I know its only thursday...but what do we know so far?
Which specs are excelling? Could someone comment with the best spec for each of the talents? (i.e. mut, combat, hat, what weapons, glyphs, poisons and rotations?)
I know the spreadsheets have it all there, but I want to see if people have tested in actual practice rather than just theory as theory is in the best case scenario.
I've never done HAT as i didn't like that it was so dependent on raid make up, esp since my guild never runs a full consistent 25 man team, and I was combat for a while but switched to muti when i got my 2nd WD and now am using SR/WD. I don't want to go back to combat unless i get some awesome fist off ulduar so I would like to stay muti if it is really beating combat, but I somehow doubt that it is.
What are peoples thoughts? in practicality what spec is best? and what poisons and glyphs would u use for that spec?
Anyone else finding decimate extremely frustrating on encounters where the boss is being moved around or you're having to move around (basically everything)?
I'm leaning towards going back to affliction because of this and because I'm still uncertain why deep demo (even non-meta) specs jumped up in dps in the latest sim runs. DG downtime is less now, so you can have it out for 1/3-1/4 of attempts and even without it, I still tend to think affliction is as good or better than deep demo.
It really sucks that destro just isn't viable anymore since i was really looking forward to a change in playstyle.
FYI, the conflag hotfix didn't go live until later in the evening yesterday, so if your destro specs "felt" okay last night, that could be why.
I believe you are correct in the sense that once we get all the glyphs (haunt/life tap) affliction will be top again, but until then (probably another 3ish days for most) 41/30 is going to be better just because of the ease in glyphs.
The first 'actions' line isn't part of what you cast during the fight - it's the stuff you do before the pull. It tells the simulator what self-buffs you have, and what you have summoned.
The second 'actions' line is a list of priorities and conditions, not an order in which to cast spells.
So it's a check list the simulator goes through every GCD.
1) Is the Life Tap Glyph's spellpower buff on? If not then life tap, else continue to 2).
2) Do you have the Decimate Buff? If so the cast Soulfire. Otherwise continue to 3)
3)Do any dots need refreshing and is target health >=35? If so then renew DoTs, (if more than one dot needs refreshing then your order of priority is Immolate, CoA, Corruption). Otherwise go to 4)
4) Cast incinerate (or life tap if OOM, which you shouldn't be if you're life tapping every 20 seconds for the buff.)
Ok, thank you for clearing that up. Makes more sense now, though I'm still lost on what the rotation should be.. I'll keep checking around.
binkenstein made an excellent post for everyone in his blog. I highly suggest everyone check out his other blog post as well. Even though most of the information that people want can be found in this thread.
I didn't pick Inner Focus because OO5SR doesn't regen so much. I don't know how useful Healing Focus is in Ulduar, but maybe you can post some comments about that.
I tend to use alot Flash Heal, along with CoH and PoH. PoM is up all the time. Greater Heal consists like 5-10% of my heals - should I be using that more with new Serenpidity?
Usually my job is to handle raid and assist on tank, if needed.
I didn't pick Inner Focus because OO5SR doesn't regen so much. I don't know how useful Healing Focus is in Ulduar, but maybe you can post some comments about that.
I tend to use alot Flash Heal, along with CoH and PoH. PoM is up all the time. Greater Heal consists like 5-10% of my heals - should I be using that more with new Serenpidity?
Usually my job is to handle raid and assist on tank, if needed.
I'm far from an expert in holy, but a few things strike me as odd here.
Yes, in my opinion you should be using greater heal more than you are, and thus pick up both Serendipity and Holy Fury. I'd also pick up empowered healing.
I'd drop Spell Warding and the renew boosters but keep one point in Emp. Renew just to get that instant heal. The jury's apparently still out on going for Renew or not, but I'm in the "no" camp myself. There are better ways to spend 6 talent points.
On second thought, not sure you linked to the correct spec, since Inner focus is taken in that spec and you claimed to have skipped it.
Are those numbers right? I mean I can understand affliction being up at the top with its scaling with all the new gear...but only a ~300dps different from using a doomguard and a succubus? Am I missing something here...
I'm far from an expert in holy, but a few things strike me as odd here.
Yes, in my opinion you should be using greater heal more than you are, and thus pick up both Serendipity and Holy Fury. I'd also pick up empowered healing.
I'd drop Spell Warding and the renew boosters but keep one point in Emp. Renew just to get that instant heal. The jury's apparently still out on going for Renew or not, but I'm in the "no" camp myself. There are better ways to spend 6 talent points.
On second thought, not sure you linked to the correct spec, since Inner focus is taken in that spec and you claimed to have skipped it.
I'm truly sorry, I linked the wrong link there. Here's the correct one: 13/58/0
I'm truly sorry, I linked the wrong link there. Here's the correct one: 13/58/0
Please, comments on that again.
I'd pick up at least 2/3 Test of Faith over 2/3 Emp Renew. 8% more healing on the targets that need it the most is very nice. It'll never be overhealing, you'll always get value for that 8%.
I know people say "Test of Faith is worthless you shouldn't let your raids get that low" which was true in Noxromulus, but Ulduar has tons of nasty raid damage, and just saying "they never get that low" ignores the fact that they really do. CoH is smart, and shall always be hitting the lowest person, PoH is dumb, but should always hit at least 1-2 low people, PoM goes off on people who get low all the time.
I'm actually thinking of cutting 1/3 Emp Renew and just going all in on Test of Faith.
After our first Ulduar raid yesterday I'm thinking about giving up on a little throughput/utility from deep holy and getting Mental Agility + Mental Strength. The World of Warcraft Armory Seems a worthwhile tradeoff to me.
Last nigth was our first session on Ulduar (after a really laggy patch day on wednesday) and I really got annoyed/confused with the loot of 1st boss (leviathan whatever) .
Thing is I got [Mechanist's Bindings] ilevel226 and replace my old [Advanced Tooled-Leather Bands] ilevel 200 from heroic LH. After equipped I got very surprised 'cos I only gained +11 ap, +20 armor, some more crits with my current equip/build (combat) (which is not really good honestly, mostly blues from heroics).
Im aware there are some tricky items on every raid instance which are a lot less good quality than they seem to be on paper, but:
is it normal so sligth difference between 2 steps ilevels items (200 -226)?
New 13/58/0 - I've decided to put this build under heavy test.
I spent 3 points in Test of Faith, because after reading your comments, it really pays off in many ways. Because of this, I could leave Desperate Prayer away from the build - renew or CoH would cover that if I'm gonna die.
I see quite a lot of ppl still faithfully supporting the 0/41/30 build, which has proven to be consistant with good dps output. I wanted to try something a little different.
I came up with the idea of going for the following build:
The reasons I thought of giving this build a go were the following:
First: we are in the stage of get-to-know the raid instances and for that massive dps is required to make up for a likely 2-3 dps's exchanged for healers in 25-man raids (few extra healers to try and prevent multiple wipes). On this build, I chose to bring out our little daemon friend once again to increase HP do a some dmg as well (not as much as FG but with other advantages) and also, provide an raid buff.
One of the talents which I think is a <must> for either Demo or Dest builds is 300% increase from spellstones acquired byt the Master Conjuror, which directly increases your crit chance rate by an additional 5%.
Another very interesting reason I chose to go like so, was the use of Decimation which in a specific boss encounter as soon as we got his health down to 35% I managed to get 1 SoulFire for every 2 SB's cast, without losing a shard on the process and almost guaranteeing a critical hit. With only 1 point in MC, with the haste provided by spellstones, cast of SB's and SF's etc., you will get MC triggered very frequently.
On the Dest tree, I chose the usual ones to reduce cast time and improved shadow bolt for additional damage combined with Ruin (they must go together for better DPS).
Demonic Power will also ensure that your little friend is doing a good amount of damage and by enabling that, you also get Backdraft which will increase your gmd and the chance of getting crits besides giving you another instant cast of either SB or Incinerate, so in total, with Shadow Trance, Decimate and Backdraft, you have massive dmg going out effortlessly and all that without even proccing any trinkets you may have.
Improved Immo + Emberstorm completes to make your DOT's consistant and conflagrate to give your rotation a very nice Crit boost.
GLYPHS:
for this build I chose to not go too creative, keep it simple with the usual Immo + Corr glyphs and add the Glyph of Life Tap which will grant you a nice spellpower increase.
okay, so maybe im asking a pointless question, but with siphon life no longer being an actual spell, do we just replace it with SB while waiting for dots to time out, so we don't clip? or what would anyone suggest. assuming the target isn't at 25% or below health.
Things this thread should not be used for
Don't post your unfounded untested spec.
Basically you're posting a very bad variety on the 0/40/31 spec, a simple thing like taking out 3 points out of backdraft and putting them into demonic tactics alone would give you 3% extra crit and your pet 6%. Then you're missing the conflag glyph and have no aftermath, core things for any conflag build. It's not gonna work.
Since the 3.1.0 Patch I am trying to figure out what the heck I am supposed to do to respec in such a way to minimize the 10% penalty to damage for dual wielding 2H weapons. It seems like my strength is a lot more since the patch and my AP is great. Just looking for advice. I am currently spec 18/53/0 My current spec is as follows:
After looking at a couple of specs I noticed some choose to use the Improved Cleave. Is this the way to go or not? Thanks all. I appreciate the help.
I am also struggling with my rotation. Specifically i am being told that I should be doing tonnes more DPS than I am right now. My overall DPS in the last instance I ran was about 2101. I have mostly Epic gear now (from Heroics not Naxx). My AP is about 4500 buffed, crit is over 35% I think and str is like 1189. If I am doing it right.. what type of DPS should I be doing. Currently my rotation is as follows:
BR, Intercept, BS (if buffs from other party members are not better otherwise CS), DW, WW, BT (Slam if it procs) and then spamming HS until cd is up for BT or WW again. I occasionally throw in Heroic Throw, and VR if they are available. I have also heard that Demoralizing shout should be used but have not found this has been much help. I should also mention that when my other enrage effects are available I pop those as well.
Also note that the agility you gain will scale directly with buffs (via. kings), while it may only look like a few more AP /crit when you're not buffed.
I see quite a lot of ppl still faithfully supporting the 0/41/30 build, which has proven to be consistant with good dps output. I wanted to try something a little different.
I came up with the idea of going for the following build:
The reasons I thought of giving this build a go were the following:
First: we are in the stage of get-to-know the raid instances and for that massive dps is required to make up for a likely 2-3 dps's exchanged for healers in 25-man raids (few extra healers to try and prevent multiple wipes). On this build, I chose to bring out our little daemon friend once again to increase HP do a some dmg as well (not as much as FG but with other advantages) and also, provide an raid buff.
One of the talents which I think is a <must> for either Demo or Dest builds is 300% increase from spellstones acquired byt the Master Conjuror, which directly increases your crit chance rate by an additional 5%.
Another very interesting reason I chose to go like so, was the use of Decimation which in a specific boss encounter as soon as we got his health down to 35% I managed to get 1 SoulFire for every 2 SB's cast, without losing a shard on the process and almost guaranteeing a critical hit. With only 1 point in MC, with the haste provided by spellstones, cast of SB's and SF's etc., you will get MC triggered very frequently.
On the Dest tree, I chose the usual ones to reduce cast time and improved shadow bolt for additional damage combined with Ruin (they must go together for better DPS).
Demonic Power will also ensure that your little friend is doing a good amount of damage and by enabling that, you also get Backdraft which will increase your gmd and the chance of getting crits besides giving you another instant cast of either SB or Incinerate, so in total, with Shadow Trance, Decimate and Backdraft, you have massive dmg going out effortlessly and all that without even proccing any trinkets you may have.
Improved Immo + Emberstorm completes to make your DOT's consistant and conflagrate to give your rotation a very nice Crit boost.
GLYPHS:
for this build I chose to not go too creative, keep it simple with the usual Immo + Corr glyphs and add the Glyph of Life Tap which will grant you a nice spellpower increase.
Try it out and tell me what you think.
Darth
W
T
F
?
Seriously, improved shadowbolt + emberstorm is BRILLIANT. I am so angry that I didnt think of that one.
Please remove that guys post.... And then remove this one too.
I was thinking about taking this build but was wondering was it worth dropping 1 or 2 points in imp wf totem and fully specing elemental fury and picking up elemental focus?
04/16/09, 6:44 PM
