Monk

## Overview

Monk is a versatile support with some strong passives, supporting two useful buffs and bringing the unique Combat Guard, it can serve either as a combo builder or a healer. It's also a reasonable damage dealer on specific teams, able to make use of Heroism, Cascade, and Critical Apex.

## Combo Builder

#### Equipment

* Hammer / Katana
* Coat
* Buckler
* Beads Chain

### Build Details

This is Monk's most common build, serving as a versatile combo builder. Blessed Strikes is its main attack in the early turns, buffing itself with Glory (crucially, it's the only buff/attack skill that gives you the buff before the attack) to power its Critical Mass, trigger Combo Buffing, and share those buffs with Enlightened. Once it has a few Glory buffs, it can transition into using Flurry of Blows for its better hit count. Buffing Heal provides a bit of bonus healing and helps trigger Assistance, while Auto Restore can help cleanse debuffs. Between Evasion and Combat Guard, Monk can get very tanky when fully buffed, and it does reasonable damage for a support.

This build wants full Crit Chance to enable Critical Boon and Evasion, and as much toughness as possible. Hammer offers great utility while Katana brings better attack and Crit Chance. Coat and Beads Chain give us a mix of crit and toughness, while helping with the mana costs of our expensive skills, and Buckler allows us to hold an extra instance of two powerful buffs.

### Team Options

* Damage Dealers like Wolf, Asura, and Goblin Hood are both partners, as they appreciate Sidekick and Glory buffs and help stack even more.
* This build has minimal healing and minimal debuff removal, so it would like to be paired with an ally that can accomplish both those things. Sutsune and Koi both have Critical Healing plus Mass Restore and support one of the buffs that Monk also likes, while Dodo has Multi Sidekick and Sidekick Support, and can cleanse debuffs with Curse Breaker.
* While its rarely seen on Warrior teams, Monk is solid on Spirit tribal, pairing well with fellow Enlightened monsters like Aazerach, Ascendant, and Kanko to share buffs between themselves and get massive dodge chance.

## Healer

#### Equipment

* Hammer / Fan
* Tambourine
* Buckler
* Beads Chain

### Build Details

While Monk isn't that great of a healer, only having access to single-target healing outside of its ultimate, it's the only healer with access to both Multi Sidekick and Multi Glory, and as such is used in some teams who want its auras but need their combo builder slot for something else.

Heal is our primary skill, giving us 8 heal procs with double Power Healing, and with Critical Healing, Critical Mass, and Assistance, we can still apply our buffs. Thanks to Critical Healing and Cascade, it can bring an ally from nearly dead to full even with Monk's poor Magic. Our passives are the same as before, providing great support to Sidekick and Glory. This build also takes Meditation to enable a surprise attack with Fireball Storm that can deal high damage once fully buffed.

Our stat priorities are the same, except that this build often uses Fan as its weapon, which provides more Crit, more Magic, and a boost to our healing. We also use Tambourine over Coat, again for the healing bonus.

### Team Options

* Dracozul is one of the best teammates for healer Monk, it has Sidekick Support to boost Monk's Healing (and buffing, because Sidekick Support heals can crit), it has Multi Sidekick, it has Sidekick Support, and it can boost Monk's crit and bulk with Blacksmithing. Ninki Nanka also has Multi Sidekick and healer Monk allows it to run Overcast for more damage and not worry about Mana thanks to mana Symbiosis. Dodo also brings Multi Sidekick and Sidekick support.
* Similarly to last time, damage dealers like Wolf, Asura, and Goblin Hood appreciate Monk's buffs.
* This Monk build is even less good at debuff removal, so combo builders with some debuff removal like Ornithopter, Raduga, or Megataur can be good partners.

## Damage Dealer

#### Equipment

* Scythe / Torch
* Buckler
* Fin
* Fang

### Build Details

With the buffed Critical Apex and its already great buff support, Monk can be a strong damage dealer in its own right, with Cascade and Heroism buffing its damage and being able to buff itself easily with Critical Mass.

Blessed Strikes returns again as our primary attack, hitting hard while buffing us with Glory. Fireball Storm is Monk's hardest hitting move and gives us the ability to hit mons that resist physical, and Flurry of Blows gives us the highest damage from Cascade and Critical Apex, and when fully buffed Monk does have the potential to wipe teams with it.

As a hybrid damage dealer, we want Attack and Magic as well as Crit Chance and Crit Damage, so we take Scythe as our weapon (though Torch can work as well if you have teammates that can apply more Glory to you). Buckler still provides access to useful buffs, Fin is a great item for any damage dealer, boosting our damage and toughness, and Fang helps boost our poor Attack and Magic.

### Team Options

* This build needs a buffer that can apply Might, Sorcery, Glory, and/or Sidekick to it. Thanatos and Frosty are both great options with Full Offense, Thanatos has great buff support and Frosty has Spirit Strength. Bard is a good option as well, though with Bard you may want to swap Fireball storm for a physical attack.
* Once again, Monk would like to be paired with a healer that can also remove debuffs from it. Bard is a good option here too, as are Sutsune and Curse Breaker Dodo.
* Combo builders like Caraglow and Ornithopter can apply buffs to Monk while building up combo to increase its damage further

## Checks and Counters

* A lot of Monk's toughness comes from Dodge and Damage Reduction, which means that debuff damage, while can't be dodged and isn't reduced by damage reduction, is very scary for Monk, especially since its innate ability to remove debuffs and stacks is quite weak.
* Monk needs a teammate with Cleansing Sidekick to be able to interact with opposing buff teams, and it doesn't have the team-wide damage boosters that some other supports do.
* The damage dealer build can build up some toughness with its buffs but is very frail starting out, which means it's liable to be picked off early when facing an aggressive team.