Benefits of keeping Lann a pure Zen Archer?

[Chester]

I'm thinking of reclassing Lann, I feel like I'm missing the point of keeping him a Zen Archer. His Ki Strike bonuses (Magic, Lawful, etc.) only work with unarmed strikes and not his bow, unless I'm mistaken. Almost all of his Ki Powers don't seem well suited to firing a bow (except True Strike). And his Zen Archery feat allowing him to use Wisdom instead of Dex is pointless since his Dex is so good. The only benefits seem to be Ki Arrows, which he gets pretty quick and a few nice bonus feats (and an extra attack from Flurry of Blows, which he'll keep after an immediate reclass anyway). Everything else seems to still be focused on getting him in the front lines as a tank/off tank fighting with his hands. I'm not looking for a min/max build but I'm not seeing the benefits of keeping him there long term.

(I think the build is trying to put him just behind the front lines and have him be a kind of turret with Snap Shot and Attacks of Opportunity. That seems like a lot of micromanaging though, since that maxes out at about 10 feet after 3 feats and he'll never get that close on his own)

(I'm thinking of letting him get True Strike and maybe Ki Arrows, then switching him over to either Mutation Warrior Fighter for Mutagen madness and tons of free feats or Demonslayer Ranger for some demon hatin' and a spell list so he can actually make use of his high Wisdom. Though that spell list is a little underwhelming too)

[MagnusGrey]

His arrows count as unarmed strikes.

[GunStarX]

I just made him a hunter after 3 levels in zen archer. Makes boosting his wis work for casting and accuracy, and having an awesome triceratops has been great for my party

[Conquista]

there is not much benefit in keeping lann as pure zen archer
3 levels in zen archer and than changing into any wisdom based support build is a popular choice for him

[SmallGespenst]

Zen Archers kinda suffer from having a fairly early "well what now?" ceiling, Lann gets a functional build pretty quick, then gets entirely lost on trying to improve, to the point that the default build takes at least one outright useless feat. I would say that you might want to keep in mind that he does get "Ki strike - cold iron / silver" and with how common damage resistance can be it's probably quite valuable to have

[Ghost]

Freebooter Lann is the way

[Menthur]

1 Freebooter, rest Rogue/Rowdy for sneak attacks

[Cutlass Jack]

The main benefit is massive damage. His arrows do damage equal to monk unarmed damage and do it at extreme range. So it gets substantial if you keep him as Zen.

While his stats are good enough to take him many different directions, I've never felt compelled to do so. He's really the hardest hitting most reliable ranged dps companion you get. He blows groups up every round for me with his exploding mythic arrows.

[B Unit]

Cold Ice Strike is nice

[Falkon Swiftblade]

to be fair I have not used other "Archer" builds other than just training people in a bow with precise shot, but in my current playthrough I'm lvl 13 and he crits a lot, and you can specialize him to get bows with 15-20 crit range and x3-5 multiplier plus a slew of ranged feats that makes him a big dmg dealer. If you ever wanted to play a smaller team his movement speed is really fast for kiting and he gets some nice ki powers.

[Dekkion]

I kept Lann as a pure Zen Archer monk. If you pick his feats right, he can face tank without suffering attacks of opportunity (AoO) while inflicting AoO while still being a machine gun nuker. Also, his base damage and total attacks per round via Flurry of Blowd scales with his level as bows are considered unarmed attacks for Zen Archers.

[Edstyles]

Man if U gonna go freebooter at least put 5 points in it....this gives plus 4 to the entire party . Making it better than inspire courage

[Chester]

I don't mean to imply Lann isn't kicking ass - he's puts out insane damage for me constantly with generally more attacks per round than anyone else. I just feel like I could be doing more. And I must be out of my mind, but I swear the Ki Strike damage type wasn't activating for me on my bow attacks. Damage reduction he should've been able to get around he wasn't. Is there something I have to do first to activate it? Or did I just misread something?

[Trolleur_Durden]

The ability to use his unarmed stike damage with his bow allows him to use shortbows without losing damage compared to a longbow, so he pairs quite well with another more traditional archer using longbows like Aru, in the sense that they aren't competing for gear.

When it comes to multiclassing, there's two very popular and efficient way to do things imo: either go divine caster route after level 3, or go full archer route by taking 11 Zen archer lvls. The 11th Zen archer level is awesome because it provides another attack with flurry of blows, but after that, there's nothing else really interesting to take, so branching out is better. There's a lot of good multiclassing options: you can either go the sneak attack route with a class providing that feature, or take 4 Fighter levels (Mutation warrior seems to be the best archetype) in order to take Weapon specialization and unlock the mythic version of that feat, which is very strong on a character having so much attacks with his full bonus.

[Miskatonic]

I don't know for sure but I doubt it applies to bows, since you can make weapons out of those materials anyway

[LArc7thHeaven]

Dip a bit in thug and the sneak attack will compound his damage + sickened debuff helped other spellcaster by giving -2 spell resistance and DC