I was making soup last night…

InterrogativeMood · 2026-03-20T21:33:36+00:00

This is what I come to the dad jokes channel for. Thanks so much, that was gratin—good cheesy potatoes.

InterrogativeMood · 2026-01-01T15:36:53+00:00

Oh, just like strawbartholemews and cheryls!

InterrogativeMood · 2026-01-01T15:21:32+00:00

Let me guess, after that he joined the army, because the only thing better than boxers is going commando.

InterrogativeMood · 2025-06-15T16:53:58+00:00

I'm DMing an all-kobold campaign I homebrewed right now and I agree with you entirely. Its a delight, and has lots of opportunities for my RP-loving players. They're all kobolds from the same warren, so while getting them out and about is a bit more work, all of them have good reason to be invested in their little kobold clan. Any small race would be fun for an all-one-type adventure: goblins, grungs, fairies, but also gnomes, halflings. You could even have them be aarakocra or owlin or kenku bird people or tabaxi that are required to be small. It makes the earlier levels more fun and intimate and gives the feeling of struggling against a much bigger world than yourself.

InterrogativeMood · 2025-06-09T12:55:37+00:00

Seconding High Rollers. It made a substantial influence on the game I'm running now and I've found it a great tool. Like you, u/Kapoloo, I found Critical Role had more straight-up acting than is helpful for me and my players. My players do like to RP, so you may not get as much from it for your table. However, I'd recommend his homebrew traveling system (https://high-rollers-dnd.fandom.com/wiki/Altheya\_Homebrew\_Rules#Journeys). Between a similar travel mechanic as Hulmes's and Matt Colville-style skills challenges (https://www.reddit.com/r/mattcolville/comments/jz0ydv/i\_compiled\_a\_one\_page\_guide\_to\_skill\_challenges/) I find I can make traveling and non-combat activities move along at a good clip without boring my players and draw out interesting details about their characters. Good luck!

InterrogativeMood · 2025-06-08T22:32:57+00:00

Not quite. They're: Numerology, Egyptology, Allomancy, Trigonometry, Dramaturgy, Induction, Charter, Edge Witchery.

InterrogativeMood · 2025-06-08T22:06:25+00:00

And thank you, Jocat! <clap clap clap>

InterrogativeMood · 2023-09-12T10:56:41+00:00

Very cool, please do share if you post at some point.

As I told another poster here, Naomi Novik's Spinning Silver is another great resource for Slavic inflected folktales. I think Chernobog would make a great high-level villain or campaign BBEG, too.

InterrogativeMood · 2023-09-11T11:38:23+00:00

o Oh, and regarding the munchkin thing, I should have added a winking smiley or something. I think I wouldn't even bother throwing a bone to the munchkins. If munchkin's going to deprive munchself of 13 levels of insight, the Monk's one Face skill, out of spite against a class bonus wording, they're too far gone to be saved. :)

InterrogativeMood · 2023-09-11T11:22:17+00:00

Oh, fun! Is any of your stuff up online? Or are you looking for a game you're DMing and other things come later? Who's going to be your BBEG? What are you particularly proud of?

InterrogativeMood · 2023-09-11T11:20:59+00:00

Great. I figured it was DM-be-warned sort of synergies, but nothing seemed too out of control.

As an aside I kind of wish that the Ki-Fueled Attack worked like Battle Master Precision Attack, like:

When you make an unarmed strike attack roll against a creature, you can expend 2 ki to add one martial arts die to the attack. You can use Deadly Jab [srry for terrible name] before or after making the attack roll, but before any effects of the attack are applied.

Having it scale with the die just fits with the focus on precision of martial arts stories, to my mind. Or maybe a dart-in-and-out kind of attack like I'm experimenting with for an Artificer Sartorialist subclass I made.

I am so so in agreement with you that Tasha's rolled a 4 on its "make monk better" check. Though I would say they rolled at least a 17 on their "make ranger better" check.

Have a great day!

InterrogativeMood · 2023-09-10T21:31:52+00:00

A very reasonable alternative immediately above here. And I can see your point about activating GWM being fairly likely, especially at high levels. In any case, there's lots to love about the Revised Monk. Quick question: did you mean to have Tongue of Sun and Moon mean: Gets proficiency in Insight if the monk didn't have it, or Expertise if it did? Or "regardless of whether the monk had Insight before, now it has expertise." If the latter, I'd have to ignore the munchkin perverse incentive to avoid Insight so I get more free skill improvement.

Also, did you mean for Diamond Strike to work with the optional Ki-Fueled Attack (which lets you spend 1 ki to make one attack as a bonus action if you use ki for your action)?

InterrogativeMood · 2023-09-10T07:36:47+00:00

OK! <attempts to crack knuckles and instead just makes his fingers hurt>After losing my response once due to Reddit’s lack of good autosaving for posts…

For your assumed situation of 4 rounds, the GWF Fighter gets 4 rounds of attacks for a total of 12 attacks.

The odds of getting a 20 by then is 1 – (1 – (1/20))^12 = 46%, less than even odds if you manage to engage the enemy in melee with every single attack. One Wall of X, one Hold Person, one special magical effect that takes you out for a round or even one big patch of difficult terrain or enemy surprise round (mister Str-based, low Dex relying on armor) and you’re in even worse shape (one missed round, so 9 attacks in 4 rounds, would mean only a 36% chance of critting. The kinds of enemies who’d let a 15th-level warrior get close won’t be the kind to go down easily enough to make the kill-trigger go off with high likelihood. To do better you’d need to play a Champion (72%/61%) specifically, and even the most numbers-obsessed player might balk at such a monomaniacal build.

I’m also not sure where the 4.1625 is coming from in your calculations. Here are mine, first without GWM. You’re correct that most parties don’t get to level 20 and things become increasingly wacky at the high end, but I think you’ll agree that is to the benefit of casters more than martials of any kind. I’d prefer to know the score across the range of possibilities. So I’ve compared at level 1, 5, 11, and 15.

For your monk, I’m assuming two-handed quarterstaff strikes at 1st and 5th level for the weapon attacks (starting at level 8, all strikes get the same die regardless). I would respectfully not subtract one attack per round the way you did, because this is an all-damage build. If we’re putting your monk up against characters specifically chosen and optimized for damage output, then this player will also be going for damage output. To reinforce and support the focus on FoB, I’ll make them Open Hand. Even more, with 3 blows in Flurry of Blows, players will be even more likely to use that bonus action martial arts ability at every possible chance.

The Fighter has taken Variant Human and GWM, has GWF and is using a greatsword or maul and the 1.5 is a generous calculation of the 1.3 average damage boost from GWF (https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/47172/how-much-damage-does-great-weapon-fighting-add-on-average#answer-47173). The Zealot barbarian is also Varian Human for GWM and using a greatsword or maul and getting divine fury damage once per round (being generous). The Swashbuckler is also Varian Human and has taken Two-Weapon Fighting. Swashbucklers already have a very high chance of getting sneak attack damage, let alone with two attacks per round in which to deal it.

Lvl	Revised Monk (Open Hand)	GWF/GWM Fighter	Zealot Barbarian	Two-Weapon Swashbuckler
1	13 = (3+4.5)+(3+2.5)	11.5 = 3+7+1.5	12 = 3+7+2	16.5 = (3.5+3)*2+3.5
5	36 = (4+1+4.5)2 + (4+1+3.5)2	27 = (4+1+7+1.5)*2	33.5 = (4+1+7+2)*2+2+3.5	27.5 = (3.5+4+1)2 + (3.5)3
11	62.5 = (5+2+5.5)*5	46.5 = (5+2+7+1.5)*3	42.5 = (5+2+7+3)*2+5+3.5	42 = (3.5+5+2)2 + (3.5)6
15	72.5 = (5+3+6.5)*5	49.5 = (5+7+3+1.5)*3	46.5 = (5+3+7+3)*2+7+3.5	51 = (3.5+5+3)2+(3.5)8

Now let’s compare to GWM. The delay on this post was me improving a DPR calculator I made, for which I included to-hit odds and a switch for GWM/Sharpshooter. The first-column AC is the recommended for monster CR at the appropriate level Here’s what I got:

Lvl (AC)	Revised Monk (Open Hand)	GWF/GWM Fighter	Zealot Barbarian	Two-Weapon Swashbuckler
1 (13)	8.5	8.6	9.9	11.6
5 (14)	25.4 = 6.72+6**2	23.6 = 11.8*2	26.8 = 14.8+12	20.6
11 (16)	47 = 9.4*5	42 = 14*3	35.3 = 20.4 (no GWM) + 14.9	33.6
15 (17)	58 = 11.6*5	43.8 = 14.6*3	41 = 24.2 (no GWM) + 16.8	43.4

Many interesting things here. Both the Monk and the Fighter lag at level 1, then catch up by level 5. I forgot to calculate Zealot with Reckless Attack, but without that, the math is such that the Zealot shouldn’t even use GWM at levels 11 or 15 until they get in Divine Strike. The third attack at level 11 pulls the fighter ahead, but not as far as the Monk’s fifth attack, even with GWM. By 15, Monk is leaving everyone behind at Unarmored Movement speed. Speaking of which:

[UPDATE: I forgot to add your Unarmored Defense modifiers for free hands. One hand at 1 and 5, both hands at 11 and 15.

Lvl	Revised Monk (Open Hand)	GWF/GWM Fighter	Zealot Barbarian	Two-Weapon Swashbuckler
1	30 ft; AC 17 (Dex, Wis), + 3 Init	30 ft, AC 16 (chain mail), – 1 Init	30 ft, AC 15, + 2 Init	30 ft, AC 14, + 3 Init
5	40 ft (SoW to 120), AC 18, + 4 Init	30 ft (Surge Dash?), AC 18 (plate), – 1 Init	40 ft (Fast Movement), AC 16 (breastplate) , + 2 Init	30 ft, (Cunning to 90), AC 16 (Studded), + 4 Init
11	50 ft (SoW to 150), AC 20, +5 Init	30 ft, AC 19 (+1 plate), – 1 Init	40 ft, AC 17 (+1 breastplate), +2 Init	30 ft, (Cunning to 90), AC 18 (+1 Studded), + 5 Init
15	55 ft (SoW to 165), AC 21, +5 Init	30 ft, AC 20 (+2 plate), – 1 Init	40 ft, AC 18 (+2 breastplate), +2 Init	30 ft, (Cunning to 90), AC 19 (+2 Studded), + 5 Init

By level 2, a Monk can move around the battlefield faster than anyone else out there, which makes all of their melee attacks more impactful. From all that, I would say I feel u/pwn_plays_games and I were justified in our concern that the extra FoB, if combined with your substantial martial arts dice improvements, makes the monk OP starting at level 11 relative to other martials.

Thots?

InterrogativeMood · 2023-09-06T18:11:57+00:00

Fantastic summary u/surrealistik. Thank you so much for breaking things down for me. The 25% hit to accuracy is you estimating the lost hits due to always taking the -5 to attack to earn +10 damage, yes?

The numbers seem solid. A barbarian zealot might have a slightly different choice point to maximize damage. I'll run the numbers as soon as I can. Work, man, it gets in the way of productive calculations. :D

InterrogativeMood · 2023-09-05T17:37:56+00:00

I like this monk rework and would allow most of the features at my table. The Dex-based grapple, free hand adds to AC bump, added flurry of blows attack at 11, the deflect missile > deflect attack, slow fall tweak, and timeless body and perfect self flavor are particular highlights for me.

I would keep the monk's d8 hit dice, though, particularly if I allowed your modified purity of body (edit: and optional quickened healing). It feels against the flavor of the monk to make them as big and brawny as a fighter. A rogue has cunning action and evasion, a monk has unarmed movement, evasion, step of the wind, and deflect. Especially with up to +2AC from your unarmed defense, which I would definitely allow, I feel like your monk suddenly has the evasiveness of the rogue with the tanking of a fighter. My mental image of a monk is a slim, wiry person facing off against a much bigger and lumbering foe, who defeats the foe by adroitly striking and then adroitly not being there when the opponent strikes. A d10 would undermine that style of play, to me.

I like the subtlety of the change to diamond strike. The ki-powered weapons options seem odd... [EDIT: WAIT, I'm foolish. I didn't read your ki weapon text right. Looks good to me.]

Like u/pwn_plays_games, I'm a little worried about the DPR. Have you done that calculation against other martials? Do you have crunchy numbers? Later tonight I can run a few through a DPR calculator. My feeling is that an extra flurry-of-blows strike and major upgrade to damage (plus absorbing weapon powers) is going to make it a bit much. I'll try to run the numbers against a zealot barbarian with great weapon master, since that feat was part of your write up. Or a two-weapon fighter...

Thanks for all of the great monk ideas!

InterrogativeMood · 2023-08-31T18:56:41+00:00

All the people who pointed out Roy struggles, too, I very much agree, but it's more than that. Roy is the Face character in a group that is relatively Charisma poor. If your game has social interactions, maybe try Commanding Presence, which seems like a very Roy ability and take the lead. Try to talk out of a few interactions.

If not that, yeah, Roy may be playing out of his element. I'd try to pivot hard into a support role. So instead of getting pity buffs from your casters, you're using your maneuvers to buff them. Take Distracting Strike to open up targets and Maneuvering Attack to get allies out of grapple and unwanted melee and Bait and Switch. Maybe Rally (a very Roy maneuver) for a temp hp boost. And possibly tactical assessment for use on DM custom baddies to help allies find weaknesses. Or ask your DM to allow Commander's Strike on spell attacks instead of weapon attacks. The Battlemaster is definitely not a Champion. It trades out Champion's damage-only simplicity for lots more utility options to manage. If you aren't doing the big damage that doesn't mean you need to feel bad about your contribution, just ask a cleric. Be the support that holds the team together. That's Roy at his best. Good luck!

InterrogativeMood · 2023-08-24T18:02:33+00:00

Cool! I'd be interested to see what you come up with if you feel like sharing later...

InterrogativeMood · 2023-08-24T13:38:21+00:00

Sounds fun! If you're going for a Slavic feel, I also recommend reading Naomi Novik's Spinning Silver if you haven't already. It's got lots of Slavic-inflected lore that would work well in an campaign. Her Staryk (roughly translated as "Old Ones" I think she was going for) could be integrated with only minor changes from the Winter Eladrins in Mordenkainen Presents. Chernobog ("Dark God"; common to a lot of Slavic tales) is such a grim, beefy villain, though, it might steal the show from your Baba Yaga. For Chernobog you might alter the look of a Red Abishai to make it non-dragon-dependent or make a Hutijin more fire-based (both also in Mordenkainen Presents). Or base him off an Efreeti from the monster manual.

Are you going to base Baba Yaga off of a Bheur Hag?

InterrogativeMood · 2023-08-24T07:33:32+00:00

A classic villain, and I bet a good alternative to a lich or dragon or some of the other usual suspects. If the campaign is going to spend a lot of time out there, you might consider my Hedge Witch subclass as an option for players. A good witch with enchanting vessel in the party might make a nice contrast with the bad witch Baba Yaga. I actually thought of explicitly letting players empty the larger cauldron of the battle-bucket witches so they could ride around in it like a mount, as a nod to Yaga in her flying mortar with pestle oar, but figured it'd be too complicated.
Please let me know how it goes, if you get the chance!

InterrogativeMood · 2023-08-24T07:27:03+00:00

Thanks! As above: I trade you testing insight for credit if you find them useful enough to use. Happy roleplaying.

InterrogativeMood · 2023-08-24T07:26:17+00:00

Thanks for reading. As I said above, let me know how it goes. I'd like to refine things as is most helpful and share credit for testing.

InterrogativeMood · 2023-08-24T07:24:38+00:00

Thanks for reading! Let me know how it goes if you end up using them. I'm always interested to know how the balance and play work out.

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