Post/Author/DateTime	Post
#1 b_dog Oct 29, 2008 2:37:52	I'm not completely ignorant of the ins and outs of the system but i've never joined a game (played the miniatures game a lot and played other RPGs). a friend of mine has asked me to join his. but it is far from a level 1 starting game and they are already mid-way through their third campaign. with levels falling between 16 and 18. what is more some of them are power gamers and while not cheating they do tend to lean... toward the "spiked chain" end of things. so after going over numerous character options my choice to join this band of bloodthirsty PCs is: 9th level human Monk, multiclassed to entropy champion and turned in to a vampire for 7 more levels. i'm aiming for a mostly bare handed grappler (thinking for throwing in some armor spikes to make his blood sucking hugs extra fun) that may throw some sharp objects from time to time. may question(s) is how do i get the most out of this character? are there any skills a character shouldn't be without? what about feats? is there anyway of circumventing the sun damage thing? does combining energy drain and flurry of blows work?
#2 bowensilverclaw1986 Oct 29, 2008 5:23:48	There are 2 problems with your build: 1) Vampire 2) Monk
#3 bergtann Oct 29, 2008 5:42:42	One of the best things about D&D is that you can enjoy it so many times, by building different characters. I would not advise you to build the most powerful PC imaginable for your first time out. That will make later games feel less fun. You need a PC that can hang with the rest of the party wiothout either slowing them down or overshadowing them. Can you tell us more about what the rest of the party does/are? And what books you are allowed to use?
#4 b_dog Oct 29, 2008 6:27:13	thank you BowenSilverclaw1986 that was very helpful, I'm sure when you order at restaurants and they ask if you liked the food the response "fork and pepper" really gives them a good idea of how to improve their cooking. Honest, non-sarcastic part of post: in response to Bergtann: all of the information i have on the players characters is anecdotal. no specifics but from what my friend has told me his brother has a character that is nothing sort of game breaking but doesn't know how to use it, there is no cleric so any character i make will on his own as far as staying in fighting trim and he has advised me that i had better bring something at least borderline overpowered and that they'd be willing to accept just about anything (although seth's D&D pet peeve has always been psionics "they don't belong in D&D", he will allow it in his games). I've GM'd enough games on other systems to know how annoying power players can be. I've played a characters that sacrifice stat power for the sake of good role playing enough times to know how much fun it is. this time however i want to play a powerful evil character, and go around doing powerfully evil things.
#5 eltacolibre Oct 29, 2008 6:45:27	only problem with the current build but not sure what level you are starting in this campaign: --Vampire needs to have at least 5 HD (under 5 HD you become a vampire spawn), so at minimum a vampire starts at lvl 13 since they have LA+8. --Vampire are always evil (Monk requirement is to be lawful good but I suppose your gm could house rule that) which by default falls under the ruling of vampire losing class abilities. My recommendation: Fighter and uses bonus feats to get improved unarmed strike and all the other feats that you want to become a bare handed/grappler kind of guy, fighter doesn't have an alignment restriction and you don't lose class abilities by becoming evil but of course if your dm houserule the alignment go ahead.
#6 khift Oct 29, 2008 7:02:13	One of the key rules of D&D 3.5e is to avoid races with level adjustment. A level adjustment (LA) of +1 is bad, but livable if you get enough out of it. Any more than that and it'll ruin your character. A vampire has a LA of +8. This means that at level 16, you'll have the stats of a level 8 character plus your vampire stats. That doesn't add up. It doesn't even come close. You'll end up with a character who feels like a level 10 character in a party of 16s and 18s. Eight times out of ten, human is the best race. The bonus feat and skill points and complete lack of of penalties makes them extremely flexible and always a safe choice. Sometimes another race will slightly edge them out for a specific role, but it is fairly uncommon. As for class, monk is considered the weakest class in the PHB. Weaker classes exist, but you have to look to find them. This doesn't mean a monk is completely doomed to suck, but you've got your work cut out for you if you want to play a strong, powerful, effective monk. Try these guides for some hints (just pulled out of nowhere; better guides could exist): http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=978174 http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=1032986 Either way, good luck sir.
#7 bergtann Oct 29, 2008 8:07:51	The problem is that "overpowered" is a very relative concept. What they think of as overpowered is not necessarily so. However Power + Evil normally is normally spelled Ur-Priest. If you for role-playing reasons are married to the idea of a monk, I'd recomment Monk 5/Ur-priest 2/Sacred Fist 9. Otherwise, I would recommend something like a Fallen Plaladin build: (Ex)Paladin 4/Bard 1/Ur-Priest 1/Bone Knight 10. You get 9th level spells, BaB +11 I think, good hp, and the combination of Bone Knight and recovered paladin abilities is going to give you a strong set of defenses. Which will be forgiving of any newbie mistakes you make. I am away from books, so check me for mistakes. There may be some class that is better after Paladin than Bard for the purpose as well. (would Paladin 4/Bone knight 1 qualify for entry into Ur-Priest? If so, Paladin 4/Bone knight 1/Ur-priest 1/Bone knight +9/anything 1 For feats, Divine Metamagic: Persist or Quicken. Ur-priest and Sacred fist are complete divine, Bone Knight are Five Nations I think.
#8 Krusk Oct 29, 2008 8:32:11	--Vampire are always evil (Monk requirement is to be lawful good but I suppose your gm could house rule that) which by default falls under the ruling of vampire losing class abilities. Actually monks need to be Lawful, not always good. You could be Lawful Evil. IIRC one of the vampires in the mm is actually a vampire monk.
#9 eltacolibre Oct 29, 2008 8:56:48	ah I somehow misread it, my bad about it. A vampire monk would be nice but I am afraid that flurry of blows doesn't work with natural attacks or slam attacks but well...if you get the chance to use a full attack might as well use your claws and slam attacks which basically means can't make a flurry of blows energy drains...that would be fun tho.
#10 sonofzeal Oct 29, 2008 12:08:09	There are 2 problems with your build: 1) Vampire 2) Monk Elaboration.... 1) The vampire template gives you some awesome bonuses, but the +8 LA means you're so far behind everyone else that it doesn't matter. A Vampire character of the same Equivalent Class Level (ECL) is generally categorically weaker than a regular PC. 2) Monks are a really cool class... but suck. They're easily the weakest class of the base set, for two reasons. First, their defense sucks compared to someone who can actually wear armor - they get a lot of potential bonuses that gradually help reduce the gap, but they'll never really eliminate it compared to someone in fullplate. Second, their offense sucks because {a} they don't get full Base Attack Bonus progression meaning they won't hit that often, {b} Flurry requires standing next to someone for your entire turn and doesn't work at all with a mobile, agile archetype, and {c} they get no real options to increase their damage beyond the weapon damage dice boost, which is always a nominal portion of total damage anyway. So to summarize.... Monk gives you poor defense, poor offense, and only marginal utility... and Vampire prevents you from levelling up far enough in Monk to get what few benefits (SR) the class has to offer.
#11 snex Oct 29, 2008 12:18:16	ah I somehow misread it, my bad about it. A vampire monk would be nice but I am afraid that flurry of blows doesn't work with natural attacks or slam attacks but well...if you get the chance to use a full attack might as well use your claws and slam attacks which basically means can't make a flurry of blows energy drains...that would be fun tho. although the flurry does not work with a slam attack, the energy drain still applies to unarmed strikes. however, you can only use the ability once per round.
#12 kromlech06 Oct 29, 2008 12:44:12	If I'm not mistaken, Vampires also have no con score. So not only will you be 8-10 levels behind everyone in HP, but you'll have no con mod to HP either. 12+7d12 (if that d12 rule even applies to class HD) will be your HP. At an AVERAGE of 57, it's really really low. You'll be turning into mist often, better hope you never go farther than 9 miles of your coffin. Vampires just don't make good PCs. At least that's my opinion.
#13 khift Oct 29, 2008 13:42:44	although the flurry does not work with a slam attack, the energy drain still applies to unarmed strikes. however, you can only use the ability once per round. He could still make a slam attack at the end of his full attack action as a secondary natural attack, though. So, while he couldn't substitute unarmed strikes in his flurry with slams, he still gets one at a -5 penalty at the end of the full attack. The OP expressed interesting in a grappling character. Barbarians can make excellent grapplers, especially the Bear Totem variant from Unearthed Arcana. With that in mind, a Goliath (source: Races of Stone) Barbarian with Bear Totem and Mountain Rage (Goliath Barbarian substition level, Races of Stone pg.150) could provide a base for an absolutely dominating grappler while still feeling decidedly monstrous. Just try to get the Level Adjustment buyoff variant to pretty much nullify the Goliath's +1 LA (Unearthed Arcana pg.18; also, no, this wouldn't help the Vampire, since he wouldn't even be eligible for beginning the buyoff until level 32 and wouldn't be finished with it until level 108, far beyond the scope of any D&D game.)
#14 lt_col_pilgrim Oct 29, 2008 14:13:12	A more strong build that would hold with your evil party that is still pretty monk-ish would be something like ... Monk 2 Swashbuckler 1 Duskblade 2 Ur Priest 1 Sacred Fist ++++++ The LA from vampire basically will give you some nifty abilities, but leave you very short on things like hit points. If you do want to throw on a template, there are others that don't cost you as much that are FAR better.
#15 snex Oct 29, 2008 14:38:17	for a while i was playing an evil monk 2/warblade 2/swordsage 4/lion totem barb 1 not a whole lot of damage potential, but my main strategy was to utlize setting sun throw maneuvers to keep enemies on the ground. it was quite effective until a blind, webbed, almost dead dracotaur got THREE lucky swings on me. my favorite thing about that character was throwing a grey render zombie down a flight of stairs, regaining my throw maneuver while he climbed back up, and then doing it again over and over. even though he was a size category larger, my trip checks were absurdly high and had a small chance of failing.