Raiding as a Tree - Page 13

Kamileon · 02/01/08, 6:41 PM

These does make spell haste better than useless for trees, but if we are going to use spell haste, it will be most effective in a stairstep way. After you can maintain a 4 GCD cycle, or a 5 GCD cycle, any extra spell haste between that and the next "jump" to an additional GCD cycle isn't really used.

Also, not all fights need all of your cycles used, so I would see having a spell haste set that they use with enough haste rating to get them to the next cycle level based on their lag for fights where they need one more. For me, this would be hyjal trash as we use 5 tanks there, or RoS. I'm not normally used for bloodboil group healing, but I *could* if I could get to 5 cycles. I don't think at that point a Druid is still the best choice for bloodboil healing, as compared to CoH, as rolling 5 LBs would take 100% of the Druid's attention.

The best application of this I can see is for the higher latency druids that have trouble or cannot make a 4 GCD cycle, as that is a more realistic case where a smaller amount of haste would be sufficient to add another cycle.

giansm · 02/01/08, 7:06 PM

The implications of 5 GCDs per cycle goes beyond lifeblooming 5 targets. It also lets you lifebloom four while rejuvenating two (Council), or keep up lifebloom+rejuv on three (Bloodboil, Shahraz).

Assuming haste reduces the GCD using the same formula as it does for regular casts, the GCD would be:

GCD with haste = 2355 / ( H + 1570 ),

where H is your haste rating. This works out to a 1.5s GCD with zero haste and a 1s GCD with 785 haste. I'm not exactly sure how latency affects instant casts, but assuming it adds a single-latency delay between each one, then the GCD required to get off five casts is:

GCD needed = (7 - L*5)/5 = 7/5 - L = 1.4 - L,

where L is your latency in seconds. This means to achieve five casts per cycle with no lag requires 113 haste rating. With 100 ms, you need 242 haste rating. With 150 ms, 314 haste rating. With 200 ms, 393 haste rating.

There aren't that many haste items available to druids. The list, from best to worst (in terms of the haste vs heal tradeoff) is basically:

[Dark Blessing] which replaces any of various weapon choices
[Blessed Band of Karabor] which replaces [Band of the Eternal Restorer] or [Jade Ring of the Everliving]
[Botanist's Gloves of Growth] which replaces [Thunderheart Gloves]
[Brooch of Nature's Mercy] which replaces [Nadina's Pendant of Purity], [Lord Sanguinar's Claim], [Vindicator's Pendant of Salvation], or [Emberspur Talisman]
[Shroud of the Highborne] which replaces [Shroud of Forgiveness] or [Shroud of the Final Stand]
[Bracers of Renewed Life] which replaces [Rejuvenating Bracers]
[Belt of Primal Majesty] which replaces [Life-Step Belt]
[Shoulderpads of Renewed Life] which replaces [Thunderheart Spaulders]
[Achromic Trousers of the Naaru] which replaces [Kilt of Immortal Nature] or [Leggings of Eternity]

If the assumption about latency is correct, it's difficult to get to even the 242 haste required for a 5-GCD 100ms latency cycle (you would need weapon + 2x ring + gloves + neck + cloak + bracers + belt). If you managed to do this, the loss in +healing would be minimal, somewhere around 30 or 40 +healing depending on how you gemmed things. This is mostly due to the high +healing on the haste gloves, rings, and neck. There would be a substantial loss of both mp5 and spirit, somewhere around 80-100 spirit and 40-50 mp5. If you could amass the gear it would probably be worth it on fights with 3 or more tanks, and definitely be worth it on fights with 4-5 tanks, assuming you could overcome the mana problem.

Norfair · 02/01/08, 7:11 PM

Originally Posted by Lailoken

On the WoWWiki page about haste is this formula:
Hasted Speed = Weapon Speed / ( (1+(Haste 1 %/100)) * (1+Haste 2 %/100)) * (1+(((Haste Rating 1 + Haste Rating 2 + ... )/100)/10.52)))

Using that you can calculate what you need (someone let me know if my math is just plain wrong):

*calculations*

Not very likely unless you're trying to gimp yourself. However, you do have to consider not only the possibility of item changes in Sunwell, but this haste change may be foreshadowing things to come in WotLK. Perhaps with insane item budgets and Inscription the GCD will be easily knocked down to 1.3 seconds.

The math seems ok, but you are using melee formulas. Check this page. It also says that "if you could cast 100 spells before, you can now cast 101, then it's 1% increase". This is correct if you look at 150 seconds: before you could cast 100 gcd's, now you can cast 150. An increase of 50%. So therefore 50% * 15.7 = 785. The is the (correct) formula is also given on that page:

New Casting Time = Base Casting Time / (1 + (Spell Haste Rating/1570))

So:

1.0 = 1.5 / (1+(SPR/1570))

1.5 / (1+ (SHR/1570)) = 1.0

1+(SHR/1570) = 1.5

SHR/1570 = 0.5

SHR = 785

Phoe · 02/01/08, 7:46 PM

Been going over the numbers and gear myself; yeah unless Blizzard add haste items with actual regen on them, this is not worth doing for the extra spellcast imo. Think i'll keep my mana regen high (which is already lower than similarly geared Priests, even after focusing my gems/enchants on it).

Although I do get the feeling Sunwell bosses will show us more alternatives for this - with such an alteration to spell haste mechanics, haste gear for every caster will undoubtedly drop frequently in there.

Kamileon · 02/01/08, 8:37 PM

Comparing your regen to similarly geared Priests is completely irrelevant, as you are not a priest, nor are you using priest spells. Is your regen enough for you? Are you running oom?

Kelyas · 02/02/08, 4:28 AM

It's a bit premature, but with CM posts on spellhaste reducing global cooldown, wouldn't that make it a *VERY* sought after stat for lifebloom rolling? That's a potential of 5 total rolls going down at once, with a second to spare. Granted, there would be other mechanics to it (ie: new rotations), but overall it's a vast boost. Perhaps when the patch goes live/numbers are crunched, someone can figure it out on what is exactly needed to maximize the rollin.

Phoe · 02/02/08, 8:50 AM

Originally Posted by Kamileon

Comparing your regen to similarly geared Priests is completely irrelevant, as you are not a priest, nor are you using priest spells. Is your regen enough for you? Are you running oom?

Yeah fair enough, guess my point should have been that I would run oom with haste gear on far too often/easily.

And Kelyas please see a few previous posts for the actual amount of haste needed to get that extra spellcast (it's 785 haste according to Norfair. Which is a lot ^^).

ppilatee · 02/02/08, 12:50 PM

Originally Posted by Phoe

Yeah fair enough, guess my point should have been that I would run oom with haste gear on far too often/easily.

And Kelyas please see a few previous posts for the actual amount of haste needed to get that extra spellcast (it's 785 haste according to Norfair. Which is a lot ^^).

It's 242 haste for a 1.3 second GCD, giving 100ms between casts.

Phoe · 02/02/08, 1:54 PM

Originally Posted by ppilatee

It's 242 haste for a 1.3 second GCD, giving 100ms between casts.

Oh right I see; thought 785 was necessary. Still, don't know if the loss of mp5 is worth this.

Blackpatch · 02/02/08, 3:25 PM

Originally Posted by Phoe

Oh right I see; thought 785 was necessary. Still, don't know if the loss of mp5 is worth this.

I'm excited for the change, but like any change, it needs to be tested by the playerbase before we know exactly how good it is. I don't think it's going to be as fundamental as +healing on every charge of the Lifebloom stack. I see the main initial effect as making life easier for us by giving us a little more cushion between actions during a 4 GCD per 7 seconds effort. This will make it easier for us to assess the fight environment and use consumables while working at 4GCD/7s.

Here's a little irresponsible speculation: haste will show up on druid gear throughout Heroic Magister's Terrace and Sunwell and will force a tradeoff with mp5. 5GCD/7s will be a new level of druid effectiveness reached via stacking in mid-Sunwell and may be important to later Sunwell fights (perhaps a sustained 5-MT fight with some kind of environmental mana regeneration mechanism). Sunwell farming will allow sustained 5GCD/7s with minimal mana problems.

Playered · 02/02/08, 3:56 PM

I doubt we will be forced to endure a full instance worth of Teron gloves, its more likely we will either see;
Balanced stats (ie T6) with haste ontop.
Items with only MP5 or Spirit (Aneth boots, Naj hat etc) with haste ontop.

I hope however there will still be items like T6 only enhanced, and without haste :P oh and healing jewelery/cloaks with spirit

Ribeye · 02/03/08, 9:08 PM

I have to agree with the last poster. In order for this haste change to really be usefull to us, the haste gear we are currently privvy to would have to be changed rather dramatically. My assumption when I heard this was that the change was intended for DPS classes, and any oddities that arise for healers will be purely circumstantial. I guarrantee that haste rating will always come with a trade off and I can't see building an entire Haste set just so I can roll 6 vastly inferior lifeblooms. That being said, I'd love to be proven wrong so we'll see.

In regards to an earlier post on being able to keep up a whole bloodboil grp, the key here is too just drop the lifeblooms on the entire group and let them expire. Two rotations is usually enough to keep the entire group healthy throughout the dot. I use the same practice to keep up a group on Phase 3 RoS.

There is a lot of talk about +healing to be the only way to go for endgame druids. I myself beg to differ. My guild favored other than healing classes for the spinels when we first entered BT/Hyjal and so I filled all my t6 quality gear with 11healing 2mana/5 gems. MP5 is pretty much my primary stat, although, the gear is stacked with stam, int and healing anyways. Completely buffless, i have 423/237 mana5 and it goes up substantially after buffs, a flask, my innervate, the proccing of my Memento and a Shadow Priest. While in a Shadow Priest group I can virtually heal forever using rank 8 regrowths, rejuves and a ton of lifeblooms. Using a mana pot almost seems like cheating. I won't say its better than full plus heal, cause I have not tried that, but I will say it is a great feeling having an endless pool of mana at your disposal. I will admit though, that if all I ever did was roll lifeblooms, plus healing would seem the obvious choice.

Pyros · 02/03/08, 10:07 PM

Originally Posted by Ribeye

I have to agree with the last poster. In order for this haste change to really be usefull to us, the haste gear we are currently privvy to would have to be changed rather dramatically. My assumption when I heard this was that the change was intended for DPS classes, and any oddities that arise for healers will be purely circumstantial. I guarrantee that haste rating will always come with a trade off and I can't see building an entire Haste set just so I can roll 6 vastly inferior lifeblooms. That being said, I'd love to be proven wrong so we'll see.

In regards to an earlier post on being able to keep up a whole bloodboil grp, the key here is too just drop the lifeblooms on the entire group and let them expire. Two rotations is usually enough to keep the entire group healthy throughout the dot. I use the same practice to keep up a group on Phase 3 RoS.

There is a lot of talk about +healing to be the only way to go for endgame druids. I myself beg to differ. My guild favored other than healing classes for the spinels when we first entered BT/Hyjal and so I filled all my t6 quality gear with 11healing 2mana/5 gems. MP5 is pretty much my primary stat, although, the gear is stacked with stam, int and healing anyways. Completely buffless, i have 423/237 mana5 and it goes up substantially after buffs, a flask, my innervate, the proccing of my Memento and a Shadow Priest. While in a Shadow Priest group I can virtually heal forever using rank 8 regrowths, rejuves and a ton of lifeblooms. Using a mana pot almost seems like cheating. I won't say its better than full plus heal, cause I have not tried that, but I will say it is a great feeling having an endless pool of mana at your disposal. I will admit though, that if all I ever did was roll lifeblooms, plus healing would seem the obvious choice.

So you're saying you don't drink mana pots, and this is why you need your mp5 on your gear? Honestly I'd much rather drink cheap pots on the healing intensive fights(not that many) and full gem everything with healing, but I don't run out of mana either, and since I have twice the healing on every socket, I'd probably end up at +120ish healing at equal gear level(I'm a bit too lazy to count how many sockets there is on gear tho ^^). I don't innervate myself, I innervate my spriest. I'd probably run out of mana if I was throwing regrowths all over the place tho, which I don't. Every fight I use regrowths, they have an insane overhealing %, and it doesn't even count the hot part ticking with the target at full hps. To be honest, besides putting it on the tank, I almost never bother using it, we have awesome paladins/priests/shamans, with 2s cast I'm just not landing them in time. Doomfires and Deadly Poison on illidaris(because after the heal, the hot will heal the envenom damage a bit, and people take random AE often enough that it might still be useful even after) make the most of my regrowth usage.

As for haste, currently haste comes at the cost of mp5/spirit, not healing. While the items have less healing than T6, it's mostly because of ilvls, not bad points allocation. However after the initial excitement of the announce, seeing the values needed to even get down to 5spells before 1lifebloom drops, I'm not sure it's gonna help at all. At least if tier6.5 has haste on it, it won't be totally wasted, as a little lag/mess up might not make your whole stacks fall at once.

Honestly I'm more interested in seeing if they changed anything else, and especially the so-expected pvp nerfs, and how they will affect pve. That and moonkin improvements, but that's not fit in this thread ^^.

Edghar · 02/04/08, 9:57 AM

Originally Posted by Ribeye

There is a lot of talk about +healing to be the only way to go for endgame druids. I myself beg to differ. My guild favored other than healing classes for the spinels when we first entered BT/Hyjal and so I filled all my t6 quality gear with 11healing 2mana/5 gems. MP5 is pretty much my primary stat, although, the gear is stacked with stam, int and healing anyways. Completely buffless, i have 423/237 mana5 and it goes up substantially after buffs, a flask, my innervate, the proccing of my Memento and a Shadow Priest. While in a Shadow Priest group I can virtually heal forever using rank 8 regrowths, rejuves and a ton of lifeblooms. Using a mana pot almost seems like cheating. I won't say its better than full plus heal, cause I have not tried that, but I will say it is a great feeling having an endless pool of mana at your disposal. I will admit though, that if all I ever did was roll lifeblooms, plus healing would seem the obvious choice.

If you aren't using pots, you aren't gearing yourself properly for max potential. You could easily sacrifice a lot of that mana regen to stack some extra +heal and make up for it in mana potions. You aren't doing anyone any favors.

Personally if I finish a fight with more than 10% mana and I used a super mana pot on every cooldown, I feel like I overgeared my mana regen.

Melador · 02/04/08, 1:58 PM

If you aren't using pots, you aren't gearing yourself properly for max potential. You could easily sacrifice a lot of that mana regen to stack some extra +heal and make up for it in mana potions. You aren't doing anyone any favors.

I don't use pots unless I need to, and that's pretty rarely nowadays. I barely ever get a SP in my group, and that's one of the advantages of a tree druid -- we get great efficiency while still doing solid healing. I've pretty much gemmed entirely with +11/2mp5 gems rather than +22 gems, both to have some more longevity when I don't have a SP, and because it fits all the blue socket bonuses better. Yeah, I could put 22 in my gloves, but instead I have 15/2mp5. Instead of 22 in my helm, I have 20/2mp5. Seems like a reasonable tradeoff to me, especially when longevity is one of my strengths.