The Teachings of Xuen: A Windwalker PvE Guide

[Saltycracker]

I'm finding mastery somewhat wanting for these normal mode fights. TEB needs a significant amount of time to ramp up, and usually by the time we can start rolling brews, it is about 60-90 seconds into the fight. I think gemming agility is still the way to go, finding your haste balance point, and then going mastery or crit.

[Deleted]

I got 6k haste and managed to do fine in 2nd and third boss. But those targets include alot target switching

[Deleted]

the WW sim, simc gives out as the highest dps
has 10k haste and gems mastery...
but 10k seems very much as you will prob get energy capped...

[Deleted]

Should we use Chi Wave in normal rota? Or rotation with low haste?

And is op gonna update Op stat weight for 5.2? Even if we dont know wich stat prio is best but at least make some changes and try to explain why we should go 7k haste > mastery > crit? Or some else?

I am average player who can avoid shit and do enough dps to kill Heroic bosses etc but im terrible at simcrafting and trying stat weights and build (or making own builds) without any help so forums like this give me huge help.

Just want to thank Op and hope you keep doing great job and ofc everyone who writes here and other forums and share their opinions and info so players like me can improve our dps.

[Gulvan]

I did 6.8k haste last night and I was constantly energy capped so I think Im gonna go with more of a 5.8-6k build. I am not sure of who Mihir got out of his 7k haste build. I think being a raid leader isn't helping my haste capping either especially while learning the normals lol.

Tonight Im gonna go 6k haste > mastery. I have been using my brew at the start w/ trinkets opening potion when I get 1-2 stacks which does help with some damage. I was getting around 200k opening dps which was nice for a change.

Going from 4k haste to 7k was a huge difference in energy management and I probably was just completely used to be gassed all the time that having so much energy resulted in wasted gcds. Ill see how I do tonight with the said changes.

[NeverStop]

Should we use Chi Wave in normal rota? Or rotation with low haste?

And is op gonna update Op stat weight for 5.2? Even if we dont know wich stat prio is best but at least make some changes and try to explain why we should go 7k haste > mastery > crit? Or some else?

I am average player who can avoid shit and do enough dps to kill Heroic bosses etc but im terrible at simcrafting and trying stat weights and build (or making own builds) without any help so forums like this give me huge help.

Just want to thank Op and hope you keep doing great job and ofc everyone who writes here and other forums and share their opinions and info so players like me can improve our dps.

I'm really confused about stat priority / gemming too. Looking at WoL, the #4 parse for Jin'rokh (http://worldoflogs.com/reports/iym4l...=5800#Kazehira) is a 500 ilvl WW. He's gemming pure AGI and has 6600 Haste (armory: http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/characte...ehira/advanced).

On the other hand, the #2 parse (http://worldoflogs.com/reports/rt-h4...7#Chamberzisiz) is 514 ilvl is gemming Mastery or AGI / Mastery in red sockets and has 6200 Haste (http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...zisiz/advanced).

So my question is, what's the best value of Haste to have, and what should we gem / reforge? Simcraft isn't being helpful because it's telling me AGI = 1, Haste = 0.61, Crit = 0.44, Mastery = 0.42.

[Moozhe]

It's hard to draw a correlation between feeling energy capped and actually doing less DPS. With 4pc T14 we're always going to feel flooded with energy during Energizing Brew. And we're going to feel the same during Bloodlust. And there will be windows of time when we get RNG Combo Breaker procs all at once. Is it worth capping energy sometimes in order to reduce or eliminate times of being "energy starved"?

Weaving in Chi Wave and Fists of Fury on cooldown are both options that reduce the amount of energy regen we need. But do we gear around low haste and having openings for which to use Chi Wave, or just stack high haste and ignore Chi Wave altogether? Chi Wave doesn't build TEB stacks so it doesn't synergize with mastery, unlike BoK spam. Fists of Fury is also lower than BoK in terms of TEB stack generation rate.

And while balancing all those we have to consider the possibility of going back to Power Strikes which means less Jabs, more room for Chi Wave, and similar chi generation rate as Ascension.

So some of our options are the following:

1) Removed (Chi Wave is bugged)
2) Removed (Chi Wave is bugged)
3) High haste (6-7k) with Ascension, stack mastery, rarely use FoF.
4) Higher haste (7-8k) with Power Strikes, stack mastery, rarely use FoF.

In terms of scaling I think that options 3 or 4 will scale best with our BiS gear. I think the haste/mastery synergy is held back by the efficient usage of weaving in lots of Chi Wave and Fists of Fury. We want to keep mashing BoK to have good TEB stack generation so that our mastery has a high uptime.

Also, we have to be careful about theorycrafting Chi Wave on paper without looking how it performs in practice. The bounces are NOT reliable. Here is a log where I was trying to hit Chi Wave more or less on cooldown (without energy capping):

http://worldoflogs.com/reports/rt-tc...?s=7375&e=7816

Using a log filter I can see that I "cast" Chi Wave 23 times. That is, I spent 23 GCDs on Chi Wave. Given the length of the fight, I theoretically could have hit about 29 Chi Waves throughout the course of it. So that seems about right. However, the number of actual damaging hits of Chi Wave was only 29. It should hit 4 times per use, so I should have had 92 hits (hits and crits combined). So there is obviously a problem with the bouncing on that fight, perhaps something to do with the mob hitbox. It's something we need to look out for and not just assume Chi Wave on paper is the same as Chi Wave in practice.

Edit: referred to Combo Breaker as mastery procs. Oops.

[Gulvan]

The haste really has to do with how comfortable you are with the energy gain. The more haste, the more energy you get. I would say go with 6100 at first then increase as you see fit. Some are doing straight 7k some 6.6k.

As for actual stat weights from what I saw posted earlier in this thread its like agil > haste to 7k > mastery.

[Saltycracker]

Well said Moozh.

Energy capping "feels bad" but I don't think it has a negative impact on your DPS, unless of course you just have too much haste and it's happening constantly. There are energy peaks and valleys, and sometimes they are outside your control. I know there are points in my 4pc Energizing brew where I cap, but ultimately it's about spending chi and not energy.

I'm seeing the same behavior with Chi Wave, and it's (another) situational spell added into our rotation. Best used in close quarters, or fights where the targets are densely packed. I have a feeling that the number of bounces is inversely proportional to the distance travelled, so hitting Maegara's head is not terribly optimal. I have a feeling that Chi Wave and Fists of Fury are good for the exact opposite kinds of encounters.

For my own calculations I'm going to assume that CW hits for half of the simmed value just to be conservative.

Fists of Fury is on the chopping block for me at the moment. I'm thinking about running power strikes and using FOF for utility rather than DPS. Considering all the what ifs that happen (energy capping, RSK cooldowns, not enough chi), and this tier is even more movement heavy than the last, I think it's time to put a fork in it. Patchwerk encounters it's fine, and we can reforge to accomodate it; just like a lot of our mechanics, they look fine on paper, but in practice it's kind of a disaster.

[Gulvan]

I think for tonight I am going to do three things:

6k haste rest mastery
Power strikes
ignore FoF/cw

Ill report back how fluid my abilities are with the encounter movement mechanics. I think thatll help keep TEB stacks high as well which will be an additional bonus.

[Eijy]

So, Im not a dps, I'm a tank monk, but readed about the nerf in WW, I was thinking in off spec to dps, but, the topic here in our forum have many...well, whine, so I'm looking for something more..serious

Comparing buffs and nerfs, overall DPS and damage, in what place WW are now? Like, same thing, got better, worst? I know that for us monks, player skill is heavy envolving, but I want to know how much the dps lost with that nerf

[Callimonk]

I'll be sure to tune in before my own raid ! See how 7K fits you. I know your APM is roughly equal to my own, so it'll be interesting.

Myself - I tried proving mathematically whether Power Strikes or Ascension - but the honest truth is that Ascension also becomes "better" at higher levels of haste, at least in theory and due to the fact that - unlike Power Strikes - it is not baseline but scales. The flaw with this, however, is that we can't possibly use every single GCD - even when accounting for server lag, CB procs, and light movement, I found that with 7K haste we can certainly become energy starved without FoF or EB, though for only intervals of half a second.

If we recall in 5.0, 6-7K haste is where Windwalker became "fluid" with Power Strikes. This is what I think I will fall back on for now. Let's also keep in mind that current math points to 8 or 9K haste making mastery overwhelmingly delicious - and the fact that we don't necessarily want to scale with Energy Regen, but with Haste (given that it is a stat we technically triple-dip from, via Tiger Strikes, Energy Regen, and AA speed - quadruple dip with TeB active, in fact, when you account for higher AA + TeB = rainbowvomit).

I have the feeling that there may be no real "break even" point mathematically - but on a personal level. For a higher-level player with higher APM, the break point between PS and Asc may be 7-8K haste. For others, it could be 9-10K. I think it will fall into the realms of personal experimentation.

And then I'll later update the EJ guide once this is more thoroughly tested (lol).

[Deleted]

This nerf....is retarded. 99k dps on our Maegera kill and I was top dps most fights averaging 115-130k in 5.1

[Partyhats]

This nerf....is retarded. 99k dps on our Maegera kill and I was top dps most fights averaging 115-130k in 5.1

I'm feeling this too...I don't really know what the hell I'm doing wrong. Think I'm just gonna go back to 5.1 style, gemming agi/crit and favoring a high crit build until I get some more gear better suited to mastery stacking.

[Lissa]

Also noticed tonight that Chi Wave wasn't jumping when it was supposed to. Before WoL stopped refusing to parse, I tested on the bosses up to Ji-Kun.

Jin'rokh: Failed to bounce 50% of the time
Horridon: Bounced fine off adds; if cast on the boss it bounced to the tank and then stopped
Council: Fine most of the time, however on 3 occasions when the heal hit one of the SEF spirits, it stopped afterwards
Tortos: Fine off the bats; fine off boss as long as there were pets to bounce off
Megaera: Disaster.
Ji-Kun: 50% fine

So you're definitely on to something regarding Chi Wave and the mobs' hitboxes. Going to treat it as the lowest priority spell if I have nothing else to press; or only use on fights where the mobs have small hitboxes like Horridon or Tortos adds.

[Moozhe]

Regarding Chi Wave bouncing, I just tested the behavior:

- When you initially cast it on an enemy target it has a 40 yard range.

- It will bounce from an enemy to a friendly within 20 yards from the center of each actor's hitbox. This means if the boss has a large hit box and nobody is within 20 yards of the center of the hitbox it may not bounce at all.

- When bouncing from a friendly to an enemy it will travel only 10 yards. Again, this is the distance between the center of the hitboxes. So against a larger "elite mob" type hitbox you probably need to be within 8 yards. I tested against the Shao-Tien Behemoth mob (Golden Lotus dailies) and my Chi Waves weren't bouncing from me to the mob even when I was within melee range. That's pretty terrible.

So I'm not using Chi Wave at all at this point unless I'm energy starved and FoF is on CD.

[Bijohx]

This nerf....is retarded. 99k dps on our Maegera kill and I was top dps most fights averaging 115-130k in 5.1

And blizz says
"Go home monk, you are drunk, we dont need you dps more"

[Stuffs]

So question, I havent really messed with the clone AI, if its chasing a target thats out of range for it while I use BoK, will it have a BoK queued when it gets to the target or am I basically shorted the clone BoK

[NeverStop]

Are WW really that bad / underrepresented in T15?

We have less than 100 ranks on Council of Elders.

http://worldoflogs.com/rankings/play...r_Monk/?page=3

[Tradu]

Are WW really that bad / underrepresented in T15?

We have less than 100 ranks on Council of Elders.

http://worldoflogs.com/rankings/play...r_Monk/?page=3

No, thats just WoL being slow, and the first week isn't even over yet.