[Warlock] PVE Raiding Compendium - Page 48

Pidge · 01/26/08, 9:14 AM

So, given: 4p T6, CSD, and increased ISB uptime from casting more Shadowbolts, does Ruin ever surpass UA in straight up DPS? And if not, how close is it?

Krazen · 01/26/08, 9:58 AM

Originally Posted by moghed

I realize this is an older post but I have a question regarding CSD.

I'm not extremely good with spreadsheets, so would you mind saying how you modeled this? I'm trying to compare several different gear sets with varying crit and hit and I'd like to know how to get the spreadsheet to model the bonus to crit from this gem.

There is a selection on one of the tabs to choose your metagem. Plug your stats in, note your dps, activate the metagem, and note your dps again. Subtract the 2 values.

gargosch · 01/26/08, 11:44 AM

Originally Posted by Pidge

So, given: 4p T6, CSD, and increased ISB uptime from casting more Shadowbolts, does Ruin ever surpass UA in straight up DPS? And if not, how close is it?

Maybe you need to be a bit more specific with your question. Do you mean is there any gearset where Ruin is better then UA. Then the anser is easy. Yes just pick every hight crit item and you will see that Ruin do a lot more damage then UA.

Or do you mean with the best gear for a UA spec and the best gear for a Affliction&Ruin spec is there a gear level where Ruin get better. This is a lot harder to say. Maybe even NP hard to slove, but ofc it's not imposible.

I played Affliction&Ruin because I had destro gear and we need Shadow Embrance. If I take my stats and enter they into a spreadsheet it show me that the diffrence is realy small between Affliction&Ruin and a UA build.

My gear(all Tier 5 or lower, buffed)
Shadow Damage: 1383
Crit: 21.9
Hit: 14.7
Haste: 25

dps diffrence(don't including ISB debuff from extra SB): 24

Lets just switch one gear part. Take in Vestments of the Sea-Witch instead of Frozen Shadoweave Robe and the diffrence go down to 15 dps. Anyway I would call it close.

Suggestive · 01/26/08, 12:37 PM

I've seen the claim about Devastation being bugged a few times since TBC started, and even wasted my time tossing 1000 shadowbolts at dr. boom a few times to test it out. As far as i can tell it still works. I've had parses with a 25% crit rate despite having ~35 raid buffed, and i've seen a few with a 40% crit rate. It happens, especially with tiny sample sizes. I don't think devastation is bugged at all, and i generally don't trust those forums anyway.

Gumibear · 01/26/08, 1:06 PM

Can anyone who is good at statistics figure out a standard deviation for shadowbolt crit rate so we know what's not a big deal when WWS reports a crit rate lower than our expected? I can't even remember how to start determining that, I sucked at statistics.

galzohar · 01/26/08, 1:37 PM

First forgive me if my termination is wrong, as I did not learn statistics in english

Assuming you cast a lot of shadowbolts (will refer to what's "a lot" at the end), you can say that your # of crits has a normal deviation.
Summing up a lot of shadowbolts, each shadowbolt has C chance to crit. Call X=1 if it crit and X=0 if it did not, and E(X)=C. Var(X)=E(X^2)-E(X)^2=C-C^2.
Casting N shadowbolts, E(average crit over N bolts)=E(X)=C (obviously, on average with 20% crit rate casting 100 shadowbolts you'd crit 20).
Var(average crit over N bolts) = Var(X)/N = (C-C^2)/N
The deviation would be Var^0.5.

For 100 shdowbolts and 25% crit rate, [(0.25-0.25^2)/100]^0.5=~5.6%, which means you have ~63% chance to have your crit rate between 19.4% and 30.6% if you only cast 100 shadowbolts. So getting 30% crit or 20% crit if you only casted 100 shadowbolts is very possible.

To reduce the deviation to 1% with 25% crit rate you need to resolve:
[0.1875/N]^0.5=0.01
0.1875/N=0.0001
0.1875=0.0001N
N=1875
So if you cast less than 1875 shadowbolts expect to get at least 1% deviation in your crit chance with 25% crit. Not to mention even with 1875 shadowbolts you only have ~63% chance to be within 24% to 26% crit chance and still have some chance to be a bit further than that, however you have well over 99% chance to be within 22% to 28% if you cast 1875 shadowbolts.
In other words, I wouldn't call "bug" unless your results are further than 3*deviation than the average.

As for the "many shadowbolts", it's because everything here is an approximation that gets better and better the more shadowbolts you cast, however it would be rather close to the accurate deviations if you cast like 80+ shadowbolts with a realistic crit chance. Cast more and it gets more and more accurate for calculating the deviation.

Arelenda · 01/26/08, 3:34 PM

Not only that. Unless I'm wrong about this, your crit rate is listed against level 70s. That means that you have less chance to crit against a boss.

Take a typical Hyjal log. Since seed spam will consistently be against 70s, and shadow bolt for the large part on bosses, you would expect to see a reduced crit chance.

I'm 100% sure that when I wrote ShadowSeer, crit rating was indeed what you would expect it to be for Shadow Bolt and SoC. Now it is possible that a bug along the way has crept in there, but a mere quick glance at some logs would not be sufficient to convince me. If you see less than a 5% gap between SoC and SB, I can only say: it is supposed to be like that. It would be surprising if it wouldn't.

I'm just arguing for caution here, and for good math.

Originally Posted by galzohar

First forgive me if my termination is wrong, as I did not learn statistics in english

Assuming you cast a lot of shadowbolts (will refer to what's "a lot" at the end), you can say that your # of crits has a normal deviation.
Summing up a lot of shadowbolts, each shadowbolt has C chance to crit. Call X=1 if it crit and X=0 if it did not, and E(X)=C. Var(X)=E(X^2)-E(X)^2=C-C^2.
Casting N shadowbolts, E(average crit over N bolts)=E(X)=C (obviously, on average with 20% crit rate casting 100 shadowbolts you'd crit 20).
Var(average crit over N bolts) = Var(X)/N = (C-C^2)/N
The deviation would be Var^0.5.

For 100 shdowbolts and 25% crit rate, [(0.25-0.25^2)/100]^0.5=~5.6%, which means you have ~63% chance to have your crit rate between 19.4% and 30.6% if you only cast 100 shadowbolts. So getting 30% crit or 20% crit if you only casted 100 shadowbolts is very possible.

To reduce the deviation to 1% with 25% crit rate you need to resolve:
[0.1875/N]^0.5=0.01
0.1875/N=0.0001
0.1875=0.0001N
N=1875
So if you cast less than 1875 shadowbolts expect to get at least 1% deviation in your crit chance with 25% crit. Not to mention even with 1875 shadowbolts you only have ~63% chance to be within 24% to 26% crit chance and still have some chance to be a bit further than that, however you have well over 99% chance to be within 22% to 28% if you cast 1875 shadowbolts.
In other words, I wouldn't call "bug" unless your results are further than 3*deviation than the average.

As for the "many shadowbolts", it's because everything here is an approximation that gets better and better the more shadowbolts you cast, however it would be rather close to the accurate deviations if you cast like 80+ shadowbolts with a realistic crit chance. Cast more and it gets more and more accurate for calculating the deviation.

weet · 01/26/08, 3:56 PM

Ah yeah I forgot about the fact that seed would be mostly vs lower level mobs, that would definately explain a common less than 5% gap.

re: People talking about their crit rage being lower than they expect (not in comparison with other spells, just lower), as Arelenda said it is pretty obvious there is some sort of crit depreciation vs higher level mobs. From my observation I expect my crit to be lower than my char sheet suggest, simply because over a long time while raiding I have seen that while I can reach my expected crit, and sometimes exceed it, overall it tends to fall slightly below the expected rate and is alot more likely to drop below than above.

Shai · 01/26/08, 4:34 PM

Originally Posted by Arelenda

Not only that. Unless I'm wrong about this, your crit rate is listed against level 70s. That means that you have less chance to crit against a boss.

I thought that was the case for melee due to weapon skill and defense, but not for spells. Spells have the miss/resist mechanic that can potentially lower crit rate against higher level targets, but beyond that? Was there ever official word from Blizzard concerning spell crit versus bosses?

• frmorrison · 01/26/08, 4:44 PM

Originally Posted by Shai

Was there ever official word from Blizzard concerning spell crit versus bosses?

Nope, however I defiantly see the crit depression against 73s using spells. There was this one Arcane mage that used Arcane Missiles for a few hours on Dr. Boom (when he was 64, so there would be the 3 level difference). It showed crit being less than the tooltip crit.

I estimate it at taking away 3% crit (I have a 27% tooltip crit, and WWS most of the time shows 24% crit).

Soul · 01/26/08, 4:46 PM

Originally Posted by Shai

I thought that was the case for melee due to weapon skill and defense, but not for spells. Spells have the miss/resist mechanic that can potentially lower crit rate against higher level targets, but beyond that? Was there ever official word from Blizzard concerning spell crit versus bosses?

No official word, but we did thousands of spellcasts in this thread and got some pretty convincing evidence that spell crit rate versus higher level mobs is lower than reported.

Arelenda · 01/26/08, 6:37 PM

It also just makes sense. Your crit chance is influenced by your crit rating by a % determined by level. Whether this is by target level or by your level isn't stated explicitly, but it would be fairly logical to assume it is by target level.

PSGarak · 01/26/08, 9:02 PM

Originally Posted by Pidge

So, given: 4p T6, CSD, and increased ISB uptime from casting more Shadowbolts, does Ruin ever surpass UA in straight up DPS? And if not, how close is it?

I'm assuming you mean higher personal ISB uptime from casting more shadowbolts instead of UA. In short, it usually doesn't.

If there are about two or more warlocks (or shadow preists if they're using mind blast and shadow word: death), the duration of ISB doesn't come into play because it's no longer the limiting factor. The model developed based on that assumption is common so I won't belabor the details. The point is, you have 3% less crit than the destro warlocks from talents, maybe more from gear and group setups. If you're concerned about ISB uptime you actually want to be casting less, not more, because your shadowbolts, on average, eat up more ISB procs than they consume.
If you have shadow priests in your raid it's a bit more complicated. In general, if your personal crit is less than the raid-weighted-average-shadow-ISB-proc-chance-thingy-number, you want to be casting less shadowbolts if possible, and if it's higher you want to be casting more. In either case UA is one full shadowbolt per 30 seconds, excepting mana, so it's not going to make a hell of a lot of difference. But if you're going to consider ISB uptime make sure your contribution is actually in the right direction.

Galzo: thanks for dregging that crap up, I intentionally forgot it as fast as I could =P. The english terms are "expectation value" "standard deviation" and "variance" ("normal" in probability usually refers specifically to a Gaussian distribution). Also, if you want, this forum supports LaTeX formatting.

Pullo · 01/27/08, 12:58 AM

Originally Posted by Pidge

So, given: 4p T6, CSD, and increased ISB uptime from casting more Shadowbolts, does Ruin ever surpass UA in straight up DPS? And if not, how close is it?

I don't have CSD because I happen to have hood of hexing as my helm. I do have 4-piece Tier 6 though and I did some testing and made a post with the results on "another" forum. I got mostly mindless crap as a response with a few exceptions.

I'll share the results here and I'll let you decide.

Pasted below:

Ok, I realize the math on Leulier's spreadsheet shows that UA is better than ruin on affliction spec and that you should be casting immolate in every spec except for destro until you get enough BT/MH drops.

I've been skeptical since almost every test I've tried shows me losing dps when I add immo to my rotation.

I was bored and curious and did some testing on the PTR last night.

The testing sample is Dr. Boom. I used a flask, oil and spell dmg food and used Curse of Shadow for every sample below. The tests were always taking Dr. Boom from 100-0 percent, as to get a fair sample and recreate having to use life tap and siphon to regen mana. I figured this kind of sample would offset if I got a lucky string of crits or nightfall procs. This seemed to work pretty well since I crit 22-18 percent in every sample.

This is using the methods Vivvid stated in a previous post here about keeping all four dots up for the maximum time, not refreshing until they've ended as to not lose dps from the last tick.

1480 Shadow Damage
1318 Fire Damage (I lose +162 fire dmg using kara neck, frozen shadoweave boots and soulfrost)
16.44 Crit
Hit Capped

First test
Spells used: Curse of Shadows, UA, Corruption, Immolate (shadowbolt filler, dark pact, life tap and siphon life only to keep mana up)
Result: 1197.4 dps (21 crit rate on shadowbolt)
Comments: I seemed to get quite a few nightfall procs on this test, but not very many when Improved Shadowbolt is up and not very many trinketed crits when ISB was up. I decide that I'm not satisfied with this test so I do it again.

Second test
Spells used: same as previous
Result: 1219.7 dps (22 crit rate on shadowbolt)
Comments: Not as many nightfall procs, but the timing of my crits seemed to be favorable. Still, I don't like casting immolate when I've just crit on a shadowbolt. I can't help but suspect I could be doing better without immolate, so I decide to try do a test without using immolate, to take advantage of my extra 162 shadow dmg and 4-piece tier 4 bonus buff to shadowbolts.

Third test
Spells used: Curse of Shadows, UA, Corruption, (shadowbolt filler, dark pact, life tap and siphon life only to keep mana up)
Result: 1250.5 dps (20 crit rate on shadowbolt)
Comments: I find that not casting immolate gives me more opportunities to cast shadowbolt, improving ISB uptime. I didn't get very many nightfall procs and my crit rate is only 20 percent, but I still manage to significantly increase my dps -- without using immolate. I'm tempted to test this rotation again, but I'm too eager to try my next rotation. (With the thought in mind that I could probably improve my performance).

Fourth test (respec required to drop UA and pick up Ruin -- yay for PTR respecs)
Spells used: Curse of Shadows, Corruption, (shadowbolt filler, dark pact, life tap and siphon life only to keep mana up)
Result: 1278 dps (18 crit rate on shadowbolt)
Comments: Obviously I'm a little disappointed in my crit rate (only 20 percent after seeing 22 on one of my UA/Immo samples). I got off to a really slow start, but I get a few crits on the end. Still, I've beaten my third test sample (UA/no immolate rotation) by 28 dps with a crappy bad-luck crit sample. Obviously I'm going to try this test again. Clearly Tier 6 4-piece bonus is putting ruin ahead for me.

Fifth test (for @#%ts and giggles)
Spells used: Curse of Shadows, Corruption, (shadowbolt filler, dark pact, life tap and siphon life only to keep mana up)
Result: 1323 dps (22 crit rate)
Comments: I'm able to get a nice crit rate (22 percent) and you can see the difference. A hunter decides to land right on top of me at around 20 percent (but doesn't dps Dr. Boom during my test, thanks btw). I do my best to not be distracted (and I'm not). Dr. Boom dies with 6 seconds left on my trinket cooldown or it could have been even better.

So take it for what it's worth. I did my best to try to follow what the annointed experts say that immolate is a must for affliction and UA>Ruin. But yet, both proved (at least for my playstyle and gear) to be incorrect in this scenario.

Say what you will about the test sample. I realize there are fights and situations where using immo will improve my dps (Archimonde, Supremus kite phase come to mind). Also realize that we have fire mages so COE and scorch debuff will help immolate dps a bit. But also realize that there was no shadoweaving debuff on Dr. Boom either, which would increase my shadow damage even more. Misery is another factor not in this sample.

So my conclusion is using immolate isn't terrible, but for many fights, not using it is better dps. In addition, with Tier 6 four-piece bonus, Ruin has shown it can be better dps than UA.

One other minor reason for using Ruin over UA. UA and immo is terribad for most trash. I know, I know, who cares about trash. Unless maybe you're trying to do a ZA timed run for a bear mount. Then speed on trash is a little important.

• frmorrison · 01/27/08, 1:06 AM

Originally Posted by Pullo

So my conclusion is using immolate isn't terrible, but for many fights, not using it is better dps. In addition, with Tier 6 four-piece bonus, Ruin has shown it can be better dps than UA.

Casting so many DoTs means you will lose DoT uptime, so dropping Immolate makes it easier to maintain your DoTs.

Same thing for Ruin > UA, you cast even less DoTs for easier upkeep of the other ones.

It is very easy to cast shadow bolts at around 2.6 seconds each, but you have to watch the GCD closely to make sure you cast another DoT right at 1.5 seconds, which is not as easy.

Caps · 01/27/08, 2:28 AM

Originally Posted by Caps

First off, Hello. I am new here... i am hoping this is the right spot to pot this =D

My name is Caps and im a 21/40 sac/destro lock

I am trying to get the most damage out of my class via gear & spell rotation (lol sb spam? :P)

Anyways this post may get long i apologize.

The current "end game" set i am aiming for is as followed.

T6 Head/Gloves/Chest/Shoulders
with my off set piece being Legguards of Channeled Elements

Neck: Translucent Spellthread Necklace
Waist: Anetheron's Noose
Back: Cloak of the Illidari Council
Feet: Slippers of the Seacaller
Wrist: Cuffs of Devastation
Ring 1: Band of the Eternal Sage
Ring 2: Ring of Captured Storms
Trinket 1: Hex Shrunken Head
Trinket 2: The Skull of Gul'dan
Main Hand: Tempest of Chaos
Off Hand: Chronicle of Dark Secrets
Ranged: Wand of the Forgotten Star

All of my sockets will be 12 spell damage gems with the exception of my wrists (they have a 14 spell dmg gem as i am a jewel crafter) and 2 glowing shadowsong amethyst in order to make my meta gem work.

The enchants are all the basic spell damage enchants, my weapon will have soulfrost.

Now according to wowequip

this leaves me at 1336
16.80% spell hit
16.31% spell crit
0 haste
(unbuffed)

So my first question is to other locks raiding bt/hyjal with their full end game set, how does your differ from mine? Is there anything i can switch around gear wise to produce more damage?

My second question is what is your take on haste rating? -- Yes i know haste is awesome and nice, but with destro locks they need that 202 hit cap, and sadly with most of the haste gear floating around it takes away hit & crit. Have any of you tried a haste set and seen a increase or decrease in dps?

annnd my last question..
Spell Rotation ^.^
What are you guys doing to get the most out of the class?
For me i mostly Shadow Bolt spam and Curse of Doom.

Wow Web Stats
Wow Web Stats

those are a few of my WWS reports that i have posted.

I would link my armory but i am pretty sure that would be pointless at this point since for the weekend i am sl/sl spec and kickin it in my pvp gear ^^

Anyways, any feedback would be fantastic.

and sorry if this is not the place to post this =D

bumping this cause im still lookin for some input <3 =)

weet · 01/27/08, 2:54 AM

For what it's worth I value haste relatively highly due to the effective mp/5 I have while raiding and the fact that most fights have downtime in which to life tap.

weetbix - Character - World of Warcraft - WoWDigger - We've got your back!
Is my ideal gear set currently, not sure about hyjal ring or ring of ancient knowledge.. depends on the specific fight.

Arelenda · 01/27/08, 5:15 AM

Awesome. Thanks for doing this.

I'm sure that with imp scorch up and shadoweaving, any build with immolate will be better than the listed values here. But it still shows that it depends on the fight and raid setup, in my opinion.

Originally Posted by Pullo

I don't have CSD because I happen to have hood of hexing as my helm. I do have 4-piece Tier 6 though and I did some testing and made a post with the results on "another" forum. I got mostly mindless crap as a response with a few exceptions.

I'll share the results here and I'll let you decide.

Pasted below:

Ok, I realize the math on Leulier's spreadsheet shows that UA is better than ruin on affliction spec and that you should be casting immolate in every spec except for destro until you get enough BT/MH drops.

I've been skeptical since almost every test I've tried shows me losing dps when I add immo to my rotation.

I was bored and curious and did some testing on the PTR last night.

The testing sample is Dr. Boom. I used a flask, oil and spell dmg food and used Curse of Shadow for every sample below. The tests were always taking Dr. Boom from 100-0 percent, as to get a fair sample and recreate having to use life tap and siphon to regen mana. I figured this kind of sample would offset if I got a lucky string of crits or nightfall procs. This seemed to work pretty well since I crit 22-18 percent in every sample.

This is using the methods Vivvid stated in a previous post here about keeping all four dots up for the maximum time, not refreshing until they've ended as to not lose dps from the last tick.

1480 Shadow Damage
1318 Fire Damage (I lose +162 fire dmg using kara neck, frozen shadoweave boots and soulfrost)
16.44 Crit
Hit Capped

First test
Spells used: Curse of Shadows, UA, Corruption, Immolate (shadowbolt filler, dark pact, life tap and siphon life only to keep mana up)
Result: 1197.4 dps (21 crit rate on shadowbolt)
Comments: I seemed to get quite a few nightfall procs on this test, but not very many when Improved Shadowbolt is up and not very many trinketed crits when ISB was up. I decide that I'm not satisfied with this test so I do it again.

Second test
Spells used: same as previous
Result: 1219.7 dps (22 crit rate on shadowbolt)
Comments: Not as many nightfall procs, but the timing of my crits seemed to be favorable. Still, I don't like casting immolate when I've just crit on a shadowbolt. I can't help but suspect I could be doing better without immolate, so I decide to try do a test without using immolate, to take advantage of my extra 162 shadow dmg and 4-piece tier 4 bonus buff to shadowbolts.

Third test
Spells used: Curse of Shadows, UA, Corruption, (shadowbolt filler, dark pact, life tap and siphon life only to keep mana up)
Result: 1250.5 dps (20 crit rate on shadowbolt)
Comments: I find that not casting immolate gives me more opportunities to cast shadowbolt, improving ISB uptime. I didn't get very many nightfall procs and my crit rate is only 20 percent, but I still manage to significantly increase my dps -- without using immolate. I'm tempted to test this rotation again, but I'm too eager to try my next rotation. (With the thought in mind that I could probably improve my performance).

Fourth test (respec required to drop UA and pick up Ruin -- yay for PTR respecs)
Spells used: Curse of Shadows, Corruption, (shadowbolt filler, dark pact, life tap and siphon life only to keep mana up)
Result: 1278 dps (18 crit rate on shadowbolt)
Comments: Obviously I'm a little disappointed in my crit rate (only 20 percent after seeing 22 on one of my UA/Immo samples). I got off to a really slow start, but I get a few crits on the end. Still, I've beaten my third test sample (UA/no immolate rotation) by 28 dps with a crappy bad-luck crit sample. Obviously I'm going to try this test again. Clearly Tier 6 4-piece bonus is putting ruin ahead for me.

Fifth test (for @#%ts and giggles)
Spells used: Curse of Shadows, Corruption, (shadowbolt filler, dark pact, life tap and siphon life only to keep mana up)
Result: 1323 dps (22 crit rate)
Comments: I'm able to get a nice crit rate (22 percent) and you can see the difference. A hunter decides to land right on top of me at around 20 percent (but doesn't dps Dr. Boom during my test, thanks btw). I do my best to not be distracted (and I'm not). Dr. Boom dies with 6 seconds left on my trinket cooldown or it could have been even better.

So take it for what it's worth. I did my best to try to follow what the annointed experts say that immolate is a must for affliction and UA>Ruin. But yet, both proved (at least for my playstyle and gear) to be incorrect in this scenario.

Say what you will about the test sample. I realize there are fights and situations where using immo will improve my dps (Archimonde, Supremus kite phase come to mind). Also realize that we have fire mages so COE and scorch debuff will help immolate dps a bit. But also realize that there was no shadoweaving debuff on Dr. Boom either, which would increase my shadow damage even more. Misery is another factor not in this sample.

So my conclusion is using immolate isn't terrible, but for many fights, not using it is better dps. In addition, with Tier 6 four-piece bonus, Ruin has shown it can be better dps than UA.

One other minor reason for using Ruin over UA. UA and immo is terribad for most trash. I know, I know, who cares about trash. Unless maybe you're trying to do a ZA timed run for a bear mount. Then speed on trash is a little important.

Nicarras · 01/27/08, 5:40 AM

Originally Posted by weet

For what it's worth I value haste relatively highly due to the effective mp/5 I have while raiding and the fact that most fights have downtime in which to life tap.

weetbix - Character - World of Warcraft - WoWDigger - We've got your back!
Is my ideal gear set currently, not sure about hyjal ring or ring of ancient knowledge.. depends on the specific fight.

I'm still going to lean with conventional thought and say that crit is AS valuable as haste, no one stat more than the other. You stack too much haste then you are more a drain on healers, if you have less crit as a result you may become an ISB drain rather than a benefit also.

Granted to really stack haste you need two items off Illidian, so its gonna take some work.

Spline · 01/27/08, 6:47 AM

Originally Posted by Nicarras

I'm still going to lean with conventional thought and say that crit is AS valuable as haste, no one stat more than the other. You stack too much haste then you are more a drain on healers, if you have less crit as a result you may become an ISB drain rather than a benefit also.

Granted to really stack haste you need two items off Illidian, so its gonna take some work.

One important thing to consider is that there's no random component to haste rating. Stacked haste will generally give more consistent returns than stacked crit.