PHB versus DDO, Monks

[MrWizard]

Well, after a day of downloading risia...day two is downloading the update to risia (lame)

So all I have to go on is the players handbook...maybe this is good as we can help others understand the monk and how to build it.

PHB

Alignment: Lawful only


Important abilities in order of importance

• Wisdom - Powers offensive and def abilities
  
• Dexterity -Better def (ac) and better skills
  
• Strength - Important for unarmed combat

DDO

Alignment: Lawful only

Important abilities in order of importance

• Wisdom - determines amount of Ki and helps with ac?
  
• Dexterity -unknown
  
• Strength - to hit and to damage for unarmed combat?

Skills that a monk in ddo needs are:
??????

Feats or enhancements that a DDO monk should have that require a certain stat to be at a certain level?

????


Good multiclass options -

Monk/cleric? The age of battle clerics upon us?
Monk/rogue? too many over lapping abilities?
Monk/paladin/rogue? New batman?
Barb/monk? real fast high hit point raged monks?

any thoughts to help me, you , newbs, any of us much appreciated by anyone interested in this discussion.

[jkm]

barbarians can't be lawful

[dragonoffrost]

I am actually looking at a high str and con, mid wis and dex build based with the fire stance.

Concentration helps you keep your ki after it's gained. So I am looking at Constitution also helping here.

I got to level 3 or 4 on Risia and was brutalizing kobolds in Waterworks at level 2 or 3. The burning hands finishing move was nice and I got it often with this plan.

[Coldin]

Well, Constitution is going to be important for both HP and the Concentration skill. Strength will be important for damage, Dex for AC, and both will be for to-hit. Wisdom is useful for AC and increasing the DC on the various special attacks. Int and Cha are basically dump stats, though some players might invest a little into them.

As for skills, Concentration is the most important. Other skills like Jump, Spot, Balance, Tumble all basically vary depending on play-style.

For feats, Weapon Finesse will be important for the dex-based monk. Beyond that, I don't really know of any "must-have" feats for monks. There might be some folks that want to take Skill Focus: Concentration I suppose.

[RazorrX]

Depends really.

Wisdom: DC values, Ki and AC
Wisdom is used for the DC of stunning fist, etc. SO it is very good to have high.

Dexterity: AC, reflex Saves, some skills, to hit on dex builds

Strength: Damage and to hit on some strength builds

Constitution: Hit Points and Ki
Constitution = Stat used for Concentration. Your concentration skill is the amount of Ki you can have stored at any given point. When you leave combat your ki will begin to decrease. It will stop decreasing when it reaches your Concentration skill level. The base elemental attacks cost 5 ki, so if your concentration is below 5 you will have to fight a bit first to build up to even doing one of the base strikes. Later you need more and more Ki to pull off some of the other Ki skills (such as wholeness of Body).

The elemental Paths are also keyed to certain Stats. Water is tied to Wisdom, Air is tied to Dexterity, Earth and fire are tied to Strength and Constitution but cant remember right now which is tied to which. You will need a natural (IE No items) stat of 14 for level 2 enhancements and a 16 for level 3.

CONCENTRATION is your number one skill!

Multiclass will be iffy, you lose a lot of your monk goodness if you are not using monk weapons or armor of any kind. Some that people think may be good is a Ranger 6 Monk 10 or a Rogue Acrobat 6 Monk 10, etc.