Monk Build Collection

Pre-Elites Monk: Sadly, Monk is really under equipped early on in every aspect. The free slots are for your secondary class (and maybe a stray skill with 0 points) which you put the attribute at 9.

• /R: In Prophecies, access to the pet will be useful for Augury Rock since the Doppleganger doesn’t have a pet. Prophecies and Factions also have access to Strength of Honor to increase the pet’s damage. You may play Bow Monk if you want to.
• /W, /D, /A: Melee Monk is risky because of your low armor, but the damage remains decent. With 12 Smiting and 12 in your weapon, Strength of Honor on you, you get a decent damage output.
• /E, /Me: Both decent options for caster dps. Me relies more on Empathy and Backfire, which is perfect for Prophecies early on, while E direct damage remains good across the board.

As a Monk, your goal is to reach Kaineng and Eye of the North as fast as you can. The main reason is to get access to significantly more skills, the second reason is to grab your max armor (60) as soon as possible, especially if you play in melee. Once there, you have choices.

Ray of Judgment : Easy elite to get in Factions, but with a huge caveat: it causes scatter, as the enemies will run from the Jesus Beam. If you have an Elementalist Hero, run it with Water Magic and snares like Ice Spikes to make sure the enemies can stay inside the beam as long as possible. Arcane Echo allows to cast two RoJ twice within its duration, while the Inspiration Magic variant allows for more energy returns.

Healer Monk:

• /D Healers benefit from Eremite's Zeal as an energy management tool, while /E have Glyph of Lesser Energy instead. The examples here show the /D versions, just replace EZ by Glyph when going /E. With a +5 Mysticism staff, you only need to be in earshot of 4 enemies for Eremite's Zeal to regain 8 energy twice. A Necromancer staff will always be the god-tier of energy management, while an Elementalist staff will give you a flat +15 energy and up Glyph of Lesser Energy to a 13 energy reduction.
  Unyielding Aura is by far the best resurrection skill for Monks and a strong boost to your healing abilities. Before casting it, use a +3/+1 Divine Favor headpiece to maximize UA, then switch to your +3/+1 Healing Prayers piece.
  Word of Healing is a powerful healing spell, and one that can cast pretty quickly with Holy Haste as a less powerful Healer's Boon. It requires external energy management though, or going /E for Glyph of Lesser Energy.
  Healer's Boon allows to power up Heal Party for strong group healing, but really asks for /E and Glyph of Lesser Energy to be really efficient, or an external energy management source.

Protection Monk

• Like healers, /D and /E allow for energy management, this time I’m showing the /E variations.
  Aura of Faith is perfect when high spike damage is expected, being able to cover an ally with strong protection and additional healing through Divine Favor and Divine Healing for party healing.
  Divine Boon manages to turn your protection to powerful healing sources, using the same headpiece swap as UA to boost the healing further. This bar is very flexible and can play a large variety of elites, such as Zealous Benediction, Life Sheath, Peace and Harmony, Divert Hexes, Restore Condition, Mark of Protection and Blessed Light. To complete the bar, Reverse Hex, Dismiss Condition and Reversal of Fortune are strong choices, while Seed of Life and Divine Healing can add more healing if needed.

Hybrid Monk

• Monk has the ability to run both healing and protection in a single build for powerful, though often energy hungry bars. Depending of your elite, Healing 11+3+1 and Protection 11+3+1 are both valid, swap accordingly.
  As an elite, Healing Burst is still doing decent despite the nerfs, while Mark of Protection is a strong protection skill and Word of Healing remains a solid healing option as well.

Weapon and Armor

• Protection Monks always use a 40/20/20 Staff. The value of +20% Enchantment duration is too strong to be passed out over a Necromancer mod, though you can have one of those as a switch if you want to.
• Sup Vigor can be Major Vigor. Necromancer can be Fortitude for budget.