Solithaira

Sorry...maybe i'm just being extra slow today but I'm not able to make sense of the whole RAF thing. I've read all the posts in this thread, and also the RAF post in the general forums. I'm still not sure exactly how this works...

I recently actually did recruit a friend, and have both accounts currently linked (they will be linked until the end of December.) Based on what i've read, I can only gift levels from a higher leveled character to a lower leveled one. Now, none of the characters my friend is leveling will be higher than 55 by the time Wrath comes out. I think the only option would be to transfer over a character of mine who is under level 60...and then raise them to level 59 or so in order to be able to gift to my death knight at level 57.9?

Due to the limitation of only transferring to lower characters...i'm also not sure how creating a second DK who will follow you around will help? Sorry to be noobish but if someone could please explain exactly how this process is supposed to work that would be greatly appreciated.

 

methods

Virulence is useful at the melee hit cap. My tests assumed 9% to hit for specials and melee and ~11% or so for spells before virulence.

I've found Gargoyle to be a dps increase in my calculations but there is too much confusion on it's consistency to include in the numbers above. That being said, Gargoyle would put impurity even higher on the valued list as well as ebon plaque. It would also lower the value of morbidity even more.

As for the aura, it can be argued either way and has been in previous pages.

 

pldcanfly

I took the liberty to tabelise it

#	Skill	Rotation(21.5) PS/IT	% per point		Skill	Rotation(20) 4x SS	% per point
1	SS	15.03%	exempt		SS	19.82%	exempt
2	EbonPlaguebringer	9.08%	3.03%		Epidemic	8.23%	4.12%
3	Bone Shield	1.96%	1.96%		EbonPlaguebringer	9.27%	3.09%
4	Wandering Plague	5.63%	1.88%		Bone Shield	1.96%	1.96%
5	BcB	4.85%	1.62%		Wandering Plague	5.83%	1.94%
6	Crypt Fever	4.74%	1.58%		Crypt Fever	4.90%	1.63%
7	Rage of Rivendare	6.62%	1.32%		BcB	4.77%	1.59%
8	impurity	5.76%	1.15%		Rage of Rivendare	6.85%	1.37%
9	Vicious Strikes	2.20%	1.10%		Vicious Strikes	2.56%	1.28%
10	Desecration	4.76%	0.95%		impurity	5.34%	1.07%
11	Shadow of Death	0.77%	0.77%		Shadow of Death	0.75%	0.75%
12	Morbidity	2.31%	0.77%		Morbidity	2.07%	0.69%
13	Necrosis	3.21%	0.64%		Necrosis	3.16%	0.63%
14	Virulence	1.23%	0.41%		Desecration	2.77%	0.55%
15	Ravenous Dead	1.14%	0.38%		Virulence	1.14%	0.38%
16	Outbreak	0.85%	0.28%		Ravenous Dead	1.12%	0.37%
17	Epidemic	0.00%	0.00%		Outbreak	0.46%	0.15%

 

Illundai

If you have RAF active and you make the 2nd account follow you around, you get triple XP from the quests you do.

 

◊ zirky

Wouldn't a build such as this (17/0/54) be more suitable for raiding? Its been discussed at length the shortcomings of perma-ghoul (no ae avoidance, no means of self healing, etc) and the questionable value of Desecration. That build gains one of, if not the best, RP dumps available to the class, maxes out Impurity and doesn't lose the points in 2H spec.

I could see some benefit of going 4/5 Desecration and 1/3 Ravenous Dead, if you really feel that the gains and mechanics of Desecration would be worth the point investment. Its hard to justify taking a mobile dps talent, while at the same time, maxing a talent designed for imobile dps.

 

Wylder

Only until level 60 though, right? It would basically be worthless for 2 DK's to do.

 

• Zurm

The fact that I didn't include gargoyle was a mistake on my part. Regarding desecration, I personally like it. And I like having the ghoul around for various things. But you bring up some excellent points, for sure. And the reason having an immobile and mobile dps talent is good is because you can get both and be good with both. You use impurity to get to the target faster, and then desecration once there to hit that target harder.

 

• vank

I'm surprised Ghoul survivability hasn't been discussed more. Perhaps someone who did Naxx-25 can chime in here. My gut feeling tells me Ghouls will melt like butter in 25-man raids, but we know these forums aren't about gut feelings. So if anyone has anything to share on this... mucho appreciado. Obviously this will change things greatly if Ghouls aren't a viable/reliable source of damage.

 

methods

Thanks pldcanfly! I added my Blood calculations for the 20 second rotation above.

 

Illundai

Well, not completely useless; you get about 2 extra levels out of it.

 

Nephthys

TellMeWhen can display the icons for these abilities under all the conditions you asked. I used it on beta and found it amazingly useful for Sudden Doom and Rune Strike. For diseases I used regular timer bars (NeedToKnow, in my case).

 

Xelopheris

Not completely worthless, actually.

Both Death Knights I did on Beta dinged 58 after turning in the final quest. That means 462,100 XP. If you RAF'd two death knights, that would turn into 1,386,300 XP. Obviously you'll ding 60 before you use all that. You end up with roughly 200k XP into level 60 (out of 260k) by the time you leave the starting zone.

There's more than one bonus to this. First of all, you don't risk being one of the DK's that gets out at level 57 then has to go kill 80 mobs before going through the dark portal. Second, a lot of Hellfire Peninsula quests have a minimum level requirement of 60 -- you can get everything right off the bat.

 

◊ zirky

I somewhat assumed that Gargoyle was a mistake. I thought it was worth reinforcing its amazing value as a single point ability. As for Desecration, I agree that it does have its use; I'm just currently skeptical as to its worth for the point investment. But honestly, I'm not even completely certain on Desecration; I need to play with it more in a raid setting.

If perma-ghoul had some of the Demo talents that increased pet survivability (ae avoidance, passive healing), the points would easily be better spent in ghoul increasing talents and Desecration would, I'd imagine, be less desirable. Perma-ghoul definitely adds a little more flavor to the spec. I really hope the short comings are addressed.

 

Nephthys

Regarding rune cooldown addons, I agree that the ones we have now seem lacking. Like there's got to be a better way to show that information. I'm having trouble imagining what that would be, though. The traditional status bar / icon spinner frameworks don't seem up to the task.

What information do we want from a rune addon? In order of priority, I'd say:
1. Which runes are available NOW
2. Which runes are almost available
3. Whether the almost-available runes are available on the next GCD, or whether there's space to throw in another ability like Death Coil.
Ideally, an addon would show all this information such that point 1 is more visible than point 2, and so on.

What do we NOT need to know? What information can we throw out to make the display easier to read?
4. Whether it's the left blood rune or the right blood rune (for example) that's available.

The different addons we have highlight these things to different degrees. RuneHero, for example, is really good at points 2 and 3. Not so much at point 1, because moving things always attract your attention more than static things. This is the big failing of bar-based addons and those that put number text on icons. Available runes should stand out more than non-available ones. SimpleRune takes a different approach and is really good at points 1 and 2, but really bad at point 3.

I think the big question is: what kind of graphical convention would cover all of these bases, in the order they need to be covered?

 

Illundai

This talk about XP and RAF got me thinking about my plans to level. I was wondering, if a quest turns grey at say 63 and you do it at 61, do you get less XP than if you would do it at 58 or 59?

Need to re-evaluate my questroute, I was planning on going to all the major cities and stuff, but if the XP bonus is greatly reduced, I'm not going to bother with that. There's a few of the quests I got turnin stuff for that turn grey at 63 and I'd be doing them at 61.

I would deffo do WPL Cauldrons + EPL turnins though, I think that's a pretty safe bet; takes perhaps 30-40 mins for a big burst of XP.

 

Nephthys

NeedToKnow can. If the other timers can't (DoTimer, ClassTimer, Elkano's Buff Bars, etc.), then they need to get off their butts and add it as an option. It's built into the buff/debuff API.

 

• Zurm

Doing a Red/Orange/Yellow quest awards the same (full) experience. Green quests give some percentage less, and gray gives nothing.

 

Tafsis

*EDIT* Above poster covered this.

 

abyssichate

I've been using ClassTimer in the beta for the disease tracking on the target and for the player's buffs (I filtered UB, IBF, BS, HoW) for a while now and it's working like a charm.

 

Herrm

DoTimer does this as well.

 

Illundai

Any number on how much less percentage for a green quest?

 

Herrm

Check out this thread Illundai...

World of Warcraft - English (NA) Forums -> How much exp do you get from green quest

 

Illundai

Ah, didn't think the official forums could have useful information, thanks a lot. That's very helpful, seems like most of the quests I was planning to do will still be useful.

 

Herrm

My thoughts exactly, I was pleasantly surprised clicking into the official forums for a change.

 

Janraea

Along the lines of the impact of move-speed on dps - I'd like to call attention to the importance of our ranged abilities. The movespeed math you read about in the thinktank was mostly done for rogues - we have a notable difference: we can do significant dps from range for short periods. This is particularly relevant for bosses with predictable motion or 'haul-ass' periods, since we can structure our 'rotations' to make sure we have full rp and both frost runes to use during the period we're not in melee range.

I consider this a bonus for frost and for blood - blood won't be able to help capping much of the time from sudden doom procs (last I checked. If blood can keep up with its rp generation now, please correct me), and frost gets two big Icy Touchs and an HB while at range (depending on which rotation and when it gets interrupted). Unholy, on the other hand, will rarely be able to do more than weak icy touches.

It looks to me like a significant difference on any dynamic encounter. Opinions?