Way of the Open Fist

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Monk Silver.PNG

The Way of the Open Fist dungeon is the Class: Monk Monk Silver Class Challenge. The challenge is set in Dungeon: Ick Swamp Ick Swamp. The boss is Blerglwergl, a Super Meat Man with slightly less health and Trait: Weakening blow Weakening blow.

Resources Available

Alchemist and Witch preparations are available. Item: Fortitude Tonic Fortitude Tonic and Item: Can of Whupaz Can of Whupaz are recommended from the Witch. Shops spawn normally. Two of the following three altars spawn: God: Binlor Ironshield Binlor Ironshield, God: The Earthmother The Earthmother, and God: Taurog Taurog.

Note that, like in standard Dungeon: Ick Swamp Ick Swamp, plants have a chance to drop a Item: Spoon Spoon, and Item: Wisp Gem Wisp Gems are guaranteed from Monster: Warlock Warlocks.

Strategy

There are two ways to approach this challenge. First, you can play standard monk (go for Class: Monk Orc Monk), and use Item: Spoon Spoons, Item: Wisp Gem Wisp Gems, God boon: Greenblood Greenblood, Item: Skullpicker Skullpicker, and God boon: Stone Fist Stone Fist to raise your damage to crazy levels for a monk. With the right setup, you can easily take on Monster: Meat Man Meat Man 5 levels above you. Certain shop items and glyphs are helpful with this. If you go this route, be sure to save your Item: Fortitude Tonic Fortitude Tonic for the middle of the boss fight.

Another slightly more unconventional strategy is to take a Class: Monk Gnome Monk and bypass the boss's Trait: Weakening blow Weakening blow ability with fireballs. This works well with an Earthmother strategy, since you can get a large late-game mana spike.

Do standard Monk regenfighting stuff as much as you can. Before you level up, clear out all the visible mana burn and poison plants in the way. Prey on high-level Gorgons, Vampires, and Meat Men. Wait to worship Earthmother until you're ready to fight the boss, as it becomes very difficult to move around when you can't clear away plants. For the boss, you can use a God boon: Greenblood Greenblood strategy to get a bunch of free corrosion damage on the boss, or you can use a God boon: Clearance Clearance strategy to fireball the boss down.

Item: Platemail Platemail works well here, comboing with the Monk's natural damage reduction and God boon: Vine Form Vine Form if you're feeling saucy to massively reduce damage done. Unfortunately, it does leave you vulnerable to Nagas, who would normally serve fairly well as popcorn. Obviously, the monk loves damage items, and if you go Gnome, a Item: Trisword Trisword and Item: Whurrgarbl Whurrgarbl can translate into a bunch of extra damage on the boss. If you go the fireball boss kill route, standard caster items like Item: Crystal Ball Crystal Ball and Item: Battlemage Ring Battlemage Ring are good finds. Item: Viper Ward Viper Ward and Item: Soul Orb Soul Orb give you a great deal of freedom to clear plants, and give a great deal of CP when you're done clearing plants.

While it is not an item, Glyph: HALPMEH HALPMEH is very good here as well, allowing you to clear poison plants with impunity, as well as playing into the Monk's attrition strategy by offering more health/tile explored.