Is the 100% cap before or after reduced ArP efficiency i.e. paperdoll or real value?

i've been reading a lot now but i am a little confused. i saw that many talk about about 51/0/20 spec (and 51/2/18 variation), but i saw that this tends to differ.

before stating some conclusions and questions, i must say that i am using this 51/0/20 and as rotation i am using IT PS HS HS DS Rune Dump DS HS HS HS HS Rune Dump

from my point of view 51/2/18 has 2 points wasted in frost. why? because with a well managed rotation you are most likely to not get that 30 extra rune power (so the 3rd DC would be out of question). the only advantage i see to it is the extra 3 seconds for DRW but considering the fact you benefit of it once 1.5minutes, it is not that great.

as for 51/0/20 versions i fail to understand how would the variation of what i linked would be more beneficial (if someone can explain).

also i tried to test Sigil of Awareness vs Sigil of the Vengeful Heart. until now Sigil of Awareness > Sigil of the Vengeful Heart but i must say that i don't benefit of the bonus from 2t8. can anyone that has tested this with the bonus state his conclusion?

If you're hitting every death rune into a heart strike, that gives the 15% chance for a death coil. Also, with soft capped hit / expertise, you'll have enough room to launch those 2 death coils at the end of the rotation, making sotvh come out on top of sigil of awareness. Haven't gotten the sigil myself ): but overall on my parses, I have quite a few more death coils than death strikes, though death strikes do get that bonus crit damage :P

Are you including Abominable Might in your "6200" figure? Your uptime on bosses should be at or near 100%, so I'm curious if the methods used to arrive at 6200 assumed 6200 before or after Abominable Might was applied. This really would make a huge difference, as you can start stacking AP much sooner in T8 gear progression if you can include Abominable Might to reach that 6200 mark.

Personally, I have found 52/0/19 to be more practical. I know that on paper this spec is not optimal but from what I have seen (in Ulduar at least) my worms constitute a very small % of my damage and having that quick rune tap has saved my life a time or two.

I know, I know; if the healers are on the ball and all is well, I shouldn't need it. We are currently learning Yogg and when I am down there on my own it helps to have that quick health injection and sometimes I hit it during movement just to make the healers life easier. I think it's really the same philosophy as hitting cooldowns on Ignis. Using anti-magic shell etc isn't necessarily good for dps but it sure makes me an easier person to keep alive.

Some people take two points in epidemic to offset movement and loosen up the rotations a bit. I personally haven't had much issue with this so I stick to 1 point. MY point being that you have to find what works for you in your guild as a dead dk does no dps

I'm not claiming to put out the most amazing numbers but I do decent dps. Here's a parse Ulduar

I'm not sure this works out to 100%.

I currently run about 43% ArP and with a grim toll proc, this puts me at around 95% I believe (I may be off by a % or 2 since I am doing this from memory at work). If you factor in blood gorged this does indeed put me over 100%. My point being that I don't think 25% with the proc is going to get you to 100%.

I probably need to dig up the formula and plug some numbers in...

This is no fixed value of AP where ArP > Str. The value of each stat varies relative to one another with each other and with every other stat. Stacking more crit, for example, will tend to make Str stronger relative to ArP because there are abilities that can crit that scale with AP but not ArPen. The idea that there is one AP number when ArP becomes better, point for point, than Str is ludicrous. The realtive strength of Str and ArPen will vary with gear, raid composition, and spec and should be evaluated on a case by case basis.

Considering switching points around in my 51/2/18 spec for Bloodworms. Currently those points are in Mark of Blood and Imp. Blood Presence; obviously Bloodworms would be a DPS increase over those two, but I'm concerned over whether the little guys will cause me any issues in regards to their aggro. Also, do they avoid the mountains of AoE somehow (passive avoidance?) or do they just curl up and die a lot? I am not a fan of pets in the slightest, especially ones I can't control directly, but if they're not an inconvenience AI-wise they're probably better than what I have those points in now.

This depends solely on your trust of the healers. I have yet to have issues where a rune tap would save my life, so I take 3/3 bloodworms. Granted, it only adds like 75 dps for 3 points, it still adds dps whereas rune tap and improved rune tap won't (assuming healers keep you alive). As for the healing done, it really isn't enough to change things in the long run, they heal for ~250 per swing, but with the amount of burst in Ulduar, I wouldn't consider the healing "life-saving". In the end it just matters how much you trust your healers.

I'm using the 52/0/20 spec with the bloodworms, and I haven't run into any problems caused by the worms. However, I OT all the multitank fights in the 10 man so I can only safely say for Hodir, Mimiron, General, and Yogg. Out of all these fights I'd think Yogg and Mimiron would be potentially the most precarious if the worms were to cause any trouble (proximity mines and green clouds in P1 respectively).

In the end, after getting the pure DPS talents in the blood tree, Blood Worms is the only filler talent that will actually give you more dps. Granted I get 80 or so on a typical fight but its better than 0 lol.

Pets don't trigger mines or clouds, so that's nothing to worry about.

To be honest, the only reason I take Rune Tap over worms is because it makes soloing elites and old content easier when you have a heal on command. Though, I do wonder if Blood Worms would do more healing over time and end up being more worthwhile despite AoE killing them in some cases.

I still hear people constantly talking about the 6200 AP threshold. This was calculated before the "nerf" to ArP that capped it at 100%- does this still apply now?


The main thought is that gemming and stacking ArP will not get you to 100% without grim or Mjo- but will make it so you go over a good amount whenever there is a proc up. So this means that any extra Arp during that time is just extra, while gemming for str would continue to effect you while the proc was on.


Someone better than me at the formula's would need to recheck to make sure we should still be gemming ArP at the 6200 threshold, or if the cap on ArP changes the game.

As tetracycloid's post says above you, "There is no fixed value of AP where ArP > Str." The value of ArP depends on all your dps stats, including how much ArP you have.

I don't even recall where the 6200 ap figure came from-- I think it was someone's estimate based on running the old version of the simulator. The point at which ArP becomes better than Str will vary from person to person, and your best bet is to run an extra long sim yourself to compare. The other point that has been often raised is that Str is still always your all-around best stat. In any AOE situation, Str is better.

Bloodworms do indeed die alot, still they are a dps increase over IBP. The only fight where you shouldnt spec them is Yogg since they tend to run towards untanked crusher tentakles leading to crushes (one)hitting your raid.

Interrupting Diminish Power sounds like great thing to me :P, and Crushes are no different from when an actual tank receives it, it's 8yard AoE afaik, so no raid member should ever be close.

In addition to the 6200 AP threshold having never actually been real ArP has not yet been nerfed and the meaning of 'capped at 100%' is not yet clear.

I'm fairly certain they mean that if you gain over 100% armor penetration it will only count as 100%. You can not send a target into a negative armor value any more.

The other part commented on by Blizzard leads me to believe that mobs will start to have a base mitgation value that is not armor based.

From my most recent WWS when I was blood, my bloodworms were doing ~100 dps. That makes it 200 hps. Rune tap is 10% health, 16.67% with 2/3 improved. Raid buffed I have ~27k health, making that a 4500 heal, every 40 seconds. Do the math and get ~112 hps. With 3/3 improved, it become a 5400 heal every 30 seconds for 180 hps. In the end this is still personal preference and how much you need on demand heals. I choose to go with death pact for a heal, or DS spamming if I am that desperate.

Keep in mind when debating Bloodworms vs Rune Tap is that RT consumes a Blood Rune and a GCD.

That can usually be managed with a quick Blood Tap (if you don't have a spare Blood/Death rune) seeing as Blood specs really don't have another use for it. I realize the Blood Tap counters a little bit of of what you are trying to do with Rune Tap. I personally think it's better to give up the damage of 1 Heart Strike if it means not being dead.

This is not completely true. Over in the druid feralbynight thread, someone used a weeks worth of logs to estimate the overlap time when wearing both trinkets. It was somewhere between 19%-27% based on how much running around the fight required. In other words, 70% to 80% of the time when you are getting the benefit of a proc, it is only one trinket; and combining the trinkets should increase this uptime.

This means that the combined trinkets will still give a big increase in your average ArP rating, but be slightly less effective when they proc together. We would need more parsed logs and/or simulations to work out if this reduction would warrant dropping one of the trinkets.

Because Rune Tap consumes a rune and a GCD (even if you blood tap, that rune could have been used on a HS), I consider IBP and BWorms considerably better talents. The only situation in all of Ulduar where I've felt that Rune Tap may have been useful is inside of Yogg's illusion room if you enter with already-low health and your healer is late to enter. But even then, I simply chose to be safe and sacrifice tentacle DPS by staying near the brain (which actually gave me more time DPSing the brain). I consider IBP to be a great talent, though. It's passive, therefore doesn't interfere with rotations, allowing all of the AoE healing and HoTs going around the raid to be slightly more effecient. I take 2/2 IBP and 2/3 BWorms for these reasons.