Top 10 5E D&D Homebrew Monastic Traditions by a Factor of Three

Over at Nerdarchy the YouTube channel Nerdarchists Dave and Ted take a play from the book here at the website and check out the most popular homebrew content for fifth edition Dungeons & Dragon at D&D Beyond. We get a kick out of seeing what folks come up with and sharing their creations. (There’s lots of these posts whether for homebrew subclasses, magic items, spells, feats and more floating around for the curious.) I’m harnessing the mystic energy of ki this time around to see what creations embodying training and asceticism there are for the most disciplined class in 5E D&D — the monk — and checking out the Top 10 homebrew Monastic Traditions. There’s currently over 3,250 homebrew of them so let’s get into it.

Monastic Traditions at D&D Beyond

Before getting started it’s important to note you can create homebrew content for private use and share your homebrew content publicly at DDB at no cost — there’s no subscription required to access these services. However if you want to add any of the homebrew Monastic Traditions mentioned below or any other homebrew content you come across to your 5E D&D collection you must subscribe at the Hero Tier or above. There’s a lot you can do at DDB for free. Check out what you can do here.

The DDB homebrew collection uses several statistics to track entries. Views shows how many eyeballs any particular homebrew creation received, Adds shows the number of times a creation was added to someone’s collection and Rating is an upvote/downvote system. Since there are over 3,250 Monastic Traditions in the collection I’m going to share the top 10 highest rated, most viewed and most added selections and to see what’s out there along with any crossover between these three lists.

Top 10 highest rating Monastic Traditions

1. Way of the Four Elements: Remastered. You follow a monastic tradition that teaches you to harness the elements. This comes as no surprise. There’s a lot of affection for the Way of the Four Elements and just as much disappointment in the execution. Personally I think it’s great but take this with a grain of salt since managing this Monastic Tradition’s ki points is not a problem in the kinds of 5E D&D games I play. Not for nothing too we’ve got a take on retooling this one ourselves right on the website here.
2. A Path Towards Ice and Fire. I’m a stickler for naming conventions so I went into this one with a grumble. The capstone feature to create two duplicates — one of fire and one of ice — is pretty cool. Other than this the features deal more damage and offer some protection with fire and cold flavor.
3. Way of the Lightning Storm. Monks who follow the Way of the Lightning Storm are able to channel the power of lightning into their own bodies. Looking for an overpowered combat option for a monk with a lightning theme? Look no more.
4. A Beacon of Elements. Another take on Way of Four Elements. I actually like this one for the simplicity of the design. But another misnamed Monastic Tradition? Ugh.
5. All Might. You are the Symbol of Peace, the number 1 hero around and holder of the quirk One for All. I can’t even take this one seriously even if it was named properly. Next!
6. Way of the Brawler. Far less mystical than most monks. Overpowered nonsense.
7. Way of Hamon. The bane of Undead and Evil alike, the Way of Hamon allows the wielder to channel the power of the very sun through their body through breathing. I’m gonna guess this is something from an anime and I don’t get it. At this point I checked to make sure I had these homebrew Monastic Traditions in descending order because so far they’ve all been not so good.
8. Path of the J’ehdi. This Monastic Order is an ancient academic, meritocratic, and pseudo paramilitary organization mostly consisting of polymaths: teachers, philosophers, scientists, engineers, physicians, diplomats, and warriors. A new twist on misnamed subclass options! Now we’re borrowing from the barbarian. This one is kludgy as heck and the Force holds almost no appeal to me even in the context it originates from.
9. Way of the Four Forms. Monks who master The Way of the Five Forms are disciplined in form and art. Very much representative of animal forms of martial arts but it’s so kludgy. Is it me today or what? When I see things like a feature to deal 20d6 fire and 20d6 bludgeoning damage I can’t even.
10. A Path Towards Imagination. The temple of imagination focuses on freedom, laughter and will always rise for the defense of children. This is clearly meant to be silly — the monk transforms into a Looney Tunes style creature. But you know what? I actually dig this one! In the right kind of game (a game I’d be happy to play in) this would be a lot of fun. Needs to be renamed though. I told you I’m a stickler!

Top 10 most viewed Monastic Traditions

1. Way of the Four Elements: Remastered.
2. All Might.
3. Way of the Ninja. The ninja is classically depicted as an assassin of great skill and strong will. I feel a kinship with the creator that perhaps we were both fans of Sho Kosugi films in the 1980s.
4. A Path Towards Ice and Fire.
5. Way of the Shadow Soul. I appreciate the theme but the execution is poor. The first feature presents a new condition, which is never mentioned again and only serves to provide an unusual static to hit bonus. Then the capstone feature grants a permanent 4th level spell shadow of moil requiring no casting, no concentration, no ki point expenditure and it’s always on? Ridiculous.
6. Way of the Drunken Fist. Based on the style of Drunken Boxing, monks of the Drunken Fist focus on the advantages of being drunk (aka poisoned) to improve their combat prowess. Alarmingly far removed from the real world inspiration aside turning a negative effect (poison damage and poisoned condition) into a source of more power feels icky.
7. Way of the Spell Slayer. Controlling the chaotic energies of magic inspires monks who seek to keep rogue mages in check. Finally! A strongly themed and executed Monastic Tradition. It’s powerful in particular context and the features are succinct. Bravo to this creator.
8. A Path Towards Imagination.
9. Way of the Brawler.
10. Way of the Red Oni. Few monks have study and learn this dark, powerful fighting style and fewer use it’s abilities, for almost all who have used these techniques have been executed for high treason, murder, heresy, and much more. Another way overpowered Monastic Tradition I suspect is anime inspired. “Your martial arts die is now permanently one die size bigger than stated on the Monk table” right off the bat at 3rd level? Come on.

Top 10 most added Monastic Traditions

I’m going to do things differently here because there’s something different in the outcome worth highlighting. I’ve seen so many re-done Way of the Four Elements iterations but I’ve got to give props to DDB user scottclowe for doing something I’ve never seen before. This creator made a Monastic Tradition for each of the four elements individually. When I came across these I thought, well duh, this makes so much sense! Approaching the concept this way opens up so much design space. I’m not even going to comment on them because frankly I’m so grateful to see this approach I don’t even care what the features do.

1. Way of the Four Elements: Remastered
2. Way of the Lightning Storm.
3. All Might.
4. Way of the Red Oni.
5. Way of the Brawler.
6. A Path Towards Ice and Fire.
7. Way of the Waterbender. Waterbending, one of the four elemental bending arts, is the hydrokinetic ability to control water in all of its various forms.
8. Way of the Firebender. Firebending, one of the four elemental bending arts, is the pyrokinetic ability to control fire.
9. Way of the Earthbender. Earthbending, one of the four elemental bending arts, is the geokinetic ability to manipulate earth and rock in all their various forms.
10. Way of the Airbender. Airbending, one of the four elemental bending arts, is the aerokinetic ability to control and manipulate air.

Monastic Traditions rising to the top

Holy moley y’all. I’ve done these Top 10 homebrew lists from DDB stuff so many times now and this was far and away the worst of them all. Apologies to the creators who shared these Monastic Traditions but they are so bad! I really don’t enjoy putting negative thoughts like this out into the world and potentially discouraging creativity but I was really shocked. Even putting aside my bias against misnamed subclass titles in 5E D&D these monk options were a hot mess of poor mechanical language, kludgy features, overpowered nonsense and if I’m honest straight up boring character options. Monks in 5E D&D pretty much focus entirely on themselves but at least they’ve got some utility features along with combat enhancing stuff. The majority of these homebrew Monastic Traditions just pile on extra damage dealing and damage mitigation and that’s just not exciting at all.

Other than the refreshing take on the Four Elements, which only showed up under the most added ones (weird!) I’ve got to hand it to the Way of the Spell Slayer for rising to the top. It’s got a great theme, presented well and not just another iteration of an anime character’s powers.

5E D&D monk resources

I mention our own forays into homebrew content creation for 5E D&D several times to plant the seed in your mind. Now you’re wondering, “What kind of homebrew content do you create, Nerdarchy? I’m extremely interested!” In addition to the monthly rewards our Patreon supporters receive we’ve presented tons of material in our videos and right here at Nerdarchy the Website ready to drop right into your games too. Another place we frequently create new content for Dungeon Masters and players to drop right into games is Nerdarchy the Newsletter and you’ll also get several gifts including $9.99 in store credit so you can add whatever you like there to your own collection when you sign up. We’ve explored the cleric class many times already. Here’s some resources to check out if you dig 5E D&D clerics.

• Way of Excess
• Way of the Gorgon
• Way of the Four Elements Monk Reborn for 5E D&D
• Way of the Third Eye — Blind Fighting Psychic Monastic Tradition for 5th Edition
• Way of the Chained Fist
• Way of the Northern Wind
• Play Your Next 5E D&D Game as a Way of the Unseen Fist Monk
• Exploring Eberron through the Way of the Living Weapon Monk for 5E D&D
• D&D Party Composition — Playing an All Monk Party
• A Group of Monks is Called a Fellowship
• Embody the Horror of Ravenloft Through the Way of the Astral Self from Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything

*Featured image — Whatever their discipline monks are united in their ability to magically harness the energy that flows in their bodies. Whether channeled as a striking display of combat prowess or a subtler focus of defensive ability and speed, this energy infuses all that a monk does.

New videos every Monday, Wednesday and Friday at Nerdarchy the YouTube channel here