Frozen Blows -- Frost DPS (Updated 06.11.09) - Page 4

Nen · 05/21/09, 3:46 PM

Nice post OP.

Do you guys have any logs of UP frost? I viewed the few posted in this thread, but the damage is on par with BP. XT and Hodir are special cases so UP will outperform BP quite easily due to the mechanics of the fight. I can’t seem to think of any other fight where that would be the case.

Erekose · 05/21/09, 4:02 PM

Originally Posted by Nen

Nice post OP.

Do you guys have any logs of UP frost? I viewed the few posted in this thread, but the damage is on par with BP. XT and Hodir are special cases so UP will outperform BP quite easily due to the mechanics of the fight. I can’t seem to think of any other fight where that would be the case.

UP excels in fights where you have the opportunity to soak RP from AMS and fights where you have to move a lot, and in fights when you have a very short window of DPS time. Pretty much all of Ulduar.

As of right now if you are using IT glyph and one of the 'new' t8 rotations that have been discussed....UP is > BP in every.single.fight. As Kroot/Darkside mentioned in this and the previous thread, you can still have ~2 dead GCDs in UP and still have it pull ahead of BP..and in the thick of a boss fight I rarely if at all have many free GCDs with ITx6.

Nen · 05/21/09, 4:06 PM

I understand the theory behind why UP would be better; I am looking for logs to confirm that theory.

• Darkside · 05/21/09, 4:42 PM

Originally Posted by Nen

I understand the theory behind why UP would be better; I am looking for logs to confirm that theory.

World of Logs - Real Time Raid Analysis

Any parse you can find there that features me is done in Unholy Presence, though not with the 6x IT Machine Gun rotation.

I would appreciate it if people would keep these types of questions of an absolute minimum, as they heavily detract from the discussion currently on hand. As a compromise, I'll try and link my parses in the OP for everyone's future reference.

Synia · 05/21/09, 5:01 PM

Originally Posted by Valtiel

What stacks well for BP is that I've noticed I'm essentially almost never RP starved. In reality my rotations are made of pumping as many FS I can get without ever waiting for GCDs to light. More often than not, I just skip using BS if I don't have the time. Having such a powerful RP dump means that at some point you can't care less about using all your runes if you can still keep hitting with FS. From a rotation point of view it's inefficient, but from a damage point of view most of the time those two BS slots are filled with a FS and a Ryme procc and over the course of the damage interval the gain is obvious.

This to say that the theorycal superiority of UP is undeniable. With the current IT glyph, my experience is that such superiority is also practical but less sensible than theory would make us assume, and I feel that if the IT glyph will change, UP will lose viability altogether because translating the theorycal advantage in practical gaming will net you a small gain when you make it and a huge loss when you don't.

I agree entirely with this, given my personal experience. I have found that in Ulduar, there are some fights where, clearly, UP can provide faster damage in certain phases (such as on XT's heart phase or the brain phase on Yogg), playing in BP has a fluidity in it that, to me, feels more comfortable and controllable when I use it. Using a standard two-disease rotation (and modifying it as the situation might require) that prioritizes keeping up FF and using FS when able, I might never be out more than one blood rune, and that is on a rare occasion; usually I try to refresh FF/PS at around the same time (to benefit having both up for Obliterate for the four-piece bonus) but have recently been aiming to prioritize FF and throw PS up when I have the unholy rune to do so.

To add to what Valtiel stated, whenever I use UP, it feels very unstable and that the slightest mistake can absolutely destroy my rotation and cost a loss of several hundred DPS. While I agree that UP is likely superior if played in a completely perfect manner, the human factor is too much of an issue for me to use it viably. Given my play style (which is what many people should probably take into account), my own conclusion is that UP has its place, particularly on fights where one benefits from pushing out a lot of damage in a short time. BP seems better, to me, when you are able to stay on a target and build up your damage, albeit with a slower GCD. I think that a subject that could be brought to discussion (as I do not recall having seen it over the course of reading the Frost threads) would be presence dancing and if there are fights/appropriate times when it is worth the cost of an unholy rune to switch into UP.

I will, however, attempt to begin using IT more often to take up the death runes, which I have not tried before.

Edit: Although I realize that the extra RP might mess with the rotation and a bit of a DPS loss, which could force the need for UP. Quite the predicament.

Wow Web Stats -- For relevance of two-disease, primarily-BP 17/51/3. For some reason, it did not save Ignis or Mimiron, to which point the person who uploaded is not sure as to why. We are still progressing on Yogg due to lack of attendance for the duration of 3.1 thus far.

Yubble · 05/21/09, 5:08 PM

I'm curious - has anybody experimented with BT at the beginning of a rotation to more evenly distribute RP and/or GCD's between the first half and second half of the rotation? I suppose this point is moot if you're using priority and no rotation... but maybe it's just me that has trouble keeping up with priority in UP.

Here's one idea using DRM (20/51/0). Also get blood plague for the OB's and BS's. I guess you could call it a 1.5 disease rotation.

BT -
IT PS OB IT BS - 90 RP +4 butch
OB IT IT BS IT - 105 RP +4 butch

total = 203 RP

if you can squeeze in some extra RP before the start, you should net 3xFS per half.

Please tell me if this is too much theorycraft for the thread - if so, I'll post accordingly in the future.

Tarquin · 05/21/09, 5:12 PM

Originally Posted by Erekose

Wrong. If you spec for Frost Strike, Vengeful Heart destroys Awareness. In every situation, for every rotation, presence, etc. It's arguably a better upgrade than Betrayer to Voldrethar.

If you are going to post something that is not backed up by *any* data at all other than your untested opinion, at least have some halfway intelligent theory-craft to back it up.

Sorry to sound so mean, but I'm just absolutely sick and tired of people crapping up this thread after we went through 45+ pages of the exact same nonsense in the previous thread.

Er, I think you're misconstruing the post. I think the point was "OB rotations are better then IT spam rotations until you get Vengeful Heart," not "Awareness is better than Vengeful Heart if you want to run an OB rotation."

Whether or not that's true is something I'm interested in, as my DK is an alt and doesn't have access to 25-man Ulduar gear for the forseeable future. Frost Strike is still definitely the most significant portion of my DPS even with Awareness, but I'm not sure how many OBs I want to convert over for the extra RP.

• Darkside · 05/21/09, 5:14 PM

Originally Posted by Yubble

I'm curious - has anybody experimented with BT at the beginning of a rotation to more evenly distribute RP and/or GCD's between the first half and second half of the rotation? I suppose this point is moot if you're using priority and no rotation... but maybe it's just me that has trouble keeping up with priority in UP.

Here's one idea using DRM (20/51/0). Also get blood plague for the OB's and BS's. I guess you could call it a 1.5 disease rotation.

BT -
IT PS OB IT BS - 90 RP +4 butch
OB IT IT BS IT - 105 RP +4 butch

total = 203 RP

if you can squeeze in some extra RP before the start, you should net 3xFS per half.

Please tell me if this is too much theorycraft for the thread - if so, I'll post accordingly in the future.

This thread can never have too much theorycrafting, please keep it up.

Derailing the conversation about Blood Tap ever so slightly, I have an interesting observation to report that I have never seen brought up before. If you use BT after using one of your Blood Rune, but before the other, you will end up with 2x Death Runes. It works something like this:

BBUUFF -> Blood Strike
dBUUFF -> Blood Tap
DDUUFF

Where lower case letters indicate runes that are on cooldown. I make use of this trick at the beginning of every boss fight to insure that I am not RP starved for the first 10s or so.

Yubble · 05/21/09, 5:25 PM

Originally Posted by Darkside

Derailing the conversation about Blood Tap ever so slightly, I have an interesting observation to report that I have never seen brought up before. If you use BT after using one of your Blood Rune, but before the other, you will end up with 2x Death Runes. It works something like this:

BBUUFF -> Blood Strike
dBUUFF -> Blood Tap
DDUUFF

Where lower case letters indicate runes that are on cooldown. I make use of this trick at the beginning of every boss fight to insure that I am not RP starved for the first 10s or so.

Are you saying it refreshes both blood runes as death runes within the first 10s?

So if I BS > BT at the beginning of the fight, I'll have 10 RP and DDUUFF?

• Darkside · 05/21/09, 5:27 PM

That's exactly how I've seen it work. Furthermore, from what I can tell this will always happen so long as you have 1 Death Rune refreshing and 1 Blood Rune ready to use.

[e]: You'll actually have 20 RP, as Blood Tap gives 10 on its own.

Yubble · 05/21/09, 5:49 PM

Originally Posted by Darkside

That's exactly how I've seen it work. Furthermore, from what I can tell this will always happen so long as you have 1 Death Rune refreshing and 1 Blood Rune ready to use.

[e]: You'll actually have 20 RP, as Blood Tap gives 10 on its own.

Wow. I've heard about the "death rune bug" but I didn't know that's how it worked.

In that case...

BS > BT -
IT PS OB IT BS - 110 RP +4 butch (3xFS w/ 18 RP leftover)
OB IT IT BS IT - 105 RP +4 butch (3xFS w/ 13 RP leftover)

That means you'll have 31 leftover RP from the start, meaning you should be able maintain 6xFS (3 per half) throughout an entire fight. Or you could HoW and get 7 off the bat.

[EDIT:] There's also always the option of just starting with IT PS OB BS BS or OB OB BS BS and going from there.

Taizu · 05/21/09, 5:56 PM

You are losing DPS time that you could use during the boss pull.
For single disease, I use IT-Oblit-BS-(BT)-Oblit -> can sneak in Unbreakable Armor at the pull if you are positive you can use that again during heroism on longer fights.

Has there been a consensus on whether single disease is still superior to double disease? I figure the extra oblit per 20 seconds is worth the dps from PS+BP? I am unholy now, but now that I am familiar with all the fights I'll probably go back to Frost once I get my XT sigil.

Yubble · 05/21/09, 6:23 PM

Originally Posted by Taizu

You are losing DPS time that you could use during the boss pull.
For single disease, I use IT-Oblit-BS-(BT)-Oblit -> can sneak in Unbreakable Armor at the pull if you are positive you can use that again during heroism on longer fights.

Has there been a consensus on whether single disease is still superior to double disease? I figure the extra oblit per 20 seconds is worth the dps from PS+BP? I am unholy now, but now that I am familiar with all the fights I'll probably go back to Frost once I get my XT sigil.

It has more to do w/ RP gen than anything - IT+PS = 35 RP... OB = 20 RP. Thats pretty much a whole FS less (about 7k avg) every 40 sec, which equates to about 175 dps, whereas that extra oblit might only be 3k more damage than IT+PS (on average), plus you'd lose blood plague. So, .5 FS+IT+PS+BPlague > 1 OB.

Erekose · 05/21/09, 6:47 PM

Originally Posted by Darkside

That's exactly how I've seen it work. Furthermore, from what I can tell this will always happen so long as you have 1 Death Rune refreshing and 1 Blood Rune ready to use.

[e]: You'll actually have 20 RP, as Blood Tap gives 10 on its own.

I can confirm this from personal experience last night using ITx6 rotation. It is awesome. Especially since all our procs usually go up within the first rotation, so I do IT BS BT OB OB UA, so that UA is both stacking with greatness/infusion/crusader/whatever and being used during a very RP rich segment in our rotation.

Arvien · 05/21/09, 6:47 PM

Just finished my raid and did some testing on Iron Council while doing Hard Mode, you might want to add Overload from Stormcaller to "Taking advantage of AMS". You only take like 2k damage from it and you get full runic power bar (you can combine it with IBF if you want, as you still get full 130 rp).

Taizu · 05/21/09, 7:02 PM

Trying to justify the new rotation now that 4p t7.5 is not as good as it was. I needed to run the numbers for myself, but I am pretty sure there are some others who also want to know.

Assuming IT glyph and 17/51/3,

1 Disease ("old" rotation)
IT Ob BS Ob = 25 + 20 + 10 + 20 = 75 RP per rotation
4 GCD, with 2.33 FS per rotation
with 4p t7, RP gain is 85 RP per 10 seconds = 2.66 FS per rotation

2 Diseases in the OP
IT PS Ob BS BS = 25 + 10 + 20 + 10 + 10 = 75
Ob IT PS IT IT = 20 + 25 + 10 + 25 + 25 = 105
= 180 RP per 20 seconds
5 GCD with 2.8 FS per rune rotation
with 4p t7, RP gain is 200 RP per 20 seconds = 3.125 FS per rotation

TL;DR
If you play in BP, the old 1 disease rotation fits perfectly as you'd spend either 6 or 7 GCDs per rotation (9 to 10.5 seconds).
The 2 diseases rotation in the OP falls short if you play in BP, as to take advantage of the extra RP you'd have to spend 7-8 GCDs per rotation. This is doubly true if you are still wearing 4 piece T7. This is not even counting the AMS 'abuse'.

To fully take advantage of the 3.1 2 diseases rotation, you'd need to use between 7-8 GCD (8-9 GCD if you are still using 4 piece). UP will definitely provide that.

Erekose · 05/21/09, 7:56 PM

Originally Posted by Synia

I agree entirely with this, given my personal experience. I have found that in Ulduar, there are some fights where, clearly, UP can provide faster damage in certain phases (such as on XT's heart phase or the brain phase on Yogg), playing in BP has a fluidity in it that, to me, feels more comfortable and controllable when I use it. Using a standard two-disease rotation (and modifying it as the situation might require) that prioritizes keeping up FF and using FS when able, I might never be out more than one blood rune, and that is on a rare occasion; usually I try to refresh FF/PS at around the same time (to benefit having both up for Obliterate for the four-piece bonus) but have recently been aiming to prioritize FF and throw PS up when I have the unholy rune to do so.

To add to what Valtiel stated, whenever I use UP, it feels very unstable and that the slightest mistake can absolutely destroy my rotation and cost a loss of several hundred DPS. While I agree that UP is likely superior if played in a completely perfect manner, the human factor is too much of an issue for me to use it viably. Given my play style (which is what many people should probably take into account), my own conclusion is that UP has its place, particularly on fights where one benefits from pushing out a lot of damage in a short time. BP seems better, to me, when you are able to stay on a target and build up your damage, albeit with a slower GCD. I think that a subject that could be brought to discussion (as I do not recall having seen it over the course of reading the Frost threads) would be presence dancing and if there are fights/appropriate times when it is worth the cost of an unholy rune to switch into UP.

I will, however, attempt to begin using IT more often to take up the death runes, which I have not tried before.

Edit: Although I realize that the extra RP might mess with the rotation and a bit of a DPS loss, which could force the need for UP. Quite the predicament.

Wow Web Stats -- For relevance of two-disease, primarily-BP 17/51/3. For some reason, it did not save Ignis or Mimiron, to which point the person who uploaded is not sure as to why. We are still progressing on Yogg due to lack of attendance for the duration of 3.1 thus far.

I don't particulaly understand how a rotation done with a 1.5 sec GCD has more 'fluidity' than a 1 sec GCD, in fact I would say the exact opposite. For me, BP feels like im wading through lag when compared to UP.

The comment about 'slightest mistake destroys rotation' also bugs me, because in my experience its the complete opposite. In BP if I get any sort of interruption to my extremely tight rotation (especially with Rime procs and AMS soaks) I've just fallen behind on GCDs, whereas with UP you have lee-way and if something gets dodged no worries you have 50% more GCDs in which to utilize your abilities. UP is the best presence for when the 'human factor' comes in to play in my estimation.

That parse you posted...was that done in your current gear on the armory? Because you're almost all Ulduar geared out W/ Vengeful Heart...your gear level is capable of outputting much, much higher than 8.5k on Hodir and 5.5 on XT, and I'm fairly certain its because you're not using an optimal rotation/presence. Your gear is equal to or better than my own, and my dps is much, much higher using the new ITx6 rotation or the IT PS BS BS OB - OB IT IT PS IT rotation. I say this not to brag; I do not possess in-game capabilities that you do not, and truly wish that other people get to see the fun dps numbers as well. Please try a different rotation..it might suck at first until you get used to it, but considering the current state of Frost, RP generation via IT glyph, FS w/ Vengeful and the nature of the fights in Ulduar I cannot imagine a situation in which BP > UP. I am of course open to well constructed arguments.

I mean, look at some of Kroot's parses, he's doing like 12.5k on Hodir and 8.2k on XT in UP...that's damn impressive.

Lollersk8er · 05/21/09, 8:29 PM

Originally Posted by Erekose

I mean, look at some of Kroot's parses, he's doing like 12.5k on Hodir and 8.2k on XT in UP...that's damn impressive.

It's not that much impressive. Hodir dps is all about getting lucky with buffs and at XT you can chain hearts for some insane damage. Vezax or Thorim P2 are much better bosses to compare dps.

concept84 · 05/21/09, 8:59 PM

Originally Posted by Lollersk8er

It's not that much impressive. Hodir dps is all about getting lucky with buffs and at XT you can chain hearts for some insane damage. Vezax or Thorim P2 are much better bosses to compare dps.

Yes Kroot puts up high numbers on the gimmick bosses but his overall DPS on defeated bosses for 5-13-09 raid night shows around 5600 DPS, and given his current gear shows proof that a rotation in UP that includes some IT spam (although not ITx6) is comparable to both Unholy and Blood using an optimized spec and rotation on mostly every boss fight in Ulduar. From what I can gather his parses also show us that this new rotation with T8 also outperform the previous "best" Frost specs and rotations, furthering us towards the goal of this thread which is optimizing Frost DPS in progression content.

Synia · 05/21/09, 9:01 PM

Originally Posted by Erekose

I don't particulaly understand how a rotation done with a 1.5 sec GCD has more 'fluidity' than a 1 sec GCD, in fact I would say the exact opposite. For me, BP feels like im wading through lag when compared to UP.

The comment about 'slightest mistake destroys rotation' also bugs me, because in my experience its the complete opposite. In BP if I get any sort of interruption to my extremely tight rotation (especially with Rime procs and AMS soaks) I've just fallen behind on GCDs, whereas with UP you have lee-way and if something gets dodged no worries you have 50% more GCDs in which to utilize your abilities. UP is the best presence for when the 'human factor' comes in to play in my estimation.

That parse you posted...was that done in your current gear on the armory? Because you're almost all Ulduar geared out W/ Vengeful Heart...your gear level is capable of outputting much, much higher than 8.5k on Hodir and 5.5 on XT, and I'm fairly certain its because you're not using an optimal rotation/presence. Your gear is equal to or better than my own, and my dps is much, much higher using the new ITx6 rotation or the IT PS BS BS OB - OB IT IT PS IT rotation. I say this not to brag; I do not possess in-game capabilities that you do not, and truly wish that other people get to see the fun dps numbers as well. Please try a different rotation..it might suck at first until you get used to it, but considering the current state of Frost, RP generation via IT glyph, FS w/ Vengeful and the nature of the fights in Ulduar I cannot imagine a situation in which BP > UP. I am of course open to well constructed arguments.

I mean, look at some of Kroot's parses, he's doing like 12.5k on Hodir and 8.2k on XT in UP...that's damn impressive.

Surprisingly, I had higher numbers before on Hodir before. 9.8k with Armageddon if I remember correctly, as a matter of fact -- I think that I can partly attribute that low value to the fight itself, and the fact that some people in my guild don't understand how it works very well (watching threat was a major issue). If I can't manage to get the crit buff, very obviously my DPS will suffer a bit. As for XT, I may have had a couple more times to run out of combat, leading to a few mistakes. We have had problems in 3.1 (mostly with attendance of our better-geared raiders) and raid performance on the top end has suffered a bit as a result, I think. I certainly don't think that I can't improve, which is why I've read the new thread as well as the old one, but you know how it goes. A few bad apples can sometimes spoil the whole tree.

As for the whole BP vs. UP comfort issue, it just feels odd to me whenever I use UP under Frost because I get points where I sit and wait for runes, and I'm really just not used to it, so BP feels more proper. Of course, I can use HoW as a filler/10 RP generation and usually there is at least one rune available afterward, but it seems like I'm still RP starved even if I'm using IT. On the other hand, if I am using BP and try to use IT a bit more, I can't keep up with the runes, which would definitely be a bit of a loss. My "destroying DPS" comment was a little bit of an exaggeration, but more to the point that it is less difficult for me in my present playstyle to ruin my rotation under BP than it is UP. Perhaps I am not using it enough, and a change in rotation to provide more lenience towards IT will lead to higher numbers. It had only appeared to me as if IT was not as good any more because no one really ever seemed to mention it in the old thread once 3.1 dropped. I was never an ITx6 spammer, though, even back then.

We are working on Yogg tonight, so it is not the best means of measuring DPS compared to other fights, but I will be certain to try it out, see how it goes, and report back.

Edit: I have switched to 20/51/0. I don't need the 3% hit because my hit is at 335 right now due to gear and it will allow for more ITs.

Arokh · 05/21/09, 11:26 PM

Originally Posted by Darkside

This thread can never have too much theorycrafting, please keep it up.

Derailing the conversation about Blood Tap ever so slightly, I have an interesting observation to report that I have never seen brought up before. If you use BT after using one of your Blood Rune, but before the other, you will end up with 2x Death Runes. It works something like this:

BBUUFF -> Blood Strike
dBUUFF -> Blood Tap
DDUUFF

Where lower case letters indicate runes that are on cooldown. I make use of this trick at the beginning of every boss fight to insure that I am not RP starved for the first 10s or so.

Yeah, it refreshes a blood rune basically that is on cooldown, and it transforms a blood rune into a death rune. It doesn't have to be the same rune though so if one is on cooldown and a death rune already, it simply takes the other blood rune that is not on cooldown and transforms it.

It's this way for some time now, and personally, like Taizu mentioned it, it fits perfectly with the rotation for my unbreakable armor/deathchill macro.

Tsukigato · 05/22/09, 12:50 AM

Sorry in advance if this has been brought up before (just finished a lousy raid, didn't read all 4 pages), but I had a question after reading through the OP. As far as consumables go, it says the Insane Strength Potion + UA, but what are your thoughts on popping Indestructible Potions (especially one on the pull and one during) for 2-4 minutes of +97ap (Before Unleashed Rage/TSA, etc)? This is what I've been doing for a while now.

Also I don't know how much it helps, but I'll link our guild's meters just for more numbers on 17/51/3 as that is what I normally am for most fights, since I figure more meters the better (Hodir and Thorim Hard mode down so far). I'll give the IT spec out next raid. WoW Meter Online - Combatlog Replay in Engrish (Forgive some of my dps, since I tend to drop on fps to 2-5 a fair amount of the time).

Erekose · 05/22/09, 2:11 AM

Our parser got borked but I was able to SS recount from our Yogg kill just now. 6.2k DPS with ITx6 and it could have been better

Taizu · 05/22/09, 3:43 AM

Yogg saron is as far away from ideal fight as it can possibly be. There are a lot of things to do/not do in this fight, meter is pretty much useless. The keepers inflate your DPS, DPS time is probably 80%-90% max, lots of stop and go DPS on p2, multiple guardians up on p3, running out to regen sanity, etc etc.

I'd say the only fights that we can 'reliably' compare our DPS would be Ignis and Vezax. Other fights, while good to compare performance, really fall short to provide any insights as there are a lot to the fight beside tank and spank.

Erekose · 05/22/09, 4:07 AM

Originally Posted by Taizu

Yogg saron is as far away from ideal fight as it can possibly be. There are a lot of things to do/not do in this fight, meter is pretty much useless. The keepers inflate your DPS, DPS time is probably 80%-90% max, lots of stop and go DPS on p2, multiple guardians up on p3, running out to regen sanity, etc etc.

I'd say the only fights that we can 'reliably' compare our DPS would be Ignis and Vezax. Other fights, while good to compare performance, really fall short to provide any insights as there are a lot to the fight beside tank and spank.

I would argue that your DPS on tank and spank fights is less important then your DPS on the more complicated fights like Yogg. I don't know why everyone obsesses over the more simplistic bosses to DPS on. It's not like each individual raid instance has different keeper buffs, or the sanity mechanics change depending on what server you log into. One of the points of discussion at this moment in time is whether or not ITx6 is viable/competitive and we need data to see if it performs well.

For previous weeks on Yogg I have been Blood with over 50% passive ArP and I thought Blood was super-ideal for brain phase DPS (DRW is up every time), but I rarely would get close to 6k let alone surpass it handily.