Playstyle and Cooldowns

Mistweaver Monk is a melee-based healer that utilizes casted spells and damaging abilities to efficiently heal the group and contribute meaningful damage and utility. The spec is extremely flexible in our healing profile and we can adjust to many different damage patterns thanks to our versatile kit.

Mistweaver can get complicated or overwhelming due to the flexibility but with practice you will become much more comfortable with the improv-type of playstyle and be more confident in your decision-making

There’s very few rules that can be applied to Mistweaver that would “always be true” but there’s some solid starting points that can set you in the right direction.

Healing Rotations

I hesitate to call this a rotation section since Mistweaver has a plethora of answers to various damage types but this should be enough to get you started. Once you become more comfortable on the spec you can begin to branch out and learn when to rely more on your healing to damage conversions versus casting.

There’s a few things to consider when deciding how to heal the damage:

1. How many players are taking damage?

Remember that Ancient Teachings is split evenly among injured targets which means if only one target is injured, they will be receiving 100% of your Ancient Teachings healing which can cover decently high damage intake on one player. If there’s 2 injured players then you still may be able to get away with continuing your DPS rotation depending on how intense the damage is. At 3+ injured players I’m considering sending Sheilun's Gift or another cooldown if I can afford it.

2. What kind of damage are they taking?

If they’re taking moderate to low damage, you can continue the DPS rotation and heal through Ancient Teachings . If the damage is more severe or sustained over a long period of time, it’s time to consider a cooldown like Life Cocoon for single target or two targets to help mitigate some of the casting required and again at 3+ if it’s moderate to heavy damage then send a stronger cooldown like Chi-ji. It's also important to note that Ancient Teachings and Aspect of Harmony will not heal full health allies even if they have a heal absorb on them.

3. How many enemies can I hit?

Mistweaver scales slightly with multiple enemies to hit and as a result it can be a little more effort for similar throughput when there’s only one enemy to hit. This is most noticeable with Ancient Teachings but it can impact which spells we end up using to heal. You should be able to heal through Ancient Teachings better on multiple targets, but on single target you may need to consider casting depending on the intensity of the damage

4. Do I need to specifically hold cooldowns for another mechanic? What cooldowns do I have available?

If you have significant healing to do but there’s unexpected damage taken, it’s time to consider which cooldowns you have available, and which ones will be back up before their regular use time. Usually this will end up being Sheilun's Gift or Jade Empowerment, since these have the shortest cooldowns and shortest use time (a one-time cast and a short channel).

Maintenance Healing

Maintenance healing basically just comes from pressing your buttons and the passive effects from them, like Crane Style, Rapid Diffusion, and Ancient Teachings. This also includes HoTs like Renewing Mist and Enveloping Mist with Strength of the Black Ox procs from the Conduit of the Celestials hero talents. Jadefire Stomp is included in this since whether you’re DPSing or healing, you should be placing your Jadefire Stomp so that you have near full uptime on it.

Single Target Healing

For heavy single target damage, use Soothing Mist (if talented), Enveloping Mist once, and Vivify until the player is healthy. You may also use Sheilun's Gift if you do not need it for AOE healing, or you may continue your damage rotation and heal through Ancient Teachings . If the damage is intense enough, consider using a cooldown like Life Cocoon.

2-3 Target Healing

If 2 or 3 allies are injured, you can use Enveloping Mist on each player, and Vivify the lowest player until the party is healthy. If you’re using Soothing Mist and Peer Into Peace, you can use that to spread your Enveloping Mist and triage through Soothing Mist with Vivify, otherwise just hardcast. You may also use Sheilun's Gift, or continue your damage rotation and heal through Ancient Teachings if the damage intake allows it.

4+ Target Healing

At this point you’re going to be committing a cooldown in most situations. If the damage is anything more than just maintenance or a few scattered casts then a cooldown is going to be your best bet. Typically I like to lead with Sheilun's Gift or Life Cocoon and then, if more is needed, send Chi-ji or Revival.

Damage Rotations

Our damage rotation varies far less than our healing priorities, but there is some amount of thought that goes into our damage rotation as well since it is directly tied to our healing. All rotations under the assumption that you are standing in your Jadefire Stomp.

Other than target count for pure DPS, these are some things to consider:

1. For Jade Empowerment , am I using this for damage, healing, or both?

Jade Empowerment is a powerful DPS ability on single target and multiple targets but the healing it provides through Ancient Teachings is also significant, so you can either use it as a DPS cooldown, a healing cooldown, or you can pool your stacks of Jade Empowerment up to 2 and use them as either if you’re planning ahead.

2. Can I use Thunder Focus Tea for damage?

You can use Thunder Focus Tea for damage through Rising Sun Kick or Expel Harm, but generally if you don’t need Thunder Focus Tea for healing you should be using it on Rising Sun Kick. Take care not to over cap your Jade Empowerment stacks.

3. Am I playing Master of Harmony or Conduit of the Celestials?

You'll want to focus more on Tiger Palm, Blackout Kick, and Rising Sun Kick when playing Master of Harmony to build and spend your Vitality. We rarely use Spinning Crane Kick anymore, but even less when playing Master of Harmony due to the lack of Vitality interaction. Building Vitality through Tiger Palm, Blackout Kick, Rising Sun Kick, and healing is much faster than Spinning Crane Kick. We also spread and intensify our Aspect of Harmony DoT through these abilities, and Spinning Crane Kick does not. You can use Spinning Crane Kick as Conduit of the Celestials with very high target count but it's generally not used outside of tagging with Mystic Touch.

Single Target Damage

1. Jade Empowerment if not needed for healing

2. Rising Sun Kick

3. 1-2 Tiger Palm

4. Blackout Kick

2-4 Target Damage

1. Jade Empowerment if not needed for healing

2. Chi Burst

3. Rising Sun Kick

4. 1-2 Tiger Palm to your preference

5. Blackout Kick

5+ Target Damage (Conduit Only)

1. Jade Empowerment if not needed for healing

2. Chi Burst

3. 1-2 Tiger Palm to your preference

4. Blackout Kick

12+ Target Damage

1. Jade Empowerment if not needed for healing

2. Chi Burst

3. Spinning Crane Kick

Cooldowns

Chi-ji, the Red Crane

Where does the healing come from?

During Chi-ji there is going to be player healing and Chi-ji healing. The player healing includes Ancient Teachings, Gust of Mists, Enveloping Mist, and Renewing Mist. Chi-ji’s healing includes Chi Cocoon, Gust of Mists, and Enveloping Breath. Chi-ji’s Gust of Mists healing is triggered by the player’s Blackout Kick and will proc Gust of Mists. Chi-ji’s Enveloping Breath is triggered by the player’s Enveloping Mist casts.

How do I use Chi-ji?

Chi-ji is an extremely versatile cooldown and can be used in many ways depending on the situation and type of healing you need but all rotations will involve Tiger Palm, Blackout Kick , and Enveloping Mist . These are more standard rotations but you may find yourself straying from them if needed.

Setup: Have 4 stacks of Teachings of the Monastery, be in Jadefire Stomp, have Ancient Teachings active. Because Chi-ji with Gift of the Celestials is such a short duration, it’s important to do as much as you can beforehand to maximize the healing during your 12 second Chi-ji window.

Rotation #1: This is what I would consider the default rotation that should cover most forms of damage. Blackout Kick, Enveloping Mist, 1 or 2 Tiger Palm, Blackout Kick, Enveloping Mist, Rising Sun Kick, repeat.

Rotation #2: This rotation removes Blackout Kick and most of the Gust of Mists healing from the rotation. This is technically not optimal but it can be useful when you need the healing from Chi-ji but are unable to get through your rotation before the damage would kill you. This way you can still utilize the absorb from Chi Cocoons, heal amps from Enveloping Mist and Enveloping Breath, in addition to some Gust of Mists. 2-3 Enveloping Mist, Rising Sun Kick, Blackout Kick, Enveloping Mist, Rising Sun Kick

Rotation #3: This rotation is basically opposite of the last one, and in this rotation we'll be removing the Enveloping Mist cast from the rotation. This is used for bursty damage that you have time to get through the rotation for. This is only really used if you absolutely don't have time to get Enveloping Mists out but have time for your Tiger Palms. This doesn't happen often but it's good to have in your back pocket! Blackout Kick, 1-2 Tiger Palm, Blackout Kick, 1-2 Tiger Palm, repeat.
Anything else?

Chi-ji has anti-root and anti-slow properties which means you cannot be slowed or rooted during the duration. While Chi-ji is active, using Blackout Kick, Rising Sun Kick, or Spinning Crane Kick, you gain a buff that reduces the mana cost and cast time of your next Enveloping Mist by 33% up to 3 for an instant and free cast. Blackout Kick used with Jadefire Stomp or with Teachings of the Monastery stacks will grant multiple Chi-ji stacks.

Revival

Revival can be multi-use depending on the dungeon pool. It’s a powerful healing cooldown but it also has a mass dispel component. This is often used to quickly top people before a mechanic since it is an instant cast, but when used as a planned cooldown it usually focuses on movement heavy mechanics or mechanics with debuffs as well as damage taken.

Sheilun’s Gift

Sheilun's Gift is sort of a cooldown on a 40 second recharge (with Veil of Pride talented). This doesn’t full heal players but it is a decently strong AOE heal on a relatively short recharge that can be paired with other cooldowns like Celestial Conduit, Revival , or Chi-ji, the Red Crane.

Life Cocoon

Life Cocoon is a large absorb (when talented into Calming Coalescence) that can be used on anyone, even your tank. Often times Life Cocoon is used to prevent one shots on dps players, to remove one player from your triage during heavy AOE damage, or on a tank to help them cycle their defensives better.

Jade Empowerment

Jade Empowerment is another short cooldown on a 30 second recharge as it is triggered from Thunder Focus Tea. The Jade Empowerment charges also can stack up to 2 so it has the potential for some extremely strong burst healing when multiple enemies are present. Typically this is pooled during single target encounters, spending 1 stack when no healing is needed for damage to avoid overcapping stacks, and then used for healing through Ancient Teachings.

Celestial Conduit

Celestial Conduit is a channeled pulsing heal and damage ability that pretty much functions by itself as a healing or damage cooldown though it's recommended to use it mainly for healing. You have the option to press Celestial Conduit again during its channel but this usually isn't necessary because it will automatically recast at the end of the original channel. You can also cast certain abilities during this channel without interrupting it as long as it doesn't do healing or damage. These are abilities like Ring of Peace, Paralysis, Diffuse Magic, Leg Sweep, Tiger’s Lust, Fortifying Brew, Roll, Spear Hand Strike, and more!

Defensives

Fortifying Brew

Fortifying Brew is one of our major defensives. With Expeditious Fortification it's a 1.5 minute cooldown and gives us additional health which can buff things like Life Cocoon and Chi Cocoon as they scale off of our health pool.

Diffuse Magic

Diffuse Magic is a 60% damage reduction against Magic abilities which makes it extremely strong for some mechanics but will not work for Physical damage so it's important to know what type of damage you're taking when planning defensive use.

In addition to this being a major defensive, Diffuse Magic is also a pseudo-spell reflect that can be used on certain bosses and trash packs to get a lot more damage out of our toolkit. The impact of the reflect interaction depends on the dungeon pool and it a spell-by-spell basis but in the past the diffusable debuffs have been very strong!

Life Cocoon

Mentioned above as a cooldown but it can also be used as a personal defensive if needed. Life Cocoon is a large absorb (when talented into Calming Coalescence) that can be used on anyone, even your tank. Often times Life Cocoon is used to prevent one shots on dps players, to remove one player from your triage during heavy AOE damage, or on a tank to help them cycle their defensives better.

Chi Cocoon

Chi Cocoon is a 12% HP + Versatility shield proc when we Invoke Chi-ji, the Red Crane or use Expel Harm with Thunder Focus Tea.

The Chi Cocoon from Chi-ji is a 5 target shield proc and when used with Expel Harm it is a personal shield only.

Jadefire Teachings

Jadefire Teachings is a talent to buff Ancient Teachings but this also gives it 5% Stamina. Your uptime on Ancient Teachings should be very high anyway but occasionally the 5% can be enough to prevent a one shot.

This also makes things like Life Cocoon and Chi Cocoon bigger as they scale off of our health pool.

Jade Sanctuary

Jade Sanctuary is a talent in our Conduit of the Celestials hero talents which gives a 15% damage reduction during Celestial Conduit and for 8 seconds after the channel ends. This allows Celestial Conduit to be used as both a defensive and a healing cooldown.

Elusive Mists

Elusive Mists is tied to Soothing Mist and gives a small amount of damage reduction to yourself and your target. This is another tool that can help prevent one shots or just lessen the damage from a heavy hitting ability or DoT.

Dance of the Wind

Dance of the Wind is a passive talent in the class tree that gives up to 100% reduced Physical damage taken for one hit: 10% from the base talent plus the stacking 10% up to 9 stacks.

This has insane value in certain dungeons but can also be a life saver from a stray melee or randomly targetted ability. It's a good idea to track your stacks so you know your DR amount, as this can help you decide whether or not you need to send a defensive or if Dance of the Wind can be your defensive.