Loving the mod, really nice to see this subclass getting the buffs it deserves! One question though, i'm going to start a listonomicon playthrough and i want to add this mod, for it what version should be nice. balanced or strong? Listo has difficulty mods, combat extender and such other tweaks, making the game difficult in general.
Having tested both versions on my playthroughs with difficulty-increasing mods added, I would say either version is viable. However, if it adds mods that significantly increases the health or amount of enemies then I would definitely recommend the Strong version because of its damage matching the health/number of enemies.
Considering what others have said, and I do agree that it feels a tad bit too strong and wouldn't mind more balanced version, I would propose a different approach once you start tinkering with balance: There are people who like to play and feel strong. Leave this version for those people. Make a copy of the mod, and tinker with the copy. Upload a different, nerfed version beside this one. That way, people will have an option to choose one or the other. That is, ofcourse, if you have time to do so. My modding knowledge is abysmal, so I cannot really help in any other way, but I feel that if done this way, both parties will be satisfied, because they have an option to choose which variation they want to run.
Hmm, that could work. I personally play with some difficulty-increasing mods that may skew my perspective on how powerful this monk actually is compared to vanilla gameplay. So having one version to work with difficulty-increasing mods and one version for the base game does seem like a good route. Thank you for the idea!
I agree with this, this may be a best of both worlds approach. I really like your expansion of its functionality and the construction of the combat method. But I really don't like the repeated increase in damage feature. This does not match the combat rhythm of other classes I have currently obtained. I also have ideas for optimization, it depends on when I can spare some time to study lol
Wondering if anyone can speak to the overall balance of the mod? I remember trying a bunch of Four Elements "fixes" and "rebalance" mods a while back and they all were a little too powerful.
I think it's a bit strong for normal Honor difficulty (I use Combat Extender and Ajax configuration). Stronmaus's Guidence with Elemental Expertise: Air, at level 3, you can instantly get a terrifying burst against multiple targets, and even trigger a critical hit. It can instantly destroy a large amount of health of most targets, and has a chance to restore Ki points compared to other spellcasters, and fully restores all Ki points on a short rest.
I haven't experienced higher levels yet. If this strength is used as a benchmark, you should configure it to about 1.5 times the difficulty of my strength to have a normal combat experience. If this strength is not what the author wants, then I think it should at least be weakened in terms of multi-target burst ability.
Wow, I didn't realize Stronmaus' Guidance was that strong until you pointed it out. I compared the raw average damage of Stronmaus' Guidance to Fangs of the Fire/Chill of the Mountain and it does significantly more damage than either spell combined if all lightning bolts hit.
I think the strength of Stronmaus' Guidance doesn't lie in its damage, but rather in the fact that it's an AOE skill. If it were to be nerfed, I believe they could reduce the damage dealt to secondary targets and increase the ki point cost required to cast it.
I haven't delved deeply into the Four-Element Monk yet, but judging from the numbers, its overall damage seems a bit high. For now, I suggest balancing it by lowering the damage and adding more crowd-control and debuff effects. Monks, after all, should differ from spellcasting classes.
For the Elemental Monk, provide Ki - replenishing means, encourage using Monk spells, and keep single - attack damage low...
Dear author, Greetings! First and foremost, I would like to express my gratitude for your creativity and the exceptional work you've done in revamping the elemental monk. It's truly impressive. You've been very receptive to the feedback and suggestions from localization workers regarding the mod. As a D&D player, I believe the most significant issue lies in the excessive damage output and some nuanced mechanics. The elemental monk, as it stands now, seems to embody the strengths of multiple classes without any real weaknesses.
Due to my affection for this mod and my personal penchant for Oriental monk culture, I've shared some preliminary thoughts on it in my post, link below: Naturally, this is just my personal perspective and by no means a definitive solution. However, based on my experience, if the base damage of monk spells could be halved first, and then the extra damage mechanics adjusted, that might help. If, in your design, the damage boosts are intended to come from special features, then the base spell damage should be significantly reduced. Alternatively, if you want to keep the base damage in the features, you could remove some extra damage mechanics and excessive advantage bonuses.
I'm curious if you'll make adjustments in this direction, or allow other modders to create patches. I personally don't have time to make patches right now. I'm just asking if you could grant such permission. Anyway, this is a fantastic work. Time and fine - tuning are all that's left. Thank you!
Thank you guys for the feedback! I am currently in a crunch period trying to get all my assignments done for university, but I will focus on reducing/reworking the power of the spells and features in the following week.
Also as far as permissions, I have now allowed other modders to alter the mod since I don't have the most keen eye for balancing.
Don't listen to them! I'm having a lot of fun playing right now. Thank you for bringing us such a great mod! The idea of balance is pretty subjective, after all everyone plays with different mods, which makes the difficulty different for every player.
Thank you for the encouragement! However, I do need critical feedback in order to create a monk that is still fun to play and also stays in line with the balance of the other classes/subclasses. So, you guys sharing your opinions like this helpful for me.
Also, if someone makes a patch of my mod that seems to balance things near perfectly then I would consider that a win and might even use their idea in the main mod.
Sorry, it's me again. I found that the spell "Chill Ray" (forgive me for not knowing what its monk version is called) has no special effects, only sound effects. Although this is not a big problem, I think this can be avoided? Sorry, it's me again. I found that the spell "Cold Ray" (forgive me for not knowing what its monk version is called) has no special effects, only sound effects. Although this is not a big problem, I think this can be avoided?
I assume you are talking about the spell Chill of the Mountain? If so, the spell should still have the proper visual effects even without the VFX Library and VFX Vault mentioned in the dependencies.
Just tested this out with only the mod present and the spell is visually working just fine. Do you have another mod that changes visual effects? If not, then I'd recommend redownloading this mod and see if that helps with the issue.
There is a small flaw here. When I upgrade to level 7, I unlock the ability to increase my spell damage through "Ki", but I will have an extra fifth-ring spell slot. I don't know why, can this be avoided?
Sorry about this since it is a bit tacky, but yep, the fifth level spell slot is supposed to be there and can't be avoided for now. Until I figure out how to make the Toolkit upcast spells using only ki points, the level 5 spell slot will have to stay since spell slots are mandatory for upcasting currently.
There used to be an avatar state mode that added a feat that allowed you to use the four elements and gain the avatar state. It was made by thestarpest. Can you make an optional version similar to that with this mod - I prefered being an astral monk with this feat attached.
The feat let you get the four elemental abilities and when you used them once you could attune to an avatar of the same element you just used. I think it was something like that - it's been over a year since I last played.
I apologize, but that is outside the scope of my mod. Firstly, the way the Avatar State works in thestarpest's mod seems very different from the way it works in my mod, so it would be difficult to alter mine to work similarly to theirs.
Second, this mod is only meant to alter and improve the Four Elements subclass. Relegating the features of an entire subclass into a feat, defeats the purpose of having the subclass and its exclusivity.
If you haven't already, I would recommend asking thestarpest to see if they can repost/update their mod and hopefully they will respond with good news. I apologize again and wish you the best of luck.
I think I've found a little bug however. It seems like Water Whips dc is not increased by spell save dc increasing items like the other monk spells are. I don't think it's intentional because I haven't found other save dc based elemental monk stuff where this is the case so far. Only level 6 now so haven't tested everything. :)
Thank you for bringing this to my attention. Strangely enough, the devs used a maneuver saving throw (ones normally used by the Battle Master Fighter subclass) for Water Whip instead of a spell saving throw. Nevertheless, Water Whip works properly now and accounts for equipment that adds to the spell save DC.
Yep, it is perfectly ok to install mid-game. Make sure to respec the monk at Withers in order to receive all the new features from previous levels.
I assume you are talking about the mod by Mharius, and if so, yes it should be compatible with this mod. I would recommend putting their mod above my mod since their's overwrites the base monk class while mine mainly alters a subclass.
I am LOVING this mod! Just what I've always wanted out of the 4 elements monk!
One thing I'm running into though, and I may be doing this wrong; but I can't upcast Earth Tremor. All the upcast slots are greyed out and it gives an error that "Target's level is too high".
I'm glad to hear that you are enjoying the mod. Also, yep, the upcasts for Earth Tremor and Rush of the Gale Spirits are unavailable until levels 10, 13, and 17, and are only meant to upcast up to 3 levels. Earth Tremor and Rush of the Gale Spirits don't cost any ki points so I thought it would be too strong to have them gain upcasts alongside other spells.
Thank you for bringing this to my attention. I realized the description, nor the changelogs covered this, and I have changed the description accordingly to show this exception.
60 comments
One question though, i'm going to start a listonomicon playthrough and i want to add this mod, for it what version should be nice. balanced or strong? Listo has difficulty mods, combat extender and such other tweaks, making the game difficult in general.
There are people who like to play and feel strong.
Leave this version for those people.
Make a copy of the mod, and tinker with the copy.
Upload a different, nerfed version beside this one.
That way, people will have an option to choose one or the other.
That is, ofcourse, if you have time to do so.
My modding knowledge is abysmal, so I cannot really help in any other way, but I feel that if done this way, both parties will be satisfied, because they have an option to choose which variation they want to run.
I really like your expansion of its functionality and the construction of the combat method. But I really don't like the repeated increase in damage feature. This does not match the combat rhythm of other classes I have currently obtained.
I also have ideas for optimization, it depends on when I can spare some time to study lol
It can instantly destroy a large amount of health of most targets, and has a chance to restore Ki points compared to other spellcasters, and fully restores all Ki points on a short rest.
I haven't experienced higher levels yet. If this strength is used as a benchmark, you should configure it to about 1.5 times the difficulty of my strength to have a normal combat experience.
If this strength is not what the author wants, then I think it should at least be weakened in terms of multi-target burst ability.
Stronmaus Guidance - (1d4 + 1d4 + Wisdom Modifier + 1d4) * 4 | (2.5 + 2.5 + 3 + 2.5) * 4 = 42 raw average damage
Fangs of the Fire Snake - 1d6 + 1d6 + Wisdom Modifier + 1d4 | 3.5 + 3.5 + 3 + 2.5 = 12.5 raw average damage
Chill of the Mountain - 1d6 + 1d6 + Wisdom Modifier + 1d4 | 3.5 + 3.5 + 3 + 2.5 = 12.5 raw average damage
I will reduce the damage of Stronmaus' Guidance in the next update and see if that reigns it in. Thank you for pointing this out.
For the Elemental Monk, provide Ki - replenishing means, encourage using Monk spells, and keep single - attack damage low...
Greetings!
First and foremost, I would like to express my gratitude for your creativity and the exceptional work you've done in revamping the elemental monk. It's truly impressive.
You've been very receptive to the feedback and suggestions from localization workers regarding the mod. As a D&D player, I believe the most significant issue lies in the excessive damage output and some nuanced mechanics. The elemental monk, as it stands now, seems to embody the strengths of multiple classes without any real weaknesses.
https://www.nexusmods.com/baldursgate3/mods/15585
I mark specific suggestions with a color code like [color] xxxx.
Due to my affection for this mod and my personal penchant for Oriental monk culture, I've shared some preliminary thoughts on it in my post, link below:
Naturally, this is just my personal perspective and by no means a definitive solution. However, based on my experience, if the base damage of monk spells could be halved first, and then the extra damage mechanics adjusted, that might help. If, in your design, the damage boosts are intended to come from special features, then the base spell damage should be significantly reduced. Alternatively, if you want to keep the base damage in the features, you could remove some extra damage mechanics and excessive advantage bonuses.
I'm curious if you'll make adjustments in this direction, or allow other modders to create patches. I personally don't have time to make patches right now. I'm just asking if you could grant such permission. Anyway, this is a fantastic work. Time and fine - tuning are all that's left. Thank you!
Also as far as permissions, I have now allowed other modders to alter the mod since I don't have the most keen eye for balancing.
Also, if someone makes a patch of my mod that seems to balance things near perfectly then I would consider that a win and might even use their idea in the main mod.
Sorry, it's me again. I found that the spell "Cold Ray" (forgive me for not knowing what its monk version is called) has no special effects, only sound effects. Although this is not a big problem, I think this can be avoided?
Just tested this out with only the mod present and the spell is visually working just fine. Do you have another mod that changes visual effects? If not, then I'd recommend redownloading this mod and see if that helps with the issue.
The feat let you get the four elemental abilities and when you used them once you could attune to an avatar of the same element you just used. I think it was something like that - it's been over a year since I last played.
Second, this mod is only meant to alter and improve the Four Elements subclass. Relegating the features of an entire subclass into a feat, defeats the purpose of having the subclass and its exclusivity.
If you haven't already, I would recommend asking thestarpest to see if they can repost/update their mod and hopefully they will respond with good news. I apologize again and wish you the best of luck.
I think I've found a little bug however. It seems like Water Whips dc is not increased by spell save dc increasing items like the other monk spells are. I don't think it's intentional because I haven't found other save dc based elemental monk stuff where this is the case so far. Only level 6 now so haven't tested everything. :)
1. Is it ok to install it mid game ? I also do not have the level 20 mod
2. Is it compatible with the "Monk unleashed" mod ?
I assume you are talking about the mod by Mharius, and if so, yes it should be compatible with this mod. I would recommend putting their mod above my mod since their's overwrites the base monk class while mine mainly alters a subclass.
One thing I'm running into though, and I may be doing this wrong; but I can't upcast Earth Tremor. All the upcast slots are greyed out and it gives an error that "Target's level is too high".
Again, GREAT MOD!