Not really...

1. Because you will lose the diseases on the target you switched to. The duration is only 15 seconds without epidemic. Until you switch again you have lost the diseases on your last target.
2. What do you want to do else?? SS?? would be less dmg... You don´t need to switch.

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That´s wrong sorry. If you D&D at second 19.5, this runes used will be available at second 27.5. Doing nothing from 23 on... wait 4.5 seconds for the runes to come back (2-second-window). Then let´s do a SS and BB. This runes will be again available at 37.5... to start your diseases again (Just did a D&D at 34.5). 37.5/39/40.5. You lose disease uptime on every target for 2.5 seconds. Second 38 to 40.5. If you are the only UH-DK not really an Option.

If you want to use D&D in 15 second-intervalls without Epidemic, you are not really able to use BB.

I just wanted to show a 20 seconds rotation you could repeat. 20 seconds D&D fits very nice in there.

Another thing to keep in mind is the fact that if GCD availability is the primary benefit of haste for Unholy in 3.2.2, it'd be good to determine the exact point where it no longer provides needed GCDs and what it's EP would be after that point.

Basically we have 22.5 seconds currently worth of spells in the Reaping-less rotation, so the question is, considering not all of the abilities we'll be using are spells, how much haste would it take to chop 2 GCDs off the rotation?

8 of those GCDs are melee attacks, and 7 are spells.

So we need to chop probably about 2 GCDs off to make room for latency/user reaction speed.

So we'd want, what, about 29-30% haste then, optimally, no more?

Edit:Actually, I'm only coming up with 12-13 GCDs per rotation, not 15, what am I missing?

IT PS BS BS SS DC (1 second gap) SS BS BS SS DC DC is 12 GCDs+1 second, 13 GCDs when RP overflow allows a second DC during the first runeset in the 1 second gap. That's 19.5 seconds, just barely within the 20 sec rotation.

You're missing a horn and another DC in the first set.

Losing BBs is an Epidemic issue, not a Morbidity issue.

In the case you're talking about, you can instead spread diseases at 34.5 and DnD at 37.5 (which is 18 seconds from your previous one. Still a gain over 20 seconds. If you wanted to keep going, it would essentially fall like that - 15 seconds between DnD and DnD, then 18 seconds, then 15 seconds, etc). Although perhaps not the full gain, it is most certainly a gain. It just doesn't make a for a "clean" rotation. Priority system ftw?

Also, beside the point, but you should SS before BBing. SoV proccing and all.
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I was trying to figure that out earlier. With 15 GCDs, you're at 22.5 seconds. You could bring that down to as little as 19 seconds (7 spell gcds, minus 0.5s each). Optimally, you would bring it down to 20 seconds.

However, if you bring it down to 19, you have an extra second (which is an entire spell gcd at that point), which would allow you the perfect place for Ams/Revitalize -> DC dropping. So, yeah, going all the way to the spell gcd cap should be fine. I doubt you'll get all the way there in BiS, but it does mean you shouldn't worry about getting too much of the stat. There just isn't that much of it on good gear and, unlike hit and the like, it isn't worth going out of your way to cap or anything like that.

You have the rotation wrong, which is part of where you are missing GCDs. Remember, no epidemic and no reaping. Thus:
PS IT SS BS BS DC Horn DC // PS IT SS BS BS DC DC = 15 GCDs and not a single RP remaining.

Ah, right, completely forgot about Horn.

@ Qaenyin:

You miss the point of No Epidemic...

PS-IT-SS-BS-BS-DC-DC every 10 seconds. (gaining 79 RP every 10 seconds without HoW)

You have to use IT and 2x DC in 4 sec. Therefore needing a GCD of 1,33 sec with no Latency.

1.50 / 1.33 = 1.1278 You need would need about 13% Haste without Latency.

Factoring in Latency (150ms) - Seven abilities - 1050ms - Let´s say one additional second.

So you have to use IT and 2x DC in 3sec. (4GCD for melees = 6 secs, 1 sec Latency, 3 sec remaining)

You need an GCD of 1sec to do this. Therefore needing 1.5/ 1 = 1.5 -> 50% Haste

I don´t think, that you will ever reach that number as Consider mentioned.

@ Consider

You forgot the the RP gain from Butchery. I think that HoW will be a dps loss (One HoW every 100 sec would be enough). But i am not sure.

As a BloodElf you could even produce 15 RP every 2 Minutes without ever using HoW and therefore you won´t lose that GCD.

Might be better suited for the BiS thread, but I'm showing [Comet's Trail] trumping [Darkmoon Card: Greatness]. Are others getting this result with their sims as well?

edit- This is with the no-reaping, no-epidemic build, of course.

Oh, duh. Butchery. Yeah, that means one HoW every 5 'rotations' (100 seconds) as you said. It would be a dps loss beyond that (or with enough RP coming from AMS/Revitalize to make that one per 100 irrelevant), as you will always have something else you could do which actually caused damage. Always can use it on movement, of course.

Because it does less damage than the alternative? =p. That's really all there is to it. You spend 10 points to get 15% IT damage, 10% Frost damage, and 10% shadow damage. Alternatively you can spend those points in Blood and get 9% SS crit, 9% BS crit, 2 RP/5 seconds, 4% weapon damage, and however much AP 3 points of Bladed Armor gives. The latter simply wins out. Scourge Strike and DC aren't as large a portion of dps as they were in 3.1 (especially when you factor in no reaping and no epidemic rotations), and thus Black Ice doesn't scale as well.

Even without 4p t9, X/0/Y is still better than 0/X/Y.

Well, doing things the old fashioned way:
Greatness = 90 STR passive + 300 STR proc x 33% uptime
Greatness = 90 (3.05) + 100 (3.05)
Greatness = 579.5 AP

Comet's Trail = 240 AP passive + 726 Haste proc x 20% uptime
Comet's Trail = 240 (1) + 145.2 (2.29)
Comet's Trail = 240 + 332.5
Comet's Trail = 572.508

Doesn't quite win out, although due to the fact that the gap is so incredibly small, depending on how Zerack's calculates the uptimes, the latter could be slightly on top. But then you have to remember is that if all of that haste (which is quite a chunk) plus your haste on gear plus haste from a ret paladin/moonkin/etc is enough to put your gcd where it needs to be, with that point depending on your latency and such although Bensch showed the estimate abopve, it will begin to lose value.

I must be missing something, could you clarify how you end up with 79RP/10secs?

I see
PS=10RP
IT=10RP
SS=20RP
BSx2=20RP
Butchery for 10 secs = 2RP?
Total=62RP

Glyph of Icy Touch would throw in another 10RP bringing the total to 72RP

PS gives 15 RP (+5 from Dirge).
Butchery gives 4 RP (2/5seconds).

Thus, 79.

ps=15 (dirge)
it=20 (glyph)
butchery=4 per 10 secs

79RP/10secs seems correct

IF my math is right, then it would take ~1378 haste (42%) with Wrath of Air and Boomkin/Ret aura to reach the GCD cap for our spells in blood presence. I don't see this even being remotely feasible really.

That said though, getting to 1.33 GCD would require 410 haste, or only 148ish with Boomkin/Ret aura. 1.25 requires 656 or 394. Finally, 1.16 would be 937 or 675 haste.

1.25 (technically 1.28) would safely allow another spell to be cast assuming 6 in the regular rotation (or just shorten the rotation by 1.5 seconds), so haste is certainly looking good.

Thanks to the people who clarified where the extra RP comes from, shame on me for not catching that.

Now as far as rotation can anyone confirm if this would be the optimal cycle

(Horn at start) PS - IT - SS - BS - BS - DC - DC x5
PS - IT - SS - BS - BS - BT - Bone Shield - BT cancel - DC - DC

Repeat

Since Bone Shield more than supplies the extra 10RP needed every 100s you won't ever need to pause to reapply Horn (especialy if someone else is doing it or you have shammy totem)

In which case the only question is what's the best place in the rotation to break for Gargoyle and use ERW. I'm guessing right after the second BS pop Garg then burn ERW then restart the rotation from the begining.


Any suggestions?

Is it never worth starting with IT in the rotation first? Seeing as you never start a boss at 5 yard range as you'd probably die due to proximity agro. Or perhaps the small dps gain from the first few seconds is lost by messing up of the rune cooldowns? I understand the logic of doing PS first, due to rage of rivendare affecting the spells and abilities.

The Rage damage buff affects the disease damage from IT as well, so you want that buff up first. Also, waiting for you to run up to melee range means more time for the tank to build up initial aggro.

I don't see the added value to cancel BT buff as you will use it as a blood rune anyway.

Threat issues aside, throwing up IT as you run in is almost certainly the way to go post-patch, and likely on live as well. Doing so effectively buys you one extra GCD, and it is hard to think of a way to spend that GCD that will do less damage than 10% on the IT and 5 ticks of Frost Fever. Given the way runes come off cooldown, it is very easy to switch back to PS first.

Personally, I start with IT on ranged pulls, then as Diospadre says, switch back to PS first once I'm stationary, as that tends to be optimal, and hence why that's how it's handled in the OP. One GCD > 10% IT damage, however once you're still you lose that extra GCD from IT first, so 10% IT > nothing. In a perfect rotation with no extra RP from AMS/Revitalize/Etc and no lag, it wouldn't matter, as you would always be reusing both before FF/BP fell off, but yeah - that might be how it is on paper, but in reality it isn't.

Also have to remember that on half the fights in TotC you can start in melee range, due to how the boss encounters start, so it becomes a simple decision.

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So, since it was brought up by Bensch, I've been doing some more live testing of 17/0/54 in comparison to 0/17/54 Oblit and 3/13/55 Oblit - running a lot of sims and doing some good old paper math.

Apparently I was quite wrong (as I'll be the first to admit) in being so quick to discard the possibility on live since it's seemingly more than just a possibility.

Using my own gear (minus the 4p t9 bonus, which I set as not having, as it essentially does nothing currently) instead of the default 2h Uld set used in the previous tests by myself/Bensch (this is the key point, as when I/Bensch used the 2h Uld set it was shown to be a neutral dps change or, at the most, a single digit difference from live. That gear set, however, is rather weak compared to what most people have, and I myself am nowhere near BiS or anything amazing), I am getting a much larger gap between the two - over 100 dps (~7515 average for 17/0/54 as opposed to ~7400 for 0/17/54)*. Factoring out the Subversion change since it's obviously not live (Dirge was covered for 0/17/54 by adding 5 RP per 5 seconds), the first still comes out a solid 50-75 dps ahead. What more is that when I changed the tests to using the X fights of 350s length, the dps gap went up to ~170 dps, which would put it ~125-150 dps ahead.

Without some actual parses/more sims of other people, I wouldn't (yet) go so far as to call it optimal and definitely worth speccing in to - but it is pretty interesting stuff and enough (for me, anyways) to switch and see how it performs in an actual raid. So long as your gear is superior to the 2h Ulduar set in the sim (which it probably is for most raiders, as that set is fairly 'bleh' at this point), it has a lot of potential.

As such, I went ahead and added 17/0/54 to the "live server" part of the OP. Currently it's just in the specs, but I'll also add in the stat weights/rotation/glyphs/etc to all of those areas. Simple enough to do since I merely have to drag the text down from the Changes section and then slightly edit it as appropriate. I'll do it in the morning, assuming I don't forget.

*Live spec aside, these numbers also show that going forward, we'll scale better with the new 17/0/54 build than we would have with either of the Oblit builds, which is always a plus.

After playing with it for a bit, I will say this though; the spec certainly does take some getting used to - refreshing diseases when they have 5+ seconds left, and not having a single empty gcd (even with only HoWing every 100 seconds) is quite odd feeling.

I think the best part about all of this is that, assuming it is true and that 17/0/54 is currently a dps wash at worse or a dps gain more likely, that means a SS build (and thus SS) has been viable this entire time. And apparently no one - GC and the devs included - caught the possibility of it until these patch notes. So we never had to touch Obliterate, they never had to buff Subversion or nerf Dirge (although both of those changes are good for the long run, regardless). The list goes on. Very, very amusing. Haha.

Props to Bensch for being the first!

I thought Unholy used a priority system of refreshing diseases when they are about fall off, so the 3.2+ SS build instead uses a rotation where you clip diseases?

Edit: Due to a 15 second diseases in the SS build, you have to refresh diseases earlier.

EJ has a large influence, people copy/paste stuff here in other places. Whatever is posted here is usually taken as gospel, even if it is isn't totally accurate. While the Oblit build may have been unnecessary, I like that Subversion was buffed because of it, since it encourages people to go to the Blood tree which rewards people wearing Plate via Bladed Armor (I like if Plate is always better than the same item level Leather/Mail).

On another note, your thread title displays strangely, it appears you are trying to link an image when it should just be text.

We did many sims with or without reaping, with or without epidemic, with or without SS and this new 17-0-54 showed up as the winner. Even now on live-servers.

You don´t actually lose any disease-ticks. In a 20-second-rotation the diseases tick 6 times (3,6,9,12,15,18). In the 10-second rotation now they tick 3 times. Making a total of 6 ticks in 20 seconds as before. (3,6,9,13,16,19). Because of this clipping is no problem.

Thread title fixed. Not sure how that happened, but editting things at 4am will do that, I suppose.

You actually do lose some disease ticks (which is why 4p t9, although still incredible, has a lower EP value in the stat weights), or at least the simulator believes you do - and I'm inclined to believe. A better way to think of it is not how many disease ticks you have but how many you lose - in a 20 second rotation, you apply them once, losing somewhere between 0-3 seconds of diseases ticking (even if they wouldn't have ticked during that time). In a 10 second rotation you apply them once, losing between 0-3 seconds of diseases ticking, thus it happening twice as often, meaning you're losing more time. The reason why simply looking at the number of ticks doesn't work is because where Oblit builds do have a clean 20 second rotation, SS does not - it's over 10 seconds (which makes it over 20), as previously discussed in terms of haste.

Anyways, some pic proof:

(The reason the numbers in these two are both about 50 dps higher than the ones I previous offered was because draenei aura was turned on. They both gained almost the exact same dps from it, so it wouldn't have changed anything in my previous post)

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