Playstyle & Rotation
Windwalkers use a priority system, not a rotation. This means that you want to use the highest priority ability available and don’t delay a higher priority ability for a lower one.
Single-Target:
- Fist of the White Tiger (without capping Chi and about to cap Energy)
- Expel Harm (without capping Chi and about to cap Energy)
- Tiger Palm (without capping Chi and about to cap Energy)
- Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger
- Weapons of Order (if Kyrian) / Bonedust Brew (if Necrolord) / Fallen Order (if Venthyr)
- Whirling Dragon Punch
- Spinning Crane Kick (if Dance of Chi-Ji proc)
- Faelin Stomp (if Night Fae)
- Rising Sun Kick
- Fists of Fury
- Touch of Death
- Fist of the White Tiger (without capping Chi)
- Expel Harm (without capping Chi)
- Chi Burst (without capping Chi)
- Blackout Kick
- Chi Wave
- Tiger Palm
Opener:
Necrolord
- Expel Harm 14 seconds before pull
- Chi Burst 2 seconds before pull
- Fist of the White Tiger
- Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger
- Storm, Earth, and Fire (press it again instantly to gain the damage bonus of Coordinated Offensive)
- Bonedust Brew
- Rising Sun Kick
- Tiger Palm
- Fists of Fury
- Expel Harm
- Whirling Dragon Punch
Kyrian
- Expel Harm 14 seconds before pull
- Chi Burst 2 seconds before pull
- Fist of the White Tiger
- Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger
- Weapons of Order
- Storm, Earth, and Fire (press it again instantly to gain the damage bonus of Coordinated Offensive)
- Rising Sun Kick
- Fists of Fury, cancel after 1 second
- Blackout Kick
- Expel Harm
- Blackout Kick
- Rising Sun Kick
- Blackout Kick
- Whirling Dragon Punch
- Blackout Kick
- Rising Sun Kick
Multi Target:
Multi-Target (3 Targets or more)
- Fist of the White Tiger (without capping Chi and about to cap Energy)
- Expel Harm (without capping Chi and about to cap Energy)
- Tiger Palm (without capping Chi and about to cap Energy)
- Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger
- Weapons of Order (if Kyrian) / Bonedust Brew (if Necrolord) / Fallen Order (if Venthyr)
- Whirling Dragon Punch
- Spinning Crane Kick (if Dance of Chi-Ji proc)
- Faeline Stomp (if Night Fae)
- Fists of Fury
- Touch of Death
- Expel Harm (without capping Chi)
- Fist of the White Tiger (without capping Chi)
- Chi Burst (without capping Chi)
- Rising Sun Kick (Use it to enable Whirling Dragon Punch)
- Spinning Crane Kick (3 targets, 2 targets with Calculated Strikes)
- Tiger Palm
Setting up your burst window:
As Necrolord in AoE situations, there is a degree of setup involved before entering your cooldowns. You have two main objectives to accomplish before entering your cooldowns
- You want to get Fists of Fury, and Rising Sun Kick on cooldown in order to use Whirling Dragon Punch.
Note: You may skip this process if you believe the mobs will not survive the entire length of your cooldowns. It may depend on the situation but it is often recommended that you do NOT cancel Fists of Fury early as if you are it may be better to have skipped using it, if this is the case then you would also not use Rising Sun Kick as well to preserve the Chi.
- You want to be at 5 (or 6 if you have Ascension talented) Chi
If you are using Ascension this can be achieved by using Tiger Palm -> Chi Burst (hitting two targets) -> Tiger Palm, or by using 3x Tiger Palm if you don't have Chi Burst available. Because you're not using Hit Combo the broken mastery isn't as big of a DPS loss as not being able to enter your Cooldowns quicker.
If you are using Fist of the White Tiger instead, you can easily generate 5 chi by using Fist of the White Tiger -> Tiger Palm.
Either way you ideally want to saveExpel Harm in order to help recover the Chi spent from Fists of Fury.
Once you have built up your Chi, Follow this sequence:
- Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger
- Fists of Fury (Fully channel)
- Tiger Palm
- Expel Harm
- Storm, Earth, and Fire
- Rising Sun Kick
- Tiger Palm
- Fixate Storm, Earth, and Fire (This is accomplished by pressing your Storm, Earth, and Fire keybind again.)
- Bonedust Brew
- Spinning Crane Kick
- Whirling Dragon Punch
- Spinning Crane Kick until you're empty on Chi.
Note: Make sure to track the remaining duration on your Mark of the Crane and make sure you have 5 stacks during your cooldowns if possible.
Playstyle:
On single target, your playstyle is mostly just keeping buttons on cooldown and aligning them while managing your resources. Your playstyle can differ significantly depending on your covenant choice because each covenant structures its cooldown use differently.
For example, Kyrian is more of an "all-in" playstyle where you try to use all of your cooldowns and both of your Storm, Earth, and Fire charges during your Weapons of Order window. This differs from Necrolord, where Bonedust Brew is a shorter cooldown and duration, and therefore you are using your Storm, Earth, and Fire charges around that.
In AoE situations, you are mostly managing your Mark of the Crane debuffs on targets while simultaneously using Spinning Crane Kick as much as possible while maintaining your mastery. An ideal Windwalker fight will have at least 5 targets alive.
Cooldown Management
As Kyrian, you want to use all of your cooldowns together every time for maximum effectiveness. You always fully channel Fists of Fury during Weapons of Order.
As Necrolord, there will be times where you will be forced to just use Storm, Earth, and Fire + Bonedust Brew. Every third Bonedust Brew on a boss fight will be used by itself so you can line it up with your other cooldowns on the next usage.
Mark of the Crane
Mark of the Crane is the term for the mechanic when you use Tiger Palm, Blackout Kick, or Rising Sun Kick. It applies a 20-second debuff that increases the damage of your Spinning Crane Kick by 18% per stack. In AoE, it is crucial to maintain as many debuffs as there are targets up to a maximum of 5 to deal the most damage with Spinning Crane Kick. This can be accomplished when you use Storm, Earth, and Fire because by default the spirits will seek out targets that you are in combat with and targets that do not have a mark applied to them. When you use an ability that would normally apply a Mark of the Crane, it effectively triples the speed at which you can gain stacks in AoE. This should be done to speed up the process of your burst damage but be sure to fixate your spirits on a priority target to gain the damage bonus from Coordinated Offensive.
Ignoring Mastery as Necrolord
You want to ignore mastery during your AoE burst because of the Windwalker specific effect of Bonedust Brew, "Spinning Crane Kick refunds 1 Chi when striking enemies with your Bonedust Brew active." you will often ignore your mastery in favor of a playstyle that just spams Spinning Crane Kick. The threshold for this is if you have +30% haste (which you will) and less than 40% mastery during your cooldowns.
Movement
Windwalker Monk is one of the most mobile classes in the game. You have a plethora of mobility tools available, such as Flying Serpent Kick, Roll, Transcendence, and Tiger's Lust if you have it talented.
Survivability
You have many defensive cooldowns available to you, such as Touch of Karma, Fortifying Brew, and Diffuse Magic if you have it talented, as well as the constant healing from Expel Harm. You should try to identify good times to use Touch of Karma to deal damage as long as it is not detrimental to your group and does not put you at risk later on.
Tier Set
The 4 piece of your tier set doesn’t alter your playstyle very much but there are a few things to keep an eye out.
- Expel Harm doesn’t count as a Combo Strike while the buff is active. This means that Blackout Kick -> Expel Harm -> Blackout Kick will break mastery.
- If you are nearing 10 stacks of the buff and your Rising Sun Kick and/or Fists of Fury has either just come off cooldown or is about to cooldown you should try to fit those spells in the window.
- Bonedust Brew, Expel Harm, and Weapons of Order will generate but not consume a stack of Primordial Potential (the stacking buff) but won’t consume stacks of Primordial Power (the damage buff).