Monk Society Help Please

[Elate]

Hey guys, what society would you suggest that is best suited for a monk? I'd like to check out GoS but I don't know if the crit weighting applies when brawling barehanded. Similarly, if wearing robes with the Iron Skin spell active, would the Sigil of Major Protection provide padding that is equivalent to wearing crit padded leathers for example? Thanks a lot for any advice.

[Aluvius]

Yes the sigils would stack and work normally as far as we have been told. I dunno if anyone has actually tested to see if its working though. :)

The only drawback to GoS is that monk's don't handle crowds very well solo. I think any of them will do well though, go ahead and try out GoS.

[cwolff]

GoS is pretty good for monks because the TP's for skills that add to stamina are low. On the other hand monks probably aren't going to train a lot of HP and your best crowd control spell takes 19 mana per and it's not that hard to ward. If you use it you might need to hit it two or three times or you'll have to walk away. Monks just don't do crowd control well and that's a key to surviving in a War Camp.

If you've got the spirit CoL's not a bad way to go. Just take the permanent +35 bonuses and run them constantly with no fear of popping muscles or frying yourself. Perfect self is a great aid in having well balanced stat placement, so I'd think that most monks are going to have great spirit.

Voln is good for a UCS monk. It's nice to fight in areas with mixed living and undead and not have to worry about getting weapons blessed before going there. Just kill everything. My non-voln characters shun undead because it's a pita. If you don't care about that then it may not matter for you.

My Monk mastered GoS as a rogue then I converted him. I think that if I was starting him from scratch I'd go CoL or Voln.

Alivius is right though. If you're interested in GoS, go for it. I do not believe that crit weighting does a whole lot for UCS. The DF will be based on your ironskin and the padding will be part of your robes but it will be equivalent to wearing padded leathers or whatever ASG your iron skin is giving you.

[Aluvius]

My dwarf monk is CoL at level 29, I just put up ;isigns and forget about it. Even with dissipation in use its not a problem his spirit regen is so fast. He has feint, surge/burst and perfect self at the moment, so I run surge/burst and feint most mobs before they attack since I'm not using the stamina for sigils. It works out well, but I do think about Voln for the UAC friendly stuff there.

Dwarf bonuses + perfect self + monk PF costs give him insane stamina regen rates. I wish they had access to more useful active cman skills, particularly non UAC bases since I just fixskilled him to THW.