We're talking about minutiae today, so I don't blame you if you skip it. 3.5 and Pathfinder have a problem with monks. To explain pretty quickly, the class has historically been called underpowered. It brings less damage than fighter, but less skills than rogue. Normally being a middle-of-the-road class wouldn't be bad, but that's...not where it actually lies, only where it's supposed to. Instead, it ends up doing less damage than even the rogue. Part of this is due to equipment: Amulet of Mighty Fists is extremely expensive in both editions, even though Pathfinder has tried to fix this issue. It also only goes up to +5 equivalent. This means the monk is either stuck using substandard weapons like the Kama, taking an exotic weapon proficiency, or being down on attack bonus and damage. Pathfinder tried to help with Brawler and Unchained Monk, but it's not a hundred percent there yet and won't be until the issue of their weapons is fixed.
Put a pin in that idea for a second.
I hate running into ambiguousness. In my opinion, having it in your game means you failed in some way. Whether something is good or bad, unbalanced or even intended to suck, it should at least be clear how it works. The rules for three weapons in Pathfinder are ambiguous: Brass Knuckles, Cestus, and Rope Gauntlets. Normal gauntlets can even be lumped in here.
When Brass Knuckles were first introduced in the Advanced Player's Guide, they were explicitly unarmed attacks and even mentioned directly that monks could use their unarmed attack dice when using them. This was, essentially, the balancing factor monks needed to compete with other classes in terms of damage. So, you can imagine I wasn't surprised at all when a more recent book(the Equipment Guide) alters this wording to change Brass Knuckles into a regular light melee weapon, yet another thing in the weapons section nobody in their right mind would actually use. Just throw it on the pile of neat stuff we won't ever see in a PF game.
So no problem, right? I wish. First off, they forgot to change the wording of Cestus, Gauntlet, and even Brass Knuckles to remove any mention of unarmed attacks. So now they're explicitly unarmed attacks, but with their own damage dice, and it's left entirely up to interpretation what in the world that means. Am I considered armed or not? Do I use my unarmed attack dice, or not? Most people say no, I think. But, there's confusion.
There's confusion in part because of one of Paizo's designers at the time, Sean K Reynolds. He's a veteran of game design who's worked on things like the 3.0 Forgotten Realms books and a shitload of stuff for Pathfinder. Before the Paizo forums were declared too toxic to engage on, and before Reynolds left the company, he'd engage with Pathfinder fans about their questions and things. It's revealed through his posts(especially the stuff about Brass Knuckles, as you'll find out) that Paizo is just like any big company and full of people who don't know the whole story, don't CARE about the whole story, or aren't communicating with each other. However, Reynolds can't just post official clarifications or errata himself, so when he tried to explain that the wording for these weapons was dumb and reference to them being unarmed attacks at all should be removed, it was his opinion as a game designer. That's all probably true, anyway.
Apparently, things took a turn against Sean and he was declared the guy that killed monks.
He wasn't trying to 'nerf' monks, though. He worked on APG. The brass knuckles were his idea. He even helped with the books that declared flurry to work "the way everyone thought it did to begin with" with Brawler and Unchained Monk. He was just trying to explain where the problem is, not make a commentary on how things should be. So the guy who tried to fix monks took the heat for Jason Bulmahn, the actual guy who tried to kill monks...or at least destroy a deliberate attempt to assist them. Jason either convinced Sean to change Brass Knuckles, or used his position as Lead Designer to have it done.
But whoever made the change, the posts seemingly caused more confusion, because Sean was speaking as an expert but not an authority. He can't make rulings himself or officially clear up confusion. I hate confusion. Monk has either been the victim of a man named Bulmahn who saw no problem with the class(somehow) or of Paizo being a huge corporation with poor communications and slow reactions. Maybe both. Here's the fix I recommend.
- Brass Knuckles let you use your unarmed attack damage.
- Gauntlets, Brass Knuckles, Cestus, and Rope Gauntlet count as unarmed attacks for purposes of feats and abilities, but are otherwise regular light melee weapons with their own weapon damage.
- You are considered armed when wielding any of these weapons.
- None of this has anything to do with natural attacks. People with natural attacks need to look elsewhere for enchantments.
This means the benefit of Brawler is that they can use Close Weapon Mastery to drop their attack damage by a die to get a 19-20 crit range on their unarmed attacks. I see that as fair. You also keep away from literally every unarmed fighter using cestus and causing odd behavior. If it bothers you that monks are using brass knuckles, I urge you to re-flavor the items instead of removing them. This is the part that I remind you that something like Japanese tekko would be brass knuckles, mechanically. Arguably, early Greek Cestus, which were just a strip of leather bound under the palm, would be brass knuckles too. There's also the Indian Vajra-Mushti knuckle dusters used in Indian wrestling. Basically, if your problem is the modern-era image of the brass knuckle, then you may not be aware of how old this idea is.
As for making monks too strong? I don't think that's anything we have to worry about. They're getting the benefit of Two Weapon Fighting without having to buy two weapons...but TWF is historically low damage and highly feat intensive compared to two handed weapons anyway. Really, monk and brawler are the only places it works for damage in the first place. We're buffing something that's already kind've in the dog house. TWF in other places is best used for tossing things like dirty trick(using Quick Dirty Trick), disarm or trip out with your offhand attacks rather than actually trying to do it for raw damage. This means that TWF users are going to be skimping on their off hand enchants or even using gimmick weapons(ones with flags like disarm or trip) that have lower damage since they won't be dealing damage. After all, greater trip allows you to trip with your weaker offhand, then get a free AoO on your main hand weapon. The monk can also flurry with a two handed weapon...if he takes an exotic weapon proficiency. Even then, he's giving up his (usually) superior monk damage dice to do it, so the math is currently out on if that's even a good idea.
I dunno, guys. I just like punching things. Both monk and brawler are near and dear to my heart and it sucks seeing them lag behind. It was nice of Mr. Reynolds to try and fix them with brass knuckles, but it ended up causing confusion and ambiguity later. He'd probably tell you the game's too complex. While I don't agree, it was inevitable that something like this would happen. Luckily, it's pretty easy to fix. If you still don't like the idea of brass knuckles after all this, I urge you to let monks wear ki wraps on their glove slot that enchant like a weapon does. That way, they're using up a slot to do it, since it'd be gloves instead of technically a held weapon in terms of magic items. If you truly desire a compromise, I think that's not a bad one. Magic item slots aren't a big deal early in the game, but once you pass level 15 or so in a normal game, they become your restrictor more than gold does. This is also about when the monk would be feeling the blues due to weapon costs, so you've lessened the restriction, but not entirely.
Not that I think you need to compromise. Just let them use brass knuckles. Come up with a few contemporaries for knuckles. Hell, allow knuckles as well as ki wraps so people can choose the fantasy they want. Even after Unchained Monk, the class could still use a leg up.
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