Drunken Master Monk Build Guide – The Imbibed Brawler – 2024 Update

For all D&D guides on Nat1gaming, they only use the main sourcebooks (2024 Player’s Handbook, Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything, Xanathar’s Guide to Everything) as well as Strixhaven: A Curriculum of Chaos (mostly for Silvery Barbs) as those tend to be the most commonly used books at tables. Always be sure that if you’re following a guide that you’re adhering to your tables rules about what sourcebooks you are allowed to follow. Furthermore, be sure that you’re using the most current edition of the rules, especially as some 2024 Player’s Handbook rules are updates on Tasha’s or Xanathar’s rulings.

Any spell, class, feature, or other game item that is linkable on this website is covered by the 5th edition Open Games License and will be in the Player’s Handbook, but not everything in the Player’s Handbook will be linked to. All other materials that aren’t linked to are from other sourcebooks or aren’t allowed to be linked to per the 5th Edition Open Games License, so please refer to the appropriate sourcebooks for that information.

For the purposes of this guide, it will be assumed that you would not be multiclassing. While multiclassing can be excellent for many of these, this is for those who want to play the build all the way through in the same class. Guides that use multiclassing will be separate from these.

If you’re a big Jackie Chan fan or you just love the idea of being absolutely plastered while duking it out, this is the subclass for you. While none of your abilities are particularly high impact, they are very on theme which can make this a really fun class to play in combat and really fun to roleplay over all – the hallmarks of a class I’d be interested in playing!

Bonus Proficiencies (Level 3) – D- Tier – Not technically worthless, but definitely flirting with it,

Drunken Technique (Level 3) – B- Tier – A free Disengage and extra speed for functionally free is really good.

Tipsy Sway (Level 6) – D+ Tier – Standing from prone quickly isn’t that helpful, but redirecting missed attacks is somewhat interesting. That said, I would not really want to spend focus on this most of the time as you won’t know how hard the enemy was going to hit you making this really unreliable.

Drunkard’s Luck (Level 11) – D Tier – Spending 2 focus points to cancel disadvantage on a roll is a pretty bad deal. Maybe if you were able to give yourself advantage or cancel disadvantage I can see this being somewhat reasonable, but this is crappy as is.

Intoxicated Frenzy (Level 17) – C+ Tier – Potentially getting three additional attacks is really good, but you do need to be in a really specific set of circumstances for this to work. This is still nice though!

Not seeing the exact build you want in this guide? Check out this guide instead!

Species: Goliath (Hill Giant)

Attributes:

Class: Monk

Class Features: Unarmored Defense, Martial Arts

Skill Proficiencies: Acrobatics and Insight

Background: Criminal

Starting Equipment: Spear, 5 Daggers, Artisan’s Tools, Explorer’s Pack, and 11 gp + 50 gp from background

Species: Goliath

A great species for martial characters and you have the excellent benefit from Hill Giant ancestry to knock someone down so you can grapple them afterwards to keep them down.

Attributes

A great stat distribution for any Monk as you need high Dexterity for good damage and AC, high Constitution to stay alive, and a decent Wisdom score as Monks care about that.

Proficiencies: Acrobatics and Insight

This is going to be the standard proficiencies for Monks, especially if you’re taking the Criminal background.

Background: Criminal

The best background for Monks as it gives you good stat distributions, the best feat for Monks in Alert, and solid skill proficiencies with Sleight of Hand and Stealth.

Starting Equipment – Spear, 5 Daggers, Artisan’s Tools, Explorer’s Pack, and 11 gp + 50 gp from background

Standard starting equipment for a Monk, not that you get much to begin with.

Class – Monk

For Monk you get two abilities to work with immediately – Unarmored Defense and Martial Arts.

Unarmored Defense is simple, if you’re not wearing armor your AC is 10 + DEX + WIS which will give you a reasonable AC to work with, but not as high as a martial character would probably like.

Martial Arts is the classic feature of Monks that are really multiple abilities in one. First, you get to use Dexterity instead of Strength for unarmed attacks. Second, your unarmed strikes or monk weapon get to deal an inherent d6 of damage that will scale up as you gain levels. Finally, you can use your bonus action to make an unarmed strike. Overall an excellent feature that lets Monks deal solid damage.

Level 2

Class Features: Monk’s Focus, Unarmored Movement, Uncanny Metabolism

Level 2 for Monk brings not one, not two, but three new features!

Monk’s Focus is yet another standout ability of the monk which is extremely similar to the fifth edition, Ki, but with a few updated features. First off you get Flurry of Blows which means you can make two unarmed strikes as a bonus action if you spend a Focus point. Second, you get Patient Defense which lets you Dodge as a bonus action, but if you spend a Focus point, you can Dodge and Disengage as the same bonus action. Finally, you get Step of the Wind which means you can Dash as a bonus action, or if you spend a focus point, Dash and Disengage as the same bonus action. Overall, these abilities are very good, and although they are somewhat limited by your Focus points, they are pretty powerful.

Your next ability is Unarmored Movement which gives you an additional 10 feet of movement speed if you aren’t wearing armor or a shield. Definitely a great ability to help you weave in and out of combat.

Finally, you get Uncanny Metabolism which, once a day, lets you refresh your Focus points and gain some health when you enter a combat. This is a very strong ability and much needed for Monks to not feel like they are useless after the first fight or two.

Level 3

Class: Drunken Master Monk

Class Features: Bonus Proficiencies, Drunken Technique, Deflect Attacks

Level 3 brings your subclass, Drunken Master, two new subclass features as well as a new Monk feature.

Bonus Proficiencies simply gives you proficiency in Performance and brewer’s supplies, pretty thematic for this class.

Drunken Technique gives you a bit more movement speed when you use Flurry of Blows and you gain the benefits of Disengage. Simple, but pretty effective.

Your classic Monk feature, Deflect Attacks, is much more exciting by comparison. You can trade your reaction to reduce the damage dealt to you by an attack by 1d10 + DEX + your Monk level which will be really high impact in the earlier levels. Then if you reduce this damage to 0, you can spend a Focus point to redirect the attack which is both a great and super thematic ability. Definitely one of the Monks better features as well as a really good use of your reaction.

Level 4

Feat: Grappler (DEX)

Class Features: Slow Fall

Level 4 brings your first feat, and for every Monk, you have to pick up Grappler. Grappler simply does too much for Monks as you can combine a grapple attempt and an unarmed strike, you have an easier time hitting your grappled target, and you get no movement penalties with grappling makes this an incredible feat. Whether you’re particularly interested in grappling or not, it’s simply too good now to not utilize.

Monk also gets a class feature this level with Slow Fall. As the name implies, this ability helps you slow your fall if you have something nearby you can brace against. Realistically this isn’t the best ability, but it is a cool ability and can prevent tragedy in the lower levels.

Level 5

Class Features: Extra Attack, Stunning Strike, Martial Arts Die to 1d8

Easily the most exciting feature for martial characters, level 5 brings your Extra Attack! Being able to get another full attack in is always welcome, even if it feels like Monk has plenty of attacks to go around.

Second, you gain access to the redesigned Stunning Strike! This iteration of Stunning Strike only gives you one attempt per turn to stun them until the beginning of your next turn, but now even if they pass their save, they lose a bunch of speed and your next attack is at advantage! This is still quite a strong ability and getting value out of it no matter what is really nice.

Level 6

Class Features: Tipsy Sway, Empowered Strikes, +15 feet Unarmored Movement

Level 6 brings your next subclass ability and your next base class ability!

Tipsy Sway gives you two features: one where standing from prone only costs 5 feet of movement speed and you can deflect attacks spending a focus point and your reaction…wait that sounds familiar. While this is similar to your Redirect Attack ability, this works on missed attacks rather than hits. If you need a little bit of damage, using a focus point and your reaction to redirect the hit can be nice, but it’s not something I would use often.

Empowered Strikes is a simple ability to let you ignore all damage resistances with your unarmed strikes which is definitely nice!

Level 7

Class Features: Evasion

A classic and great ability, if you have a DEX saving throw and you pass it from an effect where you’d normally take half-damage, you take no damage, and if you fail, you take only half damage instead of full! This is a great ability you’re going to get a lot of mileage out of it.

Level 8

Feat: Dexterity to 20

Class Features: None

While you would love to take a feat at this point, maxing out your Dexterity is just too good to not do at this point. Max attack, damage, and AC is hard to ignore.

Level 9

Class Features: Unarmored Movement Improvement

Now you can pretend you’re in the Matrix by running up walls and running across water on your turn. This is excellent for travel, less needed for combat, super cool regardless.

Level 10

Class Features: Heightened Focus, Self Restoration, +20 feet Unarmored Movement

You get one and a half abilities with level 10, Heightened Focus and Self Restoration.

Heightened Focus is the half ability as it’s not an ability itself, but upgrades to your base Focus abilities. First, your Flurry of Blows now go up to 3 unarmed attacks which is awesome, your Patient Defense gives you temporary health to help you stay alive even better, and Step of the Wind lets you bring an ally along with you. All great upgrades and very welcome.

Your second ability is Self Restoration which is similar to the old Timeless Body ability from 5e, but also lets you end charmed, frightened, and the poisoned condition on yourself which makes failing those saving throws way less crippling.

Level 11

Class Features: Drunkard’s Luck, Martial Arts Die to 1d10

You get your penultimate subclass ability – Drunkard’s Luck.

Now you can cancel disadvantage on functionally any d20 test for 2 focus points. Solid ability, it’s just hard to say how often you’ll need this.

Level 12

Feat: Inspiring Leader (WIS)

Class Features: None

This was a tough call between increasing Wisdom or increasing Constitution, but Inspiring Leader just wins out by a bit. This feat is just so good as you’re not only giving yourself more health to work with (which increasing Constitution was going to do for you anyway) on top of giving your allies more health as well! That said, if you already have an ally with Inspiring Leader, then you can opt for a different WIS feat like Fey-Touched.

Level 13

Class Features: Deflect Energy

Level 13 brings an upgrade to Deflect Attacks with Deflect Energy. While this only really works against elemental damage that makes an attack roll, just having more options to deflect is good, even if you’re pretty limited by how often you can use this specific part of Deflect Attacks.

Level 14

Class Features: Disciplined Survivor, +25 feet Unarmored Movement

This is a renaming of the 5e Diamond Soul feature, but it does the same thing. Having proficiency in all saving throws is already excellent, but spending a Focus point to have a reroll on a saving throw is extremely strong. The only shame about this ability is that it doesn’t come earlier as it’s easily one of the strongest Monk features.

Level 15

Class Features: Perfect Focus

Yet another ability to help sustain the Monk’s marginally limited Focus pool by always having 4 Focus points when you roll initiative rather than dealing with 0-3. While 4 is not even one third of your total pool, 4 focus points is a surprising amount for a single combat and will likely be just the right amount for your average encounter.

Level 16

Feat: Constitution to 18

Class Features: None

You could opt for increasing Wisdom instead at this point for higher AC and better Stunning Strikes, I think the slightly more health from more Constitution is a little more worthwhile at this point.

Level 17

Class Features: Intoxicated Frenzy, Martial Arts Die to 1d12

Your final subclass ability is Intoxicated Frenzy which gets you up to three additional Flurry of Blows attacks, they just have to be against separate targets. While this may seem excellent, you’re not often going to have enough targets next to the one you’re interested in hitting to get much mileage out of this. Sometimes this ability will really up your damage potential, but it won’t be that often.

Level 18

Class Features: Superior Defense, +30 feet Unarmored Movement

Superior Defense is pretty good for your ability to survive a combat as getting resistance to nearly every damage type is obviously good, especially for a class who has the lowest health and AC out of the martial characters.

Level 19

Epic Boon: Epic Boon of Combat Prowess (DEX)

Level 19 always means one thing – getting your Epic Boon!

For martial characters, you’re going to be hard pressed to not take Epic Boon of Combat Prowess. Functionally getting another attack per turn is very much worth the Epic Boon slot, even if it’s just for an additional unarmed strike, especially when that unarmed strike can mean a grapple attempt or knocking the enemy prone with your Hill Giant lineage ability.

Level 20

Class Feature: Body and Mind

Level 20 brings your capstone ability – Body and Mind. No frills, just +4 to DEX and WIS. Awesome.