Brewmaster PvE Quick Guide

This guide is designed to be a basic, quick guide for Brewmaster with just the information you need. For more in-depth, advanced, information follow the links to those pages in the “Further Reading” sections or in the “Advanced” section in the menu above. Navigate quickly to the section you need using the sidebar on the right.

This guide has been updated for Patch 10.2 of Dragonflight and is regularly updated when discussion, theorycrafting, or testing yields new information.

Talent Builds

For Brewmasters, most of your specialization tree talent points in particular are “locked in” and will rarely be changed. Despite this, there are four distinct builds present depending on the type of content you are doing. All of them are shown below.

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Build notes:

You have a buffer of roughly four points to stretch into whatever utility you may need in the class tree. This can be as simple as dropping Detox for Hasty Provocation, or backtracking through Chi Wave to get the points for Bounce Back, Summon Black Ox Statue, and Generous Pour.
In the Brewmaster tree, you can use Charred Passions and Special Delivery instead of Dragonfire Brew and Rushing Jade Wind if you wish, but be aware that Charred Passions and Rushing Jade Wind must both be played well to end up as superior choices.
In terms of your own defense and self-healing, you are largely free to choose what you want out of Staggering Strikes, Healing Elixir, or Quick Sip. Spirit of the Ox and Gift of the Ox are non-negotiable. You could also consider removing the point in Counterstrike for a second point of High Tolerance.
If you are feeling particularly ambitious, consider running Blackout Combo, removing a point of High Tolerance in the process.

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Build Notes:

This build largely forgoes a number of utility talents that are unlikely to be necessary in a raid environment in favor of dealing more damage. There is still a small amount of flexibility in the class tree if you are in need of something.
Escape from Reality is uniquely chosen in this build to gain an extra class talent point due to single-target/raid encounters rarely benefitting from the reduced Touch of Death cooldown provided by Fatal Touch.
You may choose to give up the extra defense from High Tolerance in favor of more damage from Blackout Combo and Face Palm.

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Build Notes:

Depending on what utilities the dungeon would benefit from, you may want to talent into Detox, Hasty Provocation, or a second rank of Generous Pour.
It is perfectly fine to use Special Delivery and Dragonfire Brew instead of Rushing Jade Wind and Charred Passions if you do not enjoy their added complexity.
Do not hesitate to switch from Dance of the Wind to Dampen Harm if in need of another defensive cooldown!
If defense is not necessary, Pretense of Instability may be exchanged for Chi Surge. Blackout Combo may also be considered for a more advanced playstyle.
The point of High Tolerance may be exchanged for Face Palm if you are in less dangerous content and want slightly more damage.

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Build Notes:

This talent build should be considered the most advanced build available to you as a Brewmaster; it is very difficult to play it well enough to surpass the others and is meant for exclusively single-target scenarios with heavy Stagger damage intake. That being said, when played correctly, this is the build that will result in the highest damage output.
Playing this build revolves around careful use of Improved Invoke Niuzao, the Black Ox talent, Call to Arms, and Purifying Brew to maximize the damage dealt by Niuzao’s Stomp ability.
There is more or less zero flexibility in your specialization talent points, though there is still the usual amount of flexibility in the class tree.
It cannot be stressed enough, do not use this talent build if you want to have fun playing the game; it is largely here for comprehensiveness.

Ability Priority

Brewmasters follow a priority system rather than a strict rotation, based on which abilities are coming off cooldown and how much Energy is available. In addition, use of this priority system impacts your unique defensive tools, many of which get reduced cooldowns from your offensive abilities. With this in mind, your main pillars of playing Brewmaster are the following:

Blackout Kick and Keg Smash are cast on cooldown: simply put, Blackout Kick is the most important ability you have as a Brewmaster. It both deals a large amount of your total damage, and gives plenty of defensive benefits. Keg Smash falls into a similar spot, providing both damage and defense on a very low cooldown.
Stagger is not damage reduction by itself: Although Stagger does not make you take the full amount of damage from a hit right away, if you do not do anything about the damage in your Stagger pool you are still taking the full hit over a period of 10 or 13 seconds. Making proper use of Purifying Brew in particular is the biggest difference between an average Brewmaster and a great one.
Use the right cooldown for the job: Brewmasters have many defensive cooldowns in Dragonflight, including Dampen Harm, Diffuse Magic, Zen Meditation, Fortifying Brew (and its modifier talents), Invoke Niuzao, the Black Ox, and Celestial Brew. Some of these abilities have cooldown timers that are much longer than the others, and some have their cooldowns reduced by your other abilities and talents. While this will make things complicated in judging the “value” of using one, in general you should consider abilities with longer cooldowns as being your “stronger” ones that you should be more judicious about using. Likewise, you shouldn’t be using a magic damage reduction cooldown like Diffuse Magic against Physical damage. Plan appropriately!

Although these three big guidelines may seem daunting to follow, the Brewmaster ability priority will become second-nature over time, as many of your effects are passively performed by following it correctly. The hard part is getting over the initial learning curve (and number of keybinds). With that in mind, here is your full ability priority as a Brewmaster Monk.

The general priority is great to follow when you’re in the middle of a fight and have used all of your initial cooldowns, but blindly following it when first entering combat could very well cause you to drop your precious Shuffle buff and put yourself at unnecessary risk. As such, consider following this more specific sequence of abilities as something of an “opener” if you have all of your abilities available:

Activate Rushing Jade Wind before entering combat, if talented, and use Chi Wave as you are moving to the enemy.
Use Keg Smash.
Use Blackout Kick, followed by Tiger Palm if you have Blackout Combo talented. If you do not, ignore Tiger Palm here.
Use Breath of Fire.
Activate Weapons of Order, if talented, followed by another cast of Keg Smash.
Use Blackout Kick again, or whenever it has come off cooldown.
Use Rising Sun Kick.
Refresh your Rushing Jade Wind.

From this point, follow the generic rotation priority. This will ensure that you have built up enough Shuffle to begin pressing more of your offensive cooldowns.

Rushing Jade Wind (cast before even entering combat). You may also cast Chi Wave while moving to your target.
Touch of Death, if possible
Bonedust Brew, making sure to hit both yourself and your enemies, even if the enemy is already debuffed by an activation of Bountiful Brew.
Blackout Kick (if Charred Passions is talented and active, or with Blackout Combo)
Rising Sun Kick (with 10 stacks of Press the Advantage, if talented and facing 3 or less targets)
Keg Smash
Breath of Fire
Weapons of Order
Blackout Kick (regardless of talents)
Rising Sun Kick
Exploding Keg. Immediately follow up with two casts of Spinning Crane Kick to maximize its bonus damage effect; if you are running Blackout Combo, do not bother.
With Stormstout’s Last Keg talented, use your second charge of Keg Smash to start “banking” partial recharge time when Keg Smash comes off cooldown in the middle of using another ability.
Spinning Crane Kick (if Charred Passions is active and fighting 2+ targets)
Chi Wave
Rushing Jade Wind (refreshing its buff)
Tiger Palm/Spinning Crane Kick in single-target or AoE, respectively, so long as you will have enough Energy to spend on Keg Smash once it is off cooldown again. With Press the Advantage talented, do not cast Spinning Crane Kick twice in a row unless fighting 3+ targets.

Ability Usage Notes

Keg Smash – Your highest-priority Energy ability; also grants Shuffle and cooldown reduction to your “Brew” abilities.
Blackout Kick – Your highest-priority free ability; also grants Shuffle to improve your Stagger.
Breath of Fire– A damage-over-time effect that also reduces damage enemies deal to you. This ability’s cooldown does not matter due to the Sal’salabim’s Strength talent.
Rising Sun Kick – Although it has no interactions with the rest of your toolkit, this ability deals massive damage while also being free and having a low cooldown. Use it as often as you can.
Gift of the Ox – You will passively generate a healing sphere for every 100% of your maximum health taken as damage (before counting any Armor or mitigation).
Expel Harm – A cheap, low-cooldown heal that will also immediately gather any Gift of the Ox spheres present.
Tiger Palm/Spinning Crane Kick – Your main “filler” abilities that also cost Energy. In general, use Tiger Palm in single-target and Spinning Crane Kick when facing 2 or more enemies, regardless of talents.
Charred Passions/Dragonfire Brew – Two competing choice talents that both interact with Breath of Fire. Due to Sal’salabim’s Strength, both talents are competitive in single-target, though Charred Passions has an advantage against 2-5 targets and Dragonfire Brew against 6 or more.
Rushing Jade Wind/Special Delivery – Two choices on the same talent node that increase your damage. Keep Rushing Jade Wind‘s buff active if you have it.
Purifying Brew – Used to reduce your Staggered damage; gets cooldown reduction from Keg Smash and Tiger Palm.
Celestial Brew – Cast this ability more or less on cooldown, as it offers defensive benefits and gets cooldown reduction from Keg Smash and Tiger Palm.
Dampen Harm/Diffuse Magic/Fortifying Brew/Zen Meditation – your primary defensive cooldowns. Use as appropriate based on both the type of damage being taken and how large the hits are.
Exploding Keg – You deal additional damage to all targets hit by this ability for 3 seconds based on the number of hits you deal. This means you should aim to use Spinning Crane Kick in these windows.
Invoke Niuzao, the Black Ox – For the most part, this cooldown is more defensive in Dragonflight, as his potential Stomp damage has been both reduced and requires an investment of three talent points to gain strength; may be situationally useful in raids.
Bonedust Brew – This ability does gain cooldown reduction from Keg Smash and Tiger Palm. You should still cast it even if your target has been debuffed by the Bountiful Brew talent.
Weapons of Order – Use this ability on cooldown for bonus damage. So long as you are properly casting Keg Smash, you will already be maximizing this ability’s potential.
Touch of Death – Use when it can be triggered. If you are looking to really min/max, you can make sure to only use it when it will kill the target, as this can do a maximum of 100% of your HP as damage instead of the 35% it normally does to boss targets.
Summon White Tiger Statue – Mostly a “use on cooldown” button, easiest way is to macro it to something with an @cursor or @player targeting conditional.

Gearing

Stats

Offense: Agility (item level) > Critical Strike = Versatility > Mastery > Haste

Defense: Item level (item level) > Mastery > Versatility = Critical Strike > Haste

The offensive stat priority can change for your character depending on your current gear and stats. Stat weights are largely an outdated thought. Sim the gear you have through Top Gear. If you’re looking for what gear to aim for, use Droptimizer.

Dual Wielding vs 2 Handed Weapons

TL;DR: Generally, dual wielding wins with full enchants and consumables. It is possible for 2-handed weapons to pull ahead based on your current gear, however. For specific situations or item level gaps, sim your character’s options with Raidbot’s Top Gear Tool.

Currently, the difference between 2 handed weapons and dual wielding results in dual wielding generally being better. This mostly happens because of very powerful enchants in Dragonflight. For some math behind this topic from the Peak of Serenity discord, click here. As always, the best way to tell what is best for your character is to use Raidbot’s Top Gear Tool for the most specific and accurate results.

Gems

Use Raidbot’s Top Gear Tool for the most specific and accurate results for your character. In general, it will usually follow the stat priority above.

Enchants

2H Weapon – Enchant Weapon – Sophic Devotion
Dual Wield Weapons – Enchant Weapon – Shadowflame Wreathe (x2, damage), Enchant Weapon – Sophic Devotion (minor damage gain in AoE, offhand only)
Helm – Incandescent Essence (earned from defeating bosses in Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope)
Cloak – Enchant Cloak – Graceful Avoidance/Regenerative Leech/Homebound Speed (Avoidance, Leech, or Movespeed; largely your preference)
Chest – Enchant Chest – Waking Stats or Accelerated Agility (slightly less Agility in exchange for movement speed)
Bracers – Enchant Bracer – Devotion of Avoidance/Leech/Speed (Avoidance, Leech, or Movespeed; largely your preference)
Belt – Shadowed Belt Clasp
Boots – Enchant Boots – Watcher’s Loam/Plainsrunner’s Breeze (Stamina or Movespeed; your preference)
Ring – Enchant Ring – Devotion of Versatility as a general recommendation, or sim for your character
Armor Kit – Frosted Armor Kit/Fierce Armor Kit > Reinforced Armor Kit (these are functionally enchants)

Trinkets

The easiest thing is to look at the lists on BloodMallet or HeroDamage. They’re lists based on the sim profiles.

“Best-in-Slot”

Sim the gear you have through Top Gear. If you’re looking for what gear to aim for, use Droptimizer.

Miscellaneous

Consumables

Phial – Phial of Tepid Versatility/Iced Phial of Corrupting Rage
Potion – Elemental Potion of Ultimate Power/Potion of Shocking Disclosure (cheap, but somewhat worse in all target counts)
Food – Hoard of Draconic Delicacies/Grand Banquet of the Kalu’ak/Deviously Deviled Eggs . You can use stat food that matches your gems/ring enchants as well.
Weapon Enhancement – Buzzing Rune (use 2 if dual wielding)

Racials

Currently, all races sim within a small range of each other and reshuffle constantly. The added utility of Blood Elf’s Arcane Torrent can be useful at times. Other than that, pick whatever race you prefer.

Professions

Professions have no bearing on your ability to perform your role. Pick whatever will make your playing time easier and more enjoyable. As a starting point, many players take Engineering and/or Alchemy for some small perks.

WeakAuras

There are very few, if any, required WeakAuras for Brewmaster. The most commonly used are to track current Stagger damage, though WeakAuras can be used for more complicated tasks as well such as monitoring the health of your Black Ox Statue.

Traditional Stagger
- Use this aura to track Stagger more effectively. Traditional Stagger can let you adjust how your Stagger is displayed in a number of ways, such as how much of your Maximum Health is being Staggered, the total amount per tick, and the like.
Black Ox Statue Health can be useful for those moments when you are relying on your Black Ox Statue (Dave) to hold the attention of some enemies but want to be aware of how soon it will be destroyed if it does not receive any healing.

Macros

All-in-One Taunt Macro

#showtooltip Provoke

/cast [nomod,@mouseover,harm,nodead] Provoke

/cast [nomod] Provoke

/targetexact [mod:alt] Black Ox Statue

/cast [mod:alt] Provoke

/targetlasttarget [mod:alt,exists]

This macro will allow you to use Provoke in a variety of ways. It can target whatever you are currently mousing over, or if the modifier key is used, target your Black Ox Statue for its aoe-taunt capability. Should alt not be the key you wish to use for statue-taunting, you can modify that section of the macro.

Passive Double Barrel Macro

#showtooltip Keg Smash

/cast Double Barrel

/cast Keg Smash

This macro will automatically make use of the Double Barrel Honor Talent if you have it selected and cast it at the same time as your Keg Smash whenever the ability is off-cooldown. It will still work even if you do not have this Honor Talent selected and is useful if you would just like to benefit from its passive damage increase and stun effect every 45 seconds while out in the world.

Changelog

Nov 06, 2023 – Talent Builds/consumables updated for Patch 10.2. Added an opener section to the rotation.
Jul 10, 2023 – Talent Builds updated for Patch 10.1.5.
May 01, 2023 – Page initially updated for Patch 10.1
Apr 14, 2023 – Talent/Rotation Priority consistency pass.
Mar 21, 2023 – Reviewed for Patch 10.0.7.
Jan 24, 2023 – Updated for Patch 10.0.5. Talents adjusted; slight consumable/enchant adjustments.
Nov 28, 2022 – Guide created for Dragonflight