Top 10 Magic Items For Monks in D&D 5e! | Nerd Immersion

it's Tuesday so you know what that means it's time for another top 10 video this time we'll be talking about the top 10 magic items for the DND 5e monk if you want to see the rules and all the specifics behind this stay tuned so before we dive into the specifics I wanted to apologize as look you can see it's technically Wednesday so sorry about that but I also wanted to talk to you about a sponsor for today's video and that is the team over at eventier games we've worked with them in the past they're an absolute pleasure to work with and they churn out amazing wonderful content and that is the case in heretic's guide to devotions and Divinity it's no secret that I love divine characters clerics and paladins you can see the numbers are rising right here clerics and paladins are some of my favorite classes to play in 5th edition and I love running things for divine characters because I think there's so much you can do and so much opportunity for great role play where you have someone who has a Devotion to a higher power or or whether it be an oath or a God or what have you so if you were a huge fan of books like uh complete Divine things like that for or the book even the old versions of the book of exalted Deeds that were physical books you could have in older editions this seems to be in my opinion a spiritual successor to both of those books combined into one providing everything you could want for running a game for a Divine character there are a ton of different tiers things that'll get you even things like physical rewards things like Miniatures files pins cards 25 is the base level and that'll get you access to the PDF as well as virtual tabletop ready maps and that will be available to you as soon as February of next year with a hardcover coming for uh a little bit later in May of 2023 so it's not even just stuff that could necessarily be used for a Divine uh player but there's obviously a lot more to it uh it has stats for God's avatars they have over 30 new Celestial creatures contained within the book they have all sorts of different options there's also a 20 Page free sample you can click and download and that gives you a really good idea of what you're going to be looking at they have things like Relic hunts which I think is a really cool concept so basically like search for the Holy Grail concept things for these Relic style uh ritual items for religion you know religious characters or again a treasure hunting party uh if you pledge in the first 48 hours which it did Just Launch just this morning you receive Adventure PDF uh pack three featuring two fifth edition Adventures the priest sorrow and the abbesses Revenge sorry uh you don't have to do anything you'll just get that if you back in between now and I think the next tomorrow will be uh 24 hours so I guess between now and Friday uh but yeah it's all sorts of different options here you can click through and take a look at this I really like that they brought back the concept of the old Oaths from other books where this is not something for just a paladin you could take thing like an oath of Mercy or an oath of poverty and basically relinquish something from your character in for in favor of getting some sort of benefit like again you can see oath of poverty it'll give you some benefits but you basically can't have physical possessions right you break your oath when you own or use currency of any object that has a value of more than one gold piece so your forsaking material Goods in benefit for other benefits again thank you to eventier games for sponsoring this video I highly recommend you check out this Kickstarter there'll be a link in the top of the video description as well as the pinned comment so jumping on to the specifics uh for this bunk video you know what I'm going to talk about but we're not going to be covering any legendary magic items just common rare and very rare magic items uh no legendaries also as with all of these videos they should be paired with the original video that started off the revitalization of the series top 10 magic items for all classes right because you have those 10 magic items and then these ones are specific so the 10 that can be applicable to all classes should be considered when you're playing any class in fifth edition uh also we won't be doing any consumable magic items so no potions no Scrolls also no magic items that have unlimited number of charges that don't recharge something again I use the chime of opening as an example where it expands the uses and then it's gone when it's done uh we are are also doing this in a subclass agnostic situation where we're not going to be saying like oh if you happen to play this particular monk subclass this magic item will be really good for you again for example if you happen to play uh as a monk for example a subclass that lets you cast a spell then you are technically considered a spell caster for the terms of uh the purposes of a tuning to and being able to use certain magic items so this is subclass agnostic and I will tell you up front it was actually kind of difficult to come up with 10 magic items for a mug not including the 10 in that a written which most of the 10 magic items for all classes were a large majority of what uh were in my original video from a couple years ago but anyway let's Dive In number 10. the Ring of free action this rare Attunement magic item comes to us from the base rules and it makes difficult terrain that cost extra movement for you in addition magic can either reduce your speed nor cause you to be paralyzed or restrained as a monk you are zipping around the battlefield you also have a lot of movement and potentially different movement options depending on the subclass that you are so being able to maneuver around the battlefield is important for you and you do get a lot of really tough built-in uh resistances to a lot of things you know immunity to poison and disease eventually proficiency with all saving throws so you have a lot of things going for you in that respect but still being paralyzed or restrained will shut down I mean again some of those even leading to Auto crits on you if people are able to hit you uh and then again hampering your movement is something you don't want so this is uh I've actually played a monk a handful of times in fifth edition and I was able to get access to this ring uh at least on one of them and it was a game changer for me it allowed me to do so much more the only thing unfortunately it doesn't work is if something has a natural means of poisoning or sorry paralyzing or restraining you like something with ropes or tentacles that can restrain you it only specifically functions with magic I do feel like it should work on that as well but either way number nine the mantle of spell resistance this rare tune of magic item also comes to us from the basic rules and while again eventually at level 14 as a monk you will have proficiency with every single saving throw having advantage on saving throws against spells from this cloak is gonna be useful especially because not a lot of folks one get to level 14 I was actually nice enough to benefit from both of the times that I've played a monk in fifth edition we got to at least that level so I got to for a short time experience what it's like to have Proficiency in all saving throws but even still that proficiency is nice but it still will be hampered by however High you were able to get your ability scores so being able to rely on advantage on saving throws against spells is pretty useful we talked about the ring of free action in the last uh one here which again this you in theory could help you there if you had to get only one the mantle of spell resistance would actually provide you advantage on the saving throttles versus you know paralyze or restrain so possibly if you had to get one I'd probably lean more towards the mantle of spell resistance as it has more applicable things I mean you also have the benefit of having evasion so dexterity saving throws could not become a problem for you too much but having Advantage so that you're guaranteed to maybe make that dexterity saving throw with us taking no damage it really it's just a really solid magic item and this was actually a runner-up for top 10 magic items that should be applicable to all so all classes number eight the shadowfell brand magical tattoo this rare tuna uh Magic item comes to us from Tasha's cauldron of everything I'll give you a warning up front tattoos are going to show up quite a bit on this list and that's because of the kind of limitations that monks have right you're not wielding a shield you can't wear armor uh you more often than not depending on what you are gonna be focusing on unarmed strikes maybe a weapon but you're even Limited in what weapons you can use so the tattoos actually worked really well as something that monks could gain access to uh and I always like the concept of the tattooed monk from older edition so it just fits in my mind so this gives you dark vision out to 60 feet which again maybe you already have dark vision so it's not as useful for you but it does give you advantage on stealth checks which is just a common like the two going together interesting choice I would have liked to have seen if you have dark vision it extends it by a further amount but either way gives the opportunity to play a race that doesn't have dark vision and then again the extension uh advantage on stealth checks is huge and that would be almost enough as it is but then you also get shadowy defense when you take damage you can use your reaction to become insubstantial for a moment having the damage you take that can't be used again until the next Sunset as I mentioned previously right you have Proficiency in multiple saving throws uh you'll have evasion so for an instance where you perhaps don't have an ability to negate that damage easily you can and it's whenever you take damage right so this could be damaged from any Source right typically fall damage you can reduce from you know slow fall but you have a variety of different options here right this could be a weapon attack uh but it's just nice to have the options right if it's a missile attack you can maybe deflect missiles but if it's a spell that possibly you can't get out of with evasion shadowy defense could be there to help kind of mitigate that for you number seven the life well tattoo a very rare a two minute magic item that again comes from Tasha's cauldron of everything this one will give you resistance to necrotic damage which is again an always-on nice thing to have and the once per day ability when you go to zero hit points to pop up to one instead as I've stated before you are a monk you are in the thick of it more often than not with a lot of the different subclass options so being able to stay in the fight longer and even if you don't have any key points left and you're just doing two attacks and your Martial Arts attack that's potentially three hits three options for fishing for crits and three possible consistent sources of damage that your party can rely on if you're able to be in there hitting things not to mention the amount of you know game changing things you can do with stunning strike if you're able to make that happen so you being able to keep hitting things is useful and honestly one hit point is as good as a hundred hit points so if you can stay in that fight for one round longer you could draft alter the way that combat goes again I've expressed my issues with the life well tattoo some of the tattoos feel like the Rarity is a little bit off but either way it's a useful one the only problem you ultimately possibly run into is that not having enough skin to have all of the tattoos on you based on the requirements that they have number six the Eldritch staff this very rare Magic item comes to us from Wild beyond the witchlight of all places and again one of the items and the weapons that a monk can use is a Quarter Staff and this does function as a plus one quarter step so right there you can use it as a weapon if you need to and it also has some other benefits it has a D6 plus four uh charges returned daily at Donna which it has 10 normally and it has the sort of standard thing don't expend the last charge if you do you might roll and possibly lose it it has Eldritch attack which is when you hit with an attack with said staff you can expend up to three of its charges for each charge that you expend uh the target can take an extra d8 lightning damage so that's only triggered on a hit so you could possibly be adding an additional 3d8 lightning damage to a connection with the Eldritch staff which is pretty cool also you could wait to utilize these charges until you quit possibly doubling that 3d8 to 68 which is cool and it also has the Eldritch Escape feature at the end here if you take damage while holding the staff you can use your reaction to expend three charges whereupon you turn invisible and teleport yourself along with anything you're wearing or carrying up to 60 feet to an unoccupied space that you can see you remain invisible until the start of your next turn or until you attack cast a spell or deal damage so there's a lot of things you can do with that it also gives you a reactionary use which monks typically don't have anything other than like deflect missiles and opportunity attacks and the fact that you also have so much movement typically as a monk a 60-foot Teleport could get you seriously out of danger and then potentially you may be able to get right back in next turn after you've able to reassess the situation uh yeah it's just I feel like this is something that often gets overlooked because it comes from an adventure number five speaking of magic items from an adventure we have the Insignia of claws The Uncommon non-attunement magic item that comes to us from horde of the Dragon Queen uh basically while wearing this you have a plus one bonus to attack and damage rolls you make with unarmed strikes and natural weapons it also makes them magical again as a monk yours eventually will become magical as part of just leveling so if you get this early on it's also one of the only items on this list that is non-attunement and for the longest time it was the only way to get a bonus to your attack and damage rolls with unarmed strikes so this is basically a quintessential monk item again it lives in a horde of the Dragon Queen which is a weird thing although I have seen this appear in Adventure League Play uh for different folks outside of just the tyranny of dragons storyline so I highly recommend it like whenever you if you're a DM and you've given any of your players in the campaign a plus one weapon at any point at around that same time if you have a monk in the party an Insignia of claws should also be made available for them as it basically is the equivalency of a plus one sword to them but it allows them to use their unarmed strikes in such a way now again you could give them a plus one quarter staff sure but their martial arts ability which is their bonus action attack is limited to only being an unarmed strike so it kind of helps mitigate that or allowing them to if they want to just focus purely on unarmed strikes they won't be weakened in comparison and I've seen this personally again from playing a monk where it's like well I'm only going to use my weapon as much as I can even if I don't love the weapon that I'm using and I would rather focus on you know the descriptive combat of fighting hand to hand but I'm actually hampered damage wise because I why wouldn't I use my magic weapon so I I think the Insignia of clause is a pretty standard option to give to a monk in your campaign number four now I know I just went on a tirade sort of mini tirade about unarmed strikes but the staff of striking another magic item uh weapon for a monk this uh very rare tuna magic item comes to us from the basic rules and the only reason that it's here kind of versus the Eldritch staff is that this is a plus three quarter staff so that has a more consistent to hit bonus and a more consistent damage bonus than the Eldritch staff would have it also has 10 charges uh when you hit with a melee attack you can expend up to three of those charges to deal extra Force damage I have a D6 per charge spent and then again it also has the concept of the expend the charges if you spend the last one you can lose it pretty standard stuff so really if you had to pick it can go either way between this or the Eldritch staff I put staff of striking a little higher on the list because it has the consistent output of the extra to hit and damage of being a plus three weapon uh also Force damage is a little is pretty much almost resistant by almost nothing in the game whereas lightning damage has more resistance to it although the force damage is a little less also again the staff of striking comes from the basic rules and people may not use something like wild Beyond The Witch light to provide magic items from So You Stand a better chance of getting access to this in your game number three the bracers of Defense you knew they had to be here right this is a rare tuna magic item that comes to us from the basic rules and just gives you a plus two bonus to your armor class if you're not wearing armor or wielding a shield again as a monk you typically can't wield armor or use a shield to get the benefits of your unarmed strike ability so bracers of Defense are one of the only options to do that again a lot of people think of bracers of Defense on a barbarian but I will remind you that barbarians technically can wield they can wear armor and they can wield Shields so they could get something like an animated shield for example and then still be able to wear armor if they wanted to uh whereas the monks really only option to boost their Armor class is again things like bring a cloak of protection or the bracers of Defense number two the Eldritch claw tattoo this uncommon Attunement magic item comes to us again from Tasha's cauldron of everything and outside of the Insignia of claws this is the only other way that I know of off the top of my head to boost your mat your unarmed strike ability with a magic item so it comes with the op uh the ability magical strikes which is your unarmed strikes are now considered magical for the purposes of overcoming immunity and resistance and they get a plus one bonus to attack and damage rolls with unarmed strikes So in theory if you were to wear the Insignia of Claws and have the Eldritch claw tattoo you could net yourself a plus two bonus to attack and damage rolls with your unarmed strikes and if that was enough it also comes with the Eldritch ma ability which you can activate as a bonus action and lasts for a minute for that duration your melee attacks uh and you could also double this up with a weapon um uh but you're also your unarmed strikes now have a reach of 15 feet and deal an additional D6 Force damage on a hit the most recent monk I played actually got the Eldritch claw tattoo so I had this personally and I could tell you it is a game changer not only does the 15 foot reach provide you all sorts of opportunities to maneuver around the battlefield but the extra D6 Force damage on a hit is huge especially once you're level five and could potentially be doing upwards with Flurry of Blows to four attacks a turn two from Attack an extra attack and then two from Flurry of Blows that means that each attack you were able to do you could be dealing an extra 46 damage a turn so you're even though your damage output may be lower than something like a paladin or a rogue you are able to hit potentially consistently and then have four opportunities to hit if you hit all four attacks you could be at least if you're at level five for example be doing 2d6 per hit plus your dexterity modifier again that obviously will only increase as you level up so I was able to get good use out of this magic item and again the bonus to the unarmed strike attack and damage rolls is all factored into this and it's nice to be able to punch things but not have to be literally in melee range of some of these enemies not to mention you know the funky stuff you could do with Sentinel and all sorts of crazy things you can have going on with it I highly recommend the Eldritch claw tattoo and it is only uncommon Rarity number one the dragon hide belt this varying Attunement magic item uh comes from to us from fizzband's treasury of dragons and is only attunable by a monk it follows the format of a lot of the more recent magic items that we've seen in fifth edition where it improves some sort of key DC or or base function of your class by a varying number based on its Rarity in this instance uncommon uncommon being plus one rare being plus two or very rare being plus three and for the monk the dragon hide belt improves the saving throw DC of your key based features so for a lot of different monk subclasses they'll have different abilities to manifest powers or different things that will use a key save DC so it would improve that it will also improve the basis of uh core monk abilities for example stunning strike what a lot of people consider to be one of the most powerful if not the most powerful ability for the monk being able to improve your key save DC for that is just great TV there for you you could do so much more with that again as someone who has played a monk uh up to multiple times up to high levels uh this would be huge for me I actually lament the fact that I played a monk more recently the ascendant Dragon monk in a dragon-themed campaign and was never able to get access to the dragon hide belt for my character though my DM had a plenty hard time surviving and succeeding on my stun stunning strike save DC's so I think it was a choice to not give me this magic item so that he didn't have to have even harder time doing so and if that wasn't enough you also can use an action to regain key points with a role equal to your Martial Arts die which you can't use this ability again until the next dawn again forgive me for saying this but key points are key to playing a monk a lot of your abilities are tied to your usage of key points not just your core features like Flurry of Blows patient defense stunning strike but also a lot of the subclass abilities as well so when you don't have key points you are severely weakened in comparison to some other classes uh so now you do get all of your key points back on a short rest which is nice but if you find yourself in combat and you're not at a high enough level where you get them when you start initiative which I think is level 20. uh you would need the ability to do so it does suck that it uses up your whole action to get these key points back but you know what you could use some of those key points if you roll High to say do something like patient defense take the Dodge action to kind of survive the turn and then reassess with what key points you have on the following turn I also like this because that ability will actually just get stronger as you get stronger as your Martial Arts diet continues to grow as you level up so again a well-designed magic item I would have liked it's a bummer that this is kind of one of the only if not the only magic items specifically for monks uh which I'm pretty sure it is the only one that's attuned by a monk only I'd like to see more of this I'd like to see more of that Concept in general expanded for all of the classes so yeah I I again as someone who's played a monk before I I think this is a fantastic addition and I would highly recommend that you give your players the opportunity to get one possibly craft one as again it's made out of dragon hide and everybody always harvests monster bits so there you go so anyway folks that is my top 10 magic items for the monk again as someone who has played among relatively recently as well as in the past both with the same DM I have a lot of experience there and I do know a lot of people have issues with the monk they think the Monk Is underpowered or weak I could tell you again that that same DM did not seem to think that the monk was underpowered and or weak uh I routinely erect a lot of combats with things like stunning strike or just consistent damage output and clever usage of key points but either way I will admit that certain things are you know it could possibly use a little more hit die maybe go up to a d10 as you are someone that's supposed to be finding yourself more often than not in the middle of things in melee uh also with lack if you don't have enough key points a lot of the newer subclasses have also made sure that your abilities use your key points actually some of them have not and I do appreciate that because if everything is sapping on that one resource of key points you will expend them relatively quickly and then you'll basically be unable to use a lot of the cool abilities of your class subclass perhaps something as simple as just adding proficiency bonus to the number of key points that you have you know that table where it's two per level maybe it's that plus your proficiency bonus or wisdom modifier just to give you a little bit more maybe an innate ability to similar to a Wizard's Arcane recovery to get some key points back uh on a short rest although again actually never mind you get them all back a short rest this would have to be something you could do relatively quick to just get a couple back maybe something similar to the updated Paladin's ability to get kind of a channeled you know spouseless back with Channel Divinity I don't know again we'll see and seemingly in about one to two weeks time we think that the uh Warrior subclass or the warrior class grouping for the one d d play test will be available to us we think that's going to be the next one there's nothing really to base that off of but if that's the case we'll get to see possibly what the plans are for future monks in the one DND slash whatever we're going to end up calling it in the future uh so I'm curious to see how this magic item list Will Survive the next version of the play test so anyway thank you all so much for watching thank you to Evan tiergames once again for sponsoring this video and a shout out to my patrons over on patreon for continuing to support me and the channel I will see you all next [Music] thank you

Channel: Nerd Immersion

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Keywords: Nerd Immersion, top 10 D&D, top 10 D&D 5e, top 10 magic items, top 10 D&D magic items, top 10 D&D 5e magic items, Dungeons & Dragons top 10, Dungeons & Dragons, D&D 5e top 10 magic items, DnD 5e top 10 magic items, updated top 10 magic items, D&D 5e magic items, D&D magic items, best magic items 5e, D&D magic items for monks, D&D best magic items for monks, monk magic items, dnd magic items for monks, dnd monk guide, 5e monk magic items, dnd 5e monk magic items

Id: 01IjUQbdrnQ

Length: 26min 30sec (1590 seconds)

Published: Thu Nov 03 2022