I'm very new to DnD and I'm designing a Monk character. The campaign is suppose to be norse mythology based and my DM mentioned that he already has lore written about monotheistic monks that were almost completely wiped out in religious crusades. My character is a survivor of one said destroyed monastery that lived as a hermit for many years travelling and studying both the martial arts and ancient ruins and religions. He also has known anger issues not very suited for a monk due to his time in hiding and mistrust of people and certain bitterness about his past both at barbarians for hunting him and at his monastery for some of their stubborn traditions leading to being unable to defend themselves.

But I'm looking for ideas on where to take the character both build-wise and character. I'm focusing the warrior side more than the scholar but I'm interested in the focus of "staying true to the ways" and running way of the open hand and a quarterstaff that I will eventually drop entirely (especially if I can convince my DM into some fist weapons), compared to the idea of him adapting a more unique style in his survival and bitterness like way of Kensei sounds fun. I'm thinking like an Oni mask and a homebrew Kusarigama. Like I designed a demon mask and weapon based on my studies to terrifying bounty hunters or bandits in my time alone. This also seems to make more sense if through the campaign he leans more towards adapting from the monastery's ways or turning on them entirely.

My DM has opened up an ability for the character based on his anger issues like a monk based Rage. Where for 3 turns I have extra ki and can roll to dodge all attacks made against me but every enemy on the battlefield will focus me.

If you're very new to D&D, I'd recommend you just stick to regular monk mechanics for now. You don't need a special power to be angry in combat, you can roleplay it. Maybe he attacks the last person who hit him, regardless of tactics. Maybe if he drops someone you describe him continuing to batter the limp body. You don't need to take actions to do it if it doesn't actually affect the battle. Get into describing how you do things.

As for where to go in the future, just try to be present inside your character as the story unfolds. Be reactive. Think about what he's going through and how he'd react. Does he reach back to his training to reign in the anger, or does he embrace a darker path? Try to find that moment of decision in the game and then just try to do what he would do.

I’m mostly curious on how a Monk can be integrated into a Norse Mythology World.  I certainly can see an out of the way hermit, though I see those - traditionally - being mystical.  I’d definitely go with axes (or similar) as Monk Weapons, using fists only for the numerous mead halls your DM better let you visit.  Been watching any series or movies that kind of inform your ideas?

I mean, if you set aside the initial Wuxia aesthetic Monks have, they're essentially someone who's agile and good at fighting barehanded. Rather than being a martial artist in the traditional sense, they can be more like a straight up brawler. The basic mechanics of hand to hand combat have been explored by many cultures who then went on to have some form of wrestling, and it's not like a fiction setting needs to be a 1-to-1 match with real life examples anyways.

Quote from Appellion >>

I’m mostly curious on how a Monk can be integrated into a Norse Mythology World.  I certainly can see an out of the way hermit, though I see those - traditionally - being mystical.  I’d definitely go with axes (or similar) as Monk Weapons, using fists only for the numerous mead halls your DM better let you visit.  Been watching any series or movies that kind of inform your ideas?

 In the real world, Medieval Scandinavia (and the rest of Europe) was far more diverse that it's typically given credit for.  You could actually find merchants or diplomats from North Africa or even as far away as India up in the Norse countries.  Certainly a rare occurrence, but not an impossible one.  Something similar could happen for a D&D world.

Quote from The_Ace_of_Rogues >>

I mean, if you set aside the initial Wuxia aesthetic Monks have, they're essentially someone who's agile and good at fighting barehanded. Rather than being a martial artist in the traditional sense, they can be more like a straight up brawler. The basic mechanics of hand to hand combat have been explored by many cultures who then went on to have some form of wrestling, and it's not like a fiction setting needs to be a 1-to-1 match with real life examples anyways.

 Monks are constrained by their stats as much as their flavor. For most people a straight-up brawler would focus on STR and CON, but monk is required to focus on DEX and WIS. Mechanics like your Stunning Strike scaling in effectiveness with your WIS and Martial Arts constraining weapon and armor choices mean you have to give up a lot of your effectiveness if you try to color outside the lines.

If you want to be a brawler/wrestler, fighter or barbarian with the unarmed fighting style will require fewer mental gymnastics to reflavor.

I'd recommend this for viewing, it's slow and moody (but I like slow and moody films) and does very much give a monastic-pilgrimage vibe:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Es-CEAWXcfw

(stunning soundtrack too).  @OP - I'd want to know specifically about the lore/Pantheon, because there could be the world of difference in "Norse-like" and the actual Norse Pantheon.  If your DM's digressing, that's definitely very important to know before you do further planning.  If it is The Norse Pantheon, there's pretty much a god to cater for however you want to go, Thor or Tyr could make sense and there's a whole stack of material already available there.

I'd also ask what's the makeup of the rest of the party?  ...and as said before flavour your character through good Roleplay over additional mechanics, you'll certainly make life easier that way.

To most fully enjoy the character, the advice to just BE him is by far, the best.  I play an Open Hand Monk who started off Agnostic.  He believed in all the Gods, but felt none worthy of worship.  Events unfolded and his simplistic, linear thinking, ended up him believing a scroll they found was intentionally placed by the goddess the temple had been built for.  The scroll (Revivify I think it was) got used to bring him back....now he is a follower (actually The Follower, since in this homebrewed world, our group awakened this sleeping Goddess) of said goddess.   To get there, I had to put myself into his mind as events unfolded.  How would HE react, what would HE think and so on.  By doing that, he developed naturally and has been a joy to play.

Funky mechanics, especially those drawing attacks on yourself, aren't a good idea, IMO, unless you're the only melee in the party and expected to take some heat.  While my monk's AC is great, when he gets hit, he gets to dangerously low levels fairly quick.  I am fighting behind a Fighter and previously a Barbarian, so I wasn't drawing too much fire, just bopping away with my magical staff and fists and feet.  Stunning Strike is handy if you use it wisely.  It's a Con save, so the massive hulk-like thing might not be a good target.  Skinny bugger throwing fire at you, however, may succumb more readily.  Using the FoB perks, you can prone them or knock them back or kill their reaction.  All good tools to allow yourself or others to back away safely or, as I have done on a few occasions, boot the enemy off a ledge.  Nothing fancy or weird, just stuff I can do.  Our DM homebrewed a few things for me as well, a pair of shackles that give me a + to hit and damage on unarmed strikes, a ring that allows me, as a reaction, to make an attack roll on an enemy that has just "hit" me.  If I hit him on my roll, I roll damage and his hit misses.  I often reserve it for what we figure out to be the "big hit" of the enemy lol.

Thematically, you can go into a described rage when you enter combat, as others have said.  There doesn't need to be a mechanical effect, you can just describe the raging, a loud shout at every strike, red faced, veins bulging eyes wild.  As a Monk you can enter a fighting frenzy and it all fits, using Dex (and adding Wis for a better save DC as well as AC)  Raging doesn't have to mean a massive hulking brute smashing everything to paste.  It can just as easily be a spinning, kicking, punching, staff swinging little maniac, twirling through the battlefield leaving shattered bones in his wake.  Open Hand techniques are ideal for that too.  On a FoB for knockback, I tend to describe my Monk taking a hop step forward and thrusting his foot out into the middle of the enemy's chest, driving him back. It's all in the flavor.

I haven't gotten just a lot of info on the actual pantheon but I know my hermit discovery is suppose to literally be the location and use of Yggdrasil I'm gonna assume that it's literally the norse pantheon.

Rest of the party is a Life Cleric, Beast Master Ranger, Druid, Battle Master Fighter, Berserker Barbarian.   Seems me like the frontline is handled I can focus more on flanking

The original inspiration was actually Athelstan from the show Vikings (and slightly Ragnar). The character is religiously outcast. Neither of them are monks in the sense of unarmed combat though. That came from the idea of instead of raids across the sea, there were religious crusades attacking these types of hidden away monasteries. Which gives us ground for a monk fighting style in the traditional sense. What we end up with is a religious outcast untrusting of others who is trained in a strange form of combat than what people normally see.

You're perhaps right about the homebrew mechanics. It really started as a joke since my party and DM are all very good friends and our Barbarian is very much so an IRL large redheaded man who "unga-bungas" everything and we thought it would be funny to give him the ability called "unga-bunga" and snowballed from there.

If these types of things stick for our DM we already decided they would be actually implemented for quite a while, so I will certainly be describing my temper issues.

Sigh.  You have a monk.  And you're in a campaign based on Norse Mythology.  And you are thinking of giving him an Oni Mask and a homebrew hand scythe. 

No offense, but you're really limiting him, IMHO.  It's something I see over and over with Monk builds and I'd like to give you - and hopefully others - another option.  Like I said, no offense - you have a fine backstory and I really do hope you have a ton of fun with him.  But, you're falling victim to tropes.  And the world opens up to all kinds of possiblities is you look a little further at what a monk is, and what they can be. 

All too often I see people look at the Monk and all they see is standard martial arts character - essentially some kind of either Last Air Bender or a variant off Kung Fu cinema, or a Ninja type or something that says, "My guy does kung fu - so he's studied in some Asiatic philosophy, and he fights like that because he's a Ronin/Ninja/Shao kinda dude", which no offense, is kinda on the nose and often limits character development by locking them into that trope.  But they don't have to be that way.  

Consider what a Monk is in DnD.  From a very basic level, they're a class of martial artistry. Martial Arts aren't just Kung Fu or eastern weapons.  Martial Arts - are any art form of war, from Kung Fu to Boxing, or Native American Haida,  or even just bad-ass back alley beat down.  If you can teach it, or put it in a book and share it with others who can study it -- it's a Martial Art form.  Seriously consider than Apaches had styles and techniques of fighting that were insane - that were passed down from generation to generation.  I would rather face off against 20 Ninja, or 10 Shaolin, than a Lipan Apache War Chief any day.  A monk, could just as easily be Apache, or Nordic, Welsh, or Elven or anything - all cultures study war, and almost all have warriors who study both the physical, and the spiritual aspects of it.  

Martial Arts forms exist in every culture, and every mythology.  They can use all kinds of weapons which match up with the staff/club/axe/sword of the Monk Weaponry - or yeah, even a small scythe they used tending fields (aka a Kusarigama) if that's your cup of tea.  

Which means they're not allegiant to any geography.  I know, I know, I know -- the Player's Handbook describes the classes and so on... I really wish someone would point out that the Players Handbook and the DM's Guide are just those -- guidebooks which provide rules for play.  Your backstory, history, etc., doesn't have to be beholden to them coming from some Eastern Philosophy/Mythology just because they're a Monk.  Take the rules and keep them, but create your own monastic order. 

Maybe your Monk is from a monastery of similar to that of Upsalla, a real Nordic monastery, and they studied tactics handed down to them from Wodan himself which allow them to have Stunning Strikes and the equivalent of Ki, etc., all the goodies you get.  Maybe instead of "Quivering Palm" its some kind of death blow that takes minutes/days/hours, there are dozens of tales of warriors who hit someone and they died later, and it doesn't stop there -- virtually every item found in the players handbook from Monk classes can be made to work with another mythology if you think outside of the realm of 'they must be of an eastern mythology/philosophy' because there's an analog for every eastern philosophical / mythological element in almost every other mythology.  

So don't trap yourself into thinking they have to be from an eastern type monastery.  You're a monk.  You could just as easily be the kind that fought and lived and studied in Norway or France, or Istanbul or Egypt, and have no idea what a Zen Koan is -- your spirituality you get from walking the path of Mielikki, or Yggdrasil, or whatever, make something up.  Every culture in every geographical and mythological region has groups which studied martial arts.  Maybe it's name is 'way of the open hand' because their hands are so tough because they beat their hands on rocks at the shores of the Fjords or they're hard as stone from tending fishing nets in ice cold seawaters off the Nordic coast.  It's your story - write it your way.  The rules still apply just as if they were Ninjas, and speaking of Ninjas...  Read up on some of the Viking raiders historically - many were considered terrifying because they were silent as ghosts and moved in the shadows attacking at night or in the dark.  The same is true of assassins' monks in France and Egypt and even Native American culture.  

If you want the eastern elements - cool - my comments are not to say that's not good.  As I said, sounds like you have a cool character in mind and I would not ask anyone to break from their chosen fun.  Any way someone creates a character is good if you like the character and you're having fun.  But don't limit yourself either.  If you ever find yourself hitting a wall with a Monk character because you're trying to work in the trope and trappings of the eastern martial arts memes around what you want your character to be... don't be afraid to break down the trope wall and go your own way.  It's easy to drop into a trope because that's how it is in the book, don't lock yourself to that though. 

I guess, what I'm trying to say is don't be afraid to play around with really wild ideas and make your character your own, the rules and almost all DMs will work with you.  

I now step off my soapbox, and return you to your regularly scheduled discussion... 

Quote from rjakobson >>

Sigh.  You have a monk.  And you're in a campaign based on Norse Mythology.  And you are thinking of giving him an Oni Mask and a homebrew hand scythe. 

No offense, but you're really limiting him, IMHO.  It's something I see over and over with Monk builds and I'd like to give you - and hopefully others - another option.  Like I said, no offense - you have a fine backstory and I really do hope you have a ton of fun with him.  But, you're falling victim to tropes.  And the world opens up to all kinds of possiblities is you look a little further at what a monk is, and what they can be. 

All too often I see people look at the Monk and all they see is standard martial arts character - essentially some kind of either Last Air Bender or a variant off Kung Fu cinema, or a Ninja type or something that says, "My guy does kung fu - so he's studied in some Asiatic philosophy, and he fights like that because he's a Ronin/Ninja/Shao kinda dude", which no offense, is kinda on the nose and often limits character development by locking them into that trope.  But they don't have to be that way.  

Consider what a Monk is in DnD.  From a very basic level, they're a class of martial artistry. Martial Arts aren't just Kung Fu or eastern weapons.  Martial Arts - are any art form of war, from Kung Fu to Boxing, or Native American Haida,  or even just bad-ass back alley beat down.  If you can teach it, or put it in a book and share it with others who can study it -- it's a Martial Art form.  Seriously consider than Apaches had styles and techniques of fighting that were insane - that were passed down from generation to generation.  I would rather face off against 20 Ninja, or 10 Shaolin, than a Lipan Apache War Chief any day.  A monk, could just as easily be Apache, or Nordic, Welsh, or Elven or anything - all cultures study war, and almost all have warriors who study both the physical, and the spiritual aspects of it.  

Martial Arts forms exist in every culture, and every mythology.  They can use all kinds of weapons which match up with the staff/club/axe/sword of the Monk Weaponry - or yeah, even a small scythe they used tending fields (aka a Kusarigama) if that's your cup of tea.  

Which means they're not allegiant to any geography.  I know, I know, I know -- the Player's Handbook describes the classes and so on... I really wish someone would point out that the Players Handbook and the DM's Guide are just those -- guidebooks which provide rules for play.  Your backstory, history, etc., doesn't have to be beholden to them coming from some Eastern Philosophy/Mythology just because they're a Monk.  Take the rules and keep them, but create your own monastic order. 

Maybe your Monk is from a monastery of similar to that of Upsalla, a real Nordic monastery, and they studied tactics handed down to them from Wodan himself which allow them to have Stunning Strikes and the equivalent of Ki, etc., all the goodies you get.  Maybe instead of "Quivering Palm" its some kind of death blow that takes minutes/days/hours, there are dozens of tales of warriors who hit someone and they died later, and it doesn't stop there -- virtually every item found in the players handbook from Monk classes can be made to work with another mythology if you think outside of the realm of 'they must be of an eastern mythology/philosophy' because there's an analog for every eastern philosophical / mythological element in almost every other mythology.  

So don't trap yourself into thinking they have to be from an eastern type monastery.  You're a monk.  You could just as easily be the kind that fought and lived and studied in Norway or France, or Istanbul or Egypt, and have no idea what a Zen Koan is -- your spirituality you get from walking the path of Mielikki, or Yggdrasil, or whatever, make something up.  Every culture in every geographical and mythological region has groups which studied martial arts.  Maybe it's name is 'way of the open hand' because their hands are so tough because they beat their hands on rocks at the shores of the Fjords or they're hard as stone from tending fishing nets in ice cold seawaters off the Nordic coast.  It's your story - write it your way.  The rules still apply just as if they were Ninjas, and speaking of Ninjas...  Read up on some of the Viking raiders historically - many were considered terrifying because they were silent as ghosts and moved in the shadows attacking at night or in the dark.  The same is true of assassins' monks in France and Egypt and even Native American culture.  

If you want the eastern elements - cool - my comments are not to say that's not good.  As I said, sounds like you have a cool character in mind and I would not ask anyone to break from their chosen fun.  Any way someone creates a character is good if you like the character and you're having fun.  But don't limit yourself either.  If you ever find yourself hitting a wall with a Monk character because you're trying to work in the trope and trappings of the eastern martial arts memes around what you want your character to be... don't be afraid to break down the trope wall and go your own way.  It's easy to drop into a trope because that's how it is in the book, don't lock yourself to that though. 

I guess, what I'm trying to say is don't be afraid to play around with really wild ideas and make your character your own, the rules and almost all DMs will work with you.  

I now step off my soapbox, and return you to your regularly scheduled discussion... 

 Well said. Just because a class is described one way in the players handbook doesn’t mean that’s the only way they can be. 

To the OP, you don’t have to have a homebrew “rage”. That is your Ki reflavored. You get angry in battle so you “rage” (spend a Ki point) and make two unarmed attacks (flurry of blows) as a bonus action. You can describe it as in a fit of fury you swing wildly 3-4 times with your fists (or kick or elbow or knee) at your opponent. Or you swing your axe twice then follow by bashing them in the face with a fist and kick to the gut. 

Open hand seems like a good option. So does Kensei if you prefer focusing on your weapons. Mercy can work (it comes with a mask 😉) if you focus on the harm aspect more. But you can also do Drunken Master. Nothing says you need to drink for your abilities to work. You get extra movement and disengage when you “rage” (FoB). Get up from prone quickly and redirect a missed attack. Your “rage” (spend 2 Ki) to cancel disadvantage. And when you are really really mad you can make 7 attacks against different targets. 

You can pretty much do this with any of the subclasses to fit your character. Don’t let the names of subclasses/abilities pigeonhole. 

When i hear "norse monk" the Greybeards at High Hrothgar in Skyrim come to my mind, studying the secrets of "The Voice" or something like that, its been a long time since i played Skyrim. But as a Variant they could train to get ready for any kind of Ragnarök Scenario or to gather, preserve and protect ancient lore, turning their body into the tools that are required, because weapons can get lost, break, or are "soulless instruments of bloodshed and murder, and only useful to fight against mundane threats" or something equally obscure.

You might also take a look at the ki-adepts of the Shadowrun universe, as they mostly are also less centered on the eastern martial arts stereotypes.