Brewmaster Monk Class Guide - MoP Classic

Welcome to our Mists of Pandaria Classic (MoP Classic) Brewmaster Monk Class Guide for Phase 1, it focuses on getting you up to speed with the Spec for PvE content, Dungeons and Raiding. The guide includes key information for what has changed going into MoP, the best Talent builds, Major Glyphs, your Rotation, Gearing and Consumables for Brewmaster Monk.

Table of Content:

• Changes from Cataclysm to MoP
• Talents
• Rotation & Abilities
• Gearing & Consumables

What’s New for Brewmaster Monk in Mists of Pandaria Classic

In this section of the class & spec guide, we tend to discuss what’s new in Mists of Pandaria for said class or specialization. However, Monks are the brand new class for the expansion, so everything is new. Here’s a quick introduction to the Class instead.

The Monk Class is the third Energy / Combo point class in World of Warcraft. It’s an Agility (and Intellect) Class and uses leather armor, like its counterparts. It’s a hybrid class with 3 specializations: Windwalker (Melee DPS), Mistweaver (Healer) and Brewmaster (Tank).

Regarding Brewmaster, this is the only Energy and “Combo points” (named Chi for the monk) tank in the game, and with the new Stagger mechanic, it’s the most unique tank in World of Warcraft by the time of its release. Brewmaster's health will never go down from an instant damage source, but will continuously take damage from their Stagger mechanic, redirecting instant damage into DoTs. The nature of this mechanic can surprise healers, and will take some time for your Classic WoW healer friends to get used to.

Is Brewmaster Monk Good?

Yes, Monks are a great addition to any raiding party and Brewmaster is a great tank. With great mitigation and very strong damage, especially in the early tiers, Brewmasters are always a good choice for Raids. They also complement Blood Death Knights, who are unkillable but tend to be trucks without engines when it comes to movement. If you want to play a tank and raid in MoP, Brewmaster is a very safe pick.

Best Talents & Glyphs for Brewmaster Monk in MoP Classic

With the new revamped talents, we will provide you with 2 talent builds. Tanks tend to have a little less choice when it comes to talents, and those choices might not depend entirely on the type of activity you’re doing, but more-so what the specific boss fight or dungeon needs, so we will explain talent choices a bit more in depth in the raid talent build section below.

Brewmaster Monk Raiding Talent Build

The standard raid talent build should look a lot like this. But you can change pretty much every talent depending on the fight or what you need to do, except for Chi wave and Ascension which are pretty much locked-in.

On the first row Tiger’s Lust can be swapped for Momentum if you run around a lot. The instant move speed and cleansing effect from Tiger’s Lust is incredible, but it might not be enough if you need to move during the whole fight.

Leg sweep can be swapped with Ring of Peace if you need a knockback or if you need to kite mobs around a lot. Ring of Peace is a very unique piece of utility and can be very useful in specific scenarios.

Dampen Harm and Diffuse Magic are both great. Dampen Harm is for physical damage mitigation and Diffuse Magic is for magic damage mitigation. Dampen Harm is a bit “easier” to use if you aren’t sure of what damage type you will have to tank, but in the long run you should change this to match the encounter you are in.

Finally, Invoke Xuen will be played in pure single target fights and Rushing Jade Wind in long AoE and cleave situations.

Best Brewmaster Monk Raid Glyphs

Regarding Major Glyphs, you will want to obtain Glyph of Fortifying Brew, Glyph of Touch of Death, Glyph of Spinning Crane Kick.

Other choices might be Glyph of Enduring Healing Sphere, Glyph of Fortuitous Sphere and Glyph of Zen Meditation. For Dungeons, you can take Glyph of Breath of Fire.

There are very few good Minor Glyphs, the ones worth noting are Glyph of Spirit Roll, Glyph of Water Roll.

Brewmaster Monk Dungeons & Challenge Mode Talent Build

The Dungeon Build relies on the same logic as the raiding build, just with you taking Rushing Jade Wind every time. The logic behind each choice is the same as the raiding build, so if you want more detail on what to take depending on each situation, we recommend reading the raiding build choices.

Best Brewmaster Monk Dungeon Glyphs

Regarding Major Glyphs, you will want to obtain Glyph of Fortifying Brew, Glyph of Breath of Fire, Glyph of Spinning Crane Kick.

Other choices might be Glyph of Enduring Healing Sphere, Glyph of Fortuitous Sphere, Glyph of Touch of Death and Glyph of Zen Meditation.

There are very few good Minor Glyphs, the ones worth noting are Glyph of Spirit Roll, Glyph of Water Roll.

Rotation for Brewmaster Monk in MoP Classic

Single Target Rotation & Priority

Brewmaster monks use Energy to generate Chi, and spend Chi to cast strong and unique abilities. The following is a list of priority, not a straight rotation. Brewmaster’s Rotation relies a lot on maintaining buffs, so don’t waste all your energy and Chi doing things like spamming Jab or Blackout Kick, you need to be a bit mindful of your resources and never get below 30 energy while still not over capping your Chi and your Energy.

1. Stay in Stance of the Sturdy Ox.
2. Maintain Summon Black Ox Statue.
3. Maintain Guard.
4. Maintain Shuffle with Blackout Kick.
5. Maintain Tiger Power with Tiger Palm.
6. Use Elusive Brew around 7-8 charges. It should never reach 15 charges and should have next to 100% uptime.
7. When you get Red Stagger, use Purifying Brew.
8. Use Invoke Xuen on Cooldown.
9. Use Chi Wave on Cooldown.
10. Use Keg Smash on Cooldown if you have 3 Chi or less.
11. Use Jab (aggressive) and Expel Harm (self-healing) to generate Chi.
12. When you have all your buff ups, mitigation isn’t a problem, spend Chi on Blackout Kick and Tiger Palm.

AoE Rotation & Priority

In AoE, the rotation is pretty much the same. You will use Spinning Crane Kick to generate Chi and not Jab, but that's pretty much it. If you have Rushing Jade Wind, you want to maintain it.

Brewmaster Monk Opener

Regarding Openers, you want to first get your different buff and debuffs running: Expel Harm before pull to generate 1 Chi, place your Black Ox Statue, taunt, and then Keg Smash, Tiger Palm, Blackout Kick and Xuen/Rushing Jade Wind to get your buffs going, then follow the normal rotation.

Best Gear & Stats for Brewmaster Monk in MoP Classic

Best in Slot (BiS Gear) aren’t as big in Mists of Pandaria Classic. Reforging is the new hype, so you can tailor your gear better than before.

The gear you should aim for are: Trinkets, Tier Sets and Weapons.

The best weapons you can find pre-raid in the first phase are:

• Krol Scimitar, World drop.
• Ka’eng, Breath of the Shadow, from Taran Zhu”s Personal Stash in Shado-pan Monastery.
• Siege-Captain’s Scimitar, a bit lower in iLvL, from Commander Vo’jak in Siege of Niuzao.

The best pre-raid trinkets are:

• Relic of Xuen if you have Inscription.
• Searing Words, Darkmaster Gandling, Scholomance.
• Windswept Pages, from Temple of the Jade Serpent.

MoP Classic Brewmaster Monk Stat Priority

Reach your Hit cap, so 7.5% and then your Expertise cap, so around 15%. Then, Agility and Stamina are your best stats.

Regarding the other stats, it usually depends on what you want to do. Mastery gives a better, smoother damage mitigation at the cost of damage. Critical Strike increases Elusive Brew uptime and your DPS, but the damage mitigation will be a bit spikier. I would personally go full crit, because it’s the funnest thing to do, but a good balance of Mastery and Crit is a good idea, with a bit of Haste just to have a smoother rotation.

Best Consumables, Enchants & Gems for Brewmaster Monk in MoP Classic

The following tables outline the recommended Consumables, Enchants and Gems for Brewmaster Monk in Raiding and Dungeon content.

Consumables

Enchants

Gems

We hope this guide helped you improve your Brewmaster Monk Gameplay and better understand the spec. To check out all of our MoP Classic content, such as Class Guides, Tier Lists and more, you can browse our full library of MoP Classic Guides.