Ice Strike Monk Leveling Build

Build Introduction

The Ice Strike Monk is a fast, easy, reliable way to start your Path of Exile 2 journey! This leveling guide is viable for league starters and new characters, and focuses on providing the smoothest, safest leveling experience it can.

Consistently freeze and shatter your enemies, avoid incoming damage, and teleport around, blowing up entire packs of monsters and deleting bosses before they even get a chance to move. A fun, fast, and safe option, with multiple Ascendancy options for you to choose from!

This guide was written and is maintained by Lollash. If you have any questions or feedback, you can find him here.

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Strengths and Weaknesses

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Ascendancy

Select your first Ascendancy after completing the Trial of the Sekhemas in Act 2. The trial is not difficult, so complete it within the level range of 20-30. During the early access of Path of Exile 2, the Monk can ascend as an Invoker, Martial Artist, or Acolyte of Chayula. You will be choosing Invoker or Martial Artist, both providing powerful bonuses that can scale the build

Invoker

1. I am the Blizzard… – This adds additional cold damage to all your attacks, boosting damage and improving your freeze rate.
2. … and I Shall Rage – Provides a new cooldown skill that dramatically increases your damage for bosses and other dangerous encounters.
3. Lead me through Grace… – Grants additional Spirit based on your Evasion and Energy Shield from your equipped Body Armour.

Martial Artist

NOTE: This is an entirely new Ascendancy, so these are my best guesses at what will be most valuable. They may change suddenly and quickly upon further testing after the update goes live.

1. Runic Meridians will give you 5 Rune Sockets you can use to gain bonus stats in the campaign. While this is speculative, having access to additional resistances that you dont lose when changing gear is already very strong, and we know that with Runes of Aldur you will get a lot of new Runes, including many new special options.
2. Hollow Focus Technique will periodically spawn bells around you, providing additional targets for Shattering Palm and improving your clear.
3. Hollow Resonance Technique attaches a bell to your back that will deal damage in an area around you whenever you crit. This will improve both single-target and area damage and should be quite good once you have some additional Critical Strike scaling.

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General Leveling Advice

Path of Exile II’s campaign can be quite difficult starting out, but with this build it will be a breeze. The most important thing by far in the early campaign is to CHECK VENDORS FOR GOOD EARLY GEAR. 

Look for the following gear from vendors:

1. Quarterstaffs with higher DPS than you currently have/with sockets for runes (Until Hollow Palm Technique)
2. + Added flat damage on Gloves and Rings
3. + Level of All Melee Skills on Amulet and Gloves
4. Boots with #% increased movement speed
5. Any gear with Maximum Life, Resistances, or good Evasion and/or Energy Shield.

Regal Orbs or Orbs of Augmentation can be used on these items that you find as magic. If you can’t find pieces from bullets 1 or 2 and find yourself struggling, consider buying them off the trade site using Exalted Orbs or gambling for them from the vendors.

Vendor bad magic or rare items you don’t need for gold, do NOT disenchant anything besides white items with sockets or quality. It is always worth Identifying rare items, even if you have to buy a Scroll of Wisdom during Act 1, as Rare items will always gain more value from being identified than a Scroll of Wisdom costs.

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Leveling Passive Tree

The Passive Tree below can be followed all the way through the campaign and into the endgame. Remember: You will need to choose which attributes to assign to each travel node based on the requirements of your gear and skill gems.

Skill Gems

Listed below are all Skill Gems that should be used during the leveling process. There may be a slight variation depending on which Act you’re currently progressing. Notes for each Act will be listed below the Skill Gem tool.

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Act I Notes

Until you get access to Ice Strike later in Act 1, you will be using your Quarterstaff Strike in combination with Tempest Bell for single-target damage. For clearing, you will use Killing Palm to generate Power Charges and then consume them with Falling Thunder for massive high-damage AoE nukes.

Getting used to darting into combat with Killing Palm and rolling away to use Falling Thunder to hit large packs may take some time, but is very effective and will only be required until Ice Strike is available.

You will be rushing towards Hollow Palm Technique on the passive tree, a powerful keystone that makes leveling a breeze! If you have no weapon equipped, it grants additional base damage to all of your Quarterstaff skills, as well as some additional Critical Strike Chance and Attack Speed bonuses. This means you will no longer have to worry about finding or upgrading your weapon consistently through the campaign.

Once Ice Strike is online, you use it exclusively while moving through the map, casting Frost Bomb and Tempest Bell on tougher enemies. This play pattern can take you all the way from level 14 to 70 with minimal adjustments, but we will be adding some additional tools later on.

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Act 2 Notes

In Act 2 you will continue adding supports to your existing skills when possible, progressing through the passive tree and searching for gear upgrades. If you find a Level 8 Uncut Spirit Gem towards the end of the Act then cut a Combat Frenzy to automate the generation of your power charges by freezing enemies with Ice Strike. This will be important once you get access to Charged Staff with a
Level 9 Uncut Skill Gem.

You will also be cutting an Elemental Weakness Curse Skill Gem, and a Freezing Mark Skill Gem. The Curse will shred enemy Elemental Resistances, and the Mark will increase the speed of freezing the boss, and then grant you additional Cold Damage for a duration.

Upon completing the Trial of the Sekhemas, you will ascend and allocate:

• Invoker:
  • I Am The Blizzard… for a significant damage boost.

• Martial Artist:
  • Runic Meridians will let you socket 5 Runes into your character, providing a lot of raw stats and possibly some cool unique effects from the Runes of Aldur League runes.

With the new skills you have acquired, your approach to bosses changes slightly. First, just before they become targetable, cast your Elemental Weakness, followed by Frost Bomb and Freezing Mark when they do spawn. Then continue using the combo you have been using up until this point. If the enemy isn’t dead by the time the curse expires, repeat the Curse and Frost bomb to reapply their debuffs and shred enemy resistances.

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Act 3 Notes

In Act 3 you will find your first guaranteed Lesser Jeweller’s Orb in the Sandswept Marsh. Use this on Ice Strike and add a third support to improve your clearing speed. You will also be adding Charged Staff, a buffing skill that consumes Power Charges to provide you with an on-hit lightning wave to all attacks. This will dramatically improve your damage and area of clear, as well as adding some lightning damage that may lead to more frequent shocks on the enemy.

You will also be cutting a Shattering Palm Skill Gem, which will also help speed up your clear significantly. This changes your clear pattern slightly. You will dash into the enemy packs with Shattering Palm before Ice Strike to apply a powerful Area of Effect damage debuff to all monsters in the pack.

To generate charges, you will use a combination of the Combat Frenzy Spirit Gem and the Keystone Passive Resonance to automatically generate charges whenever you freeze enemies. After defeating Ignagduk in the Azak Bog you will get an additional 30 Spirit and if you havent already, cut and add Combat Frenzy to your skills.

Continue the main questline until you reach the Temple of Chaos, and upon Ascending allocate

• Invoker
  • … and I Shall Rage for a long cooldown, high impact damage buff skill: Unbound Avatar. Use this when fighting bosses and other tough enemies.
• Martial Artist
  • Hollow Focus Technique will periodically spawn Bells around you that can provide additional targets for Shattering Palm, and that deal damage when hit by any of your attacks for more AOE damage.

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Act 4 and the Interludes

In Act 4 you will have complete freedom to complete each zone in whatever order you choose. For this build there is no important priority, so feel free to explore! You can visit Ngakanu to find an extra weapon Vendor to check for new Quarterstaffs, and Arastas has a vendor with jewelry. Otherwise continue to fill out and level up your support gems, and follow the Passive Tree Planner.

Late in Act 4, or early in the interludes, you will allocate the Heavy Frost notable on your passive tree. After doing this you can stop using Frost Bomb and Elemental Weakness if you’d like to press less buttons, as any frozen target is counted as having no elemental resistances and you will so consistently and quickly freeze and kill things that the resistance shredding is no longer necessary most of the time.

When reaching the Interludes you can choose to complete them in any order you wish. Once again, some classes have a preferential order but this one does not, so pick whichever one appeals to you the most.

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Rotation

For Bosses or tanky Rares, try to enter the fight with full Power Charges ready to cast Charged Staff as the fight begins

1. Cast Frost Bomb, Elemental Weakness and Freezing Mark.
2. Ice Strike to build combo for your Tempest Bell, then use it.
3. Ice Strike until Tempest Bell is available again.
4. Maintain your Charged Staff buff as much as possible.
5. Reapply debuffs from Frost Bomb, Elemental Weakness and Freezing Mark.

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Gearing Progression

This build equips item upgrades during the campaign according to a stat priority list. You will want to regularly upgrade your Quarterstaff, identifying every one that drops looking for affixes from the list below. Then use your crafting currencies to try to improve any that already have good affixes. Remember, you can always equip a new weapon and check the tooltip DPS value in your skill gem screen to see if its a better

For defenses, focus mostly on improving your resistances and maximum life values, but pay attention to pieces with particularly high evasion and energy shield.

Offensive Gear

Prioritize the following stats to improve your offensive power. Remember that added damage to attacks can also be found on your rings and gloves for even more damage!

1. Attack Speed
2. Adds # to # Damage (All Types are valuable)
3. % increased Elemental Damage with Attacks

Defensive Gear

Prioritize the following stats on armor and jewelry pieces to improve your defensive power.

1. Maximum Life
2. Resistances
3. Evasion/Energy Shield

Augments

Socket Runes into your gear to help bring your missing resistances to the base cap of 75%, or to help with meeting attribute requirements. For your Quarterstaff, runes that add flat damage are best in the early campaign, and later on runes that grant % increased physical damage are better. Exactly when this happens is highly dependent on your weapon.

You can Salvage gear you would otherwise vendor that has sockets at the Salvage Bench to obtain Artificer’s Orbs to put extra sockets on your gear. This will allow you to frequently use these orbs to add sockets to your best gear pieces, and socket more resistances to make the campaign even easier!

Leveling Uniques

This build is entirely League-Start / no-budget viable. But if you do have extra currency, pick up these uniques for a twink leveling character.

Weapons and Offhands

• Pillar of the Caged God – Very powerful when combined with other Attribute granting uniques, such as the unique belt Meginord’s Girdle, until Hollow Palm Technique.

Boots

• Wanderlust – Excellent boots with Move speed and immunity to slows, usable from Level 11.

Helm

• Goldrim – Tons of resistances, usable from Level 10.

Chest

• Foxshade – Grants Movement speed and Evasion, usable from Level 4.

Amulet

• Surefooted Sigil – Increases dodge roll distance, and Evasion after dodge rolling. Usable from Level 8.

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Return of the Ancients Mechanics

With the Return of the Ancients update, and its accompanying Runes of Aldur League, there are a ton of new tools being introduced that will dramatically change up itemization. One of the additions is the introduction of powerful runes available at low levels that grant powerful stats for specific builds.

If you are struggling with your character or are running low on currency, you should consider engaging with this mechanic often to earn targeted rewards to help boost your power.

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Campaign Buffs

Throughout the campaign, you will encounter several opportunities to gain permanent buffs for your character by completing side-quests. You should choose the following buffs for the Invoker:

• Valley of the Titans Altar (Act 2)
  • 30% increased charm charges gained.
• Venom Draught (Act 3)
  • 25% increased Mana Regeneration Rate.
• Eye of Hinekora (Act 4)
  • Resistances from all three Tattoos.
• Tribal Medicine (Act 4)
  • Rakiata’s Lesson (Evasion as Deflection Rating)
• Solitary Confinement (Act 4)
  • % increased recovery from Life Flasks.
• Qimah Pillars
  • These can be changed at will, so you can choose Resistances to help early and later swap to global defenses, movement speed, etc.

For more details, check the guide on Campaign Difficulties and Permanent Stat Bonuses.

Flasks and Charms

While leveling, you will find several flasks and Charms. Upgrade your flasks as you go along and if you fail to find flask upgrades, check vendors to buy them with gold.

Modifiers to look for on your flasks and charms:

• Health and Mana Flasks
  • Prefix: Increased Amount Recovered
  • Suffix: # Charges gained per second
• Charm: Stone Charm, Thawing Charm, Staunching Charm

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Changelog

• May 27th, 2026: Updated for 0.5, Support for Martial Artist Ascendancy added
• December 25th, 2025: Updated for 0.4
• November 28th, 2025: Guide created for Path of Exile II, Early Access