• Arawethion

I'm thinking about ilvl-based pricing schemes at the moment. What's the best writeup of the most up-to-date information about ilvls, slot modifiers, stat costs, and other related numbers?

Answers to Moonkin questions:
0) Read the TTT/use the spreadsheet: http://elitistjerks.com/f47/t66856-moonkin_pve_dps/
1) Maintain high DoT uptime. Use WiseEclipse.
2) Nothing beats 2T8.
3) Yes, sometimes you cast many Wraths and no Eclipse procs. Deal with it.

 

◊ Anias

Go forth to the raid and dungeons forum, and read you this treatise:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...p=1#post143561

That's the thread that started it all. Sadly you can't filter out the "tag" and '/bump' stuff.

I can say from personal experience, that there are a few good fits for the exact slotmods, and it doesn't matter greatly which you pick. Hopefully slouken will bend at some point in the future and give mods access to ilvl in the lua sandbox.

Math is very easy, explaining math is quite difficult.

 

• Arawethion

I've read that thread, but it is up to date? I thought I'd seen more recent work with some scaled-down values.

Answers to Moonkin questions:
0) Read the TTT/use the spreadsheet: http://elitistjerks.com/f47/t66856-moonkin_pve_dps/
1) Maintain high DoT uptime. Use WiseEclipse.
2) Nothing beats 2T8.
3) Yes, sometimes you cast many Wraths and no Eclipse procs. Deal with it.

 

Lagomorph

I think you're remembering how they put a post up at blizzcon that had simple numbers like 1% crit is worth about 14 points. (old memory here, don't hold me to that number)

I remember when people put that up vs. Hyz's numbers it worked out to a common factor that made the numbers smaller (if a little less accurate).

 

◊ Anias

Hyz has continued posting in the thread, so you can find updated commentary throughout. It's really the sort of thing that needs a wiki.

Math is very easy, explaining math is quite difficult.

 

Whiteknight

Sort of like this one?
http://www.wowwiki.com/Formulas:Item_Values

I'm not sure which is the more up-to-date.

 

Hyzenthlei

Looks like the wowwiki article is from just the original itemvalue post (and doesnt have the more recent updates to some stat mods, which to be fair I haven't always updated on my main post either). There have been more recent updates, especially to caster weapon balance and dps scaling. I have a collection of my posts on this I can put up somewhere, but I dont just want to spam a thread to death with long lists of numbers and equations. If there is interest I post them here or make another thread though (so you don't have to go fishing through 30 pages looking for the original posts).

As for the scaled down values, I've seen some posted and I started on some myself. Typically though they weren't as accurate as the larger numbers. When forced into rounder looking fractions several changes of a few % here and there were introduced and it ends up having hte potential to signifiacntly alter the result. Conversely, efforts to keep the same ratios but make the standard stat mods 100 instead of 230 just result in smaller arbitrary numbers but no real progress is made in making them 'pretty'.

 

◊ Praetorian

Feel free to post a comprehensive summary of your current findings here -- I'd love to see it, and it'd be a useful resource.

 

◊ Anias

Yes please.

Math is very easy, explaining math is quite difficult.

 

Hyzenthlei

This is a clip job from a few of my main posts which show new numbers and equations (I left out those answering questions). Several of these are word for word from the original forums, though some have been altered slightly with new or revised values that haven't been seen on the wow forums.

 

Hyzenthlei

I’ve been toying with the idea of how WoW items are balanced on creation for the last few weeks. Here is something I’ve come up with that seems to consistently represent things pretty well, and after posting it up for some guildies I decided to put it here as well.

Blizz Reps, please take a look at some sections of this, especially the part about the d#@!& of benediction, so those poor souls can get it fixed or at least see what it really is. Also, if you have access to the actual balance formulae I‘d love to see how close my numbers are to the real thing. There will be some rounding errors due to trying to reverse engineer a system in which I have to take items as they are given. However the errors I point out aren’t off by just a few points, they are off by an entire quality lvl or 10+ ilvls.

-----------

Some people have been asking me about my work on these and I promised I’d put up something so here it is. So far these calculations only work reliably for armor, trinkets, rings, necks, shields, etc… Weapons are a different beast entirely and they sometimes modify innate dps in ways that defy logic (or at least I don’t have enough samples yet to get a reliable figure for), and scaling seems to be different for them. You can try to apply these scaling routines to weapons, but don’t be upset if they fall short on the high end things (they should work fine for most of the greens and blues below ilvl 65 though).

Update - weapons are covered in subsequent posts, caster they follow a separate system for stat balance based on dps trading, most melee weapons are fine with the concepts put forth in this first post.


First, some basic concepts/terms

All numbers in this examination are in arbitrary units, they depend heavily on the values I give to each StatMod, and they aren’t pretty and round because I didn’t use the same absolute StatMods that blizzard does (they should all still be in the same ratios though).
So even though the numbers aren’t pretty, they should still give correct results.

Ilvl - the effective level of an item, this is intimately related to its stats bonuses, armor and dps. The minimum level to use an item is ilvl – 5. If that value is above 60, then the min level is 60.

ItemValue – the total value of stats on a given item, this value scales predictably based on item type, quality and ilvl. It is normalized to be linear with increasing ilvl for a given item type.

StatValue – the amount of a given stat on an item, if a ring has 12 int, then it has an int statvalue of 12.

StatMod – the weighting given to a specific stat, this is how stats are compared in value; in my system everything is compared to the base stat value of +healing, which is assigned a StatMod of 100. Really any value could be used and set to any standard; it is the ratios that are important, so if done properly any standardization should give the same overall results.

SlotMod – Weighting for predicting the value of an item based on equipment slot.

The Stats

Items have stats, sometimes many, sometimes few. Sometimes these stats are well thought out, other times they are absolutely worthless. All items share from the basic pool of stats, these are:

Strength, Agility, Stamina, Intellect, Spirit, DPS, Attack Power, Ranged Attack Power, +%To Hit, +%Crit, Armor, Defense, Damage Shield, +%Dodge, +%Parry, +%Block, +BlockValue, x/5 hp regen, x/5 mana regen, +%SpellCrit, +%SpellHit, +AllSpells, +Healing, +Fire, +Frost, +Shadow, +Arcane, +Nature, +Holy, Fire Resist, Frost Resist, Nature Resist, Arcane Resist and Shadow Resist.

There are other, less common stats that cannot be weighted, such as the chance to put an attacker to sleep, or of using the item to regain mana. While these don’t just out with an immediately obvious value this system can be used to see what the blizzard item designers think they are worth and translate them into a stat-equivalent format.

Armor Scaling

Armor values on item follow a simple linear scaling pattern within specific regimes. For example, mail armor scales linearly between certain ilvls, at which points the sloes of the linear increase change. One of these points is ilvl 45, above this point it scales more rapidly. Remember that an ilvl 45 item can be worn at lvl 40, and shamans and hunters get mail at 40. So they wanted mail to scale up fast for those classes just getting into it without raising the amour values of pre 40 warriors too high (don’t worry warriors, plate armor scales up even faster). An example of armor scaling is shown below.

Plate Chest Armor = (ilvl-44)*8.9+428

The values from this scaling are for green plate chests. The armor value of rare or epic pieces is also very easy to obtain using a simple multiplier. If you really want to go into detail, you will notice that there are plate chests with ilvls below 44. Due to their ilvl they should be equippable below lvl 40 (if any class could) and follow a different scaling equation (which is why jouster plate stuff has such pitiful armor values compared to many other starting plate item, their ilvls are all low).

For Items of the same armor type (cloth, leather, etc…) and the same ilvl

Rare Armor Value = Green Armor Value * 1.1
Epic Armor Value = Green Armor Value * 1.2

The exception to this is shields, which use a slightly different scaling

Rare Shield Armor Value = Green Shield Armor Value * 1.125
Epic Shield Armor Value = Green Shield Armor Value * 1.25

Now you are thinking, “But I’ve seen some items with much higher armor than others around that lvl!” And you are right, some items do have higher armor than these equations would predict. But those items are using that extra armor as an actual ‘stat’. Only this extra armor, above and beyond the predicted armor is considered in item weighting. So while the base armor level of an item is ‘free’, going higher will cost you other stats.

To find an expected armorvalue for a given item you will first need to know the scaling of that item type.

Do a search on thottbot for green items of that type, with lvl ranges of 44-46. Find the base armor they have. Then do the same for items of that slot at ilvl 61-63.

Then use

ArmorScaling = (higharmor - lowamor)/(highilvl - lowilvl)

this is the armor increase per ilvl for a green of that armor type.

Once you have that, do

ArmorValue = (Desiredilvl - highilvl)*ArmorScaling + higharmor

This will give the value of a green at that ilvl.

Then multiply it by 1.1 for a rare, or 1.2 for an epic.

Let's try this on a stormrage helm, 183 armor, ilvl 76.
Green leather helms:
ilvl 45, armor 99
ilvl 64, armor 132

ArmorScaling = (132 - 99)/(64-45) = 1.74 armor/ilvl

(76 - 64) * 1.74 + 132 = 152.8
152.8 * 1.2 = 183.4 -> 183 armor

You can use this to find the ArmorScaling factor and expected armor for any item.


The Equation

Here is the result of testing many forms of equations to see what did the best job of representing the way WoW itemization was handled.

ItemValue = [(StatValueX*StatModX)^1.5+(StatValueY*StatModY)^1.5+ …]^(2/3)/100

There are a few things you should notice about this equation

1) It’s simple (I was dreading something ridiculously complex) but not so simple that it is just all the stats added together. This means that there isn’t some weird voodoo trick to balancing items, but it rather can be represented with a very simple value.

2) Each stat is taken to the 1.5 power. This isn’t too fast of a growth, but it does cause a single high stat to be weighted fairly heavily. For example, an item could have +29 to Str or +18/19 to Str/Stm, the ItemValue would be the roughly the same in either case (close enough to correspond to the same ilvl).

3) After summing the series of stats to the 1.5 power, the total sum it taken to the 2/3 power, this keeps the ItemValue from spiraling up and scaling with a power. After this modification the ItemValue scales linearly with ilvl.


Item Types

You’ve probably noticed that some item slots tend to have better stats than others. That is a helm for example will usually give a better benefit than a bracer. The stat value for each item corresponds not only to its ilvl, but also to the equipment slot in which it belongs. Below are the scaling factors by which the predicted ItemValue for any item of a given ilvl should be modified by to compare it to the actual ItemValue. That is, ItemValue = PredictedItemValue * SlotMod

SlotMod list

Head – 100%
Neck – 54%
Shoulder – 74%
Back – 54%
Chest – 100%
Wrist – 54%
Hands – 74%
Waist – 74%
Legs – 100%
Feet – 74%
Ring – 54%
Trinkets – 68%
Shield – 52%
Off-hand – 52%

1h Weapon – 41%
2h Weapon – 100%
Ranged - 30%


The Weightings

After comparing thousands of items, these are some rough weightings I have obtained. Some, such as str, int, resists, +spell damage, etc… are pretty reliable since they occur on many items and in large values. Others, such as %crit, %tohit, %spellcrit and others are much rougher as they don’t appear much and then only in small values (1 or 2%). It is harder to get a solid value for them due to this. Also, items that have nothing else except for 1 or 2 of these less common stats sometimes wont fit in at exactly the ilvl you would expect because getting 1 more of that stat would push it far too high, or it was close and they just rounded when creating the item.

Another thing to consider, a few weightings seem to be different on different item types. This is certainly the case for weapons, but also some stats on rings and necks as well. For example, rings can get higher resist values than their ilvl would imply, so they have a slightly lower StatMod for resists. They have a higher StatMod for x/5 health regen though. There are a few scattered stats that are this way, but overall they make a relatively small impact.

Strength = Agility = Stamina = Intellect = Spirit = 230
Attack Power = 115
Ranged Attack Power = 92
attack power (demons, beasts, undead) = 76
+%To Hit = 2200
+%Crit = 3200
Armor = 22
Defense = 345 post 1.7 (was 230 prior)
Damage Shield = 720
+%Dodge = 2500
+%Parry = 3600
+%Block =1300
+BlockValue = 150
x/5 hp regen = 550 (changed in 1.09?)
x/5 mana regen = 550
+%SpellCrit = 2600
+%SpellHit = 2500
+AllSpells = 192
+Healing = 100
+Fire = +Frost = +Shadow = +Arcane = +Nature = 159
+Holy = 210
Fire Resist = Frost Resist = Nature Resist = Arcane Resist = Shadow Resist = 230

Weapon skill (daggers) = 720 Possibly just due to having more examples, most other weapon skill mods have sevral clumped onto one item
Weapon skill (other) = 550


ItemValue Estimations

Now that we know how item values are figured, and having listed out hundred of items we know that they scale linearly with level, we should be able to predict them based on ilvl, item type and quality.

Green ItemValuePrediction = (ilvl * 1.21 – 9.8 ) * SlotMod
Blue ItemValuePrediction = (ilvl * 1.42 – 4.2) * SlotMod
Purple ItemValuePrediction = (ilvl * 1.64 + 11.2) * SlotMod


What does this tell us?

So now we have all the tools, let’s apply them.

First let’s try to see if we can predict an item’s ItemValue and then check it.

For this example we will use

Circle of Applied Force
Binds when picked up
Unique
Finger Miscellaneous
+12 Strength
+22 Agility
+9 Stamina
Requires Level 60

This item has an ilvl of 75.

If we do the prediction calc above we find that it should have an ItemValue of about 72.1. If we do the calculations with the stat numbers of the item we find that its actual ItemValue is 71.1. Now why is this a whole point below what it should be? That’s because if any of the 3 stats on the ring were increased by just 1 point it would go above 72.1 and wouldn’t be a valid ilvl 75 ring anymore (also I wouldn’t put it past rounding errors).

We can also try this on

Cloak of the Shrouded Mists
Binds when picked up
Back
57 Armor
+22 Agility
+12 Stamina
+6 Fire Resistance
+6 Nature Resistance
Requires Level 60
Item Level 74

This case is a tigher fit, estimated value using this system comes to 71.8, while the actual ItemValue of the cloak is 71.7.

And just so you casters don’t think I’m forgetting you (I’m a healer too after all).

Shroud of Pure Thought
Binds when picked up
Back
57 Armor
+10 Stamina
+11 Intellect
Requires Level 60
Equip: Increases healing done by spells and effects by up to 33.
Equip: Restores 6 mana every 5 sec.
Item Level 75

The estimated ItemValue of this cape is 72.7, while the actual value falls into the window well at 72.5.

You might be wondering why I keep showing capes. It’s because of my next example of mishaps in item creation.

Also, I am showing some high end items to demonstrate that this system works, but many of my values and the scaling groundwork were obtained examining low - med lvl green and blue scaling. So it typically works well across all ilvl ranges.


Item Creation Gone Wrong - Mislabelling

Let’s use this to examine a blizzard blooper.

Everyone probably knows of the D#@!& of Benediction (ilvl 67)
http://www.thottbot.com/?i=35923

It is a cape that seems horribly underpowered for where you get it from, Azuregos. Let’s see how it shapes up using these tools.

When you work out the numbers, the actual ItemValue of the D#@!& is 48.3, but an ilvl 67 Epic cape should chime in at 65.3 so something seems amiss.

Maybe its ilvl was too high? Lets see at what ilvl an epic cape should have an ItemValue of 48.3. This works out to be ilvl 48, seems a little low and random, maybe we are missing something….

Let’s see what the ItemValue of a rare (blue) ilvl 67 cape would be, maybe that will tell us something. This value is 48.9 (with a lower bound of 48.2). The ItemValue of the d#@!& of benediction falls right into this window.


So now we have the mysterious ilvl 67 rare (not epic) cape, d#@!& of benediction. All of you who said it shouldn’t have been an epic are exactly right. It was designed as a rare and flagged as an epic (a mixup like the snowblind shoes that are epic but originally tagged as a rare, though they fixed those).


Items Valued with unnaturally high ItemValue

There are also items that have been tweaked or changed by blizz that have item values far above what they should (and if you look carefully for discrepancies you will be able to tell which they are). But I’m not going to go into specifics as I was asked by people who use them not to get them nerfed


Tier 2 Sets

Many people have voiced opinions that tier 2 sets are not any better and in some cases worse than tier 1. In some cases of practicality for the needs of the class they are assigned to that may be true, but they were not balanced as worse. People also said that they were intentionally created to be even with tier 1 sets because people already got some in molten core, and that their stats would be raised after bwl comes out.

However, taking a look at item values for items in tier 2, they are exactly where they should be as ilvl 76 items compared to the tier 1 sets sitting at ilvl 66. The item designers just made choices on where to spend those stats that many people don’t agree with.

So don’t expect an across the board boost of tier 2 armor. The most they would do is move some of the allowed stats around, but they will likely stay ilvl 76.

 

Hyzenthlei

Itemvalue and High-Level Caster Weapons

(warning, more math incoming)

So now that there is a pool of caster weapons to draw data fromwe can figure out how the tradeoff of weapon dps for stats works.

You've probably all seen the new shiny weapons like claw of chromaggus or Lok'amir il Romathis, with their crazy +spell dmg mods, along with other great stats. You may have asked yourself, how is that balanced? Then you probably looked at their dps and did a double take, ilvl ~80 items with the dps of ~ilvl 57s. Obviously that is how blizz justifies the crazy mods on the weapon (and I'm glad they do, since I'm a caster).

The scaling of itemvalue with sacrificial dps is different than other stats. It doesn't even involve the 2/3, 3/2 powers at all.

I'll explain the sacfricial dps system through an example, the sexy Lok'amir il Romathis.

Lok'amir il Romathis
Binds when picked up
Unique
Main Hand Mace
47 - 127 Damage Speed 2.10
(41.9 damage per second)
+10 Stamina
+18 Intellect
+8 Spirit
Durability 105 / 105
Requires Level 60
Equip: Increases damage and healing done by magical spells and effects by up to 84.
"The Hand of Nefarius"
Item Level 81

The Lok'amir il Romathis has an actual itemvalue of 184.4. A little high for the estimated value of 57.6 (using a modifier of 40%, which seems to be the best fit for high end 1-handers; though some still work better with 42%, I'll need to play with that some).

So at first glance the Lok'amir il Romathis seems to be 126.8 points off.

However, this is where the scaling system comes into play. There is a direct, linear relationship between the dps sacrificed and the amount over budget the weapon is allowed to be.

AmountOverbudget = 6.5 * SacrficedDPS - 11

The mace is about 20.9 dps below what is expected at that level (comparing to the other weapons of that ilvl). The easiest way to find average weapon dpsat those lvls is to open thottbot, search for that ilvl and see what the typical dps range of other 1h purples at that ilvl is.

For epics from the lvl range of 65+ you could also use the rough equation

DPS = 0.966 * ilvl - 15.9

or the slightly more accurate, but messier

DPS = ilvl^2 * 0.00841 + ilvl * -0.252 + 28.0


For Lok'amir il Romathis this is -> 6.5 * 20.9 - 11 = 124.9

Also remember that since weapon dps can shift about 0.3 dps either way for a given ilvl, that this may be off by a few % (this one is off by 1.5%).

Some other weapons that follow this feature are

Claw of Chromaggus; off by 91.6, dps sacrifice makes up 93.6

Aurastone Hammer; off by 28.9, dps sacrifice makes up 28

Sorcerous Dagger; off by 20.9; dps sacrifice makes up 21.5

Due to the large numbers of overshot involved and the variability of the dps on a given weapon the values may be off by a few points, but overall they are a good fit (the scaling equation has a r^2 value of 0.996 across the entire set of 1h epic DPS sacrficial weapons in the game so far, so not too bad).

It is also worth noting that the equation

AmountOverbudget = 6.5 * SacrficedDPS - 11

Doesn't come out to zero if there is no dps sacrifice. Rather, there would be a net loss of itemvalue if this was considered for all weapons. This implies that there is a 'cost' to initiate this stat exchange of about 1.7 dps.

Only sacrifices larger than 1.7 dps will start see any gain on the return.

So this is good news for all those casters (and possibly feral druids if they use this on gear for you) out there, each dps point you give up on the weapon can potentially buy you 6.5 points of itemvalue for other mods.

Update
--------

You can now use the itemvalue system for weapons now, just be sure to apply these rules to those which made dps sacrifices (it always worked for the others before). Also, for those of you who are trying to balance ranged weapons, the mod is 30%. For 2-handers it's 100% and 1 handers ~41%.

With the change to 41%, the fit for DPS sacrifice for 1h weapons became

AmountOverBudget = 6.48 * SacrificedDPS - 12.0


2 handers (100% multiplier):

AmountOverbudget = 4.85 * SacrficedDPS - 11.2

These values have all been calculated for high level epics (since there don't seem to be any sacrificial DPS weapons at low lvls), they may not work for rares/legendaries.

 

Hyzenthlei

The weapon scaling equations seem to be broken up into 3 parts for greens and blues; an initial ramp, then a strongly increasing section, then a more slowly increasing group. Purples all correspond extremely well to a single scaling equation.

Each section can be broken down into a 3rd order polynomial with high accuraccy. I found linear fits to be very poor for most dps ranges. R^2 values are judged againt every single blue and purple in that range (except those that have had dps sacrificed for other stats), and for greens it uses an average of every instance of a weapon speed difference at the same dps. That means that if a given lvl has weapons with 30 dps 1.4 speed, 30 dps 2.4 speed and 30.2 dps with 1.4 speed we use 3 different values, even if there are 50 variations of 30 dps 1.4 speed weapons.


x = ilvl
y = dps

1H:

greens

ilvl 10 - 34
y = -2.269E-04x^3 + 1.822E-02x^2 + 6.533E-02x + 3.308E+00
R^2 = 9.995E-01

ilvl 35 - 47
y = -2.535E-03x^3 + 3.132E-01x^2 - 1.199E+01x + 1.627E+02
R^2 = 9.997E-01

ilvl 48+
y = -2.780E-04x^3 + 4.734E-02x^2 - 2.075E+00x + 4.987E+01
R^2 = 9.998E-01


Blues:

ilvl 20-27
y = -4.724E-04x^3 + 2.497E-02x^2 + 1.383E-01x + 4.472E+00
R^2 = 9.992E-01

ilvl 28 - 42
y = -2.327E-03x^3 + 2.465E-01x^2 - 7.803E+00x + 9.401E+01
R^2 = 9.995E-01

ilvl 43+
y = 1.159E-04x^3 - 1.716E-02x^2 + 1.437E+00x - 1.008E+01
R^2 = 9.998E-01


Purple, all
y = 1.4472E-04x^3 - 1.8915E-02x^2 + 1.4172E+00x - 4.6784E+00
R^2 = 9.9990E-01


2H:

greens

ilvl 10-30
y = 7.638E-05x^3 + 1.874E-03x^2 + 4.967E-01x + 1.906E+00
R^2 = 9.994E-01


ilvl 31-44

y = -1.412E-03x^3 + 1.870E-01x^2 - 7.046E+00x + 1.018E+02
R^2 = 9.998E-01


ilvl 45+
y = 2.268E-04x^3 - 3.704E-02x^2 + 2.784E+00x - 3.616E+01
R^2 = 9.998E-01


Blues

ilvl 20-28

y = 1.563E-03x^3 - 1.219E-01x^2 + 3.802E+00x - 2.227E+01
R^2 = 9.995E-01


ilvl 29 - 41

y = -3.817E-03x^3 + 4.015E-01x^2 - 1.289E+01x + 1.530E+02
R^2 = 1.000E+00

ilvl 42+

y = 1.829E-04x^3 - 2.692E-02x^2 + 2.086E+00x - 1.645E+01
R^2 = 9.999E-01


Purples, all
y = 1.8065E-04x^3 - 2.2919E-02x^2 + 1.7274E+00x - 3.6052E+00
R^2 = 9.9995E-01

 

Hyzenthlei

Some more fun rules about dps sacrifice for additional itemvalue:

Have you ever wondered why all these new weapons that trade dps for additional itemvalue always seem to stack +dmg/healing or +healing so high? Why don't the spread out the stats more (which would be the more advantageous thing in the long run for getting the most out of your items).

The reason you don't see more spread out itemvalue spending in these dps trading situations is because it's just that, a dps trade.

All of the extra itemvalue gained from this dps sacrifice has to be spent on +dmg/healing or +healing (or +shadow, etc...)

There's a quick, shorthand way to figure how much +dmg you will get as well (it works for most weapons I've seen so far).

For any item that sacrifices X amount of damage you can get:

+damage/healing: X*4
+healing: X*7.66
+school damage: X*5

These fit the statmod ratios

(+damage/healing)/(+school damage) = 192/159 = 1.207 ~5/4 (this one is 3-4% off, but the only weapon I had to check it on is anathema and if that weapon is off by a point or two then it could make the difference)
(+damage/healing)/+healing) = 192/100 = 1.92 ~ 7.66/4 (1.915)


But how much can be sacrificed? Why can't you just take a ilvl 81 2h weapon down to 0 dps and get +327 spell damage? There seems to be a max allowed sacrifice on an item, that is ilvl-60. That doesnt mean that every item that sacrifices dps will give up that much, but it can give up no more than that (or at least none have so far).

Item Name ilvl sacrificed dps
Fang of Korialstrasz 76 15.8
Runesword of the Red 76 16.0
Claw of Chromaggus 77 16.1
Lok'amir il romathris 81 21.0
Staff of the Shadowflame 81 20.9
High Warlord's Staff 78 18.0


None of these items' sacrificed dps is greater than their ilvl - 60, most of them are right on that value, a few are less.


While both 1h and 2h are usually given the same +damage from sacrificed weapon dps you might recall that they have different scaling equations for how much itemvalue they get from giving up dps (1hs get more per dps). These still play out, all the sacrificed dps on a 1h accouts for the needed itemvalue for the +spells while the 2h's sacrificed dps isn't enough and they need to pull from the base itemvalue of the item to reach the same level. So if you ignore the +spell part of a 2h its base stats don't quite use up all of the allowed itemvalue, while a 1h's base stats use all of the allotted base points.

 

Hyzenthlei

A few commonly asked questions that merit being posted.


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Q u o t e:
On a final note, by making item budgets scale linearly with item level, while point expenditure on stats scales exponentially, gear will improve slower and slower as we reach higher levels of items. If that trend continues, eventually we'll see a point where an increase in itemlevel barely gives you one stat point worth of item value to spend. If item budgets themselves had an exponential component, then we wouldn't encounter the current situation of seeing gear improvement grind to a screeching halt once you get above item level 70 or so.
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This isn't how the scaling actually works. The equation actually has a reverse power in it as well (remember, (x^1.5)^(2/3) = x ).

This means that if an item only had strength for example, then the str value would scale linearly with ilvl.

ItemValue = [(StatValueX*StatModX)^1.5+(StatValueY*StatModY)^1.5+ …]^(2/3)/100


So for this hypothetical Item of Strength

ItemValue = [(StrengthValue*230)^1.5]^(2/3)/100
ItemValue = (StrengthValue*230)/100 = StrengthValue*2.3


What this exponential really does is inhibit min-maxing on items. If the item had both strenth and stamina for instance, then the best way to get the highest total amount of stats would be to have them equal. If your strength value is high, then it will dominate the ItemValue due to the 1.5 power.

This is becoming especially pronounced on some of the higher ilvl items seen in bwl. Say for example you have a hunter bp of ilvl 77, it could have +60 agi as the only stat on there. However, you could, for the same itemvalue get 54 agi, +20 ranged attack power and 1% crit.

Overall the second is better, and has more useful values. The first has too much of its value sucked up by the agility being taken to the 1.5 power.

At any itemvalue you will be able to get much more useful stat balances by spreading out across many stats item instead of making it high on just one or two. This effect just becomes more noticeable at the high ilvl end.








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Q u o t e:
I looked at robe of volatile power and it looks like it only has an ilvl of 58, though it's supposed to have 66. I'm wondering how Blizzard cuts off additions. Do they try to cram in as much stat and other points as possible in most items or do they just come close?
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I've wondered this myself. Obviously on many items they could add another random stat or two and keep in in line for the ilvl. But you don't see items with a lot of +1 fire resist, or +2 healing on them.

As for the robes, there are two possibilities that spring to mind.

1) When making the items, blizz might have set their stm/int/spr values first and then started toying with spell crit. Found that 3% was too high for the ilvl they wanted and stopped short at 2%.

2) Or maybe the values for spell crit on chest pieces are significantly different than those for rings, trinkets and necks (the statmod for spell crit would have to be 3500 for this to balance out exactly).
Valueing it this highly throws off some set gear values though. you can check the chestplate of tranquility to see that stm/int/spr and +spell dmg on chests are all in line with the erlier numbers. So if any value is being readjusted, it would be the spell crit.

Or it could just be that the robes of volatile power are one of those odd outlying items that don't fit in where they should based on their ilvl.

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Actually, I just ran some more numbers and something very odd came up.

These robes seem to suggest a statmod for spellcrit of ~3500. So I tried this on some other armors with spell crit. It seems that any armor with 2% spell crit uses a more highly weighted value than most 1% spell crit items. Cap of the Scarlet Savant and Gloves of spell mastery both have this. They are undervalued when balancing at the normal value of spellcrit.

There is obvioulsy some imprecision in the exact weighting numbers I used, but this is more than can be accounted for just by rounding errors or small stepwise variations in ilvl.

I don't have a good explanation right now of why that is the case. Perhaps it is another artificial balancing agent by blizz to prevent people from having too much spellcrit.

Other items I tested still fit much better with the old value. Only the 2% spell crit items really showed a large discrepancy.








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Q u o t e:
Has anyone reverse-engineered Feral AP? I'm getting an extremely weird result when I tried - the first 140 is free, and every point after the first 140 is worth 12.5. The 0-cost 140 is definitely out of the ordinary, but it's the only way items with feral AP on them fit within the item budget right now, since Hammer of Bestial Fury and the druid quest hammer from AQ20 both max their stat budget already.
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All the +feral attack power weapon balance their budgets without considering the feral mod. So it looks like all +attack power in feral form mods are cost-free. Probably to balance out the dps increase of typical weapons as ilvl goes up. The standard itemvalue stat budget can't balance out the effective loss of dps for a feral druid as they fall behind on the dps curve with increasing ilvl weapons since they don't get the benefits from innate weapon dps.


There are only 3 weapons with this mod so far, so it's hard to draw any reliable extrapolations or equations. The best thing I found to fit them all fairly well however is

Added Feral Attack Power = ( Expected weapon dps - 42.4 ) * 15.4

Remeber it uses 'expected' weapon dps for that ilvl, not the actual dps. You can get this value from the dps scaling equations posted a few pages back. So a weapon can have sacrifical dps for caster stats as well as it's ilvl expected feral attack power.

The fits for the above equation are

Hammer of bestial fury
(52.4 - 42.4) * 15.4 = 154 (154 actual)

Blessed Qiraji War Hammer
(60.6 - 42.4) * 15.4 = 280.3 (280 actual)

Mace of Unending Life
(51.5 - 42.4) * 15.4 = 141.0 (140 actual)

This equation seems a bit odd, since it would be expected that 1 dps = 14 attack power, and perhaps it may be. One of these could be off (if we looked only at bestial fury and unending life I'd have said added attack power = 14*[ilvl-60] this comes up 14 short on the war hammer though ).

 

Hyzenthlei

Those are the highlights and major summary posts that have been made on the main thread in the R&D forums, there are other smaller rules/equations/values here and there I can try to put in a useable format, but hopefully this posts will answer most questions about in-game intemization in WoW.

 

• frmorrison

Thanks for posting the info at a good place. It would be nice if someone used this to update wowwikki, the more places ilevel info is posted the better.

I recall a spreadsheet that has this information in it, that would be helpful as well.

DK - Ashbane Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.

 

◊ Kalman

When I did numbers for +skill, I remember it always being 550, including on dagger items (though that might not have been a rigorous check... I know I did ACL gloves, don't recall if I checked CoRD or Mugger's or Death's). The complicating factor seems to be that multiple +skills are charged as only one (Edgemaster's Handguard's being the key example here), under the theory that you literally can't make more use of 2 of that type of modifier than of 1.

edit: Yeah, I misremembered, 650 was the one I'd found, not 550.

 

Hyzenthlei

It may just be that the items I checked for dagger skill were skewed. You can see I have the value for other skills at 550 which is the same number you got. I should probably recheck that now that more +skill items are in the game (my original checks were done back before a lot of the newer skill items were introduced).

 

Grogzor

a website that does it all on its ownsome

http://subcreation.net/itemlevel/

But when it comes time for me to remove your wings, and you, you must try to fly...

Click Here to see what makes me tic(k).

What Are You Going to Roll for Warhammer Online?

 

Whiteknight

This is great info. I think I may go play with a spreadsheet.

(incidentally, the website posted above reports an ilvl of 102 and -6.8 for Gauntlets of Steadfast Determination. Not sure if I'm doing something wrong or if it hasn't implemented the formulae quite correctly)


edit: it seems their forum has a set of posters with similar concerns to mine. I guess it shouldn't be too hard to build a spreadsheet.

 

◊ Kalman

Well, I just rechecked Circlet of Restless Dreams with 550 and correcting for armor, and it still comes out underbudget by more than I'm comfortable with. Other items with weaponskill:

ACL: budget 92.02, actual 89.6 @ 550, 92.49 @ 650
CoRD: budget 129.28, actual 122.65 @ 550, actual 125.88 @ 650
OEB: budget 122.72, actual 115.5 @ 550, actual 120.6 @ 650
Death's: budget 61.0736, actual 60.12 @ 550, actual 61.75 @ 650
Mugger's: budget 62.04, actual 67 @ 550, actual 70.3 @ 650
Expert Goldminer's: budget 49.76, actual 47.67 @ 550, actual 54.0 @ 650
Infernal: budget 66.8, actual 63.77 @ 550, actual 66.2 @ 650

Edgemaster's are the example I'd point to for my theory that there's something odd when you have multiple valuations.

Budget: 67.75. If we charge each +skill mod individually, it can only cost ~450 per point. But that puts those other items way, way underbudget.

I don't know. Something odd.

 

Moridin

You get a rebate when adding more then 1 weapon skill maybe? so in reality, 1 of the weaponskills costs much more then that, the others are free. Since at least for ranged, you can only ever get the benefit from 1 of them at a time. Same for melee for classes that cant dual wield, and even then, the off-hand will gain less from it (I guess).

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,
Look on my Works ye Mighty, and despair!

 

CheshireCat

Yeah, I think it's almost certain that you get "discounts" on multiple weapon skills. Like the Robe of Winter's Night, with 40 frost damage and 40 shadow damage. I'm pretty sure the item budget only accounts for one of those, and the other is "free," which is fine since no class uses both damage types.

 

◊ Kalman

Well, I originally thought it might be that one is paid for and others are free, but that doesn't seem to work out either.