Chi is a universal energy. Or multiversal in WoW’s case. Chi is not spiritual, things both animate and inanimate have Chi. It is life force and electromagnetic energy, the balance of the Yin and Yang. It flows through every single atom, subparticle, dark matter that exists. It is very much a constant cosmic wind and can be used for Yin - female, darkness, passivity, earth/water. Or Yang - Male, active, light bearing, aggression, fire/air.
The idea of the cosmic wind is why Chi appears mist like in the spells. Every rock, star, fiber has Chi, because the cosmic wind is always blowing through and resonating within it. Certain power areas will pool and spiral with these energies, like mini hurricanes or tornados. There are pathways that Chi travels best through - which if you study Feng Shui, explains a little bit of the idea of how to get Chi flowing properly through your home with the work of elements and furniture placement.
Technically everyone can manipulate Chi. Monks have just studied and mastered it so well that they can condense it for a purpose.
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Okay Chi doesn’t make sense. Imagine you walk into this world, you haven’t changed. You can learn to channel the magic that exists in the air because this world is different. You can train and learn how to fight with a sword. You can make pacts with demons. You can call upon the spirits in this world. But how does one just have Chi inside of them? This is some Gwyneth Paltrow type BS.
It’s literally life magic.
Mistweavers could be said to ctually being using the water portion of shamanistic power, except more exact, where as shamans kinda drop a bucket on their target, monks trace a few drops into whatever they need to effect.
Monks are the closest thing WoW has to water benders. And I mean literally water benders, as weaving it in and around is literally bending it.
Literally.
The character is not the source of Chi, they are a vessel that Chi passes through like a sieve. When you take damage, the monk channels more positive Chi into your Chakras to incite healing and restore you to a balanced/undamaged state.
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Chi is stored in the Bal… Ahem I’d better stop here, or I’ll never make trust level 3.
So there’s lore backing for Chi?
Yeppers. Chi is very much a real world idea taken from Asian culture. Google Chi Energy.
Edit: I guess I should also ask if you’ve done the Pandaria Monk questlines - they go into detail about how important it is to restore the balance and give some tutorials about how to use Chi when fighting the other monks at the starting zone. A lot of it focused on disciplining yourself, but it’s been a hot minute and I can’t remember if they explained where exactly Chi came from or not.
What I googled sounds like what Gwyneth Paltrow would say… o_o
I guess I’m not seeing how the ideas of Chi are more Gwyneth Paltrow like than Druidic, Shamanic, Arcane, or Priest based magic? Or do you just really want to keep pegging her name for some internal gratification I’m misunderstanding?
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Beer. Monks are all Canadian.
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Brewmasters don’t even use chi, though. We just have energy like Rogues.
The august celestials. The wild gods of pandaria. Chi ji, xuen, yuolon, etc
it’s some pretty strong stuff as well IIRC. oversaturated spirit made WoD’s nature all funky.
Sucks that most this stuff is relatively unexplained if you haven’t read any warcraft books.
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Brewmasters do use Chi. Fire breath is a spell created by the Yang fire energy. You don’t just run around the universe with a Zippo glued to your face to incinerate things after you kegsmash. You also have Yang Wind energy in the Rushing Jade Wind spell. Expel Harm is a mist/water spell that helps you remove negative Chi and self heal. Vivify, also water/mist Chi spell. Chi torpedo… The yellow orbs that Gift of the Ox populate that are heal bubbles are Chi and as a monk, only you can see it.
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It led to Draenor being dominated by Life beings, which were then beaten into submission by a giant earth elemental summoned by the Titan Aggramar. As the earth elemental fought bits of magical rock fell off of it and were suffused in pure Life energy, creating the Gronn, ogres and orcs.
It also meant that Draenor’s elementals were unusually unified since they weren’t fighting over scraps of Spirit, which is part of the reason orcs are such talented shaman.
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Draenor lore is pretty cool. Really is a shame the expansion didn’t convey that.
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Monks actually employ the element of spirit, as shamans do. Instead of using this to commune with the elements, they use it to empower themselves.
They employ spirit more outwardly when healing or using basically any magic they have.
Mistweaver and Restoration Shaman are not all that different, actually. Mistweaver is just less directly wet.
I’m kind of annoyed they didn’t go into some of the dodgier aspects of the Draenei’s settlement of Draenor in WoD.
Like, for instance, naming a planet they weren’t from after themselves.
Or the fact that they kind of just watched on while the ogres and arakkoa killed and enslaved the orcs without doing anything.
Or the moral implications of drawing the Legion to world after world without giving the natives a heads up as to what’s coming or even helping them escape the doom the Draenei brought with them.
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Assuming you mean source of “magical” power is in imo there isn’t a source of power. To begin I would set aside the brewmaster and windwalker specs from your question. Like warriors, their combat powers are purely physical. They do not invoke any power source in combat. They punch, kick, and drink brews to enhance their abilities.
The issue arises when we talk about mistweavers. It is my opinion that mistweavers do not, and cannot exist canonically in the wow universe. ( they are a mess lore wise as well). Mistweaver (although wonderfully designed and which I fell in love with at MoP) is simply a healing spec given to a new class at a time when developers had a design philosophy that a class should have at least 3 specs.
Seeing the varied answers to where monks get their source of power in this thread supports there truly isn’t a source of power for “magic” used by monks. Let’s take a look at a few issues. Mistweaver monks use mana to cast healing spells. ( imo this is purely a game mechanic choice by developers to keep it simple). But it’s not qi or life energy that does the healing, it’s mists. Renewing mist, enveloping mist, soothing mist, etc…. I’ve seen some posters equate mists to water based healing like shamans. I assume this is assumed because we think mist as water vapor, but this isn’t the important part. Mist is what was used by Emperor Shaohao to cloak Pandaria from the destruction of the sundering. To hide the continent to allow it to be safe and to heal itself. So when I cast mists on my party, I don’t see it as I’m chucking water healing , I see it as I’m cloaking my party members from the destruction of the mobs as their own life force heals themselves. Just like Shaohao did for Pandaria.
Even the Mistweaver artifact is not imbued with some power. It is a stick from the top of Kunlai Summit, found by the Pandaren hero Kang, and just “blessed” by Xuen. ( again the Mistweaver lore is a mess as the August Celestials associated with mistweavers are Yu’lon and Chi’ji, not Xuen).
So to wrap this diatribe, imo monks do not have a power source they draw on. Canonically they are a purely physical class like warriors. Mistweavers while amazing ly beautiful spec imo actually would not exist in wow.
