Just as a side note, if you don't want to go all-in on a Monk/Cleric, picking up Magic Initiate and taking Shield of Faith can be immensely useful. Sure, it's only once per long rest, so your mileage may vary, but the last time I played a Kensei Monk long term I was getting up to AC 24 at level 8, thanks to 20 Dex, 16 Wis, Agile Parry, Bracers of Defense, and Shield of Faith. That was on a Dragonborn too, I imagine on top of a character that starts off with a Dex bonus you'd be able to get there even quicker. A level or two of Cleric, even if you're just looking for a few more cracks at Shield of Faith, feels like it might be worth a couple of ki points to me.
Well, yeah. You can always have almost ridiculously powerful characters as long as you roll well enough for stats...
Way of Shadow / Fighter mix for blindfighting is a great death ninja....and it opens the monk up for use of many magic weapons that it may not have otherwise...I see this as much better synergy than cleric.
Way of Shadow / Fighter mix for blindfighting is a great death ninja....and it opens the monk up for use of many magic weapons that it may not have otherwise...I see this as much better synergy than cleric.
Monks don't really need weapons and you can get FIghting Initiate for the Blindfighting. Or just dip Twilight Cleric.
3 levels of gloomstalker ranger on a shadow monk is fun too, if you're going into game at lvl 8 or higher.
Still, if we're talking about a long haul campaign that starts at lvl 1-3, single level dip for versatility and added flavor is all you'll want if you're main class is monk. Then take monk all the way to 14 before considering more multiclass levels.
For this, I'd say your best single level dips are cleric, fighter, warlock, and to a lesser extent sorcerer if you have the stats to meet the requirements. Each gives you a pretty solid set of tools at lvl 1.
Way of Shadow / Fighter mix for blindfighting is a great death ninja....and it opens the monk up for use of many magic weapons that it may not have otherwise...I see this as much better synergy than cleric.
Monks don't really need weapons and you can get FIghting Initiate for the Blindfighting. Or just dip Twilight Cleric.
I know this post is about a year old now already, however I'd still like to disagree lol
Until you hit very high levels your weapon damage wil always be higher than your unarmed strike damage. Monks already struggle with keeping up in damage after the early-mid tiers so not taking a good weapon is just going to leave you even further behind. Fighting Initiate exists, however you don't get many ASI. You already want to have your DEX as high as possible and also a decent WIS and CON, and if you are going to use an ASI for a feat you're MUCH better off with picking Mobile so you can use your BA to deal more damage or Dash instead of Disengage and so you can Disengage without needing to use your limited Ki points. Twilight Cleric is a good dip as well though, no question.
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I've never encountered a forum where I got this many "talking to a wall" impressions as this one...
I ran with a Sun Soul Monk/Light Cleric in Storm King's Thunder, honestly was a fantastic time. She had mostly debuff and buff spells outside of the subclass spells, used Patient Defense a lot, and made a really good frontline support. She dumped Wisdom and Constitution though, but had a decent AC and dodge/disengage/Sanctuary, there was a lot of synergy between the two classes. Damage-wise, not amazing, but it's pure support. Cast Bane and start stunning, throw out healing words when needed, and spells like Beacon of Hope basically mimic a Paladin when you're already in melee doing Monk shit.
I ran with a Sun Soul Monk/Light Cleric in Storm King's Thunder, honestly was a fantastic time. She had mostly debuff and buff spells outside of the subclass spells, used Patient Defense a lot, and made a really good frontline support. She dumped Wisdom and Constitution though, but had a decent AC and dodge/disengage/Sanctuary, there was a lot of synergy between the two classes. Damage-wise, not amazing, but it's pure support. Cast Bane and start stunning, throw out healing words when needed, and spells like Beacon of Hope basically mimic a Paladin when you're already in melee doing Monk shit.
I'm surprised you had good success with debuff spells like Bane and using Stunning Strike when you dumped WIS considering your save DC would've been super low as well, plus since you dumped CON too it means you would've had a much more difficult time keeping up concentration on your buff and debuff spells.
Unless you used "dumped" incorrectly here of course.
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I've never encountered a forum where I got this many "talking to a wall" impressions as this one...
My bad, I said WIS, I meant CHA, I was on a 19 hour shift when I wrote that. CON was 10, but I didn't take that many hits, honestly. Party had a Paladin that drew a lot of fire, and Patient Defense along with kiting using Sun Bolts makes a pretty survivable character.
I've run a Kensei/Samurai/Forge (12/4/4) Aarakocra, with Mobile feat, in a feudal Asian flavored campaign for the last 4ish years. Its been a lot of fun and frustrating as hell for our DM. Even Sentinel didn't help him out much because all it did was keep me in range to focus damage on one enemy. Forge Cleric was a storyline based decision, and the small dose of healing was a big boon to the party as a whole. I'm still torn on whether Action Surge, Fighting Spirit, and Second Wind were a good trade off for the losses of more Ki, and the redundant Extra Attack wasted level.
I think it can work and be pretty sweet, provided you don't care about high level spells or monk super abilities (touch of death for example). What a war cleric/drunken master monk multiclass gets you is a monk who can use a longsword as monk weapon (dedicated weapon), get a bonus action longsword attack (Wis times per day), divine favor on unarmed attacks, bless or bane, can disengage after attacking for a hit and run style, heal yourself or others. The Fist of God build uses the monk's flurry of blows with divine favor to do (eventually) 1d6+1d4+ Dex for every unarmed strike 4 times per round until the ki runs out or 3 times per round normally after monk 5. If you go to cleric level 8, you can add another 1d8 per attack for 1d6+1d4+1d8+ Dex for an average of 16 per strike. 45 hp per round or 60 per ki point round. and you have a bunch of cleric spells to help out.
Depending on the sub-classes, it may work in-character, as you can argue that some sub-classes Clerics and Monks may thematically work together due to the learnings of a specific god. I have an Ascendant Dragon Monk, and I'm planning to go with either War, Life, or even a Forge Domain Cleric. Plus, multiclassing can be a character-based thing too, since it can add more roleplay options.
I think it can work and be pretty sweet, provided you don't care about high level spells or monk super abilities (touch of death for example). What a war cleric/drunken master monk multiclass gets you is a monk who can use a longsword as monk weapon (dedicated weapon), get a bonus action longsword attack (Wis times per day), divine favor on unarmed attacks, bless or bane, can disengage after attacking for a hit and run style, heal yourself or others. The Fist of God build uses the monk's flurry of blows with divine favor to do (eventually) 1d6+1d4+ Dex for every unarmed strike 4 times per round until the ki runs out or 3 times per round normally after monk 5. If you go to cleric level 8, you can add another 1d8 per attack for 1d6+1d4+1d8+ Dex for an average of 16 per strike. 45 hp per round or 60 per ki point round. and you have a bunch of cleric spells to help out.
If you really like the flavour by all means make this character, but after trying to theory craft a build out of it I don't think it's better than a pure monk, nor better than a pure cleric.
For the monk part you can use spells like divine favor, holy weapon (If your DM doesn't mind you using your fists as weapons) and spiritual shroud to increase your dmg with every hit, however using your bonus action to cast a spell means you can't use it for flurry of blows, meaning you'll have to consider the lost flurry/unarmed attack when calculating for your new dpr. You also have to take into consideration that all of these spells require concentration, meaning between casting and your next round you could lose the spell and will have to cast it again, further tanking your dmg. A last point to consider is that dmg now is better than dmg later in DnD. If you flurry on your fist round you could kill your target, stopping them from making another attack before your next round, or capitalizing on a hold person spell and critting with every hit. Even the war cleric's bonus action attack isn't worth taking a class level in unless you have a strong magical weapon. The dmg won't beat a flurry of blows, and even compared to one bonus action unarmed attack the increase in dmg is minimal. The pure benefits boils down to the spells, but you get some healing and utility for slowing your class progression.
As a cleric the main benefits you get is another way to calculate AC (though clerics already have a great armor class, so this is mostly flavor), the ability to flurry (though imo clerics have so many great bonus action options this is redundant), and potentially multiattack. All this at the expense of slowing your spellcast and access to great higher level spells.
If you really like the flavour by all means make this character, but after trying to theory craft a build out of it I don't think it's better than a pure monk, nor better than a pure cleric.
The main benefit is the versatility that spellcasting and channel divinity give you compared to pure Monk, and the speed and melee options that Monk gives you compared to pure Cleric. I mixed Kensai with War Cleric on a character and had a blast with it, because it meant I could be in more of a support role in some combats, joining the front-liners, or racing down distant high threat targets in the next, plus it gave me more to do outside of combat.
Is it stronger than either? Not really, as there are always trade-offs in multi-classing, but it's a lot of fun to be able to switch roles as needed, or as you please, and can be very useful. A pure Cleric has the option of spirit guardians + spiritual weapon for "melee" but this is often better against enemy groups rather than individual threats, and depending upon the length of campaign the Cleric/Monk can still get these if they want them.
A last point to consider is that dmg now is better than dmg later in DnD.
This depends a lot on the target; I wouldn't use divine favor or similar when facing a group of weaker enemies, but when facing boss monsters, i.e- high durability, usually lone enemies, where there's no chance of them going down in one or two rounds, the extra damage can add up fast.
Concentration is definitely a big concern, but it depends partly on whether you're the highest threat or not; if you're not the only front-liner then it's usually best if the other(s) can draw focus (or just be the only viable target) initially, as that helps. The rough math on divine favor specifically wants at least two rounds out of it; if we assume a 1d6 martial arts dice and +4 Dexterity, giving up Flurry of Blows means losing an average of 15 damage, which is what you'll gain from the extra 1d4's on six attacks (Extra Attack both rounds, Flurry of Blows in the second) so you only break even.
If you can get three rounds though it's worth it, or if the target is vulnerable to radiant damage or resistant to physical damage then two rounds is already paying off. It's also very good if you start fighting at range; my Kensai/War Cleric would sometimes start at range with a longbow before closing, either because the enemy is too far away, or both the Fighter and Blood Hunter in the group turned up that day so I wasn't needed on the front-line, but again the value depends what you're facing as Ki-fuelled Attack or War Priest for a third attack can be more useful for a quick kill.
Even the war cleric's bonus action attack isn't worth taking a class level in unless you have a strong magical weapon.
One more level in Monk only gives one extra Ki point (so one extra Flurry of Blows per short rest), but a single level dip in War Cleric gives you WIS bonus action weapon attacks per long rest, and I found it very useful to have another resource to burn on a Monk. Even with a Wisdom of +3, that's 3 extra uses to burn per long rest, meaning you'd need at least two short rests for the same in Ki points.
How useful this is depends upon a few factors; the quality of the weapon being one, but it doesn't have to be magical, as you can use War Priest with a shortbow on any Monk at range, while saving the Ki required to trigger Ki-fuelled Attack (plus for most Monks Focused Aim is the only trigger at range anyway). This is good on a Kensai who can be using a longbow instead, and while they have Deft Strike to trigger Ki-fuelled Attack with, it still gives you the option of saving Ki. Of course with a decent magic weapon that will be even better, but I wouldn't say it has to be strong, even a basic +1 or +2 weapon increases the value of a bonus action weapon attack quite a bit. The other factor is if your group has anything that only triggers via weapons, which can include poisons that you can obtain and apply yourself.
But yeah, the benefit is definitely more the utility; a single level dip into Cleric gives Monks a fair bit of extra utility and options in and out of combat, and so do the 2nd- and 3rd-levels in Cleric if your campaign is long enough to justify taking them. It's certainly not one of the strongest multiclasses, like slapping Fighter onto something for Action Surge, or Warlock on pretty much any Charisma caster, but you gain plenty to offset what you're delaying.
The key challenge in my experience was picking the right levels; delaying Extra Attack on a Monk is rough, and War Cleric doesn't really help with that, though divine favor can in the right circumstances. But once you take Monk to 5th-level, you often want 6th-level for the sub-class feature (though some at this level aren't great) and then 7th-level for Evasion, maybe 8th-level for the second Ability Score Improvement…
If you really like the flavour by all means make this character, but after trying to theory craft a build out of it I don't think it's better than a pure monk, nor better than a pure cleric.
The main benefit is the versatility that spellcasting and channel divinity give you compared to pure Monk, and the speed and melee options that Monk gives you compared to pure Cleric. I mixed Kensai with War Cleric on a character and had a blast with it, because it meant I could be in more of a support role in some combats, joining the front-liners, or racing down distant high threat targets in the next, plus it gave me more to do outside of combat.
Is it stronger than either? Not really, as there are always trade-offs in multi-classing, but it's a lot of fun to be able to switch roles as needed, or as you please, and can be very useful. A pure Cleric has the option of spirit guardians + spiritual weapon for "melee" but this is often better against enemy groups rather than individual threats, and depending upon the length of campaign the Cleric/Monk can still get these if they want them.
A last point to consider is that dmg now is better than dmg later in DnD.
This depends a lot on the target; I wouldn't use divine favor or similar when facing a group of weaker enemies, but when facing boss monsters, i.e- high durability, usually lone enemies, where there's no chance of them going down in one or two rounds, the extra damage can add up fast.
Concentration is definitely a big concern, but it depends partly on whether you're the highest threat or not; if you're not the only front-liner then it's usually best if the other(s) can draw focus (or just be the only viable target) initially, as that helps. The rough math on divine favor specifically wants at least two rounds out of it; if we assume a 1d6 martial arts dice and +4 Dexterity, giving up Flurry of Blows means losing an average of 15 damage, which is what you'll gain from the extra 1d4's on six attacks (Extra Attack both rounds, Flurry of Blows in the second) so you only break even.
If you can get three rounds though it's worth it, or if the target is vulnerable to radiant damage or resistant to physical damage then two rounds is already paying off. It's also very good if you start fighting at range; my Kensai/War Cleric would sometimes start at range with a longbow before closing, either because the enemy is too far away, or both the Fighter and Blood Hunter in the group turned up that day so I wasn't needed on the front-line, but again the value depends what you're facing as Ki-fuelled Attack or War Priest for a third attack can be more useful for a quick kill.
Even the war cleric's bonus action attack isn't worth taking a class level in unless you have a strong magical weapon.
One more level in Monk only gives one extra Ki point (so one extra Flurry of Blows per short rest), but a single level dip in War Cleric gives you WIS bonus action weapon attacks per long rest, and I found it very useful to have another resource to burn on a Monk. Even with a Wisdom of +3, that's 3 extra uses to burn per long rest, meaning you'd need at least two short rests for the same in Ki points.
How useful this is depends upon a few factors; the quality of the weapon being one, but it doesn't have to be magical, as you can use War Priest with a shortbow on any Monk at range, while saving the Ki required to trigger Ki-fuelled Attack (plus for most Monks Focused Aim is the only trigger at range anyway). This is good on a Kensai who can be using a longbow instead, and while they have Deft Strike to trigger Ki-fuelled Attack with, it still gives you the option of saving Ki. Of course with a decent magic weapon that will be even better, but I wouldn't say it has to be strong, even a basic +1 or +2 weapon increases the value of a bonus action weapon attack quite a bit. The other factor is if your group has anything that only triggers via weapons, which can include poisons that you can obtain and apply yourself.
But yeah, the benefit is definitely more the utility; a single level dip into Cleric gives Monks a fair bit of extra utility and options in and out of combat, and so do the 2nd- and 3rd-levels in Cleric if your campaign is long enough to justify taking them. It's certainly not one of the strongest multiclasses, like slapping Fighter onto something for Action Surge, or Warlock on pretty much any Charisma caster, but you gain plenty to offset what you're delaying.
The key challenge in my experience was picking the right levels; delaying Extra Attack on a Monk is rough, and War Cleric doesn't really help with that, though divine favor can in the right circumstances. But once you take Monk to 5th-level, you often want 6th-level for the sub-class feature (though some at this level aren't great) and then 7th-level for Evasion, maybe 8th-level for the second Ability Score Improvement…
The issue is that Monks get an unlimited BA attack, that will quickly outperform any weapon attack (both require the Attack action be taken), with a limited use BA double attack (FoB). So unless you are using a magic weapon (pretty limited for Monk) or are using a Greatsword/Halberd/Battleaxe (now you need high Str, Wis, and Dex) you will never use the War Priest BA attack.
Now, if your party is lacking a healer or anyone else who can ritual cast, I could see the Cleric dip not being a bad choice for some 1st level spells. But if you do, you are delaying Ki points, ASIs, and Martial Arts dice for some versatility that is ideally covered by another party member.
The issue is that Monks get an unlimited BA attack, that will quickly outperform any weapon attack (both require the Attack action be taken), with a limited use BA double attack (FoB). So unless you are using a magic weapon (pretty limited for Monk) or are using a Greatsword/Halberd/Battleaxe (now you need high Str, Wis, and Dex) you will never use the War Priest BA attack.
I already pointed out ranged weapons, as every Monk can use a shortbow, Kensai can use a longbow; unarmed strikes aren't any use if you can't reach a target, and nothing is better for defence than being hard or impossible to hit back. There are also a fair few magic weapons that work well for Monks; a sun blade for example can be used by any Monk, a flame tongue is available as a shortsword if you can't get longsword proficiency etc.
But even basic +1, +2 etc. weapons are beneficial as they don't just do a little more damage, they also have a better chance of hitting. And like I said, you can use them with anything else that requires a weapon, such as a poison, certain spells etc.
It takes a while for Martial Arts to outpace weapons, only Flurry of Blows will outperform it most of the time, but that costs Ki. The benefit of War Priest to a Monk is not having to spend Ki, while Ki-fuelled Attack is not having to spend more Ki (since it's triggered by spending at least one already, e.g- Focused Strike to prevent a near miss), this helps with Monk's resource management.
My Kensai/War Domain multiclass character made a lot of use of Ki-fuelled Attack (via Deft Strike or Focused Aim) and War Priest for making three longbow attacks in the campaign he featured in. Which meant not only solid damage at range, but when he closed into melee range he had more Ki to leftover for Flurry of Blows or Patient Defence.
Now, if your party is lacking a healer or anyone else who can ritual cast, I could see the Cleric dip not being a bad choice for some 1st level spells. But if you do, you are delaying Ki points, ASIs, and Martial Arts dice for some versatility that is ideally covered by another party member.
1-3 levels of delay on these isn't that big of a deal depending upon your expected campaign length; a loss of one Ki isn't a problem if you're getting one or more additional resources instead. All Clerics are giving you spell slots (two for a single level, three with a second, or six for a three level dip), plus any other resources they give (Channel Divinity at second level, War Domain gives WIS uses of War Priest at 1st-level etc.). Martial Arts dice progression isn't a big deal either as it's only an average of 1 damage per hit.
While yes, in an ideal world everything is better covered by another party member, that's not always going to be the case, and what matters most is the character you're trying to build and what you want to play as. Even if your spellcasting as a multiclass will be miles behind a pure caster, it's still more casting for the group (plus casters gain slots fastest at earlier levels, so it's a hefty resource boost). Meanwhile a lot of higher level Monk features in 5e also just aren't very good, so delaying or losing access to them isn't a great loss.
War Cleric’s heavy armour and the BA attack was not the big draw for my Bugbear Mercy Monk. Adding a d4 to every attack from Divine Favour, (if your DM lets you pre-cast), plus 2d6 per is a great opener. I wish we were given more KI points I would love to have room to add action surge to this combo.
That would only work on your weapon attacks, not on your BA Martial Arts or FoB. So you would be sacrificing an extra 1d6 to 2d6 in the first round for an extra 2d4 for each following round (assuming you maintain concentration). And you can only do this 2-3 times per day, whereas your Ki comes back on a short rest.
I think the 2d6 is from the Bugbear's updated Surprise Attack feature in Mordenkainen's Monsters of the Multiverse, which IMO is currently a bit broken as if you can get off a flurry of blows early in the round you could be landing an extra 8d6 damage in the first turn if you've got your Extra Attack. You could also do it using weapons and divine favor (no flurry of blows) for 4d6 + 2d4, probably with a view to using Ki-fuelled Attack or War Priest in following rounds for three weapon attacks (and up to 3d4 radiant damage in each of those rounds).
While the 3d4 extra damage in later rounds isn't world shattering extra damage, it can still add up, but the big secondary benefit is that you're not spending any Ki points (unless you get the third weapon attack via Ki-fuelled Attack), just a spell slot and some of your Wisdom modifier War Priest uses (so probably 3+) which is still pretty good value for only a single level dip into Cleric required to get it. It's a good way to maximise the spell, and squeeze the most out of a combination of Cleric resources while conserving Ki for later use, or for things like Focused Aim (which in turn can trigger Ki-fuelled Attack so you can save a use of War Priest instead).
I've done the same myself on my Kensei/War Cleric, but mostly with a view to ranged rather than melee (where you're more likely to lose concentration before divine favor pays off), though the Bugbear excels at that too since their Surprise Attack applies to any type of attack.
Same here, I am starting a level 3 character 2-monk 1-cleric in the trickster domain. The second level in trickster cleric giving the mirror image and advantage on attack seems super useful to me. Excited to level up and see how it goes.
That would only work on your weapon attacks, not on your BA Martial Arts or FoB. So you would be sacrificing an extra 1d6 to 2d6 in the first round for an extra 2d4 for each following round (assuming you maintain concentration). And you can only do this 2-3 times per day, whereas your Ki comes back on a short rest.
Not sure what the "plus 2d6 per" means there.
Not sure what you mean about BA attacks not being weapon attacks for the DF spell. I did suggest that you would need the DMs ok to precast Divine Favour before the fight breaks out.
From Sage Advice on this site
Can a monk use Stunning Strike with an unarmed strike, even though unarmed strikes aren’t weapons?
Yes. Stunning Strike works with melee weapon attacks, and an unarmed strike is a special type of melee weapon attack.
The game often makes exceptions to general rules, and this is an important exception: that unarmed strikes count as melee weapon attacks despite not being weapons.
Well, yeah. You can always have almost ridiculously powerful characters as long as you roll well enough for stats...
Way of Shadow / Fighter mix for blindfighting is a great death ninja....and it opens the monk up for use of many magic weapons that it may not have otherwise...I see this as much better synergy than cleric.
Monks don't really need weapons and you can get FIghting Initiate for the Blindfighting. Or just dip Twilight Cleric.
3 levels of gloomstalker ranger on a shadow monk is fun too, if you're going into game at lvl 8 or higher.
Still, if we're talking about a long haul campaign that starts at lvl 1-3, single level dip for versatility and added flavor is all you'll want if you're main class is monk. Then take monk all the way to 14 before considering more multiclass levels.
For this, I'd say your best single level dips are cleric, fighter, warlock, and to a lesser extent sorcerer if you have the stats to meet the requirements. Each gives you a pretty solid set of tools at lvl 1.
I know this post is about a year old now already, however I'd still like to disagree lol
Until you hit very high levels your weapon damage wil always be higher than your unarmed strike damage. Monks already struggle with keeping up in damage after the early-mid tiers so not taking a good weapon is just going to leave you even further behind. Fighting Initiate exists, however you don't get many ASI. You already want to have your DEX as high as possible and also a decent WIS and CON, and if you are going to use an ASI for a feat you're MUCH better off with picking Mobile so you can use your BA to deal more damage or Dash instead of Disengage and so you can Disengage without needing to use your limited Ki points. Twilight Cleric is a good dip as well though, no question.
I've never encountered a forum where I got this many "talking to a wall" impressions as this one...
I ran with a Sun Soul Monk/Light Cleric in Storm King's Thunder, honestly was a fantastic time. She had mostly debuff and buff spells outside of the subclass spells, used Patient Defense a lot, and made a really good frontline support. She dumped Wisdom and Constitution though, but had a decent AC and dodge/disengage/Sanctuary, there was a lot of synergy between the two classes. Damage-wise, not amazing, but it's pure support. Cast Bane and start stunning, throw out healing words when needed, and spells like Beacon of Hope basically mimic a Paladin when you're already in melee doing Monk shit.
I'm surprised you had good success with debuff spells like Bane and using Stunning Strike when you dumped WIS considering your save DC would've been super low as well, plus since you dumped CON too it means you would've had a much more difficult time keeping up concentration on your buff and debuff spells.
Unless you used "dumped" incorrectly here of course.
I've never encountered a forum where I got this many "talking to a wall" impressions as this one...
My bad, I said WIS, I meant CHA, I was on a 19 hour shift when I wrote that. CON was 10, but I didn't take that many hits, honestly. Party had a Paladin that drew a lot of fire, and Patient Defense along with kiting using Sun Bolts makes a pretty survivable character.
I've run a Kensei/Samurai/Forge (12/4/4) Aarakocra, with Mobile feat, in a feudal Asian flavored campaign for the last 4ish years. Its been a lot of fun and frustrating as hell for our DM. Even Sentinel didn't help him out much because all it did was keep me in range to focus damage on one enemy. Forge Cleric was a storyline based decision, and the small dose of healing was a big boon to the party as a whole. I'm still torn on whether Action Surge, Fighting Spirit, and Second Wind were a good trade off for the losses of more Ki, and the redundant Extra Attack wasted level.
I think it can work and be pretty sweet, provided you don't care about high level spells or monk super abilities (touch of death for example). What a war cleric/drunken master monk multiclass gets you is a monk who can use a longsword as monk weapon (dedicated weapon), get a bonus action longsword attack (Wis times per day), divine favor on unarmed attacks, bless or bane, can disengage after attacking for a hit and run style, heal yourself or others. The Fist of God build uses the monk's flurry of blows with divine favor to do (eventually) 1d6+1d4+ Dex for every unarmed strike 4 times per round until the ki runs out or 3 times per round normally after monk 5. If you go to cleric level 8, you can add another 1d8 per attack for 1d6+1d4+1d8+ Dex for an average of 16 per strike. 45 hp per round or 60 per ki point round. and you have a bunch of cleric spells to help out.
Depending on the sub-classes, it may work in-character, as you can argue that some sub-classes Clerics and Monks may thematically work together due to the learnings of a specific god. I have an Ascendant Dragon Monk, and I'm planning to go with either War, Life, or even a Forge Domain Cleric. Plus, multiclassing can be a character-based thing too, since it can add more roleplay options.
If you really like the flavour by all means make this character, but after trying to theory craft a build out of it I don't think it's better than a pure monk, nor better than a pure cleric.
For the monk part you can use spells like divine favor, holy weapon (If your DM doesn't mind you using your fists as weapons) and spiritual shroud to increase your dmg with every hit, however using your bonus action to cast a spell means you can't use it for flurry of blows, meaning you'll have to consider the lost flurry/unarmed attack when calculating for your new dpr. You also have to take into consideration that all of these spells require concentration, meaning between casting and your next round you could lose the spell and will have to cast it again, further tanking your dmg. A last point to consider is that dmg now is better than dmg later in DnD. If you flurry on your fist round you could kill your target, stopping them from making another attack before your next round, or capitalizing on a hold person spell and critting with every hit. Even the war cleric's bonus action attack isn't worth taking a class level in unless you have a strong magical weapon. The dmg won't beat a flurry of blows, and even compared to one bonus action unarmed attack the increase in dmg is minimal. The pure benefits boils down to the spells, but you get some healing and utility for slowing your class progression.
As a cleric the main benefits you get is another way to calculate AC (though clerics already have a great armor class, so this is mostly flavor), the ability to flurry (though imo clerics have so many great bonus action options this is redundant), and potentially multiattack. All this at the expense of slowing your spellcast and access to great higher level spells.
The main benefit is the versatility that spellcasting and channel divinity give you compared to pure Monk, and the speed and melee options that Monk gives you compared to pure Cleric. I mixed Kensai with War Cleric on a character and had a blast with it, because it meant I could be in more of a support role in some combats, joining the front-liners, or racing down distant high threat targets in the next, plus it gave me more to do outside of combat.
Is it stronger than either? Not really, as there are always trade-offs in multi-classing, but it's a lot of fun to be able to switch roles as needed, or as you please, and can be very useful. A pure Cleric has the option of spirit guardians + spiritual weapon for "melee" but this is often better against enemy groups rather than individual threats, and depending upon the length of campaign the Cleric/Monk can still get these if they want them.
This depends a lot on the target; I wouldn't use divine favor or similar when facing a group of weaker enemies, but when facing boss monsters, i.e- high durability, usually lone enemies, where there's no chance of them going down in one or two rounds, the extra damage can add up fast.
Concentration is definitely a big concern, but it depends partly on whether you're the highest threat or not; if you're not the only front-liner then it's usually best if the other(s) can draw focus (or just be the only viable target) initially, as that helps. The rough math on divine favor specifically wants at least two rounds out of it; if we assume a 1d6 martial arts dice and +4 Dexterity, giving up Flurry of Blows means losing an average of 15 damage, which is what you'll gain from the extra 1d4's on six attacks (Extra Attack both rounds, Flurry of Blows in the second) so you only break even.
If you can get three rounds though it's worth it, or if the target is vulnerable to radiant damage or resistant to physical damage then two rounds is already paying off. It's also very good if you start fighting at range; my Kensai/War Cleric would sometimes start at range with a longbow before closing, either because the enemy is too far away, or both the Fighter and Blood Hunter in the group turned up that day so I wasn't needed on the front-line, but again the value depends what you're facing as Ki-fuelled Attack or War Priest for a third attack can be more useful for a quick kill.
One more level in Monk only gives one extra Ki point (so one extra Flurry of Blows per short rest), but a single level dip in War Cleric gives you WIS bonus action weapon attacks per long rest, and I found it very useful to have another resource to burn on a Monk. Even with a Wisdom of +3, that's 3 extra uses to burn per long rest, meaning you'd need at least two short rests for the same in Ki points.
How useful this is depends upon a few factors; the quality of the weapon being one, but it doesn't have to be magical, as you can use War Priest with a shortbow on any Monk at range, while saving the Ki required to trigger Ki-fuelled Attack (plus for most Monks Focused Aim is the only trigger at range anyway). This is good on a Kensai who can be using a longbow instead, and while they have Deft Strike to trigger Ki-fuelled Attack with, it still gives you the option of saving Ki. Of course with a decent magic weapon that will be even better, but I wouldn't say it has to be strong, even a basic +1 or +2 weapon increases the value of a bonus action weapon attack quite a bit. The other factor is if your group has anything that only triggers via weapons, which can include poisons that you can obtain and apply yourself.
But yeah, the benefit is definitely more the utility; a single level dip into Cleric gives Monks a fair bit of extra utility and options in and out of combat, and so do the 2nd- and 3rd-levels in Cleric if your campaign is long enough to justify taking them. It's certainly not one of the strongest multiclasses, like slapping Fighter onto something for Action Surge, or Warlock on pretty much any Charisma caster, but you gain plenty to offset what you're delaying.
The key challenge in my experience was picking the right levels; delaying Extra Attack on a Monk is rough, and War Cleric doesn't really help with that, though divine favor can in the right circumstances. But once you take Monk to 5th-level, you often want 6th-level for the sub-class feature (though some at this level aren't great) and then 7th-level for Evasion, maybe 8th-level for the second Ability Score Improvement…
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The issue is that Monks get an unlimited BA attack, that will quickly outperform any weapon attack (both require the Attack action be taken), with a limited use BA double attack (FoB). So unless you are using a magic weapon (pretty limited for Monk) or are using a Greatsword/Halberd/Battleaxe (now you need high Str, Wis, and Dex) you will never use the War Priest BA attack.
Now, if your party is lacking a healer or anyone else who can ritual cast, I could see the Cleric dip not being a bad choice for some 1st level spells. But if you do, you are delaying Ki points, ASIs, and Martial Arts dice for some versatility that is ideally covered by another party member.
I already pointed out ranged weapons, as every Monk can use a shortbow, Kensai can use a longbow; unarmed strikes aren't any use if you can't reach a target, and nothing is better for defence than being hard or impossible to hit back. There are also a fair few magic weapons that work well for Monks; a sun blade for example can be used by any Monk, a flame tongue is available as a shortsword if you can't get longsword proficiency etc.
But even basic +1, +2 etc. weapons are beneficial as they don't just do a little more damage, they also have a better chance of hitting. And like I said, you can use them with anything else that requires a weapon, such as a poison, certain spells etc.
It takes a while for Martial Arts to outpace weapons, only Flurry of Blows will outperform it most of the time, but that costs Ki. The benefit of War Priest to a Monk is not having to spend Ki, while Ki-fuelled Attack is not having to spend more Ki (since it's triggered by spending at least one already, e.g- Focused Strike to prevent a near miss), this helps with Monk's resource management.
My Kensai/War Domain multiclass character made a lot of use of Ki-fuelled Attack (via Deft Strike or Focused Aim) and War Priest for making three longbow attacks in the campaign he featured in. Which meant not only solid damage at range, but when he closed into melee range he had more Ki to leftover for Flurry of Blows or Patient Defence.
1-3 levels of delay on these isn't that big of a deal depending upon your expected campaign length; a loss of one Ki isn't a problem if you're getting one or more additional resources instead. All Clerics are giving you spell slots (two for a single level, three with a second, or six for a three level dip), plus any other resources they give (Channel Divinity at second level, War Domain gives WIS uses of War Priest at 1st-level etc.). Martial Arts dice progression isn't a big deal either as it's only an average of 1 damage per hit.
While yes, in an ideal world everything is better covered by another party member, that's not always going to be the case, and what matters most is the character you're trying to build and what you want to play as. Even if your spellcasting as a multiclass will be miles behind a pure caster, it's still more casting for the group (plus casters gain slots fastest at earlier levels, so it's a hefty resource boost). Meanwhile a lot of higher level Monk features in 5e also just aren't very good, so delaying or losing access to them isn't a great loss.
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War Cleric’s heavy armour and the BA attack was not the big draw for my Bugbear Mercy Monk. Adding a d4 to every attack from Divine Favour, (if your DM lets you pre-cast), plus 2d6 per is a great opener. I wish we were given more KI points I would love to have room to add action surge to this combo.
That would only work on your weapon attacks, not on your BA Martial Arts or FoB. So you would be sacrificing an extra 1d6 to 2d6 in the first round for an extra 2d4 for each following round (assuming you maintain concentration). And you can only do this 2-3 times per day, whereas your Ki comes back on a short rest.
Not sure what the "plus 2d6 per" means there.
I think the 2d6 is from the Bugbear's updated Surprise Attack feature in Mordenkainen's Monsters of the Multiverse, which IMO is currently a bit broken as if you can get off a flurry of blows early in the round you could be landing an extra 8d6 damage in the first turn if you've got your Extra Attack. You could also do it using weapons and divine favor (no flurry of blows) for 4d6 + 2d4, probably with a view to using Ki-fuelled Attack or War Priest in following rounds for three weapon attacks (and up to 3d4 radiant damage in each of those rounds).
While the 3d4 extra damage in later rounds isn't world shattering extra damage, it can still add up, but the big secondary benefit is that you're not spending any Ki points (unless you get the third weapon attack via Ki-fuelled Attack), just a spell slot and some of your Wisdom modifier War Priest uses (so probably 3+) which is still pretty good value for only a single level dip into Cleric required to get it. It's a good way to maximise the spell, and squeeze the most out of a combination of Cleric resources while conserving Ki for later use, or for things like Focused Aim (which in turn can trigger Ki-fuelled Attack so you can save a use of War Priest instead).
I've done the same myself on my Kensei/War Cleric, but mostly with a view to ranged rather than melee (where you're more likely to lose concentration before divine favor pays off), though the Bugbear excels at that too since their Surprise Attack applies to any type of attack.
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Same here, I am starting a level 3 character 2-monk 1-cleric in the trickster domain. The second level in trickster cleric giving the mirror image and advantage on attack seems super useful to me. Excited to level up and see how it goes.
Not sure what you mean about BA attacks not being weapon attacks for the DF spell. I did suggest that you would need the DMs ok to precast Divine Favour before the fight breaks out.
From Sage Advice on this site
Can a monk use Stunning Strike with an unarmed strike, even though unarmed strikes aren’t weapons?
Yes. Stunning Strike works with melee weapon attacks, and an unarmed strike is a special type of melee weapon attack.
The game often makes exceptions to general rules, and this is an important exception: that unarmed strikes count as melee weapon attacks despite not being weapons.