Brewmaster Monk PvP

Pandaren Brewmaster in Primal Gladiator gear Yes, Brewmaster PvP can be done. You’re able to soak a lot of damage and can dish out a decent amount. You will achieve pleasure by watching the frustration on your enemy’s faces as they try to being you down, before you kill them.

No, you won’t likely top the arena rankings, or get close, but Brew PvP can be fun in less demanding situations.

Talents for Brew PvP
Glyphs
Stat Priorities
Gearing Up Your Brewmaster
Gems and Enchants
Rotations & How To
Macros for Brewmaster PvP
Visit Skill-Capped for many more Monk guides (though none for Brewmasters, sorry.)

Brewmaster Monk Tanking Talents

Certain talents are better for some situations, while other talents might be better at other times. Keep a stack of Tome of the Clear Mind for switching talents (and glyphs.)

Descriptions are below the image (comment if you want to discuss) and our picks are checked: .

Tier 1, Level 15:

Tier 1 offers us three mobility enhancing talents. Tiger’s Lust is the generic pick for PvP with its root/snare break. Glyph of Freedom roll lets your rolls break snares, but not roots or stuns, and will make Celerity and Momentum a bit more useful. .

Celerity is one of two options this tier that enhance roll and Chi Torpedo, increasing the limit of charges by 1 and reducing the cooldown time by a small amount. It’s a nice overall movement boost and you don’t have to activate it. It’s a passive ability, one less thing to think about, and it will give you quite a few more rolls over the length of a fight. Take this if you want more rolls.
Tiger’s Lust gives us a speed increasing, PvP triket type spell that can be cast on both ourselves and others (such as a healer or off-tank.) No Chi cost. Especially useful if you need clutch movement and snare/root breaking. It’s basically a “Sprint” every 30 seconds and provides the best clutch movement for most situations. It’s especially nice if you do the occasional PvP.
Momentum is a passive that causes our Roll and Chi Torpedo abilities to grant us a speed increase for a short time, stacking up to 2 times. This has it’s uses, one being when you have to move a large distance. It’s also a passive ability, one less thing to think about, and gives a nice movement boost. Note that it does not break free of effects, unlike Tiger’s Lust.

Tier 2, Level 30:

Forget any of these for group healing, as they’re pretty useless for that. Which one heals you the most and increases your damage?

Chi Wave is a basic chain heal type ability. It’s best used for one vs one.
Zen Sphere summons a sphere that periodically heals the target (you) and damages the nearest enemy. Zen Sphere can be detonated early for a small burst of AoE healing. For Brew it’s a decent “fire and forget” heal that adds to your damage. It has no cost and the shortest cooldown.
Chi Burst is best used for healing a stacked up group. That it has a cast time is a minus. It’s better for PvE dungeons and Raids.

Tier 3, Level 45:

Which of these is “best” really depends on what you are doing. Do you need more Chi generally? A higher Chi max with faster energy regen? Or burst Chi?

Power Strikes passively causes our Chi generating attacks to generate an additional 1 Chi once every 20 seconds. This is the best general pick of this tier. If you’re already at max Chi the additional Chi is not wasted, but takes the form of a Chi Sphere next to you. You can use your Chi using abilities then grab the sphere(s) for more.
Ascension increases your maximum Chi by 1 and your energy regeneration. It’s a decent passive, but does fall behind the other two in overall value.
Chi Brew instantly restores all of our Chi on a 1 minute cooldown. Not a bad talent, but Power Strikes will give more Chi/energy overall. This one could be nice for emergency use. Mostly it depends on how you do your Brewmastering. Useful when you need a bit of burst or have to pick up an add when your resources are low.

Tier 4, Level 60:

Each of these does useful, but different things. Again, what’s your game require?

Ring of Peace forms an 8 yard sanctuary around one friendly target for 8 seconds, incapacitating all enemies in the area for 5 seconds (this “stun” breaks on damage.) Nice thing to drop on your healer.
Charging Ox Wave stuns all targets in its path up to 30 yards away. A decent option for stunning targets you need to catch up to/grab threat on. Also good when kiting (stunning) a bunch of targets at range, such as incoming players or some BG group. Note that you do have to aim it accurately.
Leg Sweep stuns all nearby enemies (within a 5 yard radius) on a 45 seconds cooldown. Nice anytime you’re dealing with groups that can be stunned and you don’t need the ranged stun of the Ox Wave. This is the best default choice, but if your team already has lots of stuns then try one of the others.

Tier 5, Level 75:

Which one is best depends greatly on the type of damage that you’re taking, though Dampen Harm is a decent default pick.

Healing Elixirs adds a small heal to our use of Brew/Tea abilities. Not bad, but not exactly a great survival ability for when you’re taking heavy damage either. It’s decent if you’re not really concerned about survival.
Dampen Harm is particularly good against short periods of heavy damage. If you’re going up against a lot of magic damage then take Diffuse Magic.
Diffuse Magic is very helpful against magic damage heavy fights, pointless in all others. If the Mage is going to burn you to ash then this is the one to take. You get 6 seconds of near immunity to magic damage. For non-magical damage you should be using Dampen Harm.

The best choice in my opinion is either Dampen Harm or Diffuse Magic depending on whether a fight is loaded with magical damage or not.

Tier 6, Level 90:

Rushing Jade Wind is an AoE effect, best used for groups of targets. It replaces your Spinning Crane Kick.
Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger is somewhat useful as it adds to your DPS and gives the enemy another target to think about.
Chi Torpedo doesn’t offer anything interesting to us at this time. It’s basically an improved roll and the damage and heal are hardly worth the effort.

Tier 7, Level 100:

Soul Dance allows you to Stagger a small amount (30% of your normal Stagger amount) of magic damage. Your other cooldowns should cover this damage well enough, but it might be useful if you’re attacked by casters.
Chi Explosion replaces your Blackout Kick and is a nice DPS increase, perhaps cutting down your survival a bit since you’re not using that Chi on survival abilities. Take this if DPS is more important than survival.
Serenity is used when you are at full Chi and instantly refunds any Chi use for 10 seconds. Useful in any situation where you want to spend lots of Chi over 10 seconds (90 second cooldown.) A very nice burst cooldown.

Brewmaster Monk PvP Glyphs

Glyph of Freedom roll lets your rolls break snares, though not roots or stuns.
Keg Smash – increases the range of Keg Smash by 5 yards, which is pretty useful.
Breath of Fire – When you use Breath of Fire you will incapacitate any opponents affected by your dizzying Haze, such as from your Keg Smash.
Fortuitous Spheres – summons up a Healing Sphere whenever you get to 25% health or less.
Glyph of Touch of Death – how often do you use T of D in PvP? Once he’s below 10% This is an insta-kill.
Glyph of Expel Harm – Highly recommended. It reduces the cost Expel Harm, by 5 Energy, when you’re 35% or lower. This make it available a bit more often.
Glyph of Fortifying Brew – More damage reduction (5% more) makes up for a smaller (10% instead of 20%) health gain.
Glyph of Zen Meditation – Let’s you move while using ZM, which will occasionally be very useful.
Glyph of Guard – Only useful on magic heavy fights.

Minor Glyphs

The minors are mostly just cosmetic, such as a color change, but a couple add a bit of convenience.

Glyph of Spirit Roll – Can roll when dead, so you get back to your body a bit quicker. Hopefully you’re not dying often enough to find this to be useful.
Glyph of Water Roll – Can roll over water, which is occasionally useful.
Honor – Bow to him after you “One Shot” him with Touch of Death.

Stats for Brewmaster PvP

In order of Interest:

Agility – From gear and a few effects.
Bonus Armor – From PvE pieces, adds AP as well as defense
Mastery – Adds to Shuffle and Attack Power
Haste – Faster energy regen
Crit – Harder hits and procs more Elusive Brew
Multistrike – A chance for one additional (30% effect) hit.
Versatility – Adds to damage, heals, and damage reduction.

Agility comes from your gear, potions, flasks, etc. There’s never a conflict with other items so it’s not really a part of the priority list, since you can’t gem or enchant it and there’s never a conflict where you have to choose Ag Vs any other secondary stat.

Bonus Armor does not come on PvP gear, but if you’re using a PvE piece then note that it increases your attack power (via your Bladed Armor ability) as well as physical defense.

Mastery adds to your defense (more Stagger) and your offense (more attack power.)

Haste increases your energy regen, speeds up cooldowns, etc. It doesn’t scale well with better gear, but is still a big help.

Critical Hits do 150% damage (200% in PvE) and proc your Elusive Brew stacks. Dual wielding will get more auto-attack crits and so more brew.

Multistrike hits can crit and can proc anything than normal hits can proc, which isn’t much for Brew, unfortunately. You get one chance (two in PvE) at a 30% effect extra hit or heal.

Versatility adds to your damage, your heals, and your damage reduction. It’s actually a nice stat if you can stack enough. You’ll have to get enough faction rep to be able to do that, though.

Gearing Up

A pair of one handed weapons generates more Elusive Brew due to more auto-attack crits, but the 2-hander hits harder. Your call.

If You’re Under Level 100

Under 70: Your heirlooms are more than good enough. If you don’t have those then just get the best gear you can find or don’t worry about it and blast through those levels.
Level 70: Brutal Gladiator’s set from legacy vendors. It’s better than your ‘looms till mid-late 70s.
Level 80: Wrathful Gladiator’s set
Level 85: The crafted Vicious set or grab the Cataclysmic Gladiator set from the PvP Vendor. Note that you might be able to find iLevel 450 blue PvE gear on the Auction House.
Level 90: just blast on through (unless you’re doing 90 content.) If you’re sticking around at this level for awhile you can get PvP gear from the vendors on the west wall of the Vale of Eternal Blossoms. Alternatively, you can work the Timeless Isle for a couple hours and get the ilevel 498 PvE gear.

Level 91+: This is the twink level. You can, if you’re rich, equip three crafted item level 640 (weapon is 630) pieces. Each can be adjusted upwards by 45 points, and another 30 in patch 6.2 (very expensive to boost the items 75 levels.) Yes, in 6.2 you will be able to have two pieces of 715 armor and a 705 weapon on your level 91.

Etched-Blade Warstaff (inscription) – upgraded with Weapon Crystals
Supple Vest (leatherworking) – upgraded with Burnished Essences.
inscription (leatherworking)

Stats on crafted items can be rerolled. You may have to do this repeatedly to get the stats you want, ideally Mastery & Haste.

Your armor will need a Leather Refurbishing Kit for each reroll.
Your weapon needs a Volatile Crystal

Level 100

Warlords Season 1 brought three tiers of PvP gear.

Primal Aspirant, 600/660, found only in boxes from wins and in work orders from your Garrison.
Primal Combatant, 620/675, in the Honor Gear.
Primal Gladiator, 660/690,is the Conquest gear.

PvE Vs PvP gear? PvP, definitely. Here’s why: The PvP pieces have two ratings, one for PvE, the other for PvP. For example, the Season 1 Honor Gear is 620/675. That second number is the item level of the gear in any PvP situation. You will have to do some serious raiding to beat that, if you want to use PvE gear.

Note though, that there are no gem sockets and no tertiary stats (Avoidance, Leech, etc.) on the PvP gear. So your 665 PvE piece with a gem socket is pretty close to that 675 piece without.

The Gear

Every gear slot has two options for the honor gear and three, with sufficient faction rep, for the Conquest gear. Only one of those options come with a set bonus, the others do not. For example:

Primal Gladiator’s Chain Armor has the set bonus, which you probably really want. This piece has Crit & Haste.
Primal Gladiator’s Armor has no set bonus and comes with Crit and Mastery.
Primal Gladiator’s Chestguard, has no set bonus, requires the faction rep, and has Versatility and Multistrike.

The set bonuses are:

These set bonuses don’t look to be too useful in PvP, but it’s your call.

2 piece Set (Brewmaster): When you use Roll, the Energy cost of your Jab is reduced by 30 for 4 sec.
4 piece Set (Brewmaster): Guard also applies to the nearest ally within 15 yards.

It’s important because not all of the pieces available for any given slot actually have the set bonuses. The 4 piece bonus might be nice if you team and is useless if you solo PvP (eg: duels, or your partner is never that close.)

The Honor gear has two options for every slot, each has different secondary stats. The Conquest gear has three options, but the third requires revered rep with your home faction. In both cases only one option will have a set bonus. For the most part, only the rep piece will have Versatility.

As an example, for the season 1 Conquest chest (season 2 will be similar:)

Primal Gladiator’s Ironskin Tunic, set bonus, Crit & Mastery
Primal Gladiator’s Tunic, no set bonus, Crit & Multistrike
Primal Gladiator’s Chestguard, no set bonus, Haste & Versatility.

How to Upgrade, What Order do I get Stuff?

If you do not already have an escape trinket then that should be your #1 pick up. Keep in mind that you can buy one right off the Auction house, no Honor cost at all. So unless you’re Human you have no excuse not to have one.
Consider getting both Warlords PvP trinkets before anything else, for the 15% damage reduction set bonus.
Honor Weapons do not have any special requirements to buy, beyond the cost. If you’re working on the honor gear then get these items first.
Conquest weapons DO have a requirement of 7,250 points earned first. Grab those after getting your gloves and a big item (head, chest, or legs.) The points work out best that way.
Get the “On Use” DPS trinket.
Finish the 4 piece set.
Get the neck, cloak, and rings, since these items can be enchanted.
Boots and bracers.
Save the upgraded escape trinket for last.

Gems and Enchants

The Gems

Gemming PvE gear is really easy. There isn’t any. There are no gem sockets on Warlords Season 1 PvP gear.

For the pieces (PvE) that have sockets, all the gems are the same type and all fit into any available socket. There are no socket bonuses, as there were with previous expansions.

Now, if you are using a PvE piece with a gem socket then gem for Mastery.

Greater Mastery Taladite: +50 Mastery
The patch 6.2 version of the gem is +75 Mastery. Immaculate Mastery Taladite

The Enchants

Warlords enchants are limited to Neck, Back, Rings, and your weapon(s.)

Neck: Enchant Neck – Gift of Mastery: +75 Mastery
Back: Enchant Cloak – Gift of Mastery– +100 Mastery and +10% movement speed
Rings: Enchant Ring – Gift of Mastery: +50 Mastery
Weapon(s:) Enchant Weapon – Mark of Bleeding Hollow – Sometimes increases Mastery by 500 for 12 seconds –or– if you like bleeds: Enchant Weapon – Mark of the Shattered Hand – sometimes bleeds your enemy over 6 seconds.

Rotations and “How To”

Build Chi and then spend it, not much more to it than that. Well, there is, but this is the basic routine.

Tiger Palm – cuts enemy armor
Keg Smash for 2 Chi and Dizzying Haze debuff (slows opposition)
Jab x 2, now have 4 Chi total (Jab is pretty much only useful for building Chi)
Chi Explosion (or two Blackout Kicks if under level 100)
Tiger Palm as a filler
Repeat

Touch of death when the enemy gets to 10% or less.

Stuns, Slows, and Control

Since your damage isn’t that hot you’ll need to make especially good use of your control, escapes, and heals.

Slow: Dizzying Haze slows enemies in the area of effect.
Slow: Keg Smash also slows your opponents.
Silence: Spear Hand Strike interrupts the heal spell your opponent is casting.
Sap: Paralysis incapacitates your opponent for a few seconds, but damage breaks it. The Glyph of Paralysis removes damage over time effects from your target, to keep the spell from breaking.
Stun: Leg Sweep (talent) stuns the enemy for 5 sec. Longish cooldown.
- Charging Ox Wave (talent) is a sort of ranged stun and can hit a number of opponents. You have to aim it, though.
- Ring of Peace (talent) is a great thing to drop on your healer if he’s getting hit hard.

Getting Out

Escape: your PvP Trinket. Note that there is an heirloom version, so you can have this even at level 1.
Escape: Tiger’s Lust (talent) breaks you free of all snares and roots (not stuns)
Escape: Nimble Brew, 2 minute CD, removes stuns, roots, etc. Almost another PvP trinket
Escape: Transcendence Transfer lets you swap places with your spirit. Short cast time until you get the perk, which makes it instant.
Glyph of Freedom roll lets your rolls break snares/slows, though not roots or stuns.

Reducing Damage and Other Defenses

All Damage: Blow Fortifying Brew when appropriate.
All Damage: Guard – Absorbs a portion of any damage and increases heals on yourself. Put it in a macro with your Zen Sphere.
All Damage: Zen Mediation can be useful against casters and is only good for one shot against melee, but if it’s that “One Shot of Utter BrewMaster Destruction” melee attack, then it’s well worth it. Such as when you think that Rogue might open on you with an Buffed, Critical Ambush. Channeled ability, but the glyph lets you move while channeling.
Dodge: Elusive Brew to dodge both melee and ranged attacks. Once you have a few stacks you should be able to keep this up nearly all the time.
Heal: Purifying Brew isn’t a heal or damage reduction, per se, but it gets rid of all that damage you’ve staggered. Use it as often as necessary.

Pulling Yourself Back Together (Heals)

Brewmaster Macros for PvP

Survival

Expel harm combined with Elusive Brew. Note that since you’re drinking a Brew you will get the heal from healing Elixers (if you took that talent.) Casting Guard first will improve this heal.

#showtooltip
/cast Expel Harm
/cast Elusive Brew

Combine Guard with you Zen Sphere for defense and more healing.

#showtooltip
/cast Guard
/cast Zen Sphere

Offense

Burst macro. ’13’ is your first trinket slot where you have your “on use” damage trinket.

/cast Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger
/use 13
/cast Fortifying Brew

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