0.5: Ice Martial Artist Monk

Glacial Cascade is an incredible ability for levelling, and makes for a very fast and smooth campaign. We can also combine this with Hollow Palm Technique, letting us have fists of ice that scale with our abilities, meaning we are not reliant on quarterstaves during the campaign. And giving us the following huge advances for leveling:

1. Super fast map clear.
2. Mostly ranged so much smoother than melee monk builds.
3. Freezing enemies and bosses makes the game very easy
4. Hollow Palm Technique requires no weapon, so very easy to set up.
5. Martial Artist Giga buffs our gloves for huge damage scaling.

This then scales incredibly well at endgame due its super high speed and AoE capabilities. Full endgame will be worked in once we have the new monk ascendancy in 0.5

This is an incredibly easy build to play in all campaign content. For the most part its just 2 buttons and keeping your distance.

• Cast Frozen Locus to place a destroyable ice locus
• Throw in Glacial Cascade to smash enemies and destroy your Frozen Locus
• Pounce as needed in and out of combat

It sounds simple but it destroys everything. Bosses go down in second thanks for the Frozen Locus and Glacial Cascade combo. And Herald of Ice helps clear large packs of mobs.

Here are the main points that make the build work and should answer any questions you might have:

How Hollow Palm Works:

Hollow Palm Technique removes our need for a weapon and instead gives us a stacking amount of stats from other areas. Hollow Palm Technique lets our attack speed scale with the amount of evasion on your armour, and your crit rate scales with the amount of energy shield. Therefore prioritising armour is both a defensive and offensive buff in this build.

We also gain a huge advantage by using the Martial Artist build and having Way of the Stonefist, which gives us a massive buff to our gloves and pick up any stats you might be missing from a powerful quarterstaff. i.e "added cold damage to attacks".

Why We Use Pounce:

Pounce gives us a huge advantage, being a giant leap across the screen. But after the leap, we also stay in werewolf form and run on all fours, being a huge boost to travel during the campaign. On top of this at later levels we can add powerful gems that let us trigger abilities from this. As the werewolf natural affinity is to ice, this works well

Is Glacial Cascade Really That Good:

Yes. Glacial CascadeGlacial gives us huge damage and allows us to stay ranged. Please don't put yourself through leveling with a melee abilities on monk, most of them are rough. It also helps us to pop our Frozen Locus for a big damage pop.