Monastic question

[hollyfant]

Meet Bob. Bob is a Fighter.
Bob the Fighter levels up, and joins the Sun Soul monks. Bob is now a Fighter/Monk.
Bob the Fighter/Monk levels up again (way to go Bob!) and finds (a) God. Bob is now a Fighter/Monk/Cleric.
Bob the filthy powergamer levels up again. Can Bob take another level in the Monk class?

• No. Bob took a level other than Monk, and has two classes other than Monk. The Sun Soul order permits only one.
• Yes. Bob only too one other class after joining the Sun Soul, and that order permits one other class. The level(s) before becoming a Monk are irrelevant.

Bob has me confused.

[Perle]

This is probably a better question for a forum with more traffic. I suggest this one: https://www.reddit.com/r/DnD/

Personally I'd have to do some creative Google searching to find the answer.

[hollyfant]

reddit
Google

Good ideas, but I wager you'd get thirteen different answers. And I'm only really interested in ALFA's position on the matter.

[Arianna]

per https://www.alandfaraway.info/wiki/Monk

Ex-Monks

A monk who gains a level in any class other than monk may never again raise her monk level, though she retains all her monk abilities. The exception to this rule is that a player character who belong to certain canon Monastic Orders may be allowed to multiclass with some restrictions.

See:

https://www.alandfaraway.info/wiki/Monastic_Order


My understanding of the Order of the Sun Soul is that if Bob joined the order as a level 1 fighter he would have to level to 3 in monk before he could level to 2 in fighter, Monk having to become and stay the highest level class. They can also only level in ONE other class so if Bob became a Cleric he could no longer level as a monk and could only level as fighter or cleric from then on.

[Knighted]

For (unofficial) ALFA1 Moonshaes and Daggerford we still have the old ALFA Player Manual: https://drive.google.com/file/d/18vOURD ... b7x62/view

See page 52: Monks
Monks who multiclass are never again
allowed to advance as a monk, having
lost the focus required by their
stringent lifestyle.

This reflects what's in the SRD: https://www.d20srd.org/srd/classes/monk.htm

There are no exceptions listed because it's about lifestyle, focus, a kind of meditative state almost maybe, which a Cleric's duties would interfere with.
But then again as a DM I'd never rule out the possibility totally, just say that it is basically impossible unless you can find an IC way to convince me otherwise!

[hollyfant]

unless you can find an IC way to convince me otherwise!

IC it would be tricky indeed, but OOC there are of course the explicit exceptions in Forgotten Realms-specific sourcebooks.
Plus there's the little matter of Monks sucking. Badly. Really, really badly. Probably more so than any other class.
The less Monk there is in your Monk, the better your Monk is at being a Monk.

(that might be why the rules need to force you to stay a monk)