[Balance] Mists of Pandaria 5.2, Guide and Discussion [5.3 updates] - Page 8

nephyron · 10/11/12, 6:41 AM

Thanks for the fast reply, every top parsing druid i've looked at is using an all-crit reforge.

♦ Tecton · 10/11/12, 8:49 AM

A few things to consider on that debate:

Wrathcalcs looks at single target DPS, and gives you the crit percentage that it says on your character sheet. However, if you look at some of those top parses you'll find they're getting more crits than you'd expect because the RNG played in their favour. They'll also have attempts where they are cursing life as they go without a crit for a while when it works the opposite way. This is the classic problem fire mages complain about early in an expansion (i.e. a large swing in their DPS depending upon crit luck).

The other factor is that most of the heroic encounters have a large multi-target/high movement component to them. Crit helps with both of those, increasing DPS as a result (as you'd expect).

• Hamlet · 10/11/12, 10:40 AM

Doesn't haste help with them, since all your multi-DoTs get added ticks? (Also, crit is weaker since DoTs on targets other than your main target don't get extended).

♦ Tecton · 10/11/12, 10:51 AM

The increased SS proc rate is what I was more thinking about. I could be wrong, but it does feel easier/more effective to manage heavy multi-dotting with a higher crit rate because of it.

• Hamlet · 10/11/12, 11:12 AM

Yeah, it might. Just for a quick estimate of how much each helps, a DoT tick is something like 1/15 the size of a Starsurge. So over the course of a single DoT, 1% to crit on each tick might give you around that much. It's tricky though because you use time to cast the Starsurge etc., so it really depends on exactly what you're doing.

Just overall though, it's interesting that people are giving conflicting reports of what top-parsing Druids are doing. I've not looked into it much myself. Perhaps it's a bit of a reach right now to get 5700 haste, and people are giving up a large chunk of crit to do it--but once gear is slightly better you can hit the haste mark without quite as large a blow to crit and that will get better.

Proudhorn · 10/11/12, 3:30 PM

I was pretty underwhelmed with the all crit reforge. The extra time between eclipses turns a minor timing mistake into a massive dps loss. Even if stacking crit is a theoretical gain, it seemed like a loss in practice.

I reforged and regemmed for the haste breakpoint on ilvl 464 gear and saw a benefit of 6-8k dps on 10m Feng the Accursed. More experience with the encounter probably made the larger difference, but the higher haste build was more natural to execute and less punishing for canceling a cast.

• Hamlet · 10/11/12, 10:41 PM

Moonkat nerf: Druid: Heart of the Wild Changes - Forums - World of Warcraft

mightymax474 · 10/12/12, 3:38 AM

Originally Posted by Hamlet

Moonkat nerf: Druid: Heart of the Wild Changes - Forums - World of Warcraft

Nooooooooo!!!

Latas · 10/12/12, 4:35 AM

Was WrathCalcs taking the mooncat portion of HotW into account with its dps calculations or was it just calculating the int increase? Also as far as I can tell it seems to me, at least with what tinkering around I did, that DoC is not worth it till until you get 4t14 and then it shoots ahead of HotW and NV.

♦ Tecton · 10/12/12, 4:57 AM

Originally Posted by Latas

Was WrathCalcs taking the mooncat portion of HotW into account with its dps calculations or was it just calculating the int increase? Also as far as I can tell it seems to me, at least with what tinkering around I did, that DoC is not worth it till until you get 4t14 and then it shoots ahead of HotW and NV.

I don't think Hamlet had finished nailing the HotW mechanics to add in mooncat type shenanigans.

Regarding gear/talent levels, the last time I did a check DoC takes a big jump when you get to 4t14 Normal levels of gear, then Incarnation catches back up in Heroic gear. Please note: this is only single target and doesn't take fight mechanics into account, people should still use their own judgement in terms of what talents to use in each fight.

Zantaz · 10/12/12, 11:20 AM

In the course of satisfying my curiosity about HotW, I repeated my earlier tests and found that switching out to cast Moonkin DoTs was now actually giving me less dps than staying in Cat Form. Auto-attacks were much beefier, hitting for an average of about 31k. I suspect casting Moonkin DoTs during HotW may only be worth it if you have a Yu'lon-style trinket that procs Intellect (and thus Agility for Cat) off spell hits and you're trying to force it to proc. However, I will continue to test and see if this is a pattern or merely a coincedence.

Incidentally, Windsong was also fixed. Starfall in particular procs it like crazy, to the point where double or triple Starfalls generally result in all 3 procs being up at once.

Raesu · 10/12/12, 12:37 PM

I have a question on haste break points. I usually refresh both dots at the beginning of each eclipse, and often clip the buffed dot before leaving eclipse. This seems to be a good practice and just to gauge I pull around 65k single target.

Basically my dots rarely fall off since I'm refreshing so often, and can't understand why hitting a breakpoint is so significant when dots seldom run their entire duration. Crit on the other hand has a chance to extend my buffed dots even into the next eclipse, as well as proc SS. Can someone clarify the breakpoint benefit , or if I am probably refreshing dots too often?

♦ Tecton · 10/12/12, 12:56 PM

I've not found myself needing to refresh DoTs prior to leaving on eclipse, why are you doing that? Even without SotF I am transitioning fast enough to only refresh once per Eclipse and have it fall off just as I go to apply the new set in the opposite Eclipse. You need to pay attention to where you use your SS procs, though, as using them in the wrong place can cost you an extra cast.

Raesu · 10/12/12, 3:04 PM

I guess if I have to move its making my dots run off faster thus my tendency to refresh as they are only a few sec from dropping as I leave eclipse. I'll focus more on transitioning and not having to refresh...thanks for the clarification that I should not have to clip dots leaving an eclipse!

Slippykins · 10/12/12, 4:12 PM

With the changes to WrathCalcs, the only improvement I can see over the BiS list on MMO-Champ is Jade Spirit enchant -> Windsong. Surprising, but since secondary stats are better in gems, I can see it being better on weapons too.

DPS is up at 110443.61.