Martial Artist is SUPER FUN! - Monk Leveling Build Guide
This guide provides a comprehensive overview of leveling a Monk Martial Artist in Path of Exile 2: Return of the Ancients, focusing on an Ice Strike-based playstyle.
Summary
- Core Mechanic: The build utilizes Hollow Palm Technique to eliminate the need for weapons, prioritizing flat damage, attack speed, and evasion gear.
- Key Skills: Ice Strike serves as the primary attack, while Frozen Locust provides essential screen clear.
- Ascendancy Strategy: Prioritize Way of the Mountain for early survivability and damage, followed by Way of the Stonefist for a significant power spike.
- Gearing: Focus on rings and gloves with flat added damage to attacks. Evasion-based gear is critical as it converts to attack speed and damage via the build’s passives.
- Playstyle: The gameplay loop involves debuffing enemies with Hand of Chayula and Frost Bomb, then engaging with Ice Strike and Tempest Bell to maximize damage.
Ascendancy Order
- Way of the Mountain: Chosen first for consistent flat damage and survivability, making it the ideal choice for early campaign progression.
- Way of the Stonefist: The second pick, which converts flat damage bonuses on gloves into specific element/damage type bonuses, offering a substantial damage increase even with low-tier gear.
Leveling Strategy
- Early Game: Act 1 can be challenging; players may use crossbows or other ranged options if the quarterstaff playstyle is uncomfortable.
- Core Combo: Use Frozen Locust to clear packs. Dash backwards, leave a spike, and destroy it to trigger an explosion that wipes out surrounding enemies.
- Main Skill: Ice Strike is recommended for its ability to generate the necessary combo points to deploy Tempest Bell.
- Mobility: Utilize Pounce combined with Werewolf Form for increased movement speed and traversal during mapping.
- Note: A known bug currently causes players to lose the benefits of Charged Staff if they shapeshift.
Gearing Priorities
- Flat Damage: Seek rings and gloves that provide flat cold, physical, fire, and lightning damage to attacks.
- Evasion: Prioritize high evasion gear. Due to Hollow Palm Technique, evasion is converted into attack speed, which increases overall DPS and fluidity.
- Amulet: Aim for a “+1 to Level of all Melee Skills” modifier as early as possible.
- Utility: Obtain stun and freeze immunity via charms as soon as possible.
Passive Tree & Gem Setup
- Passive Pathing: Rush Hollow Palm Technique immediately. Focus on attack speed and damage nodes at the start, transitioning into critical strike nodes (e.g., Strike Through, Deadly Force, True Strike) around level 50.
- Support Gems:
- Ice Strike: Pair with Rapid Attacks, Rage, and Blindside.
- Frozen Locust: Pair with Ice Bite, Innerve, and Blazing Critical.
- Debuffs: Use Hand of Chayula (linked with Elemental Weakness and Freezing Mark) and Frost Bomb (linked with Potent Exposure) for single-target damage.
Advanced Playstyle
For single-target encounters:
- Apply Hand of Chayula and Frost Bomb.
- Use Ice Strike to generate combo points.
- Deploy Tempest Bell and spam the skill button to consume combo points for maximum damage.
- Refresh debuffs whenever they fall off.