Raising attributes

[Klutz]

Originally posted by farl: One side question comes to my mind. Without a pure spell caster, one focus of my all melee party is magic, but the attributes intelligence and piety are completely neglected. Are the initial values high enough to develop decent spell casting just by practice?

Yes, the keyword being "decent". You will NOT have spellcasting experts by any means, but you will be able to functionally cast most low-mid level spells to moderate power levels fairly reliably with practice at their base INT/PIE levels. Don't be worried about it, though: you'll have much more powerful combatants as a result of that sacrifice, and if you do ever want to explore Magic more fully with dedicated spellcasters, there's always next game. (Plus there's a couple of NPC casters you can pick up to experiment with if you want.)

As for the "haste" comments and relation to development of SPD: That's absolutely correct but Farl's party does not include a Bard, Bishop, or Psionic. His only possible haste caster is the Dwarf Monk, who will probably not be doing so reliably enough to design everyone's attribute plans around. That being said, with my own Wiz8 parties every time I've played so far I have had a Bard, Bishop, and/or Psionic (usually both a Bard and Bishop in fact), and I usually do de-emphasize SPD for my characters as a result.

Even in Farl's party, you really only need a couple of characters to be fast, for minimal casting purposes. (Basically one for late-game Element Shield and one for late-game Soul Shield.) In fact, with so much melee power, for his party it will actually be an advantage for most characters to not be so fast: that increases the likelihood that they will be able to move a little at the beginning of combat to get into close combat range and still attack afterwards instead of losing combat actions.

Originally posted by TinyMage: And whats this about martial arts??? are you nutz? even with a terribly weak weapon he will do more damage ( and more instakills ) then barehanded.

Flat-out false. You obviously haven't tried it yourself. Search around the forum and you'll find plenty of evidence disputing this. The Martial Arts using Monk is, in fact, the 3rd most powerful melee combat damage-dealer in Wiz8, behind only the backstabbing Rogue (#2) and the berserking Fighter (#1). What makes the Monk's Martial Arts so nasty, above and beyond the Monk's %25 class bonus, is that secondary attacks are exactly as powerful as primary attacks with Martial Arts. (You get the same mix of kicks & punches from both the primary and secondary attacks.) You also don't need to raise the Dual Wield skill to get secondary attacks with Martial Arts, which every other combat class has to contend with to power up its secondary attacks.

That being said, the staff is still not a bad choice for a Monk, particularly due to the extended reach ability. Also, if you prefer critical hits over raw damage, the Staff of Doom is fantastic for any character, including the Monk. The Zatoichi Bo gives you the flexibility of auto-switching to either barehand for martial arts or a sling for ranged (since it's not cursed like the Staff of Doom), but its lower instant kill stat and moderate damage means that it's worse than both: pick the Staff of Doom for better criticals, and Martial Arts for better damage. Plus, the Staff of Doom is available much earlier in the game than the Zatoichi Bo, although both are guaranteed finds.

[TinyMage]

The speed is not neccessarily for going first ( which is also nice ). It is for the extra attacks.

Strength + speed are the primary attributes for a melee party hands down, the strength provides damage + to hit and penetration and the speed provides the attacks.

Originally posted by Klutz: The Martial Arts using Monk is, in fact, the 3rd most powerful melee combat damage-dealer in Wiz8, behind only the backstabbing Rogue (#2) and the berserking Fighter (#1).

So your saying it can beat someone with the light sword ( 5 - 40 damage and 10% kill ) or excalibur or even the zotaichi bo?

Even if you could match the damage you can't match the effects or % to kill.

Maybe the site I was looking at is wrong, but I understand you only gain 8.5 ( 10.6 for monk ) damage with maxed unarmed skill. I don't see how that beats any halfway decent weapon.

Of course, if you want to dual weild, then the monk doesn't have many choices, but I still say the staff of doom or zoitachi bo would be better then dual wielding.

[ 06-16-2005, 03:30 PM: Message edited by: TinyMage ]

[LewyRay]

As someone who has played a couple of monks, I wanted to throw my two cents in...

My first party had 6 characters, including a Dwarf Fighter, Dracon Samarai, Human Monk, Hobbit Bard, Mook Ranger, and Fiary bishop. The Monk used martial arts only and had twice the kills of the next closest character, the fighter.

By the mid 20 levels, the fighter and the bard, started catching up. The fighter used either excaliber or ivory blade (depending on if he had a shield or not) and the bard wielded Fang. At this point what the fighter could do was scary....almost 1000pts of damage/rd.

However, in the early game it was all the monk. At level 6 or 7 he was already getting up to 6 swings per round (3 attacks, 2 swings/attack, averaging about 12 pts/hit and rarely missing. By level 12 he was consistantly doing 200 pts/round (killing nightmares single handedly.

I really think the difference is in number of attacks...maybe you see more damage with a weapon, but when you are getting twice or three times as many attacts it just doesn't matter.

Right now I am playing a duet with a Human Monk and a Felpurr Ninja (I know, I shouldn't gone with a fairy ninja but I didn't have the patients to get them through the early game). The Monk is a machine when compared to the Ninja (currently weilding two Nunchuka). They are at level 10 now and I am on my way to the Umpani base camp after spending time in and around Arnika getting experience and trying to get as many spell books as possible.

Anyway, that is my experience.

Monks, don't leave the beach without one....

[TinyMage]

Well, all this discussion made me curious that I had missed something when I had a martial arts monk in my party.

So I decided to test it out. I made a game with 1 monk, 1 samurai and 1 priest ( for healing ) on normal difficulty. The test was to see just how good a martial arts monk is vs a sword weilding samurai in the beginning - mid game. Since they both have critical strike I thought this was a good comparison.

Both characters were human, and basically had the same stats. The monks stats were 54, 50, 50, 45, 57, 64, 55 ( strength to senses ). The samurais stats were 56, 55, 45, 50, 62, 62, 45.

For both I put 3 in strength and speed at every level up.

For the samurai I put 3 in dual weapons, close combat and swords every level.

For the monk I put 3 in martial arts, close combat and critical strike every level.

When I started in the monastery they both did about the same amount of damage. As I got near Arnika the monk was inching ahead of the samurai.

However, once I got to arnika and gave the samurai bloodlust, the samurai quickly made the monk look inferior. He was regularly doing 30+ damage while the monk was only doing 10. Also bloodlust gives an extra attack.

Both the monk and samurai were at 1 swing 1 attack ( not counting the extra swing from bloodlust ) at level 7 with 80 speed and about mid 30's in their skills ( not counting bonuses ).

I am not sure how the above author got 6 swings at level 7.

This is about the same as I remember it the last time I tried.

When does the monk become the "3rd most powerful melee combat damage-dealer" ????? What level? What stats?

Maybe I am doing something wrong but I don't see how.

Seems more likely the people that rate the unarmed monk higher aren't using their other characters properly.

At this rate I would go so far as to say the samurai could keep bloodlust the rest of the game and still outdamage the monk.

[ 06-16-2005, 08:10 PM: Message edited by: TinyMage ]

[GMK]

If the monk is only at 1 swing 1 attack, raise him a little more, or consider putting less in strength and more in dex.

Normally when i take a monk he is attacking at least 4 and sometimes 8 times a round while my samurai is still on 1 (+1 for bloodlust) and 1 off-hand (quite weak) per round. Plus the monk tends to have better chance to hit/penetrate.

The damage is vaguely comparable until the dex/spd/skill extra swings/attacks start to come in, when the monk just pulls away because he gets them with both hands and the +1 swing of bloodlust goes from doubling attacks down to maybe 1/3 extra (with 3 swings base). Sam will get bigger hits when he connects and doesnt do 1-2-3 damage, but monk is dealing 10-20 damage 7-8 times a round at mid level.

[LewyRay]

I think GMK is correct about DEX. I always concentrate on DEX and STR for my MONK (actually most of my Melee fighters). DEX does seem to be the most important atribute for a Monk.

Also, the Monks martial arts skill seems to raise much faster than other combat skills, probably because of all the extra attacks. My Monk/Ninja Duo are at level 12 and 11 now. The Monks martial arts skill is at 105 (after the 25% bonus). The Ninja is duel welding Nunchuka but only has a mace/flail and duel weapon skill in the mid 40's.

That being said, I do think a well developed fighter type with an elite weapon eventually is as good or better than the unarmeed Monk. But early to mid game the Monk is hard to beat.

[TinyMage]

Wouldnt the samurai get extra swings too?

I would really like to know the stats of your samuria GMK. How is the monk at so many attacks and your samurai is still at 1?

If you guys really think martial arts is so great why not just build a fighter and switch to a monk / ninja for a level and powertrain MA to 100.

Then switch back to a fighter and beserk.

Now THAT would beat a samurai with bloodlust.

But the question still remains, would that fighter have been better off with the light sword + diamond eyes?

[Klutz]

Originally posted by TinyMage: The speed is not neccessarily for going first ( which is also nice ). It is for the extra attacks. Strength + speed are the primary attributes for a melee party hands down, the strength provides damage + to hit and penetration and the speed provides the attacks.

Both Dexterity and Speed provide extra attacks, and any combatant wants both. The question is which to max first. For combatants the answer, IMHO, is almost always Dexterity, because its secondary benefits (improved melee and ranged chance to hit & penetrate) are better than Speed's (improved initiative). Then add in the fact that Speed is far easier to buff than Dexterity.

Originally posted by TinyMage: quote: Originally posted by Klutz: The Martial Arts using Monk is, in fact, the 3rd most powerful melee combat damage-dealer in Wiz8, behind only the backstabbing Rogue (#2) and the berserking Fighter (#1).

So your saying it can beat someone with the light sword ( 5 - 40 damage and 10% kill ) or excalibur or even the zotaichi bo?

Even if you could match the damage you can't match the effects or % to kill.
[/QUOTE]

Originally posted by TinyMage: When does the monk become the "3rd most powerful melee combat damage-dealer" ????? What level? What stats?

The above comparison is for combat performance at high levels on Ascension Peak with all the best items available to the various classes. So yes, that is also MA Monk > Cane of Corpus Faerie Ninja. Say 100 STR/DEX/SPD, with haste as necessary for all characters that need it, but it's really the STR and Martial Arts skills that matter.
There's a lot of factors that combine to make the Monk so effective:

- Effortless, fully effective dual wield: The MA monk will be at least 2/3 / 2/3 on Ascension Peak, for an average of 8 and max of 12 martial arts attacks per round. (I've never seen 3/3 / 3/3 myself, since I've never hit 125% on Martial Arts with my Monks, but since I've seen 3/3 for a Valkyrie and Samurai with 125% in their weapon skills that should be possible for a Monk also, which would be an average of 12 and max of 18 attacks per round!) And remember, those "secondary" attacks for a Monk are exactly as powerful as their primary attacks.

- Relative weakness of all other combatant's secondary weapons: Yes, the Light Sword and Cane of Corpus are incredible, and the Muramasa Blade is nice too, but the best secondary weapons (Wakizashi +1, Rod of Sprites) are far worse. The notable exceptions are the Thieves Dagger and Diamond Eyes, which help the Rogue and Fighter perform better in combination with their special combat abilities.

- Relative weakness of two-handed weapons: Excalibur, Zatoichi Bo, Faust Halberd, Dread Spear, Stun/Mindblast Rod, Giant Sword, and Staff of Doom all pale in comparison with the top one-handed weapons like the Light Sword and Cane of Corpus. The Staff of Doom is generally considered the best of that group with its 15% kill (same as Cane of Corpus and Muramasa Blade), and for raw damage the Giant Sword is good.

- The Monk gets status effects too: Monk's get up to 5% kill for 100% in Critical Strike (1% base + 1% for each 25 in Critical Strike is the formula I usually see), and Monks also get a chance to KO. I have no clue what the formula is for Monk KO chance, but at high levels it works pretty often. (Probably some combination of Martial Arts skill and strength score.)

Originally posted by TinyMage: Maybe the site I was looking at is wrong, but I understand you only gain 8.5 ( 10.6 for monk ) damage with maxed unarmed skill. I don't see how that beats any halfway decent weapon.

I've never found any site that accurately lists martial arts damage; I go by my own experience and what I've read here and on other Wiz8 boards. If I saw it on Flamestryke's or Rick Rust's sites I'd believe it.

Originally posted by TinyMage: However, once I got to arnika and gave the samurai bloodlust, the samurai quickly made the monk look inferior. He was regularly doing 30+ damage while the monk was only doing 10. Also bloodlust gives an extra attack.

As you have discovered, Bloodlust is an absolutely INSANELY powerful weapon for the early-mid game. If you could give it to your Bishop, the Bishop would have the most kills. It's that good. Which is too bad, because it basically makes the Bushido Blade obsolete. I typically don't replace it until I get Fang, and even Fang is only a little bit better than Bloodlust for most characters that can use both. And if you think Bloodlust is great on your Samurai, try it on a Rogue... though in my parties it's usually the Bard that gets it (using songs for ranged combat as needed).

Originally posted by TinyMage: Seems more likely the people that rate the unarmed monk higher aren't using their other characters properly.

*chuckle* I like to think I can build a Wiz8 combat character pretty decently, though I'm not as persistent at reloading for perfect equipment as some. (I do make an exception for the Light Sword.) But again, I'm not making any of this up: I'm just regurgitating what I've read on this and other boards, adding in my own experience which matches up. I've never done any actual damage "testing" myself, but I always build my hybrids (and Bards) for combat and the Martial Arts Monk (when I use one) always outperforms them by the end.

Not to say I haven't made mistakes. My first Fighter, despite being a basic Lizardman Fighter, was awful: he tried to learn too many different weapons (Dagger, Sword, Mace, Dual Wield, Bow/Xbow) and hence was always behind other characters on weapon skills. My first Monk, though, was even worse: she was a Faerie with maxed INT and SPD first to try to get good spellcasting over good melee. It worked to an extent, but delaying STR so long meant that she barely broke 50 STR towards the end of the game.

Don't forget when doing your own comparisons to watch for the initiative effect. The Light Sword and Bloodlust have incredibly high initiative bonuses, so if you often fight small or spread-out groups, your Monk may not have anything left to fight after your high-initiative sword-wielder gets to go first. Attribute distribution can have the same effect to a lesser extent.

Anyway, have fun all, Monks or not!

[Klutz]

Originally posted by TinyMage: If you guys really think martial arts is so great why not just build a fighter and switch to a monk / ninja for a level and powertrain MA to 100. Then switch back to a fighter and beserk.

Even if that worked, you'd lose the Monk's +25% to Martial Arts and probably the Monk KO ability. (Though the Fighter has innate KO ability also.) The +25% alone would seriously hurt since that's key to the Monk martial arts damage as well as number of attacks. It would be worth trying though just for amusement value... I'm not sure if an ex-Monk (or ex-Ninja) would even be allowed to attack barehand using Martial Arts. Easy to tell: if you only get punches and never kicks, you're not using Martial Arts.

[TinyMage]

Again, it seems your just guessing on this stuff.

Got any hard statistics you could tell me?

I did a test, your theories didnt seem to work. The monk was hardly better then a samurai in the beginning and I really doubt he could compete with the later weapons.

If I am doing something wrong just tell me what it is.

The -25% to martial arts would reduce the fighters damage by how much?

Also, secondary attacks are NOT as good as primary attacks for monk.

He has a 50 / 50 chance of executing a punch or kick ( from what I can tell ). Punches are with 1% strength damage bonus ( above 50 ) and kicks are with 2% strength damage bonus ( above 50 ). You can check this on your character screen.

This is the same as a character with a secondary weapon.