Managing debuffs, how do YOU do it? The warlock v fire mage problem - Page 2

Kalman · 09/06/06, 6:41 PM

Raid-buffed, a hemo rogues Rupture can hit 100 DPS.

Most other rogues shouldn't generally be using Rupture anyway.

(Note: this is neither in favor of nor against Rupture usage, simply pointing out that Rupture improved significantly w/ 1.12)

Lokoki · 09/06/06, 6:41 PM

Uhh, Rupture/Rip is more than 90-100 DPS (since 1.12). It's stronger than any warlock DoT, currently. Btw, I'm a resto druid, so I'm not saying this because I want to use a finisher. ;)

Deep wounds requires how many talents points? 8 talent points if you get 2/2 Impale. If you're a fury build, it's a waste to spec into the impale line, imo, especially if you are DW fury. 8 talents points is alot, 3 of which are a complete waste (Improved Rend), 3 which give you a terrible DoT that annoys other DPSers. I just don't see how it's not worth it.

The only warlock DoT that is worth casting is Corruption, if you have Nightfall. The proc, along with the DoTs actual damage justifies it's casting.

Lokoki · 09/06/06, 6:43 PM

Originally Posted by Kalman

Raid-buffed, a hemo rogues Rupture can hit 100 DPS.

Most other rogues shouldn't generally be using Rupture anyway.

(Note: this is neither in favor of nor against Rupture usage, simply pointing out that Rupture improved significantly w/ 1.12)

Rip was also improved, and can now hit in the low 100s.

Trindade · 09/06/06, 6:46 PM

Originally Posted by Kalman

Raid-buffed, a hemo rogues Rupture can hit 100 DPS.

Most other rogues shouldn't generally be using Rupture anyway.

(Note: this is neither in favor of nor against Rupture usage, simply pointing out that Rupture improved significantly w/ 1.12)

Whollistic perspective though. That hemo rogue has the opportunity to use eviscerate instead. Not sure what the dps is like on the new eviscerate rank, but hypothetically let's say it's 80dps. That means the DoT is then only worth 20dps, so it's more effective to give that debuff slot to someone else.

Crazypie · 09/06/06, 6:48 PM

Originally Posted by Lokoki

Uhh, Rupture/Rip is more than 90-100 DPS (since 1.12). It's stronger than any warlock DoT, currently. Btw, I'm a resto druid, so I'm not saying this because I want to use a finisher. ;)

Deep wounds requires how many talents points? 8 talent points if you get 2/2 Impale. If you're a fury build, it's a waste to spec into the impale line, imo, especially if you are DW fury. 8 talents points is alot, 3 of which are a complete waste (Improved Rend), 3 which give you a terrible DoT that annoys other DPSers. I just don't see how it's not worth it.

The only warlock DoT that is worth casting is Corruption, if you have Nightfall. The proc, along with the DoTs actual damage justifies it's casting.

The usefulness of deep wounds really depends on the encounter. If an encounter is straight spank and tank, it will almost never tick and be useless. However, if an encounter requires movement or dps breaks, deep wounds will tick somewhat. It can pretty much be anywhere from 1-4% of your overall dps. Impale depending on how many special attacks you cycle thru while dpsing, can be anywhere from 3%-5%. So yes it's an expensive talent to have, but it's not exactly a waste.

So far after scanning thru the sustained dps thread, almost every single dw fury warrior above 700 dps has had impale. Would the encounters be possible without wars with impale? Of course, but impale just means that you have less of those unbearable 1% wipes.

Lokoki · 09/06/06, 6:50 PM

Originally Posted by Trindade

Originally Posted by Kalman

Raid-buffed, a hemo rogues Rupture can hit 100 DPS.

Most other rogues shouldn't generally be using Rupture anyway.

(Note: this is neither in favor of nor against Rupture usage, simply pointing out that Rupture improved significantly w/ 1.12)

Whollistic perspective though. That hemo rogue has the opportunity to use eviscerate instead. Not sure what the dps is like on the new eviscerate rank, but hypothetically let's say it's 80dps. That means the DoT is then only worth 20dps, so it's more effective to give that debuff slot to someone else.

The same can be done with any skill/talent. You could say a warlock would be better off casting Searing Pain than Immolation, or that a warrior would be better off specing Improved Heroic Strike than Deep Wounds. I'm not saying that either are viable just that the same can apply to others, as well.

Tempestra · 09/06/06, 6:52 PM

Frost mages shouldn't be coming close to fire mages in a straight nuke-fight, given equal gear, ability and level of "trying." They shouldn't even be sniffing the primary ignite holder. I'm pretty sure that fire mages make their debuff slots count.

Quigon · 09/06/06, 6:52 PM

Mortal strike shouldn't be up there IMO. Nor should winter's chill if you're maximizing your mages.

Some of those debuffs are just unrealistic with the deep wounds spam.
I think a previous poster said it best in that the warlock isnt' going to be able to use all their DoTs. Theres ISB and all sorts of nonsense that will be up there knocking stuff off.

I think you need to look at this from a practical standpoint:

Sunder, demo, Curses... stuff that increases raid DPS
Everything else minimize, so the ignite doesn't fall off.
Maybe that means no more dots for warlocks?

Kasi · 09/06/06, 6:52 PM

Corrent Lokoki, but the question is not whether rupture or rip is better than corruption, it is if either is better than eviscerate/ferocious bite plus corruption. Not sure those dots are better than corruption, but I'm pretty sure overall raid dps is higher with the second.

Bibdy · 09/06/06, 6:57 PM

Nightfall increases DPS by a VERY small margin. Its essentially 1 second off a Shadowbolt about once a minute.

On the other hand Nightfall is SUPER HAPPY MEGA FUN. The number of times I've blindly run straight into shadow vulnerable Chromaggus and caught an ignite flesh just to get a Nightfall proc off...JOY!

Ignite takes a LOT more than 1 debuff slot to enable and maintain. First off, those Fireballs leave DOTs. Really, really useless DOTs which they themselves can knock off an Ignite. Second of all, you need to leave a 'buffer zone' in the debuff slots to ensure that your 'zomg 8k ignite' isn't going to get bumped off by proc-based debuff applications like deep wounds or Improved Shadowbolt. This is because Ignite is low on priority. They probably haven't increased its priority yet because they don't want those massive ignites ticking for very long. This is probably more advantageous than a hinderance because it equates to more aggro on one guy and potential pulling of aggro. Very high DPS has its drawbacks...

We had a fire mage (who wasn't specced Burning Soul for whatever reason) continuously pulling aggro through 4k Ignites. Because the output DPS of a corpse is somewhere around the region of zero point nothingty zilch, I was not impressed.

Trindade · 09/06/06, 7:04 PM

Originally Posted by Quigon

Mortal strike shouldn't be up there IMO. Nor should winter's chill if you're maximizing your mages.

Some of those debuffs are just unrealistic with the deep wounds spam.

Mmm. OK, so you bring 0 frost mages to HF raids? How do you control fights where you need to ae without imp blizzard then?

We currently run 3 frost mages, 3 fire mages.

Again, it's only our off-tanks spec'd 31/5/15 that carry MS. Our fury warriors all avoid the impale line. Telling those off tanks to respec to drop deep wounds won't be much of an issue, I just posed it as an example stupid debuff effect that comes up from talents.

Fizil · 09/06/06, 7:11 PM

Originally Posted by Lokoki

The same can be done with any skill/talent. You could say a warlock would be better off casting Searing Pain than Immolation, or that a warrior would be better off specing Improved Heroic Strike than Deep Wounds. I'm not saying that either are viable just that the same can apply to others, as well.

It is not quite equivalent. Warlocks are very mana inefficient nuke-wise. It isn't simply a question of doing 1400 damage with Corruption versus doing 1000 damage with Shadow Bolt, it is a question of doing 1400 damage for 340 mana versus doing 1000 damage for 380 mana. While we can Life Tap, this still cuts into our DPS, and leaches healer mana, so mana efficiency is still a concern for Warlocks in long fights.

The counterpoint that Eviscerate costs 10 more energy than Rupture may be valid, but frankly with the differences in how mana and energy work, I don't know how to make a direct comparison.

Anyway, in DPS sensitive fights, having more than a couple Warlock DoTs up is somewhat counterproductive. Hopefully the 40 debuff limit in the expansion fully fixes that problem.

Quigon · 09/06/06, 7:23 PM

Originally Posted by Trindade

Originally Posted by Quigon

Mortal strike shouldn't be up there IMO. Nor should winter's chill if you're maximizing your mages.

Some of those debuffs are just unrealistic with the deep wounds spam.

Mmm. OK, so you bring 0 frost mages to HF raids? How do you control fights where you need to ae without imp blizzard then?

We currently run 3 frost mages, 3 fire mages.

Again, it's only our off-tanks spec'd 31/5/15 that carry MS. Our fury warriors all avoid the impale line. Telling those off tanks to respec to drop deep wounds won't be much of an issue, I just posed it as an example stupid debuff effect that comes up from talents.

We just do everything as a team basically... when we want to optimize for something, we pay to spec that way. We went full fire mage spec a while back, and have never turned back. So frost isn't even an issue anymore... mages work so synergistically with fire.

What fight incidently, requires improved blizzard? I'm not aware of a single one. AE'ing is generally easy right? I'm willing to bet moving those last 3 frost mages to fire will improve your OVERALL dps rather significantly, especially on thaddius and loatheb.

As for MS - and offtanks. Our offtanks seem to do fine with pure fury builds I guess... we have 2 protection main tanks, and the rest are full fury. Isn't fury leagues better in dps anyway?

Lokoki · 09/06/06, 7:24 PM

Originally Posted by Fizil

Anyway, in DPS sensitive fights, having more than a couple Warlock DoTs up is somewhat counterproductive. Hopefully the 40 debuff limit in the expansion fully fixes that problem.

Coupled with reduced raid sizes, it should be much better.

Zoner · 09/06/06, 7:34 PM

Most of those debuffs listed are not knocked off by dots ever. A lot of them have short durations and they merely expire. Deep wounds (and I think Fireball dots) are also set as 'extra low' priority, meaning if you see them up on a mob, it means there is room for stronger stuff like corruption, as those are what will be knocked off if you cast one.