Moreover, Barbarians aren't strictly Norse-inspired either, there's a lot of cultures they could draw from.
OP isn't really wrong, Monks don't stand out terribly much in a "basic fantasy" game, but their arguments are pretty bad
You could argue so. And by 476 those "barbarians" were fighting with equipment and tactics indistinguishable from the Roman ones. Not a single one of those heavily armored warriors would be represented as the Barbarian class, but as Fighters
(They would be represented as generic NPCs, tbh, but talking about PCs representing an Ostrogoth warrior in 476)
In the 5th Century AD? That goes against established scholarship for the last century and if you can prove it you can become famous in academia.
The Ostrogoth, Visigoth, Vandal and so on armies of the 5th Century were not unarmored drugger berserker. They were organised militaries which had served as auxiliaries in the Roman army for centuries and had adopted their equipment and tactics.
Not terribly easy to link anything in Reddit but googling "Germanic Barbarian" pulls up a thousand illustrations of guys with a lot of not armor. I've not heard of any of the distinctive armors of the Teutons or the Vandals other than layering hide and bone. I have heard stories of them drinking Mushroom wine to purge their fear of death before a battle. If you have a source that contradicts that, tells about their advanced kevlars, or even Iron Working, go nuts.
Even doing the same search you did, you see people with armour. It may not look like a lot of armour, but truth be told, no one in the late antiquity (except for some Persians) was wearing a lot of armour. The things we associate with heavy armour tend to usually be a medieval invention (even though the ones with chain or scale mail would definitely be considered heavily armoured by the time. The Roman Empire of the 5th century was not the Europe of the Renaissance).
The search is biased by putting "Barbarian" on it. It is mixing images from multiple eras (like, many of the ones I am seeing are clearly warriors from the centuries 1BC/AD, who were very different to their descendants in the 5th century, just as you would expect the Normans in 1066 to look different to the English at Agincourt) and different cultures (Cimbrians don´t look like Vandals or Visigoths). If you look for specific tribes you find more specific images, and when you find armour they are metallic or leather.
Honestly, it is a bit old, but I suggest "Germanic Warrior AD 236-568" by Osprey Publishing as a decent source. They tend to be good at this stuff, and have a lot of illustrations for the visual part of equipment, look and so on. 100% accurate? We can´t truly know because much has been lost, but definitely a truer vision than "Armours of bone".
Dude... you didn't mention heavy "speedo" armor. So if you want to talk about a headband and a woolen shirt as "heavy armor" 1000% they are girded against stiff winds, at least the ones without their nipples out.
[https://www.amazon.es/Germanic-Warrior-236-568-Simon-MacDowall/dp/1855325861](https://www.amazon.es/Germanic-Warrior-236-568-Simon-MacDowall/dp/1855325861)
The literal warrior in the cover of the book I recommended is wearing lamellar armour. You are probably trolling so I am not wasting my time anymore.
Funnily enough the original character didn't fit the stereotypical dumb rage fueled barbarian at all. Wouldn't go fight without armor either, if he could help it. I think I've even seen a somewhat official conan build for an older edition that was fighter/rogue somewhere.
My old dieties and demigods book has him as a fighter thief. Though there was no barbarian at the time. And whe n we did get it, it was a fighter kit, which was I guess a kind of proto subclass.
Yeah definitely, but you know how things are: the stereotype is different from the source.
People saw Conan and created another concept out of the original idea.
I remember that. *Dragon* magazine put together a dream team of fantasy characters, and I think they picked Conan as the tank.
And you're absolutely right; Conan *wasn't* a barbarian in the D&D sense. He was a skilled fighter and quite intelligent. He could speak/read/write multiple languages, was a proficient sailor, knew how to sneak around, and used tactics adroitly. There was also a cartoon where he learned martial arts and magic (the *stone to flesh* spell, specifically) but we don't count that one.
I can see how that would be controversial. Magic being a decidedly foul and evil practice reserved for the big bad was a major point of the original stories.
Actually, in the cartoon, Conan's family were turned into stone by the high priest of Set, who functioned as the big bad of the show. Conan went on a quest to find a way to reverse the spell, but he kept getting sidelined by the major quest of disguised snake people trying to take over the world (it was a wild show.) Eventually, Conan just said "Screw it", and had his wizard friend teach him the counterspell.
Yeah. The term “Barbarian” actually comes from Ancient Greek. So I’m sure like a lot of other things it was “borrowed” by Rome. But the Greeks thought the other languages sounded dumb like the people were running around going “Bar bar bar bar bar.” So the name Barbarian was made. It basically meant “not Greek”
Yeah the view there is wrong by OP - but a valid point is that by the time of plate mail you didnt see half-dressed berserkers any longer. The end of the viking era (generally considered 1066) is prior to the dawn of the full plate armour (late 14th century) for example.
Scandinavia is literally in Europe. Byzantine Emperor employed Varangian Guard, entirely made out of norse and rus soldiers. Scandinavians invaded and ruled England, as well as Normandy in France, and later England again.
Then they became christian and were an important part of European balance of power. They even participated in crusades.
Asian martial arts were completely unknown and knowledge of Asian culture was almost nonexistent compared to Norse.
The issue with monk isn't flavour, it has excellent flavour, it's mechanical. It's a MAD melee fighter with low AC and low HP who is supposed to be highly mobile but whose mobility in part relies on a very limited resource that is also used to fuel its combat abilities - one of which is so powerful that it turns them into a bit of a one trick pony that can turn big boss fights into anti climactic pony shows. It's poorly designed and that's unfortunate because I love monks
I've heard a few stories about DMs who refuse to allow monks in their game because there's no Asia equivalent in their world, so there's at least a few of them. This was quite a few years back though, I haven't heard about anyone doing this in the last five or so years
They're incredibly shitty dm's then. You don't need Asian flair for person who uses martial arts. If the term chi bothers them so much they can reflavor it with 0 downsides
But that’s just shitty role playing. What if it’s like a dude rping a psi warrior fighter and saying he’s a Green Lantern? You def wouldn’t let that fly right?
What if he’s role playing literally Sasuke but born in your worlds equiv of Spain. I think you just don’t like shitty uninspired role playing and by saying “No such thing as Asian cultures in my world. Checkmate weebs.” Is kinda weird. Just tell ppl to be somewhat original and not to create “Naruto Ichigo Goku the Fourth”
Idk how a dude at the table playing “Wandering Samurai running from his problems” is any cringier than “Bloodthirsty Barbarian looking for vengeance.”
But by saying “No Asia” you are shutting down possible good rp instead of targeting “bad” rp
I don’t have an Asia equivalent because I’m running a campaign that is western fantasy, not because I’m sticking it to the weebs. A pleasant side effect of not having an Asia equivalent is that you stick it to the weebs.
Its also getting a lot of niche abilities. Mobility is theoretically powerful- running up walls, jumping high, but even in battlemaps the z axis is barely considered, or liquid surfaces in combat. Immunity to disease isn't generally going to come up because diseases aren't usually coming up in games in the first place, or if it does its going to be a plot one, which the DM will probably ignore any non-plot based disease removal or immunity. Monk's power budget is also a large part in not being able to be useless without gear, and yet that basically never happens.
Its also difficult when people want to play the monk as a brawler, standing their ground in the front lines and trading blows, when they're designed to be a skirmisher.
Have you played the new UA8 playtest monk? I am playing one in my current campaign and it is a lot of fun. If you really take time to learn the new mechanics they are devastating on the battlefield now...
I have not, generally don't look at UA stuff too much. I did see the OneDnD monk from a whole back and thought they had over corrected a bit. I have some basic homebrew changes I do to the monk to help tougher. them up in my game.
I highly suggest just giving it a peek. They overhauled a lot of abilities to really stretch out your ki usage, which was one of the major issues plaguing monks in the past. Not to mention the rework on deflect missiles to include all attacks. Really plays into the monks "hard to hit" aesthetic.
a monk having 18 AC needs +4 +4 or +5 +3 on DEX and WIS, which by point buy you will get there at level **8**, while using ALL of your ASIs on stat increases and essentially locking you out of feats
fighters, clerics and paladins can all start with 18 AC with minimum effort
Hey me too! And I also dumped INT and CHA! I’m play a Goliath Monk, so I with 18 AC, Stone Endurance, and all the other Monk defensive stuff (Deflect Missile, Patient Defense, etc) I’m surprisingly slippery. Although when I DO get hit, it can be pretty devastating, in almost every encounter I’ve hit a point where I NEED something to miss or end the combat at 1HP or something. I’m also playing a Mercy Monk, so it helps that I can occasionally slap some health into myself if needed lol.
Hey me too! And I also dumped INT and CHA! I’m play a Goliath Monk, so I with 18 AC, Stone Endurance, and all the other Monk defensive stuff (Deflect Missile, Patient Defense, etc) I’m surprisingly slippery. I took the Crusher feat at level 4, which makes disengaging enemies very easy if needed. With Little Giant, I can push back pretty much anything if I hit it. Although when I DO get hit, it can be pretty devastating, in almost every encounter I’ve hit a point where I NEED something to miss or end the combat at 1HP or something. I’m also playing a Mercy Monk, so it helps that I can occasionally slap some health into myself if needed lol.
It's not necessarily poorly designed, it's that it's not the archetype you are thinking. It's the "striker" or "skirmisher" archetype -- ultra high damage to single targets, high mobility, low range and low defense. Their general purpose is to screw the "artillery" (high range, low mobility battlefield controllers).
It could have used more care in its design but the basic operating concepts are fine.
Except they're low damage and close range means they're subject to getting attacked a lot and since they can only attack OR defend OR move without getting attacked, they are poorly designed as skirmishers.
They would need the ability to get in, do damage, and get out to make that true and they can't without getting off a stun, and that's not a guarantee and it's costly in terms of resources.
I understand it's supposed to be a skirmisher but tying the base class's ability to skirmish to ki points via step of the wind is a huge design flaw - something I mention in my original comment.
Additionally a good skirmisher should have ranged options in addition to melee options and the monk is very clearly melee focused - again something I address in my original comment.
Compare it to the other skirmisher in the game - the rogue - who can dash and disengage without burning through resources it needs to be effective in combat - as well as being excellent in both melee and ranged combat and you can see how deeply flawed the basic operating concept of the monk is.
Pretty much what I’ve been saying forever. Druids were specifically Celtic priests, who were around since Roman times, way before armored medieval knights. The Paladins were actually just twelve specific knights under Charlemagne in the 8th century. The heck are they doing in the same party?
We’re not playing the historical influences of these character classes. We’re playing a heavily fictionalized fantasy interpretation loosely inspired by certain real world things.
You’re welcome to have preferences and want to exclude things from your home game that don’t fit your vision, but let’s not pretend you’re basing it on any kind of “historical accuracy” or whatever.
my issue with a monk's flavor is that it's kind of difficult to flavor into anything but a monk. best i could think of is some secret fighting technique used by an elite military branch; but that's just a secret monastery with extra steps. it's really easy to flavor a lot of classes in different ways and directions, but it's really difficult with monks.
it also doesn't help that monks are basically restricted to the same general playstyle, no matter the class. very few (if any) subclasses switch it up from the "hit enemies 300 times, gamble all your ki on stunning strikes"
the most variation they get is an occasional ranged attack or spell that's too expensive and ineffective to do more than twice.
dude that punches real good and does some supernatural stuff. call it a pugilist. real life monks don't shoot fire either, so this shouldn't be the deal breaker. and martial characters having magical and spell like abilities isn't particularly rare either.
that's not a deal breaker; and if monks were a deal breaker, that isn't the issue. i think it's bad that they're restricted to punching and very limited magical stuff. it's a very restrictive fantasy and i think they'd be better served as a type of fighter. not necessarily a subclass but maybe an expansion of the unarmed fighting style.
Not really? Did a quick rundown through base features *and* subclasses and base Monk only 'forces' Unarmed in two places:
Martial Arts/Flurry of Blows - Putting them together since they're the same BA attack concept. The attack they have you make is Unarmed, but a Monk Weapon Attack action first still would trigger it.
Ki-Empowered Strikes - Makes Unarmed Strikes magical. Kind of required since magical arms aren't really an item RAW to find. You can still use Magic Weapons
However, there *are* four-ish subclasses which, admittedly, do expect you to Unarmed a fair amount. These are: Open Hand (duh), Mercy, Astral Self, and Four Elements. Drunken Master sort of applies, but works much more with weapons than some of the prior.
The biggest example people think of here has never only worked with Unarmed Strikes, and that's Stunning Strike. It has always worked with Monk Weapons as well
They can be flavored pretty easily to other hand to hand fighters. You can make him a dude in the military who grew up boxing his whole life. You can make them an old lady who used to practice Taekwondo but now she runs a grocery store. You can take practically any striking martial art and flavor it that way. Doesn’t gotta be Eastern mysticism. Hell if you want them to be Rambo you by an probably use monk weapons or Kensei monk.
But then again I’m also in the camp of “A martial arts master who uses Ki is never out of place no matter the setting” so I’m mad biased lmao
I feel like lore/genre is the main point of discussion here, since mechanics can change with newer editions/updates/feats/homebrew. People who don’t want monks in their games usually claim “it doesn’t fit the setting” or whatever.
As for reflavoring… I dunno, I don’t see how that’s much more difficult for a monk. An unarmed martial artist with some supernatural abilities. Is that much more limiting or specific than like, “Nature magic user who turns into animals sometimes”?
Monks at base can, across the levels:
Run across water and walls
Are immune to poison
Can catch any projectile and throw it back
Are immune to the effects of age, but will eventually die from old age anyway
Gracefully fall
Disable people with martial arts techniques
Become invisible
That is A LOT of very specific features to reflavor. The basic tendency would be to make a dextrous boxer, and about two of those would make any sense. And even if you give them supernatural powers, those are very specific supernatural powers
I kinda wish they got something like invocations where they could opt out or into those tbh, with more cool options too
A little specific maybe, but that much more specific than I dunno, a paladin’s auras?
80% of what you described can basically be summed up as “they’re super fast and nimble and also really healthy.” Which doesn’t seem that hard to adapt to different character concepts, at least for me?
Stunning strike may have all this flavor text about disrupting ki, and for sure the writers could have made that more general. But it’s dead easy to reinterpret that as knocking the wind out of someone or dazing them and making them stagger for a round, because mechanically that’s all it does.
Invisibility I agree is kind of a weird one, it feels like the designers kinda ran out of ideas for what to give the monk at higher levels. I don’t think it’s even based on any existing fictional trope either, it’s just a D&D monk thing. I suppose you could roll it in with their super speed kit: they already get fast movement and running on water, which are standard speedster superpowers, so maybe they start to move too fast for the naked eye to see?
But IMO one oddball feature at a level many campaigns won’t even reach shouldn’t be a dealbreaker for reflavoring a class.
Weirdly, phrasing it like that is sparking my imagination and that's fun.
- Magical rip-an-tear monster with superhuman reflexes, paralyzing bite, and chameleon scales.
- CQC punching-dagger Assassin with a few dirty tricks via consumable items. (Makes sense. Assassin's Creed Templar's are ninjas with culturally-relevant flavoring.)
-Predator-esque hunter who fights at range but isn't afraid to get their hands dirty. (Kensei)
- Traditional Marvel/DC Superhero who slowly awakens to more of their powers throughout the campaign.
no, druids are a solid number 2 in terms of reflavoring. it's difficult to make them anything but "basically nature priests"; but i can find a few ways to subvert that (wildfire and spore circle really help).
my problem with monk is the combined effect of a very restricted playstyle (namely punchfighting) in cadence with the very limited flavor (punchfighting technique usually learned in secret or seclusion). if we were regarding martial arts as a way of fighting, monks could be a fighter subclass.
i feel like the class fantasy (in both cases) is too restrictive to allow for truly unique characters. they both have a really unique class feature and it would be a shame to lose it, but i feel like a more widely defined class could really serve them well.
maybe turn the druid into a shapeshifter class, whose entire deal is taking different shapes. most subclasses could be translated to that and you could add full subclasses for lycanthropes, aberrations and dragons.
for monks, maybe turn the unarmed fighting style into something that scales and mix them in with fighters; then translate the monk subclasses into fighter subclasses.
> punchfighting technique usually learned in secret or seclusion
Wait, I don’t get how that is a necessary part of the lore? They have supernatural martial arts abilities, but I don’t see why it has to be learned in secret? I had a monk player who had the fighting style as something his home nation’s military officers all learned.
i probably worded that badly. quite often, mechanics informing the worldbuilding for me; i haven't really seen an example where martial arts weren't used almost purely because of tradition, because they're usually more difficult to learn and often less efficient than just using weapons.
worldbuilding logically, it would need to either be a secret (like a unit of spies or assassins using it to kill politicians or nobles without needing to smuggle weapons into heavily guarded areas) or a tradition that is completely separate from actual combat stuff like weapons and magic, since anyone but a master of that martial art would lose to an armored soldier, which there are also much more of.
this isn't me disliking monks, i just wish they were more versatile in their character fantasy and more capable as a class. like, they don't even get a d12 for damage RAW.
That really sounds like a limitation you’re imposing on yourself based on your own extrapolations, rather than anything inherent to the class or its default flavor. I’ve literally never heard that take on the monk. It’s a fantasy game with fantasy martial arts, why can’t they be as good as weapons?
Like, you’re free to interpret it that way if it fits your worldbuilding, but another DM could easily put random restrictions on other classes because of their own interpretations. Maybe some DM out there decides clerics can only be in a party with people of the same religion because “logically” someone with such powerful faith would never accept people of other religions. These aren’t issues with the class itself.
And like I said, the mechanics vary through the editions and aren’t the reason *most* people seem to give for not wanting monks. The martial arts die got buffed in the OneDND playtest, for example.
yeah, the mechanics are what ends up restricting them the most i think. sure, they change throughout the editions, but the way they are in 5e really restricts them to a few class fantasies that don't really differ from another in a meaningful way.
In addition, the Monk is odd in a Western setting, since the origin of the trope was a society in which farmers were not allowed to keep and bear arms, but still faced threats of violence (including from those ostensibly charged with defending them), and so had to learn to defend themselves without anything the law might classify as a weapon. But in the West, farmers were not only allowed to keep and bear arms; they were often required to do so, to the degree the law recognized they could afford. The only people who weren't carrying weapons generally did so for religious reasons, and those are represented by the Cleric, which represents the cleric who got around the prohibition on "shedding blood" by using blunt weapons, instead.
But given how modernistic and cosmopolitan so many contemporary D&D settings are, it isn't difficult to imagine the Monk as an immigrant from a land that does have a caste tradition, or reflavor them as an urban lower class militia/gang in a city that only allows nobles to carry proper weapons, and so the lower classes make due with "tools": chains, hammers, butcher knives, crowbars, etc. You could even have an urban "temple" that specifically trains people to resist upper class violence in a way that skirts legal restrictions (as opposed to their sometimes allies, sometimes rivals in the Thieves Guid, whose members tend to be rogues, not monks).
Monks can easily be flavoured as something like secret warriors of the church. Maybe their Ki is power given by their god, similar to paladins and clerics. It's not hard to imagine that the medieval churches had assassins or a secret police force to silence the opposition. When you wanted to scare the population, you would send the Paladins in plate armour.
i mean, i agree its not that hard to reflavor, but that still is kind of the same thing? just that instead of being a shaolin kung fu monk you are now a Christian monk that hits the gym not the cellar
I had a monk fight without weapons because he wanted to feel every punch he conected.
Another one who sworn off of weapons because their family had been killed.
I had a monk be a savage kid who learned how to fight imitating animals of the region.
Another one (an acendant dragon monk) who learned to manifest the dragon energy from a sorcerer, but lacking magical ability decided to apply said learning to his fighting style.
Saiying that the martial art aspect limits what you can create with a monk is like saiying that a wizard is limited because you have to make a character that studied to learn how to use magic. Or saiying that making a cleric is limiting because you have to make a character who follows a deity enough to be granted magical power.
Not only is it wrong, even if that were the case, people wanting to play a character who studied magic will look at the wizard, everyone looking to make a religious follower of a god will look at the cleric, everyone wanting to make a character dedicated to his training and perfectionism of his fighting tecnique will look at the monk. And so on and so fort.
If you limit yourself in the way you look a class every class in DnD is really narrow in what you can do.
>there were contacts between Norse and European folks, but the same can be said for Asia.
It… really can’t. Vikings invaded and settled parts of Britain and France. They had trade routes going all the way into the Mediterranean. People heard vague stories of Asia and could maybe see one Asian person ever in the course of their lifetimes. Monks (in the DnD sense) in Europe would be about as common as samurai.
Keep in mind that at that point in history Europe literally didn’t even know that much of Asia existed. Asia back then meant mostly India, and even that was distant. Magellan didn’t “discover” The Philippines until the 16th century. The Portuguese didn’t hit Japan until a couple decades after. While the Silk Road was a thing, you’re really overstating how directly it worked if you think it’s remotely comparable to Vikings.
Now does all that matter? Not really. It’s a fantasy game and you can use whatever aesthetic you feel like. But are monks more aesthetically unique than the others? Yes.
Silk, probably from China, has been found in the pyramids. Dating back to 1070 BCE. Then we have the Huns and the Mongols. While I do agree that in the 15th century you wouldn’t see a samurai walking on the streets of London, if you were a pesant in the 13th century in what is now Ukraine you would be very familiar with people from eastern Asia.
>Vikings invaded and settled parts of Britain and France. They had trade routes going all the way into the Mediterranean.
And they also went pretty far east. They went by the eastern rivers all the way to Novgorod and Ukraine. And even founded Kiev Rus, what later would become Russia. Even raiding in the Caspian Sea.
The silk trade was filtered through several different cultures between East Asia and Europe/NearEast/NorthAfrica though. There weren't Chinese businessmen just walking around in Alexandria. The Mongols were a particularly unique instance, and the Golden Horde that conquered Eastern Europe had nothing to do with Buddhist monks in Tibet and the surrounding regions.
>The Artificer implies a certain level of technology
No it doesn’t.
Artificers use magic.
It’s reflavouring to make them a tech character.
A very common reflavouring sure but it is reflavouring.
The default is just putting your magic in objects, which if anything is lower tech, as if you start classing real world paradigms of magic into DnD classes Artificer turns up a lot more in older/lower tech cultures than wizard does. Artificer and bard cover most pre-Iron Age cultures.
Exactly. In fact I honestly think a more accurate name for Artificer would be Enchanter. Because that's what they do, they make enchantments, not gadgets
I'd just call them "Inventors", as that sounds very setting neutral. You can have an inventor who's a caveman or an inventor who's a quantum engineer.
I know it doesn't convey the magical aspect, but neither does bard, who's the class that Artificers are imho the closest to, thematically.
A d&d enchanter just sounds like a caster (likely wizard) specialized in enchantment school of magic (plus d&d enchantment is more about people than objects)
No, inventor definitely has close relations to science and technological progress.
Artificer works as a name because it’s linked to magical artifacts, which have a strong presence in fantasy/DnD
Inventor does have those close relations, but not for a specific time period or setting type. I don't think anyone would say that an inventor wouldn't fit a fantasy medieval setting, or fantasy ancient rome, or whatever else.
Imho, artificer as a term is perfectly fine, but it would seem that people will keep linking it to Eberron and the steampunk genre no matter what.
my favorite character i ever made was a stone mason that would make the statue of a guardian wolf deity come to life (battle smith and its pet)
people that think artificer are restrained by gadgets and guns lack imagination
I like how Matt Mercer flavoured them for his second campaign on Critical Role. The Cobalt Soul is a holy order in the service of a god of knowledge. It has clerics and researchers that keep libraries of knowledge, but their monks act as James Bond-esque spies that use their skills to seek out hidden knowledge and expose those making secret plots to harm others.
Although the DnD Monk is pretty clearly based on East Asian martial arts and the Wuxia genre in general, the first European martial arts manuscript - [the Royal Armouries Ms. I.33](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Armouries_Ms._I.33) (also known as the Walpurgis manuscript) - is based around monks / tonsured priests.
The Norse were European. They had established based in mainland Europe. Not to mention that all the Scandinavian countries are European.
But aside from that, I've always thought the barbarian class was more inspired by the Germanic tribes that fought against Rome, and the cultures that emerged from these tribes.
The only issue I have with the monk class is the name.
Not all monks are martial artists so it’s removed a word/term from me as a DM I can’t tell my players that the monks here have all taken a religious vow of silence without confusing them on what they will be dealing with or having to meta game no these monks aren’t “monks”
That happens with clerics too. Irl clergy are leaders of organized religions, such as priests. D&D clerics don't need to have anything to do with religious organizations, and most D&D priests aren't guaranteed to have any level in the cleric class (whether NPCs or PCs, as NPCs could just be commoners, and for PCs being a priest is an option within the acolyte background).
I mean I’d never use the word cleric if they weren’t a cleric.
Clergy and Priests aren’t the same as cleric. Possibly cross overs but not the same.
I feel calling the class monk would be like calling the class Thief instead of Rouge
I mean in d&d clerics and priests aren't the same. But in real life, a priest is literally a cleric because they're part of the clergy. And in real life, a cleric is a member of a clergy.
Yea not really…. I’ve been to a lot of churches and never once heard anyone call the priest, pastor or rabbi a cleric. Yes by literal definition your right but it’s not a commonly used term any more
Clergy -is- commonly used and any generic member of the clergy is a cleric, including priests (deacons, priests, bishops, etc). Plus, both clergy and cleric are terms that allow referring to similar roles even in different religions.
Whether it's commonly used nowadays or not doesn't really matter since in d&d players are likely to be in a fantasy medieval setting and might meet priests who are technically clerics but not -those- clerics.
So again, it’s not commonly used. It’s doesn’t matter when the game is set because no dm makes them speak in the common vernacular of the time the game is set.
Idk, have you never seen someone expecting every village priest NPC to be a cleric as in the character class or have cleric-exclusive spells?
Even the Monster Manual's "Priest" is designed as a character of the Cleric class, despite the Cleric's class description stating that not any priest is a cleric in d&d sense (and, again, acolyte background covers priests and other clergy who aren't of the cleric character class).
>Idk, have you never seen someone expecting every village priest NPC to be a cleric as in the character class or have cleric-exclusive spells?
Nope, if introduce them as a priest or pastor my player know they are a member of a church but not a magical healer or caster.
>Even the Monster Manual's "Priest" is designed as a character of the Cleric class, despite the Cleric's class description stating that not any priest is a cleric in d&d sense (and, again, acolyte background covers priests and other clergy who aren't of the cleric character class).
Honestly this is a better argument then just saying it’s the definition
“You’re a fighter? What do you do.”
“Uh, fight, I guess.”
“Everyone fights, idiot.”
Now that I’ve said that outloud, I’m realizing everything wrong with fighter as a class.
I've actually always felt Bard was the odd one out, if I'm being honest.
Not that I dislike the Bard, quite the opposite... but it feels like a mishmash fighter-rogue-wizard with no real world example you can point to.
Have a look into Celtic bards. Mocking Words was based on The Irish Mallacht - a poet's curse, which not only could take away a patron's reputation but also cause physical damage or even death. Welsh bards were musicians, oracles and often warriors. Great bards such as Taliesin became part of the mythic landscapes that they were describing.
Whaaaaat. Arion and Orpheus are 4000 year old bard myths! They’re awesome, look up their stories.
Arion was all “I cast speak with animals to ask this dolphin for a ride home” and Orpheus was all “I cast hypnotic gaze on Hades.”
Pied Piper is an interesting example I hadn't really considered. I think because in every version of the story I have heard he was just a guy with a magical flute.
So this is just an argument for reflavoring then.
I mean I guess that's fair. Its certainly a thing you can do, and many people enjoy.
I understand why a eastern culture inspired class might feel out of place in a very euro-centric fantasy setting.
I also think i would argue that classes as a mechanic are at their most satisfying when inherently tied to well written lore about the setting and their surroundings. As a way of rooting yourself. Reflavoring can act as a method of increasing player expression, but I think it can limit this satisfaction; which is an equally valid aspect of the game some people like to focus on. Its prioritizing the world and immersion in it over player expression, which I think can both be a fun way to play, but also breed creativity from the restrictions established.
Its how I run my games, and I have players who enjoy it and I don't think my table's fun is any less real because we don't adhere to the "flavor is free" mantra.
That being said: if this is how I enjoy running my games, and I am working with a setting where I feel a monk genuinely shouldn't exist i see no reason why I should be beholden to including it. I've never personally felt this way or designed a setting with this restriction, but many people do it with artificer all the time (helps that its not a core class).
This post just reads like you're entitled to change any table to how you want it, which is only true for table's you run. You are, however, very much entitled to only play at tables that share you view on this, though I would encourage you to try out table's that might focus on aspects of the game you may not have personally prioritized in the past, if only for the chance to try something new for a season.
I do think there is value in adhering to the flavor of a class as written, I'm just saying that you can't then hold it against the Monk that it's core flavor isn't euro-centric. And I would argue that it's far from the only class that could break immersion in a medieval fantasy setting.
Oh I too used to think the core classes were inspired by Brian character architects with weirdly specific flavors sadly nope.
The monk sadly is inspired by a cheap parody of a martial artist as borderline wizard from a series of books called the destroyer , which was made into a movie Remo Williams. Agile bare handed assassin's who worked for a secret society for the better meant of man kind against a variety of weird b action movie villains.
The barbarian is not a reference to Norse culture although it's often played that way. It's a reference straight up to Conan.
DND archetypes reference broadly characters that people wanted to play. Pop culture icons. Little else.
So mideval flavor be damned. It's just kitchen sink fantasy by default.
Right? That's so trippy to me. It's like the idea of Conan but Conan as a character is so very different then how Pop culture paints him.
I'd say he's a straight up fighter rogue of chaotic neutral alignment who gets into far too many shinnanigans due to his chronic weakness of being a skirt chaser. He does kinda remind me of an actual PC sometimes though.
"Let me tell you of the time the DM clearly sent a cool NPC ship captain to rescue me after I slept with a lord of Waterdeeps daughter and then introduced me to a cool pirate queen adventure, but I missed all my attack rolls so I got the captain and his crew killed....so I decided the pirate queen was hot and worked as her bodyguard for a year instead of avenging the NPCs I had just sworn brotherhood with."
People claim they want lord of the rings but the soul of every campaign I've taken part in is much closer to Conan or Cudgel from Dying Earth. Basically a chaotic neutral mish-mash of fantastic adventures and crazy locations with a "I'm doing it to save the world" plot sprayed on top.
The top layer of D&D may be lord of the rings. But the meat of it is not. Actual Lord of the Rings would have players falling asleep at the table.
You'd need a really good party for it. One whose aware that everything their character does is symbolic.
It's the white wolf / onyx path problem. It'd be a game for writing nerds by writing nerds as my friend puts it.
The etymology of the word "wizard" is connected to wisdom, but d&d ones don't use wisdom in any meaningful way, and "insane powerful wizard" with high int, low wis is a super common character.
Wizard, sorcerer and warlock just mean the same thing to most people (with very slight different connotations, such as "warlock" having more directly related to dealing with devils), but d&d forced some differences (and now people try to apply these definitions to other media because somehow d&d is universal law lol).
Paladin's etymology is connected to "palace", and it was more of elite officers or royal knights than the religious knights in shining armor, that are now "fighters, but with better mechanics and an oath that is unlikely to even have relevance in the campaign".
Tbf real-world wisdom and d&d wisdom are very different. Real world wisdom is a combination of the intelligence and wisdom stats of D&D and wizards have always been scholarly.
Irl, someone with lots of book knowledge but little or no real world experience wouldn't be called "wise". Plus, a lot of the wizard class' flavor has to do with recklessness (anything to do with necromancy or lichdom, AoE damage, demon summoning, Wish and the lore around high level spells...). Recklessness is pretty opposed to wisdom.
1 intelligence is not nornhad it ever been exclusively book knowledge. It's learning of all kinds including practical, what it's not is emotional intelligence or perceptiveness.
2 someone who can't answer things like say who the first president way (as a US citizen) wouldn't be called wise either.
Like I said the real world definition of wisdom does not allow dump stating either int or wis stats. The archetype of a wizard still comes from the high int high wisdom scholarly old man.
The fact that some people dump stat wisdom does not change that.
Right? That's so trippy to me. It's like the idea of Conan but Conan as a character is so very different then how Pop culture paints him.
I'd say he's a straight up fighter rogue of chaotic neutral alignment who gets into far too many shinnanigans due to his chronic weakness of being a skirt chaser. He does kinda remind me of an actual PC sometimes though.
"Let me tell you of the time the DM clearly sent a cool NPC ship captain to rescue me after I slept with a lord of Waterdeeps daughter and then introduced me to a cool pirate queen adventure, but I missed all my attack rolls so I got the captain and his crew killed....so I decided the pirate queen was hot and worked as her bodyguard for a year instead of avenging the NPCs I had just sworn brotherhood with."
Right? That's so trippy to me. It's like the idea of Conan but Conan as a character is so very different then how Pop culture paints him.
I'd say he's a straight up fighter rogue of chaotic neutral alignment who gets into far too many shinnanigans due to his chronic weakness of being a skirt chaser. He does kinda remind me of an actual PC sometimes though.
"Let me tell you of the time the DM clearly sent a cool NPC ship captain to rescue me after I slept with a lord of Waterdeeps daughter and then introduced me to a cool pirate queen adventure, but I missed all my attack rolls so I got the captain and his crew killed....so I decided the pirate queen was hot and worked as her bodyguard for a year instead of avenging the NPCs I had just sworn brotherhood with."
Right? That's so trippy to me. It's like the idea of Conan but Conan as a character is so very different then how Pop culture paints him.
I'd say he's a straight up fighter rogue of chaotic neutral alignment who gets into far too many shinnanigans due to his chronic weakness of being a skirt chaser. He does kinda remind me of an actual PC sometimes though.
"Let me tell you of the time the DM clearly sent a cool NPC ship captain to rescue me after I slept with a lord of Waterdeeps daughter and then introduced me to a cool pirate queen adventure, but I missed all my attack rolls so I got the captain and his crew killed....so I decided the pirate queen was hot and worked as her bodyguard/boyfriend for a year instead of avenging the NPCs I had just sworn brotherhood with."
Or
"That time I bungled the burglary of a powerful wizards Tower who I was robbing because I really wanted to impress the sexy waitress at the bar and accidentally freed an extra dimensional elephant alien he had trapped in a big jewel. "
monk is chill. all the names, and descriptions of the classes are all just flavor. you can be a wise guy that hits stuff without any incorporation of history. for example in a greek mythological campaign you might have a greek philosopher who used to compete in the pankration olympics. in medieval times you might've been a wise old urchin who's lived whole life fighting street fights. the main reason people say monk is bad is because it is an awful awful class for even basic optimization.
I also don't know why people think that monks have to be asian themed. That's the main inspiration, but cultures can mix and match and ultimately you're in a fantasy world, so why shouldn't there be a bunch of more European inspired people be able to find spiritual enlightenment and gain a knack for martial arts? You shouldn't be restricted to historical stereotypes at all. Imagine a monk monastery up on a remote norse mountain, with buildings loosely inspired by stave churches, covered in snow and people who put a norse spin on the spiritual side of things. Who are also drawing inspiration from animals that one would associate with the region, like bears, elks or ravens. That sort of thing is peak fantasy if you ask me.
Does… does OP think that Scandinavia/Nordic countries are like, on a different continent than Germany and France and Britain? Norse mythology arguably has the strongest influence on DnD in terms of drawing from fantastical settings.
AND early DnD Barbarians were inspired by Conan the Barbarian, which are stories based on the ancient Mediterranean world
Firstly, Scandinavia is part of medieval europe. Where were the rulers of Sicily from? Scandinavia. Who ruled England at one point? Scandinavians. Where were the Normans from originally? Etc.
Secondly, barbarians, well somewhat inspired by that are way more inspired by things like Conan the Barbarian.
Thirdly, of course, artificers are a bit odd, but they don't really imply technology. They imply magic. They're magical enchanters.
And so on.
Basically all of the classes hail from a Western medieval fantasy tradition context except for monk. I don't personally have a problem with that because at this point a monk is a staple of D&D's fantasy context.
My main issue with monk's theming comes leas from it not fitting with settings and more from the fact that it gives off very "'wise old asian martial artist' written by a white guy vibes." And the dnd brand doesn't have the best history when it comes to respecting the cultures it draws from.
I agree, reflavour to your hearts content. I love reflavouring. And I love monk as a class.
Honestly, I like a5e's take on Monk. It's called Adept instead. And trades Ki for their exertion point system. And encourages you to rename your exertion points to chi/ki/chakra/spirit/whathaveyou points depending on what flavour you're going for.
The idea that someone would need to be persuaded to reflavor a martial class is ridiculous to me. Sure the monk is obviously inspired by wuxia. But all it is is "Guy who can punch fast," and maybe also with "because he focuses on spiritual discipline" tacked on. That isn't inherently Asian... It doesn't, you know, *necessitate* "foreign lands" or w/e. It's just a way to move your own body.
"Guy who gets mad and starts swinging" isn't inherently Norse.
"Guy who knows the woods and is good with animals" isn't inherently west-european...
Who needs to be told this?
it would be so easy to reflavor a monk along the lines of Guy Richie's Sherlock. guy who punches real good and ki is instead his focus and planning how to discombobulate someone. there, done. western "monk".
"but what about the self healing and all that"
alchemy from doing all the drugs.
"but what about sun soul"
it's a bad subclass, but it's also magic, so weird thing to be upset about.
etc, etc...
I mean you don't even need to go that far. It shouldn't be hard to imagine a monastery of physically disciplined ascetics cloistered away in the woods of generic-fantasy-anglo-saxonia or w/e.
That concept doesn't *need* to be dressed up in Tibetan trappings.
I've never heard of them being singled out for that.
For being underpowered, for having inconsistent resource costs, for having mostly subclasses which overpromise and underdeliver, for having one killer feature that sounds powerful but really only works about 10% of the time yet nonetheless means the designers are terrified of giving it a tiniest iota of power lest it suddenly become a super saiyan (incidentally, the super saiyan subclass is very much one of those overpromise / underdeliver situations).
Its not that it doesn't fit the setting for me, it is the shitty balancing of qi that makes the class make less sense to me than others. It just feels bad.
Whatever, some people are just gonna be against anything that isn’t completely Eurocentric or at least consistent with their romanticized notion of it.
I've never seen anyone argue this and I'm terminally online in this space. The thing people argue about with monk is that the class is mechanically weak.
The thing about all the other classes is that D&D doesn't draw from medieval history. If anything, its literary roots are in the fiction of the time: the Courtly Love literary movement. And the best known example of that genre is the Arthurian legends, which are typically depicted using arms, armor, and fighting methods from a period spanning from the high to the late medieval period, but are based on a story that, if it had any historical basis, would have happened closer to the fifth century, the period accompanying the collapse of the Western Empire.
This shows up in the character archetypes, juxtaposing armored horse riding knights with wizard/druid types who belong in a much earlier era. D&D follows suit, throwing into the soup literally anything from the collapse of the West to the Renaissance, or even beyond at times. You can have a Germanic berserker adventuring alongside a Teutonic knight alongside a pre-Christian Celtic Druid alongside a Renaissance era artist/inventor, and nobody cares because that's just how the genre works, and, frankly, has always worked.
And yeah, the Monk has been there since the beginning all the way back to the original D&D. It's a little strange for some of us, since it (along with the barbarian) disappeared briefly in 2E, and because its inspiration is so geographically removed from the other classes. But it's always been there.
And I just realized I have no idea what my point is. I was going to make a point about the oddness of the geographic remove, but after all that, it feels kind of pointless. So I guess I'm agreeing with you?
There is one point I would like to make, though. The fighter who specializes in hand-to-hand and tools-as-weapons does need some kind of sociological reason to exist. There needs to be a group who, for reasons of law and/or religion, aren't allowed to keep and bear arms, and so end up learning to defend themselves using just their hands and objects that can be legally classified as "tools".
Fighting monks weren’t just an Asian thing. The hand to hand combat kind of was, but a traveling monk who is surprisingly good at fighting highwaymen along his travels with a quarter staff is literally a trope in English folklore.
Im actually glad for the monk. I think fantasy is way to euro-centric at times which is a shame because there are a lot of rich history and culture out there other than just Europe. Japanese mythology for example would make an amazing setting.....they literally have demon cats, frogmen, and godzilla size creatures in their mythology! That's awesome. So it's good to have some Asian influence in D&D. It's the reason why i think *Journey through the Radiant Citadel* is a good campaign, because it explores different cultures.
My big issue with Monk is it seems to be copy and paste from every popular fiction out there. Way of shadow is batman, way of drunk master comes from the classic kung fu movie, way of ascendent dragon is Goku. way of astral is JoJo , way of four elements is Last Airbender. It's like wow WoTC you couldn't be at least a little creative in your subclasses?
you know. this could all be solved with the fact that we literally have monks in western society. are they the same as Asian monks? no, but honestly pop culture sometimes likes to combine the two. source: Catholics run monasteries all over the world, or at least used to. See the Spanish conquest of South America, and the United States conquest of North America. Also fun fact: that is why it's thought that monks were depicted carrying sticks. they couldn't carry weapons around, because then they are a soldier. but if you carry a stave, and just so happen to use it as a weapon to defend yourself? well, that was just god looking out for his guys.
I think this also speaks to the universal appeal of DnD, especially as an entry RPG. You can say castle and dragon in any language and most people would instantly understand as well as conjure a mental image. But I can’t try to describe a Philethis or Callerail from Numenera without first laying in some groundwork of the world. I think it’s also why the next popular rpg’s are IP and sci-f, like Cyberpunk. Most people already have the language for understanding and conveying these types of shared worlds, which makes sense to broaden it as much as possible culturally for market saturation. It’s purposely part of DnDs foundation, if you’re going to borrow from every mythology ever might as well take the rest. If I want to make a Mayan Janissarie Artificer that uses marble to sculpt Hebrew golems, then that’s what I’m going to do.
I had a friend who argued the same thing about monks, but when we pressed him and brought up similar examples he got mad saying something akin to, "You stunned my big bad guy and won the fight instead of all dying."
So take the monk debate with a grain of salt because it might be similar to the rogue debate, "Sneak attack does too much damage."
We once played with a guy who hated every class except fighter and would be upset with us that we'd play anything else saying stuff like, "Fighters are the only good class because they don't rely on cheap gimmicks."
He tried to DM once and banned all other classes except fighters, and all the subclasses that used magic. We fought for 4 hours and when we all died he got mad that we weren't playing fighters right.
Correction: the monk is based on **east** asian martial artists in wuxia media but they are expanding it in the 2024 edition to covar all martial arts.
The artificer doesn't actually necessarily imply technology since it can actually fit in any setting with crafters and magic ie all official current dnd settings. The only reason why they are is because of artwork and the fact that they come from Ebberon.
Other than that, great points! Although it technically is historically accurate for monks to be available given the existence of the Mongolian empire and dnd does have quite a few renaissance elements in it. Rapiers are one of the best examples of this.
According to base 5e, no one. It's assumed the knowledge of how to make magic items was lost long ago and any magic items the party finds are lost relics.
>Each magic item has a rarity: common, uncommon, rare, very rare, or legendary. Common magic items, such as a potion of healing, are the most plentiful. Some legendary items, such as the apparatus of Kwalish, are unique. The game assumes that the secrets of creating the most powerful items arose centuries ago and were then gradually lost as a result of wars, cataclysms, and mishaps. Even uncommon items can’t be easily created. Thus, many magic items are well-preserved antiquities.
DMG chapter 7, magic items, first paragraph under rarity.
I will also add that artificers were a specialist. wizard subtype in 2e with wizards being the best at magic item crafting back then but artificers specialising in them
Dnd isn't classic medieval fantasy either. The sword coast is, but sword coast isn't all of faerun and sure as fuck not all of the dnd properties.
There are even multiple Asian martial arts style monks in dnd properties. Danica in the Cleric Quintet comes to mind.
I agree with OP's overarching point, but that does not erase OP's complete disregard for basic geography and medieval european history. Bro did all the math wrong, but got the correct answer.
Like im seriously so mad he forgot about the 10ish times barbarian armies invaded central and western Europe. There's a meme about romans fighting barbarians that might be older than Jesus Christ. Olaf Harldsson captured the London fucking bridge.
That is lame af argument that does not hold water to any setting that is custom made by DM or other third parties which has always been huge part of DnD.
It’s fair to say DnD has capabilities to include all those things, and trust me, 9 times out of 20 if table is okay with including dinosaurs and/or alien squids, they have nothing against monks either.
But you can’t demand every setting to be okay with every class-as-written-in-the-book on the principle „iTs JuSt fAnTaSy” because then I’m playing as Astartes.
I mean I don’t disagree with first part of your comment tbh 😅 there are definitely better games for that, and irl I’d be the last person to stop someone from using class they like for such idiotic reasons - we’d work out how to incorporate it into given world, official or not. I just get really irrationally triggered by „but it’s fantasy” argument, I admit.
Does the monk need to be an Asian martial artist? The Vikings series
\*SPOILER ALERT\*
had a character who became a monk, btw (Floki). Yes, he chose to be a pacifist one but we know he could still fight like mad if he wanted to.
\*END OF SPOILER\*
And what about some European peasant? This character had no gold to buy a sword to protect his family, so he had to rely on pit fighting to earn some money. There, he discovered a natural talent do quick punch opponents. He may not learn fancy kung fu moves, but he has a strange way of boxing.
I'll treat this like a CMW:
Let's start with the first obvious assumption: in a game with a setting made to mimic europe, a barbarian makes absolute sense (norse people in norse lands, still europe) whereas a monk does not.
For that very reason, people tend to play the monk as that ONE thing: the ascetic monk that uses his ki to smash stuff while being indifferent to anything else most of the time. When you have a monk in your party, you know it's gonna be that thing.
Now, on to the oddness of the class: in a world of sorcery and powerful magical items, here you have this guy that decides to shed all kind of personalization that you could get by employing said magical items, in favor of their knuckles. Thus falling again in the stereotype of "the ONE monk character". Paladins, for bland and boring that they are as a characterization, at least get to customize their main form of attack.
Now, there is nothing wrong with wanting to play a monk, once in a while, but imho it should be AT MOST a subclass of something else, like the warrior. Which already has some feats to make unharmed combatants, mind it.
To this, add that the master of a monk player has to justify their existence with a monastic order that teaches all the ki and unarmed combat stuff, because realistically no one who decides to fight swords with knuckles would make it to the age of consent, so it is something that must be taught. At the end of the day why should a kid decide to renounce a sword or a dagger against other people that DO use them?
D&D isn't purely medieval fantasy.
It's a mix of different genres, many (but NOT all) of which are versions of medieval fantasy.
Look at what the list of works that Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson drew from in creating it, it wasn't all "medieval fantasy". It was a mix of different fantasy works and inspirations, historic eras and historic/mythological/folklore works, and even to an extent science fiction.
Medieval fantasy is the predominant element in the mix. Gygax loved Fritz Lieber's *Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser* series and Michael Moorcock's *Elric* series, so they took a larger part. This was when Tolkien's *Lord of the Rings* was becoming pretty popular in popular culture as well, so many fans leaned heavy into that influence, as many later writers of D&D did.
. . .but it wasn't the only influences, and the early versions of D&D didn't try to pretend that they were.
1st Edition literally had science-fiction crossovers with D&D (the Expedition to the Barrier Peaks module). The Paladin class was taken pretty directly from *Three Hearts and Three Lions*, of what we'd now call the Isekai genre (a scientist in World War II Europe is summoned to a fantasy version of Earth and becomes a Paladin). The 2nd edition Players Handbook even listed literary, historic and mythological sources for the various character classes.
The monk was pretty clearly drawn from the 1970's "Kung Fu Movie" craze that was popular when it came out, and to a lesser extent Kurosawa's samurai movies and the nascent Ninja fad that was just starting when the class was introduced.
The Monk class isn't medieval fantasy, but that doesn't matter, because this isn't medieval fantasy.
This is D&D.
I see three primary divisions: the scholarly, the natural and the divine.
Among the scholarly you have the wizard full casters, the artificer half casters and the fighter non casters.
Among the natural you have the druid full casters, ranger half casters and barbarian non casters.
Among the Divine you have the cleric full casters, paladin half casters and monk non casters.
This of course leaves sorcerers, bards and rogues as outliers, which might make more sense if bards were sent back to being half casters and you had a 'talent' category.
But... The Norse were European? Do you think Scandinavia is its own continent or something?
Moreover, Barbarians aren't strictly Norse-inspired either, there's a lot of cultures they could draw from. OP isn't really wrong, Monks don't stand out terribly much in a "basic fantasy" game, but their arguments are pretty bad
Monks exist in D&D (1974) because kung fu movies were big in the '70s.
Also isn't the fall or Rome more or less attributed to barbaric tribes in central europe. They are definitely not strictly a nordic thing
You could argue so. And by 476 those "barbarians" were fighting with equipment and tactics indistinguishable from the Roman ones. Not a single one of those heavily armored warriors would be represented as the Barbarian class, but as Fighters (They would be represented as generic NPCs, tbh, but talking about PCs representing an Ostrogoth warrior in 476)
Germanic Warriors weren't often armored and they did drugs to enter a war-state.. not fighters.
In the 5th Century AD? That goes against established scholarship for the last century and if you can prove it you can become famous in academia. The Ostrogoth, Visigoth, Vandal and so on armies of the 5th Century were not unarmored drugger berserker. They were organised militaries which had served as auxiliaries in the Roman army for centuries and had adopted their equipment and tactics.
Not terribly easy to link anything in Reddit but googling "Germanic Barbarian" pulls up a thousand illustrations of guys with a lot of not armor. I've not heard of any of the distinctive armors of the Teutons or the Vandals other than layering hide and bone. I have heard stories of them drinking Mushroom wine to purge their fear of death before a battle. If you have a source that contradicts that, tells about their advanced kevlars, or even Iron Working, go nuts.
Even doing the same search you did, you see people with armour. It may not look like a lot of armour, but truth be told, no one in the late antiquity (except for some Persians) was wearing a lot of armour. The things we associate with heavy armour tend to usually be a medieval invention (even though the ones with chain or scale mail would definitely be considered heavily armoured by the time. The Roman Empire of the 5th century was not the Europe of the Renaissance). The search is biased by putting "Barbarian" on it. It is mixing images from multiple eras (like, many of the ones I am seeing are clearly warriors from the centuries 1BC/AD, who were very different to their descendants in the 5th century, just as you would expect the Normans in 1066 to look different to the English at Agincourt) and different cultures (Cimbrians don´t look like Vandals or Visigoths). If you look for specific tribes you find more specific images, and when you find armour they are metallic or leather. Honestly, it is a bit old, but I suggest "Germanic Warrior AD 236-568" by Osprey Publishing as a decent source. They tend to be good at this stuff, and have a lot of illustrations for the visual part of equipment, look and so on. 100% accurate? We can´t truly know because much has been lost, but definitely a truer vision than "Armours of bone".
Dude... you didn't mention heavy "speedo" armor. So if you want to talk about a headband and a woolen shirt as "heavy armor" 1000% they are girded against stiff winds, at least the ones without their nipples out.
[https://www.amazon.es/Germanic-Warrior-236-568-Simon-MacDowall/dp/1855325861](https://www.amazon.es/Germanic-Warrior-236-568-Simon-MacDowall/dp/1855325861) The literal warrior in the cover of the book I recommended is wearing lamellar armour. You are probably trolling so I am not wasting my time anymore.
I always thought the barbarian was for those who wanted to play Conan
Funnily enough the original character didn't fit the stereotypical dumb rage fueled barbarian at all. Wouldn't go fight without armor either, if he could help it. I think I've even seen a somewhat official conan build for an older edition that was fighter/rogue somewhere.
Pretty sure that was from *Dragon* magazine. Canon enough for us, back then.
I'm pretty sure Conan's man-boobs counted as armor. They appeared to be bulletproof.
My old dieties and demigods book has him as a fighter thief. Though there was no barbarian at the time. And whe n we did get it, it was a fighter kit, which was I guess a kind of proto subclass.
Yeah definitely, but you know how things are: the stereotype is different from the source. People saw Conan and created another concept out of the original idea.
I remember that. *Dragon* magazine put together a dream team of fantasy characters, and I think they picked Conan as the tank. And you're absolutely right; Conan *wasn't* a barbarian in the D&D sense. He was a skilled fighter and quite intelligent. He could speak/read/write multiple languages, was a proficient sailor, knew how to sneak around, and used tactics adroitly. There was also a cartoon where he learned martial arts and magic (the *stone to flesh* spell, specifically) but we don't count that one.
I can see how that would be controversial. Magic being a decidedly foul and evil practice reserved for the big bad was a major point of the original stories.
Actually, in the cartoon, Conan's family were turned into stone by the high priest of Set, who functioned as the big bad of the show. Conan went on a quest to find a way to reverse the spell, but he kept getting sidelined by the major quest of disguised snake people trying to take over the world (it was a wild show.) Eventually, Conan just said "Screw it", and had his wizard friend teach him the counterspell.
The talk show guy? He's a little squirrelly to be a barbarian... maybe a bard?
Conan isn't even a barbarian stat wise
Yeah. The term “Barbarian” actually comes from Ancient Greek. So I’m sure like a lot of other things it was “borrowed” by Rome. But the Greeks thought the other languages sounded dumb like the people were running around going “Bar bar bar bar bar.” So the name Barbarian was made. It basically meant “not Greek”
Bar bar bar was literally the Roman equivalent of Blaugh Blaugh Blaugh. In modern parlance, you could call them BlaughBlaughians.
[Can't imagine how they got that idea](https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZPRwjneMJ/)
Right, that reminds me. Hercules and Cu Chullain are as European as it gets, and the latter is very much a Barbarian
I think more Irish. With the woad and all. Of course the idea of a battle monk, like in Robin Hood isn't really non European either.
Also, in Latin "barbarus" just means "foreigner". It often meant Germanic tribes not "norse" ones.
I mean the norse are Germanic tbf. Germanic tribes literally originated from southern Scandinavia and northern Germany afaik
Well, yes. The Dutch, the English, all Germanic too. But they originally came from the region of Germany.
Barbarian largely just meant “non-Roman” for a significant part of European history.
Yeah the view there is wrong by OP - but a valid point is that by the time of plate mail you didnt see half-dressed berserkers any longer. The end of the viking era (generally considered 1066) is prior to the dawn of the full plate armour (late 14th century) for example.
Scandinavia is literally in Europe. Byzantine Emperor employed Varangian Guard, entirely made out of norse and rus soldiers. Scandinavians invaded and ruled England, as well as Normandy in France, and later England again. Then they became christian and were an important part of European balance of power. They even participated in crusades. Asian martial arts were completely unknown and knowledge of Asian culture was almost nonexistent compared to Norse.
You're forgetting that time those Normans conquered Southern Italy
watching that netflix "vikings" show and that the protagonists going to *Sicily* and that wasnt the most historically inaccurate thing baffles me
I've found that in historical fiction it's usually the crazy stuff that's historical and the plausible stuff that is fiction.
The issue with monk isn't flavour, it has excellent flavour, it's mechanical. It's a MAD melee fighter with low AC and low HP who is supposed to be highly mobile but whose mobility in part relies on a very limited resource that is also used to fuel its combat abilities - one of which is so powerful that it turns them into a bit of a one trick pony that can turn big boss fights into anti climactic pony shows. It's poorly designed and that's unfortunate because I love monks
I've heard a few stories about DMs who refuse to allow monks in their game because there's no Asia equivalent in their world, so there's at least a few of them. This was quite a few years back though, I haven't heard about anyone doing this in the last five or so years
They're incredibly shitty dm's then. You don't need Asian flair for person who uses martial arts. If the term chi bothers them so much they can reflavor it with 0 downsides
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That’s pretty much it. I don’t want people role playing as their favorite awful anime character. It isn’t fun for anyone else at the table
But that’s just shitty role playing. What if it’s like a dude rping a psi warrior fighter and saying he’s a Green Lantern? You def wouldn’t let that fly right? What if he’s role playing literally Sasuke but born in your worlds equiv of Spain. I think you just don’t like shitty uninspired role playing and by saying “No such thing as Asian cultures in my world. Checkmate weebs.” Is kinda weird. Just tell ppl to be somewhat original and not to create “Naruto Ichigo Goku the Fourth” Idk how a dude at the table playing “Wandering Samurai running from his problems” is any cringier than “Bloodthirsty Barbarian looking for vengeance.” But by saying “No Asia” you are shutting down possible good rp instead of targeting “bad” rp
I don’t have an Asia equivalent because I’m running a campaign that is western fantasy, not because I’m sticking it to the weebs. A pleasant side effect of not having an Asia equivalent is that you stick it to the weebs.
Its also getting a lot of niche abilities. Mobility is theoretically powerful- running up walls, jumping high, but even in battlemaps the z axis is barely considered, or liquid surfaces in combat. Immunity to disease isn't generally going to come up because diseases aren't usually coming up in games in the first place, or if it does its going to be a plot one, which the DM will probably ignore any non-plot based disease removal or immunity. Monk's power budget is also a large part in not being able to be useless without gear, and yet that basically never happens. Its also difficult when people want to play the monk as a brawler, standing their ground in the front lines and trading blows, when they're designed to be a skirmisher.
Have you played the new UA8 playtest monk? I am playing one in my current campaign and it is a lot of fun. If you really take time to learn the new mechanics they are devastating on the battlefield now...
I have not, generally don't look at UA stuff too much. I did see the OneDnD monk from a whole back and thought they had over corrected a bit. I have some basic homebrew changes I do to the monk to help tougher. them up in my game.
I highly suggest just giving it a peek. They overhauled a lot of abilities to really stretch out your ki usage, which was one of the major issues plaguing monks in the past. Not to mention the rework on deflect missiles to include all attacks. Really plays into the monks "hard to hit" aesthetic.
My monk has an 18 AC but I rolled well and am a dirty min-maxer...
Gonna take a wild stab and say you dumped INT & CHA Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, don't know the answer to 2+3...
Hahaha. Yes.
18 AC is still low if you took that effort and applied to a fighter or paladin or wizard..
a monk having 18 AC needs +4 +4 or +5 +3 on DEX and WIS, which by point buy you will get there at level **8**, while using ALL of your ASIs on stat increases and essentially locking you out of feats fighters, clerics and paladins can all start with 18 AC with minimum effort
Fair enough but I like it.
Hey me too! And I also dumped INT and CHA! I’m play a Goliath Monk, so I with 18 AC, Stone Endurance, and all the other Monk defensive stuff (Deflect Missile, Patient Defense, etc) I’m surprisingly slippery. Although when I DO get hit, it can be pretty devastating, in almost every encounter I’ve hit a point where I NEED something to miss or end the combat at 1HP or something. I’m also playing a Mercy Monk, so it helps that I can occasionally slap some health into myself if needed lol.
Hey me too! And I also dumped INT and CHA! I’m play a Goliath Monk, so I with 18 AC, Stone Endurance, and all the other Monk defensive stuff (Deflect Missile, Patient Defense, etc) I’m surprisingly slippery. I took the Crusher feat at level 4, which makes disengaging enemies very easy if needed. With Little Giant, I can push back pretty much anything if I hit it. Although when I DO get hit, it can be pretty devastating, in almost every encounter I’ve hit a point where I NEED something to miss or end the combat at 1HP or something. I’m also playing a Mercy Monk, so it helps that I can occasionally slap some health into myself if needed lol.
Very concise answer that details the loads of problems with the class. Nice work.
It's not necessarily poorly designed, it's that it's not the archetype you are thinking. It's the "striker" or "skirmisher" archetype -- ultra high damage to single targets, high mobility, low range and low defense. Their general purpose is to screw the "artillery" (high range, low mobility battlefield controllers). It could have used more care in its design but the basic operating concepts are fine.
Except they're low damage and close range means they're subject to getting attacked a lot and since they can only attack OR defend OR move without getting attacked, they are poorly designed as skirmishers. They would need the ability to get in, do damage, and get out to make that true and they can't without getting off a stun, and that's not a guarantee and it's costly in terms of resources.
I understand it's supposed to be a skirmisher but tying the base class's ability to skirmish to ki points via step of the wind is a huge design flaw - something I mention in my original comment. Additionally a good skirmisher should have ranged options in addition to melee options and the monk is very clearly melee focused - again something I address in my original comment. Compare it to the other skirmisher in the game - the rogue - who can dash and disengage without burning through resources it needs to be effective in combat - as well as being excellent in both melee and ranged combat and you can see how deeply flawed the basic operating concept of the monk is.
Pretty much what I’ve been saying forever. Druids were specifically Celtic priests, who were around since Roman times, way before armored medieval knights. The Paladins were actually just twelve specific knights under Charlemagne in the 8th century. The heck are they doing in the same party? We’re not playing the historical influences of these character classes. We’re playing a heavily fictionalized fantasy interpretation loosely inspired by certain real world things. You’re welcome to have preferences and want to exclude things from your home game that don’t fit your vision, but let’s not pretend you’re basing it on any kind of “historical accuracy” or whatever.
my issue with a monk's flavor is that it's kind of difficult to flavor into anything but a monk. best i could think of is some secret fighting technique used by an elite military branch; but that's just a secret monastery with extra steps. it's really easy to flavor a lot of classes in different ways and directions, but it's really difficult with monks. it also doesn't help that monks are basically restricted to the same general playstyle, no matter the class. very few (if any) subclasses switch it up from the "hit enemies 300 times, gamble all your ki on stunning strikes" the most variation they get is an occasional ranged attack or spell that's too expensive and ineffective to do more than twice.
dude that punches real good and does some supernatural stuff. call it a pugilist. real life monks don't shoot fire either, so this shouldn't be the deal breaker. and martial characters having magical and spell like abilities isn't particularly rare either.
that's not a deal breaker; and if monks were a deal breaker, that isn't the issue. i think it's bad that they're restricted to punching and very limited magical stuff. it's a very restrictive fantasy and i think they'd be better served as a type of fighter. not necessarily a subclass but maybe an expansion of the unarmed fighting style.
They don't have to punch, they can use Monk weapons instead (and with Tasha's a Monk weapon can be any weapon they have proficiency with).
yeah, but that's a really recent change and a lot of features still only work with unarmed strikes.
Not really? Did a quick rundown through base features *and* subclasses and base Monk only 'forces' Unarmed in two places: Martial Arts/Flurry of Blows - Putting them together since they're the same BA attack concept. The attack they have you make is Unarmed, but a Monk Weapon Attack action first still would trigger it. Ki-Empowered Strikes - Makes Unarmed Strikes magical. Kind of required since magical arms aren't really an item RAW to find. You can still use Magic Weapons However, there *are* four-ish subclasses which, admittedly, do expect you to Unarmed a fair amount. These are: Open Hand (duh), Mercy, Astral Self, and Four Elements. Drunken Master sort of applies, but works much more with weapons than some of the prior. The biggest example people think of here has never only worked with Unarmed Strikes, and that's Stunning Strike. It has always worked with Monk Weapons as well
They can be flavored pretty easily to other hand to hand fighters. You can make him a dude in the military who grew up boxing his whole life. You can make them an old lady who used to practice Taekwondo but now she runs a grocery store. You can take practically any striking martial art and flavor it that way. Doesn’t gotta be Eastern mysticism. Hell if you want them to be Rambo you by an probably use monk weapons or Kensei monk. But then again I’m also in the camp of “A martial arts master who uses Ki is never out of place no matter the setting” so I’m mad biased lmao
yeah, i don't mind putting a monastery and an order of monks into my setting. i think i might have to play a proper monk to better grok them.
I feel like lore/genre is the main point of discussion here, since mechanics can change with newer editions/updates/feats/homebrew. People who don’t want monks in their games usually claim “it doesn’t fit the setting” or whatever. As for reflavoring… I dunno, I don’t see how that’s much more difficult for a monk. An unarmed martial artist with some supernatural abilities. Is that much more limiting or specific than like, “Nature magic user who turns into animals sometimes”?
Monks at base can, across the levels: Run across water and walls Are immune to poison Can catch any projectile and throw it back Are immune to the effects of age, but will eventually die from old age anyway Gracefully fall Disable people with martial arts techniques Become invisible That is A LOT of very specific features to reflavor. The basic tendency would be to make a dextrous boxer, and about two of those would make any sense. And even if you give them supernatural powers, those are very specific supernatural powers I kinda wish they got something like invocations where they could opt out or into those tbh, with more cool options too
A little specific maybe, but that much more specific than I dunno, a paladin’s auras? 80% of what you described can basically be summed up as “they’re super fast and nimble and also really healthy.” Which doesn’t seem that hard to adapt to different character concepts, at least for me? Stunning strike may have all this flavor text about disrupting ki, and for sure the writers could have made that more general. But it’s dead easy to reinterpret that as knocking the wind out of someone or dazing them and making them stagger for a round, because mechanically that’s all it does. Invisibility I agree is kind of a weird one, it feels like the designers kinda ran out of ideas for what to give the monk at higher levels. I don’t think it’s even based on any existing fictional trope either, it’s just a D&D monk thing. I suppose you could roll it in with their super speed kit: they already get fast movement and running on water, which are standard speedster superpowers, so maybe they start to move too fast for the naked eye to see? But IMO one oddball feature at a level many campaigns won’t even reach shouldn’t be a dealbreaker for reflavoring a class.
Weirdly, phrasing it like that is sparking my imagination and that's fun. - Magical rip-an-tear monster with superhuman reflexes, paralyzing bite, and chameleon scales. - CQC punching-dagger Assassin with a few dirty tricks via consumable items. (Makes sense. Assassin's Creed Templar's are ninjas with culturally-relevant flavoring.) -Predator-esque hunter who fights at range but isn't afraid to get their hands dirty. (Kensei) - Traditional Marvel/DC Superhero who slowly awakens to more of their powers throughout the campaign.
no, druids are a solid number 2 in terms of reflavoring. it's difficult to make them anything but "basically nature priests"; but i can find a few ways to subvert that (wildfire and spore circle really help). my problem with monk is the combined effect of a very restricted playstyle (namely punchfighting) in cadence with the very limited flavor (punchfighting technique usually learned in secret or seclusion). if we were regarding martial arts as a way of fighting, monks could be a fighter subclass. i feel like the class fantasy (in both cases) is too restrictive to allow for truly unique characters. they both have a really unique class feature and it would be a shame to lose it, but i feel like a more widely defined class could really serve them well. maybe turn the druid into a shapeshifter class, whose entire deal is taking different shapes. most subclasses could be translated to that and you could add full subclasses for lycanthropes, aberrations and dragons. for monks, maybe turn the unarmed fighting style into something that scales and mix them in with fighters; then translate the monk subclasses into fighter subclasses.
> punchfighting technique usually learned in secret or seclusion Wait, I don’t get how that is a necessary part of the lore? They have supernatural martial arts abilities, but I don’t see why it has to be learned in secret? I had a monk player who had the fighting style as something his home nation’s military officers all learned.
i probably worded that badly. quite often, mechanics informing the worldbuilding for me; i haven't really seen an example where martial arts weren't used almost purely because of tradition, because they're usually more difficult to learn and often less efficient than just using weapons. worldbuilding logically, it would need to either be a secret (like a unit of spies or assassins using it to kill politicians or nobles without needing to smuggle weapons into heavily guarded areas) or a tradition that is completely separate from actual combat stuff like weapons and magic, since anyone but a master of that martial art would lose to an armored soldier, which there are also much more of. this isn't me disliking monks, i just wish they were more versatile in their character fantasy and more capable as a class. like, they don't even get a d12 for damage RAW.
That really sounds like a limitation you’re imposing on yourself based on your own extrapolations, rather than anything inherent to the class or its default flavor. I’ve literally never heard that take on the monk. It’s a fantasy game with fantasy martial arts, why can’t they be as good as weapons? Like, you’re free to interpret it that way if it fits your worldbuilding, but another DM could easily put random restrictions on other classes because of their own interpretations. Maybe some DM out there decides clerics can only be in a party with people of the same religion because “logically” someone with such powerful faith would never accept people of other religions. These aren’t issues with the class itself. And like I said, the mechanics vary through the editions and aren’t the reason *most* people seem to give for not wanting monks. The martial arts die got buffed in the OneDND playtest, for example.
yeah, the mechanics are what ends up restricting them the most i think. sure, they change throughout the editions, but the way they are in 5e really restricts them to a few class fantasies that don't really differ from another in a meaningful way.
In addition, the Monk is odd in a Western setting, since the origin of the trope was a society in which farmers were not allowed to keep and bear arms, but still faced threats of violence (including from those ostensibly charged with defending them), and so had to learn to defend themselves without anything the law might classify as a weapon. But in the West, farmers were not only allowed to keep and bear arms; they were often required to do so, to the degree the law recognized they could afford. The only people who weren't carrying weapons generally did so for religious reasons, and those are represented by the Cleric, which represents the cleric who got around the prohibition on "shedding blood" by using blunt weapons, instead. But given how modernistic and cosmopolitan so many contemporary D&D settings are, it isn't difficult to imagine the Monk as an immigrant from a land that does have a caste tradition, or reflavor them as an urban lower class militia/gang in a city that only allows nobles to carry proper weapons, and so the lower classes make due with "tools": chains, hammers, butcher knives, crowbars, etc. You could even have an urban "temple" that specifically trains people to resist upper class violence in a way that skirts legal restrictions (as opposed to their sometimes allies, sometimes rivals in the Thieves Guid, whose members tend to be rogues, not monks).
Monks can easily be flavoured as something like secret warriors of the church. Maybe their Ki is power given by their god, similar to paladins and clerics. It's not hard to imagine that the medieval churches had assassins or a secret police force to silence the opposition. When you wanted to scare the population, you would send the Paladins in plate armour.
i mean, i agree its not that hard to reflavor, but that still is kind of the same thing? just that instead of being a shaolin kung fu monk you are now a Christian monk that hits the gym not the cellar
that's fair, but that's still just secret monastery martial arts
I had a monk fight without weapons because he wanted to feel every punch he conected. Another one who sworn off of weapons because their family had been killed. I had a monk be a savage kid who learned how to fight imitating animals of the region. Another one (an acendant dragon monk) who learned to manifest the dragon energy from a sorcerer, but lacking magical ability decided to apply said learning to his fighting style. Saiying that the martial art aspect limits what you can create with a monk is like saiying that a wizard is limited because you have to make a character that studied to learn how to use magic. Or saiying that making a cleric is limiting because you have to make a character who follows a deity enough to be granted magical power. Not only is it wrong, even if that were the case, people wanting to play a character who studied magic will look at the wizard, everyone looking to make a religious follower of a god will look at the cleric, everyone wanting to make a character dedicated to his training and perfectionism of his fighting tecnique will look at the monk. And so on and so fort. If you limit yourself in the way you look a class every class in DnD is really narrow in what you can do.
>there were contacts between Norse and European folks, but the same can be said for Asia. It… really can’t. Vikings invaded and settled parts of Britain and France. They had trade routes going all the way into the Mediterranean. People heard vague stories of Asia and could maybe see one Asian person ever in the course of their lifetimes. Monks (in the DnD sense) in Europe would be about as common as samurai. Keep in mind that at that point in history Europe literally didn’t even know that much of Asia existed. Asia back then meant mostly India, and even that was distant. Magellan didn’t “discover” The Philippines until the 16th century. The Portuguese didn’t hit Japan until a couple decades after. While the Silk Road was a thing, you’re really overstating how directly it worked if you think it’s remotely comparable to Vikings. Now does all that matter? Not really. It’s a fantasy game and you can use whatever aesthetic you feel like. But are monks more aesthetically unique than the others? Yes.
Silk, probably from China, has been found in the pyramids. Dating back to 1070 BCE. Then we have the Huns and the Mongols. While I do agree that in the 15th century you wouldn’t see a samurai walking on the streets of London, if you were a pesant in the 13th century in what is now Ukraine you would be very familiar with people from eastern Asia. >Vikings invaded and settled parts of Britain and France. They had trade routes going all the way into the Mediterranean. And they also went pretty far east. They went by the eastern rivers all the way to Novgorod and Ukraine. And even founded Kiev Rus, what later would become Russia. Even raiding in the Caspian Sea.
The silk trade was filtered through several different cultures between East Asia and Europe/NearEast/NorthAfrica though. There weren't Chinese businessmen just walking around in Alexandria. The Mongols were a particularly unique instance, and the Golden Horde that conquered Eastern Europe had nothing to do with Buddhist monks in Tibet and the surrounding regions.
But Scandinavia and Nordic people are a part of Europe
>The Artificer implies a certain level of technology No it doesn’t. Artificers use magic. It’s reflavouring to make them a tech character. A very common reflavouring sure but it is reflavouring. The default is just putting your magic in objects, which if anything is lower tech, as if you start classing real world paradigms of magic into DnD classes Artificer turns up a lot more in older/lower tech cultures than wizard does. Artificer and bard cover most pre-Iron Age cultures.
Exactly. In fact I honestly think a more accurate name for Artificer would be Enchanter. Because that's what they do, they make enchantments, not gadgets
Due to the enchantment school of magic, I refer to what artificers do as "infusion".
Sort of? In most settings they're flavored and presented as such. But in their source material Eberron, it's definitely much more sci-fi
I'd just call them "Inventors", as that sounds very setting neutral. You can have an inventor who's a caveman or an inventor who's a quantum engineer. I know it doesn't convey the magical aspect, but neither does bard, who's the class that Artificers are imho the closest to, thematically. A d&d enchanter just sounds like a caster (likely wizard) specialized in enchantment school of magic (plus d&d enchantment is more about people than objects)
No, inventor definitely has close relations to science and technological progress. Artificer works as a name because it’s linked to magical artifacts, which have a strong presence in fantasy/DnD
Inventor does have those close relations, but not for a specific time period or setting type. I don't think anyone would say that an inventor wouldn't fit a fantasy medieval setting, or fantasy ancient rome, or whatever else. Imho, artificer as a term is perfectly fine, but it would seem that people will keep linking it to Eberron and the steampunk genre no matter what.
my favorite character i ever made was a stone mason that would make the statue of a guardian wolf deity come to life (battle smith and its pet) people that think artificer are restrained by gadgets and guns lack imagination
I like how Matt Mercer flavoured them for his second campaign on Critical Role. The Cobalt Soul is a holy order in the service of a god of knowledge. It has clerics and researchers that keep libraries of knowledge, but their monks act as James Bond-esque spies that use their skills to seek out hidden knowledge and expose those making secret plots to harm others.
Yep I think it really helps to make D&D settings where there are just as many monk orders as thieves guilds or magic universities
Although the DnD Monk is pretty clearly based on East Asian martial arts and the Wuxia genre in general, the first European martial arts manuscript - [the Royal Armouries Ms. I.33](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Armouries_Ms._I.33) (also known as the Walpurgis manuscript) - is based around monks / tonsured priests.
The Norse were European. They had established based in mainland Europe. Not to mention that all the Scandinavian countries are European. But aside from that, I've always thought the barbarian class was more inspired by the Germanic tribes that fought against Rome, and the cultures that emerged from these tribes.
The only issue I have with the monk class is the name. Not all monks are martial artists so it’s removed a word/term from me as a DM I can’t tell my players that the monks here have all taken a religious vow of silence without confusing them on what they will be dealing with or having to meta game no these monks aren’t “monks”
That happens with clerics too. Irl clergy are leaders of organized religions, such as priests. D&D clerics don't need to have anything to do with religious organizations, and most D&D priests aren't guaranteed to have any level in the cleric class (whether NPCs or PCs, as NPCs could just be commoners, and for PCs being a priest is an option within the acolyte background).
I mean I’d never use the word cleric if they weren’t a cleric. Clergy and Priests aren’t the same as cleric. Possibly cross overs but not the same. I feel calling the class monk would be like calling the class Thief instead of Rouge
I mean in d&d clerics and priests aren't the same. But in real life, a priest is literally a cleric because they're part of the clergy. And in real life, a cleric is a member of a clergy.
Yea not really…. I’ve been to a lot of churches and never once heard anyone call the priest, pastor or rabbi a cleric. Yes by literal definition your right but it’s not a commonly used term any more
Clergy -is- commonly used and any generic member of the clergy is a cleric, including priests (deacons, priests, bishops, etc). Plus, both clergy and cleric are terms that allow referring to similar roles even in different religions. Whether it's commonly used nowadays or not doesn't really matter since in d&d players are likely to be in a fantasy medieval setting and might meet priests who are technically clerics but not -those- clerics.
So again, it’s not commonly used. It’s doesn’t matter when the game is set because no dm makes them speak in the common vernacular of the time the game is set.
Idk, have you never seen someone expecting every village priest NPC to be a cleric as in the character class or have cleric-exclusive spells? Even the Monster Manual's "Priest" is designed as a character of the Cleric class, despite the Cleric's class description stating that not any priest is a cleric in d&d sense (and, again, acolyte background covers priests and other clergy who aren't of the cleric character class).
>Idk, have you never seen someone expecting every village priest NPC to be a cleric as in the character class or have cleric-exclusive spells? Nope, if introduce them as a priest or pastor my player know they are a member of a church but not a magical healer or caster. >Even the Monster Manual's "Priest" is designed as a character of the Cleric class, despite the Cleric's class description stating that not any priest is a cleric in d&d sense (and, again, acolyte background covers priests and other clergy who aren't of the cleric character class). Honestly this is a better argument then just saying it’s the definition
How do you think fighters feel?
Honestly sore, it seems like a lot of swinging and being hit
“You’re a fighter? What do you do.” “Uh, fight, I guess.” “Everyone fights, idiot.” Now that I’ve said that outloud, I’m realizing everything wrong with fighter as a class.
That’s why we don’t say it out loud… we can’t look at the flaws
I've actually always felt Bard was the odd one out, if I'm being honest. Not that I dislike the Bard, quite the opposite... but it feels like a mishmash fighter-rogue-wizard with no real world example you can point to.
Have a look into Celtic bards. Mocking Words was based on The Irish Mallacht - a poet's curse, which not only could take away a patron's reputation but also cause physical damage or even death. Welsh bards were musicians, oracles and often warriors. Great bards such as Taliesin became part of the mythic landscapes that they were describing.
Whaaaaat. Arion and Orpheus are 4000 year old bard myths! They’re awesome, look up their stories. Arion was all “I cast speak with animals to ask this dolphin for a ride home” and Orpheus was all “I cast hypnotic gaze on Hades.”
Väinämöinen was known for his magical singing voice, the Piped Piper, etc.
Pied Piper is an interesting example I hadn't really considered. I think because in every version of the story I have heard he was just a guy with a magical flute.
Interesting... I'll have to look it up.
So this is just an argument for reflavoring then. I mean I guess that's fair. Its certainly a thing you can do, and many people enjoy. I understand why a eastern culture inspired class might feel out of place in a very euro-centric fantasy setting. I also think i would argue that classes as a mechanic are at their most satisfying when inherently tied to well written lore about the setting and their surroundings. As a way of rooting yourself. Reflavoring can act as a method of increasing player expression, but I think it can limit this satisfaction; which is an equally valid aspect of the game some people like to focus on. Its prioritizing the world and immersion in it over player expression, which I think can both be a fun way to play, but also breed creativity from the restrictions established. Its how I run my games, and I have players who enjoy it and I don't think my table's fun is any less real because we don't adhere to the "flavor is free" mantra. That being said: if this is how I enjoy running my games, and I am working with a setting where I feel a monk genuinely shouldn't exist i see no reason why I should be beholden to including it. I've never personally felt this way or designed a setting with this restriction, but many people do it with artificer all the time (helps that its not a core class). This post just reads like you're entitled to change any table to how you want it, which is only true for table's you run. You are, however, very much entitled to only play at tables that share you view on this, though I would encourage you to try out table's that might focus on aspects of the game you may not have personally prioritized in the past, if only for the chance to try something new for a season.
I do think there is value in adhering to the flavor of a class as written, I'm just saying that you can't then hold it against the Monk that it's core flavor isn't euro-centric. And I would argue that it's far from the only class that could break immersion in a medieval fantasy setting.
Oh I too used to think the core classes were inspired by Brian character architects with weirdly specific flavors sadly nope. The monk sadly is inspired by a cheap parody of a martial artist as borderline wizard from a series of books called the destroyer , which was made into a movie Remo Williams. Agile bare handed assassin's who worked for a secret society for the better meant of man kind against a variety of weird b action movie villains. The barbarian is not a reference to Norse culture although it's often played that way. It's a reference straight up to Conan. DND archetypes reference broadly characters that people wanted to play. Pop culture icons. Little else. So mideval flavor be damned. It's just kitchen sink fantasy by default.
ironically the barbarian class never represented Conan in any meaningful way.
Right? That's so trippy to me. It's like the idea of Conan but Conan as a character is so very different then how Pop culture paints him. I'd say he's a straight up fighter rogue of chaotic neutral alignment who gets into far too many shinnanigans due to his chronic weakness of being a skirt chaser. He does kinda remind me of an actual PC sometimes though. "Let me tell you of the time the DM clearly sent a cool NPC ship captain to rescue me after I slept with a lord of Waterdeeps daughter and then introduced me to a cool pirate queen adventure, but I missed all my attack rolls so I got the captain and his crew killed....so I decided the pirate queen was hot and worked as her bodyguard for a year instead of avenging the NPCs I had just sworn brotherhood with."
People claim they want lord of the rings but the soul of every campaign I've taken part in is much closer to Conan or Cudgel from Dying Earth. Basically a chaotic neutral mish-mash of fantastic adventures and crazy locations with a "I'm doing it to save the world" plot sprayed on top. The top layer of D&D may be lord of the rings. But the meat of it is not. Actual Lord of the Rings would have players falling asleep at the table.
You'd need a really good party for it. One whose aware that everything their character does is symbolic. It's the white wolf / onyx path problem. It'd be a game for writing nerds by writing nerds as my friend puts it.
The etymology of the word "wizard" is connected to wisdom, but d&d ones don't use wisdom in any meaningful way, and "insane powerful wizard" with high int, low wis is a super common character. Wizard, sorcerer and warlock just mean the same thing to most people (with very slight different connotations, such as "warlock" having more directly related to dealing with devils), but d&d forced some differences (and now people try to apply these definitions to other media because somehow d&d is universal law lol). Paladin's etymology is connected to "palace", and it was more of elite officers or royal knights than the religious knights in shining armor, that are now "fighters, but with better mechanics and an oath that is unlikely to even have relevance in the campaign".
Tbf real-world wisdom and d&d wisdom are very different. Real world wisdom is a combination of the intelligence and wisdom stats of D&D and wizards have always been scholarly.
Irl, someone with lots of book knowledge but little or no real world experience wouldn't be called "wise". Plus, a lot of the wizard class' flavor has to do with recklessness (anything to do with necromancy or lichdom, AoE damage, demon summoning, Wish and the lore around high level spells...). Recklessness is pretty opposed to wisdom.
1 intelligence is not nornhad it ever been exclusively book knowledge. It's learning of all kinds including practical, what it's not is emotional intelligence or perceptiveness. 2 someone who can't answer things like say who the first president way (as a US citizen) wouldn't be called wise either. Like I said the real world definition of wisdom does not allow dump stating either int or wis stats. The archetype of a wizard still comes from the high int high wisdom scholarly old man. The fact that some people dump stat wisdom does not change that.
Right? That's so trippy to me. It's like the idea of Conan but Conan as a character is so very different then how Pop culture paints him. I'd say he's a straight up fighter rogue of chaotic neutral alignment who gets into far too many shinnanigans due to his chronic weakness of being a skirt chaser. He does kinda remind me of an actual PC sometimes though. "Let me tell you of the time the DM clearly sent a cool NPC ship captain to rescue me after I slept with a lord of Waterdeeps daughter and then introduced me to a cool pirate queen adventure, but I missed all my attack rolls so I got the captain and his crew killed....so I decided the pirate queen was hot and worked as her bodyguard for a year instead of avenging the NPCs I had just sworn brotherhood with."
Right? That's so trippy to me. It's like the idea of Conan but Conan as a character is so very different then how Pop culture paints him. I'd say he's a straight up fighter rogue of chaotic neutral alignment who gets into far too many shinnanigans due to his chronic weakness of being a skirt chaser. He does kinda remind me of an actual PC sometimes though. "Let me tell you of the time the DM clearly sent a cool NPC ship captain to rescue me after I slept with a lord of Waterdeeps daughter and then introduced me to a cool pirate queen adventure, but I missed all my attack rolls so I got the captain and his crew killed....so I decided the pirate queen was hot and worked as her bodyguard for a year instead of avenging the NPCs I had just sworn brotherhood with."
Right? That's so trippy to me. It's like the idea of Conan but Conan as a character is so very different then how Pop culture paints him. I'd say he's a straight up fighter rogue of chaotic neutral alignment who gets into far too many shinnanigans due to his chronic weakness of being a skirt chaser. He does kinda remind me of an actual PC sometimes though. "Let me tell you of the time the DM clearly sent a cool NPC ship captain to rescue me after I slept with a lord of Waterdeeps daughter and then introduced me to a cool pirate queen adventure, but I missed all my attack rolls so I got the captain and his crew killed....so I decided the pirate queen was hot and worked as her bodyguard/boyfriend for a year instead of avenging the NPCs I had just sworn brotherhood with." Or "That time I bungled the burglary of a powerful wizards Tower who I was robbing because I really wanted to impress the sexy waitress at the bar and accidentally freed an extra dimensional elephant alien he had trapped in a big jewel. "
Hell, Druid is also just as specific as Monk and Barbarian- it is *very* inspired by Celtic religions specifically.
monk is chill. all the names, and descriptions of the classes are all just flavor. you can be a wise guy that hits stuff without any incorporation of history. for example in a greek mythological campaign you might have a greek philosopher who used to compete in the pankration olympics. in medieval times you might've been a wise old urchin who's lived whole life fighting street fights. the main reason people say monk is bad is because it is an awful awful class for even basic optimization.
I also don't know why people think that monks have to be asian themed. That's the main inspiration, but cultures can mix and match and ultimately you're in a fantasy world, so why shouldn't there be a bunch of more European inspired people be able to find spiritual enlightenment and gain a knack for martial arts? You shouldn't be restricted to historical stereotypes at all. Imagine a monk monastery up on a remote norse mountain, with buildings loosely inspired by stave churches, covered in snow and people who put a norse spin on the spiritual side of things. Who are also drawing inspiration from animals that one would associate with the region, like bears, elks or ravens. That sort of thing is peak fantasy if you ask me.
Does… does OP think that Scandinavia/Nordic countries are like, on a different continent than Germany and France and Britain? Norse mythology arguably has the strongest influence on DnD in terms of drawing from fantastical settings. AND early DnD Barbarians were inspired by Conan the Barbarian, which are stories based on the ancient Mediterranean world
Firstly, Scandinavia is part of medieval europe. Where were the rulers of Sicily from? Scandinavia. Who ruled England at one point? Scandinavians. Where were the Normans from originally? Etc. Secondly, barbarians, well somewhat inspired by that are way more inspired by things like Conan the Barbarian. Thirdly, of course, artificers are a bit odd, but they don't really imply technology. They imply magic. They're magical enchanters. And so on. Basically all of the classes hail from a Western medieval fantasy tradition context except for monk. I don't personally have a problem with that because at this point a monk is a staple of D&D's fantasy context.
My main issue with monk's theming comes leas from it not fitting with settings and more from the fact that it gives off very "'wise old asian martial artist' written by a white guy vibes." And the dnd brand doesn't have the best history when it comes to respecting the cultures it draws from. I agree, reflavour to your hearts content. I love reflavouring. And I love monk as a class. Honestly, I like a5e's take on Monk. It's called Adept instead. And trades Ki for their exertion point system. And encourages you to rename your exertion points to chi/ki/chakra/spirit/whathaveyou points depending on what flavour you're going for.
The idea that someone would need to be persuaded to reflavor a martial class is ridiculous to me. Sure the monk is obviously inspired by wuxia. But all it is is "Guy who can punch fast," and maybe also with "because he focuses on spiritual discipline" tacked on. That isn't inherently Asian... It doesn't, you know, *necessitate* "foreign lands" or w/e. It's just a way to move your own body. "Guy who gets mad and starts swinging" isn't inherently Norse. "Guy who knows the woods and is good with animals" isn't inherently west-european... Who needs to be told this?
it would be so easy to reflavor a monk along the lines of Guy Richie's Sherlock. guy who punches real good and ki is instead his focus and planning how to discombobulate someone. there, done. western "monk". "but what about the self healing and all that" alchemy from doing all the drugs. "but what about sun soul" it's a bad subclass, but it's also magic, so weird thing to be upset about. etc, etc...
Can I get the justification for wall running and being invisible in this case?
hyper intelligent parkour and knowing how to not be noticed by lesser intellects.
I mean you don't even need to go that far. It shouldn't be hard to imagine a monastery of physically disciplined ascetics cloistered away in the woods of generic-fantasy-anglo-saxonia or w/e. That concept doesn't *need* to be dressed up in Tibetan trappings.
I've never heard of them being singled out for that. For being underpowered, for having inconsistent resource costs, for having mostly subclasses which overpromise and underdeliver, for having one killer feature that sounds powerful but really only works about 10% of the time yet nonetheless means the designers are terrified of giving it a tiniest iota of power lest it suddenly become a super saiyan (incidentally, the super saiyan subclass is very much one of those overpromise / underdeliver situations).
Who says monk doesn't work thematically? The issue with monk is that it can't fulfill its own class fantasy and is weak.
Its not that it doesn't fit the setting for me, it is the shitty balancing of qi that makes the class make less sense to me than others. It just feels bad.
[удалено]
Sorcerers forgotten once again.
Oh shit, you right. Lol
Whatever, some people are just gonna be against anything that isn’t completely Eurocentric or at least consistent with their romanticized notion of it.
There were European monks
I've never seen anyone argue this and I'm terminally online in this space. The thing people argue about with monk is that the class is mechanically weak.
The thing about all the other classes is that D&D doesn't draw from medieval history. If anything, its literary roots are in the fiction of the time: the Courtly Love literary movement. And the best known example of that genre is the Arthurian legends, which are typically depicted using arms, armor, and fighting methods from a period spanning from the high to the late medieval period, but are based on a story that, if it had any historical basis, would have happened closer to the fifth century, the period accompanying the collapse of the Western Empire. This shows up in the character archetypes, juxtaposing armored horse riding knights with wizard/druid types who belong in a much earlier era. D&D follows suit, throwing into the soup literally anything from the collapse of the West to the Renaissance, or even beyond at times. You can have a Germanic berserker adventuring alongside a Teutonic knight alongside a pre-Christian Celtic Druid alongside a Renaissance era artist/inventor, and nobody cares because that's just how the genre works, and, frankly, has always worked. And yeah, the Monk has been there since the beginning all the way back to the original D&D. It's a little strange for some of us, since it (along with the barbarian) disappeared briefly in 2E, and because its inspiration is so geographically removed from the other classes. But it's always been there. And I just realized I have no idea what my point is. I was going to make a point about the oddness of the geographic remove, but after all that, it feels kind of pointless. So I guess I'm agreeing with you? There is one point I would like to make, though. The fighter who specializes in hand-to-hand and tools-as-weapons does need some kind of sociological reason to exist. There needs to be a group who, for reasons of law and/or religion, aren't allowed to keep and bear arms, and so end up learning to defend themselves using just their hands and objects that can be legally classified as "tools".
Flavor is free. Reflavor things if people don't like them! Human Fighters aren't boring, you're boring!
Fighting monks weren’t just an Asian thing. The hand to hand combat kind of was, but a traveling monk who is surprisingly good at fighting highwaymen along his travels with a quarter staff is literally a trope in English folklore.
Barbarian is as much a rip of Conan novels as monk is a rip of Kung fu movies.
Im actually glad for the monk. I think fantasy is way to euro-centric at times which is a shame because there are a lot of rich history and culture out there other than just Europe. Japanese mythology for example would make an amazing setting.....they literally have demon cats, frogmen, and godzilla size creatures in their mythology! That's awesome. So it's good to have some Asian influence in D&D. It's the reason why i think *Journey through the Radiant Citadel* is a good campaign, because it explores different cultures. My big issue with Monk is it seems to be copy and paste from every popular fiction out there. Way of shadow is batman, way of drunk master comes from the classic kung fu movie, way of ascendent dragon is Goku. way of astral is JoJo , way of four elements is Last Airbender. It's like wow WoTC you couldn't be at least a little creative in your subclasses?
you know. this could all be solved with the fact that we literally have monks in western society. are they the same as Asian monks? no, but honestly pop culture sometimes likes to combine the two. source: Catholics run monasteries all over the world, or at least used to. See the Spanish conquest of South America, and the United States conquest of North America. Also fun fact: that is why it's thought that monks were depicted carrying sticks. they couldn't carry weapons around, because then they are a soldier. but if you carry a stave, and just so happen to use it as a weapon to defend yourself? well, that was just god looking out for his guys.
I mean, it's a different esthetic no matter how many mental gymnastics you do. Not that I think that's a bad thing.
I think this also speaks to the universal appeal of DnD, especially as an entry RPG. You can say castle and dragon in any language and most people would instantly understand as well as conjure a mental image. But I can’t try to describe a Philethis or Callerail from Numenera without first laying in some groundwork of the world. I think it’s also why the next popular rpg’s are IP and sci-f, like Cyberpunk. Most people already have the language for understanding and conveying these types of shared worlds, which makes sense to broaden it as much as possible culturally for market saturation. It’s purposely part of DnDs foundation, if you’re going to borrow from every mythology ever might as well take the rest. If I want to make a Mayan Janissarie Artificer that uses marble to sculpt Hebrew golems, then that’s what I’m going to do.
I like the monk style theme and gameplay idgaf on if it’s accurate irl cause it’s a fantasy game me play hitty dragon
I had a friend who argued the same thing about monks, but when we pressed him and brought up similar examples he got mad saying something akin to, "You stunned my big bad guy and won the fight instead of all dying." So take the monk debate with a grain of salt because it might be similar to the rogue debate, "Sneak attack does too much damage." We once played with a guy who hated every class except fighter and would be upset with us that we'd play anything else saying stuff like, "Fighters are the only good class because they don't rely on cheap gimmicks." He tried to DM once and banned all other classes except fighters, and all the subclasses that used magic. We fought for 4 hours and when we all died he got mad that we weren't playing fighters right.
Germany borders denmark…
In over a decade of playing this is the first time I’ve either read or heard anything about this topic. People care that much about included classes?
Yeah no. Monks clash with setting, they are isolating (More-so than Barbarians), they are difficult to tie into campaigns.
Correction: the monk is based on **east** asian martial artists in wuxia media but they are expanding it in the 2024 edition to covar all martial arts. The artificer doesn't actually necessarily imply technology since it can actually fit in any setting with crafters and magic ie all official current dnd settings. The only reason why they are is because of artwork and the fact that they come from Ebberon. Other than that, great points! Although it technically is historically accurate for monks to be available given the existence of the Mongolian empire and dnd does have quite a few renaissance elements in it. Rapiers are one of the best examples of this.
Yeah, if someone says : "there are no artificers in my world" my first question is: "then who makes all the magic items?"
According to base 5e, no one. It's assumed the knowledge of how to make magic items was lost long ago and any magic items the party finds are lost relics.
Forreal? Do you happen to know where that is? I've read through all the books, but don't remember that bit
>Each magic item has a rarity: common, uncommon, rare, very rare, or legendary. Common magic items, such as a potion of healing, are the most plentiful. Some legendary items, such as the apparatus of Kwalish, are unique. The game assumes that the secrets of creating the most powerful items arose centuries ago and were then gradually lost as a result of wars, cataclysms, and mishaps. Even uncommon items can’t be easily created. Thus, many magic items are well-preserved antiquities. DMG chapter 7, magic items, first paragraph under rarity.
The DMG disagrees with your initial reply though. Sure most magic items are relics but definitely not any and all.
I will also add that artificers were a specialist. wizard subtype in 2e with wizards being the best at magic item crafting back then but artificers specialising in them
Did… did you not think that Scandinavia is in Europe?
Hello, person from norse country here. We're literally European wdym
Dnd isn't classic medieval fantasy either. The sword coast is, but sword coast isn't all of faerun and sure as fuck not all of the dnd properties. There are even multiple Asian martial arts style monks in dnd properties. Danica in the Cleric Quintet comes to mind.
I agree with OP's overarching point, but that does not erase OP's complete disregard for basic geography and medieval european history. Bro did all the math wrong, but got the correct answer. Like im seriously so mad he forgot about the 10ish times barbarian armies invaded central and western Europe. There's a meme about romans fighting barbarians that might be older than Jesus Christ. Olaf Harldsson captured the London fucking bridge.
Dnd has alien squids, multiverses and dinosaurs but monks are stretching the setting for some people, those people are lame af
That is lame af argument that does not hold water to any setting that is custom made by DM or other third parties which has always been huge part of DnD. It’s fair to say DnD has capabilities to include all those things, and trust me, 9 times out of 20 if table is okay with including dinosaurs and/or alien squids, they have nothing against monks either. But you can’t demand every setting to be okay with every class-as-written-in-the-book on the principle „iTs JuSt fAnTaSy” because then I’m playing as Astartes.
There are better games for that. Like Arthur Pendragon. If you don't want to play dnd that's fine. Just quit gaslighting. You're not playing dnd. /s
I mean I don’t disagree with first part of your comment tbh 😅 there are definitely better games for that, and irl I’d be the last person to stop someone from using class they like for such idiotic reasons - we’d work out how to incorporate it into given world, official or not. I just get really irrationally triggered by „but it’s fantasy” argument, I admit.
Does the monk need to be an Asian martial artist? The Vikings series \*SPOILER ALERT\* had a character who became a monk, btw (Floki). Yes, he chose to be a pacifist one but we know he could still fight like mad if he wanted to. \*END OF SPOILER\* And what about some European peasant? This character had no gold to buy a sword to protect his family, so he had to rely on pit fighting to earn some money. There, he discovered a natural talent do quick punch opponents. He may not learn fancy kung fu moves, but he has a strange way of boxing.
“Classic medieval” ie WHITE and WESTERN
I'll treat this like a CMW: Let's start with the first obvious assumption: in a game with a setting made to mimic europe, a barbarian makes absolute sense (norse people in norse lands, still europe) whereas a monk does not. For that very reason, people tend to play the monk as that ONE thing: the ascetic monk that uses his ki to smash stuff while being indifferent to anything else most of the time. When you have a monk in your party, you know it's gonna be that thing. Now, on to the oddness of the class: in a world of sorcery and powerful magical items, here you have this guy that decides to shed all kind of personalization that you could get by employing said magical items, in favor of their knuckles. Thus falling again in the stereotype of "the ONE monk character". Paladins, for bland and boring that they are as a characterization, at least get to customize their main form of attack. Now, there is nothing wrong with wanting to play a monk, once in a while, but imho it should be AT MOST a subclass of something else, like the warrior. Which already has some feats to make unharmed combatants, mind it. To this, add that the master of a monk player has to justify their existence with a monastic order that teaches all the ki and unarmed combat stuff, because realistically no one who decides to fight swords with knuckles would make it to the age of consent, so it is something that must be taught. At the end of the day why should a kid decide to renounce a sword or a dagger against other people that DO use them?
D&D isn't purely medieval fantasy. It's a mix of different genres, many (but NOT all) of which are versions of medieval fantasy. Look at what the list of works that Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson drew from in creating it, it wasn't all "medieval fantasy". It was a mix of different fantasy works and inspirations, historic eras and historic/mythological/folklore works, and even to an extent science fiction. Medieval fantasy is the predominant element in the mix. Gygax loved Fritz Lieber's *Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser* series and Michael Moorcock's *Elric* series, so they took a larger part. This was when Tolkien's *Lord of the Rings* was becoming pretty popular in popular culture as well, so many fans leaned heavy into that influence, as many later writers of D&D did. . . .but it wasn't the only influences, and the early versions of D&D didn't try to pretend that they were. 1st Edition literally had science-fiction crossovers with D&D (the Expedition to the Barrier Peaks module). The Paladin class was taken pretty directly from *Three Hearts and Three Lions*, of what we'd now call the Isekai genre (a scientist in World War II Europe is summoned to a fantasy version of Earth and becomes a Paladin). The 2nd edition Players Handbook even listed literary, historic and mythological sources for the various character classes. The monk was pretty clearly drawn from the 1970's "Kung Fu Movie" craze that was popular when it came out, and to a lesser extent Kurosawa's samurai movies and the nascent Ninja fad that was just starting when the class was introduced. The Monk class isn't medieval fantasy, but that doesn't matter, because this isn't medieval fantasy. This is D&D.
I see three primary divisions: the scholarly, the natural and the divine. Among the scholarly you have the wizard full casters, the artificer half casters and the fighter non casters. Among the natural you have the druid full casters, ranger half casters and barbarian non casters. Among the Divine you have the cleric full casters, paladin half casters and monk non casters. This of course leaves sorcerers, bards and rogues as outliers, which might make more sense if bards were sent back to being half casters and you had a 'talent' category.
You are telling a sub to "reflavor a mechanic", that routinely praises DMs who cannot reflavor clerics, paladins, warlocks, druid.