Not entirely, I just assumed that the DPET of a DoT cast (even with GCD's for shifting) massively outweighed white Cat DPS even at triple Agility.

I see, I'll play around this evening then.

Another thought that hit me was that it's unlikely we're going to be in eclipse whilst going cat, so the DoTs will be weaker still. My logic for this is that we're likely to be under NGrace whenever we're in an eclipse, so in favour of not wasting NG - HotW would be best used in a non-eclipsed state, one cast away from the following eclipse so we're straight back into NGrace once leaving cat.

Yeah I remember doing 5-6k average out of HotW in my slightly weaker gear, so 20k sounds right with HotW up. An uneclipsed, non-NG DoT does well over 100k in one GCD though. Even a non-instant Starsurge does close to that. Basically you want to make full use of your yellow cat damage during HotW but good Moonkin spells are better than white DPS for filler.

I think you would shift during NG/Eclipse, after getting DoTs up (although maybe awkward since you lose Starfall when you shift? Should check that). There's no important reason to cast Eclipsed Starfires with NG on; NG helps you just as much after shifting to Cat. And this way DoTs/Starsurges you cast during HotW will have Eclipse.

Perhaps I'm convincing myself that cat camping is the way to go, as it's simpler to manage!

My DoTs do nowhere close to 100k though, my gear is still pretty hopeless though.

Starfall does drop on sshift yea.

Regards Starfall, yes you do lose that when shifting into a non-humanoid form.

I have a 463 caster staff and a 463 agility staff, so I'll try weapon-swapping a bit. Although there was a forum post on the US forums during beta that basically said it wasn't worth it unless the Feral weapon was a higher ilvl, there have been numerous iterations since. Definitely worth another look.

My preferred usage at the moment is to enter a fight at 75 Lunar, pop HotW and then go straight into the Moonkin burst cycle. Seems to work pretty well overall and means no loss of NG (except it being delayed at the start of combat, of course).

EDIT: Just tried it now and was then reminded that weapon swaps in combat incur a GCD, which isn't particularly desirable once HotW ends and you're trying to get back into your Moonkin rotation. Plus, you lose a load of Intellect from your caster weapon which means your reapplied DoTs during Energy downtime will be weaker. Overall, I can't see it being worth it unless you have a significantly better Feral than caster weapon.

Don't shapeshifts incur the same non-hasted 1.5a GCD as Weapon swaps anyway? So you'd just overlap the swap with the reshift to Moonkin. Could well we worth if a proper Feral weapon made the DPS better.

I honestly cannot remember if this is the case or not. Will test when I log on later today (it's 3am here now, haha!) and see if this can be done. I'll go log some time on the target dummies for some proper tests and come back to this thread - assuming that somebody else doesn't do so first.

Well, I've just gone and dropped an hour or so into a few different tests and I'm posting my findings here.

Constant conditions for each test:

- Buffed with Mark of the Wild and Alchemist's Flask
- On-proc trinkets removed to minimise RNG
- Weakened Armour debuff kept up via Faerie Fire
- Rake reapplied either in the last second or as soon as possible after it fell off (depending on Energy)
- Ferocious Bite only used at >=50 Energy
- When switching to Bear form, using Mangle, then Lacerate and returning to Cat form
- When switching to Moonkin form, applying both Moonfire and Sunfire and returning to Cat form
- No other debuffs present on the target dummy (i.e. No Physical or Spell vulnerability debuffs or +critical strike chance debuffs)
- Only testing during the 45s activation of Heart of the Wild; stopped all attacks once the timer expired (i.e. all DPS values are over 45s)

I did each test twice to try and smooth out the variance of combo point generation, since we still get double combo points on a yellow critical hit. I would like to do more but, with a 6 minute wait inbetween tests, it's a bit too much for me to do all in one sitting.

Also, as Fonzey said above, you can macro form shifts to weapon swaps and it incurs the same GCD.

That being said, here is what I've found:

1): Agility staff equipped, no shifts to other forms = 46116.9 DPS

2): Intellect staff equipped, no shifts to other forms = 45160.8 DPS

3): Agility staff equipped, shift to Bear form once Energy dumped = 45842.2 DPS

4): Intellect staff equipped, shift to Bear form once Energy dumped = 44817.7 DPS

5): Intellect staff equipped, shift to Moonkin once Energy dumped = 42211.5 DPS

6): Cat form w/ Agi staff equipped, shift to Moonkin w/ Int staff equipped = 48571.4 DPS

Conclusions:

Cat form with an Agility staff shifting to Moonkin form with an Intellect staff seems to yield the best results. Unfortunately, it's impossible to completely eliminate the RNG factor with these tests due to double combo point generation on crit, but I have smoothed it out as best as I can. I know it is only a small sample size but it appears that, at the moment, optimal use of HotW does require a staff for both forms and proper shifting. However, if you want to keep it simple, you can obtain a comparable amount of DPS by simply equipping an Agility staff and staying in Cat Form for the whole duration of HotW.

I hope this is of some use to you all.

For optimal bear I suspect you want to stay in form till your second mangle (1 to 3 lacerates). (Bear/Mangle/Lacerate/Shift is in form for 4.5s, interacts poorly with a 2.5s swing timer). Staying in form longer also means you get the rage for Maul (maul is off the GCD, as is frenzied regen, another rage dump with some slight utility).

That might be enough for your bear test (3) to pass your agility cat test (1). It might not though. Cat auto attack is very impressive.

Having said that, it still looks like your two-weapon moonkin test (6) is likely to be best. Thanks for posting these test results.

The only problem with that is that you've reached 100 Energy before that Mangle's GCD has finished and thus you're wasting Energy regeneration. I'm happy to retest under those conditions though, just to satisfy scientific curiosity.

I am trying to figure out a full BIS set list.

We going with the Haste staff or the main hand offhand. Also relic of yulon Relic of Yu'lon - Item - World of Warcraft thoughts? Also Mrrobot BIS seems wrong as usual http://www.askmrrobot.com/wow/gear/u...er/ronnylandau