Invoker Monk Build Guide for Path of Exile 2: A Critical Strike Powerhouse

Invoker Monk Build Guide for Path of Exile 2: A Critical Strike Powerhouse Path of Exile 2 introduces the powerful Invoker Monk Ascendancy, which blends evasion, energy shield, critical strikes, and elemental damage into a versatile offensive and defensive powerhouse. This build is designed for players looking to maximize damage output through critical hits while maintaining survivability through defensive mechanics such as evasion and energy shield.

Ascendancy: Invoker Monk

The Invoker Monk Ascendancy is centered around a balance between evasion, energy shield, and spirit, which fuels powerful Meta Skills and offers unique defensive benefits. This Ascendancy excels in both damage and defense, allowing you to craft a character that thrives on evading damage while unleashing devastating critical strikes.

Key Ascendancy Nodes:

1. Lead me through Grace…
   • Effect: Gain 1 Spirit for every 6 Energy Shield and 1 Spirit for every 15 Evasion Rating on your equipped Body Armour. Cannot gain Spirit from Equipment.
   • Strategy: This node emphasizes building your defense while also providing the Spirit resource, which powers your Meta Skills.
2. …and Protect me from Harm
   • Effect: Evasion Rating also grants Physical Damage Reduction, but at a 40% reduced effectiveness.
   • Strategy: This node makes evasion more potent for physical damage mitigation, ensuring your defense is enhanced even further, despite the reduction.
3. Sunder my Enemies…
   • Effect: Critical hits ignore non-negative enemy monster elemental resistances.
   • Strategy: A critical hit-centric build will greatly benefit from this, as you can bypass enemy resistances, ensuring that your damage is always impactful.
4. …and Scatter Them to the Winds
   • Effect: Grants the Elemental Expression skill, which triggers on Melee Critical Hits.
   • Strategy: Elemental Expression triggers an elemental explosion, bolt, or wave depending on your stats. This provides massive AoE (Area of Effect) damage, further enhancing the build’s overall output.

Core Mechanics and Synergies

Evasion + Energy Shield Synergy

The Invoker Monk excels by combining evasion and energy shield to both survive and deal damage. Evasion offers physical damage mitigation, while Energy Shield acts as a buffer for additional defense. Both stats contribute to Spirit generation, which powers the build’s Meta Skills, making this synergy essential for maintaining both offensive and defensive strength.

Critical Strikes and Elemental Damage

The build revolves around critical strikes. The node Sunder my Enemies… allows critical hits to bypass resistances, while Elemental Expression triggers elemental explosions, creating significant AoE damage. The Ascendancy’s nodes also provide extra Cold, Lightning, and Elemental damage, giving you a diverse toolkit for critical strikes.

Meta Skills and Spirit

Spirit is the resource that powers your Meta Skills, such as Elemental Expression and Unbound Avatar. Spirit is generated through evasion and energy shield, ensuring that you can trigger these powerful skills consistently, further increasing your damage output and survivability.

Skill Gem Selection

Primary Skill: Shattering Palm

• Reasoning: Shattering Palm provides high base critical strike chance and can trigger elemental explosions, making it a perfect fit for this build. Its synergy with critical hits and elemental damage boosts your overall damage output.
  
  Support Gems:
  • Critical Damage: Amplifies your critical damage, significantly boosting your burst potential.
  • Cold Penetration: Reduces enemy cold resistance, enhancing the cold explosion damage.
  • Melee Physical Damage: Increases your physical damage, although it can reduce attack speed. Use cautiously to avoid slowing your strike frequency.

Secondary Skill: Hand of Chayula

• Reasoning: This unarmed skill offers a quick dash and strike, complementing Shattering Palm’s melee focus while providing additional utility through curse and mark application.
  Support Gems:
  
  • Added Cold Damage: Synergizes with the build’s cold damage focus.

Additional Utility Skills:

• Movement Skill: Flicker Strike is a solid choice for mobility, letting you reposition quickly while benefiting from critical strikes.
• Aura Skill: Malice inflicts critical weakness on enemies near you.
• Mantra of Destruction offers guaranteed critical hit after reaching max combos.

Equipment Recommendations

To make the most of the Invoker Monk build, your gear should focus on evasion, energy shield, and critical strike chance/multiplier.

• Body Armor: Look for armor that offers a good balance of evasion and energy shield to maximize Spirit generation and physical damage reduction.
• Weapons: A Quarterstaff is an excellent weapon choice due to its synergy with Flicker Strike and its bonus to critical strikes. This will ensure you’re consistently triggering your powerful elemental skills.
• Defensive Stats: Equip gear that provides additional life, resistances, and energy shield for maximum survivability.

Passive Tree Allocation

• Evasion and Energy Shield: Prioritize nodes that enhance evasion and energy shield to improve both defense and Spirit generation.
• Critical Strike Chance/Multiplier: Invest in nodes that increase your critical strike chance and multiplier, maximizing the effectiveness of Shattering Palm and Toxic Growth.
• Elemental or Chaos Damage: Look for nodes that enhance your elemental or chaos damage, making your skills even more powerful.

Challenges and Considerations

• Balancing Evasion and Energy Shield: Be mindful of balancing evasion and energy shield in your gear and passive tree to ensure optimal defense and Spirit generation.
• Elemental Resistance Management: As always, managing elemental resistances is key to surviving tougher content. Make sure to invest in resistances via gear or passive tree nodes.
• Confirmation of Toxic Growth: While Toxic Growth is recommended, ensure its inclusion in Path of Exile 2 before finalizing your build.

Conclusion

The Invoker Monk build is a powerful, versatile character that blends critical strikes, evasion, energy shield, and elemental/ chaos damage into a well-rounded offensive and defensive powerhouse. By focusing on synergies between these mechanics, you’ll be able to craft a character capable of dominating both offensively and defensively in Path of Exile 2. Adjust your gear and passive tree based on the latest updates, and always make sure to test the synergy between your chosen Meta Skills and core skills for optimal performance. This guide provides a strong foundation for building a critical strike powerhouse that balances offensive damage with defensive sustainability, making it a fun and powerful option for Path of Exile 2 players.