Mistweaver Advice

[jemd13]

Hello everyone!.

A couple of weeks ago I preordered WoD and used the lvl90 boost on my lvl60 monk, and chose Brewmaster as my spec. Started tanking in LFR and got gear there. Now I'm trying healing, with LFR and timeless isle I've gotten some gear for this.

I checked the mistweaver guide for patch 5.4 on this forums, but still wanted to ask for some advice. Keep in mind this is only for LFR or possibly Flex (inb4 LFR is not real raiding so just do whatever. I actually want to learn ).

So here are some questions :

1.- Am I supossed to ONLY used Surging Mist while channeling Soothing Mist so it's instant cast? Let's say I see some dps drop down to 30% health and I want to heal this person, should I channel Soothing Mist and instantly use Surging Mist and stop channeling, or just cast Surging Mist right away?. Same question applies for Enveloping Mist.

2.- I feel that Mistweaver raid healing is a little lacking, but I want to believe it's just that I'm doing something wrong. My biggest problem is that I think the biggest AoE heal we have is Uplift, but that only heals targets that have Renewing Mist rolling on them. Asides from that I got Chi Torpedo and Spinning Crane Kick, but both of those depend on where I'm standing and where the targets I want to heal are, and then I have Zen Sphere, which I'd have to time right so it blows up at the right time. So, any advice on AoE healing? I usually keep Renewing Mists on both tanks and then it spreads,but then again, sometimes I don't manage to heal more than 6-7 people with Uplift unless I use Thunder Focus Tea and then Uplift so Renewing Mist spreads out more.

3.- Is it worth placing Healing Spheres around?. I feel that it depends too much on the people's awareness. If the person doesn't run through the Sphere, then it just heals for a little bit, and only after 1 minute. (Remember this is LFR mostly so I can't really tell people "hey I just put a Sphere next to you, run through it!"

And that's pretty much it. Feel free to give me more advice on Mistweaver healing if you feel it's necessary, any tips or tricks are appreciated . ( For the record I've healed before with a Paladin, back in Cataclysm, mostly through Dragon Soul, if that helps at all lol ).

Thanks!

[Babylonius]

1. You can certainly do that, should be faster than the cast time depending on your haste levels.

2. Its not lacking, its just that Pallys, Priests, and Shaman eat up the healing with their smart heals and aborbs, so MW heals whatever is left over, which can be small. More often than not you'll want to take RJW instead of Chi Torpedo and just keep that rolling when there is AOE damage. You'll also want to take Chi Burst rather than Zen Sphere which is mostly a crap talent this tier.

3. It had been the most efficient way to heal, but it is difficult so most ignore it unless there is nothing else to do.

[Deleted]

welcome to our MW world, and i do hope you enjoy yourself

Babylonius answered your questions, just wanted to add

Hello everyone!.

...- I feel that Mistweaver raid healing is a little lacking, but I want to believe it's just that I'm doing something wrong...

This little nugget here - how a fresh person to MW healing discovers this and thinks he must be doing something wrong.

Not going to dwell on it too much, just enough so you can make a educated decision on how to move forward in WoD.
There is a big discussion raging atm about the state of mistweavers in 5.4 and in 6.0 on beta and a big part of it is raidhealing and the inability to control who you heal through ReM/Uplift as you experienced firsthand.

Don't want to bore you with the details but check out the consolidated feedback forums on MW right here on MMO-Champion or on the official beta forum.

Other than that, i am happy you are trying out the spec for yourself

[Ltgoose]

I feel competent enough to give you your answers as I see them.

1. The general consensus is to only cast Surging Mists and Enveloping Mists while channeling Soothing Mists. The reason being is that they become instant cast which is kind of what we are built around currently. On a side note with this, some MW's have taken to casting Surging Mists without casting Soothing Mists first once they get the Legendary Meta Gem (LMG) for a fast and large heal at no mana cost when it is glyphed to not require a target. I don't do this currently as I prefer the raw healing and damage output that Crackling Jade Lighting provide with the LGM proc.

2. Despite not noticing it, MW can be one of the strongest raid healers in game currently. If you can keep Renewing Mists on cd and on as many people as possible, you can blanket up to 16 people in an lfr if you time your thunderfocus tea cd effectively. This is by far the hardest skill cap to MW on live to play MW efficiently. When you have many Renewing Mists up on the raid, you cast Uplift for two chi to heal all those people at once. This effectively constitutes our raid healing besides stacked up Rushing Jade Wind spamming, which can and will be a huge mana drain if you aren't generating enough chi to spend to get mana tea back for mana regen. I can touch on this later if you want me to.

3. Is it worth placing Healing Sphere's? Sure, they are a huge instant heal that costs 2% mana. If you haven't noticed already, our mastery spheres aren't exactly picked up or sought after currently. I personally don't use them on other raiders as it is just too time consuming to find them mid fight to drop a heal under then when another healer may already top them off. I use my Healing Spheres as a personal heal when shit hits the fan as it usually takes 2-3 to top me off from about 10% health. I compare them to lock cookies except they can crit for a whole bunch of healing which is good for us. Other than that, they don't generate Chi and therefore I consider the spell a negative mana return spell due to how long it takes to effectively heal with them. Now in pvp, that is a different story. Something to keep in mind though is that the spell Healing Sphere is being removed in WoD, but our mastery spheres are staying.

I hope this helps. If you have any more questions, feel free to ask away!

[jemd13]

Thanks for your help guys . I got a couple more questions now, hope you can help with this.

I did what Babylonius suggested and took RJW and Chi Burst instead of Chi Torpedo and Zen Sphere just so yall know, and it's been working fine.

1. Now, for glyphs I've been using Renewing Mist,Spheres (The one that causes spheres to last longer,can't remember the name), and Spinning Crane kick. Now that I picked up RJW, I no longer have to worry about the speed penalty,so the glyph of Spinnning Crane Kick is wasted. What should I pick up instead? I was thinking about the Expel Harm glyph to make it targetted,but not sure if that's worth it. Any advice on glyphs?.

2. Any advantage on using 2h weaps instead of 1h + OH? I currently have a ilvl502 1h sword and ilvl528 OH. Should I aim for ilvl528 2h or stick to 1h+OH?. (Taking Fistweaving into consideration).

3. Since I already mentioned fistweaving. The MW guide in this forum says that fistweaving should only be used on certain cases when the group needs more dps or when I don't need big heals as long as I have self-control and know when to switch back to normal healing. So I'm assuming Fistweaving is only used to switch to a more "support" role right? As in, it's not a reliable source of healing if the raid is taking AoE damage right?. I currently fistweave on trash or when I see the other healers are doing ok keeping the group up. Is this right? Or is there actually a way to make fistweaving the "main" healing technique for the MW?.

Once again thanks for the advice and help guys!

[Babylonius]

1. Targeted EH is another very mana efficient heal. Many people believe you should use it on CD for a practically free Chi.

2. 2H should be better for FW, not sure if its a drastic difference, but it SHOULD be better.

3. Its a very reliable source of AOE healing, but dont' expect it to keep everyone up through reasonable damage. Its meant as a cover to patch holes if other healers are handling it or there is very little damage going out. There isn't a way to make fistweaving the "main" healing technique in the sense that it will never do more healing than mistweaving. It can be the main technique if thats the only one you use, but may not be optimal in all situations.

[Baladash]

I feel competent enough to give you your answers as I see them.
2. Despite not noticing it, MW can be one of the strongest raid healers in game currently. If you can keep Renewing Mists on cd and on as many people as possible, you can blanket up to 16 people in an lfr if you time your thunderfocus tea cd effectively. This is by far the hardest skill cap to MW on live...

Once you get the hang of this and find its flow (I usually listen to hip-hop on my monk) you will have so much fun. It can be tricky to learn how to target the right people to *try* to control the Mist. I prefer not to use Glyph of Renewing Mist as Melee and Ranged are typically in two different groups and I like to chose where my mists go for the most effective uplifts.

edit:
Forgot to mention Renewing Mist Tracker is a good way to get a feel for where your mists are at and when you should renew and even get a few extra hits on your uplift if you wait until the last second before it wears off of the oldest target. Once I got the hang of it I didn't need the addon anymore.

[Ltgoose]

1. I use glyph of targeted expulsion as my third glyph slot along with Renewing Mists and Enduring Spheres.

2. From what I have read, a 2h weapon is better for fistweaving where a main hand/off hand is better for traditional healing i.e. casting only. At your gear levels, I would go with which ever weapon(s) yields the highest average ilvl or which ever combination that gives you the most crit.

3. For fistweaving specifically, it seems to have fallen on the wayside right now with how things are. If you have the LMG, you can use those procs to use Jab->TP twice to get 8% mana back in a short amount to time. For me, I will fistweave usually in heavy AoE phases like on Garrosh phase 1 and just BlK the adds for insane AoE healing. This is coupled with RJW to blanket the melee group and some added dps cleave. However recently I have moved to lignting weaving which is exactly like it sounds. I cast CJL to deal damage on my down time instead of punching things. For me, this yields more eminence healing since my CJL damage output is greater for single target stuff than traditional fistweaving.

And just like Baladash said, get a Renewing Mists tracker addon. These are god sends for us when using TFT. I personally use Affinitii's WA string one as it is more compact. Here is the link to his weakauras strings if you are feeling lazy about looking it up: http://pastebin.com/aWCPFXYj

[Deleted]

1. You can do a direct cast if you like, but I have always prefered using soothing mist and then instant cast them since it gives you quicker response time if several surging mists are needed. However, surging mists mana cost makes it very punishing to use several time so I only use it when it truly is a time for panicking. But if I know the damage pattern and know that it won't be more damage spikes, I reign in the inclination and use constant soothing mist + enveloping mist until the player is at full health.

2. AoE heals when people are spread is a Mistweavers worst nightmare. However there are some tricks a skilled MW can use. If the raid is stacked, Chi Torpedo and Spinning Crane Kick/Rushing Jade Wind are of course the best options. But that is seldom the case. You should develop a habit of always using Thunder Focus Tea on cooldown, even when the AoE is rather light. The trick with TFT is to time it exactly right (I use weak auras to track how many ReMs are out). If you have enough haste your ReM spread will bounce between 6-8 players. The two very first ReMs will give you 6, the third will spread it to 8 before the first ReM cast starts to tick out. But during that moment use TFT and you have a fresh ReM on 8 players. You'll be able to cast it twice again before it starts ticking out, so for a second there you'll have a spread on 15 targets. Not for long, but if you use Chi Brew (which you always should, in my opinion) you can cast two uplifts during that time and pack some immense AoE healing. If the AoE is really high I recommend using Xuen for emminence healing while you focus on you ReM spread. Also, Zen Sphere is probably the worst talent in it's tier since it's so weak. Use Chi wave or Chi Burst. Chi Burst is stronger but you can do other healing while Chi Wave is bouncing around and you don't need to locate people, so I've always prefered Chi Wave.

3. Healing Spheres have a bit of an odd place in a Mistweaver's spellbook. I wouldn't use it for more sphere spamming since the mastery will already do that for you. However, it can replace surging mist on single target if you can locate the player you're healing (something that's very, very useful in Proving Grounds, for example). It's cheaper than surging mist and you can spam it away to your heart's delight. A bit tricky to place though, mostly I only use it on tanks and preferably they're also marked so I have a better notion of where they're at. Too bad it's going to be removed in WoD, but we're going to get Detonate Chi instead so those mastery orbs finally gets to good use.

So, there it is! Hope any of it helped