Stunning Blow?

[Son_of_the_South]

So ive read that many people think Stunning Blow is not necessary....

Advice....? (Ive got a HOrc 32 pt build with ST as primary stat - currently up to 28, buffed, at lvl 8)

[edgarallanpoe]

It depends...light or dark?

If he is light, no reason for it. Light has plenty of stuns already. If dark, go for it. It is really nice to have them both if you can keep the DC high enough to make it worth having.

[Son_of_the_South]

HOrc light Monk (ST based) but thinking of going Dark later - not sure as this is my first Monk build.....

Light has plenty of stuns.....which ones? Please enlighten (pun intended) me. Again, my first monk build so i am a little ignorant.......

:-)

[Hobgoblin]

HOrc light Monk (ST based) but thinking of going Dark later - not sure as this is my first Monk build.....

Light has plenty of stuns.....which ones? Please enlighten (pun intended) me. Again, my first monk build so i am a little ignorant.......

:-)

u have stunning fist - kukando (ranged stun) jade tomb, and i think one other

hob

[edgarallanpoe]

A light monk has the following stuns...

SF
Tomb of Jade - situational but usable in a vast array of quests
Kukan Do
Jade Strike - (situational and only on a critical)

Jade strike and Tomb of Jade work on anything extraplanar (elementals, devils, demons,etc...), undead, aberrations (Beholder, mind flayer, drow scorrow, reavers, etc... Also works on mudmen which never occurred to me until I saw someone do it.)

Fitting SB into a light monk build can be difficult but not impossible.

IMHO the following feats are must haves..

Two weapon fighting
Improved two weapon fighting
power attack (prereq for cleave)
Cleave (prereq for Shintao)
Greater two weapon fighting
Improved crit bludg
Improved sunder...essential for SF. It adds 3 to your SF DC even if the mob makes its save
Toughness

I have seen people take Luck of Heroes as their prereq for Shintao but that makes no sense to me. Monks already have spectacular saves so the +1 from Luck of Heroes really makes *very* little difference. On the other hand, cleve can be a very nice boost to DPS and crowd control. With a nice set of paralyzing handwraps you can run into a group of mobs, hit cleave, and watch as up to 5 mobs freeze. Kill at leisure at that point.

IIRC even after taking all of those feats I have listed, you should still have a feat left. You can use that for Stunning Blow if it is your first life. If this is a TR then that last feat should probably be your Monk Past Life feat.

Also...please note that a lot of melee epic destiny enhancements require you to have power attack on and cleave. They aren't working right now with handwraps but that is something that the devs have said will be fixed. Just something to note in your planning.

[scottmike0]

A light monk has the following stuns...

SF
Tomb of Jade - situational but usable in a vast array of quests
Kukan Do
Jade Strike - (situational and only on a critical)

Jade strike and Tomb of Jade work on anything extraplanar (elementals, devils, demons,etc...), undead, aberrations (Beholder, mind flayer, drow scorrow, reavers, etc... Also works on mudmen which never occurred to me until I saw someone do it.)

Fitting SB into a light monk build can be difficult but not impossible.

IMHO the following feats are must haves..

Two weapon fighting
Improved two weapon fighting
power attack (prereq for cleave)
Cleave (prereq for Shintao)
Greater two weapon fighting
Improved crit bludg
Improved sunder...essential for SF. It adds 3 to your SF DC even if the mob makes its save
Toughness

I have seen people take Luck of Heroes as their prereq for Shintao but that makes no sense to me. Monks already have spectacular saves so the +1 from Luck of Heroes really makes *very* little difference. On the other hand, cleve can be a very nice boost to DPS and crowd control. With a nice set of paralyzing handwraps you can run into a group of mobs, hit cleave, and watch as up to 5 mobs freeze. Kill at leisure at that point.

IIRC even after taking all of those feats I have listed, you should still have a feat left. You can use that for Stunning Blow if it is your first life. If this is a TR then that last feat should probably be your Monk Past Life feat.

Also...please note that a lot of melee epic destiny enhancements require you to have power attack on and cleave. They aren't working right now with handwraps but that is something that the devs have said will be fixed. Just something to note in your planning.

as a monk myself, i see no reason with cleave so i take the next best thing as a preq

When i had cleave as a monk i never really used it because i find using ki moves are more interesting than using cleave constantly..

[Kielbasa]

Only take stunning blow on your monk if you are strength based. Otherwise the dcs on it will be awful. I only found it useful for stunning casters and low fort save enemies. After u14 there are some compeling reasons to go wisdom based so you won't see many people rocking stunning blow anymore.

[wax_on_wax_off]

Not sure what your tome situation is but for end game I'd go something like this:
Half-orc, 32 point, light path
18 base str, 14 base dex (+3 tome for GTWF), 14 base con, 16 base wisdom
2 level ups in strength+3 tome for Overwhelming Critical
4 level ups in wisdom+3 tome for Vorpal Fists

The prereqs of OC exclude any other feats except stunning fist. You qualify for Shintao with Cleave as there's no room for dodge.

If you don't have the tomes available then I'd just skip vorpal fists but still go for OC, with it the DPS is very competitive with dark and light offers many other nice perks (especially as shadow fade got significantly proxy nerfed in U14).

[t0r012]

My light path, healing amp monk took stunning blow along with stunning fist. I don't regret it for a second. The dc is a point or 3 lower than my sf but still super useful.
Though she is human so I had an extra feat to play with.

More than one caster? Stun them both
Switch to wind and running low on ki? Stunning blow.
Dangerous mob rolls a 20 on your SF ? Toss a blow.

Now after having had it, if I had to give up a feat it would be a tough choice between SB and toughness as to which I'd give up.

[gee-dragon776]

as a monk myself, i see no reason with cleave so i take the next best thing as a preq

When i had cleave as a monk i never really used it because i find using ki moves are more interesting than using cleave constantly..

i use cleave and get multi stuns, palms, dismiss, and some times jade. but more stuns an dismisses

just my 2cants

[Son_of_the_South]

Wow, great feedback. Thx guys, the Monk is certainly a complex class (im used to Arcanes though so no biggy).

can someone explain to me how U14 has affected the Monk, in particular?

wax_on_wax_off - I have, already, +2 Tomes for ST and WIS and will no doubt get one for CON and DEXT too. I have been putting level ups into ST (currently at 28 with ship buff) so perhaps i should put the remaining into Wisdom?

I too took Cleave. How do you Cleave and SF at the same time - just hit Cleave then SF I guess (this may be a durrr question...)

I will give SB a go and see whats what - can always swap it out.

The Monk is so hotbar/key intensive!!

[JollySwagMan]

Can't Cleave and activate Stunning Fist/Blow/any other strike at the same time, however the stun chance from the wraps may trigger.

I also consider Luck of Heroes a bit 'wasted' on a Monk, I assume Power Attack on almost any Monk build, so Cleave is a natural fit. It's handy for ki generation...plus I like the roundhouse kick animation, especially when jumping around. As mentioned above it ties in well with Paralysing (or Cursespewing) wraps.

Or one might go for another stance, especially if the build does not include Power Attack.
Combat Expertise (requires 13 int, but is a prerequisite for Improved Trip...changed in update 14 to be an extra 10% ac rather than +5 AC, so its value in itself may have changed for some).....
Resilience (+4 to all saves)
Or even Precision (which no longer halves damage, just bypasses Fortification with a slight attack bonus now)

I have Cleave on a somewhat outdated WF Dark Monk (built oddly, with just 9 base wisdom but 13 int) uses Stunning Blow, Improved Trip and also picked up Improved Sunder when that was buffed...but not Stunning Fist. One of these days I mean to feat-swap him into a Light Monk for raiding/gathering TOD rings/greensteel clickies with, then LR-ing back to Dark Monk (preferably with a bit more Wisdom, perhaps dumping UMD/sneak skills with the loss of Int)

[Son_of_the_South]

So far, this is the plan (at lvl 9 HOrc Light Monk, ST as highest stat at around 28 atm)

1 Stunning Fist (Martial Arts)
1 Two Weapon Fighting
2 Power Attack (Martial Arts)
3 Cleave
6 Toughness (Martial Arts)
6 Improved Sunder
9 Improved Two Weapon Fighting
12 Improved Critical: Bludgeoning
15 Greater Two Weapon Fighting
18 Toughness/Dodge(?)

Thinking of changing Improved Sunder to Stunning Blow and then take IS at lvl 18????

[wax_on_wax_off]

Why no OC?

[Son_of_the_South]

OC being Overwhleming Critical??

[JollySwagMan]

Overwhelming Critical is an Epic Feat...I don't have Epic Destinies myself, so I can't really comment on that...but I would think the Improved Unarmed Strike Epic feats would be a higher priority for a Monk..?

[Son_of_the_South]

Well, yes, me either. But i guess you have to plan for them....

[edgarallanpoe]

i use cleave and get multi stuns, palms, dismiss, and some times jade. but more stuns an dismisses

Yeah...uhm...sure you do.

[wax_on_wax_off]

Overwhelming Critical is an Epic Feat...I don't have Epic Destinies myself, so I can't really comment on that...but I would think the Improved Unarmed Strike Epic feats would be a higher priority for a Monk..?

Improved Unarmed Strike gives +1[weapon] damage which for a monk is +3.5*21/20=<4 bonus damage. Overwhelming Critical increases the hit ratio from 21/20 to 23/20 giving a 9.5% increase in first number DPS - almost twice what IC:B gives - making it a very good feat for a monk who can fit it and who benefits more from it than a character who uses any other weapon (for instance Khopesh goes from 27/20 to 29/20 which is 7.4% first number increase).

It is difficult to fit and it does have costs but I think on a Half Orc it is a must have as you've lost DPS from the get go and this is a good strategy to get it back.

Fair to say though that a Human Dark Monk with OC is probably one of the better DPS builds in U14 though I guess another race could skip Toughness (ouch!).

[Therigar]

I have only used Stunning Blow on one monk. I run with Stunning Fist regardless of whether playing a light or dark monk. If I were to run Stunning Blow regularly I don't know what feat I would give up in order to keep it. I think it would likely be the Stunning Fist. I could only imagine doing that if I tanked WIS or if I were dark path and focused on using short swords for some reason. Dropping Stunning Fist for Stunning Blow doesn't really seem intuitive to me.

OTOH, if you can fit in all the TWF feats, Toughness and Improved Critical: Bludgeoning and still have room for both Stunning Fist and Stunning Blow then go for it. It is only 7 feats total and players have that many. And, if I planned to stick around at L20 or run the character to L25 then it might well be worthwhile.