Hit hard, hit hard again, and then hit harder. You're not an adept of control, or a tank (though you have good options in both), you're a glass cannon who'll carry a lot of fights with raw damage on single targets. You're also pretty good at avoiding damage, rather than tanking it.


We're going to aim for 8 Open Hand Monk / 4 Thief. This is likely the best approach and there are not many viable alternatives in my opinion. If you're curious as to why we aim for this particular contribution:

8 Open Hand Monk

• Access to control variants of Flurry of Blows at level 3
  
• Access to Extra Attack at level 5
  
• Access to WIS scaling passives at level 6
  
• Access to Ki Empowered Strikes which makes your punches bypass physical resistance
  
• Access to Wholeness of Body for Ki regeneration an an extra bonus action
  
• Access to 2 feats

4 Thief

• Extra bonus action
  
• 1 feat which puts us to 3 total

If you're curious about alternatives, see Alternatives below.

• High, consistent and sustained damage
  
• Not much requirement if terms of set-up
  
• Insane mobility - the best in the game
  
• Super fun to play
  
• Excellent itemization - nothing you need is contested by other builds
  
• Comes online at level 4 and will carry you through the early and mid game

• Definitely not a party face
  
• No utility
  
• Low control

These weaknesses are largely irrelevant. You just can't do everything at once, and everything this build lack can be given by another party member.

You should note that the optimal version of this build requires elixirs. This is absolutely not a weakness per se, but it is tough making room for this build in your party if another of your characters already uses those.

Start with 17 CON and 16 DEX. Dump STR, INT and CHA to 8. The first will be acquired through elixirs, the last two are irrelevant. If you're confident, you can start with only 17 DEX, 15 CON and 16 WIS, but you're really squishy in the early levels, and WIS will not be that relevant until early Act 3. You do you.

Note: If you don't want to use strength elixirs, you should start with 16 STR, 14 DEX and 13 CON.


Species honestly doesn't matter too much, so you can go with what you like.
I went with Half-Orc because I was hoping the brutal critical perk would work on unarmed attacks, but it didn't seem to be the case. That said, getting the free revive once per long rest is nice in the early game.

You can also go for Wood elf to have (even) better movement. But as I said, it's really up to you. This build doesn't require any particular species.

Githyanki are also great with some good utility spells.

If you're familiar with multiclassing in this game, you probably know that you usually want to get Extra attack as fast as possible - that is, at level 5 - before multiclassing. We're actually going to get to monk level 6.

At level 3, take the Open Hand subclass.

At level 4, take Tavern Brawler with an extra CON point.


Level 7 is when we start taking Rogue levels. I used to start the Rogue dip at level 6, but Open Hand Monk's level 6 is just too good to delay.

The respec here gets us two things:

• We can redistribute our attribute scores to get higher WIS. We don't need high CON anymore.
  
• We can open as Rogue to get expertise for thievery skills (sleight of hand and stealth)

If you already have the (now) optimal ability scores and don't care about thievery skills expertise, you can forego the respec.

Otherwise, respec, open Rogue and take 17 DEX, 15 CON and 16 WIS.


Keep leveling Rogue up to 4.

At Rogue level 3, take the Thief subclass for an extra bonus action.

At Rogue level 4, take Ability Score Improvement with +1 DEX and +1 WIS.


Get your last 2 levels in Monk. At Monk level 8, take Ability Score Improvement and +2 WIS.

Our final characteristics should look like this:


If possible, you should get +1 WIS from Hag's Hair in Act 1. You also absolutely should get +2 WIS from Mirror of Loss in Act 3.

Note: Our strength will actually be 21, or 27 late game, with elixirs.

We have no need for a melee weapon, and to be fair, no need for a ranged weapon either. I personally like to go without armor (only clothing) all game, but there's an argument to use medium armor if it adds your full DEX modifier to your AC.


The Sparkle Hands[bg3.wiki] are the first good gloves you can pick up. Wear them until you can get Gloves of Cinder and Sizzle[bg3.wiki] which will stay with you for a long time. You can get The Graceful Cloth[bg3.wiki] at exactly the same time.

There are other variants of these gloves (with other elements and built-in spells) but you get them much later and at this point, your best gloves will be available.

Armour of Uninhibited Kushigo[bg3.wiki] can be acquired basically for free in late Act 1. Whether it's worth wearing depends on how often you use Patient Defence.

Soon after, you can get the weaker version of Sentient Amulet[bg3.wiki]. You don't have to equip it right now. Hold on to it.


Darkfire Shortbow[bg3.wiki] is an item you want to wear. You're not going to be firing a lot of arrows, but this bow gives you resistance to two elements and the ability to Hasten yourself once per day. Very worth it.

You can also get Cloak of Protection[bg3.wiki] at the same time. Both these items can be acquired within 10 minutes of Act 2.


The first good monk item of the act is basically gifted to us by the game. Early in the act, you're going to be fighting a group of - guess what - monks. One of them can be looted for the Boots of uninhibited Kushigo[bg3.wiki], which add our Wisdom modified to damage dealt by our unarmed strikes. These are your best boots and shouldn't ever be taken off.

Early in Act 3, you can also get the best version of Sentient Amulet[bg3.wiki]. This is a great amulet option. Another one is Khalid's Gift[bg3.wiki] to reach an even WIS score and increase your modifier (if you didn't get Hag's Hair).

At the same time, you can also get Horns of the Berserker[bg3.wiki] which is a great headpiece for you.

Within an hour or so, you can buy Vest of Soul Rejuvenation[bg3.wiki] which is your best armor. Extra AC and Greater Kushigo Counter which is your best reaction. It's crazy good.

Finally, the last item we're going to look for is the Gloves of Soul Catching[bg3.wiki].
You get +1d10 of force damage on all your unarmed attacks, and each turn, after an unarmed hit, you may heal for 10 HP or gain advantage on attack rolls and saving throws until the end of your next turn.
And you get +2 Constitution. Strong contender for best item in the game.

We're going to deal a lot of damage, so our main problem is to stay alive.


The easiest way to protect a damage dealer is to have someone getting the focus of the enemies for you. In my Tactician run, I always had Karlach (with the Alert perk and a lot of health) and Shadowheart (re-specced as a Paladin + Life Cleric for an immense amount of healing, protection + sentinel reactions, and 20+ defence with heavy armor and shield) with me to tank the attacks.
Karlach always played first and was able to immediately take the focus of some enemies, while Shadowheart was super resilient in long fights. Both their presences allowed my monk to basically hit and run for free.


This build has insane mobility. You can double dash and cover 40+ meters in one movement action, or jump insanes distances. Not only can he move a lot more per turn (so long as he does not wear armor), we can also dash as a bonus action (with Ki at Monk Level 2, and without Ki once you get your second Rogue level).

Speaking of dashes, dashing with the rogue cunning action is cheaper since it has no Ki points. But Step of the Wind: Dash doesn't only give you a regular dash, it also removes the bonus action cost from Jump, which means you can jump infinitely so long as you have movement speed. Coupled with your high strength, you can jump from point A to point B to point A again with basically no cost. If something needs to be done somewhere, chances are you should go.

That allows you to start your turn away from enemies, hit them, kill the one closest to you and then go back into a safe position. If you positioned yourself correctly before striking, you will not trigger opportunity attacks.

If you can't go back into a safe position, you can stay near a companion with Sentinel, or just use Patient Defence.


Our Ki abilities give us a lot of options to manipulate the field to our advantage and maximize damage.

• Flurry of blows: Stagger nullifies an enemy's reactions. Perfect to be able to hit them and then back off without punishment.
  
• Flurry of blows: Topple is great to cripple an enemy's movement and give your allies an easier time hitting them.
  
• Flurry of blows: Push can send an enemy into a chasm or a well placed hazard like Cloud of Daggers or Cloudkill.
  
• Stunning Strike is super powerful as you can just completely rob an enemy of their turn. Great on any enemy that has annoying or powerful attacks. Also your go to against powerfull bosses.

The less enemies attack you, the greater your odds of survival. When it's your turn to play, pay attention to which enemies have not played yet. If you have enough damage to kill some of them before they take their turns, it is absolutely worth trying.

Enemies that are far away from you are likely to just Dash on their first turn (especially low level enemies). In that case, you can ignore them in the first turn, let them come to you, maybe place some hazards like Grease or Cloud of Daggers if you have good chokepoints.


We have a character that deals a lot of damage. Here are some tips to make sure not to waste that damage, nor the Ki that fuels our attacks.


Usually, fighter attacks go like this:

• First attack (Action)
  
• Second attack (Extra attack from Action)
  
• Pommel strike, Flourish or other skills (Bonus Action)

A Monk is going to play this very differently. The maximum damage combo (once you're level 9) is always going to be this one:

• First attack (Action)
  
• Flurry of blows (Bonus Action)
  
• Second attack (Extra attack from Action)
  
• Flurry of blows (Second Bonus Action)

But this isn't the one you're always going to be using. For instance, you can use a bonus action for an extra unarmed strike after a first strike. It deals less damage, but if your target has 10 hp remaining, you don't need a Flurry of blows to finish them off - that would just be a waste of Ki.

Ki Shortage can be a real problem in a fight, so you don't want to waste it. Also, feel free to use Wholeness of Body early (like turn 2 or 3) in a fight. The healing is irrelevant. What you want is getting the extra bonus action and ki regen for three turns. It's a great set-up for burst damage.

Sometimes, you also need to jump or dash to reach an enemy before attacking them, which means you have one less bonus action - but less attacks are better than none.

You can always use Flurry of Blows whenever you want (before, after or between your 2 Action strikes). But you can only use the bonus, single unarmed strike after a first unarmed strike. So it is usually better to open with a standard (or stunning strike), then consider whether you want to use a bonus unarmed strike or a Flurry of blows.


Once you have bought your shortbow in Act 2, you can use Haste once per long rest. While this is a greedier approach (if your concentration is broken for whatever reason, you get Lethargic and your next turn is forfeit, unless someone can cast Freedom of Movement on you), it is a huge boost to damage and a big help in tougher fights.
You can also use a speed potion (you can stack your 4 characters together, throw the potion between them, and apply haste to everyone). It lasts only three turns, but you don't have to worry about maintaining concentration on a spell.

You might consider dropping one feat to get level 9 monk and the resonating Ki ability. And technically, you can.

However, while the AoE is cool, it just doesn't compare to the damage a dedicated AoE build can dish out. Worse - you only get so many Ki points and while you have great Ki restoration options with Wholeness of Body and Sentient Amulet, you can still run out of Ki during a fight. Ki should only be used on Step of the Wind, Flurry of Blows and Stunning Strike which are by far your best abilities.

This is the only alternative multiclassing you want to consider for this build. You do not want to take something like Fighter 2 for action surge. It would mean losing on a feat and either the thief subclass and its extra bonus action (Flurry of Blows is a bonus action - need I say more?) or Evasion which is an amazing passive. Not worth it at all.


If you don't want to bother with Elixirs, you need to start with 16 STR (lower DEX and CON) and update STR rather than WIS with feats. In Act 3, you can use the Gauntlets of Hill Giant Strength[bg3.wiki] which are found at the same place as the Gloves of Soul Catching. But the latter are just too good to pass on in my opinion.

The optimal version is definitely playing with elixirs and high DEX. I also happen to have beaten Tactician with the suboptimal version using no elixirs. You do you!

If something isn't clear to you, or if you feel like I missed something, let me know in the comments below. I read every single comment I get, and will do my best to answer yours.

Thanks for reading the guide and I hope you have fun with the build!

For the sake of clarity and transparency, I will be noting relevant changes (that is basically anything but typos) to the guide here.

23/01/2024: Added alternative approaches section and updated characteristics.

27/01/2024: Added a section to sum up strength and weaknesses of the build.

21/02/2024: Major overhaul of the guide. Clarified the class contribution, leveling process and characteristics, using the optimal stats variation (credits to u/Prestigious_Juice341 for their version of the build and detailled guide).