.

Even more laughable was that the battle took about four rounds. Only one golem managed to land a hit, but Melissa’s Iron Root Defense softened the impact of this one-time victory. I guess in hindsight I should have used all three golems, but I erred on the side of caution because they lacked a healer (and a couple more characters to round things out).

After that non-event I was not about to pull any punches with the mummy crypt, because mummy-punches prevent you from healing and I, being on the other side of the screen, find it delightfully malevolent. They attacked as soon as the characters entered, but both characters made their Will saves against despair and proceeded to breezed through the encounter without taking any hits at all.

To be fair I stopped reading their resistances right after bludgeoning, satisfied that Melissa’s punches would deal half damage. Had I kept going I would have seen that all of their attacks dealt half damage. Well, except for Melissa’s ki-powered, double-damage-dealing fire-cones, which is what she ended up using when she realized that her unarmed attacks were not very effective.

The room lead to a short hallway that split both north and south, with another stone face at the intersection. This one had ear-alcoves, and in true Gygaxian fashion one contained something useful, the other a trap. Melissa guessed the ear with the green key, but then went ahead and triggered the trap anyway. She made her save, but Kamon got a face full of dagger-covered door. It was a bit depressing, for me, that the first and only time he got hurt was because of the actions of a fellow party member, and not because of golems or giant hit-point sapping mummies.

After Kamon recovered they spotted a green basalt pillar in a room to the south, which sparked a conversation about basalt and if it could be green. They happily suggested alternative substances that were both basalt-like and green, but I adamantly repeated the adventure’s flavor text until they dropped the subject. Suspecting a theme with pillars, keys, and colors, they opened it up and looted a cursed necklace that they had no way of knowing was magical and treacherous, pocketing it like so much worthless treasure that they would never be able to later redeem because, again, one-shot.

The only other way to go was north, towards a pillar-filled hallway. To the west they could see a suit of armor with blades for hands guarding a door, so opted to head east. Given my track record so far, I was both not sure why they were afraid of it, or why I even bothered including it. This lead to a larger room with decidedly less harmful-looking rugs and tapestries, but only because neither had played older D&D editions or read up on the subject of carnivorous furniture. Kamon decided to cut down the tapestries, which were in fact harmless. Unfortunately this involved walking across the rug, which was not.

The rug forced a Wisdom save, and if you failed you got sucked in. On the plus side you can be saved by a handful of spells, including a few staples like dispel magic and fly. On the downside no one in the party had access to magic of any sort (though, I mean, who would think to cast fly on someone trapped inside a rug?). Melissa made the save thanks to a +5 modifier and advantage against magic, but Kamon did not. Eh, we were out of time anyway, so it was basically a wash.

As playtest adventures go I think the only thing that we learned was that the monsters are really easy to hit, and were really unlikely to do any hitting. Damage, when I got to roll it, was pretty high. Melissa’s character had 116 hit points, and the giant mummy was more than capable of knocking almost half of it off with a single touch.

Speaking of the giant mummy, I think it was mostly fine. Its combination of a low AC and lots of hit points make it seem like you are hacking away hopelessly at a horrifying monster that lacks any internal organs to fret about. The rotting touch and fire vulnerability are likewise staples, and the despair ability is okay. The problem is that the despair is really the only thing it does before just pounding away at the characters. 4th Edition gave them curses and despair auras that penalized characters, which are both things that help differentiate them from the other heavy-hitters.

The stone golem on the other hand was pretty boring. It has a laundry list of abilities that they just ignored because Kamon had a magical sword and Melissa had a class feature. Since no one could cast spells they also did not have to worry about golem almost spell immunity, and its associated guessing game. This made the golem very similar to the giant mummy: both were Large creatures with a lot of hit points that try to hit you with their bare hands. The only major difference is that a stone golem can apparently cast slow on you for some reason.

4th Edition golems could randomly go berserk, knocking enemies aside as they rampaged about. They also exploded when they died, leaving a pile of rubble that hindered movement. I think that, especially in the case of the deathsplosion, both of those help separate them from the mummy, and more importantly other golems. Well, maybe not clay, but certainly the flesh and iron ones. I would also consider making them resistant to slashing weapons, magical or otherwise.

Martial Damage Dice needs a less specific name, especially when they can be used for things that are not damage. It also feels kind of clunky, especially when paired with the Martial Damage Bonus. I get that “mundane” classes need neat toys in order to keep up with wizard spells and monster hit points, but why not give damage bonuses on all attacks? Instead of getting both dice and a bonus that only works on one attack per turn, why not just have do something like 4th Edition’s multiple weapon damage dice.

As it stands, by level 10 a fighter can reasonably be doing 28 damage with a longsword, 20 Strength, 5d6 of Martial Damage Dice, and a +5 Martial Damage Bonus. Change it do a short sword and it becomes 27 damage, and with a dagger it is still 26. If a fighter instead starts doing 2[W] with each attack and you strip out the flat Martial Damage Bonus, she instead starts dealing 31 on average with a longsword, 29 with a shortsword, or 27 with a dagger. It is not much, but creates a wider range of damage results while allowing a player to roll more dice.

Or, as another option, why not allow the fighter to roll multiple weapon damage dice and keep the highest? It helps ensure higher damage without adding too much swing to the results.

Not a fan of all skills scaling at the exact same rate. I like the randomness of the skill die, but think that skills should start at something like a d4 or d6, and players should have to pick ones to scale up. I also think that instead of going up to a 1d12, that players should start rolling multiple dice and picking the highest. So, 1d4 becomes 2d4, then 2d6, then 3d6, and so on. Something that helps reduce the swingyness of it.

So, yeah, not much playtest feedback. We will give this another shot sometime later in the week, hopefully with a larger window of time, definitely with a wizard and cleric in tow (maybe just with a wizard and cleric?). Or I might just toss them in a necropolis filled with dracoliches and Asmodeus just to see how it all goes down.

Legends & Lore: Here Comes…the Monk!

The class and maneuver pdf got updated to include the monk class and maneuvers. Yes, maneuvers, because the monk gains Expertise Dice, you see. I will address that in a bit, but first, retrospective!

I do not recall how 2nd Edition’s monk operated, but 3rd Edition’s was very disappointing; at 1st-level you could move a bit faster and punch things. You could try to punch things twice, though you took a penalty. If you toured about sans armor you got to add your Wisdom modifier to your Armor Class, too. As you leveled up, your unarmored damage, speed, and out-of-armor AC scaled, and you got various other features like immunity to poison and disease, reduced falling damage, jumping without a height-cap, and so on.

The problem was that it encouraged multiple ability dependency, as you wanted a good Strength for unarmed damage, Dexterity for AC (and perhaps unarmed attack if you took Weapon Finesse, which you probably did), and Wisdom to further boost your AC. Of course, Constitution was also good to be able to take hits, which was probably going to happen unless you had a really good Dexterity and Wisdom. What I liked even less was that as your unarmed attack damage increased, there was no point to continue wielding weapons (despite there being a good number of “monk” weapons).

As with many other classes, it took 4th Edition to make an actually competent, engaging monk. Monk Traditions made other ability scores besides just Wisdom useful, and one even made weapons feasible. Monk powers were combination attacks and movement bonuses, making it easy to envision the monk performing crazy stunts instead of just standing in one place and punching a monster over and over. My personal favorite was drunken monkey, which let you hit a monster and cause it to wallop an ally. Utility powers removed the need for variant classes or alternate class features, and feat trees helped realize other concepts such as greatsword-wielding githzerai.

As expected the 5th Edition monk has bits of editions past, mixing static class features with meaningful decision points. Oddly the biggest thing people seem to be getting hung up on is the Lawful-only alignment restriction. I will go on record saying that I too think it makes no sense, especially considering the “drunken boxer” archetype, and really just seems like pointless tradition carried over from yester-Edition. Also, why are wizards not required to be Lawful, what with a life of study and practice?

You get to add your Wisdom modifier to your Armor Class, and despite the fact that it does not scale by level the underwhelming armors and lack of assumed/necessary magic items means that monks will likely have a really good Armor Class (at least on part with the fighter). Monastic Training lets you pick two skills from a short list, making it kind of like a Rogue Scheme-lite. Unarmed damage is a set 1d6, but given the whole Expertise Dice thing I do not see a problem with it. Also it is a finesse weapon by default, so there is no need to burn a feat on it to avoid stretching your stats too thin.

The major addition is Ki, which is a scaling daily resource that you can spend to activate Stunning Fist (creature must make a Wisdom save or be stunned for a turn), and later on Wholeness of Body (regain hit points). I get that this is a playtest, but I hope that this gets expanded so that players can actually make choices, here.

Finally, maneuvers. You start with two–Flurry of Blows and Step of the Wind–but every three levels you get to pick up another. Some are fairly straightforward and mundane, like Deadly Strike and Deflect Missiles. Others start out “mundane”, but can scale to magical if you spend enough dice. For example at one die Step of the Wind lets you boost your speed, two dice lets you run up vertical surfaces, and three dice lets you run on liquids. I like this, as it avoids the need for lots of similar powers with slightly different effects.

My final opinion is that it looks more interesting than 3rd Edition’s monk, though the Lawful alignment and preset Ki features are major turnoffs for me. I could see Monk Traditions providing maneuvers much in the way that the fighter’s Fighting Styles do, but mainly I would like to see them provide more interesting benefits (such as being able to use Flurry of Blows with a weapon).

Monk Basics

This is a nice tutorial article that gives you an in-depth look on each of the monk’s class features, as well as giving you tips on ideal races—including a sidebar on what race best matches which tradition—and multiclass options, and a sidebar with some ideas on naming your personal style.

New Feats

• Flurry Resounding: You can burn an action point to use flurry of blows again, even if you have already used it this turn.
• Internalize the Basic Kata: You can use Dexterity instead of Strength for melee basic attacks, as well as use flurry of blows on an opportunity attack.
• Master of the Fist: A multiclass feat that gives you training in either Athletics or Acrobatics, Unarmed Combatant, and ki focus proficiency.
• Piercing Palm: You can use Sneak Attack with a monk’s unarmed strike.
• Shielding Whirlwind Style: This is great for monks with a quarterstaff. You gain partial cover against ranged and area attacks for a turn after using flurry of blows, and also do not grant combat advantage for flanking.
• Slashing Kama Style: You can use a sickle, and when you use flurry of blows with one you deal ongoing damage instead of just plain old normal damage.

New Disciplines

• Deflect Arrow (level 2 encounter): An immediate interrupt that not only gives you superior cover against ranged weapon attacks for a turn, but allows allows you to shift as a free action each time you are missed.
• Wind Through the Willows (level 3): This seems like a much more elegant way to handle an attack that is supposed to represent you moving through a bunch of enemies and beating the shit out of them; instead of telling you to shift and make an attack against enemies you move next to, you instead affect a close blast and can shift into a square in the blast or directly next to it (hit or miss). As for the actual attack, it does decent damage for an area-effect, and also slows and prevents charging for a turn, and the movement part lets you swap places with an adjacent target.
• Water Gives Way (level 5): Another immediate interrupt that lets you deal damage against a target, slide it, and then knock it prone. The best part is that if the target charges you, you get a nice bonus to the attack and damage roll. The downer is that while you do not expend the power on a miss, you cannot try to use it again for the rest of the encounter (making it bad for delve runs, one-shots, or boss battles).
• Brilliant Counterstrike (level 7): The damage seems kind of low, but any enemy that attacks you for a turn takes automatic damage as a free action. The move portion lets you either end a grab or mark, and shift a couple squares.
• Stone Warrior Training (level 9): This is a really nice “training montage” power that lets you teach an ally how to better work with you. In game terms until your next rest, whenever you hit an enemy with an attack your ally gains a damage bonus equal to your Strength modifier.

Character Concepts: Dwarf Monk

Here is the character summary for Fyst, which I used during a delve playtest with an all-striker party. Masterful spiral increases the range of touch attacks, so I made sure to give him an at-will that has a range of touch (dragon’s tail) for some nifty synergy. Otherwise, not much else. Drunken monkey was a no-brainer for this guy: it fits the dwarf-style and is just too much fucking fun not to take.

====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&DI Character Builder ======
Fyst Ironfist, level 1
Dwarf, Monk
Monastic Tradition: Centered Breath

FINAL ABILITY SCORES
Str 16, Con 13, Dex 16, Int 10, Wis 15, Cha 8.

STARTING ABILITY SCORES
Str 16, Con 11, Dex 16, Int 10, Wis 13, Cha 8.

AC: 16 Fort: 15 Reflex: 14 Will: 13
HP: 25 Surges: 8 Surge Value: 6

TRAINED SKILLS
Insight +7, Acrobatics +8, Athletics +10, Endurance +8

UNTRAINED SKILLS
Arcana, Bluff -1, Diplomacy -1, Dungeoneering +4, Heal +2, History, Intimidate -1, Nature +2, Perception +2, Religion, Stealth +3, Streetwise -1, Thievery +3

FEATS
Level 1: Staff Fighting

POWERS
Monk at-will 1: Crane’s Wings
Monk at-will 1: Dragon’s Tail
Monk daily 1: Masterful Spiral
Monk encounter 1: Drunken Monkey

ITEMS
Monk Unarmed Strike, Adventurer’s Kit, Quarterstaff, Cloth Armor (Basic Clothing)
====== Created Using Wizards of the Coast D&DI Character Builder ======

Monk Playtest

I decided to whip up a basic three-encounter delve to play through myself, just to see how well the monk holds up. Initially, it was just going to be a dwarf monk with a couple of healing potions. The name of the game wasnt survival so much as seeing how well he performed. Then, I decided that maybe I should pair him up with a kenku rogue and attach a kind of tenuous plot to the mix.

What I ended up with was that a hive of kruthik had tunneled into a dwarf monastery, or something. I just cracked open a Caves of Carnage tileset that I apparently forgot about and just made something at random. Anywho, here’s the party rundown:

Fyst Ironfist (dwarf monk)
Snake (fire snake sorcerer)
Sir Frog (bullywug ranger)
Darkwing (kenku rogue)

To keep things simple I gave Frog and Darkwing feats to boost their striker damage, while Fyst and Snake got a +1 to attack. This allowed for very minor character management since I had to control four characters at once. I’m positive that I forgot to include some kicker effects on many attacks, but in the end I dont think it mattered much. I wanted to do a fire serpent writeup, but said fuck-all and just reskinned a dragonborn.

So, yeeep. All strikers. Each is armed with 2 potions of healing so that in a pinch they can heal themselves (except for Snake). How do they know eachother? Well, I assume that Snake is some kind of forge spirit that shows up when shit hits the fan, and that maybe there is a flock of kenku also living there? And, the bullywug–

You know what? Fuck it. It doesnt have to make sense!

I planned out three encounters geared mostly for a party of four. I made the first encounter a little easy just to test the waters. I was sad that I didnt get to properly use the deathcap mushrooms: I had intended to set them up as terrain hazards that players could push kruthik into to cause them to explode (which might harm allies as well), but unfortunately things didnt go according to plan.

Encounters
Encounter 1: 2 Kruthik Young, 1 Kruthik Hatchling
Encounter 2: 3 Kruthik Young, 2 Kruthik Hatchlings
Encounter 3: 1 Kruthik Adult, 2 Kruthik Young

Each encounter had kruthik burrowed beneath some rubble, and only Frog had a high enough Perception to act in the surprise rounds when they occured. Frog ended up being the bitch of the party, and I just kept mauling him since it always seemed to make the most sense, though at most he was one point shy of bloodied. None of the encounters ever made it past three rounds, and Darkwing never used his encounter attack since sly flourish did a shitload of damage every time.

In defense of the monsters, they tended to roll fairly badly and were all brutes, so they had a hard enough time hitting as-is. The kenku and fire snake were very ideal for their classes, having +4 to their attacks and +4 for secondary stats (which worked great for the sorcerer striker damage and Darkwing’s sly flourish attack). In retrospect I’m sure I could have added at least another kruthik young to each encounter. Hell, I might have been able to get away with another kruthik hatchling on top of it.

Mostly this was done to playtest the monk, and it worked out extremely well. In any instance that there was a kruthik hatchling nearby Fyst was able to drunken monkey a young into the hatchling, taking it out of the fight. If there was more than one young next to an ally, then a crane’s wings was great for kicking them away. Against the kruthik adult I used a combination of dragon’s tail to prone it, followed up by a drunken monkey to knock its ass into a young for some added damage.

The last battle was a major letdown. I forgot to use action points until then, so each character got to unload their daily and encounter in sequence. You didnt get to see it, but at one point Frog and Darkwing used driving the prey and trick strike to paddle a young back and forth between eachother for a shitload of damage. Couple this with Snake’s AoEs and encounter attack, and basically by the end of round one everything was bloodied. I plan to upload pics that I took on an almost entirely round-by-round basis, so you can see how fast things went.

In the end, I learned that not only is the monk a blast, but that a bunch of strikers is bloody-fucking-murder.

Monk Discipline Highlights

Dont really care about the overall power of the attack, this is a list of powers that caught my eye for one or more reasons. If you are interested in the perceived balance of all this stuff, the forums are a great place to listen to people bitch back and forth about it.

Crane’s Wings (level 1 at-will): Leap attack. The attack technique deals damage and has a push effect, but since the move technique lets you jump with a bonus, counts as running, and no distance limitation, I foresee many monks using this as a means for getting into the fray (which the power implies). However, its also good for getting the hell out of there if shit hits the fan.
The best part is that since this is an at-will power, by taking it you can basically jump insanely far at level one right from the start, and I have no problems with this (if anything, players will quickly learn the rules on jumping).

Now, for my own level 1 monk I was going to snag five storms so that I can do an area-effect followup attack after leaping into a mob of mooks, but then I looked ahead and saw masterful spiral, which is a level 1 daily stance. It hits a close burst 2, and for the rest of the encounter increases all of your melee touch attacks by 1. The only power that fits the bill is dragon’s tail, which lets you prone a target and swap places with an adjacent ally or prone enemy. Since I like it more than white mantis step, I’m gonna opt to pick up dragon’s tail for better synergy.

Drunken monkey (level 1 encounter): This is something that I’ve always wanted to see for monks, and the name pretty much describes what the power looks like. The attack technique slides a target, who then hits an ally with a basic attack and gains a bonus to the attack roll. The move technique lets you move faster, ignore difficult terrain, and grants a bonus against opportunity attacks from one creature.

Harmonius Discipline (level 2 encounter utility): Nothing really special here, just a handful of temp hit points, and you get an attack bonus when they peter out. I only call this one out since it reflects the fact that, while many 4E powers can do similar or identical functions, its the narrative context that makes them unique.

Dance of Swords (level 3 attack): You make an attack against one enemy, and deal bonus damage equal to twice the number of enemies around you.

Strike the Avalanche (level 7 attack): Wow. I…just…wow. This one is fucking BAD ASS. You make an attack against a creature with a slide effect, and any adjacent enemy to the target at the end of the slide gets hit with a secondary effect that knocks them prone. I really like envisioning a monk throwing a bad guy into his minions, toppling them all over. Or just throwing a minion into the big-bad-evil-guy. The move technique gives you a Speed boost and you cannot be attacked by prone targets.

Strength to Weakness (level 9 attack): You touch an enemy and deal a lot of ongoing damage (save ends). If you miss, you still deal a moderate amount of ongoing damage (save still ends, of course).

Spider Technique (level 10 at-will utility): You can run on the walls and ceiling, but cannot end there or else you will fall (of course, you might want to fall anyway).

Dance of the Stinging Hornet (level 13 attack): You leap onto an opponent’s back and punch the hell out of them. The best part is that if the opponent is bigger than you, you can end in their space and keep beating the shit out of them. They arent immobilized in this case, so there is now a foundation for clinging to a monster as it runs around frantically trying to shake you off. The move technique is the same as crane’s wings, so you get to jump beforehand.

Ring the Golden Bell (level 15 attack): This one makes me think of buddhist’s palm, just without the part where your shirt burns off, since you get to jump 10 squares and hit every enemy within a burst 1 dazing effect when you land.

Wandering Comet Strike and Watchful Hydra Stance (level 25 attack): These both tie for cool factor. Wandering comet strike lets you attack, teleport, and repeat against up to three creatures in total (but none of them more than once). Watchful hydra stance hits everyone with a burst 3, but also increase the reach of your flurry of blows attack to 3 for the rest of the encounter.

Celestial Drunken Boxer (level 27 attack): Now this is drunken monkey on steroids. You hit every enemy within a burst 2 effect, but the attack deals no damage. Instead, each target makes an attack against another target, with an attack and damage bonus.

Heart-Sundering Strike (level 29 attack): The great thing about this attack is its effect. It doesnt matter whether you hit or miss, the target will take a hefty chunk of ongoing damage. The best part? Each time the target fails the save, the ongoing damage increases. So, the shittier your roll, the worse it gets. I love it!

Playtest: Monk

So, the cat is finally out of the bag. I never played a monk in any edition but 3rd, and that joke of an experience is better left unsaid.

This has come as a big surprise to, basically, everyone: the monk utilizes the psionic power source instead of the highly speculated ki power source. They explain their reasons in the accompanying Design & Development article, and I agree with all of their points. The fact that they are strongly considering building samurai as conceptual feats works well with Josh’s own style: he’s playing a “samurai” in another game in which his actual class is the barbarian.

I like that the use of a monastic tradition is enforced, and no longer merely implied. The article only features on (Centered Breath), but obviously we can expect more when the class is actually released. I mostly like this since it works well with character backgrounds and also guides the choices and style of your character, but it looks simple and flexible enough that DMs will be able to easily make their own traditions specific to their campaigns.
They seem to be Dex- or Str-based with a few kickers from Wisdom, which is basically how you did a monk before, and an AC boost if you arent using armor or shields. It also looks like they maintained the 3E unarmed attack mechanic: it deals more damage that a typical unarmed attack, gets a proficiency bonus, and you can use any part of your body to simulate it. You can use the Enchant Item ritual to add crazy shit to your unarmed attacks. This can be represented in a number of ways (I’m a fan of mystical tattoos, myself), but I’m sure that 4E detractors will sling their best denigrations.

However, monks can also use actual weapons as, well, weapons or implements. I never liked that in 3E that had a bunch of cool-looking but ultimately shitty weaponry for characters to imagine finding a use for, but ultimately sticking to the stuff that not only didnt require a feat but was also better anyway (such as the claw bracer). Monks can use several weapons that function just as well as their unarmed attack, but can also use them as implements for powers that call for it. Basically, expect to see monks toting around quarterstaffs and the like and actually using them.

Many of the powers have the Full Discipline keyword(s?). The wording is a bit confusing, but as I understand it that if a power has the keyword it is essentially an attack and movement option paired up together. You are limited to the “use of one full discipline power per round”, which I take to mean that you cannot use the attack technique of crane’s wings and then switch to the movement technique of dragon’s tail, but can use the attack and movement technique from either power in the same round.
I really like the structure of the monk powers. They want these powers to represent fighting styles, and having so many of the powers have thematically tied attacks and movement really makes the concept work. Dragon’s tail lets you make a Dexterity vs. Fortitude attack that deals 1d6 damage and knocks an enemy prone. The movement technique lets you switch places with an ally or prone enemy, and if you use both I can really imagine the monk flipping the enemy head over heels behind her, or just throwing them.
Its good because it helps support the narrative aspect of 4th Edition that I didnt see so much in other editions. Sure, you can describe attacks and spells in any edition, but the mechanics didnt always support powerful strikes that can knock enemies back, or stun them, or trip them. These all flow really well to create a consistent cinematic experience.

However, like many of the newer classes this is going to create more bookwork on the player’s end. Many powers have two parts to them that you will have to track and utilize. I think its a matter of work vs. reward, though. You have to track more, but you have many more options than the typical class does since over half your powers are going to grant you potential movement kickers.
For me this just means that I’m going to dig the class. I have a knack for commiting mechanics and rules to memory, to the point where I was memorizing the attack bonuses for the rest of the party in Red Jason’s Punjar campaign.

The article also has a pair of paragon paths: the radiant fist and the ghostwalker. Radiant fists are monks who worship deities and get a booster shot of divine power from them, while ghostwalkers like to weaken and teleport a lot, thanks to the help of spirits (and sometimes its the enemy’s soul that they are using for ‘port fuel).
A bit of strangeness: leaf on the wind is one of the level 2 utilities. For those not keeping track, its also a level 1 warlord attack. I’m not necessarily opposed to reusing names, but this might cause confusion in case anyone in your group actually plays a warlord.

My end thoughts are that this class looks extremely promising. Its only a playtest, and I fully plan on making a monk and seeing how well it fits. I have high hopes that it will be an actually enjoyable experience, especially since Wizards made the bard useful.