For your first?
I've done so many archmage runs I can't even count them, latest being low magic.
I actually misspoke for my first full run which was normal and switching to hard at around middle of the game. I have played with monk on archmage but not full playthrough.
I have finished game 3 times now once with normal-hard twice with archmage. Past month I have been grinding archmage ironman got probably around 60 hours on those attempts for now dying to coffin vampire is my best result so far. I have not done full playthrough with all the classes yet still missing ranger, barbarian, psychic healer and mage knight. Ranger and psychic healer are the only classes I have not touched yet.
You find the monk strong?
Compared to what?
If we are talking about only pure melee classes without any casting potential my ranking would go like this:
1. Fighter 2. Gladiator 3. Monk 4. Death Knight 5. Samurai 6. Barbarian
I might put too much value for wade in but considering how much movement monk gets attacking pretty much any enemy anywhere with full attack without provoking attack of opportunity is nice. And yeah all of those classes hit harder than monk but besides fighter most of time only once. On the other hand having 14str is quite limiting early so tickling enemy many times is most of time worse than hitting once hard so I might overvalue mantis monk.
Another reason is why I rank mantis monk so high is that I find early game more harder than middle/late game besides few encounters for ironman grinding (considering that I probably should rank samurai over death knight). Mantis monk starting with 20-22 AC is quite nice without losing any movement. Middle-late game value of melee becomes lower for the reasons you know already so Im not going to list em. It is still nice to have 1 guy that hits hard middle-lategame and fighter is obviously the best choice for that.
Comparing melee classes to caster classes is probably not fruitful so I dont even try to rank all the classes.
Have you played a dual-wielding fighter with a good skewer weapon (x4 crit multiplier + big base damage >100-200 crit damage)?
That's my base for a comparison.
Yup and same time with mantis monk I used both of those classes for my first full playthrough. Fighter is better.
DK, Barbarian, Samurai hold their ground, the monk, on the other hand has a lower BAB and nothing to improve it (like the samurai when using a single weapon, the barbarian rage or smite)
Yup other than wade-in monk does not get much from levels other than some more movement + some stuff to help with survivability.
Unarmed damage is quite weak, even if you pick a half giant, of course, you can use weapons but why would you do that since it becomes a fighter with a lower BAB and less good feats?
Agreed when Im comparing monk to other classes I ignore unarmed abilities helpfulness.
In a nutshell what I think monk has going for it is high survivability/movement and getting the best melee ability in the game. Then is that worth it compared to higher early game dmg that other classes bring Im not so sure anymore :D For the next module I start with mantis monk since I have a lot more experience with chalice now than I played with monk last time so I might change my mind.