Druid: Simple Questions/Simple Answers - Page 21

Starfox · 03/10/09, 9:45 PM

Originally Posted by Ashaera

Either way you obviously want to pot during an eclipse period.

Made some ingame tests, results are in image below.

Haste from various sources dont stack up in a sexy way, so in terms of pot effect only you gain the most by using it outside of heroism.

Lets look at the lowest set of numbers to get closer to raidlike stats. Assuming potion proc at the moment you proc eclipse so only discussing SF effect.
If you use the pot outside of heroism every SF becomes 0.27seconds faster.
Inside heroism that number is 0.2seconds pr SF.

In return you cast more SF's during 15seconds inside heroism than you do outside of it.
During heroism 15 / 1,63 = 9,2025 SF
Outside heroism 15 / 2,11 = 7,109 SF

Time gained:
During heroism 9.2025*0,2 = 1.84 seconds.
Outside heroism 7.109*0,27 = 1.91 seconds

So the short answer is outside of heroism, but in reality you wont see or feel any difference so do as you please.

Argument for use before 35% - You increase the "burn" period a tiny tiny bit.
Argument for use during heroism - It might be easier to time a good use of the potion here as you will have downtime waiting for gcd after a wrathcast.

Sorry, but what do you compare here, the absolute casttime reductions you get from x% haste when you already have y%? :|

Buffs	Haste%	Casttime
Nothing	1.06 * 1.1863	2.38s
Pot	1.06 * 1.33	2.11s
BL	1.06 * 1.1863 * 1.3	1.83s
Pot+BL	1.06 * 1.33 * 1.3	1.63s

Your two possibilites are:
1. 15s of pot+bl, 15s of bl, 15s of nothing
2. 15s of pot, 30s of BL
Even with 20% haste from NG (Live or PTR) you won't clip the gcd here!

ad 1.

You gain BL  chugging the pot immedeatly
15.00/(3 / (1.06*1.3388*1.3)) = 9.224 = 10 SF with Pot+BL = 16.26s
30 - 16.26s = 13.74s time on BL left
13.76/(3 / (1.06*1.1863*1.3)) = 7.498 =  8 SF with BL only = 14.68s
Now you have 14.06s left to cast your standard SF
14.06/(3 / (1.06*1.1863    )) = 5.89  =  6 SF with Nothing = 14.31s
                                        24 SF in 45.26s

ad 2.

You gain BL and begin to cast
30 / (3 / (1.06*1.1863*1.3)) = 16.347 = 17 SF with BL only = 31.20s
After SF#17 hits, you chug the pot
15 / (3 / (1.06*1.3388    )) = 7.095  =  8 SF with Pot     = 16.91s
                             -------
                                      = 25 SF in 48.10s

Gain: 1 SF
Loss: 2.84s

That was without crits, with 100% crit it goes to
ad 1.

You gain BL  chugging the pot immedeatly
15.00/(2.5 / (1.06*1.3388*1.3)) = 11.0x = 12 SF with Pot+BL  = 16.26s
30 - 16.26s = 13.74s time on BL left
13.74/(2.5 / (1.06*1.1863*1.3)) =  8.9x =  9 SF with BL only = 13.76s
Now you have 14.97s left to cast your standard SF
14.97/(2.5 / (1.06*1.1863    )) =  7.5x =  8 SF with Nothing = 15.9s
                                          29 SF in 45.93s

ad 2.

You gain BL and begin to cast
30 / (3 / (1.06*1.1863*1.3)) = 19.6x = 20 SF with BL only = 30.57s
After SF#17 hits, you chug the pot
15 / (3 / (1.06*1.3388    )) =  7.5x =  8 SF with Pot     = 15.90s
                             -------
                                     = 28 SF in 46.49s

Gain: Nothing
Loss: 1 SF and 0.5s

So it's best to stack cooldowns

And i also have a little question:

I maintain SimulationCraft's balance druid module and also worked alot in the last days on the feral implementation. My question is about the new talent Primal Gore:
For melee classes, the crit chance is reduced depending on your targets level, is this also true for those new crits on feral DoTs? Was this tested by anyone?
I did even did a forum search for 'primal gore', because it did return en empty result on this thread :/

Maltball · 03/11/09, 3:46 AM

Simple question: what is the best build to level the quickest with?,,, I have to choose between the +int/stam/sp or +stam/ap shoulders for my lil dr00d. And if possible can a talent tree link and if possible again, an order in which to get talents be provided?

I'm looking on wow forums for the time being.

kalbear · 03/11/09, 12:28 PM

Originally Posted by Comestador

Just a couple questions, the answers to which I've not been able to peg-down due to the sheer volume of some threads.

Despite gemming what I felt was a good mix of Dodge/Expertise & Stamina gems, my T7/7.5 tanking set seems to come-up short of cap on Hit, Expertise and Armor, and still leaves me feeling like my TPS peak is barely sufficient. Raid buffed, my dodge only around 39% and health around 40K. While there are a couple pieces serving double duty for Cat and Bear, the majority are now fully available for a discriminate set.

I'm looking at moving into a fulltime MT role, and having to consider some things:

Which ratings would be most beneficial to cap, in what order, and/or is there an accepted/viable shortfall range?

When considering Dodge (since we have no figures on Savage Defense, as yet): How high should I be looking to raise Dodge %, before considering other rating increases (or is it as simple as "as high as you can, without bleeding threat production")?

In considering the pending changes to feral tanking, what relative importance will Haste have among the other ratings, especially those contributing to Savage Defense (i.e., Crit% and AP)?

Last, would someone be kind enough to clarify if Naturalist and Master Shapeshifter bonus damage directly impacts the AP used to calculate Savage Defense's DS value?

For tanking, there's nothing you should really go out of your way to cap. Having 26 expertise is very good overall, but that's almost trivial to achieve with primal precision and the amount of expertise on gear now. You won't practically be able to get near the cap on armor, and hit is just not that important since you have no big abilities that only use hit (unlike all the other tanking classes). For the most part you should focus on getting higher ilvl leather gear, getting more agility and more stamina.

Dodge really is as high as you can. I would say get it as high as you can without sacrificing too much stamina, not threat. It tends to be that the pieces with high agility tend to have high threat values anyway. It's the tanking jewelry with only strength and no agility that tend to have worse overall threat characteristics.

Haste will only improve savage defense by increasing the speed of your mauls. Because maul has a slower base speed than your GCD, that means haste can at best improve 40% of your overall crit generation, give or take. Add to this that it takes a lot of haste to reduce the attack timer by 1% and a 1% improvement to haste will mean you'll get about .4% more total crits, and it's fairly unimportant. It's better than armor pen, but worse than hit, expertise, crit rating, AP or agility.

Master Shapeshifter does not increase your AP; it increases your damage. Same with Naturalist. Neither do anything for Savage Defense.

Wednesday · 03/11/09, 12:46 PM

ed. Nothing to see here.

Treehorne · 03/11/09, 4:21 PM

Quick question, sorry if its been answered before. I looked throughout the board but couldn't find a firm answer.

I understand that haste is better than crit for my Boomkin. I'm wondering if there's a firm crit percentage that I should obtain; I vaguely recall seeing something like 20% in humanoid form. Right now I have 17.6%, should I shoot for another 2.4%?

Ashaera · 03/11/09, 8:19 PM

No - 2.4% will not make or break anything. In a 25 man raidsetting you have plenty of crit from buffs, debuffs, talents & gear without actively seeking it.

17.6% in humanoid form is allready more than most high end owls use.

Comestador · 03/11/09, 10:55 PM

Thank you, Kalbear. After posting this I'd come accross the following thread, reposted from the EU forums, and was pondering the data presented. Your reply confirms my disposition toward the balanced avoidance/EH build presented. Thanks for replying, and for correcting my presumption concerning threat vs. Stamina; I'm still a bit nervous about TPS, but I've yet to lose aggro, so I'll roll with the idea that 'sufficient suffices'. *chortle*

Aldhissla · 03/12/09, 12:05 AM

Originally Posted by Comestador

Thank you, Kalbear. After posting this I'd come accross the following thread, reposted from the EU forums, and was pondering the data presented. Your reply confirms my disposition toward the balanced avoidance/EH build presented. Thanks for replying, and for correcting my presumption concerning threat vs. Stamina; I'm still a bit nervous about TPS, but I've yet to lose aggro, so I'll roll with the idea that 'sufficient suffices'. *chortle*

I was reading that thread yesterday, while most of the data made sense to me (even though it is mostly redundant now with various changes made on the PTR), one thing which I was confused about was the lowest TTL graphs. I presume lowest TTL means the shortest time it took for that tank to go from full health to dead due to boss bursting them down? If this is the case I'm kind of confused how values around 500ms are used with a swing timer between 1.0 and 2.5 seconds. Wouldn't this mean the shortest time to live is 0.5 seconds? Which seems kind of bizarre with swing timers above 1 second.

Narfherder · 03/12/09, 3:54 AM

Originally Posted by Maltball

Simple question: what is the best build to level the quickest with?,,, I have to choose between the +int/stam/sp or +stam/ap shoulders for my lil dr00d. And if possible can a talent tree link and if possible again, an order in which to get talents be provided?

I'm looking on wow forums for the time being.

I'm postive that for leveling, energy regenerate more quickly than mana; seems less gear dependent to level feral.

Esari · 03/12/09, 9:29 AM

I started feraling few weeks ago. Im getting the OPTIMAL dps cat gear..

Is 4xT6 bonus worth it for feral?
Str vs agi (for dps), other threads say agi others str. Which one is it?

charriu · 03/12/09, 10:48 AM

Originally Posted by Esari

I started feraling few weeks ago. Im getting the OPTIMAL dps cat gear..

Is 4xT6 bonus worth it for feral?
Str vs agi (for dps), other threads say agi others str. Which one is it?

4T6 depends on the peices you have and new loot you have available, I guess. With it, you want to spec imp. mangle. Without it, shredding attacks.

Pre 3.1, str is king, with 3.1 they will swap places as far as is known.

Esari · 03/12/09, 11:59 AM

Originally Posted by charriu

4T6 depends on the peices you have and new loot you have available, I guess. With it, you want to spec imp. mangle. Without it, shredding attacks.

Assuming i have every loot in the game

kalbear · 03/12/09, 2:34 PM

If you have all the loot in the game, 4pT6 is not optimal.

The Parri link is well-written, but take it with a grain of salt. Emphasizing the highest TTL in the worst case is not that useful for tanking if it means that it's always a struggle to heal you relative to other tanks. The worst case situation (multiple seconds of never receiving a heal) does not happen particularly often, and when it does it's usually a wipe for unrelated reasons (like your healers being dead or MCed, for example).

Stamina tends to be best for fixing the worst case scenarios (either with physical or magical damage). Avoidance tends to be best for helping with the average case scenarios.

Derrek · 03/13/09, 11:42 AM

I bear when not tree-ing. I've noticed that I have a harder time generating threat than my Warrior and DK counterparts in guild. My TPS is roughly 4600 on fights such as patchwerk, while our Dk OT can regularly put out 5400 TPS.

Lacerate not falling off, Maul & Mangle every CD, Swipe in-between CDs.

For late 25man gearing, what threat generation are other bear tanks witnessing? (Or are you equiping more rogue-style gear for threat?)

Gear with 'threat generation' items equiped. If I wield Origin of Nightmares, and tank ring, my TPS drops more.

Head Hood of the Exodus
Neck Boundless Ambition
Shoulders Valorous Dreamwalker Shoulderpads
Chest Heroes' Dreamwalker Raiments
Waist Trollwoven Girdle
Legs Valorous Dreamwalker Legguards
Feet Boots of the Worshiper
Wrist Hateful Gladiator's Armwraps of Triumph
Hands Heroes' Dreamwalker Handgrips
Finger1 Titanium Impact Band
Finger2 Keystone Great-Ring
Trinket1 Figurine - Ruby Hare
Trinket2 Darkmoon Card: Greatness
Back Gale-Proof Cloak
MainHand The Undeath Carrier
Ranged Idol of Terror
ExtraWaistSocket Delicate Scarlet Ruby
Dodge: 50.00705%
Miss: 5.298392%
Mitigation: 76.89031%
Highest DPS Rotation: 2138 DPS, 4716 TPS
Highest TPS Rotation: 2102 DPS, 4732 TPS

halmmar · 03/13/09, 2:39 PM

Your TPS should be fine, but there are some things I do different when it comes to gear.
Wrists I know it's a pain to get. I had to get the badge ones myself because Noth and Maexxna both hate me. However, the BoE wrist is pretty ok for threat.
Ranged slot - use the maul/swipe lv74 idol. It's got a very nice threat boost.
Tricks of the Trade - it's a very minor dps loss for rogues to keep it up on you. And it's 15% dmg 1/5 of the time (plus extra threat from the rogue)
KT Staff, Berserker enchanted. 5% armor loss is really minor and won't kill you even while offtanking patchwerk.
Haste Potions. If you got any left from Brutallus when you tried to get him down pre-nerf, these are a great source of threat (be sure to stack them with enrage or you run out of rage in bloodlust)...
Enrage. Spec for extra damage and pop it early in the fight to get a threat lead.
Maul macro. Bind every key to Maul, then roll your face on the keyboard and laugh at the fact your class only has 3 essential buttons to press to keep aggro (Mangle,Maul; Swipe on trash), and has essentially none to try and keep yourself alive. (Not 100% serious. Except the binding Maul to every bear threat skill).

As patchwerk offtank I can pull around 2900 DPS without using tricks of the trade (the warrior MT needs them or you pull aggro trying this).
You shouldn't need any of the tricks above (except Maul macros maybe), but if you're really struggling you could try some out.

kalbear · 03/13/09, 2:55 PM

My suspicion is that you're not mauling enough. With that gear you should be doing quite a bit more DPS and TPS than 4600.

Derrek · 03/13/09, 4:00 PM

I have been mauling as often as possible, but I haven't had it macro'd to mangle / lacerate / swipe. That will be corrected tonight. I have not been using enrage outside of the initial pull rage generation. I have not been using beserk as frequently as I should.

No KT staff drop yet. Hence the Undeath staff for threat. I am curious as to the beserker enchant as opposed to Mongoose, as I am mainly concerned about threat while OT-ing, this could be very viable.

The DPS and TPS numbers are strait off of Rawr 2.1.9 with expected raid buffs.

Last Patchwerk: (above gear is some upgrades from below encounter, and I used origin of nightmares instead of undeath) Role was OT hateful sponge.
2:58
69 Maul (1 every 2.57s)
44 Lacerate
25 Mangle
28 Melee
17 Swipe
1979 DPS, 4467TPS
52.7% dodge + miss

kalbear · 03/13/09, 4:10 PM

28 melee is way too many. That was 28 melee out of a total of 97 total melee attacks, or about 30% of your potential mauls weren't. Given that maul is roughly 60% of a normal bear's threat when mauling consistently, you lost about 18% of your potential threat just from that.

Derrek · 03/13/09, 4:23 PM

Maul is over 60% of my threat for patchwerk fight. Point is taken that I need to bind it, however.

Threat Percent

Maul(R10) 61.1%
Lacerate(R3) 9.7%
Mangle - Bear(R5) 15.6%
Melee 8.0%
Retribution Aura(R7) 2.4%
Swipe(R8) 2.4%

(probably best to continue this as pm to avoid clogging up the thread)

• Polynices · 03/13/09, 5:44 PM

Binding maul to everything is a really bad idea if you are ever not the main tank (or hateful tank) as you will run entirely out of rage hitting maul that much if you are not taking a severe beating. You can, however, hit maul at the same time as you hit anything else so just have maul on a button near your other bear attacks and use 2 fingers at a time instead of 1.

wongtonsup · 03/13/09, 6:51 PM

I read through a number of threads about IFF and Misery, but I didn't see a definitive answer.

Does casting IFF interfere with Misery if cast afterwards? I've noticed on a few fights, I don't see the Misery debuff up on the boss (not exactly sure why). I don't think the SP died, but I've been using the presence of the Misery debuff (icon) on the boss as an indication of it being up. Is this a bad assumption? Does the icon roll off sometimes?

The only time i really put it up is during the Thaddius fight or Gothik when the groups are split and our group doesn't have an SP. Other times, I'm unsure if I should put it up if I don't see Misery on the boss.

The main concern I have is if I put up IFF when Misery is up, does it interfere? I'd almost rather sacrifice a GCD every 40 seconds to make sure everyone's getting the +hit benefit.

halmmar · 03/13/09, 7:06 PM

Originally Posted by Polynices

Binding maul to everything is a really bad idea if you are ever not the main tank (or hateful tank) as you will run entirely out of rage hitting maul that much if you are not taking a severe beating. You can, however, hit maul at the same time as you hit anything else so just have maul on a button near your other bear attacks and use 2 fingers at a time instead of 1.

Maul is still your best threat/rage move if you're an offtank - the modifiers on Maul are quite insane. I do keep FFF and a Mangle-Lacerate-Swipe castsequence without maul on keys further away on the keyboard. I find it a lot better to macro maul on bosses where you want to use some defensive cooldowns while still keeping up a (near) optimal threat rotation. Malygos comes to mind (lazy people who don't kill sparks).

Oort · 03/13/09, 7:28 PM

Originally Posted by kalbear

Origin of Nightmares beats Inevitable defeat unless you really need a threat weapon. It's got decent agi, but the 700 armor beats the few points of agi gain hands down, and the loss of stam is not insubstantial.

What about Origin of Nightmares vs. Undeath Carrier? +Armor vs. +Crit (especially thinking towards 3.1).

Inevitable Defeat would not be a threat weapon so much as an opportunity to swap around other slots currently geared for expertise.

Alerian · 03/13/09, 7:32 PM

Originally Posted by wongtonsup

I read through a number of threads about IFF and Misery, but I didn't see a definitive answer.

Does casting IFF interfere with Misery if cast afterwards? I've noticed on a few fights, I don't see the Misery debuff up on the boss (not exactly sure why). I don't think the SP died, but I've been using the presence of the Misery debuff (icon) on the boss as an indication of it being up. Is this a bad assumption? Does the icon roll off sometimes?

Both can be on at the same time. While the UI can only display 40 at a time, there is no debuff limit and there have been no known issues with the two knocking each other off. Misery can be up, even if you don't see it. There's also the possibility that your Shadow Priest was not casting a Misery-causing spell on the boss (cleansing-heavy fights), but that's very low since it has a 24 second duration.

Shrea · 03/14/09, 10:55 PM

Charriu, I was just curious where you weregetting your information about strength vs. agilty come 3.1

I've been reading quite a few post that have said agility will out beat strength in the new patch, and Im just curious if this is because of the changes to Savage Roar that they made?

I definately like being able to hold my own as a cat, and it just seems right now that we fall so far behind warriors, hunters and mages. Even geared very well for myself, a warrior dual weilding Betrayers is hard to beat out onthe dps meters.