In practice it is true because in practice you are typically taking ASIs over feats (with the possible exception of level 4.
Playing either a Variant Human or a Mountain Dwarf on point buy you can have a 20 AC at level 12, while also dodging the vast majority of rounds. Any other class needs spells to match that.
At level 16 you can have a 21, matching even a Sword and Board Fighter or Paladin with Defense fighting style when you are NOT dodging.
Ah cool, like to know that this works in a particular set of circumstances and not most of them. Again, if we have to get very specific, that's not exactly the "practice" as much as "what we need to get it to work".
FOB is very weak damage compared to what else you can use your ki for. IF it did more damage you would have a point, but compared to martial arts you are talking about roughly 7-8 points of damage for using a ki at 20th level. That is the peak, at lower levels is worth less. It is going to be rare that this damage will make a difference. Not unheard of but rare.
FOB is WEAK damage. This is especially true when you consider your weapons usually have high magic bonuses and using ki on your action lets you attack with your weapon.
Forgoing patient defense or another using a Martial Arts bonus action attack is often advisable. Using FOB if very rarely good. Maybe if you know you won't run out of ki and if you know no one will attack you during the next turn (i.e. one BBEG and he is stunned or similar), or if an enemy is very low on hit points and you think having two shots at him are worth the ki to get the kill now .... but those circumstances are not common,
I think you mean "Not forgoing", as that means to
not do something.
FOB can be stronger or weaker depending on level, but as you go up the numbers go up and even then we're talking about a game of damage. The Monk has defensive options, but the best one is to not be there when things are going down, in which case sometimes Disengage can be the play, but also simply running away and taking a single hit can be enough, especially when high-level monks can have enough speed to outpace a lot of foes.
Ok. To be clear - the argument presented that you replied to was FOB allows a Monk to use more stunning strikes in a turn. If you are using stunning strike with FOB you need to be able to hit the enemies with your unarmed strikes and they need to be within reach when the Monk takes the attack action.
If you are fighting one single higher level enemy, yes he will always be within reach, but he won't always be vulnerable to stunning strike. You have 3 attacks and 3 chances to stun before FOB matters at all in terms of stunning that enemy and if you land one of them then you can't stun with FOB
Yeah, but that's a risk with
anything. You use Patient Defense and someone hits you through your dodge, does that suddenly negate the strategy of the move? It's always a risk that what you do doesn't work, so trying to frame on the idea that it doesn't work misses the return on when it does, especially with multiple chances. Stunning strike has game-changing returns.
Your first post quoted above said "enemies" as in plural. To use FOB against multiple enemies they need to be standing right next to the Monk.
Okay, and...? Typically I find it harder to find two mooks who
aren't close together because, generally, they are trying to get in on you (unless they are ranged combatants or something, but that's a whole different set of strategy decisions). Suffice to say that I don't really find that to be much a hindrance.
FOB does increase you damage output against a single enemy or against 2 enemies standing right next to the Monk, but it increases it by very, very little. Something like getting a single casting of Hex through Fey touched (and boosing Wisdom) will give you a bigger bonus to damage over the course of a day than using your ki for FOB will.
Yeah, but all those can work
with Flurry of Blows. If you cast Hex, Flurry of Blows is great because more potential hits means more potential damage through the Hex die, and as an added bonus you can get knock-on effects for certain subclasses/styles: Hex on the Open Hand Monk with Flurry of Blows is awesome because once Hexed I can use it to knock them down by giving them Disadvantage on Athletics or Acrobatics checks (since Shoves are a check and not a save).
It can be good at this, but FOB is one more attack only and one more chance to stun for the cost of 2 ki. It can be the right move, but this is situational. It is most beneficia when you are high level AND ki is plentiful AND the enemy has legendary resistance AND does not have a great con save AND another use of your bonus action is not more advisable.
Also keep in mind enemies with legendary resistance at high level also often have legendary actions and at that level using patient defense to beat those multiple attacks, or alternatively to take an AOO and move out of range to get hit with Legendary action attacks is often advisable.
Patient Defense
might beat those actions, but again we are talking about high-level enemies typically with very large to-hit bonuses. Dodge becomes less useful as you pass the modified AC10 threshold. This isn't to say that it isn't good, but I'm not sure it's nearly as automatic as you make it out to be. I find that in 5E, people get hit way more than they don't even with Disadvantage, and with lower hit points it's not necessarily a sure thing.
That is my pont, people don't think this through, they just use FOB and complain they are out of ki and Monks are weak.
Think about what you are saying here - I have 3 attacks (1 probably with advantage), the bad guy has Bane on him and my Wizard is going to make him reroll if he makes his save ..... but by gosh if I use FOB and get 4 attacks that is going to be what makes a difference!
This is the real problem with Monks - if you could not stun a guy on 3 attacks under Bane and also with Silvery Barbs it is a safe bet your 4th attack from FOB is not going to either. This is the like a Wizard expecting a good result Fireballing a bunch of Devils because Fireball is his favorite spell.
This isn't that, I'm simply pointing out the power through
very basic synergy. The effects of
Stunned are absolutely massive and while you can try to write it off as situational, the stuff I'm mentioning is pretty common party teamwork.
Ok this is a great example.
Your 20th level Monk is in melee with an adult Red Dragon and he is wielding lets say a Dragontooth Dagger (which is pretty weak for this level).
With unlimited ki, using Focused aim and the Dragon concentrates all attacks on you (no breath weapon):
If you stay in melee range and your Monk uses FOB the dragon will do 83 DPR and you will do 48 DPR.
If you stay in melee range and attack but do not use FOB you use 1 less ki and do 40 DPR.
If you dodge and stay in melee, the dragon will do 60 DPR and you will do 28 DPR
If you disengage and move the dragon will do 44DPR and you will do 28 DPR
Now in the numbers above I gave the Monk a weak weapon (for 20th level) and no AC-boosting magic at all. Either of these would move the needle further towards the Monk that does NOT use FOB. At best you are getting another 18 damage from using FOB compared to using dodge or disengage or 8 more compared to using no ki on FOB and this is a team event where the Dragon is focusing on you alone and you should have allies helping.
This is with no magic at all boosting your weapon attacks or your AC and it is using focused aim so you only need a 2 to hit.
... Why aren't we using Attack/FOB/Move away? Yes, you'll invite an Attack of Opportunity, but if we max that out, even using a Jaws attack that's still going to be roughly the same amount as dodging for significantly more damage caused. Like, if I'm calculating this right (you're taking the average damage and then multiplying it by the likelihood of hitting, correct?) so, that'd make the DPR on a Attack/FOB/Move to around 63 DPR for the Dragon compared to 48 DPR for you, right? The Dragon has 256 Hit Points, so that's almost a fifth of its HP on your turn for... just over a third of yours if you move out (133+10 for a Con mod of +2).
But you also have a DC19 save for your Stunning Strike and he's saving on a DC6 with his +13 Con Save. You put 4 attempts in there and they're either wasting Legendaries or (if they are down one or two) you might well stun them. It
could fail, but I'm not going to be doing 20 rounds of dodging, especially against a BBEG. And this is just a white-box with no other party members in support.
And that last part is really part of the value of FOB and other things: if you are alone, then dodging is more optimal because you are taking all the fire. But with 3 other party members there, that won't be the case. We shouldn't simply look at it like that when we assess the value of FOB.
If I am ddodging I am expecting to take attacks and take fewer hits than if I was dodging.
If the Monk was more of a striker or if unarmed strikes did more damage it would be different, but FOB is a bad use of ki most of the time and an unarmed strike is usually not the best use of your bonus action if you have ki to make the better bonus actions available.
Yes, but it's hardly a tank, either. The monk is more of a striker hybrid, someone who has interesting defense options but is still very vulnerable to being hit even if they don't want to be. At the end it's causing decent enough damage with its hits, but more than that are the things it can do around those hits.
Note this is also a different story if you have a good magic weapon (which is relatively often) and can use ki-fueled attack. In this case using your bonus action to attack instead of using a ki because your attack is hitting harder and not costing any (more) ki.
I mean, that would depend on the Monk, wouldn't it? Drunken Masters naturally get a Disengage with their FOB. Open Hand their push/trip tied to their FOB. More than that, the way the Ki Pool is built is uneven across different subclasses to where it's easy for certain subclasses to Nova effectively while a few others are really ki-dependent (hello, Way of the 4 Elements).
Again, this is why I wanted to move away from large pools, make more actions just
actions and save big flashy things for spending a more limited resource so that spending ki was something special rather than something automatic. Spending the few early points you have on dodging instead of anything else is not exactly a stirring defense of the class and I'd say that it's already costed well as taking away other Bonus Actions. Same with Disengage. Hell, at this point I feel like you've successfully argued that for Flurry of Blows!