I've seen various threads in regards to tanking and threat but I really haven't seen a discussion on the usefulness of Devastate as a tank.
The numbers from Kenco's threat thread (Kenco: A Guide To Threat.) indicate that devastate gives a flat amount of threat (100) regardless of the applications of sunders while sunder gives 300 flat threat.
From simple calculations you can see that sunder is benficial untill your devastates can hit for 200 consistantly.
Where x = dmg done by devastate
For a situation where you have 100 rage
100/12 = 8.333 (Where 12 = cost of devastate/sunder)
That means with 100 rage you can sunder / devastate 8 times.
Therefore,
8 (300 Threat) = 8 (100 + x Threat)
2400 Threat = 800 Threat + 8x Threat
1600 Threat = 8x Threat
x = 200
Now if you put points into improved sunder x would become even larger.
100/12 = 8.333 (Where 12 = cost of devastate)
100/9 = 11.111 (Where 9 = cost of sunder)
11 (300 Threat) = 8 (100 + x Threat)
3300 Threat = 800 Threat + 8x Threat
2500 Threat = 8x Threat
x = 312.5
So devastates must hit for 312.5 to match improved sunder.
Now, I'm not sure if my calculations are completly correct, but as it stands, it seems that devastate is pretty much useless unless you are using it for farming and such.
I know I am not taking into account crits but even if I did, I don't think they could close the gap between imp sunder and devastate.
I'm just wondering how most of you tanks feel about devastate and to verify that my calcuations are correct.
Any feedback is greatly appreciated, thanks.
Feel free to remove this thread if you feel it is unnecessary.
There are times when I'm able to maintain heroic strike on every auto, shield slam, revenge, and devastate. You're just calculating threat/rage, I think. Threat/sec is important too.
Hmm, I think your unimproved sunder threat/rage is actually equivalent to threat/second. So, are your devastates not hitting for 200 on average? Even on bosses, I usually have either battle shout or leader of the pack (from the OT), in addition to possible blessing of might or shaman totems. I don't think 200 is that hard to reach, but I'll pay more attention to my log to see if that is the case.
Last edited by Suesse : 04/09/07 at 12:53 PM.
Reason: Threat/sec comment
I like Devastate because it lets me eek out a little more damage during my tanking cycle. It's not much, but it makes me feel good. I also like it for farming.
Threat per rage calculations like the ones you did are nice, but they overlook that on the fights that are hardest to tank, you usually have so much rage that the global cooldown becomes your threat limiting factor, not rage. Plus, you don't use Sunder / Devastate much because you're too busy using other, more important abilities like Revenge, SS, TC, Demo Shout.
In a given tanking situation where you're trying to maximize your TPS you'll throw up the five Sunders to give a damage boost to melee, then probably just use Devastate once in awhile to keep it there.
Most of the time, I think you'll find you're managing your threat around your GCDs while managing the CDs on SS/REV/SB, and tossing up Demo and TC.
Devastate is not very useful when tanking. When maximizing TPS, warriors focus on Shield slam/revenge/heroic strike. After 5-stacking, sunder rarely slips into the rotation, so the benefit devastate brings is very small.
However, Devastate is a respectable way for a protection warrior to increase DPS when not tanking. The DPS won't be great, but devastate certainly helps if you have a good gear set for DW.
If you plan on tanking frequently and don't want to respec often, I'd pick up devastate for occasional DPS utility. However, if you're like me, and respec once a week anyway for PVP--ignore it and spend the points elsewhere.
You just use devastate instead of sunder once you reach enough stacks so that DEV hits for 200 +.
After that, optimally you will have a sequence of REV, SS, DEV, DEV eating all of your time on the GCD. If you can, get another warrior to place the other debuffs up (including any sunders). If you can't do that you'll have to work those in to your rotation instead of DEV.
Also, in terms of HS.. only use it when you have excess rage (60+). HS is very rage inefficient. However, it is a good way to increase your TPS if you have more rage than you can spend.
I always hear differing views on Devastate. I heard that it's only useful if it's hitting for 300, as your math implies, but then you get people saying it works efficiently at 200, and that's where I get confused. Usually I'm using Devastate maybe every 20 seconds, just whenever I'm worried Sunders are running out. It's awesome DPS, but it has just always seemed to me that HS is generating a lot more threat Devastate (I think upwards of almost 1k more on my KLH), though I do run out of rage fast when spamming HS. Is it just because of the GCD that Devastate doesn't chew through your rage like HS does?
Devastate is really nice when TPS isn't your sole consideration.
When people ask why you use potions, you show them the DPS increase from using them. A tank is a typically overlooked damage source as well and can use AGI/STR potions, sharpening stones, etc to squeeze another 50+ dps into an encounter. Its just another marginal DPS bump that gets added to the mix.
So if Threat is good and if you are ahead of the game on a raid boss, you can make the encounter a marginal degree shorter.
Now, is prot big DPS? No. But all DPS adds up and sometimes you have the threat to spare.
it has just always seemed to me that HS is generating a lot more threat Devastate (I think upwards of almost 1k more on my KLH), though I do run out of rage fast when spamming HS. Is it just because of the GCD that Devastate doesn't chew through your rage like HS does?
Any time you hit with HS, it costs you the rage to do the skill, then it also prevents any rage from being added from that hit.
Yellow attacks don't generate rage, White attacks do.
HS converts a white attack into a yellow attack.
You shouldn't overuse HS, because it reduces the amount of incoming rage.
Instead, focus on making the most out of your instant attacks to maximize the use of the GCD.
That's strange you mean to say that revenge is a better use of a GCD then devastate on a mob with 5 stacked sunder? I thought revenge was lower aggro but for much less rage, i.e. optimal in non-infinite rage situations. Is that wrong?
That's strange you mean to say that revenge is a better use of a GCD then devastate on a mob with 5 stacked sunder? I thought revenge was lower aggro but for much less rage, i.e. optimal in non-infinite rage situations. Is that wrong?
ironically, revenge is higher threat with almost every tanking weapon then devastate.
Originally Posted by Apate
Zyla, International Man of a Certain Standard.
Originally Posted by Wraithlin
What have you brought to this discussion? The usual vacuous and contentless tripe that you contribute to these forums - no more and no less.
Revenge is awesome and cheap, always use it before Devastate unless you are running around with a 2.8 speed 88 DPS one hander.
Devastate with raidbuffs and Battle Shout using a King's Defender vs a 73 boss does a tad less then an improved sunder in threat for me (250ish and I save 3 talent points on improved sunder). It is probably countered by the crits (especially with leader of the pack) and the fact that it keeps my mongoose up.
Of course keep in mind that like most say, at best you will use Devastate twice per 6 seconds, the threat difference is minimal either way. I take the extra DPS/Procs personally. I doubt switching to sunder the whole fight would sway me more then 1% threat in either direction vs 25 man bosses.
I'd say it probably comes down to the rage you have in a given situation, and your spec choices. As was mentioned, neither devastate nor sunder are amazing for threat. Revenge and Shield Slam are always higher priority for your GCD. In high rage situations you can also throw on a shield bash to increase the effectiveness of your heroic strike spam.
Assuming you have only Focused Rage, they're the same rage cost, as such, if devastate hits for 200 it should be the same threat, anything over that and it's more, plus it has a crit chance. My devastates hit for over 200 pretty consistently with 5 sunders up and still using The Hungering Cold. However, if you take improved sunder armor, you have to think more closely in rage limited situations. If you go for rage efficiency, I believe Devastate needs to do ~300 damage to be as rage efficient as an improved sunder armor with focused rage. My math might be off, but I don't do 300 damage with a devastate, so sunder is probably technically better at that point. However, it's not very often when you're so rage starved that that makes a difference and you still have enough rage to sunder or devastate anywhere near consistently.
Devastate is only good for giving a Protection Warrior a method to farm outside of five mans / raids. I consistently generate more threat per application of Sunder / Shield Slam / Revenge / Heroic Strike than Devastate can ever bring to the table.
Revenge should always be on cooldown, no matter what. For GCD: Revenge > Shield Slam > Devastate/TC/Demo, depending on need. The only time that I would ever use Shield Slam before Revenge (if both happen to be up) is at 90+ rage.
Revenge should always be on cooldown, no matter what. For GCD: Revenge > Shield Slam > Devastate/TC/Demo, depending on need. The only time that I would ever use Shield Slam before Revenge (if both happen to be up) is at 90+ rage.
I would assume that what's meant here is the concern is that in a moderately rage starved situation, you might well generate more rage (and therefore do more threat) by SS + Revenge than Revenge + SS simply because revenge is only 5 rage and you might fill up. Not being snarky but that's a point worth noting.
And as for the whole not being snarky thing, is there actually a case where Devistate> Revenge in terms of threat? Even a 91 dps 2.9 1h is looking a bit on the thin side unless I've messed up my math again (very, very possible).
Devistate does scale more than the static threat of sunder, so for keeping stacks refreshed it's a slight tps increase (and all else being equal you do NOT want those sunder stacks to fall). It -also- frees up the MT using sunder (or dps warriors, or if you have a feral druid tanking), which makes thier life a bit easier.
If you have so much rage that you clearly can't dump it, then yes, devastate is better than sunder because it can crit, where obviously sunder can't. However, there are still problems.
Also, out of curiousity, why do people feel heroic strike is better than sunder when revenge/bash/slam leave a 4th cycle open in your GCD and the added threat of heroic is generally not as high as a sunder.(if someone has data showing otherwise, please direct me to it)
The problems in my view are:
1. For 5 man instances, the 9 rage sunder is clearly superior to the 12 rage devastate as you are not in an infinite rage situation and TPR is more of a factor than TPS in most of these situations, as its rare that you have infinite rage.
2. Devastate is a 41 point talent, we should not have to argue whether it is better than our most basic skill. Not only that, but it is still clearly inferior to Shield Slam and Revenge.
3. Warriors have been given large amounts of dodge gear. This lowers the infinite rage situations that occur. While I am thrilled to take less damage, I have seen instances of this where the MT simply ran out of rage and was not getting hit for extended periods of time. Part of this is random, but what this means is that TPR is not completely irrelevant even in raiding situations.
As far as revenge goes, my calculations looking at KLH Threatmeter show it generating something like 700-800 with defiance, so for devastate to outpace that, it would need to deal something like 350-400 damage(or crit).
My main beef is #2, for a 41 point talent, it is clearly underpowered and simply cannot be forced over 250-300 damage with any weapon that I have seen so far(Decapitator is like ~260 avg). If they increased its damage by say 10-15%, then this would be a very good sunder replacement.
Last edited by Stormheart : 04/10/07 at 2:07 AM.
Reason: Added info
Keep in mind crits. Fully raidbuffed I'm running above 14-15% crit (agi pots, sharpening stones etc.), even on 250 avg non-crit devastates (using a slower 1h - dragonstrike/decapitator), that comes out to ~288 avg devastates over time. The mere fact that it increases your procrate on Mongoose, where Sunder doesn't, makes it worth it imo. Even with a weapon that gives you Devastates that hit like a pansy (think TF) the mere fact that it's increasing the procrate considerably, makes Devastate *quite* worth it.
In a normal cycle, provided I'm not falling victim to one of those avoidance streaks, I'm running (putting in 0.1sec added to account for lag here):
0.0sec Revenge
1.6sec Shield Slam
3.2sec Devastate
4.8sec Devastate
6.4sec Revenge
8.0sec Shield Slam
(in higher lag situations I might take out one more devastate resulting in a Rev/SS/Dev/Rev/SS/Dev rotation)
and so on and so forth. Using a 1.7 speed weapon, that's giving you ~50% more damaging main-hand attacks, meaning attacks that can proc a weapon effect, or a weapon enchant - if my logic isn't completely flawed here, that directly results in ~50% more procs. I had devastate back at level 60, and crusader was up considerably more time using my EoC for tanking, than it was using a Sunder rotation. For what it's worth, the AP and the heal from crusader ended up actually upping my threat over a rotation with Sunder Armor. I'd imagine the benefits of Mongoose would play out in the same way (admittedly, I'm still running +15agi on my MH since warrior tanking and 2h weapons don't drop for my guild. ever.) Even with my rather weak Honor's Call, I'm seeing 230ish Devastates.
Granted, I throw on sharpening stones, and I'll pop Onslaught/Major Strength on threat sensitive fights, but for those, I also go with more +block value gear for bigger shield slams - point being, I'm talking about the average encounter here. According to what KTM is telling me I'm running in excess of 700tps all the time, peaking out at 850/900 TPS, if I'm getting a string of SS/Devastate/Revenge crits, obviously. With our top DPS sitting around the 1k DPS mark on fights such as Kazzak for example, I feel like Devastate does a fine job.
If I'm using Sunder Armor instead, it comes out to about the same amount of threat/sec with my particular gear setup, but with less dps from my part. Every little bit counts, right? (saying Kazzak here since he's one of the best straight dps example fights - I feel gruul works in favor of the MT's threat generation since half the fight people are more concerned with trying to find a safe spot or running around, while I'm already back at gruul poking at him before the 5th grasp hits)
Anyway, given all this, I've actually ended up dropping imp sunder from my prot build - against the "weaker" bosses in the early 5mans, and early Karazhan it was nice, just to get those initial sunders up faster, but at this stage I just don't feel it's neccessary at all. The only thing that'll ever make me lose aggro in the start of a fight at this rate isn't getting in those sunders fast enough, or not having enough rage for them, but getting parry/dodge streaks on my specials. There's your culprit, if anything. That being said, I definitely do use Sunder a LOT in multi-mob tanking situations (particularily in heroics, or Karazhan trash) in conjunction with Thunderclap Spam. In any lengthy fight, I still feel it's outperformed by Devastate. It might be marginal, and it might be disappointing that way (considering it is a 41pt talent), but it still holds its own, in my opinion.
The only case I use devastate is if I cannot run out of rage with Revenge / slam / Sunder / sunder / Shield block + HS spam.
Why I prefer HS + sunder over devastate ?
With improved HS, if a normal white hit give you 6 rage (and I am generous) the effective cost of a HS is 9+6=15.
It means you have the choice between 5 devastate or 5 sunder + 1 HS for totally 60 rage.
Devastate hits for 250 : 350 threat x5 = 1750
Sunder : 301 x 5 = 1505
The damage bonus on HS is 176, if you consider 20% armor reduction it is 140 + 196 threat
Totally 5 sunder + 1H = 1841.
This is not accounting for the fact that a HS will avoid getting a glancing blow, ie 40% of your white hits used for HS will get 30% more damage than without use of HS.
Today my devastate hits for 200 unbuffed, 250 buffed, so I keep spaming sunder with very rare davastate, but with stuff improvement it is possible that devastate will become more and more effective.
I use devastate when the fight is so long I can get 5 sunders up before the mob is dead. Mostly bosses only but also some of the tougher trash. With devastate I deal better TPS than with sunder armors, hence I use it and I like it. Using 2 per cycle puts me about 50-100 TPS above the sunder scenario.
Also, you can't compare threat per second to threat per rage.
Yep, but HS could also crit, which is +14; so you get 1855 for HS + sunders vs 1925 for Devastate alone.
But as I said, 6 rage per white hit is very generous, and you didn't consider the glancing blow avoidance.
If only my devastate could hit for 250 without pots ...
All in all the difference is not very big, and when armors will get a little bit more strength / AP the choice will be more clearly for devastate.
Maybe it is also time for blizzard to think of slow tanking weapons.
After two years of slow tanking weapons were the best was fast for HS spam, they give us fast weapons now that we have an instant skill ...
All I know is this: Finally managing to retrain myself to ALWAYS use devastate instead of sunder once I have a 5stack up (muscle memory working against me here) has resulted in a ~120TPS gain on bosses in 70 content and early Kara. Maybe the math would be different if I had imp. sunder, but I'm not entirely sure -- when I'm really worried about losing a boss anytime but the first few seconds, rage is not an issue, time (GCD) is.
Fast weapons will still be favored over slow weapons, since HS is still a valuable tanking skill. 10 more HS per minute > a net gain of about 30-40 damage per devastate in my opinion.
I don't bother with Devastate usually, early on in a fight to me the threat per rage benefits of sunder outweigh it since a low rage situation early on can hurt you, but otherwise in the fight it really can't after a few minutes. Also considering the above GCD cycle, you really don't sunder/devastate all that often per cooldown period. Sure Devastate will produce more threat, but really the difference is pretty small, and its arguably a wasted talent point at this point.
04/09/07, 12:42 PM
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