In Baldur’s Gate 3, the Monk class is focused on melee and unarmoured combat, with the ability to engage and disengage fights quickly, and even stun enemies. However, this doesn’t mean that you can’t play the Monk stealthily.
Although stealth itself is generally associated with the Rogue class in BG3, you can achieve this playstyle with Monk by choosing the Way of the Shadow subclass. Here’s what you should know about how good the Shadow Monk is in BG3.
How Good is the Shadow Monk in BG3?
Choosing the Way of Shadow subclass at level 3 will allow you to unlock some of the best stealth abilities that can help you in a lot of situations. Before jumping further into these, I find Shadow Monk to be decent compared to the other subclasses as it offers a lot of utility with the ability to teleport, silence enemies, turn invisible, and others. Not to mention, the style is quite straightforward as well: sneak in the dark and plot your attacks, similar to how you’d generally play assassins.
The Way of the Open Hand and Four Elements subclasses can be great too, but due to how squishy this class is, you’ll need to walk an extra mile to frontline with a Monk. Even if you do sacrifice your versatility for more power with these subclasses, there’s just so much more you can do with Shadow Monk.
For starters, Cloak of Shadows allows you to become invisible and walk past Arcane Turrets and enemies to complete your objectives. Of course, you can fully take advantage of this ability to engage with someone as well, which can come in handy when you’re planning to take someone out in the backline without alerting other hostile enemies.
If that’s not enough, you also have access to teleportation thanks to Shadow Step. With this ability, you can teleport within your enemies’ range before combat without alerting them. Meanwhile, Shadow Arts: Darkness and Shadow Arts: Dark Vision lets you make more risky plays as they allow you to blind and silence enemies.
Having trouble passing through certain points? Activate Minor Illusion, which as the name suggests, lets you create an illusion to distract nearby enemies. There’s also Shadow Arts: Pass Without Trace that gives you extra points for Stealth checks. Eventually, you’ll be able to unlock Shadow Strike: Unarmed: the ability to teleport to an enemy and strike them with a massive amount of damage.
Whether or not the Shadow Monk is good is ultimately up to how you prefer to play. But, if you’re looking for a strategic and versatile subclass for your Monk, this subclass is definitely for you.
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