Best Feats For Monks In Baldur's Gate 3

Highlights

The Alert feat grants +5 initiative bonus, crucial for Monks to act early in combat and prevent surprises.
The Athlete feat boosts core skills, movement abilities, and jump distance for Monks seeking agility.
The Ability Score Improvement feat boosts Dexterity by +4 for Monks, ensuring hits and improved attacks.

Baldur's Gate 3 has no shortage of feats that players can utilize to upgrade their character. Typically, players will get three opportunities across the game to learn a feat, with Monks learning feats at levels four, eight, and twelve.

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Each feat has the opportunity to seriously upgrade a character, and some can turn any Monk into a powerhouse capable of dealing upwards of 100 damage per turn. Picking the right feat can ensure that a character can hold their own against any foe. For any players creating a Monk character in Baldur's Gate 3, here are the best feats on offer.

1 Alert

Ensure A Monk Is Never Caught Off Guard

Grants initiative bonus
Prevents characters from being surprised

The Alert feat is a fantastic feat for any character to take, but it's undoubtedly a must-have for any Monk. This feat provides a huge +5 bonus on initiative rolls, which works slightly differently in Baldur's Gate 3. Initiative, unlike in the tabletop game, uses a single d4, instead of a d20, and adds a player's dexterity modifier. This means the +5 bonus represents a huge increase in initiative bonus, which almost guarantees that a Monk will be taking action very early in combat.

This feat pairs very well with any Monk character, who uses Dexterity as their primary ability anyway, meaning the +5 bonus to initiative will also stack with a Monk's dex modifier on initiative rolls, which allows them to hit early in combat and secure important kills or objectives. Furthermore, this feat prevents characters from being surprised, which can be great if a Monk needs to jump to the defense of their party after a particularly sneaky ambush.

2 Athlete

Improve Core Skills And Movement Abilities

Improve core skills
Increase jump distance

The Athlete feat provides a +1 bonus to either Strength or Dexterity, either of which are great options for a Monk to increase. If they opt to increase their strength, this will pay off when they can eventually learn the Savage Attacker feat, or the increase to Dexterity will help with initiative rolls, and ensure their unarmed strikes are hitting more frequently.

That's not all, however, as the Athlete feat uses 50% less movement speed when a character recovers from the Prone condition, and increases their jump distance by a whopping 50%, which allows them to traverse any battlefield with ease, and take out tricky enemies who might be hiding behind cover, or using other enemies as cannon fodder.

3 Ability Score Improvement

Improve A Monk's Dexterity

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Improve key skills
Improve one skill by two points, or two skills by one point

Monks use Dexterity as their primary skill, meaning it is critical that players get this stat up as high as they can, as quickly as they can. Baldur's Gate 3 puts some limits in place when creating a character, and as such, players won't be able to increase any skills in the character creation process beyond 17. An Ability Score Improvement can bump this number up by two by level four, providing a meaty +4 bonus to attack rolls.

This is a great improvement, especially to take early on, to ensure a Monk is hitting their target more frequently. When Monks are capable of delivering several attacks per turn, it's of the utmost importance that these attacks are hitting, making the Ability Score Improvement a feat that is not to be slept on.

4 Lucky

Gain The Power Of Luck To Reshape Battles

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Turn failures and misses into successes
Grants three luck points, which can be spent as a reaction

The Lucky feat is unquestionably one of the most powerful feats available in Baldur's Gate 3 and can work incredibly well for pretty much any class, though Monks in particular will get great value from this feat. It grants 3 luck points to the player, which they can spend when they opt to, which can be used to provide extremely valuable tactical benefits.

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It allows the player to gain advantage on saving throws, ability checks, or attack rolls, which can turn a Monk missing their stunning strike into a critical success, or it can even force enemies to reroll their attack rolls, which can not only be incredibly useful to save a Monk's skin but can also be used to defend less martially-capable allies like Wizards and Sorcerers.

5 Savage Attacker

Ensure Attacks Hit Harder

Rolls damage dice twice and uses the higher number

The Savage Attacker feat is perhaps most useful on a Monk, more than any other class, due to the sheer number of attacks they can dish out on their turn. This feat allows any character who makes a weapon attack to roll their damage dice twice and use the higher result. This effectively provides advantage on damage rolls, which can add up to incredible numbers throughout a campaign.

With Monks, who can make two attacks with one action by level 5, and can deal additional attacks using their bonus action with ease, this feat quickly pays for itself, as the increased damage begins to stack up pretty quickly. Unfortunately, it does require a Monk to utilize a melee weapon for the damage roll to roll twice, but using a quarterstaff or some other martial weapon makes this feat incredibly valuable.

6 Mobile

Glide Across The Battlefield With Ease

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Increases movement speed
Prevents reduced speed on difficult terrain while dashing

The Mobile Feat allows Monks to traverse the battlefield with ease, which is a skill not to be underestimated. This feat grants a significant increase in movement speed and prevents Monks from being impeded by difficult terrain when dashing. This pairs beautifully with a Monk's Step of The Wind ability, which allows them to double their movement speed and jump without using a bonus action.

This feat can ensure Monks are placed away from danger. After all, they aren't the best at tanking hits like a Barbarian or Fighter might be, and place themselves against spellcasters in the backline, or characters providing buffs. This feat brings incredible versatility to a Monk and ensures they aren't caught with their pants down, so to speak.

7 Tavern Brawler

Increase A Monk's Unarmed Attack Damage

Adds Strength modifier to damage rolls
Improve Strength or Constitution

Tavern Brawler is a feat that no Monk should ever find themselves without. It is almost a prerequisite for playing as a Monk as the bonus gained from this feat is so ridiculously strong that it would be silly not to take it! The Tavern Brawler feat allows players to dish out additional damage if their attacks meet some specific requirements, and one is perfect for a Monk.

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Monks with this feat will be able to add their strength modifier to not only their attack rolls but their damage too, which, when delivering multiple attacks per turn utilizing their Flurry of Blows ability, can add up. This feat is especially great for any players who spec their Monk towards a strength-based character. This feat also provides a nice +1 bonus to either Strength or Constitution scores, which is a nice bonus on top of an already incredible feat.