WotLK Discussion - Talents and abilities. - Page 162

Cabal · 11/08/08, 4:08 PM

Originally Posted by Vayeate

Which is the better RP dump for DPS? My friend had her spec built so she could run both but the talents were a shuffle of chaos.

Im afraid thats impossible... Unless you manage to hit level 81, of course!

Akuja · 11/08/08, 4:10 PM

Well i ended up looking at the Tanking Spread Sheet thing someone suggested, and worked out a very nice TPS spec, but im a bit concerned about the guys calculations, as standard in a normal raid situation with buffs (minus BoS) and only my spec debuffs the spec was putting out about 3.7k tps, with BoS it suddenly jumped to 6.6k tps and in the Ideal raid condition (debuffs, flasks, buffs) etc it was saying with the rotation that it would put out 9.5k tps and 4k dps.

Seems a little odd to me, but if someone has another calculator somewhere and can tell me how:

Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

Fairs on it, i would gladly like the feed back, since after toiling with the calculator provided in the Tank Spread Sheet, no other spec came close, not by even 1k tps at the top end.

(mind you this is taken in the ideal situation and Tier 7 content gear)

Zurai · 11/08/08, 4:21 PM

Keep in mind that Threat is basically meaningless in T7. No one will be threat capped. All four tanks put out totally absurd amounts of threat per second, far more than any DPS could hope to match.

Akuja · 11/08/08, 4:35 PM

Opps, stupid me lol.. it was 9.5k tps without the BoS. With BoS the spec puts out a whopping 11,800.9 tps (which to me is insane if the calc is correct), with the next best talent build bringing up the rear with 10k tps. SO that being said, im definitely going to be using my spec - http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?talent=j0E...gMIxcog0V0coux with the rotation - DD-PS-IT-BS|DS-BS-DD|PS-IT-BS-DS-BS if all goes to plan then it should be a good TPS build.

Tenebri · 11/08/08, 4:37 PM

Originally Posted by Zurai

Keep in mind that Threat is basically meaningless in T7. No one will be threat capped. All four tanks put out totally absurd amounts of threat per second, far more than any DPS could hope to match.

Agreed. However, I think the concern over maximizing TPS in tier 7 is more about maximizing tank DPS, which especially for those who plan on raiding the 10 man content is a substantial contribution to the overall DPS of a raid.

Akuja · 11/08/08, 4:51 PM

again.. putting the Tank spec devised at 3.934k dps output higher than all other DPS tank specs.. Trust me i worked the numbers over and over as well as the other talents, the closest was at 3.6k dps and also another unholy spec. (also in the ideal raid condition)

Tantlin · 11/08/08, 5:14 PM

The spread sheet is not locked so if you can find a mistake please point it out I want a accurate sheet I could care less about my ego.

Oh and the BoS threat option is because I'm not sure if RP gained form BoS gives you threat. It should but if it does its a silly amount of threat.

Originally Posted by Tenebri

I'm not sure it would be wise to use the numbers he is citing. I'm still trying to figure out where the inconsistency occurs, but I offer this example from the thread:

Frost OB/HB*fixed

Armor: 29855
Health: 32843
Chance to be hit: 37.36%
TTL Raw: 5.7 Sec
Average TTL: 20.7 Sec

The highest TPS rotation for this spec shows as 7041 TPS:

BS>IT>OB>HB || IT>BS>OB>HB

<Edit>: Using the threat modifier from tankspot as suggested would give frost a multiplier of 2.0735 and no additional bonus threat to rune or frost strike. This reduces the dps to a more reasonable level but still seems high compared to the dps theorycrafting and testing for pre-naxx gear. </Edit>

7041 TPS divided by 1.60 (Frost threat mod) * 1.15 (Blood damage mod) = approximately 5k dps for a tanking geared and specc'd Deathknight in pre-Naxx gear. Also some of the suggested tanking builds take the perma-ghoul talent in unholy which seems rather subpar.

Did I miss an intrinsic threat modifier to any of the abilities in his rotation? I ask because this seems in no way to match the results from those who were testing dps builds on beta.

People took those specs as suggested specs, they are not. I just through together semi reasonable specs to see what the scaling was like as the gear progressed, and posted that.

Those specs are posted purely so that people could recreate the conditions for themselves if they wanted. I could have shown the scaling effects with a lot less hassle by not posting specs to be honest.

Another thing most people forget is threat is not just pure DPS multiplied by presence. Other things can give you threat, for example, runic power gain that is not "natural" I.E talented extra gain or from glyphs adds to threat as well, and from what I can gather from tankspot at a high rate every 1 RP being 500 unmodified threat.

Here's the link to the article Deathknight Death Knight threat values - TankSpot

After I was able to account for parry haste in the spread sheet I found that there was very little difference in over all mitigation in a Two-handed set up versus a DW set up. One thing that probably led to this is its very hard with wrath gear not to have a significant amount of of expertise by Nax level gear. when you factor in that and that crushing blows are no longer a factor I feel the burst problem is not as significant and so I tried using DW builds and eventually found out the threat was much higher.

It may seem confusing at first but other than better AP scaling because of DW you also have the fact that with a DW build you can use 2% parry and Fallen Crusader which with the 30% more strength adds up to nearly 4% parry and gives you bunch more AP as well.

It is of course very possible there is a mistake in my calculations somewhere as well, but as yet I can't find it.

Akuja · 11/08/08, 5:44 PM

well its all a work in progress, and i didnt use a talent spec you used just because they were all over the place, and didnt seem to, concerning... But i was concerned with the TPS and DPS calculations on that spread, due to it becoming over the top in TPS/DPS even. If BoS does give threat meh, still looking at a cool 3.7k TPS at the low end, which is indeed a more realistic TPS due to scaling from BC, most tanks were pushing 2.5k+ tps (or at least should have been) so 3.7k + seems about right, since the Buffs bars arent working correctly i cant safely change to the ideal or lack of buffs for the settup, but it should rego at about 4k+ tps, which still is pretty much better than all the other specs i have seen and tested so far.

Tantlin · 11/08/08, 5:48 PM

Originally Posted by Akuja

well its all a work in progress, and i didnt use a talent spec you used just because they were all over the place, and didnt seem to, concerning... But i was concerned with the TPS and DPS calculations on that spread, due to it becoming over the top in TPS/DPS even. If BoS does give threat meh, still looking at a cool 3.7k TPS at the low end, which is indeed a more realistic TPS due to scaling from BC, most tanks were pushing 2.5+ tps (or at least should have been) so 3.7k + seems about right, since the Buffs bars arent working correctly i cant safely change to the ideal or lack of buffs for the settup, but it should rego at about 4k+ tps, which still is pretty much better than all the other specs i have seen and tested so far.

Sorry can you be more specific on what wasn't working and with what version? I know when I split versions I know somethings got messed up I just haven't found all the mistakes yet. and any extra help would save me time.

Zurai · 11/08/08, 6:07 PM

Originally Posted by Tantlin

After I was able to account for parry haste in the spread sheet I found that there was very little difference in over all mitigation in a Two-handed set up versus a DW set up. One thing that probably led to this is its very hard with wrath gear not to have a significant amount of of expertise by Nax level gear. when you factor in that and that crushing blows are no longer a factor I feel the burst problem is not as significant and so I tried using DW builds and eventually found out the threat was much higher.

Did you account for the fact that bosses generally have ~15% parry, which requires 60 expertise (over 490 expertise rating) to eliminate?

Akuja · 11/08/08, 6:09 PM

3.04, think all 3, not too sure, but deff the excel version and ooc. Debuffs (imp devo, demo shout and Faerie Fire) NYI (inspiration).. Talents (dont know why mine doesnt come up with the settup like you have), but Dirge (no pull down) and a couple others in there, i cant remeber which ones.

Ill be running thru it some more, and if i come up with more, then i will let you know

Flamingcloud · 11/08/08, 6:22 PM

Originally Posted by Akuja

well its all a work in progress, and i didnt use a talent spec you used just because they were all over the place, and didnt seem to, concerning... But i was concerned with the TPS and DPS calculations on that spread, due to it becoming over the top in TPS/DPS even. If BoS does give threat meh, still looking at a cool 3.7k TPS at the low end, which is indeed a more realistic TPS due to scaling from BC, most tanks were pushing 2.5k+ tps (or at least should have been) so 3.7k + seems about right, since the Buffs bars arent working correctly i cant safely change to the ideal or lack of buffs for the settup, but it should rego at about 4k+ tps, which still is pretty much better than all the other specs i have seen and tested so far.

You are greatly underestimating threat. I was able to put out 2700dps tanking in total jank gear and probably some missing raid buffs in beta. 6k+ threat being possible would not surprise me in the least.

Tenebri · 11/08/08, 6:26 PM

Originally Posted by Tantlin

Another thing most people forget is threat is not just pure DPS multiplied by presence. Other things can give you threat, for example, runic power gain that is not "natural" I.E talented extra gain or from glyphs adds to threat as well, and from what I can gather from tankspot at a high rate every 1 RP being 500 unmodified threat.

I apologize for misreading the talent trees as suggestions. Also, removing the threat created via chill of the grave still seems to leave this tanking rotation with a higher dps than some dedicated dps rotations. I'll have to see if one of the dps spreadsheets can be modified to account for the additional RP generation of Blessing of Sanctuary and the damage of Rune Strike. It may simply be that these two items are overcompensating for the loss of talent points spent on tanking abilities.

This does bring up an interesting point. While not specifically listed with a threat value, the glyph for death coil healing returns 20 runic power. If the threat from RP generation is attached to this gain, might it be more efficient to spam coil on a pet rather than on the actual target? This would especially apply on bosses with an aggro reset as there would be no miss chance or range limitation involved. The other interesting part of this would then be Arcane Torrent. During a pull, when aggro is at it's shakiest, would torrent generate 7.5k threat off of the GCD or would it be treated like Empower Rune Weapon and provide no threat?

nachrichter · 11/08/08, 7:13 PM

I would assume typo/error whatever, if 1 RP is generating 500 threat. 1 rage gain has always been 5 threat. A glyphed and talented Icy Touch isn't going to be generating nearly 10k threat, I would imagine.

Gort · 11/08/08, 7:27 PM

Normalised threat != threat. 500/point is more than Sunder, which is 438 normalised threat. Sunder is, however, 90797 threat in Dstance, and rage gain is very much not.

It's a very safe assumption that EVERYTHING we do as a DK will be filtered through the same calculations. Otherwise, glyphed IT becomes the single most efficient threat move in the game, at 5k added, and that's just silly.

Flamingcloud · 11/08/08, 7:44 PM

Originally Posted by Gort

Otherwise, glyphed IT becomes the single most efficient threat move in the game, at 5k added, and that's just silly.

IT Glyph definitely does not give 5000 extra threat(and I am not convinced any of the rp gains do). I ran with it the entire beta and I wasn't throwing out 10k threat ITs.

Lanlaorn · 11/08/08, 7:53 PM

He means 5 threat, for some reason everything on their website is x100. I mean no offense if this is a commonly held convention that I'm ignorant of, but yea that's how it is. Looking at their frost presence and blood presense modifiers makes this clear (x200 and x80 instead of x2 and x0.8, etc.).

Tantlin · 11/08/08, 8:01 PM

Actually I did make the mistake of putting it as 500 mainly wasn't thinking straight though I will profess at the time I was thinking of a ton of things. My next version will correct that and one other erroneous number I'm sure is there form that site.

Thank you for pointing it out as I said before if you find mistake please say so I would rather a good tool than a happy ego.

And I did mot multiply it by our presence since the site was explicit in that fact that is wan unmodified threat.

Gort · 11/08/08, 8:04 PM

Originally Posted by Lanlaorn

He means 5 threat, for some reason everything on their website is x100. I mean no offense if this is a commonly held convention that I'm ignorant of, but yea that's how it is. Looking at their frost presence and blood presense modifiers makes this clear (x200 and x80 instead of x2 and x0.8, etc.).

It's normalised vs unnormalised. If you look at the warrior threat post that's a few links into the "How I got these numbers" link, it's pretty clear. It appears RP gain is similar to rage gain in threat generated, and the weird numbers are due to use of integer vs decimal in the values Blizzard passes back/forth to the client. Same numbers, different notation.

Tantlin · 11/08/08, 8:11 PM

From that site...

Rage Gain __________________________ 5 (stance modifier is not applied) (verified build 9138)

Dirge RP gains _____________________ 500 per RP, unaffected by presence

Honestly not seeing the X 100 issue your talking about and again I applied that rp threat after presence multiplier not before.

It is possible that that site is wrong but I'm pretty sure I applied the information I had access to correctly. Does anyone have any other insights that could lead to better insight?

Originally Posted by Zurai

Did you account for the fact that bosses generally have ~15% parry, which requires 60 expertise (over 490 expertise rating) to eliminate?

Its a variable you can set on the front sheet but yes I have it defaulted to 15%.

I also go through 4 iterations of haste effecting the boss and player back and forth so the average haste settles to a very small difference as the two play back and forth.

It also accounts for RS not being able to be parried or dodged and the amount of MH swings that would be converted to RS'es.

And also takes into account the instant strikes you do per rotation (not counting FS as that has the same properties as RS, which makes it much easier actually) although you have to set that yourself from the front panel.

Not trying to be defensive when I answer these questions by the way, I am just trying to be a thorough as possible so we can skip a few stages of questions that may be asked next.

Aeryn · 11/08/08, 8:57 PM

Originally Posted by Flamingcloud

IT Glyph definitely does not give 5000 extra threat(and I am not convinced any of the rp gains do). I ran with it the entire beta and I wasn't throwing out 10k threat ITs.

From the linked page at TankSpot:

Power gains

Runic Power gained from Butchery, Chill of the Grave and Dirge generates 500 threat per point of RP gained. This threat is divided between all mobs who have you on their threat list.

RP gained from normal use of rune abilities generates no threat, neither does passive RP gains from Butchery.

Also, from the warrior thread:

Verifying others' findings, I hit some mobs a few times in defensive stance to get the defensive stance modifier: 452 damage creats 97322 threat. The defensive stance modifier is 207.3

So it seems clear that the 500 is indeed 5 and everything else needs to be divided by 100 too. I guess the warrior Threat Values list is simply inconsistent in that it doesn't use the integer values. I have no idea why they can't just use normal numbers that we are familiar with, like 1 damage = 1 threat. The integers may be Blizzard's internal values, but they are confusing.

Either way, it means that for DKs with 2 points in Chill of the Grave, one Icy Touch generates damage*2.07 (on one mob) + 5*5 (divided between all mobs) threat.

Mara · 11/08/08, 9:55 PM

Anyone know if Darkmoon Card: Madness will proc for a DK? If so, what buff?

kommon · 11/08/08, 11:30 PM

http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deat...03150003133151

So here is my spec right now for the xpac (I know 5 points are not allotted). Here is my questions:

As unholy, the majority of my damage will be magic related, and as I'll be situationally tanking, I wanted to make sure my dps is maximized while keeping the core tanking talents (this is assuming the dual spec feature is not in place anytime soon).

So with that being said, I am at a loss on what best benefits an Unholy off-tank/part-time dps role the most with my last 5 points. I would have originally thought that 600+ Attack power gained through Bladed Armor would be best, but now that I am starting to realize just how much damage I will be doing through my spells, death coil, AE, etc, I am not so convinced.

Here is my breakdown:

-Virulence 3/3: Currently I have this at 3/3 in lieu of early hit rating. I think this needs to stay at the start and it is very possible I will outgrow the need for this down the gear road.

-Bladed Armor 5/5: Again 600+ Attack Power is not something I take for granted. However, if the majority of my dps load will be spell and AE related, how valuable is to an Unholy spec?

-Gargoyle 1/1: This ability is very tempting as its a big DPS boost for when I'm not tanking, and I'm sure it could useful for general encounter viability if I have a pretty comfortable TPS lead while tanking.

-Vicious Strikes 2/2: Not so crazy about this one. 6% critical bonus and 30% critical damage bonus to Scourge strike, Plague Strike, and Death Strike. Its not something I would not take if it was needed to get to something more valuable down the tree, but it sits next to 2 very valuable talent allocations, so I'm sure I can justify grabbing it.

-Necrosis 5/5: Meh. Not sure how much value this would add if I'm staying in line with my: I do more damage through my spell/AE attacks, lets buff that before I buff my physical damage. Also, I am not so sure this would outweigh Bladed Armor for those 5 points.

-Ravenous Dead 3/3: This would increase my strength which would in turn increase my parry chance, so it would benefit both my dps and my tanking. In addition it would also increase my pet's damage.

-Unholy Aura 2/2: Pretty cool Raid wide buff. Not sure how much it increases my PERSONAL viability, but it would be a pretty cool thing to have for high mobility fights for the raid.
important is that to an unholy hybrid tank/dps?

So my options are:

5/5 Bladed Armor

5/5 Necrosis (not crazy about this one)

Or a smattering of points across the options I listed, e.g.:
-3/3 Ravenous Dead+1/1 Gargoyle+1/2 Vicious Strikes
-2/2 Vicious Strikes+3/3 Ravenous Dead
-2/2 Unholy Aura+1/1 Gargoyle+2/2 Vicious Strikes
-1/1 Gargoyle+2/2 Vicious Strikes+2/2 Two-Handed Weapon Specialization

Etc etc

I would love some thoughts and some opinion on what would be the most beneficial way to spend those last 5 points for my role in raids. Thanks for any insight.

Daedalix · 11/08/08, 11:35 PM

Our spells gain damage via attack power. That's the basic hallmark of our class. Bladed Armor is a must-have. Butchery is a huge talent in both tanking and dps terms. Outbreak isn't that hot, I'd shift talent points out of it into... necrosis probably. I would pull points out of toughness to get Butchery and possibly Vicious Strikes.

Tantlin · 11/09/08, 1:19 AM

I updated my spread sheet to fix many bugs I was aware of as well as some brought to light by others.

Originally Posted by Aeryn

So it seems clear that the 500 is indeed 5 and everything else needs to be divided by 100 too. I guess the warrior Threat Values list is simply inconsistent in that it doesn't use the integer values. I have no idea why they can't just use normal numbers that we are familiar with, like 1 damage = 1 threat. The integers may be Blizzard's internal values, but they are confusing.

I also changed the RP numbers to 5 because while the tankspot info is very confusing it seems more likely. If I find out its the other way I can fix it later.