[Mage] TC after 2.3 - Page 135

Doroteasenjk · 01/03/08, 7:36 PM

Originally Posted by galzohar

I suppose it's not impossible but it definitely takes some kind of effort to keep your sta so low

consdiering void reaver head, T5/badge pants and others all take you quite higher than the spellfire/spellstrike/fiery wrath stam level, you'd have to pretty much pick all those low/no-stam pieces and not upgrade spellfire/spellstrike to really be that low.

It doesn't require "choice" if the items don't drop for you. The Void Reaver head is a 0.6% drop. It is very high on my wish list, but I may never see it as VR only dies once a week. Through the middle of Tier 5, it seems that stamina is still much more expensive than other stats. I have a boss suit, and a stam-boss suit. The boss suit drops 60 damage in favor of +spell hit. The stam-boss suit drops another 25 damage in favor of stamina, keeping spell hit very close to cap; it also has some blues in it.

Imbar · 01/03/08, 7:42 PM

Originally Posted by BOHIC

It's just annoying that doing your best to minimize time between casts can sometime back fire with the new cast system.

I'm fairly certain all of these casting issues are side effects of the server-side cast queue.
In order for the server to handle the queue, if you switch to a mob that has the same name, the server doesn't understand that you switched to a new unit, it thinks you're still trying to cast at Flayer (A) when you're trying to hit Flayer (B). I'd be willing to guess that same level affects this, as well, although I'm not sure if it matters. When you start a new cast within the latency of your client (like the bar in Quartz), the server still has Flayer (A) targetted and only switches targets AFTER the cast finishes, even if this is not the way your client happens to be displaying it.

For all you computer programmers, I don't know how the servers are scripted to handle unique instances of the same object. If the Flayer objects all have the exact same signature in the server (e.g. NAME:LEVEL) then the server can't distinguish between FLAYER:70 and FLAYER:70. That's really shoddy programming. For heaven's sake, I'm only in college and I know how I'd fix that. (Assign them unique signatures based on their location in the game world since it's nearly impossible to target creatures on the other side of the map, eg. if the code for Netherwing ledge is 12, then have 12:FLAYER:70:1, 12:FLAYER:70:2, where 1 and 2 are their IDs.) There should be a large enough server-side cache for the server to say "Ok, once cast in :1 finishes, move to :2 and start this spell."

Just my rambles, if they happen to make sense to anyone.

Muphrid · 01/03/08, 8:13 PM

Originally Posted by Imbar

I'm fairly certain all of these casting issues are side effects of the server-side cast queue.
In order for the server to handle the queue, if you switch to a mob that has the same name, the server doesn't understand that you switched to a new unit, it thinks you're still trying to cast at Flayer (A) when you're trying to hit Flayer (B). I'd be willing to guess that same level affects this, as well, although I'm not sure if it matters. When you start a new cast within the latency of your client (like the bar in Quartz), the server still has Flayer (A) targetted and only switches targets AFTER the cast finishes, even if this is not the way your client happens to be displaying it.

For all you computer programmers, I don't know how the servers are scripted to handle unique instances of the same object. If the Flayer objects all have the exact same signature in the server (e.g. NAME:LEVEL) then the server can't distinguish between FLAYER:70 and FLAYER:70. That's really shoddy programming. For heaven's sake, I'm only in college and I know how I'd fix that. (Assign them unique signatures based on their location in the game world since it's nearly impossible to target creatures on the other side of the map, eg. if the code for Netherwing ledge is 12, then have 12:FLAYER:70:1, 12:FLAYER:70:2, where 1 and 2 are their IDs.) There should be a large enough server-side cache for the server to say "Ok, once cast in :1 finishes, move to :2 and start this spell."

Just my rambles, if they happen to make sense to anyone.

The problem is that there is no queue. All this system has done is allow you to send new cast attempts while casting without having the client automatically reject them. If this request arrives at the server after the server believes you are finished casting, then it starts the next cast and tells the client to put up a casting bar.

When you switch targets between casts (and while preempting your own lag), the server still believes you're casting on the first target. If the target dies before your first cast fires server-side (and thus, before your next cast request reaches the server), the server sends a message to the client to interrupt your cast (because it still believes your target is the original target).

Imbar · 01/03/08, 8:32 PM

Server-client agreement seems to be the main issue.
I can't really see a way around that, because latency will always exist.

The second part of your statement is a nice "too long, didn't read" of what I said, but in layman's terms.
Bravo.

What I'm curious about is how the server handles same-name targets, specifically casting against them. I suppose that doesn't have a place in this thread, though.

Hate Monkey · 01/03/08, 8:34 PM

Originally Posted by Imbar

I'm fairly certain all of these casting issues are side effects of the server-side cast queue.
In order for the server to handle the queue, if you switch to a mob that has the same name, the server doesn't understand that you switched to a new unit, it thinks you're still trying to cast at Flayer (A) when you're trying to hit Flayer (B). I'd be willing to guess that same level affects this, as well, although I'm not sure if it matters. When you start a new cast within the latency of your client (like the bar in Quartz), the server still has Flayer (A) targetted and only switches targets AFTER the cast finishes, even if this is not the way your client happens to be displaying it.

For all you computer programmers, I don't know how the servers are scripted to handle unique instances of the same object. If the Flayer objects all have the exact same signature in the server (e.g. NAME:LEVEL) then the server can't distinguish between FLAYER:70 and FLAYER:70. That's really shoddy programming. For heaven's sake, I'm only in college and I know how I'd fix that. (Assign them unique signatures based on their location in the game world since it's nearly impossible to target creatures on the other side of the map, eg. if the code for Netherwing ledge is 12, then have 12:FLAYER:70:1, 12:FLAYER:70:2, where 1 and 2 are their IDs.) There should be a large enough server-side cache for the server to say "Ok, once cast in :1 finishes, move to :2 and start this spell.".

Hate to quote this block of text with a little reply, but in 2.4 they are totally redoing the combat logging system, which is giving us unique identifiers for mobs/players and such. I hate to speculate on this, but a side note to them doing this is that it adds the ability to do an actual queue for spell casting, which makes this situation go away...just to throw that out there guys.

Imbar · 01/03/08, 9:18 PM

Originally Posted by Hate Monkey

Hate to quote this block of text with a little reply, but in 2.4 they are totally redoing the combat logging system, which is giving us unique identifiers for mobs/players and such. I hate to speculate on this, but a side note to them doing this is that it adds the ability to do an actual queue for spell casting, which makes this situation go away...just to throw that out there guys.

Good, then we don't need to stress. Just deal with the crap until they release the new system that may (or may not) fix the problem.

Hell, isn't that what we've been doing for years now?
O.o

Hate Monkey · 01/03/08, 9:35 PM

Well this could be the "Can't fix it till other changes are made" type of deal. And if 2.4 fixes it for good, and as far as we know, that's their intent, what good is complaining about it?

Imbar · 01/03/08, 9:42 PM

Originally Posted by Hate Monkey

And if 2.4 fixes it for good, and as far as we know, that's their intent, what good is complaining about it?

I was complaining because I had no idea that a fix was already in the works.
Now that I know, the point is moot.

Pintofbrew · 01/04/08, 7:18 AM

What I've noticed is the following sequence:

Assume you and your group is hitting on mob A

When mob A < (time for 1 more nuke) worth of life, you swap to target B

IF first spell directed to target B is NOT shot before A is dead

WHEN A dies, your cast spell cancels because it is aimed at "wrong target".

The coding suggestions do indicate that perhaps the game is having difficulty distinguishing between mobs of same name/level but it does not explain this problem in PvP.

Even if it is fixed in 2.4 however, perhaps we should investigate a work-around in the mean time if possible. As far as I can see 2.4 isn't inbound for a while.

xyu · 01/04/08, 8:55 AM

Originally Posted by manly

Sounds like you're using some weird frostbolt macro.

No, I have had this same problem happen to me as well. At first like the OP said, i thought i was just missing my target. When it started happening a little too frequently I started to pay attention to it. I've seen it a few times now. When target 1 dies my cast on target 2 stops.

I don't remember if it said "interrupted" or "target is dead" but i'm 100% sure I'm not using a macro, and that I had a living mob targeted.

Edit: seems my page didn't refresh and this was already discussed. /ignore

Andersnordic · 01/04/08, 3:08 PM

Some ppl might want to get every possible advantage for the Sunwell bosses. In this regard it would be really nice to add close to +6% dps for all group members using [Drums of Battle] + [Chain of the Twilight Owl]. And considering less than 5% of end lvl casters have LW atm (And more than 90% have enchanting) Im gonna add more info on this subject.

First of all yes, some of you should probably check out if there are additional raid enhancing profession items that will be added for Sunwell. As for me, I ditched tailoring 3-4 months ago and picked up LW as soon as spellfire/spellstrike bonus wasn't needed. Some ppl also have the luxury/possibility to allocate gathering proffs to alts and simply focus on raid enhancing proffs on the main

.

Drums of Battle

80 spell haste for 5 ppl lasting 30 sec (2 min cd).

Aprox value of 1 haste rating vs 1 spell dmg per class at BT/MH lvl;

Mage 1 haste = 1,07 spell dmg
Lock 1 haste = 0,8 spell dmg - destro (1 = 0,4 for affli)
SP 1 haste = 0,6 spell dmg
Ele shaman 1 haste = 0,9 spell dmg

Example illustration;

Grp with 2 mages, 1 destro, 1 SP, 1 Ele shammy.

Average haste value for given group would be 1 haste = 0,88 spell dmg (+71 spell dmg for average grp member).

-15 spell dmg for individual loss of gdc + ocassional range issues (40 yards).

Constant 56 spell dmg equivalent buff for all grp members.

Average fight length 4 min. 2 drums popped during fight per LW`er.

4 ppl popping 2 drums each during the encounter would be able to make the drum buff a constant +56 spell dmg equivalent buff and would add aprox +4% extra dmg for 5 ppl (BT/MH gear lvl).

In comparison the enchanting buff you get (+24 spell dmg on rings) is less than half of that.

So in fact, LW/drum is 100%+ more valuable than enchanting as a raid enhancing prof. in regards to adding value to raid dps.

And still we see 90%+ of all end lvl dmg casters speccing "enchanting" primarily for the ring buffs, yet completely ignoring LW (Less than 5% of all end lvl casters have this atm).

Chain of the Twilight Owl

If you make sure grp members always have Chain of the Twilight Owl (+2% crit necklace) at all times (1 hour cd so max usage would be every 12 min with rotation) we would be able to add close to +6% dmg to that grps dps (Drums + neck).

Obviously the crit neck can be used more situational since its a lot more expensive but with the low cost of drums I don't see a reason not to use it frequently (20-30g for 50 charges). I use about 30 charges per raid atm. Ive been slacking on the neck though, but will most likely use it for certain sunwell bosses (Depending on boss mechanic and difficulty lvl).

Sunwell is getting closer and we may soon find ourselves in a situation where every little bit of extra DPS will be VERY valuable

manly · 01/04/08, 3:14 PM

The main problem of drums is that it eats a GCD to activate. If only they removed that.

Etherealz · 01/04/08, 3:33 PM

I think a large part of the reason for the lack of BT - caster Leather workers is - you need to have those 4 people be LW's and workout the rotation in order for it to be worth the effort of losing a GCD. Although most BT guilds have at least a few dps casters who really think about these kind of things - or care for that matter. It's few and far between finding entire guilds synergized down to the detail of profession min/max'ing.

That said - If they removed the GCD - I would drop my tailoring in a heartbeat.

Searix · 01/04/08, 4:51 PM

Originally Posted by manly

The main problem of drums is that it eats a GCD to activate. If only they removed that.

Having gone drums a month ago, it's fine the way it is. As is if you just randomly pop drums alone, it's a roughly neutral DPS change (5.1% haste for 28.5 seconds, but odds are when you cast that last cast it'll just barely clip the haste and still be hasted even after drums end).

However, it can always be paired with your 2 minute cooldowns, which adds quite a bit of dps. And you get put in the caster dps groups much more often

manly · 01/04/08, 6:09 PM

Well, unless you pop the drums before entering combat...