Not every caster will take the two penetration feats, and even a 25% is already very good.
My entire point was that one has to talk about the context of the thing. SR30 doesn't make one "caster proof." At best, it makes one caster proof 45% of the time if we're talking about equal-level encounters which is the only way you can actually guage any classes abilities relative to any other classes. We won't even talk about what happens if the mage thinks to spell breach you.
About the barbarian, only half-orc can get to 36 SR, and that's will a whole lot of feats, and only during rage. Non-half-orc barbs will be maxed at 32, and only during rage, while Monks have that spell resistance ALL THE TIME.
-Added Extra Wild Shape/Extra Rage feats
Will Extra Rage affect the spell resistance for Mystic Rage the way most other Rage feats do?
Yes.
With the information we have available, Extra Rage will be another +4. So 40 and 36, as mentioned. The difference between having it at the touch of a button or all the time is moot for any situation that isn't "someone jumps you while you're spent and resting." With Extra Rage, a level 20 barb will have 8 rages a day. If we assume that this is on a 16 con (which is about standard for a Barbarian) then they will have (3+5+5)x8=104 rounds of rage. About 10 minutes. More than enough for any pvp encounter they are going to have, and assuming that you are timing them to go off just before an engagement, plenty for any PvE content. And since Barb rage is a toggle rather than a full round action, even getting jumped while you
aren't raging isn't a problem. You just need to rage before everything gets messy. I would be curious to test if barb SR would apply to a spell targeting you if you hit Rage as soon as you saw them casting, though.
But. Again. Kind of moot. It's only a very specific instance in which the difference between "during rage" and "all the time" will favor the monk, and in all other instances Barbarian rage is better.
Honestly the monsters on this server don't have the highest AC that you could imagine. And with 6-7 attacks per round, you ARE going to land some hits, even if it's only on 20. In a PvP fight when both are fighting on expertise or improve expertise, the monk will usually win cause he will have so many more attacks than your opponent.
If I have 6 attacks per round but due to my low AB only hit on 20s, that's statistically the same odds as someone who has only 3 attacks per round and can hit on 19s. If someone can hit on 18s, their one attack per round would have the same odds.
They are +3 EB to pass damage reduction, so no they don't add to your AB, but even if you hit, if you can't get passed the damage reduction, hitting will do you no good.
Any melee class can get +3EB through enchanting an item, or even just from varnishes.Don't get me wrong, I'm not arguing that this is nothing, just not as impressive in context as it sounds when listed in a vaccuum.
A DC 22 against any class that doesn't have Fort has main save is actually huge. Spellcraft don't count for that save, so even with someone who is at 16 fort, you have a 25% chance of instakilling him. Not OP?
As mentioned, the problem is that you have to be able to hit the thing you're aiming at. Quivering palm is one use per day. You thus need to actually land the blow, AND them fail the save, AND it be something lower level than you. As you just pointed out a moment ago, in pvp you're going to be fishing for 20s.
I agree it might not be as good as barbarian damage reduction, but it's still something.
It is
something but that was never the point of any of this. As I summarized at the end, they have a whole lot of neat little quality of life things, but none of them actually make them particularly great at the core function and thus they don't get to contribute much to the party as a whole.
Also, you can take disarm and just take your opponent's weapon away, and laugh as they can't hurt you.
Everyone gets disarm, so that's not really a special class feature but since you bring it up monks are going to be worse at disarming than just about anyone because they have the lowest AB. Disarm applies a -6 penalty to an attack roll on a class where AB is already the main complaint.
Disarm then puts your attack roll (15BAB-6 penalty, +1 if you have WF+ability mod for a total of 10+Mod) against your opponent's discipline (23 if they are a melee class+ability mod). That gives them a base advantage of 23 to 10 even before we discuss bonuses from feats, background, or gear.. and it's way, way easier to get discipline on gear than it will ever be to get AB.
You are the best to tank spells from a mage. You have improve evasion. You can sit around in the middle of an army of ennemies, and just laugh as your mage does any damage spell he sees fit, since you will dodge them all.
If they have no spell pen, then you will dodge 45% of their spells. If they do, you have 25%. If they breach you, your SR goes down by 5. You thus have at best 25%, at worst, none. Keep in mind there are no saves for Greater Spell Breach, and your SR does not defend against it.
No one will care how much improved evasion you have when your d8 HP with (optomistically) 14 con means you have 180HP at level 20. Maybe 200 if you got toughness. That's about two maximized Isaac's Greater Missile Storms, or a handful of generic IGMS.
Also, as you just pointed out: there is no amount of AC that will protect you from fishing for 20s. You only have so much HP. I would recommend not standing in an army of enemies indefinitely, as Monk has fairly middling HP as well for a melee class.
Antagonize and Expertise will help you a lot in bringing your AC up and lowering your opponents AC.
No one has accused monks of lacking for AC, and as I already stated, monks DO NOT get Antagonize. They are the only middle-BAB class that has no way of mitigating this fact. Antagonize is not a class skill they receive. You would at best have to cross-class the skill and then invest heavily in gear. If the discussion is about class features, class features the class does not possess do not weigh in that classes' favor.
I am unsure what to say about your claim that barbarians are immune to sneaks. Uncanny dodge 2 doesn't make you immune to flanking, they only make you keep your Dex Ac and dodge AC when flanked. Defensive awareness 2 is what makes you immune to flank, and only dwarven defenders have this feat, it's what gives them a niche. The Ravenloft Wikia states that it is immunity to flanked, but unless there was a change in the last Hak on that, it is untrue.
With the upcoming migration to EE, a few more changes have been made to classes/balance/items/etc. I've outlined them here in no particular order:
(...)
Feats:
-Added the following feats.
-Moved Disarm/Knockdown to level 1 so they are granted at character creation
-Uncanny Dodge II (as per EE) now grants immunity to flanking and thus sneak attack from flanking except from rogues four levels higher than the character. This is hardcoded with EE.