First, did you read MY post? Point out where I once complained or said anything remotely depressing. I'm actually looking forward to adjusting to the new changes.

Second, yes it is a difficult concept because it's stupid. Bad idea to post numbers of Arcane and Aimed with the same cooldown+cast time, because there's no reason not to shoot Arcane every time its up. Mana issues won't be bad enough that you have to wait an extra 5 seconds for a measly spirit tick.

You asked whether I factored in that you HAD to shoot arcane every 6 seconds and aimed every 9. Considering that my original premise was "shoot once every 10 seconds", that's an idiotic question. Of course I didn't factor it in! And you must be alliance if you're disregarding 77 MP5 from spirit.

I'm just wondering, can't you still use Aimed in your rotation, just instead of slotting it between Autoshots, use it to replace an Autoshot (only effective with a slow weapon)?

You CAN, sure. It might even be a good idea in some cases. I was just presenting the absolute minimum case: Similar special shot damage for less mana with improved autoshot damage = net effect neutral to positive.

There are plenty of ways you can improve your DPS in 2.01. I was just attempting to head off the "waah waaah we need Steady Shot to compete!" idiocy.

Zurai, things aren't nearly as bad as a lot of people make out but suggesting you can simply swap in arcane for aimed and suffer minimal losses is just flat out wrong.

For myself, in full tier 2, ash, decent accessories I would lose a good 70 dps in that situation.

I am including
- New weapon damage from beta
- 20% armor mitigation for every shot BUT arcane.

IF I get improved arcane and fire it twice in that same 10 second period I stand to gain about 15 dps over my old rotation but my mana consumption goes through the roof and I completely eliminate my spirit regen. If I use rank 1 arcane I can last for quite a bit longer but I drop 44 dps (220 * 2 / 10).

The new higher tier Marks talents mitigate some of these effects but even with these I wake up the morning 2.01 goes live worse off than I am now.

This is flat out wrong. There is one way to improve your dps in 2.01 and you will only be able to keep that up for about 1 minute.

Once we get the Aimed Shot that scales with RAP and Steady Shot to offset the auto fire reset we will be in great shape. Until then we are a work in progress as we have been since late beta, 2 years ago.

You do SEVEN HUNDRED less damage with a single aimed + multi vs a single arcane + multi with an identical build at level 60? Proof, please. Frankly, you're WAY over-exaggerating or just have no fucking clue.

I have very similar gear to you and don't lose anywhere near 70 DPS. With my same 20/31 build, I hit arcane shots for ~500 and aimed shots for ~800. Considering Multishot has increased in damage, there's no possible way it's doing 400 less on average.

As soon as I get the new patch downloaded (apparantly TBW was, indeed, nerfed <rolls eyes> GG blizzard, you nerfed the wrong part of the ability even), I'll post my numbers with identical specs.

It is trainable at 60 on the PTR.

http://ctprofiles.net/3647558

Pre-TBC

I have 409 unbuffed AGI - full raid buffs and consumables bring that up to: (409+16+25+25)*1.1 = 523 AGI

This gives me: (523 * 2) + 456 + 144 + 100 + 117 = 1863 AP

As far as crit: 27.06%

Ashjre'thul - 124 - 186 base - 155 avg

Aimed Shot - 724 - 786 base / 1218 - 1280 AP applied (2.8 speed, RWS)

Average Aimed Shot damage: 1351

Calculations for avg aimed shot:

[((1218 + 1280) / 2) * (1-0.2706)] + [((2801 + 2944) / 2) * 0.2706) = 1688 * 0.8 = 1351

Post-TBC

Some of my stats will move a bit after the item/agi changes, the losses from base agility and enchantments were included in my estimate. For simplicity's sake I will omit them as the point remains.

Arcane Shot : [(1863 * 0.2) + 220] * 1.05 = 622

Average Arcane Shot damage: 841

Calculations for avg arcane shot:

[622 * (1-0.2706)] + [1431 * 0.2706] = 841

Edit - fixed ctprofile link

Edit 2:

New Ashjre'thul - 149 - 225 base - 187 avg

DPS gain for multi-shot: 3.2

Right - so against a target with zero armor and without curse of shadows, you lose 70 DPS.

In a real situation, with a mob that has 20% armor remaining and curse of shadows up, you'll lose (1080 - 967)/10 = 11.3 DPS. And you're forgetting arrows for your multishot calculation, too; you gain 4.5 DPS (15.3 damage) even if you always use thorium arrows, by upgrading to wicked arrows. That's another 1.5 DPS. That's mitigated by armor as well though, so in reality it's 4.7 * .8 = 3.76 DPS.

11.3 - 3.76 = 7.54 DPS lost.

Ashjre'thul itself went up almost 10 DPS, so your autoshots will be doing ~8 DPS more after mitigation, for a net gain of (gasp) 0.5 DPS. With a non-optimal spec and zero changes in gear to re-optimize your setup.

I included armor reduction in my aimed shot calcs, 20%. See the end of the formula.

I also included the new 22 dps ammo, they affect aimed shot as well so there is no real effect.

I didn't include curse of shadows because I didn't include level based partial resists. On a +3 mob arcane shot will do 84% damage on average (not positive but that is what I recall, a mage could correct me easily enough. Fireball behaves the same way.)

Yes, I see it now. My apologies.

Except that Barrage multiplies the damage (which both of us forgot). That makes MS a 4.3 DPS gain.

Wrong on both counts. Arcane Shot uses ranged weapon hit, which is why it never fully resists; a full resist is considered a "miss" by the system. Full resists make up the majority of that 16% you cite; partial resists only come out to about 5-6% damage mitigation. So, with CoS and including mitigation, that's a bit over 900 average damage from arcane shot.

That's considerably less than a 70 DPS loss, which is what you claimed. Even your math only shows a 51 DPS loss (which is largely countered by autoshot and by improving your build from a 5/31/15). As far as improving your damage from current, it's as simple as taking improved arcane shot and firing it every cooldown, splitting between max rank and rank 1. r1 Arcane will deal 596 average damage counting crits, CoS, and partial resist mitigation, using your stats. That more than makes up for the difference between arcane and aimed and only costs 25 mana. Since you're alliance, you'll have blessing of wisdom and judgement of wisdom, so the additional mana cost and lack of spirit regen is negligible.