I cant offer you any proof but my gut feeling on this is that Core will add a fair amount more dps. For one thing, I'm not convinced as to the benefit of haste rating for cat form as (unless it lowers the gcd which i'm pretty sure it doesn't) it only increases white damage. Sure this is nice for dual wield where the majority of dps is from white damage, and also nice for warriors or bear form dps (lol) due to the increased rage gen. But considering cat dps is roughly 60% yellow damage I think Core is superior. Additionally being a "use" rather than a proc means you can use it at a suitable time to maximise it's benefit, ie with 100 energy and 5 cps, which grants 2 rips and a full 5 point cycle the extra benefit of 200AP.
Three out of four ain't bad, right? I'm curious about the Abacus of Violent Odds.
My normal catform DPS, unbuffed completely, on the character sheet is 220. I'm deep feral (mangle, yay), although I have none of the cat-form specific talents. What do I need to know, calculate, or otherwise figure out to properly select between Abacus of Violent Odds (which I'm fairly sure is vastly superior for a rogue/dps warrior, what with the dual wield) and Core of Ar'kelos? The simple character sheet test of clicking on them and seeing the change to my character sheet shows the Abacus as being superior, but I'm curious if catform reliance on specials doesn't tip the balance (and the 10 second differential doesn't even them out, raw-wise).
The argument on prioritizing the drop is irrelevent, I've got it in the bank. I did a search, didn't see a post related to druids on the abacus (although it may have cunningly been hidden in a thread on a different topic).
While this isn't exactly on-topic, I think I can tie it in quite nicely.
The Abacus, in my opinion, is subpar for a druid. It is a 15 second clickie, that provides us around 5ish extra white hits every 2min(that is the CD, right?). Alright, no sweat, it has a passive AP affect on it as well. Unfortunately, that (the trinket)does nothing for our primary damage, which is a Mangled Shred. With the right front-loading, Shred should out damage your white hits in a stationary tank-n-spank fight, and it's silly not to cater to this.
But! Don't discount Haste rating because of this, especially if you have 2pc Malorne bonus.
Shortly after my brief examples to hazelnutter earlier in this thread, I was fortunate enough to get ahold of the T4 shoulder, making my 2 piece bonus, and, well, wow. My original stance on powershifting remains, unless you have 2pc Malorne. It's simply not worth risking losing a potential proc for a bit of "extra" energy. It procs so often, it's staggering at times, often proccing 2-4 times in the same Rip-5cp-Rip cycle.
That being said, I strongly urge anyone with 2pc Malorne to add Dragonspine Trophy to their list. While yes, it does remove a bit of potential AP in a trinket slot, it allows us more white hits, potentially proccing the 2pc even more. While yes, the Abacus would probably provide a similar effect, it's impossible to coordinate the Use effect with 2pc proccing :P
Powershift unless you have 2pc Malorne!
AP unless you have 2pc Malorne, then go with passive haste trinkets! (Only one so far!)
It's a 10 second click every 2 minutes that moves cat speed from 1.0 to .8 and bear attack speed from 2.5 to 2.0.
So its 2 white attacks in cat and 1 in bear
Bleh, even more awful than I thought. Definitely go with a trinket with passive AP, and if you must get a clickie, get one to front-load your shreds/Rip.
My original stance on powershifting remains, unless you have 2pc Malorne. It's simply not worth risking losing a potential proc for a bit of "extra" energy. It procs so often, it's staggering at times, often proccing 2-4 times in the same Rip-5cp-Rip cycle.
Still dont have two piece Malorne yet (meh greedy warriors) but I don't see how it will affect powershifting.. unless you have poor latency you're really only losing one white hit in cat (2 at the most) and assuming the proc rate is 4% as stated on wowhead that's a 1/25 shot of "losing" 20 energy from a proc whereas you'll gain near enough 40 from shifting. Granted with 2 piece Malorne the increased dps from powershifting is less notable but it's still a nice bonus. In theory at least.
Last edited by Solstice : 04/02/07 at 5:25 PM.
Reason: mi splellin liek sux :<
So 1 sec gcd for cat means that after a special, the GCD is on 1sec even if you shift out?
Also are you suggesting that you start with rip? Have I got wrong end of the stick?
I thought you need to have 5 combo points before you rip.
Another thing i learnt that i did not do before is that if i have to choose between mangle and shred, I always assumed that i had to have mangle debuff up, but i now realise i have more time- as long as mangle debuff is up 2sec after Rip goes in. Is this correct?
Obviously you start the fight building up 5 combo points, but for the purposes of your cycle you start with rip after powershifting and letting your energy build up to 100. One thing to keep in mind is that you don't have to use your energy as soon as you have it, unless you're fighting Nightbane and he's about to take flight (or something similar that keeps you away from a boss for >10 sec) then you may as well.
Correct, if you mangle just before a rip, because they have the same duration, you'd have to mangle a 2nd time or lose the bonus damage on that last tic of rip. Whereas if you mangle just after the rip, the rip is guaranteed to get it's damage boosted, as will all of your shreds.
Of course, this is a very ideal situation, much like the old hunter cycles it heavily depends on your latency and getting 5 combo points before the mangle debuff fades. If none of your abilities crit, with lag you won't be able to land your 4th shred before Mangle fades, and that really just sucks.
I also must disagree about the Malorne set bonus being anti-power shifting. When you power shift properly, you don't actually lose any attacks overall, you essentially just convert 1 white hit into a yellow by gaining 40 energy.
This is what I use too. I will not powershift like amaniac and use potions though. I will simply do it when I know my energy bar is almost full. Too many times do I need to shift out and spot heal =/. Basically I always get 5cps, full energy then rip and mangle. Usually using a powershift from when I got my 5th CP and my energy was reduced to nearly 0.
Oh, and I never use FB unless either the mob can't bleed, duh =), or if there is no way that a rip will be able to tick for the duration (i.e. the mob is nearly dead.)
There is light at the end of the tunnel.
The only problem is, it's often an incoming train.
Has anyone actually confirmed that the shift out-in sequence is affected at ALL by a cooldown? I am not seeing it.
I never understood what people were talking about with cooldowns in this context. The reason is that when I powershift, I go from cat to caster to cat fast enough that I do not even see my caster model on the screen. I have a very fast computer (fast dual core, GTX8800, 2 MB DDR 1000) and typically 200 ms lag or less. The sequence is for all practical purposes instant for me (or as fast as I can push a button twice).
If you have extra mana - and don't likley need that mana for anything else - selective powershifting is very logical - particularly when forced to use FB. You have a nearly 100% chance of going from 0 to 60 energy instead of 0 to 20 energy, seem to nearly always get a white weapon hit (which should be higher than your catform hits), and perhaps loose one catform autoattack. I don't do the spam powershifting thing unless using the BWL rune, but a natural powershifting cycle is an integral part of druid DPS - especially if wearing hybrid gear such as is common right now.
Based on some fights over the last few nights, I estimate that when just doing my normal thing DPS wise I powershift every 20 seconds or so on average for short fights. To be honest, I havent used powershifting much on bossfights because I am saving my mana for burst healing (fights like aran, at elemental spawn) or am tanking. You would have to use pots to sustain a 20-second long powershifting cycle for more than a few minutes unless wearing heavy spirit.
Here's some numbers I crunched about rip and FB scaling, hope someone finds it useful
As I laid in bed last night I pondered when and if ferocious bite would ever surpass rip in the setting of Raid DPS (other than on mobs that are bleed immune T.T).
Since crit% and DmgReduc are both variables, I tried some different values for both, hopefully this will give you an idea of when to Rip vs Bite
Remember the dmg reduction is after sunders etc.
Crit Dmg Reduc intersection(AP) Rip Bite
30% .15 negative always never
30% .10 negative always never
30% .05 negative always never
35% .15 negative always never
35% .10 negative always never
35% .05 490 above below
40% .15 negative always never
40% .10 223 above below
40% .05 1430 above below
45% .15 negative always never
45% .10 1035 above below
45% .05 2675 above below
So basically, unless you stack the crap outta crit such that you have 45% crit and less than 2675 AP, and you're fighting a mob that has less than 5% dmg reduction, rip will always be the superior finisher. This is also assuming you have Feral Agression (15% more FB dmg).
the math I'm not willing to do is to see if wasting part of mangles duration to keep rip ticking high and not having the energy to shred is worth it. Anywho, take it how you will.
Speaking of Rip damage, I read on the WoW Forums a while ago that Rip was doing about 500 damage more than it was supposed to be *base* (The actual base appears to be 1555 before Mangle/Naturalist). I ran some of the number I had lieing around from my testing with Idol of Feral Shadows. Sure enough, Rip at 5 combo points appears to have 1555 base damage, not 1092.
Has anyone else worked this out, and figured out why this is? I'm enjoying seeing ~550 Rip ticks, and it would be nice to know that it's not because Rip is bugged.
That being said, I strongly urge anyone with 2pc Malorne to add Dragonspine Trophy to their list. While yes, it does remove a bit of potential AP in a trinket slot, it allows us more white hits, potentially proccing the 2pc even more. While yes, the Abacus would probably provide a similar effect, it's impossible to coordinate the Use effect with 2pc proccing :P
Powershift unless you have 2pc Malorne!
AP unless you have 2pc Malorne, then go with passive haste trinkets! (Only one so far!)
Cheers for this. I was very curious as to how good this set bonus was. I only have the gloves at the moment. I use stealthers helmet of second sight and I am just not sure if I should bid on the helm or not. Maybe I will just hold out for the shoulders as the stealthers helm is just... too good =/.
There is light at the end of the tunnel.
The only problem is, it's often an incoming train.
1. Mana wise, you just CANNOT do it anymore. I sport a 6k mana pool raid buffed in a decent set of DPS gear (Broke 4k ap without flasks or pots today for the first time)
2. You lose on your white damage, and maybe make up for it with the increase in yellow
3. To power shift Shreds properly, you need to wear that stupid level 40 helm, and that will gimp your DPS enough.
1. Mana wise, you just CANNOT do it anymore. I sport a 6k mana pool raid buffed in a decent set of DPS gear (Broke 4k ap without flasks or pots today for the first time)
2. You lose on your white damage, and maybe make up for it with the increase in yellow
3. To power shift Shreds properly, you need to wear that stupid level 40 helm, and that will gimp your DPS enough.
If you have a natural shifter spec, the mana cost is not too far out of bounds. If you have that and the 4-piece Moonglade set or Staff of natural fury (and they are not bugged) then its well within bounds and you have more mana to spare anyway.
Also, you don't need the helm, you can get a shred every 2 seconds or so with powershifts if you so desire and time correctly - which actually isnt that hard in low latency.
All that said - is it still worth it? The case (to me) for powershifting is if you go with a hybrid setup (...T3.5/T4/T5, heroic epics, PV Blues, PVP epics, nearly every druid specific feral item in BC) and decide that you want to convert that mana into damage as opposed to saving it for emergency utility.
How good is the conversion rate? Not that tremendous, but since you can easily be doing 3k shred crits at high frequency in even hybrid gear setups, not that bad either. You may loose that claw hit, but you gain a white weapon hit, and get almost all of the energy for that next shred which you can do immediatelly after a near-instant shift sequence.
Here is the other kick though - it is a method best used in highly static, highly controlled fights. There are very few of these out there. It takes a lot of concentration to hit the shift timing in conjunction with the energy timer while managing your energy very percisely. I have not really found a good situation to test this out emperically in BC raiding in terms of DPS boost simply because most fights don't support it well or because I value my mana more for things other than DPS.
I think you're missing the point, it's not about shifting after every shred, that would be stupid. It's about shifting after a cycle and gaining 32-40 free energy by shifting between energy tics.
As far as Natural Shifter and the Staff goes, it's amazing for this tactic. With a 6k Mana pool you'd normally get maybe 6 shifts in, with Natural Shifter and Staff you'll get 11-12 (depending on which reduces the mana first) Throw in the Moonglade set bonus for 14 shifts. For me, that would be ~30k more damage per fight. Rather significant.
Edit to the below: No, it's not including the lost white damage, but even if they all crit it would still total less than a quarter of the yellow damage gain. I'm still debating the validity of letting the 2H swing in between shifts, you likely lose 20 energy and another catform auto, but for something like the Gladiator Maul you gain a 700 hit (1500 crit) And then there's the old debates about macroing a weapon swap with your shifting to a big slow 2H (The other Gladiator Mace hits ~200 more than the feral one)
One thing to keep in mind is that Catform GCD is 1 second, caster GCD is 1.5. An ideal "power cycle" ends up looking like this with no crits (energy in parenthesis):
You will always do more DPS by letting your energy tic to full and then rip-mangle otherwise you end up having to mangle multiple times per cycle which is bad.
This macro can be hit for your last shred in Boevis' cycle (at 14:01). Spam it, you'll shred, and then powershift. I based it off the macro used to pot in less than a second. It makes everything lightning quick!
It would be interesting to work out what kind of DPS increase from powershifting we could expect with the new Furor functionality on PTR, where the energy regeneration rate resets after you shift into Cat Form. I am aware that the change hurts us a LOT but how much would be of great use to know. Is it still worthwhile spending the time powershifting with this change?
Oh and, will the rogues lose energy from activating Adrenaline Rush between ticks?
The net loss, if you were "perfectly" powershifting, would be 20 energy between now and the PTR build (1 full tick). The upshot is that instead of gaining 50-60 energy, you gain 30-40. It hurts, but powershifting is still powerful if you can do it right (although you do lose white hits and if you screw it up the gains are pretty marginal in total).
I actually don't bother with it as it is - too much else going on in most fights to concentrate on as it is to use it properly, and there's always the risk you'll miss a malorne proc, OoC proc, or whatever. I also don't have maxxed 2h mace skill, which means I get no benefit from swings in between shifts.
As far as I know, rogues will not lose energy overall. I assume it works on the same system as shifting does - you activate it half way between the ticks and you gain 10 energy on top of your normal for the first tick, then 20 every tick until the last, where it wears off half way through so you gain 10 again. It's a net gain of 20 energy in comparison to now, because you would always lose a tick at the beginning or end (same as evocation and innervate).
It would be interesting to work out what kind of DPS increase from powershifting we could expect with the new Furor functionality on PTR, where the energy regeneration rate resets after you shift into Cat Form. I am aware that the change hurts us a LOT but how much would be of great use to know. Is it still worthwhile spending the time powershifting with this change?
Oh and, will the rogues lose energy from activating Adrenaline Rush between ticks?
I thought I read somewhere that the current implementation of this was bugged on PTR? Please don't quote me on that, just swear I saw that was 'not functioning as intended'.
Regardless, if it goes live as it is on PTR, I will likely abandon powershifting, as it becomes extremely risky, and you quite literally have a window of .1-.2 seconds where it goes from useful to harmful. I'll be a little bit butt-hurt too, as it removes an aspect of our gameplay where skill/timing has a rewarding outcome, and I find it abhorrent that they're changing it just so some silly mage can get an extra 500 mana. :P
I thought I read somewhere that the current implementation of this was bugged on PTR? Please don't quote me on that, just swear I saw that was 'not functioning as intended'.
Regardless, if it goes live as it is on PTR, I will likely abandon powershifting, as it becomes extremely risky, and you quite literally have a window of .1-.2 seconds where it goes from useful to harmful. I'll be a little bit butt-hurt too, as it removes an aspect of our gameplay where skill/timing has a rewarding outcome, and I find it abhorrent that they're changing it just so some silly mage can get an extra 500 mana. :P
Some times each month I'm going to have to give it up too, because of my latency behaving odd 'that time of the month'. Right now I can still pull it off with reasonable gains but I'm afraid that will not be the case anymore unfortunately. Someone sell me a connection with more oomph please.
I will try and look for any confirmation of this being a bug and I urge you to do the same. Granted, our bugs are not always instantly fixed but at least recognition of the negative impact on our performance is welcomed.
I will try and look for any confirmation of this being a bug and I urge you to do the same. Granted, our bugs are not always instantly fixed but at least recognition of the negative impact on our performance is welcomed.
Does this apply to all classes? I remember toggling off Shadow Form as triggering the gcd last time I played my shadow priest.
It depends how you do it - using /cancelform or right clicking the buff triggers no GCD as I would presume was the case with Shadowform aswell. However, Warrior stances does not appear as a buff so I suppose they always get GCD (They do) as if they were changing from no stance to some stance.
04/02/07, 2:15 PM
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