The New World of Warcraft

World of Warcraft  the Mists of Pandaria

The Monk is a strange class to play, and only the second new class added since World of Warcraft's launch in 2004. It can't be an easy task coming up with a cohesive set of abilities to define a distinctive role in a game that's been running for almost eight years and where every class can be customized in so many ways. 

"Yeah, it's definitely hard," said Greg Street, lead systems designer at Blizzard. "We came up with what we hope is a very creative set of abilities so each ability the monk has is something brand new that players shouldn't have seen before. We're trying to go for the kind of Street Fighter button masher-y thing where you're chaining lots of combos together."  

Monks can be specialized three ways, as tanks, damage dealers or healers. Depending on your choice, the Monk's resource system will change. As a Healer, called a Mistweaver, Monks use mana. As a damage dealer (Windwalker) or tank (Brewmaster), Monks use a combination of resources. There's an energy bar and a Chi bar, both of which can be consumed to trigger the Monk's assortment of damage-dealing and fast-movement abilities. 

The Mistweaver, Windwalker and Brewmaster specialization can thereafter be switched at any time at a class trainer, so you're not locked into the build. Your choice of specialization takes on a greater significance in Mists, because the complex talent trees of old will be wiped from WoW entirely, replaced with a slimmed down talent system where every fifteen levels you'll pick one of three upgrades.