I did some simulations and on-site testing using 0/17/54 (Obli UH) and 17/0/54 (SS UH). I couldn't really be bothered to get any raid buffs so I just went into the live test by whacking at target-dummy selfbuffed. In order to reduce the random element I stopped meters at few points, run them again and made sure I used gargoyle exactly as many times in both specs. Results on sims and live are:

Simulated DPS, "Ulduar Set" 0/17/54: 6984
Simulated DPS, "Ulduar Set" 17/0/54: 7025
Difference ~40 dps

Simulated DPS, "My currect gear" 0/17/54: 7021
Simulated DPS, "My current gear" 17/0/54: 7063
Difference ~40 dps

Live testing DPS, no raid buffs, "My currect gear" 0/17/54: 3633
Live testing DPS, no raid buffs, "My currect gear" 17/0/54: 3762
Difference ~130 dps

So yeah, as surprising as it seems Scourge Strike spec look viable even at current live realm as long as you use the PS - IT - SS - BS - BS - DC - DC rotation.

Blood Tap - Bone Shield Usage is a bit wonky.

PS - IT - SS - BS - BS - BT/Bone Shield - DC - DC -- Here, the rune you use for PS comes off cooldown before you can cast Bone Shield, so it gets consumed instead of the death rune. Then, the unholy rune you used for SS comes off cooldown before you can cast SS, still leaving you with that death rune. This results in a very odd set of runes that gets pretty confusing.

Note that this rotation works just fine on the very first set of runes you use, but subsequent cycles will produce the cooldowns that screw everything up.

PS - IT - SS - BS - BT/Bone Shield -BS - BT/Bone Shield - DC - DC -- This uses blood rune 1, then turns blood rune 2 into a death rune, allowing you to use Bone Shield before your unholy runes come off cooldown, avoiding the problems in the above set. However, this causes you to lose a blood strike.

PS - IT - SS - BS - BS - DC - DC
PS - IT - SS - BS - BS - BT/BShield/CancelBT - DC - DC
PS - IT - etc - etc -etc

Is how I handled it. All it does is cause you to lose a gcd (which is no different than any other spec), but it doesn't mess up your rotation in the long term - I wasn't having the rune for PS come off cooldown before BT/BShield, even beyond the first, although it is admittedly a very small window. You have about 0.5 seconds (depending on your haste/latency/etc), which is plenty of time for an instant cast.

That said, there is a potential solution if you have that problem for lag or whatever reason: Simply switch IT and PS, as previously discussed. With neither disease ever falling, even with a ton of RP from AMS/Revitalize, it would make zero difference in this spec.

Yeah, i just forgot about our actual rotation being a little bit longer than 10 seconds. Haste anyone?

Just another question. I´m actually simming the new unholy DW-Topdog. But where should i post my results?

Both threads or only the DW one?

I´ll just give a hint. The new unholy-rotation will actually be the best one for DW Unholy. On live and when 3.2.2 hits respectively.

3-13-55 (don´t having 4PCT9) / 15-0-55 +1 (only with 4PCT9) - whenever you break 4PCT9 3-13-55 will again become better.

I´ll post my exact results in the DW Thread later this weekend.

I've yet to play with the sumulator since I do most of my reading/theroycrafting at work so I'm curiuos about some actual figures here.

I have 1 complete rotation clock at 10.5s on paper (latency not accounted for, 0 haste)
now to add latency, say 200ms which seems to be average for me I have .02x7 = 1.4 s
so total is just shy of 12s

Now for the Rune CD grace period. I was under the impression that the way it works is
Full Rune CD (10s) - Time off CD and for this rotation the you wont have anything off CD for more than .5s + latency so then runes should CD at around 9s?
The reason why I'm asking is because I'm trying to understand how Unholy rune might overlap with BT/Boneshield as I'm seeing them at 2s apart (that's with PS before IT)

I'm still curious about the optimal Gargoyle use as well, since using Garg instead of DC1 and EWR instead of DC2 seems like a waste of EWR, you might as well wait for the next rune to come off CD (maybe throw in a Horn) and continue with your regular rotation. In which case EWR just doesnt provide any added benefit in terms of burst DPS as the rotation is already completely full and would be saved for a serious messup or AoE.

Ok, let me see if I can summarize this. The ppl. testing on this thread have found that the current 3.2.2 PTR build on the first page of this thread (17/0/54 no epidimic or reaping), are also finding it to be the best for live atm. With the exception that the 4pc bonus is still broken on live. However, it seems that the stat increase for the pieces from trophy for having 4pc. t9, will make up for the APE lost from 2pc t8 bonus?

Has anyone considered putting 1 BS in the very beginning of the rotation for 17/0/54?

This would proc Desolation, possibly 2pt9, and also has a decent chance of proccing trinkets and/or FC meaning that your diseases would hit harder for that rotation in addition to the extra (1 or 2) SS...all you lose is the disease damage scaling from the first BS.

Additionally you could use Blood Tap immediately after using that first BS meaning that your two Blood runes are now Death runes for an additional SS in the first rotation, making your opener:

BS BT PS IT SS SS DC HoW DC

then return to standard PS IT SS BS BS DC HoW DC

This would only be effective on the first rotation as you need to use Blood Tap after this for keeping up BS from that point on. Thoughts?

The new Unholy build does not get Reaping, so no death rune from BS.
You could try it, since you refresh diseases with this build pretty often, it doesn't seem worth doing.

Note on a random thought, if you didn't have the T9 sigil you could do a PS IT BS BS SS DC DC rotation instead for more dps (due to no sigil strength proc and 2x BS doing more damage than SS).

DW one.

Unless it's strong enough to make going 2h Unholy DPS plain stupid (kinda like how Frost DW did that to Frost 2H), in which case, by all means, share here. This thread would either be completely adjusted or just plain closed if 2h Unholy had no chance of competing. I doubt that becomes the case, but I suppose it's possible.

Gargoyle can be used the same as ever, replacing a DC. You seem to make some connection between when you use Garg and when you use ERW - there really isn't any. ERW (not EWR =p) is certainly tricky to use, however. The best time is probably after your second Death Coil, at which point you should Scourge Strike (twice, if you can, although the runes might only be up for it once), pop ERW, Death Coil, and then continue with the beginning of your rotation (PS - IT - etc, etc, etc). That would be a slight bump in burst dps - gaining an SS and DC in the time during which you would have just been doing PS/IT, although that PS/IT is pushed back, not replaced - and one which wouldn't mess with your rotation long term. Still, it's negligible, and best off saving for a serious messup/AoE, imo.

It depends on which pieces you are swapping out for, and whether they are 232, 245, or 258. Simply multiply out the EP values to figure it out - or just plug the stat weights into wowhead for it to automatically generate the scores for you.

It's not worth doing. PS + IT comes very close to the damage of SS (within like 200ish), except for that fact that those two abilities generate twice the runic power. Now you might be thinking "Why don't we just skip SS altogether then", but you don't want to do that for three reasons: 1) GCD constraints, 2) Sigil of Virulence (how they plan to top SoV in Icecrown is a mystery to me. It's just so incredibly strong), and 3) Increased Disease Clipping.

As to extra BS's, there should never be an opportunity where you can BS twice before diseases fall as well as do your two DCs before diseases fall. And DCing without diseases hurts. Bad. Not to mention you might end up losing more disease damage do the time the mob would sit without them then you would just clipping them early.

I did some simple math but I might be wrong ofc. Used the values from OP.

Since I have 2pct8 bonus atm which is 118.64 EP and I was considering swapping T8,5 head for t9 ilvl 245 head.
Using wowhead and values from OP the stat differences are:

26str * 3,05 - 79,3
11crit * 2,1 - 23,1
74exp * 1,65 - 122,1 (this wont cap my expertise)

-49ArP * 1,30 - -63,7

total: 160,8 EP
(there is also the gain of 101 armor but I didn't include that since I'm not entirely sure how the mechanic works. Is it 5 AP per 180armor and next 5 AP when you reach that next 180 or does it also work without the 'full chunks'. example: 100 armor = 2,777.. AP ?)

which is a gain of 42,16 EP from losing tier8 bonus and gaining a new shiny helmet with awesome stats.

Is this right? I know that EP depends on my current gear etc but roughly it should be a gain rather than lose in DPS?

Also since 4pct9 is based on melee crit does the agi/3% inc dmg meta gem beats crit rating/3% meta gem or is there still any value considering IT, DC, BB and DND? I guess the difference is minor.

Your numbers are pretty much right. It's the same trade off I made - t8.5 helm for t9 245 helmet - and I recall figuring it out to be worth it.

You should already be using [Relentless Earthsiege Diamond] over [Chaotic Skyflare Diamond]. Even ignoring the effects of 4p t9, the fact that the former has much laxer requirements (one blue gem and one yellow gem, which you cover with a [Design: Nightmare Tear]) as opposed to the latter (two blue gems, only one of which can be a [Nightmare Tear], meaning the other has to be a piece of junk [Sovereign Dreadstone], which is kinda fail) pushes it above. The difference is very slight either which way - just a couple stats - but Relentless certainly wins out if you are gemming properly.

Crit is much better now than it used to be, so you might be right. It's worth another look especially if you have 2 pieces of gear with a 6 Str socket bonus.

The thing you have to remember is that as long as you can get a 4 str (or stronger) socket bonus from using a [Fierce Ametrine], you will want to use that [Fierce Ametrine] over a [Bold Cardinal Ruby] regardless of meta-requirements, thus you make a mere 1.5 AP sacrifice to use Relentless (if you are using [Nightmare Tear] to get a 6 str bonus, as 6 str + 10 agility is 1.5 AP behind just 10 str) as opposed to not having to worry about meta requirements.

On the other hand, if you are using Chaotic, you have to use that [Nightmare Tear] (which with a 6 str bonus is a 1.5 AP loss over a raw str gem, as already shown), and then a blue gem (which with a 6 str bonus is a 4 str - or 12.2 AP loss) - thus you lose a total of 13.7 AP. That's a difference of 12.2 AP.

The difference between Relentless and Chaotic, pre-working-4p t9 is 13.23, meaning that you would gain 1.03 AP (13.23-12.2) with the latter.

However, that requires you to have at least two separate pieces of gear, each of which have exactly one blue socket (and then zero yellow sockets - unless you aren't hit capped, in which case yellow sockets are fine - and any number of red sockets), and each of which give socket bonuses of 6 strength (or greater).

So, yeah. I was a bit hasty, I suppose. It does depend on your gear. If you meet that rather specific gear criteria - which I personally don't, but it is certainly possible to do so - then Chaotic wins out. By 1 AP =p. The gap does grow greater next patch (with 4p t9 working) but not terribly so.

I have contemplated adding a gem section to the OP (one of much more depth and clarity than this post, of course), especially with the value of haste going up so much, meaning that you'll actually want to use yellow sockets on Fierce Ametrines fairly often, instead of just skipping them over for reds. I might still do it, it's just that the meta-situation is so gear specific, that it's a pain to explain and to cover every scenario.

But isn't the rotation GCD constrained already? If the dmg of 1 SS is close to IT+PS, and we can issue the extra SS instead of IT+PS to save a GCD, doesn't that net us DPS?

And for disease clipping, wouldn't it better to be clipping disease when they're on the last tick, instead of halfway through? If you clip early, then you simply have more clips in the long run. Unless I'm misunderstanding your meaning of clipping, which I believe is when you IT or PS it resets the disease instead of refreshing it?

Using too many GCDs isn't quite the same as being GCD constrained, if that makes sense. DC + UB is our hardest hitting ability, meaning it's what you want to do the most of - you are better off DCing over using runes so long as diseases are up and you're RP capped (or the next ability will overcap you or you are on an empty gcd anyways). This is contrary to how it usually is in two ways:
1) Rune abilities have usually hit harder for most specs, or
2) We haven't had that many extra non-rune-gcds before we had to use runes to refresh diseases, which this spec, despite not having epidemic, has. You have a 5 second gap after runes refresh in which diseases are still on the mob. With epidemic and a 20 second rotation, you only have a 4 second gap after every other rune refresh. That means it's less than half as much.

Thus when you ignore that factor - since it isn't a factor - it comes down to 1 IT + 1 PS or 1 SS. The latter might hit 100-200 harder, but the former generates almost twice the RP (35 as opposed to 20), which more than covers that gap, thus making it win.

As said in a previous post, however, you can't drop SS completely because of SoV (which really is that huge), disease clipping (which you want as little as possible of) and because of GCDs (going over 10 seconds in gcds per rune refresh is fine, but going over 15 per rune refresh would cause issues, and dropping SS completely could lead to that potentially).

Not really. When you clip diseases in relation to the entire duration of the disease doesn't matter. What does matter is when you clip diseases in relation to how long the diseases had until it was to tick next.

That said, using IT + PS more does increase the latter, which is why our total disease damage will be somewhat lower next patch. However, it is still worth doing:

If you do what you're suggesting (which is PS - IT - SS - BS - BS - DC - DC // SS - IT - PS - BS - BS - DC - DC), what do you do on the third rune refresh? SS - PS - IT - BS - BS - DC - DC? Then you only notice that extra SS the first time around, as you can't keep doing it (since those BS's won't convert to death runes meaning you can't go SS - SS - PS - IT - DC - DC. And you don't want to go SS - SS - BS - BS - DC - DC, because diseases will fall off before that last DC). So, yeah, it isn't something you can do repeatedly, and thus disease clipping isn't an extended issue. You can do it once per the entire fight (or per phase change or whatever it would take for you to completely restart your rotation) and that's it. And the 20 extra RP covers that one time 100-200 damage loss - thus meaning you don't even want to bother doing it that one time.

If any of that made sense.

Feel free to use the sim and try to make it work, but I couldn't get it to myself, and these are the reasons why it seems logical to me that I couldn't.

Gems seem like a BiS thread to show people what to do. However, saying use Bold for red/blue gems and a Fierce yellow/red gem if you get a 4 strength or higher bonus maybe worth adding.

You can steal my text from the Ret BiS thread:
Gems
Normally use [Bold Cardinal Ruby] and one [Nightmare Tear] for your gems. Use Hit rating [Etched Ametrine] if under the melee hit cap and [Fierce Ametrine] in yellow sockets if the socket bonus is +4 Strength or higher.

And how about not skipping reaping and using it on 2 ITs?

I never thought about that but seeing it made me do some math again just to see the values:

20str - 20 * 3,05 = 61

socket bonus 8 str - 8*3,05 = 24,4
10str = 10*3,05 = 30,5
10hst = 10 * 2,29 = 22,9
total = 77,8

socket bonus 6 str - 8*3,05 = 18,3
10str = 10*3,05 = 30,5
10hst = 10 * 2,29 = 22,9
total = 71,1

socket bonus 4 str - 8*3,05 = 12,2
10str = 10*3,05 = 30,5
10hst = 10 * 2,29 = 22,9
total = 65,6


best place to get bonus for chaotic seems to be Chestplate of the Frostborn hero which has RBY sockets and +8str socket bonus. Using +10 stats/+20str/+10str+10hst. EDIT: Best for me since that piece of gear isn't going to change for a while for me.

Also t9,5helm has +8str bonus and yellow socket. T9 gloves has yellow socket and +4str bonus, T9 pants has yellow socket and +6str bonus . It seems strange to swap out so many +10str for +4str/+10hst etc but math doesn't lie I guess.

Given the new stat weights I think it's likely that the BiS combo would change to [Legplates of Ascension] and [Koltira's Battleplate of Triumph], rather than [Chestplate of the Frostborn Hero] and [Koltira's Legplates of Triumph], depending on if the hit can be worked around.

Are we talking about a DPS gain switching to 17/0/54 right now in the Oblit gear we have (ArPen heavy)? Or is this a gain only after regearing to the new stat weights? I would prefer to switch sooner rather than later.

Also, you may want to add Algalon to the "Abusing AMS" section of the OP. You can get a full RP bar by AMSing a cosmic smash on the melee— you need to be close to where it hits, but not so close as to get knocked up in the air. ~7 yards.

Have you run that through Zerek's gear optimiser? As when I run the full 245 sets (25 man + 10 man heroic) I get shoulders, chest, gloves + legs for the 245 set, with [Sunreaver Champion's Faceplate]. I'm sure it depends a lot on whether or not you can run 10 man heroic though.

Edit: Did some more runs through the gear optimiser, seems the difference (for humans at least) between having the helm and the legs as the non-set piece is only 3 AP, so getting what you can would probably be best in that situation.

Orcs still have to drop the T9 helmet. It has way too much Exp on it.