Hi everyone!

I wonder what special high level combat abilities should I give to my SoA monk in ToB? Greater whirlwind and hardiness is nice, but I would try the other abilities too. Since monks has tons of stunning blows the ability: power attack and smite seems to be kinda useless. The same seems to be true to the deathblow ability, because of the quivering palm. Are there any other abilities for a monk to take? Please help!

You can have Resist Magic, or other things

As was stated above, there are other options, but none that are terribly apealing. I would seem the monk just got lumped in with the rest of the warriors for high level abilities. Magic resistance would seem to be useless at high levels, as the monk would surely have greater than 50% magic resitance late in the game. It might be useful earlier however. I wuold think Smite would be fun for a monk, but then that's just my opinion. Perhaps critical strike is the one for you. "All attacks are critical hits for the next round" sounds really nice to me for a monk. War Cry is also an option if you want to send enemies fleeing in terror, though my fighters never used it much.

Unfortunately, if these aren't really apealing, it would seem you are out of luck. The only other high level abilites they might have given a monk acess to would be evasion and greater evasion, but does a monk need lower ac really at such high levels. Idealy, it would have just been better to tailor some type of high level abilites unique to such a unique class, like damge reduction perhaps. Again, though, as it stands, doesn't seem to me much to choose from for you.

Au Contraire.

The greater whirlwind attack is still very good for the monk. He actually gets ten attacks with any weapon (his to hit is already pretty astronomical). Greater deathblow is also pretty cool. But if your point is that there is not a lot you can do to improve his combat abilities (merely because they are already so high), then I agree.
I would have thought the thief set would have been more appropriate and useful that the fighter set but I'd take a monk in my party even without high level abilities.

Like you said Greater Wirlwind is good. Greater Deathblow is also ok. I think smite is a good ability to have though (even for a monk). There isn't realy much else though.

Definitely get some Greater Deathblow's, there are quite a lot of enemies below level 12 - all of Yaga Shura's troops for example, also all of the drow in Sendai's enclave - they'll all drop like flies. It's a pity it only lasts for 2 rounds though.

Unless Im mistaken, a monk's fists only reach +4 THAC0. I cant remember if there are any enemies which are immune to +4 weapons, but if there are then presumably a monk would have to use a weapon of some descripion. Thus the high level abilities could be used to enhance the monk's otherwise relatively shoddy weapon skills if needed/desired. This is all hypothetical as Ive never played a monk, but I just thought I'd provide some food for thought :idea:

Yes. The monk's fists are considered +4 weapons when the monk gains his 25 th. level. I think there is only one creature in the whole game that can be hit by only +5 weapons or better. It's the lesser demon lord in the Underdark(Drow summoning ritual in Ust Nasta - spelling???)

[Ust Natha.] -Tal

[This message has been edited by Taluntain (edited November 06, 2001).]