RPZip

Thesis: Impale is vastly overrated as a source of additional damage, and for certain specs is inferior to other possible talent choices.

First off, correcting a common misconception; Impale is a 5% increase to yellow (non-bleed) critical strike damage per point, not 10%. Each point raises the critical strike damage bonus by 10%; two points makes yellow critical strikes hit for +120%, or 220% of normal damage. 220% (2/2 Impale) / 200% (No Impale) = 10% boost for two points, or 5% per point.

Assuming, for the moment, a Warrior whose yellow (non-bleed) damage constitutes a full 50% of their damage output... a single point of Impale will provide him with a 5% damage boost to 50% of his attacks, X% of the time (critical strike chance).

5 * .5 * X = 1
2.5 * X = 1
X = .4

For Impale to become a 1% increase in overall damage using this model, the Warrior's critical chance must be a full 40%... which is rather high. Moreover, assuming 50% yellow (non-bleed) damage is considerably higher than is typical with most DW builds - with a standard ~5% damage ensuing from Deep Wounds, this would require only 45% of your damage to result from white autoattacks. Pushing the number to 50% white damage, with 5% bleed, leaves us with 45% yellow (non-bleed) damage.

5 * .45 * X = 1
2.25 * X = 1
X = .44

Even pushing the number down to about 40% white damage, with 55% of the damage being yellow (non-bleed) - a number typical of my results with 2H Fury builds - the amount of crit required to equal even 1% damage increase is rather higher - 36%, in fact.

5 * .55 * X = 1
2.75 * X = 1
X = .36

External Factors: Additional bonuses to crit damage (Relentless Earthstorm Diamond) will cause the numbers to shift slightly.

Assuming for the moment that the Relentless metagem provides a flat 3% damage increase to critical strikes (rather than only effecting the damage bonus; I've seen arguments for both, although I'm inclined to believe it effects the entirety of the crit damage), it's possible to model the Metagem as simply an increase to critical strike chance. For example, with a 33.3% critical strike chance the 3% additional bonus to critical strike damage can be considered simply an increase of 1% chance to crit (after 33.3 critical strikes, the 3% increased damage _per_ crit will have caused 99.9% of the damage that would have been dealt by one single additional critical strike). This rather simplifies the math here and does not require us to construct additional models both with and without the metagem.

Conclusion: While admittedly a moot point for many builds, where even with its shortcomings Impale outclasses the competitors (in an Arms build, for example, it's considerably better than the DPS increase from your other possible talents while building to 30 points pre-MS; it certainly outclasses Anger Management) it's highly questionable if it's worth the point investment in either DW Fury builds (allowing the addition of either utility talents or max'ing out other talents such as DW Specialization) or, especially, 2H Fury builds.

20/41/0 2H Fury provides very good damage, but Impale is strictly inferior to 2H Specialization in this kind of a build - it provides a smaller raw damage increase, and 2H Specialization also provides additional Rage generation by increases white damage output. The only way to acquire both would be to sacrifice points in both Rampage and a point from Imp. Berserker Stance, both of which provide larger damage increases than you will see from Impale in most cases, although admittedly this does rely in part upon the makeup of your melee group and your own socketing and gear; with a Feral Druid and a heavy emphasis on +crit, it would be possible to have Impale slightly outclass 2H Specialization if one doesn't consider the increase to Rage generation, but it's worth considering simply _not_ acquiring Impale and instead investing a full five points into 2H Specialization.

 

galzohar

Impale is still 20% of the normal attack damage.

If you really want to look at it right, impale is equivalent to increasing your critical strike chance by 20%, as each 1% crit will add 1.2% damage instead of 1%. So for impale to add the same as +1% special crit you'll need 5% crit... With 30% crit impale will add an equivalent of 6% crit on your specials. Having 30% of the attacks doign 220% damage and the rest doing 100% damage is the same as having 36% of the attacks doing 200% damage and the rest doing 100%:
100*0.7+220*0.3=136
100*.64+200*.36=136
Could easily shown with a general equasion for any crit value and any +crit damage but it would be rediculessly hard to read ;p
Of course the effective increase to your crit chance you get from impale only applies to specials so you have to multiply that increase by the ratio of your special to non-special damage, as well as rememeber that 1% crit isn't directly a 1% damage increase, as if you have, 30% crit, you're doing 130% damage on average (without impale), so another 1% crit will only be a 1/1.3=0.77% damage increase.

Of course remember to add in dodges etc when considering the DPS increase of +crit. Without impale crit adds a bigger % DPS increase to white damage as it starts out lower (-damage from glancing and -damage from misses which are ADDITIVE to crit so adding more adds a bigger relative value).

 

Caligula

It may be overrated but where else would you put points in a DW build that would add the equivalent (albiet small) DPS increase?

 

RPZip

No... it won't. I actually addressed this in the first few lines of the post. =p 1.1%, sure, not 1.2%, and it only effects specials. It adds to the damage modifier, not to overall damage; it's the same way in which Ruin is a 33% increase to critical strike damage, not a 100% increase (200% / 150% = 1.33).

I'm not sure offhand, but it does give a lot more credence to the DPS potential of a Fury/Prot hybrid build. Potentially max'ing DW spec and Imp. Zerker Rage in a more traditional DPS build?

EDIT: I'm not trying to indicate that the ability is useless, and it may still be the best choice in a DW DPS build - it's still superb at the very least in an Arms DPS build - but in, at least, the specific case of a 2H Fury build it appears to be inferior to the other alternatives.

 

Tzan

Even if it only grants a marginal increase, it's worth it to get to Deep Wounds. Deep Wounds typically adds 2-3% of my damage on bosses who can bleed. So even if Impale did nothing, I'd take it to get the 2-3% extra damage from Deep Wounds.

 

RPZip

Deep Wounds comes before Impale. =p

 

• diospadre

He's saying that deep wounds being good tosses out the argument that dropping Impale nets you 5 talent points (instead of just 2).

 

• ikillyouheal

Have I been missreading this all the time I've played warrior, as far as I understood it, this only applies to your SPECIAL attacks.

::Edit:: Sorry, I didnt read your whole post, but the point still stands but not directed to you. Just pointing it out

[04:04:29] <Malan> Kaubel just laid the smack down in the the blizzcon thread
[04:05:07] <Kaubel> fucking idiots. i need to go on a banning rampage and put things right once and for all.
[04:05:20] <Kaubel> our forums are infested with pussy.

 

galzohar

By "normal attack" I meant "special base damage", should've phrased it more accurately ;p putting while damage aside as it's obviously not a part of the discussion of how it works (only taken into account at the end to figure out what actual DPS increase impale is).

If your base special is 100%, and a crit is 200%, each 1% crit added a 1% chance to do additional 100% damage, so in essence that's 1% more DPS (when starting at 0% crit for simplicity). If you had impale, with the same 1% crit chance you'd have 1% chance to do 120% more damage, so it would've added 1.2% damage. That is assuming special crits with impale do 220% of non-crit damage, as seems to be true by the tooltip and your original post.

I hope it's more clear now.

 

Darkrenown

Surely a fury/prot build has always been better going 0/31/30 and getting 1h spec anyway?

 

Randor

Personally, I never understood a 0-31-30 build as you miss any points in Parry. For DPS, I would think a 5-41-15 build would be more effective and sustained damage while still giving you Shield Specialization, Defiance and Last Stand. Be interesting to see if anyone has numbers crunched on 5-41-15 or 33-11-17 builds vs. 0-31-30.

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Tzan

No, I was just being an idiot who hit "submit reply" without thinking first, and while doped up on cold medicine. Ah well, thanks for trying to make me look less brain dead.

 

Tritone

(@ original poster)

The premises you're basing your argument off of are grossly miscalculated. Any warrior's dps (Fury, Arms or whatever), will be at the very minimum non-bleed 75% yellow damage in a raiding situation. Fury warriors in particular will be using heroic strike or cleave for the vast majority of their main-hand auto-attack timers. You must consider that yellow attacks cannot glance. So 75% is being very very generous to the amount of white damage done.

Even a moderately to bad geared warrior will have > 35% crit raid buffed in zerker stance and most will push much much higher.

Using the 75% yellow attacks and and 35% crit as a base, the math is simple.


Total Damge (bleeds negated) x % of damage (w/o impale) from yellow attacks x Crit chance x the Bonus from impale

or

100 x .75 x .35 x .1 = 2.625% Damage bonus from 2 talent points.

A very well geared warrior with windfury and full raid buffs will probably be doing about 80% of their damage from yellow swings, with more than 45% crit.

100 x .8 x .45 x .2 = 3.6% Damage bonus.

Correct me if you think this is wrong. But considering the ludicrous rage generation of ridiculously geared dps warriors, I think these numbers are an understatement if they're incorrect at all.

 

Ren

Tritone, you're completely off with your stats. An average DW Fury warrior's yellow damage is roughly 55-60% (and I'm being generous) of their total damage, not 75%. The only way a warrior could get 75% yellow damage is in a fight with huge damage modifiers or if they're taking in a lot of AoE damage. A "moderately to bad geared warrior" will not have over 35% crit raid-buffed in Berserker unless they have a feral druid. An average raid runs with 3 rogues in a warrior/roguex3/shaman group. One more thing: Impale is a 10% damage boost to critical specials, not 20%.

100 x .60 x .30 x .1 = 1.8% damage boost from two talent points.

The best I could do pre-normalization was 68% yellow and 32% white on Patchwerk--without WF of course. A DW Fury warrior with WF totem would have almost certainly ran with a higher % white damage.

 

dr_AllCOM3

Impale really isn't that hot, especially for Fury. Just play around with the Spreadsheet. It's like 2%. But since you have the points you put them there.

 

tristantio

Is there ever a point in gearing where the 10% bonus damage from one hand specialization would make 0/31/30 the highest dps dual wield spec?

 

Tritone

I really disagree with you Ren, on my alt warrior, wearing mostly blues with sparse glad/marshal gear with a Flurry/Blood Frenzy spec in Karazhan my damage breakdown was just under 75% yellow damage. Granted there are a lot of Aoe packs and low armor bosses in Kara, but my warrior's gear is pretty aweful, and he didn't have windfury. I think it'd be worth checking damage recaps on some really really well geared warriors to get an idea of the spectrum we're looking at. I really don't believe impale is so weak.

 

Randor

2hand specs, be it Arms or Fury benefit from Impale. Also, a Blood Frenzy build isn't that great in Kara since few bleedable mobs. Better to go 31-30 or 20-41 for a 2handed spec there.

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Etre

If Y is total yellow dmg of a warrior without impale
and he has 35% crit chance in raids

From the total of Y yellow dmg , the damage done by criticals can be found simple like this :

on 100 attacks we have 35 criticals + 65 normal hits = 35*2 + 65 = 135 equivalent hits

135 equivalent hits-------------------- Y dmg
70 (35*2 - crits) equivalent hits------ dmg done with crits (part of Y)

So the total dmg done with crits is : 70*Y / 135 = aprox 0.519 Y

Impale gives 20% bonus to critical dmg. So instead of 200% we have 220%
Considering this the dmg with impale will be 1.1 * 0.519 * Y = 0.5709 Y

Now , the total yellow dmg with impale is :

0.5709*Y (dmg from criticals) + (1-0.519)*Y (dmg from normal yellow hits) = 1.052 Y

This means an increase of 5.2% of the yellow dmg

If Y is 50% of X (total dmg) as how the original poster assumed :
Y=0.5X
considering impale we have 1.052*0.5*X yellow dmg = 0.526X yellow dmg

Total dmg will be 1.026 X , 2.6% bonus from impale over the hole dmg


You did your mats considering the number of crits , not the dmg done by this ones. Is like I am saying : 35% crit chance has 35% of the total dmg when in fact it has a bit over 50%.


PS : reading more your post I find it more and more confusing. Is hard for me to follow your logic as it has more flaws (at least this is how it looks for me).

example : you assumed that yellow dmg is 50% of the total dmg and a bit later you told that this 50% is in fact 50% of the attacks ... which is obviously not . Yellow hits do more dmg, at same amount of dmg, u have more white hits ofc ...

quote : "Assuming, for the moment, a Warrior whose yellow (non-bleed) damage constitutes a full 50% of their damage output... a single point of Impale will provide him with a 5% damage boost to 50% of his attacks, X% of the time (critical strike chance)."

This for me looks like a total wrong assumption. See also what I told above about considering the dmg done by crits , not the number of crit attacks for calculating the bonus from impale

 

Xzard

I think it might be useful to clarify this thread as being more specifically directed at DW DPS warriors or to rewrite the analysis to include the perspectives of both types of DPS. Having played both specs in a TBC raid environment, my experience is that they are very different play styles and get their damage from different sources and ability rotations. (maximizing slam effectiveness vs. maximizing melee white dmg and flurry up time) Impale is a very good talent for an Arms warrior, a good sized portion of their damage comes from yellow attacks. On the other hand, DW Fury Warriors typically see at least 50% of their overall DPS from their white damage, which Impale does not enhance, therefore their benefit is going to be different.

I will say that I recall noticing about a 50-75 DPS increase on recap when I switched from 5/41/15 to 17/44/0 while in KZ. However, that was several months ago and I no longer have the logs, so I apologize for the unsubstantiated claim.

 

RPZip

Correct, I was basing numbers off what you're likely to see with Windfury Totem up. There's really no good reason to ever not have WF totem for your melee DPS group; without it, your 2H DPS is going to crash, and even DW is going to suffer quite a bit.

[quote]
2hand specs, be it Arms or Fury benefit from Impale. Also, a Blood Frenzy build isn't that great in Kara since few bleedable mobs. Better to go 31-30 or 20-41 for a 2handed spec there.[/qupte]

If you're going two-hand Fury, you have the option to choose between 2H Spec and Impale. The math here was to demonstrate why capping out 2H Spec is the better of the two choices in that scenario. There's no reason not to cap both if you're going deeper into the Arms tree.

The individual number of attacks doesn't matter in this case. It's a 5% damage boost to half of his damage; I'll admit that the word attacks is misleading in this case, but either way the math is the same.

I'll dig through your math when I get back from work and have chugged something with caffeine in it.

I actually originally wrote it to apply specifically to 2H fury, and added in the notes about DW later. I'll try to see if I can rewrite it to be more accurate as it relates to the different specs.

Hmm... interesting. My initial temptation is to say "probably not", as as gear scales upwards AP is likely to play a larger and larger role, increasing the relative value of Imp. Zerker when compared to 1H Weapon Spec, and the loss of Precision and Rampage as well is a formidable hurdle... plus you do lose whatever DPS gains you would achieve from Deep Wounds/Impale/Imp. Heroic.

 

Tweeti

As far as I know the 10% bonus from 1h Spec is calculated after AP modifiers. Therefore it outstrips Imp Zerker stance in benefit because it also increases the DPS attributed to your weapons, along with the added bonus of not requiring Zerker Stance.

If the DPS benefit from 250 AP is less than 10% of the DPS attributed to your weapons than 1h Weapon Spec is simultaneously outstripping Imp Zerker and Rampage at the same time. Not to mention you don't have to spent rage and GCDs keeping Rampage up.

The loss of Precision is the one that really hurts 0/31/30 at lower gear levels. And of course you can't get Impale

 

RPZip