Moonkin WotLK Talent Preview / Discussion - Page 18

Erdluf · 07/24/08, 3:24 PM

Originally Posted by Vodrin

Earth and Moon (1) (5): Its only a 3 stack with a 12 second duration, you need one proc in a 12 second duration. It should be easy to keep the buff up with 2/3 points reasonably easy. 4th and 5th points only making it take less time to get initial stack.

The stack for this makes it interesting. There will be times when you only cast 3 SF within 12s of the last proc (you also cast MF, IFF, and move out of fire ...). At that point, with 2/5 E&M, you've got over a 20% chance to have lost the stack, and you might need thirty? seconds to get it back up to full strength.

It may be that 2/5 is enough to average 20% "down-time", so that instead of a full 6% buff during the fight, you average 4.8% during the fight. Each additional talent might cut that down-time in half, so the "effective buff" for 3/5 is 5.4%, for 4/5 is 5.7% and 5/5 is 5.85%.

These numbers are made up, but actual results will undoubtedly follow a curve with that general shape. The number of points you want to take will depend on

- The actual shape of the curve (very sensitive to the encounter and spell rotation).
- Raid benefit of this buff (DPS benefit of buffing arcane/nature)
- Opportunity cost (what else you could have put those points into).

It is conceivable that if you only have 1 or 2 points in E&M, you'll want to switch to Wrath specifically to build the stack, or sustain it whenever it gets down to its last few seconds.

Roywyn · 07/24/08, 5:11 PM

Originally Posted by erragal

Currently multiple shadow debuffs (Shadow weaving + ISB + CoE) are additive, not multiplicative. I would imagine it works the same unless there's been a change in the way damage is calculated.

It would be interesting to see a higher cast time wrath at the higher rank. The real benefit of a 2.5 second base cast wrath (I couldn't see them making it an odd number) would be that at high values of haste you'd be casting the same number of spells with a higher damage coefficient.

From what we know and has been tested, all vulnerability debuffs are multiplicative.
Shadow debuffs are explicitly tested and stated to be multiplicative in http://elitistjerks.com/f31/t17008-w...ng_compendium/

The NG+Wrath implementation is a pretty awkward.
Then again, getting Starfire from 3.0 to 2.5 with NG is 20% haste. If your Wrath is at 1.2s (25% haste) and you get it to 1.0s with NG is 20% haste for one cast as well.
So it's not that bad, it still get more relative benefit as Starfire if you're below 25% haste.
Try suggestions/feedback and hope that someone notices it or something.

[Edit I]:

Originally Posted by Soultrigger

Actually Nature´s Grace for Wrath is 50% haste, or in other terms, 33.3% reduction in cast time. (probably what they meant with 50% is 50% haste)
Edit: assuming you got 0 haste, that is.

Yeah, it would be 50% haste if you ever had 0% haste

I wanted to point out that even if you had 25% haste from gear/aura/totem/etc. (i.e. 1.2s cast Wrath), a Nature's Grace proc bringing your Wrath down to 1.0s is 20% haste, which is the same haste that NG procs are for Starfire.

So, even if you cant get the full 0.5s off of Wrath, you can still get the same average relative haste as Starfire from the talent if you're below 25% haste.

[Edit II]:

Originally Posted by kryptic1

It sounds to me like you made a mistake here. You have two situations that you're comparing: a 0% haste NG starfall, and a 25% haste wrath. It only makes sense to compare the two with equal haste ratings. In that case, if I'm doing this right, 25% haste starfall is 2.4 seconds, 1.9 with NG, which is ~26% haste, compared to wrath at 1.2 seconds, 1.0 with NG, which as you said is 20%.

NG doesn't work that. Absolute cast time reductions (like NG) are applied before multiplicative effect are used.
That's why NG for Starfall will always be a 20% haste buff (until you run into GCD issues below 1s cast time).
In your example, 25% base haste makes your SF 3.0/125% = 2.4. With an NG proc, it doens't become 2.4-0.5 = 1.9 though, but only (3.0-0.5)/125% = 2.0.
And 2.4/2.0 = 1.2, which means that NG is exactly 20%.

erragal · 07/24/08, 5:20 PM

Originally Posted by Roywyn

From what we know and has been tested, all vulnerability debuffs are multiplicative.
Shadow debuffs are explicitly tested and stated to be multiplicative in http://elitistjerks.com/f31/t17008-w...ng_compendium/

My mistake, I had read through that to double check before I posted it, and was testing to see the difference between damage values in additive versus multiplicative, and made a mistake in my wording.

It's definitely multiplicative, I just suck today.

Soultrigger · 07/24/08, 5:54 PM

Originally Posted by Roywyn

From what we know and has been tested, all vulnerability debuffs are multiplicative.
Shadow debuffs are explicitly tested and stated to be multiplicative in http://elitistjerks.com/f31/t17008-w...ng_compendium/

The NG+Wrath implementation is a pretty awkward.
Then again, getting Starfire from 3.0 to 2.5 with NG is 20% haste. If your Wrath is at 1.2s (25% haste) and you get it to 1.0s with NG is 20% haste for one cast as well.
So it's not that bad, it still get more relative benefit as Starfire if you're below 25% haste.
Try suggestions/feedback and hope that someone notices it or something.

Actually Nature´s Grace for Wrath is 50% haste, or in other terms, 33.3% reduction in cast time. (probably what they meant with 50% is 50% haste)

Edit: assuming you got 0 haste, that is.

kryptic1 · 07/24/08, 7:24 PM

Originally Posted by Roywyn

From what we know and has been tested, all vulnerability debuffs are multiplicative.
Shadow debuffs are explicitly tested and stated to be multiplicative in http://elitistjerks.com/f31/t17008-w...ng_compendium/

The NG+Wrath implementation is a pretty awkward.
Then again, getting Starfire from 3.0 to 2.5 with NG is 20% haste. If your Wrath is at 1.2s (25% haste) and you get it to 1.0s with NG is 20% haste for one cast as well.
So it's not that bad, it still get more relative benefit as Starfire if you're below 25% haste.
Try suggestions/feedback and hope that someone notices it or something.

[Edit]:

Yeah, it would be 50% haste if you ever had 0% haste

I wanted to point out that even if you had 25% haste from gear/aura/totem/etc. (i.e. 1.2s cast Wrath), a Nature's Grace proc bringing your Wrath down to 1.0s is 20% haste, which is the same haste that NG procs are for Starfire.

So, even if you cant get the full 0.5s off of Wrath, you can still get the same average relative haste as Starfire from the talent if you're below 25% haste.

It sounds to me like you made a mistake here. You have two situations that you're comparing: a 0% haste NG starfall, and a 25% haste wrath. It only makes sense to compare the two with equal haste ratings. In that case, if I'm doing this right, 25% haste starfall is 2.4 seconds, 1.9 with NG, which is ~26% haste, compared to wrath at 1.2 seconds, 1.0 with NG, which as you said is 20%.

Miststorm · 07/24/08, 9:51 PM

Originally Posted by Vodrin

The other thing thats bugging me is the fact that we have a few talents where their 1st point is worth much more than their last.

Improved Moonkin Form (1) (3): 1st Point gives the full effect, 2nd and 3rd decreases time to proc after it comes off cooldown.
Eclipse (1) (3): Again 1st point provides the full benefit, the 2nd and 3rd only decrease the time it takes to proc after a 2 minute cooldown.
Earth and Moon (1) (5): Its only a 3 stack with a 12 second duration, you need one proc in a 12 second duration. It should be easy to keep the buff up with 2/3 points reasonably easy. 4th and 5th points only making it take less time to get initial stack.

Maybe the duration of Improved Moonkin Aura should be dependant on the points spent in it. Maybe the cooldown of Eclipse could go 2min 1.30min 1min with 1/2/3 points in it. Earth and Moon, stacks up to 1/2/3/4/5.

This I believe is the main problem. 3 points in Earth and Moon mean a 2% chance to loose the debuff when spamming SF, which is low enough so that nobody will get 4/5 points.

1 pt Eclipse with Starfire (at 30% crit) gives you a 50% chance to proc it in the first 11 casts, and 93.5% chance to proc it within 44 casts (roughly 2 minutes) with roughly 50s expected between two proc events, so for the SF proc, one point will give you a 1.7% dps boost, while the remaining two points will add less than 0.8% extra dps in total. Again, no rational person will get more than 1 point in Eclipse.

For Improved Moonkin Aura, the expected wait time to proc (with 30% crit SF again) is 30s with 1 point, 15s with 2 points and 10s with 3 points. That means 1 points gives 20% * 8/60 = 2,6% haste, 2 points 3.5% and 3 points 4% haste. For faster spells it is even worse, so taking more than 2 points in the talent is a waste.

On the bright side, it at least ensures that I do not miss out too much after having taken the required 16 points in resto.

Erdluf · 07/25/08, 12:52 PM

Look at this table (WoW 2.3, level 70, no CoE, 1200 +spell, 18% crit in caster, no tier bonus). ManaEff and DPSEff are relative to SF8.

Spell	Level	DPSEff	ManaEff
IS6	70	122%	122%
			
MF12	70	166%	65%
MF10	58	128%	66%
MF9	52	113%	67%   (+spell penalty is 63/70)
			
Wr10	68	116%	87%
Wr9	61	104%	95%
Wr8	54	95%	102%  (+spell penalty is 66/70)
			
SF8	67	100%	100%
SF7	60	97%	106%

Each of the spells above has its place. IS is most efficient. MF is most DPS. Wrath is highest spammable DPS. SF is highest spammable DPM. Nothing new.

Lets look at WotLK. Level 80, spell damage table from mmo-champion. 1800 spellpower, 18% crit in caster. 0% haste. Mana-regen from crits is now included (240 mana back from crit). I am not including Eclipse. M&E and Master Shapershifter do not affect these results. SF10 is the new baseline. Since roots are usable indoors, I'm including full-duration roots with Brambles (probably won't be terribly common, but fun to see the numbers).

Spell	Level	DPSEff	ManaEff
IS7	80	115%	100%
IS6	70	103%	135%
			
MF14	80	153%	59%
MF13	75	141%	65%
MF12	70	133%	83%
			
Wr12	79	126%	94%
Wr11	74	120%	111%
Wr10	69	118%	147% (spellpower penalty is 79/80)
			
ER8	78	170%	166%
ER7	68	164%	236%
			
SF10	78	100%	100%
SF9	72	96%	121%
SF8	67	93%	150%  (spellpower penalty is 77/80)

Except for the Debuff, there is no reason to cast IS. Wr10 is higher DPS and DPM than both levels of IS.
There is no reason to cast SF (except for Eclipse weaving). Wr10 is straight up better than SF10 or SF9. It is almost as mana efficient as SF8, but does much higher DPS.

At higher levels of Haste, Wrath would start to look a little bit worse, as NG procs start to run into the 1s GC, but IS and SF just look bad.

erragal · 07/25/08, 5:20 PM

Originally Posted by Erdluf

DPS COMPARISON.

What does this table tell us other than always use wrath and roots when level grinding? And Insect swarm is worse than ever because it can't crit for mana. (EDIT: And I don't mean this in a negative way, just curious what you feel the value of the comparisons are at a base level

)

Even at 0% gear haste, you're still proccing IMA on your first crit every 30 seconds. That's 20% wasted haste for wrath on at least one cast, potentially more if you crit again during that duration. It doesn't take into account any raid buffs (Including consumables for significantly higher spell power values)/debuffs so it's not really applicable to raiding of 10 or 25 mans. There isn't a global debuff on the level of CoE for nature damage, particularly when you take a full raid of elemental shaman/double poison rogues taking stormstrike charges there's no way you'd ever average the full 20% from stormstrike over a given encounter, and it could be a raid dps loss to deprive a harder hitting elemental shaman of those.

I think it'd be more valuable to look at things in a best case scenario, rather than at baseline.

On another note: I've read that downranking is taking much larger pentalies in beta than on live. I haven't read a test/breakdown of exactly how much, however.

Erdluf · 07/25/08, 6:14 PM

Originally Posted by erragal

What does this table tell us other than always use wrath and roots when level grinding? And Insect swarm is worse than ever because it can't crit for mana.

Even at 0% gear haste, you're still proccing IMA on your first crit every 30 seconds. That's 20% wasted haste for wrath on at least one cast, potentially more if you crit again during that duration. It doesn't take into account any raid buffs (Including consumables for significantly higher spell power values)/debuffs so it's not really applicable to raiding of 10 or 25 mans. There isn't a global debuff on the level of CoE for nature damage, particularly when you take a full raid of elemental shaman/double poison rogues taking stormstrike charges there's no way you'd ever average the full 20% from stormstrike over a given encounter, and it could be a raid dps loss to deprive a harder hitting elemental shaman of those.

I think it'd be more valuable to look at things in a best case scenario, rather than at baseline.

On another note: I've read that downranking is taking much larger pentalies in beta than on live. I haven't read a test/breakdown of exactly how much, however.

In live, CoE made SF DPS almost as good as Wr DPS, and made SF DPM much better than Wrath DPM. The logical thing to put on tier-gear was a boost to SF damage, and that is what we got. Anything that boosted SF damage was pure win.

With these numbers, CoE still leaves SF well behind Wrath. At 20% average haste (totem+gear+imf), SF10 DPS is about equal to Wrath10, but way behind Wrath10DPM. Before any hypothetical t7 bonus, your best DPS (by a long shot, even with CoE and lots of haste) is Wrath 12, and your best mana-conserving-with-high-dps is Wrath 10. A t7 bonus along the lines of the t5 bonus would help SF catch up to Wrath, but not pass it. The bonus would be almost pointless. A t7 bonus that gave 5% to Nature or Wrath would be much more valuable.

Maybe they will massively nerf downranking, so that this doesn't work. It still seems strange that in going from 77 to 80, you should get about a 20% loss in mana efficiency (before gear upgrades), but only a 5% damage increase.

Roywyn · 07/25/08, 7:46 PM

Originally Posted by Erdluf

Maybe they will massively nerf downranking, so that this doesn't work. It still seems strange that in going from 77 to 80, you should get about a 20% loss in mana efficiency (before gear upgrades), but only a 5% damage increase.

Downranking gets a pretty rough change. The data I have isn't very clear, but it seems to be something along the lines of "after the spell gets it's final value, you lose 5% scaling every level, until you get 0% scaling after 20 levels", or maybe "5-10 level after you learned the spell, you stal losing scaling linearly until you reach 0% 25 levels after learning it".
It's something along those lines, probably the first one since it's hard to make sense otherwise.

They most likely set it up in a way that the cheap BC spell will lose significant scaling at 80.

erragal · 07/25/08, 10:29 PM

The interesting thing to me is how the Moonkin mana on crit is what turns Wrath from a low DPM spell to a high DPM spell. I wouldn't be surprised if they upped the base mana cost or put a small internal CD on the mana proc.

I ran through the math myself on wrath vs. starfire, and tested it at a bunch of different points. At 2400 spell damage, 40% haste, and 30% crit Starfire becomes minimally better DPS (This is with all the scaling talents and spell specific debuffs, but NO Stormstrike). If you catch even a few Stormstrikes, there's absolutely no contest between the two. And those are potential end of expansion fully raid buffed values, if you're lucky. At lower values/potential gear levels the difference is enormous. Definitely not good news for Starfire!

All I know now is that our raid leader elemental shaman is going to kill me when I start swiping all of his Stormstrike charges in Naxx!

PsyBomb · 07/26/08, 3:33 AM

There is one last random factor to the comparison between Wrath and Starfire that we just don't have the data for right now: Inscriptions.

Thus far, only a few Inscriptions have been found, one of which is an anti-interrupt for Wrath. There is one that is a damage bonus on Fireball for mages, though, and that one has me thinking. If Starfire gets a really good inscription, it could change everything. Can someone run the numbers under the assumption that Starfire gets one that increases its coefficient by 4%? That's about the most powerful I'd be willing to give as an assumption, since the one for Wrath is also equivalent to 2 talent points.

Apaine · 07/26/08, 2:54 PM

Originally Posted by Miststorm

This I believe is the main problem. 3 points in Earth and Moon mean a 2% chance to loose the debuff when spamming SF, which is low enough so that nobody will get 4/5 points.

1 pt Eclipse with Starfire (at 30% crit) gives you a 50% chance to proc it in the first 11 casts, and 93.5% chance to proc it within 44 casts (roughly 2 minutes) with roughly 50s expected between two proc events, so for the SF proc, one point will give you a 1.7% dps boost, while the remaining two points will add less than 0.8% extra dps in total. Again, no rational person will get more than 1 point in Eclipse.

For Improved Moonkin Aura, the expected wait time to proc (with 30% crit SF again) is 30s with 1 point, 15s with 2 points and 10s with 3 points. That means 1 points gives 20% * 8/60 = 2,6% haste, 2 points 3.5% and 3 points 4% haste. For faster spells it is even worse, so taking more than 2 points in the talent is a waste.

On the bright side, it at least ensures that I do not miss out too much after having taken the required 16 points in resto.

4/5 Eatrth and Moon will probably become a standard though, because with all that movement, and coordination that is required in today's boss encounters, we should not expect that a caster group will be allowed to stay in one place for longer than 8-10 seconds... with 3/5, if you do loose the buff, getting it back up again mey be a long process.

Eclipse is only worth it really, if you are willing to weave wrath and starfire, instead of pure wrath. If you have a choice between eclipse and the master shapeshifter 4% moonkin bonus, 4% bonus wins hands down. It's just doubful you can get them both.

Apaine · 07/26/08, 2:55 PM

Originally Posted by PsyBomb

There is one last random factor to the comparison between Wrath and Starfire that we just don't have the data for right now: Inscriptions.

Thus far, only a few Inscriptions have been found, one of which is an anti-interrupt for Wrath. There is one that is a damage bonus on Fireball for mages, though, and that one has me thinking. If Starfire gets a really good inscription, it could change everything. Can someone run the numbers under the assumption that Starfire gets one that increases its coefficient by 4%? That's about the most powerful I'd be willing to give as an assumption, since the one for Wrath is also equivalent to 2 talent points.

Can you link the wrath inscription? or provide more info about it? I'd love to know how does it work. Does it stack with the talent for 100% lack of interruption?

Graze · 07/26/08, 3:04 PM

Originally Posted by Apaine

Can you link the wrath inscription? or provide more info about it? I'd love to know how does it work. Does it stack with the talent for 100% lack of interruption?

50% spell pushback resistance on Wrath. All other effects that work similar (Earth Shield and Cons. Aura) adds up to 100% resistance so yes, I guess it does.

PsyBomb · 07/26/08, 3:08 PM

Inscription - WotlkWiki - Wrath of the Lich King Information

That's where I'm getting my Inscription info, the known glyphs are a little past halfway down.

Maax · 07/27/08, 8:14 AM

Originally Posted by Apaine

Yay for inconsistent spells then. One spell crit counts, while another doesn't? That doesn't sound like blizzard to me. At least until now there was no precedence for this with other mana gaining talents.

Actually there is precedence with Master of Elements for mages, as far as I know it cannot proc multiple times on an aoe spell.

I got into the beta the other day so if there is anything you all would like me to test let me know.

Vodrin · 07/27/08, 9:59 AM

Originally Posted by Apaine

Eclipse is only worth it really, if you are willing to weave wrath and starfire, instead of pure wrath. If you have a choice between eclipse and the master shapeshifter 4% moonkin bonus, 4% bonus wins hands down. It's just doubful you can get them both.

54/0/17 Can just put the one point in eclipse, its about all thats worth it in there. 3 points between intensity, moonglow and dreamstate depending on which is the best.

Erdluf · 07/27/08, 12:02 PM

Originally Posted by Vodrin

54/0/17 Can just put the one point in eclipse, its about all thats worth it in there. 3 points between intensity, moonglow and dreamstate depending on which is the best.

17 in resto? I see 6 points in tier 3, and 10 filler points to get there.

Vodrin · 07/27/08, 3:44 PM

Originally Posted by Erdluf

17 in resto? I see 6 points in tier 3, and 10 filler points to get there.

Depends if you want to go for master shapeshifter or not, I think its worth it. Theres no real dps buffs missing out of the balance tree in that build, 2 points in eclipse which are quite weak anyway, celestial focus maybe useful on some encounters. Is intensity better than the new dreamstate, better than the new moonglow? I'm not sure but if it isn't then 57/0/14. Still the same talents but with regen shifted around. If there is changes so that more regen is needed then 14 in resto may look a bit costly.

Erdluf · 07/27/08, 6:37 PM

Originally Posted by Vodrin

Depends if you want to go for master shapeshifter or not, I think its worth it. Theres no real dps buffs missing out of the balance tree in that build, 2 points in eclipse which are quite weak anyway, celestial focus maybe useful on some encounters. Is intensity better than the new dreamstate, better than the new moonglow? I'm not sure but if it isn't then 57/0/14. Still the same talents but with regen shifted around. If there is changes so that more regen is needed then 14 in resto may look a bit costly.

I'm really questioning the 3rd point in Subtlety. It will only apply to resto spells, so it is just filler. I'd probably put that point into Moonglow (I think both Moonglow and Intensity will be better than Dreamstate, but it will depend on gear).

Maax · 07/27/08, 10:20 PM

Well CoE has been changed to affect nature (including lower ranks):

Curse of the Elements - Spell - World of Warcraft

The tooltip says it only affects nature resist but the spell data says it is both so it is likely a typo:

Spell Details

Duration 5 minutes
School Shadow
Mechanic n/a
Dispel type Curse
Cost 430 mana
Range 30 yards (Medium)
Cast time Instant
Cooldown
Global cooldown: n/a
n/a
Effect #1 [Apply Aura]: Mod Resistance (Arcane, Fire, Frost, Nature, Shadow)
Value: -165
Effect #2 [Apply Aura]: Mod Dmg % Taken (Arcane, Fire, Frost, Nature, Shadow)
Value: 10

I imagine this changes things in the Wrath vs Starfire debate.

• Adoriele · 07/27/08, 11:01 PM

Originally Posted by Maax

I imagine this changes things in the Wrath vs Starfire debate.

Apparently Blizzard doesn't want us casting Starfire. If they're trying to get us to weave, they're going to need to significantly change Eclipse.

Vodrin · 07/28/08, 6:43 AM

Originally Posted by Erdluf

I'm really questioning the 3rd point in Subtlety. It will only apply to resto spells, so it is just filler. I'd probably put that point into Moonglow (I think both Moonglow and Intensity will be better than Dreamstate, but it will depend on gear).

Yeah I didn't even realise I hit too many fillers in resto even after you said. Would probably end up 3/3 moonglow and 1/3 intensity.. 2/3 intensity and 2/3 brambles if needed.

As for spell weaving, should still be casting starfire during high haste times without eclipse. Eclipse just needs making useful. I'm sure with bloodlust, WoA totem, some haste gear, imp moonkin aura and some nature's grace procs a starfire will be higher dps than the capped wrath.

Maybe eclipse could copy the 4set PvP bonus. Procing of non-resists, not only crits.

Your Wrath casts have a 15% chance to reduce the cast time on your next Starfire by 0.5/1/1.5 sec.

Your Wrath casts have a 15% chance to increase the damage of your next Starfire by 10%/20%/30%.

or

Your Wrath casts have a 15% chance to increase the crit chance on your next Starfire by 33%/66%/100%.

Something along the lines of a wrath proc boosting the next starfire cast, with no cooldown on the proc and a short proc duration.

erragal · 07/28/08, 9:42 AM

Originally Posted by Vodrin

I'm sure with bloodlust, WoA totem, some haste gear, imp moonkin aura and some nature's grace procs a starfire will be higher dps than the capped wrath.

.

Only, it wasn't. Even with CoE affecting only Starfire, they were almost equal at a theoretical maximum gear situation in WotlK (Minus Bloodlust). With CoE affecting wrath there's no reachable gear point that would make starfire worth casting. I don't even see a reason to want haste on your gear at this point. Before the CoE change there could definitely be an argument made of casting Starfire to proc the wrath dps boost ; with CoE affecting nature, it would be too much of a dps loss unless eclipse is changed significantly (Particularly once you start including some percentage of those using stormstrike charges). At higher crit rates wrath becomes extremely mana efficient as well. As it stands right now, Starfire won't be used at all. We're going to be basically playing Diablo 2 during raids fast clicking (I use a 5 button mouse!) to try and catch our latency before wrath goes off, so anything that eclipse does will need to have a nice duration to use it.