The monks of this tradition, better known as the Praying Mantis Style, studied the techniques, strategies, form and attributes of the praying mantis, applying their fundamentals to martial arts and using them as inspiration for their techniques. It's a style primarily based on agility, continuous attacks, joint manipulation, redirection, and pressure point attacks. The main defensive and offensive movements are of the arms and wrists, while the lower body uses agile footwork to move in and out of range, reposition, and maintain balance, with attack and defense limited to short movements. The hand positioning resembles the claws of a praying mantis and serves to hold limbs, strike, block, and parry.

Level 3: Praying Mantis Implements

To use pressure points effectively, whether beneficial or harmful, you've acquired medical knowledge and agile, precise hands. You gain proficiency in the Medicine and Sleight of Hand skills.

Level 3: Praying Mantis Style Adept

Your practice of the Praying Mantis Style is reflected in the following abilities. When you hit a creature with an unarmed strike, you can spend 1 ki point to strike a pressure point, forcing the target to make a Constitution saving throw. On a failed save, they suffer one of the following effects, your choice:

• The target has disadvantage on the next saving throw it makes before the end of your next turn.
• Choose an arm or similar limb; the target releases whatever they're holding with the chosen limb, dropping it at their feet. If the attack that triggered this effect was a critical hit, the limb becomes unusable until the start of your next turn.
• The target's speed is halved until the end of your next turn. If the attack that triggered this effect was a critical hit, the target is also knocked prone.
• The target can't use reactions until the end of your next turn.
• The next attack roll against the target before the end of your next turn has advantage.

When one of these pressure point effects succeeds, you can't attempt to apply it to the same target again in the same turn. You can hit a pressure point with one of the attacks guaranteed by your Flurry of Blows without spending the ki point.

Furthermore, when a creature you can see hits you with a melee attack, you can use your reaction to reduce the damage taken by 1d10 + your Dexterity modifier + your monk level. If you reduce the damage to 0, you can spend 1 ki point to hit the attacker's pressure point as part of the same reaction. If you used your Patient Defense on your last turn, you don't need to spend this ki point.

Finally, when using the Disengage option of your Step of the Wind, you can make an unarmed strike or a attack with a monk weapon in melee as part of the same bonus action.

Level 6: Medicinal Pressure Points

You've learned to use pressure points beneficially. During a short or long rest, you can perform a quick acupuncture session on yourself or an adjacent ally. The recipient, when spending hit dice to regain hit points, regains additional hit points equal to two rolls of your Martial Arts die. If the creature receiving the acupuncture session has exhaustion levels, they also lose 1 level in the case of a short rest and 2 levels (instead of the normal 1) in the case of a long one.

Additionally, you can use a bonus action to touch a paralyzed, stunned, blinded, or deafened creature and make a Wisdom (Medicine) check against the DC of the check the creature made to try to avoid the condition or the check it must do to end it (if there are no such checks, treat as DC 15). On a success, the condition ends for the creature. If the creature is suffering from more than one of these conditions, you can end all those whose DC your Medicine check passes on the same bonus action. You can also use a bonus action to stabilize a creature with 0 hit points.

Level 11: Strike Body and Mind

Your precise techniques can affect the mind, which in turn affects the body, and vice versa. You gain the following abilities:

• When you use your Stunning Strike or hit a pressure point, you can force the target to make a Wisdom saving throw instead of a Constitution saving throw to avoid the effect.
• When a creature within your reach casts a spell, but before its effect takes effect, you can, as a reaction, spend 1 ki point and make an unarmed strike against that creature. If you hit, the spell fails and nothing happens, so the action used for the spell is lost, but the spell slot or use is not expended.
• When you deal damage to a creature by concentrating on a spell or ability that requires concentration, the creature has disadvantage on the saving throw to maintain concentration.
• Once on each of your turns, when you hit a creature with an unarmed strike or monk weapon in melee, you can deal the target extra psychic damage equal to one roll of your Martial Arts die. If you succeeded with a Stunning Strike or pressure point hit on that attack, the extra damage is two Martial Arts dice instead of one.

Level 17: Debilitating Whirlwind

You have learned to perform the highest-level technique of the Praying Mantis Style, allowing you to attack multiple enemies in a whirlwind of blows that affect their nervous systems. As an action, you can spend 4 ki points to make an unarmed strike against any number of creatures within your reach. On a hit, a creature takes 5d10 psychic damage in addition to the attack's normal damage and must make a Constitution or Wisdom saving throw (your choice). If they fail the saving throw, they have disadvantage on their attack rolls, saving throws, and ability checks. You can choose one of the targets you hit so that if they fail the saving throw, they are paralyzed instead of gaining the disadvantages, but by doing so, you forgo trying to give the disadvantages to other targets you hit. Once you successfully paralyze a target, you cannot attempt to do so again until you complete a short or long rest. Disadvantages or paralysis last for a number of rounds equal to 1 plus the number of targets you missed (assume a round ends at the end of your turn). If it lasts more than one round, each affected target can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of their turns, ending the effect prematurely on a success.