Windwalker DPS abilities and stats

Updated at : HERE

The guys at elitistjerks.com have been through beta and analysed the monk abilites related to the windwalker, this is still in beta and is not final, so bear in mind nothing is written in stone yet, but still let's take a look at it.

Gear and weapons: primarily agility leather (with a 5% agility bonus if all 8 pieces are leather). All monks can dual wield one-handers (all kinds but daggers) and can also equip staves and polearms. Weapon choice has an effect on a couple spells: Fighting Style which morphs Jab into another abilities (only cosmetic or rp-flavored) and Way of the Monk which currently does the same for every kind of weapon but it may serve as a balance lever in the future. It's unclear to me which weapons will be the best choice for a dps monk, but it's worth noting that, if all other things are equal, dual wielding tends to edge out.

Raid buffs: all monk specs provide Legacy of the Emperor (+5%stats). Windwalker monks have the new mastery buff Legacy of the White Tiger (+5mast).

Statue: each monk spec can summon a different statue that will aid during combat. Windwalkers get Summon White Tiger Statue; it has the ability to call the aid of a tiger pet that'll fight your last target. While the wording on the dps statue is not clear, they're intended to be clicked by other players, thusly granting the buff to two players (the monk and the clicker). This statue effectively combines a fair share of very controversial mechanics: clickable items, damage being dealt by units other than the caster and reliance on other players to buff your character -usually with the worst timing- (tricks of the trade and lightwell, will it blend?).

Resource system: much like rogues, dps monks use two resources, energy and chi.
-Energy is an ever regenerating pool used by certain utility spells (disarms, snares, heal, etc.) and, primarily by Jab (40e). It regens at a steady pace (10 per second baseline); aside from haste procs and bloodlust-like buffs there's only one way to change energy acquisition: by using the 60s cooldown Energizing Brew.
-Chi is built through the use of Jab (1chi per); it's consumed in finishers of sorts, being the main difference with rogues the static chi cost; also, unlike combo points, chi stacks on the monk. Chi can be pooled up to 4 (5 if talented) and most finishers cost 1 or 2, so it is possible to chain finishers. Aside from Jab, there're only two other ways to gain chi: using the lvl30 talent Jiny'u Cider that replenishes all chi on a 90s cooldown or by dealing a killing blow with Blackout Kick (restoring 1chi).
It's worth noting that, as it stands, windwalker monks are capped on resources, not gcd (the gcd is 1'', like that of rogues). The main energy consuming move (Jab) is somewhat expensive and, while it can be used several times in a row, it's not an spammable ability.

Passive spells:
Combo Breaker: this is the windwalker's mastery. The monk has a chance to get a free basic finisher each time you use Jab.
Muscle Memory: is a stacking (up to 100) +1%crit buff on Jab procced when using Jab from behind, strangely favoring longer fights.
Stance of the Fierce Tiger: each monk spec has a stance (tanking being the Elusive Ox, and healing the Wise Serpent). The dps one increases damage dealt by 20% and is required in order to use most of the damage moves.
Tiger Strikes: it may appear as a pandaren racial in some databases, but this is actually a monk passive. It's a proc that increases white swings.

Usable spells:

Basic abilities:
Name cost cd
Jab 40e none
Tiger Palm1chi none
Blackout Kick 2chi 3s
Rising Sun Kick 2chi 8s

Jab: this is the most basic attack and main chi builder (1chi per 40energy). It'll morph into jab/club/sever/slice/pike/clobber if you equip fists/maces/axes/swords/polearm/staff. This ability will be the most used all throughout a fight (following the rogue simile, this'd be a sinister strike).
Tiger Palm: is a cheap finisher with no cooldown. It does an additional 50% damage when the target is above 50%hp.
Blackout Kick: is a strong finisher on a very short cooldown. Along with the two above, this move is shared by all monk specs. It's an execute-like ability (sub 35%hp) unless used with a mastery proc that lets cast this at any hp threshold (Combo Breaker).
Rising Sun Kick: is a windwalker-only finisher on a very short cooldown too.

AoE abilities:
Name cost cd
Spinning Crane Kick1chi
Fists of Fury 3chi 45s
Tigereye Brandy 1chi90s
Flying Serpent Kick 25s

Spinning Crane Kick: is shared among all specs and is very similar to a warrior whirlwind
Fists of Fury: is an expensive finisher on a short-ish cooldown that damages (and stuns) in a frontal cone during 4s.
Tigereye Brandy: lets your 3 basic finishers deal additional cleave-like damage during 20 secs.
Flying Serpent Kick: has two components, a movement forward and an aoe damage/snare on-landing. It has no cost so it may work as a filler spell.

Other damage related abilities:
Name cost cd
Exploding Jade Blossom1chi
Expel Harm40e15s

Exploding Jade Blossom: ranged attack that can be used as filler on the pull (if specced into Jiny'u Cider) or while running.
Expel Harm: self-heal that also deals damage on short range.

Ability usage:
A windwalker monk doesn't appear to have any selfbuff, debuff or dot that needs tracking, other than the mastery proc so a combat cycle seems to be only centered around chi expenditure and cooldowns. At first sight the cycle doesn't seem too complex: use Jab as much as your energy lets you and expend chi on the most damaging finisher available. I'd expect mastery procs to come with no icd so they should be used as soon as possible, so as to maximize the amount of procs a monk can get during a fight.

Aside from not letting either resource to cap, there really is no optimal point in a cycle to spam Jab or expend chi: you can set yourself into a cycle where you only build as much chi as needed for your next finisher or build up to 4 (or 5) chi to fire finishers back to back. If anything, this second option of chaining finishers is to be preferred when fishing for trinket or enchant procs. Interestingly, there's no apparent reason either to pool energy unless the monk needs to be on interrupts (Spear Hand is not as cheap a spell as other classes may be used to) or similar duties.

I don't know how much the finishers will be hitting for at lvl 90, but, among the basic ones, I'd expect Rising Sun Kick to be the strongest one, and Tiger Palm / Blackout Kick to be similar in each half of the fight (above 50%hp Tiger Palm is stronger). However, the cooldown on Blackout Kick may not permit it to be the only finisher below 35% so (while still interweaving Rising Sun Kicks) some Tiger Palms might be necessary to be thrown into the mix so as to not cap on chi. As to what ability should be used on the 50 to 35%hp, I suspect mastery procs will be used for Blackout and, obviously, Palm as the normal finisher when Rising Sun is on cooldown.

Cooldowns:
-Flying Serpent Kick: I imagine the land-on-demand effect of this spell is off the gcd so it can be used to deal aoe damage on the spot. If that's the case, and since it's free of cost, it will have an use in single target fights as a filler spell.
-Fists of Fury: is a very strong cooldown while leveling and I'd expect it to still be very decent even on single target at lvl90. At some point we'll need to analyze the 'damage per chi' for each ability and determine if it's worth to weave this in.
-Energizing Brew (60energy over 6'' on a 60''cd) and Jiny'u Cider (caps chi on a 90''cd talented) are the resource cooldowns for a nice boost.

Other utility spells:
All monks come with a wide array of spells such as interrupts, disarms, mobility, etc. Some of them, if previous xpacks serve as an example, are more pvp oriented, but may see an use during pve at some point.

Name cost cd effect
Roll 50e none Much like blink it'll teleport the caster a short distance forward; if used while falling the monk will still get the fall damage after landing.
Paralysis Basic crowd control move (30 to 60s effect)
Detox 20e 8s Dispel bleeds and poisons
Spear Hand 30e 30s Interrupt (or silence if the caster is facing the monk).
Resuscitate Ooc res (10/5s cast).
Grapple Weapon 60s Disarm; it may increase the monk's damage, healing or avoidance
Disable 15e none Stacking speed reduction; 3rd application roots the enemy
Healing Sphere 60e Green orbs that players can walk into and get healed (1.5''cast time).
Meditation none 180s 99%damage reduction plus self-redirect raid damage, breaks on melee attack (10s channeled).
Fortifying Ale 180s +100%hp -100%inc heal.
Crackling Jade LightningMuch like arcane missiles, it channels nature damage during 6'' over one target with the possibility to knockback said target.
Provoke Basic taunt move
Transcendence 180s Demonic circle of sorts.
Touch of Death 4chi 90s Instakills an enemy. Only works on pve and against targets below the monk max health.
Sparring none Windwalker only. Defensive passive stacking buff
Afterlife Windwalker only. Very handy heal while leveling

Talents and glyphs:
With the next MoP xpack, talents will no longer be tied to specs. As a windwalker, choosing talents and glyphs will be a matter of raid utility as they're largely unrelated to enhancing damage output.


15 Intuition Celerity Momentum
30 Mystery Talent Ascendance Jiny'u Cider
45 Deadly Reach Charging Ox Wave Leg Sweep
60 Beguile Dematerialize Tiger's Lust
75 Ring of Peace Rushing Jade Wind Chi Cocoon
90 Chi Bind Chi Sphere Chi Torpedo

There's only two talent tiers dps related:
-Level 30 (resources): aside from the nyi talent, only Cider is interesting as it bumps your chi to the cap every 90s. Managing a larger resource pool only matters in two scenarions: one, when pooling has any kind of effect in the cycle, or two, if capping in some resource is unavoidable: non of the two happen in current windwalker cycles. A case for fights where some kind of very small burst in waves of 20s is needed can be made for Ascendance, but that's about it.
-Level 90: every option leads to dps in some or another way. At the moment we don't have numbers to judge any of the three.


Glyph of Enduring Healing Sphere When attacked, the cast time of your Healing Sphere is reduced by 50%. Stacks up to 2 times.
Glyph of Expel Harm Your Expel Harm can now be cast on any friendly target.
Glyph of Fists of Fury While channeling Fists of Fury, your chance to dodge melee and ranged attacks is increased by 25%.
Glyph of Meditation You can now channel Meditation while moving.
Glyph of Rapid Healing Sphere Increases the duration of your Healing Sphere's by 30 sec.
No damage-related glyph has been exposed yet.

Comments