Ahh, I forgot about swing timer. I guess if you had a speed 2.0 weapon you'd be sure to auto-attack at the end of every cast... Anyway, the responses are pretty much what I expected, thanks for indulging me.

Added page with the best possible set that sim suggests at current itemization available. Plan to update it as soon as 2.4 loot will be known for sure.

I'm trying to figure out how the heck I went from around 30% unbuffed crit on the paperdoll to only 26%. Did anyone else have a drop in crit rate like that as they started grabbing T6 gear?

My crit is going up...it's my hit that's suffering.

My crit took a huge hit after i collected my haste gear. Went from like 30% to 26%, roughly the same as yourself. Taking a look at your armory, its the same 3 pieces of gear that i have that caused the drop (gloves, belt and ring).

Thanks for the update Yo on that, hopefully that finalizes the question about "HAI GUYZ WHICH IS BETTER"

However, I am wondering if Dragonstrike ranks higher with the presence of a Dragonspine Trophy (due to haste), we'll see what happens.

Edit: since this is the best possible "Gear Set" (which i didn't read, GG), Dragonstrike is probably still third

I went through that same response when looking over my gear wondering what i was doing wrong. Luckily, I almost always have a feral in my group as the 5th person so the loss wasn't that huge of a deal.

Once we upgrade to [Boneweave Girdle] and [Unstoppable Aggressor's Ring], we should be back to where we were previously, but just a little shy of 30% with BoK.

This is how my gearing process has been going.

But basically, you would expect your crit, hit, and AP to drop slightly as you gain access to items with haste and armor penetration, since those items will be better but not *so much better* that your overall stats go up even as you add extra stats. From memory, I've dropped from 120 hit to about 90 hit but grabbed about 600 armor penetration and 1% crit.

Careful.

The question you have is whether losing 1s of WF is worth pushing back shocks by 1.5s. The immediate cost of this is 1/4 the cost of a single shock.

Anyone know why my DPS crashes quite badly when i use 2 x syphons over rising tide/syphon?

Stats with rising/syphon - 1612 AP/27.36%crit/193 Hit
Stats with 2 x syphon - 1618/27.36%crit/172 hit

Yo!'s parses me higher with syphons and from what people saying, they also parse higher but my DPS really takes a hard drop. I struggle to keep flurry up and drop to the lower half of the DPS meter. Re-equip axe and i go back into the top 5. Baffled at why this is. Its not just on 1 fight, its happening alot and im bloody confused!

Did you maybe neglect to enchant/imbue one of your weapons before you switched?

This is the only reason I can think of that RT or Syphon would have a significant advantage over the other. Losing 1.33% hit is bad but shouldn't break you, since you have more than 100.

Also, if you're an orc, obviously the orc racial is worth a tremendous amount.

So I think I've done a pretty good job of obtaining among the best gear for each slot outside of heroics and raids (meaning from quests, regular instances, and an occasional crafted item). I've been using EP to build up as much DPS as possible. All but one of my gear is leather as I was advised in this thread that for instances/raids the favorable DPS stats from most of the leather (over mail) gear is much more important than extra armor (which if you manage threat and don't get hit too much shouldn't be much of a factor).

I'm now transitioning into Heroics and soon KZ. My GM suggested that I increase my health (which has dropped to under 6k unbuffed as I've been focusing on DPS over all else). I definitely see the need for increased health as certain AoE could wipe me out easily. I'm looking for some general direction regarding this issue (and confirmation that increasing health is important) and any specific recommendations that might be warranted.

Here is my current gear and thanks for your time:

[Helm of the Claw]
[Natasha's Choker]
[Blackened Leather Spaulders]
[Cloak of the Inciter]
[Chestguard of the Dark Stalker]
[Felstalker Bracers]
[Gloves of the Unbound]
[Rune-Engraved Belt]
[Shattrath Leggings]
[The Master's Treads]
[Ravenclaw Band]
[Overseer's Signet]
[Figurine - Felsteel Boar]
[Figurine - Nightseye Panther]
[Fist of Reckoning] x 2
[Totem of the Void]

Its almoust impossible notice any gear uprgrade or downgrade with only pure gut feeling. Check did you miss any buffs or debuffs those affects much more than any gear upgrades you can get. Buffs are easy to check but debuffs is little harder to see accurately. Imp. hunter mark 110ap or imp. JoC +3% crit is impossible to check for sure. Expose weakness uptime(>250ap) how you can measure it. Or maybe you have just very bad luck.

It could be that you're getting more offhand WF procs using the dual syphons.

I'd say run recount/wws with both weapon configs up to be sure.

I raided Kara with less than 6k for a long time; in fact, I'd put the comfort spot at around 6500. Anything more than that is just a buffer for your healers. The only fight I had trouble with in Karazhan was Maiden; the others, a little more wouldn't make much of a difference. Sorcerous shades (the trash mobs that do AoE burst damage) are a pain but you just pop SR before you engage them and you should have no trouble.

A Flask of the Titans is an extra 400 health with no new gear needed; that combined with some stam food should carry you into Kara where you'll see a lot of upgrades with +stam. You can also take the piece of gear with the least EP on it and put some high stamina green in there, until you get your health up to spec.

But if you really want to get your best bang for buck, do Battlegrounds and get some Vindicator's gear. A few weeks running AV and you should have 1-2k more health. Or if you don't like PvP, you could find a leatherworker to make you some of the epic craftables that are better than anything you'll find in Karazhan anyway: such as [Shadowprowler's Chestguard] or [Cloak of Darkness]. A combination of the two would be ideal; the Vindicator's Ring and Pendant are better than anything you'll find in Kara.

Standard would be more like Mongoose/Mongoose?

But did you forget WF imbue? That would be huge drop :P

I'll get some parses when we do some melee friendly mobs with the new raid week. Najentus for example

Blizz itemization for us has been so poor (mana per 5 sec..., bad stats distribution ), that best pure DPS set (suggested by sim) contains only rogue leather items with one hunter piece (legs).

Assuming that Sunwell loot has iLevel =159 for set pieces (T4 = 120, T5=133, T6 = 146), iLevel = 154 for non-set items, iLevel = 164 for loot from end-bosses, using Item Level formula from wowwiki (very accurate), using EP values from sim from the best set available, assuming that there will be 7 stats on chest piece (as it is now on pvp chest), further assuming that only non-set pieces can contain no stam/int, it is possible to theorycraft chest armor that will be scored highest with abovementioned EP values (Math behind this is not hard but in order to verify the results one has to run discrete optimization algorithm anyway, so take it by word):

Elitist Jerkin
Binds when picked up
Chest Mail
1078 Armor
+20 Strength
+15 Agility
Durability 140 / 140
Requires Level 70
Equip: Improves hit rating by 14.
Equip: Improves haste rating by 17.
Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 15.
Equip: Increases your expertise rating by 51.
Equip: Your attacks ignore 696 of your opponent's armor.
"Yo!"
iLevel = 154
626 EP (Midnight is scored twice less)

Another theorycrafted piece of gear possible within iLevel = 154 that you can find interesting:
Dark Naaru Paradox
Binds when picked up
Chest Mail
1100 Armor
Requires Level 70
Equip: Your attacks ignore 1100 of your opponent's armor.

It's stated that you will never see a str and AP item unless you get some silly <random> item. (Hardly the point though)

One of the basics is also that if you buff one stat far above the norm, it becomes more and more expensive in the item budget. Like "Ring of Pure Stamina" will not have the same point-by-point value of a three stat ring. (Can't find the source on wowwiki)

This is accounted for, did not know about ap/str deal though (guessed it is like agi/crit rating) --> edited stats above.
Formulas:Item values - WoWWiki - Your guide to the World of Warcraft

Overall, the kinds of gear you're collecting is right - but that's not unexpected if you're using EP and calculating what's an upgrade and what just looks shiny. However, your weapon choice, while excellent in the low- to mid-60s, could use a little work. Don't be afraid to use greens if they're better. Keep an eye out on the Auction House for 68-70 2.6 speed greens "of the Bandit" or "of the Soldier", or honestly basically anything. The 68-70 greens are (if I remember correctly) 62-64 DPS, as opposed to the 54 on your Fists.

Admittedly, you're probably going to be picking up a good main hand from Arc or Shattered Halls, and a good off-hand from heroic UB or Crypts (*shudder*), but don't be afraid to use greens in the meantime. I MH'd a [Dragonmaw] with an [Amani Tomahawk] of the something-or-other for a couple weeks while I was grinding arena points for my [Merciless Gladiator's Pummeler].