RK

I can't actually find any kind of definite formula for this- perhaps it's so well understood by everyone else it goes without saying, but as a newbie caster (18 months+ of raiding resto vs 2 weeks of raiding elemental) I'm still wet behind the ears for determining how best to gear. And I couldn't find an answer by searching (probably because all the search terms I could use are really generic).

As an elemental shaman, I have a ton of +hit just from talents, enough that I'm hit capped vs mobs up to level 72 without even trying. But it's level 73 boss mobs that matter, and I don't have the full +16% spell hit there.

Is the best thing for DPS casters (ignoring any side benefits of crit, such as clearcasting) if given the choice between spell hit rating and an equivalent amount (in itemisation points) of spell crit rating or +dmg, is the best call actually to go for the spell hit (e.g. scryer's bloodgem vs xi'ri's gift, spell hit glove enchant vs +dmg glvoe enchant)? I'm aware that spell hit rating converts into % spell hit much more favourably than spell crit does: if it was just a matter of 1% spell hit vs 1% spell hit, this wouldn't be an issue, but spell hit is obviously "cheap" in percentage terms. Which made me wonder if it's cheap because it sucks, or it's cheap and should be taken advantage of.

 

Muroka

With Totem of Wrath you end up with 12% hit from talents. The best thing to do is get 4% from gear then focus on spell damage and crit the rest of the way.

 

Pane

With the changes to clearcast, seems to me that crit is the nr 1 spellstat for elementalists. You already get a lot of +hit from talents, and you don't NEED to have a 0 miss rate to be effective. Just work with whatever stat works best or you can get cheapest.

As an example; I'm now at 19%-ish +hit (melee) as a dual wielder, compared with a 24.6% miss rate. I'm not gonna bend over backwards to get those last 5%.

 

niska

4% resist is acceptable, but I'm sure that you'll hit that cap without even trying.

 

Lanthon

It really depends on your class. In most cases though, the prevailing logic is to cap your +hit at 99% (because there's always a 1% resist rate you cannot overcome). In my case, as a shadowpriest, I put 5/5 into Shadow Focus (+10% hit) and have 76 +hit rating on my gear (you need 75 for +5% to reach 99%). When I'm grouped with an elemental shaman, my +hit goes up 4%, so I swap out +hit gear in favor of +damage (though I can't trade out the full 4% hit).

For an elemental shaman/fire mage, I could see justification in favoring crit over hit, so long as your hit is really high (97%+). Personally though, nothing annoys me more than spending mana only to get a resist.

 

Ezareth

Getting 4% hit or just under 4%(3%+.XX) should be your # 1 priority for bosses.

12.8 hit will benefit you more than 22.075 crit rating whil costing maybe 1/3 of crit in terms of item points. There really isn't much you can do to increase your DPS more.

 

Altima

As an affliction warlock, I find the hardest thing to do is balance extra shadow damage against the hit rate of my destruction spells.

Right now I have 4/5 Suppression and 9.51% spell hit from gear. This means I've surpassed the 1% limit for my affliction spells, and only Immolate and Shadow Bolt benefit further from further increase of +spell hit. Considering the fact that ~40% of my raid damage comes from destruction spells, my plan is to up my +hit from gear to ~10%, and then drop another point from suppression for 2/2 Improved Life Tap. That way, I'm still looking at

1% miss for affliction spells
7% miss for destruction spells
an extra 10% mana returned from Life Tap

To me, that's a good balance. Understand, of course, I'm playing a spec that severely undervalues crit%, especially when comparing to, say, elemental shaman or balance druid.

 

• Daler

I find the best way to handle it is to stack crit and damage for all but lvl 73 bosses. For them, I carry a Scryer's Bloodgem and swap it out for another on-use trinket (since Quag's being a stingy lil bugger).

Since I'm Draenei, I get an extra 1% from the racial bonus (assuming it's working properly...an assumption I'm hesitant to make). That's 13% before gear with the totem (above the lvl 72 instance boss cap). Add 14 hit rating from the Glyph of Power head enchant and 32 from the Scryer's Bloodgem, and with a single trinket swap, Alliance shaman can hit the cap.

So definitely just stack crit and damage. Even without the Draenei bonus, the Scryer's Bloodgem + Glyph of Power will put Horde shaman at just under the cap.

What I'm curious about is, since our spells are subject to partial resists, is there an ideal number for spell penetration akin to the +hit cap? Is it worth getting at all?

 

Teenee

0 would be the ideal number. The partial resists you're seeing are due to non-negatable resistances per level (it's speculated at least). Spell penetration remains one of the most useless PvE stats (resilience perhaps joining it).

 

Eylirria

It's speculated that these level based resists (overall DPS loss on bosses from these is 6% for a caster) is that it's a relic from the old system back in beta where you had to skillup your schools of spells just the same as you had to level up your weapons.

And now, our "spell" skill is just a "N x Level" much like druid feral skill, and there's nothing we can do to counter it.

 

Quixotic

Not for a raiding elemental shaman without CoE/CoS. The lone elemental shaman in my guild just has the +20 penetration to cloak, and chain chugs Elixir of Empowerment.