Valize

I would love to see a thread like this.

I am in 4pc T6, so no, no 2pc T4. While I can hold 2s/5r, I usually have to do a 3s/5r every now and again when I blow Blade Flurry or I just need my energy to regen.

Honestly though, it's all up to what you feel you are comfortable with. The only things that really matter in rogue dps is keeping SnD up always, never letting your energy cap out, and knowing that Rupture > Evis.

 

Seleli

I had a question on Expose Armor. My guild currently runs 2 Kara groups, and are about to start 25-man raids. On 25-mans we will have 2 or 3 warrior tanks, so sunders won't be an issue. On our Kara runs though, I often don't have a warrior, and when we do, he doesn't tank all the bosses, sometimes a Pally will. I don't often know what the raid setup will be until I'm standing outside Kara, so to my point.

Is it worth using non-talented Expose Armor in these situations? I'm, of course, not going to respec on a fight by fight basis in an instance, and I'd prefer to not have to go back to a major city and respec after a raid is formed and I see I have no warriors. Basically it comes down to: if no sunders are available for a particular fight, is it worth using non-talented EA in place of Rupture?

Note: In Kara, we have at a minimum 2, and max 3 physical DPS. If a warrior isn't tanking, than a Pally is, and while lower armor would help them, it doesn't seem as important as for a warrior/feral druid tank.

 

• Feist-Mok

If I have an energy defecit and AR is up, I'll use it to even out my cycle and try to get back onto it.

If I'm doing fine maintaining my cycle after the 45 seconds or so I allow for tank threat, then I pop it alongside all my other cooldowns and try to sneak in an eviscerate.

 

Valize

I just Thistle Tea if I find my Energy Bottoming out.

Sure it blows a Healthstone Cool, but rarely do healthstones save me in End-Game Encounters. Plus our healers are ballin'.

 

Aaberg

Try and work towards a sword spec. That probably the best you can do atm.

 

Valize

If you have a warrior in there, tanking or not, he should be throwing sunders up there, not only for his DPS, but all your Physical DPS aswell. I would throw EA up there (talented or not) if I had 3 Physical DPS, anything less than that is a waste imho.

 

• Feist-Mok

Thistle Tea is for the second time that happens :P

And healthstones save my ass constantly - I'd rather use a healthstone and save my potion cooldown for haste than use a health pot and save my stone cooldown for tea.

 

Valize

I use Haste Potions on Every cool.

It's always a judgement call whether to use Thistle Tea, if I feel I can survive through the 2 minutes till another HS timer is up, then I use it.

 

drumbum

If for some reason there are really zero warriors in the raid group, then you should use EA regardless of whether any other physical DPS is present. 2050 armor penetration is much better than Rupture even just for your own damage, nevermind any other physical DPS present. I'm not sure where you came up with "3 physical DPS" being the cutoff, but you're clearly undervaluing the need for at least EA or Sunder up on your target.

 

Sneakiest

I'd like to ask a few questions on energy pooling. I know it's probably already been covered, but I read something just a few posts ago in one of the rogue threads sometime these past two days which is something that I have indeed been wondering about for some time.

When should you exactly energy pool? I've read around things like keeping a good 60-80 energy prior to a rupture to avoid screwing up rotations. I'm doing 4s/5r cut with ashtongue over the shard of contempt simply because I don't like the way the shard operates. I'm using Elk's buff bars to monitor my self-buffs and having to wait on procs before using trinkets, cooldowns etc is something I don't really enjoy.

Sorry, I'm derailing myself. Basically my questions come down to this:
- You don't pool energy before SnD unless you're not using a cut cycle. A cut cycle straight up means you won't pool it, you'll just cut your SnD off as soon as those 3/4/5 CPs (depending on your cycle's SnD CP count) to maximize rupture uptime, am I correct?

- I do pool my energy before five sunders are up, but what would practically be best for an opener? A one point SnD straight up without five sunders up, or pooling energy and slowly getting three-four CPs and then charging up SnD? This is what I used to do until about a month ago, since I'm guessing one point and then climbing to my usual four-pointers should be more effective. I guess openers aren't too important.

- Cooldown synergy -- should I wait on proc effects for cooldowns? Just ignore fight lengths -- Say Brutallus. You should pop everything right from the start -- but would the benefit from waiting, say, for an unleashed rage proc from our shaman, maybe a pair of mongoose effects and waiting on ashtongue uptime before blowing my blade flurry be a noticeable benefit? We're not talking a massive time difference here, say a ten seconds later than I should pop it for instance. I know there's no way to theoretically measure this, but maybe some people here have the experience to tell me as my DPS bounces around too much between 1750 and 2050 DPS for me to conclude anything. I do really solid damage -- just not consistent, at all.

Here's A TL;DR version:
- When is it beneficial to energy pool?

Sorry above all if I'm making things too complex. Generally my playstyle is just nuking my instants and (recentely) pooling for rupture. It's just that in my experience, whenever I've seriously attempted things like pooling and waiting on proc effects for cooldowns, I end up losing out in DPS for one reason or another.

I'm trying to really stretch out my DPS as best as I can. I know more or less the theory fairly well, I've followed spreadsheets since around the late AQ40/Naxxramas days (I had an orc rogue I unfortunately transferred out of this server one day and regretted it in a day or two, having ended up rerolling in early BC for the same reason, character stuck on a server I hated for three months).

I'm asking this because there's some differences I just can't explain. In theory rogues are an easy class -- you keep your 3s/5r or whatever other cycle you use up and use cooldowns whenever they're up. But that's the thing, I suck at synergy. I use haste potions with blade flurry, but that's it. I don't wait on procs of any kind before using my cooldowns. I've tried to, but I haven't really noticed a difference and sometimes I'd dare say I've performed worse from what I could tell, but like I said, my DPS is also very inconsistent on long-term sustained damage fights like Teron/Brutallus. I do much, much better on fights with movement simply because I'm very good at maximizing my time on target.

Thanks in advance.

 

drumbum

As far as energy pooling goes, there are different levels of just how much you want to try to milk from it.

The most beneficial thing you can do with energy pooling is to save energy before refreshing SND (yes, even in a "cut" cycle!) -- but ONLY if your SND isn't going to fall off by doing so. Basically, before refreshing SND, you should wait until either of the following conditions is met: (1) your energy will cap if you do not refresh it now; (2) SND will fall off if you do not refresh it now. In general, when someone talks about a "SND cut" cycle, it only means that you shouldn't spend more energy on an additional combo point before refreshing SND. It does NOT mean that you shouldn't pool energy before refreshing it, since doing so has no adverse effects.

Another way to use energy pooling is to avoid emptying your energy bar until you get a random proc that will increase your yellow damage. For example, you may try to sit around 50-60 energy until Mongoose procs, and then you will try to unload all of your energy to hopefully increase the number of instant attacks that land inside the proc. After the buff fades, you can again let your energy pool back to the 50-60 range and do the same thing. This can be a bit tricky though because you want to make sure you have enough of a buffer to prevent capping your energy bar due to a few combat potency procs in a row.

I believe there are other ways to benefit from it as well, although I think these are the two most significant methods.

 

hedningen

@excelion
What kind of raid buff do you get?
If you don't have a shaman and a warrior in your group you are in a clear disadvantage compared to other dps.
Combat daggers as Combat swords rely alot on Combat Potency for energy refound. You have a very low hitrating on
your current gear and that effects the amount of energy you get back aswell as to hit procs like the Shard of contempt.
Untill you have better gear for Combat Daggers/Sword you might try to go Mutilate as its not as dependent on hit.

 

• Latito

To add a few things to the discussion:

drumbum has the right idea in regards to energy pooling. I generally just end up spamming my energy because I have other things to worry about - micromanaging a energy pool that bounces from 30-70 energy is risky if you don't give it a lot of attention. You WILL go over 100 energy if its not watched closely. With a ~0.6 speed OH (SnD, BF, DST or Lust).. you can achieve 45 energy in about 1.2 seconds (start counting time when the first proc shows up.. next 2 swings after it both proc as well). This combined with a natural energy tick makes for a really dicey situation. That said, pooling energy just before a SnD can be quite nice in regards to smoothing out cycles.

Remember those "theoretical optimal cycles" that are in the spreadsheet.. that assumes you aren't wasn't ANY SnD time. Essentially you would need an energy bar with like 500 energy or something (picking a random number here) to actually be able to absorb the swings in procs. Pooling an extra 40-60 energy is about all you can realistically do. So, say you are using a 4s/5r cycle. You pop SnD, 26.1 seconds remaining on SnD. Build up to 5 combo points. At this point I generally check my buffs. Rupture benefits from 1 thing: AP. If a Mongoose and Heroism (Shard version..) is up, I'll rupture right away. If not, I'll wait 2-4 seconds in case one comes up.. or until I reach ~60 energy. If no AP proc showed up by then, I'll just drop a Rupture right away. Technically you could do this with WF procs as well, but those buffs are up so short its more than likely just a "you might occasionally get lucky and hit one" type of thing.

Once you build back up to 4 (or however many combo point SnD you do) combo points, wait until (like previously mentioned by drumbum) your energy is around ~60 or SnD is about to fall off (0.5 sec left or so, depending on your latency and reaction time, etc). The idea is, you now have about a 60 energy headstart on your next cycle. If you happen to get a few bad Ruthlessness procs or a Combat Potency drought, this energy will help buffer you a bit. It is by no means a "sure-thing" type of safe-guard, but it helps. Essentially, you have borrowed some energy from the first cycle and rolled it over into the next cycle. Think of it like those cell phone plans that advertise Roll Over Minutes or something, but with energy. This allows your cycles to better approximate the average cycle you are able to sustain, without just chopping off your extra procs from good cycles and then getting screwed on bad cycles. It doesn't negate the RNG completely, but it helps. When you drop rupture in the cycle, aside from AP procs, really doesn't matter. If you have a 26 second cycle based on a 4-point SnD, you can rupture 5 seconds in, 10 seconds in, 25 seconds in.. it doesn't matter. Well, ok 5 and 25 are a bit outrageous due to GCD's and whatnot, but you get the idea. So long as you drop a 5-point rupture in there somewhere, your cycle is identical. This is why shifting it a few seconds (when possible) to catch an AP proc is nice. Remember, the AP you have when you apply the rupture is used in Rupture damage calcs for the duration of the bleed. Boss debuffs (Mangle) are applied on a per-tick basis.

On CD usage, specifically for Brutallus:
First, remember you have a few "layers" of CD's available. Haste Pot + Blade Flurry (+ Orc Racial!) should all be poped at the same time. Belf racial doesn't benefit from extra haste (in fact, it runs the risk of capping your energy out), so I would suggest augmenting the use of that cooldown to a low-haste period of time. This set of CD's can be used 3x per fight. Next is AR, used twice per fight. The only key is to use it within the first 45 seconds of the fight (assuming your killed kills him in exactly 6 minutes). This allows the second AR to get full usage. I would probably pop it a bit earlier, because on the 2nd usage you'll still want to use up those combo points and allowing for not hitting it ON cooldown, perhaps a few sec of needing to use GCD for something else. Next would be Bloodlust - know ahead of time when you get this. Drums are also important, altho usage varries substantially based on how many drummers you have.

Overall, it is not a good idea to use any CD before Sunder / EA is up. CoR, FF(F), EW, BF, etc. are all applied nearly instantly, but Sunder / EA generally takes 10-15 seconds to apply. Second, timing CD's to procs is a good thing to try and do, so long as you get full # of uses out of them. For instance, try and time AR to a mongoose / SoC proc if possible, but don't wait so long you only get to use it once. In general, Mongoose and SoC both proc right at the start of the fight and so using AR isn't a great thing to do then. 230 AP < 2600+ Arm Pen. Since SoC has a 45-sec ICD, you won't be able to use AR when it is up for a second time. Not to mention, poping AR *right* at the start can sometimes be touchy on threat, no matter how good your tank is - parry / dodge / miss happens. Most tanks will not be stacking Expertise for Brutallus, expect threat spikes and dropoffs. As such, I generally just use AR to shorten up my opening few cycles and get into a good rotation. If it happens to time to a mongoose.. great! No big deal.

The other major set of CD's (Haste pot, BF, Orc Racial) are pretty nice in that you can use them *whenever*. You only *have* to use them within the first ~1:40 of the fight to ensure getting a full 3 uses. I generally tend to wait until ~1 min in (when the second SoC proc comes up). This lets me pop them again at 3 min (or shortly thereafter, pending on DST / Mongoose / SoC procs) and once more around 5:30. Generally my group gets 1 or 2 bloodlusts, first being at 3 min (by my request..) and last around 1 min (mostly for Fury warrior execute). This times quite nicely to the haste/AP 2-min CD's.

Lastly, Thistle Tea. Since its on a 5-min CD and we don't need HS.. you can technically use 2. However, if you figure on an average of 2k SS from the extra 40 energy, thats ~5.5 dps. Not exactly game breaking. Instead, I would recomend just saving it until you get a cycle which is like "oh crap, I have 2 combo points and only 7 seconds left on SnD" and you need to get a cycle back on track. Saving a cycle to keep a reasonable SnD finisher out is far more valuable.

A Note to Valize:
Without 2pc T4 you cannot realistically, in any gearset, maintain 2s/5r. Do the math, open the spreadsheet.. it just doesn't work. You can get lucky streaks for sure and it works out for a short while, but overall it just won't work. Consider that a 2pt SnD is 17.4 seconds long. This is, on average roughly 226 incoming energy (10 base + 3 from c-pots). Assume both finishers proc Ruthlessness (a 36% chance to occur) you still need to get 5 SS's, ~200 energy (a bit more due to dodges and such) and then 15 average for the finisher. This gives you 10 energy slack.. every 1 in 3 cycles that you get double-proc. The other 2/3rds of the time you're basically SoL. In the long run, it just is not sustainable. AR and Tea only save 1 cycle each every 5 min. Considering a 17.4 second cycle rotates 17 times in 5 minutes, you have 15 unaccounted for cycles. Figure 1/3 of those, 5 cycles, work out with a double-Ruthlessness proc and you have 10 of every 17 cycles dropping Snd. Hardly "sustainable".

 

Nock

These are some very good points, and some good practices for maximum DPS that I have been working on perfecting more myself as well. When we're able to tell the length of any given fight (like Brutallus), and the maximum DPS is of the utmost importance, practices such as using your BF/Haste during your Mongoose/Heroism (Shard of Contempt) uptimes are the difference in a few thousand more damage.

I know that there are at least two mods for enhancement shaman that support tracking the hidden cooldown of Windfury, and I'm thinking tha a mod that tracked the hidden cooldowns of trinkets that we use to maximize the best time to use our consumables, or even just pool energy for 4 seconds to wait on a rupture refresh might be a very useful tool.

I know for rupture you don't get that much time to wait anyway, and you can already wait the 4 seconds for the proc to happen or not, but when you know that the fight will be 6 minutes and you have a 60 second window of time to play with your BF/Haste pot cooldowns to wait for procs, I think that's worth investing some time into since we don't have much else to worry about.

 

Valize

Spreadsheets or not, I live it, I do it for every raid, and have since I kicked the 2pc T4 Training wheels off. Math only takes you so far, practical usage is what matters. In any raid, I hold a 2s 5r rotation. I only do a 3s 5r when I am gearing up for a Blade Flurry, and thanks to Cutup, I wait till .7s till I refresh a new 2 point SnD. I would agree with you that maybe its luck, but then I would be lucky for 4 months x 12h of raiding a week, that is unlikely.

 

• Latito

Link a WWS of any boss fight longer than 2-3 minutes where you aren't dropping SnD multiple times. 2s/5r is NOT sustainable over anything more than short lucky bursts of 2, maybe 3 cycles in a row. 1.4 spd OH, Hit Cap, Exp. Cap, 4pcT6, 100+ passive haste, DST.. it doesn't matter, its not sustainable in the long term. You may think you are sustaining it but I can virtually gaurentee you will see a dps increase switching to a longer cycle.

Perhaps I'm coming off a bit strong here, given proper management you may be at a point where 2s/5r is *close* in dmg output to a longer cycle with less SnD downtime. What do you have to lose in trying a longer cycle? Do it for a fight, do it for 2-3 bosses in one night and see how it works out. Most likely you will find it (a longer cycle) to be both easier and higher dps. Not to mention its more forgiving and better suits interrupted combat. Try 4s/5r.

 

weka

Quick question: Why would the spreadsheet be telling me to use agility gems vs hit gems? According to the model in this thread, at all levels, hit > agi. According to the spreadsheet, depending on what gear I'm using, agility is preferred. Is the spreadsheet correct, or is the info here correct?

 

• Vulajin

The EP weights assume a particular set of gear and buffs that may not apply exactly to you. You should always take the spreadsheet as the most accurate answer, especially since the EP weights here are based off the spreadsheet.

TLDR: Read my avatar and user title.

 

Ashere

High +hit and lots of haste can help trigger more Combat Potency procs (proc per strike ftw here), which can allow one to reduce his or her SnD uptime. But this is a strategy that is kinda tricky, it needs constant micromanagement of our energy.

 

◊ Shaker

No, it won't. Aldriana posted on this not that long ago, but given a .7 offhand swing speed (i.e. your offhand swinging in half the time) and hit-capped/expertise-capped, you can only expect 75 energy from CPot. 75 + 174 = 249 energy in that time. During that time you need to generate 232 energy for 5.8 (average) sinister strikes and 15 energy on average for the 2 finishers, for a total of 247 energy. So yes, it's theoretically stable at the point where you keep your 1.4 speed offhand hasted at .7 AT ALL TIMES, and are 100% hit and expertise capped.

The point is, while hit and haste obviously will effect Combat Potency, it isn't really super significant - at the extreme case we've increased energy regen by less than 10%.

Consistency. It's only a virtue if you're not a screwup.

 

Valize

Sorry, I re-read my post and found I could be coming off a bit strong.

I would be happy to link a WWS, however my computer @ work can barely handle decent forum trolling, let alone waiting 10 minutes to display WWS. I don't know how I hold it, but I am able to. My Rupture ticks off with just enough time for me for to refresh, sometimes regen a couple ticks of energy and re-do my Slice N Dice. If it ever falls off, its only for less than a split second if I am slow to hit my 7 button when I have .7s left on my SnD Timer.

EDIT: I was able to get it Wow Web Stats

 

• Aldriana

So, quick notes on Combat Potency and 2s5r:

1) Hit does not scale Combat Potency as much as you think it does. Going from 0 hit and 0 expertise to capped with both increases your total regen by about 50% (Roughly 66% of your attacks hitting going to 100% hitting). That capping requires 363 hit rating and 142 expertise rating. Which means that the difference between, say, 200 hit rating and 300 hit rating is less than a 10% increase in your combat potency regen, and thus about 3% of your total regen.

2) Consider 2s5r for a moment. With Relentless Strikes and Ruthlessness, this takes an average of 15 + 5.8*40 =247 energy even assuming none of your sinister strikes get dodged, ever. 247 energy in 17.4 seconds is 14.195 energy per second; 10 of this is your baseline regen, meaning you need to get 4.195 from other means. Since AR, Tea, and the Blood Elf racial are too infrequent to patch all your cycles, this basically means your only source of regen is Combat Potency (barring Rod of the Sun King, which we'll ignore for the moment). This requires 4.195/3 = 1.4 offhand *hits* - not attacks, hits - per second. Even assuming you're expertise capped, using a 1.3 speed OH (which means you're using a dagger, which has it's own problems), and have 2/5 T6 for the increased SnD speed, this still requires 34.6% haste from other sources. If you assume 100% Mongoose Uptime on both hands (which is obviously impossible, but we'll go with it), that's 464 haste rating. Even with continuous drum uptime and allowing for an average of 100 haste rating from DST (which is more than you actually get, but, against, we're estimating), that's still 284 haste rating on gear, which I'm willing to bet that no raiding rogue in existence actually has at the moment - particularly not while being simultaneously hit and expertise capped.

So: I'll buy that you can sustain 2s5r with maybe a second or two of average SnD downtime. But it's just not possible to get 100% uptime, unless you know about some special rogue mechanic that has eluded the rest of us.

3) Regarding the WWS: Note that you have *9* SnD gains in a 4:26 fight. This means it's dropping about once every 30 seconds, or every other cycle. I can't speak to how *long* it's dropping, per say, but it's definitely dropping.

Edit: Off the top of my head, though: 86 rupture ticks is 11 ruptures, possibly 12 if you're clipping them (which is a problem in it's own right, but lets skip that for the moment). You also have 2 Eviscerates, one of which is presumably from AR. So you have probably 12 but possibly 13 finishers from your normal cycles, which would, in turn, imply 13 SnDs. 13 SnDs lasting 17.4 seconds each is at most 226.2 seconds SnD uptime out of a total of 266 seconds of fight, which implies you had almost 40 seconds without SnD... or you're not doing 2s5r.

 

Nock

That WWS shows you dropping SnD 9 times, which was the entire point of his post.

2s/5r in theory, would be a 100% uptime of rupture if it was sustainable. 17.4 sec of SnD and 16 seconds of Rupture. The parse you linked was 266 seconds long. Assuming a ramp-up time of 16 seconds for the first Rupture to be applied, that would give you 250 seconds of Rupture uptime, or 125 ticks. You had 86 ticks of Rupture on the boss. That's 68.8% uptime, not 100%.

I double-checked the debuffs that you had on the boss, and while it's possible you had rupture pushed off if absolutlely everything was on the boss at that same time, the reality is that not all debuffs are on the boss 100% (Ignite ticks, Imp Shadowbolt, Immolate, Expose Weakness, etc.)

So for 31.2% of your time, you didn't have rupture uptime, which means you were either working towards refreshing your rupture, or dropping smaller SnD because you were having the current one fall. There's nothing wrong with not having 100% rupture uptime (Haven't had it since 2pc T4 personally) and you really should look into revising your cycles.

 

Rearim

hey i was wondering with the new badge rewards now out for my server, would the new fist weaps do more damage then my current pvp swords, switching spec ofcourse, could anyone give me some imput as to their thoughts or numbers on it. thanks

 

• Latito

So, I messaged Valize around 2:30 (actually, just after reading and dismissing Ashere's post). I just checked my Sent Mail box and its not there, so I suspect I might have accidentally closed the tab before hitting send. Either way, I looked up his WWS logs (link to his guild below his avatar, their forum has a link to the guild WWS url). Checked out the last 3 Teron's and a Bear-boss kill, mentioned I wouldn't post on this thread since its his guilds own WWS reports, but hey:
So..

Wow Web Stats (Teron, 4:26, 9 SnD gains)
Wow Web Stats (Teron, 4:15, 7 SnD gains)
Wow Web Stats (Teron, 4:16, 8 SnD gains)
Wow Web Stats (Bear, 4:17, 11 SnD gains)

Makes sense that Bear boss is slightly higher number of SnD gains since you lose some combat potency when he charges casters. Overall, very much expected of trying to use a 2s/5r cycle.