Any mod that actually makes monk decent?
Arthas
Member Posts: 1,091
I've compiled a list of opinions I very much agree with from the .net. I think they hit right in the spot, monk is bad and should be avoided:
> monk suffers from too little too late, and it is exacerbated by the Monty Hall early game loot of Bg2. By the time you are good in melee, everyone is also good in melee. By the time your fists are pumping out what appears to be good damage, everyone melee-specialized has uber gear that outperforms the monk fist damage. The average base damage on the highest damage fists is 10.5. Purely from a damage perspective it will be outdone by weapons like daystar and FoA +3 without even counting specialization bonuses or potential extra attacks--extremely early game items. By the time your AC is pretty respectable, your AC becomes mostly irrelevant as the ToB enemies will easily hit you with their high APR unless you have a massive AC, making you mostly rely on damage resistance to stay in melee for any extended period of time.
They even have some gameplay annoyances like their movement speed because you usually don't want them in front of the team but they get their speed boost and off they go messing up your formation and putting their skirt-like AC on the front lines for everyone to swing/shoot at.
> 1d10(5.5 avg damage) is a joke compared to easy to get early game weapons like Daystar(11 avg damage), FoA(10.5), and Lilarcor(8.5), celestial fury(8.5 without counting procs). Especially when all these but lila can be paired with belm, also ridiculously easy to get early game weapon. It all gets even worse wehen you consider fighters can start Bg2 with grandmastery already in place which gives an additional attack per round plus something like -3 thaco and +5 damage.
> Add that fighters can get extra attacks with haste or improved haste, which Monks are "immune" to. And that a Fighter can use a "speed weapon" (Belm, Kundane) without penalties if they put the proficiency points. The Ninja-to of the Scarlet Brotherhood is, ironically, more useful to a Fighter/Thief dual or multi-class with UAI because of the proficiency points in the two weapon style.
> No armor means terrible AC from start to finish, you're outclassed by both fighters and mages in this department by quite a bit. No improved haste means 5 attacks per round max, which means you're taking whirlwind to stay competitive and not crit strike like fighters get. No helmet means full damage from crits, so if you play on any difficulty other than core you're going to explode into tiny pieces quickly. No bonus hp from con means d8 hp +2 MAX per level.
So we have a class that is supposed to melee, but has less HP, less AC, less attacks per round, and can't wear a helmet. All they get is MR and some fun abilities that don't offer a penalty to saves, meaning they fail all the time.
> 1d10(5.5 avg damage) is a joke compared to easy to get early game weapons like Daystar(11 avg damage), FoA(10.5), and Lilarcor(8.5), celestial fury(8.5 without counting procs). Especially when all these but lila can be paired with belm, also ridiculously easy to get early game weapon. It all gets even worse wehen you consider fighters can start Bg2 with grandmastery already in place which gives an additional attack per round plus something like -3 thaco and +5 damage.
> monk suffers from too little too late, and it is exacerbated by the Monty Hall early game loot of Bg2. By the time you are good in melee, everyone is also good in melee. By the time your fists are pumping out what appears to be good damage, everyone melee-specialized has uber gear that outperforms the monk fist damage. The average base damage on the highest damage fists is 10.5. Purely from a damage perspective it will be outdone by weapons like daystar and FoA +3 without even counting specialization bonuses or potential extra attacks--extremely early game items. By the time your AC is pretty respectable, your AC becomes mostly irrelevant as the ToB enemies will easily hit you with their high APR unless you have a massive AC, making you mostly rely on damage resistance to stay in melee for any extended period of time.
They even have some gameplay annoyances like their movement speed because you usually don't want them in front of the team but they get their speed boost and off they go messing up your formation and putting their skirt-like AC on the front lines for everyone to swing/shoot at.
> 1d10(5.5 avg damage) is a joke compared to easy to get early game weapons like Daystar(11 avg damage), FoA(10.5), and Lilarcor(8.5), celestial fury(8.5 without counting procs). Especially when all these but lila can be paired with belm, also ridiculously easy to get early game weapon. It all gets even worse wehen you consider fighters can start Bg2 with grandmastery already in place which gives an additional attack per round plus something like -3 thaco and +5 damage.
> Add that fighters can get extra attacks with haste or improved haste, which Monks are "immune" to. And that a Fighter can use a "speed weapon" (Belm, Kundane) without penalties if they put the proficiency points. The Ninja-to of the Scarlet Brotherhood is, ironically, more useful to a Fighter/Thief dual or multi-class with UAI because of the proficiency points in the two weapon style.
> No armor means terrible AC from start to finish, you're outclassed by both fighters and mages in this department by quite a bit. No improved haste means 5 attacks per round max, which means you're taking whirlwind to stay competitive and not crit strike like fighters get. No helmet means full damage from crits, so if you play on any difficulty other than core you're going to explode into tiny pieces quickly. No bonus hp from con means d8 hp +2 MAX per level.
So we have a class that is supposed to melee, but has less HP, less AC, less attacks per round, and can't wear a helmet. All they get is MR and some fun abilities that don't offer a penalty to saves, meaning they fail all the time.
> 1d10(5.5 avg damage) is a joke compared to easy to get early game weapons like Daystar(11 avg damage), FoA(10.5), and Lilarcor(8.5), celestial fury(8.5 without counting procs). Especially when all these but lila can be paired with belm, also ridiculously easy to get early game weapon. It all gets even worse wehen you consider fighters can start Bg2 with grandmastery already in place which gives an additional attack per round plus something like -3 thaco and +5 damage.
Post edited by Arthas on
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Comments
1. Their movement rate is faster, which means they have more flexibility on the battlefield.
2. They have stronger saving throws, which means they are more likely to remain functional in the face of enemy disablers (though the fact that only humans can be monks is a disadvantage; dwarves, halflings, and gnomes can get superior saves).
3. They get Lay on Hands, which partially compensates for their lower HP and defenses.
4. They get superior APR, with an extra half attack per round every 3 levels until they hit 4 base APR with a strong weapon. Note that the monk's damage per hit maxes out at 14.5 on average, not 10.5; the 1d20 gets supplemented by a +4 bonus.
5. They get incredibly high magic resistance at level 13 or 14, which very few warrior builds can match, and no warrior builds can match without specific and rare items.
6. They get immunity to poison and disease.
7. They get lots of Stunning Blows, which work very reliably. It's a little-appreciated fact that in BG1, many enemies have saves vs. spell well north of 10, and even in ToB, few enemies have saves vs. spell below 6.
8. All of their abilities require zero items, which means having a monk in the party allows you to give key items like Celestial Fury and so forth to other party members.
Number 8 is an especially important detail. A warrior that isn't using Celestial Fury frees up room for a different character to use Celestial Fury, and there's only one such katana in the game. Having a monk in the party doesn't prevent you from using strong items; it merely shifts those items from one character to another.
Also, if you get the Gauntlets of Crushing, you get +4 to hit and damage when using fist weapons, and that's an item that only monks would find useful. A late-game ToB monk with the Gauntlets of Crushing and the Girdle of Fire Giant Strength can deal 285 damage per round with Greater Whirlwind Attack (10*(1d20+4+4+10)=285), and earlier-game monks can deal respectable damage as well.
Monks have less potential in some respects than fighters, but they don't need additional buffs to be "decent." Being 20% weaker than the best character builds in the game doesn't mean a character is weak; it merely means it's somewhat suboptimal. Monks have always been viable and useful characters.
At least, they have been in BG2. In BG1, they are pretty terrible.
By the end of BG2 my experience is that monks are more than a match for fighters. If playing solo, magic is a major issue for many characters, but the 100% MR and decent saving throws of monks mean there's almost no danger to them - particularly with immunity to poison and charm (even from non-magical sources).
In melee, late-game monks will comfortably out-damage a standard fighter when unbuffed and they perform perfectly decently even in a party regularly using improved haste.
I'll also take the opportunity to try and counter the myth that AC doesn't matter in ToB - that's simply not true. A monk at the level cap will be difficult for most opponents to hit, even in ToB. While an opponent like Melissan will still hit pretty easily, the fact that her summons and allies won't makes it a lot easier for a solo monk to handle the final battles.
And yes, AC is important even in ToB. The reality is that while many enemies have THAC0 near zero or slightly below zero, it's extremely rare for enemies to get THAC0 below -10, while it's entirely possible to get AC well below -10 or even -20 for the right character build. Even Ascension Abazigal will miss a few hits on a well-constructed tank. Haer'dalis can easily hit -24 AC.
The reason it seems like AC doesn't matter is because warriors gain access to Hardiness, and resistances are therefore easier to crank up to game-changing levels than AC, at least for typical tanks.
when it comes to the overall power of being a melee character, in the end the only thing they really suffer from is lower HP ( it is very difficult to hit that 200+ mark which i like my melee'ers to hit ) but thankfully they still get hardiness which really helps a lot ( especially on insane difficulty )
their to hit is pretty good ( hitting -12 thac0 at level 25 thanks to those +4 fisties ) which is enough to hit anything with a 2 basically ( hardly do i ever see a monk miss once their thac0 hits double digit negative territory
their AC becomes insane, usually find myself hitting -20 or lower, which is way better than my OP gnone/dwarf berserker warriors only hitting around -15/-16
their damage output is almost unmatched, with gauntlets of crushing, 22 str ( 18 in bg1, +1 from tome, +2 from hell trial, +1 from MoLtM ) and with +4 fisties you can hit up to 38 damage on a normal hit, granted that d20 does have a big range, but you will see critical hits score in the 70s of damage, again, even my single weapon OP melee'ers only deal over 50 or so damage on critical hits nowhere close to 70
another great thing they get is A LOT of immunities and that crazy good magic resistance
the only REAL drawback of the monk is that they take a little while to get going ( bg1 they are complete trash unless you know how to equip them properly and even then they're meh ) they don't really start to hold their own until level 15, and then by 18 is when they really start kicking some serious butt, problem is, for some this might be too much of a long time to wait for a melee class to get good, but for me, i don't mind it, i actually have fun with how "weak" monks are at early levels, i feel that my monk can finally match the garbage that is my NPC companions for a little while before i really start to outclass them, as apposed to making a god right away making companions moot
@Stefano: being decent is not being good
@semiticgod
1) The movement speed is offset by the fact that you can't use haste on them;
2) [saving throws] True
3) [lay on hands] Meh
4) [apr] True
5) Magic resistance doesn't matter in a game where all is needed to is just to cast "lower magic resistance" and it is as you don't have it.
6) Useless unless you are playing BG1
7) mmm
8) not a point of strength, rather a disadvantage.
I ask you, why would I go for a monk while I can go for a barbarian? And you wouldn't even need very much to beat a monk in this regards, all you gotta do is just equip a good weapon and an armor that gives you DR and you are set.
@Grond0 +@Semiticgod -20 AC may matter, but not when you reach it so late. Also, in ToB I would prefere way much a helm instead of -10 AC (otherwise fire giant can just trash you)
@Abi_Dalzim Your opinion about kiting would matter if it was a class based on ranged weapons
That's incredible in its own right, right?
Advantages:
- +1 bonus to Dexterity.
- Gains the Darkvision innate ability.
DARKVISION: The shadow adept is gifted with the ability to see in the dark even better than in light. They permanently gain infravision and immunity to blindness.
- Gains the Life-Drain innate ability.
LIFE-DRAIN: Shadow monks channel the power of the Shadow Plane into their fists, gaining bonus effects based off of their level.
1st - 9th level: Drains 1 hit point on hit.
10th - 19th level: Drains 2 hit points and lowers target's strength by 1 for 2 rounds (save vs. death to avoid strength drain)
20th level onwards: Drains 3 hit points, lowers target's strength by 1 and 20% chance to drain one level permanently on hit
- Has a backstab multiplier of x2. Increases to x3 at 11th level and x4 at 21st level.
- 3rd level: May use the Shadow Pool ability.
SHADOW POOL: Shadow monks wield the power of the Shadow Plane and can manipulate it in order to cast a limited amount of Shadow Magic. The shadow monk must first spend one round drawing energy from the Shadow Weave then cast the spell. The shadow monk's concentration may be disrupted during the channeling or the casting time.
Level 1 (3rd, 6th, 9th, 12th levels): Shadow Missile, Blinding Darkness, Shadow Veil, Decoy
Level 2 (7th, 10th, 13th, 16th levels): Dark Mirage, Black Mist, Ghostly Visage, Shadow Walk
Level 3 (11th, 17th, 23rd levels): Shadowblast, Lifedrinker Touch, Shadow Comets, Impose
Level 4 (15th, 21st, 27th levels): Fireshield (Shadow), Shadeskin, Summon Shadow, Shar's Blessing
- 5th level: May cast Shadowstep once per day. Gains an additional use every 5 levels thereafter.
SHADOWSTEP: Step into the Shadow Plane and move for 7 seconds while others are frozen in time. The shadow monk cannot attack or use spells while in the Shadow Plane.
- 12th level: May cast Shadow Door once per day. Gains additional uses at 16th and 20th level.
- 15th level: May use the Deathstrike ability once per day.
DEATHSTRIKE: The shadow monk teleports to a chosen target and turns invisible for one round. Their next attack within one round is a guaranteed critical hit and drains six levels from the target.
Disadvantages:
- Hit Die: d6
- -2 penalty to Strength.
- -4 penalty to Constitution.
- Alignment restricted to non-lawful and non-good.
- Uses the shadowdancer's high level abilities table instead of the fighter's, with the exclusion of Use Any Item.
- May not use the Lay On Hands ability.
- May not use the Stunning Blow ability.
- May not use the Quivering Palm ability.
Highly recommend it if you want to play a high level monk.