If you can, have a look at the monk class in Dungeons And Dragons Online (the MMO originally from Atari / Turbine, ran by someone else now) to compare to.
The melee combat was implemented brilliantly, both the unarmed with handwraps and the light monk weapon trees.
Additionally they included Shurikens as centred weapons, and the option to use Str, Dex, or Wis for attack and damage rolls.
Then even more fun came with multiclassing and the specialist skill trees - Ninja Spies from the monk enhancement tree could remain centred with shortswords, Vistani Fighters with daggers or kukri, and with 6 fighter levels you could be centred with your specialized weapon in Kensai including ranged weapons, but only ever a single weapon type. But you could never be centred in any armour heavier than cloth or with shields.
Shuriken specialization added things like extra throws, glancing hits etc, and monks made for the fastest 'bunny hopping' as they called it thrower builds in the game, with both halflings getting bonuses to all thrown weapons, and Drow specifically getting bonuses to Shurikens and a bunch of melee weapons like rapiers.
Personally I made and really enjoyed a Ninja Spy multiclass using 4 paladin levels for maximised Aura of Grace, 6 monk levels for Ninja Spy specializiation, and 10 rogue levels maxed out loads of my skills, sneak damage and a high end rogue feat slot at level 10 for opportunist - the build was the fastest hitting and highest doublestrike melee spec in the game, with invincible saving throws and maximum unarmoured defenses (dodge / incorporeal), and all rogue utility - locks, traps, mobility and social skills, while sneak skills were ignored entirely as ninja spies gained a 30s improved invisibility clickie on a 60s cooldown negating the need for sneak skills.
But then when trying to run any of the end game difficulty stuff, if I didn't pass a dodge, AC or incorporeal check I died in 1 or if lucky 2 hits and got reduced to throwing shurikens at everything
But I could straight up fly through all the traps / mazes / tank anything that only did save based damage while typing in /sleep. In the end game content if stuff wasnt held, fascinated or disco'd, trying to melee in pyjamas was just nope.
