PoE 2 0.5 Martial Artist Skills & Best Builds (Leveling & Endgame)

The Martial Artist arrives in Path of Exile 2's 0.5 Return of the Ancients expansion as one of the Monk's three ascendancy options, alongside the Invoker and Acolyte of Chayula. Built around a distinct set of Hollow Form techniques, Runic body augmentation, and a unique glove transformation mechanic, this ascendancy offers a melee-focused playstyle with layers of resource management and customization that reward aggressive positioning and smart gearing choices.

PoE 2 0.5 Martial Artist Ascendancy Skills & Build Guide

The Martial Artist ascends from the Monk class after completing an Ascension Trial and focuses on three primary pillars: Hollow Form combat techniques that grant powerful attack states, Way of the Mountain and Way of the Stonefist passives that modify how you interact with enemies and gear, and Runic Meridians that open additional Rune sockets across your equipment. These mechanics were showcased during the Return of the Ancients Livestream on May 7, 2026, and the full ascendancy tree on PoE2DB currently shows 8 small passive nodes with several notable nodes still marked as [DNT-UNUSED], indicating more details may arrive closer to or after launch.

With that foundation in mind, let's look at the confirmed skills, a recommended leveling path, and an endgame build framework for the Martial Artist.

Martial Artist Skills

The six confirmed ascendancy nodes provide a mix of granted active skills, passive combat bonuses, and gear transformation effects. Here's what each one does:

PoE 2 0.5 Martial Artist Skill Tree & Best Builds

The Martial Artist's interaction with bells, combos, and quarterstaff fundamentals reshapes the meta around skills that hit multiple times, build combo quickly, or chain with bell triggers. Below are the best skills ranked for use on the new ascendancy.

1. Whirling Assault (S Tier)

Whirling Assault is undeniably the most meta skill for Martial Artist in 0.5 due to its massive AoE, multi-hit nature, and natural synergy with the Hollow Focus and Hollow Resonance bells that the ascendancy generates passively. The skill makes your character spin while dealing huge area damage, and because it hits multiple times per channel, it ramps up Mantra of Destruction stacks, builds combo through Marshall Master extremely fast, and rings every nearby bell with each spin. The quality change from "more attack speed" to "increased attack speed" is a non-issue since Whirling Assault is not an attack-speed-driven skill. It works at every stage of the game from your first ascension all the way through endgame, and its ability to trigger Hollow Focus bells repeatedly while channeling makes it the gold standard for Martial Artist builds.

2. Ice Strike + Shattering Palm Combo (S Tier)

The Ice Strike + Shattering Palm combination remains one of the strongest and safest options for Martial Artist, particularly when paired with Way of the Mountain ascendancy for immobilization-based defense scaling. Shattering Palm dashes you to enemies and generates ice shards, while Ice Strike freezes targets and detonates the shards for big AoE damage. The synergy with freezing pairs naturally with the new immobilization stacks on Way of the Mountain, but the build sacrifices Trinity scaling potential since it is heavily cold-locked. Hitting random bells that spawn around you is slightly less reliable than Whirling Assault, but raw damage and survivability make this the strongest backup pick.

3. Falling Thunder (A Tier)

Falling Thunder is a finisher skill that consumes power charges to deliver a massive screen-wide bonk, and it pairs exceptionally well with Whirling Assault, Ice Strike, or Tempest Flurry as a boss-deleting combo capper. With easy charge generation through Killing Palm hitting Hollow Focus bells (always critical hits), Falling Thunder becomes a reliable single-target nuke that covers a huge area for clear when needed. Some builds even play Falling Thunder as a main skill by stacking charge generation through Devour, Killing Palm, and the new Charge Infusion runes.

4. Bone Shatter (Facebreaker/Hollow Palm) (A Tier)

Bone Shatter has become an unexpectedly powerful Martial Artist skill thanks to the Hollow Focus bell interaction — bells are always primed for stun, and hits against them are always critical hits. This means every Bone Shatter swing on a Hollow Focus bell creates a massive shockwave, gets a third shockwave from Hollow Resonance proccing on the guaranteed crit, and applies AoE crits to all enemies in the explosion radius. Because crits in this game apply to area-of-effect damage rather than rerolling, this single mechanic transforms Bone Shatter into a build-defining boss-clearing skill that can be scaled with critical damage bonus alone, ignoring critical hit chance entirely.

5. Flicker Strike (A Tier)

Flicker Strike is a niche but extremely satisfying finisher skill that teleports through packs while dealing damage, working similarly to Falling Thunder by consuming power charges. It excels in dense maps and ritual-style content where many enemies cluster together, but it has the well-known downside of clearing screens too quickly, forcing backtracking for loot. Personal preference dictates whether you pick Flicker Strike or Falling Thunder as your finisher.

6. Gathering Storm (B Tier)

Gathering Storm received notable changes in 0.5 with a special bell interaction that lets it function as a strong boss finisher, potentially replacing Flicker Strike or Falling Thunder in specific builds. As a standalone skill, it can be played with Heralds for clear, but it shines brightest as a charged release skill on bosses where positioning is more controlled.

7. Tempest Flurry + Staggering Palm + Hollow Palm (B Tier)

The classic Hollow Palm Tempest Flurry combo from previous leagues may find new life in 0.5 if attack speed scaling is sufficient. You use Staggering Palm to gain the projectile-shooting buff for up to 30 seconds, then channel Tempest Flurry to fire massive air projectiles. The build's success entirely depends on whether attack speed gear can recreate the obscene speed needed to revive the archetype.

8. Oil Barrage / Rend / Devour (Wyvern Talisman) (B Tier)

Wyvern talisman skills like Oil Barrage and Devour can be played on Martial Artist by locking your second weapon set into Wyvern form. While these typically perform better on Dragon Monk Invoker, they remain highly viable on Martial Artist, especially Oil Barrage paired with Rend for boss damage scaling.

9. Facebreaker + Mace Skills (Hammer of the Gods, Earth Shatter) (C Tier)

The new Facebreaker gloves let you use mace skills with Hollow Palm Technique, opening niche combos like Hammer of the Gods spam or Earthshatter setups. Performance hinges on whether mace skills can keep up with the speed of quarterstaff alternatives — a tough sell given mace skills received slight nerfs in 0.5.

Best Martial Artist Builds for Leveling & Endgame

The Martial Artist ascendancy supports a wider variety of build archetypes than nearly any class in 0.5 thanks to Marshall Master enabling cross-weapon combo retention, Hollow Palm Technique opening up mace and quarterstaff hybrid setups, and the bell-based ascendancy mechanics rewarding any skill that can hit fast and frequently. Below are the best Martial Artist builds ranked by community testing, build creator analysis, and 0.5 patch note interactions.

Whirling Assault Martial Artist (S Tier)

Whirling Assault Martial Artist is the cleanest and most reliable league starter for the new ascendancy, leveraging the most meta skill in 0.5 with the most synergistic ascendancy in the game. The build uses Whirling Assault's multi-hit channel to constantly ring Hollow Focus and Hollow Resonance bells, build combo through Marshall Master at incredible speed, and stack Mantra of Destruction for chaos damage scaling. Charge Staff with three power charges grants huge lightning damage with shockwaves on a 40-second buff, while Tempest Bell (now allowing three active bells in 0.5) plus Infernal Cry provides massive boss damage windows. Devour generates power charges by consuming corpses, Rend adds 50% damage gained as lightning for boss bursts, and the build progression is incredibly forgiving — Way of the Stonefist first for free gloves power, Hollow Focus second for the critical-hit bell baseline, Hollow Resonance third, and either Hollow Form or Runic Meridians as the fourth depending on whether you want raw damage scaling or quality-of-life resistance solving. This makes it the definitive SSF and HC-friendly starter.

Guide Link: https://mobalytics.gg/poe-2/builds/hollow-palm-technique-invoker-league-starter-peuget2

Bell Master Martial Artist (S Tier)

The Bell Master Martial Artist is the most theory-crafted curse-stacking build of the league, exploiting the new Overabundance support gem to double the bell limit from three to six in exchange for self-applied curses, then making the player completely curse-immune through Hollow Keeper passive (50% reduced curse effect) and Rune of Warding (another 50% reduced curse effect). The real payoff comes from Warding Fetish, which grants 30% increased damage per curse on you, transforming the supposed downside of Overabundance into one of the strongest damage multipliers in the game. The build uses ancestrally boosted bells (a 0.5 buff) so each bell calls down on three nearby enemies, Marshall Adept's combo-to-energy-shield-recharge mechanic to keep ES at sub-0.5-second recharge delay, and Alith Chimes to convert combo expenditure into power charges that fuel Hollow Form. Glacial Cascade + Frozen Locust + Tempest Flurry shock magnitude provides the leveling foundation before the full bell-spam swap at maps. Way of the Mountain into Way of the Stonefist into Hollow Form is the standard ascendancy path.

Guide Link: https://maxroll.gg/poe2/planner/bapdl0y6

Bellshatter Martial Artist (S Tier)

Bellshatter is the most explosive damage build for Martial Artist by exploiting one of the cleanest interactions in the patch — Bone Shatter swings on Hollow Focus bells produce three simultaneous shockwaves (Bone Shatter's heavy-stun shockwave, Hollow Focus's destruction shockwave, and Hollow Resonance's crit-trigger shockwave), with all of them dealing damage as guaranteed critical hits because hits against bells are always crits. This means the build can completely ignore critical hit chance and stack only critical damage bonus, unlocking passive nodes like Throat Seeker (60% increased crit damage with reduced crit chance) that mace builds normally can't use. The Hollow Resonance bell builds heavy stun on bosses, allowing Bone Shatter's 50% more damage on stunned uniques to apply for true boss-deletion combos. Bone Shatter received a quality nerf from 30% to 20% increased attack speed, but this is offset by Way of the Stonefist gloves potentially rolling 10% to all skill quality. Way of the Stonefist for power charge on crit and quality affixes pairs perfectly with the build's identity.

Guide Link: https://mobalytics.gg/poe-2/builds/bellshatter-martial-artist

Whirling Slash Twister Martial Artist (S Tier)

Whirling Slash Twisters has remained one of the strongest league starters across multiple patches, and it can be played effectively on Martial Artist by leveraging the new ascendancy's defensive layers and bell interactions while keeping the proven Whirling Slash + Twister + Barrage + Frenzy Charges damage core intact. The build uses Iced Tip Arrows tech to convert twisters into frost-empowered tornadoes, generates Frenzy Charges through Combat Frenzy + Herald of Ice freezes, and uses Wake of Destruction boots for free elemental ground generation that scales the Twister damage. Spears count as both melee and ranged martial weapons, opening clever weapon swap setups where one weapon set is your spear for Whirling Slash while the other could be a quarterstaff for Tempest Bell drops. Way of the Stonefist first, then either Way of the Mountain (for damage and survivability through immobilization) or Runic Meridians (for solving resistances and attribute issues) depending on rune availability, with Marshall Master enabling cross-weapon combo retention.

Guide Link: https://mobalytics.gg/poe-2/profile/travic/builds/test-monk-build

Hollow Form Autobomber Martial Artist (A Tier)

The Hollow Form Autobomber is a unique experimental build designed around holding down a single channel button while clones do all the work, making it one of the most relaxed and safe playstyles in the new patch. The build solves Hollow Form's two main problems — movement speed penalty (down to 24% via stacking reduced movement speed penalty nodes plus 25% less penalty from separate multipliers) and power charge generation (via Way of the Stonefist's 10–15% power charge on crit affix combined with corrupted gloves doubling charges and Undying Hate jewel). The cleverest trick is socketing Sunder into Hollow Form — even with Hollow Form's 30% less attack speed line, Sunder's base 40% attack speed is overridden, and three mirages overlapping with Sunder's massive base damage results in roughly 257% more damage from a single skill swap. Hollow Focus bells, charged staff hits, and Hollow Resonance crits all generate power charges independently, sustaining permanent Hollow Form uptime. The build is theory-crafted heavily and requires testing live, but the upside is enormous if interactions work as expected.

Guide Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=egLY2r3yL7I

Facebreaker Hollow Palm Martial Artist (A Tier)

Facebreaker Hollow Palm Martial Artist is the dual-weapon-type build that exploits the unique interaction of Facebreaker gloves enabling mace skills while Hollow Palm Technique simultaneously enables quarterstaff skills, granting access to Tempest Bell, Forge Hammer, Hammer of the Gods, Rolling Slam, and Sunder all on the same character. The Hollow Form interaction with Rolling Slam is the build's centerpiece — clones use Rolling Slam's complete two-slam rotation for 815% damage per clone, multiplied by three when consuming a power charge, resulting in roughly 6,000% damage per second in pure clone DPS. Tempest Bell (now three active bells in 0.5) generates power charges via Alith Chimes combo expenditure, while Forge Hammer fissures explode under Rolling Slam's two-slam rotation for additional sustained damage. Strength scaling provides massive damage multipliers through Hollow Palm's "1% more unarmed damage per 5 strength" line. The ascendancy path is Hollow Form first, then Marshall Master for cross-weapon combo, then Way of the Stonefist (assuming Facebreaker affixes don't get nullified by the conversion), then Way of the Mountain for stun-based defenses.

Guide Link: https://mobalytics.gg/poe-2/profile/woolie/builds/0-5-woolie-s-martialbreaker-monk-leaguestarter

Falling Thunder Killing Palm Martial Artist (A Tier)

The Falling Thunder + Killing Palm setup is one of the most efficient leveling-into-endgame builds for Martial Artist, leveraging Hollow Focus's constantly-spawning bells (which are always primed for stun and always critically hit) as a built-in power charge generator. Killing Palm guarantees a power charge on killing a bell, fueling Falling Thunder's screen-wide lightning bonk for clearing and bossing alike. The clever twist is locking the second weapon set into a Wyvern talisman to enable Rend, providing a massive 50% damage gained as lightning buff for 13 seconds with Prolonged Duration — an enormous campaign damage multiplier obtainable from level 1. Devour can be added for additional power charge generation on packs, while Staggering Palm provides projectile-shooting buffs for AoE clear, and Three of the Kill plus Blazing Critical supports stack additional damage gained as elements on Killing Palm. The recommended ascendancy order is Hollow Focus first (critical for charge generation), Way of the Stonefist second, then Hollow Resonance and Runic Meridians, with Life Drain providing free sustain throughout.

Guide Link: https://mobalytics.gg/poe-2/profile/lugohq-yt-k9kns3

Martial Artist League Starter Leveling Build Guide

Getting through the campaign as a Martial Artist is straightforward thanks to the Monk's already-strong base kit; the main decisions are which ascendancy nodes to prioritize as you unlock them.

Early Leveling (Acts 1-2)

The Monk's base kit is already strong for early leveling. If going Hollow Palm, you can start unarmed immediately; it's described as "a monster" through the campaign. Focus on stacking evasion and energy shield on gear from the start to scale your damage naturally.

For quarterstaff builds, use whatever high-DPS staff you find and focus on getting through content quickly. Ice Strike Monk is recommended as one of the easiest starts with high early damage.

First Ascendancy Points

After your first Ascension Trial, your priority depends on build direction:

Hollow Palm builds: Way of the Stonefist first — the immediate evasion/energy shield per level on gloves and upgraded modifiers provide both offense and defense from the moment you allocate it
Quarterstaff builds: Hollow Resonance for the passive AoE damage on crits, or Runic Meridians for immediate defensive improvement through extra rune slots
Clone builds: Hollow Form first, paired with any skill that has long attack time for immediate damage multiplication

Mid-Game Progression (Acts 3-4)

Take your second ascendancy node to complement your first:

Hollow Palm: Add Runic Meridians (5 extra rune slots solve resistance/stat issues)
Clone builds: Add Hollow Focus for power charge generation to fuel your clones
Crit builds: Add Hollow Resonance if not taken first

Power Charge Generation While Leveling

Power charge sustain is essential for Hollow Form builds. During leveling, multiple reliable methods exist:

Lingering Illusion spirit skill (dodge → leave copy → enemy hits it → power charge) — available from around level 45+
Killing Palm (generates charge on cull)
Hollow Focus bell destruction (from ascendancy node itself)
Combat Frenzy + Resonance with freeze or electrocute

Community members report consistently maintaining 3+ power charges during regular gameplay by level 45-50 without heavy investment.

Endgame Transition

At full ascendancy points, finalize your allocation. Most builds will want 4 of the 6 revealed nodes (reserving 2 points for the unrevealed nodes or spending all available):

Maximum offense: Hollow Form + Hollow Focus + Hollow Resonance + Way of the Mountain
Maximum defense/utility: Way of the Stonefist + Runic Meridians + Way of the Mountain + (flex)
Hollow Palm optimal: Way of the Stonefist + Runic Meridians + Hollow Resonance + Way of the Mountain
Clone specialist: Hollow Form + Hollow Focus + Way of the Mountain + Way of the Stonefist

Martial Artist Endgame Build Guide

Once your full ascendancy is allocated and your gear starts coming together, the Martial Artist scales aggressively, this is the point where those theoretical damage calculations start translating into screen-wide destruction.

Scaling Hollow Form Effectively

The key insight for Hollow Form is that skills with +total attack time are disproportionately strong because clones bypass the slow animation. The clone spawns, performs the skill in its reduced time, and vanishes. This means:

Skills that normally take 1.5+ seconds per attack are effectively compressed to the clone spawn rate
You're essentially getting "free" attacks that circumvent the slowest part of high-damage skills
Pair with power charge generation for consistent 3-clone bursts

Skills confirmed/likely to work well with Hollow Form:

Whirling Assault (showcased in reveal)
Vaulting Impact (showcased in reveal)
Stampede (long animation, high damage)
Rolling Slam (long animation)
Sunder (multiple hits)
Falling Thunder (power charge consumption for insane multipliers)
Flicker Strike (built-in teleport, charge consumption)
Furious Slam (+1 second attack time bypassed = effectively 2x+ DPS)
Lightning Spear (ranged spear skill — may work since gem says "socketed attack" not "socketed melee attack")

Skills that CANNOT be used with Hollow Form:

Perfect Strike (channeled)
Supercharge Slam (channeled)
Gathering Storm (channeled)
Charge Staff (conditional)
Hammer of Gods (conditional)
Rampage (channeled)
Shield Charge
Oil Barrage (channeled)
Fear of the Mountain (channeled)

Way of the Stonefist - Maximizing Glove Value

The transformed "Fists of Stone" gloves become one of your most important equipment slots. Here's how to maximize them:

For Hollow Palm builds:

Prioritize gloves with +melee skill levels (unknown what this transforms into — potentially +attack skills or +all skills)
Evasion/ES hybrid bases benefit most from the per-level scaling
The base EV/ES values count toward Hollow Palm's bonuses per confirmation from community testing
Offensive prefixes (normally competing with defensive stats) become free since base defenses are already excellent

For weapon builds:

High flat damage prefixes transform into "gain as extra", extremely strong with high weapon base damage
Resistance suffixes presumably transform into enhanced versions
Consider using unique gloves for potentially broken transformed modifiers

Potential broken interaction: If the per-level base EV/ES is further scaled by percentage modifiers (increased evasion, flat evasion prefixes), the resulting values could be astronomical. A pair of gloves hitting 1000+ evasion and 300+ energy shield would translate to approximately 13% more attack speed and 3%+ additional base crit chance for Hollow Palm, on a single equipment slot.

Runic Meridians - Socket Strategy

With 5 additional rune sockets and 150 new runes in 0.5, your rune strategy becomes a major build-defining choice:

Option 1: Pure defense - Use extra slots for chaos resistance, armor, evasion runes. Free up other gear for offensive affixes.

Option 2: Jewel swap strategy - Use new league mechanics to convert standard gear rune sockets into jewel sockets. Use Runic Meridians slots to maintain your rune needs. Net result: significantly more jewel sockets than other builds, synergizing with The Adorned unique jewel and Voices cluster jewels.

Option 3: Unique rune stacking - With the new ability to socket unique item modifiers onto runes, having 5 extra slots means 5 additional unique effects that other builds can't access. This could be the largest power differential the ascendancy provides.

Mageblood Synergy

If Mageblood is obtained, the Martial Artist benefits enormously: permanent flask effects + Way of the Mountain's damage reduction creates a nearly unkillable character that can channel Hollow Form indefinitely. The Egg Talisman's permanent onslaught + energy shield regeneration (with Mageblood uptime) combined with the Martial Artist's inherent rune scaling and Fists of Stone could create one of the highest-performance builds in the game.

Specific Item Synergies

Voll's Protector alternative: Normally power charge builds use this unique chest for charge generation, sacrificing defense. The Martial Artist has built-in power charge generation via Hollow Focus, freeing the chest slot for better defensive options.

Charge-sharing gloves: A specific pair of gloves allows sharing charges with allies in your presence. If clone images count as allies, this could automatically grant them your power charges for Falling Thunder/Flicker Strike consumption without using them from your pool.

Arbiter of Ash gloves: These immobilize enemies at 50% life and grant 20% more damage to immobilized enemies. Extremely strong with Way of the Mountain (immobilize = stacks) and the overall damage-while-immobilized theme. Unknown how Way of the Stonefist transforms their modifiers.

Martial Artist vs. Other Monk Ascendancies

Martial Artist vs. Invoker

The Invoker focuses on elemental invocations and has been the primary Monk ascendancy for previous leagues. Martial Artist offers a fundamentally different approach, more versatile weapon options, built-in defensive layers (Way of the Mountain), equipment power (Fists of Stone, Runic Meridians), and a unique channeling playstyle.

Community consensus leans toward Martial Artist being stronger for most builds due to: 5 extra rune slots from Runic Meridians providing massive flexibility, Way of the Stonefist giving both offense and defense simultaneously, and better synergy with the new 0.5 crafting systems and rune mechanics. As one content creator put it: "This would be a far better ascendancy than Invoker in my opinion just based on what it looks like. You can get all the same or as strong defenses just through different means, with so many more tools being added to the game."

Martial Artist vs. Acolyte of Chayula

Acolyte of Chayula focuses on energy shield and chaos damage. The two ascendancies serve completely different build fantasies and rarely compete for the same builds.

Martial Artist Build Farming Potential

The Martial Artist's kit is particularly well-suited for several endgame farming activities in the reworked 0.5 endgame:

Breach (Reworked NPC Defense): The new breach format requiring NPC defense with a rotating mechanic is handled easily by the Martial Artist's clone AoE coverage and the bell's constant damage around your character.

Simulacrum: Historically excellent for Monk builds due to enclosed arenas. The Martial Artist's stationary-ish channeling actually shines here, stand in the center, channel clones in all directions, bell rings on every crit. New Voices jewels (universally needed) drop here, making it premium farm content.

Ritual (Reworked): Enclosed ritual areas benefit enormously from AoE coverage. Flicker Strike builds or clone builds fill the entire ritual area with damage.

Boss Rushing: The burst damage potential of Falling Thunder clones (if charge interaction works) makes boss-killing extremely efficient.