That's the same case with most of the buffs/debuffs which require extra gcd's to maintain. A non-BM hunter loses minimal personal dps bringing the armor reduction debuff, while a moonkin would be making a bigger sacrifice (with no personal gain from the added armor reduction either), and a resto druid would be required to do unnecessary tasks. If a healer (or healers) are able to wast time doing unnecessary tasks (such as dotting/debuffing a boss) during a standard fight, it would be more beneficial to simply drop a healer in favor of a dps and allow the remaining healers to heal at full potential.

In all cases, it is better to utilize a "fire and forget" debuff instead of one which needs to be actively cast. Prime cases are misery vs imp FF and winter's chill vs imp scorch. Sunder and Expose Armor are also in the same boat if the warrior is protection.

As discussed quite some time ago (in this thread), scorpid sting is not worth keeping up since it's reduction to 3%. IIrc, Insect swarm is also utter garbage for dps unless glyphed, at which point it no longer has the reduction to hit chance. So more likely than not, a high-end guild would simply forgo that particular debuff in favor allowing their raid members to maximize their dps/hps.

While this makes sense I think there's a flaw in your methodology.
In your examples you've maintained the average damage per shot in all 3 scenarios and the only thing that's really changed is the number of shot's you're firing in the given time span (that's why your dps for 1.6 and 1.7 spd steadies is identical over exactly 10 seconds if you never delay chimera in the 1.6 rotation). In fact, if you decide not to delay chimera shot in the 1.5 second steady scenario and fire a chimera shot at the 10 second mark instead the dps in that situation will also be 1529.5.

The reality of being a hunter, however, is that you simply cannot lower your steady shot speed easily while maintaining the same ap/crit/armpen/etc. In reality hunters will end up giving up some of those stats to obtain gear with more points spent in haste. As a result, the damage per shot will be reduced and alter the dps accordingly.

I think what people need to realize is that all of these statistics will increase your dps and for comparisons to decide which upgrade is best for your character needs to be made in the context of both the gear change, statistic change and shot rotation changes that may make the outcome quite different.

Perhaps at one point in the game you will have enough haste to have a 1.5 second steady shot but an upgrade drops that has less haste on it. You cannot simply compare the piece in the 1.5 second rotation you have above but also need to compare your original dps to that of perhaps the 1.6 and 1.7 sec steady shot rotations (i.e. compare 5:1 vs 6:1 steady:chimera rotations plus/minus delaying chimera shot with any upgrade consideration).


TLDR:
1) Flawed comparison since shot damage does not remain the same when you increase haste on an item.
2) A 1.5 second steady shot rotation (6:1 with a .5 second delay on chimera) will always be higher dps if shot damage remains unaltered (which is unrealistic).
3) When you make a gear change that affects your haste you cannot compare dps only using the same rotation but must compare your previous dps to each of the above shot rotation scenarios to determine whether it is actually an upgrade.


Am I wrong?

That was actually meant to be a facetious comment. But your logic is sound (although I staunchly disagree with the idea of healers being forced to do nothing but heal, which is straight up perpendicular to the new judgement-centric holy paladin design). That's neither here nor there, though. We can agree that the decision to use wasps is contingent upon raid makeup, which I believe was your original point. And I do support that.

One last point on the minor armor debuff discussion: while I didn't address the issue of cat druids using FFF because I wanted to make other points, I think it's important that we recognize that it's not necessarily a dps loss for a cat to do it. A cat druid can fit in FFF during parts of their rotation when they don't have the energy for another move. Their GCD is only 1.0 seconds in cat form, so it actually isn't very hard to do. If you use FFF when you don't have energy for a shred/mangle, or combo points for a rip, then filling those gaps with FFF and refreshes doesn't hurt dps at all. It costs nothing, and the GCD would be "idle" anyway. They can also use it during "movement phases" of various encounters when they are out of range for melee.

Then that lock would likely also be forced to spec for it... That AP buff is nasty in encounters where the boss is actually a challenge for the tank. And then we are back at a dedicated debuffer that gets nothing in return for a rather considerable investment. No, the warlock appears to be a 'if nothing else works' scenario.

On the topic of armor reduction, does Spore Cloud still stack with the Major and Minor armor reduction debuffs? Granted it's on a Cunning pet, but checking Shandara's spreadsheet it's only 200 or so dps loss from a cat (as BM). It would be possible to hit a point where the raid buff would be worth the dps hit, especially for non-BM specs.

I think you were missing my point. This was NOT an attempt to weigh haste against other stats. You're right, to increase your haste you are going to give up itemization on other stats - that's really a separate topic and Shandara's spreadsheet can show you how valuable each stat is with your current gear. The only point of my post was to show in a clear manner that the haste stat alone (not considering other stats) will always increase dps as you increase it. There is no bell curve as your haste approaches a factor of the chimera cool down. I believe this WAS the case, to some extent, with haste before 3.0.

It would be possible for this not to be the case. What if chimera's cool down was changed? What if it did significantly more damage? I think theoretically, if you manipulate those values it would be possible that trying to line up your steady shots so that they are a factor of the chimera cool down could be ideal. Again, I agree with you that this does not appear to be the case with the way the spell is currently defined.

Still a shared separate cooldown for me.

I, too, have considered this question, but haven't had the opportunity to test with a druid + warrior at the same time. If it does, Sporebats would be my "utility" pet of choice. When 3.0 rolled around, I decided to divy up my slots as follows:

Highest Exotic DPS: Devilsaur -'- For when I'm BM and want max DPS
Highest Non-Exotic DPS: Scatpid -'- For when I'm not BM and want max DPS
Tanking: Gorilla -'- For grinding & tanking group quests/5-mans
PVP: Undecided (Chimeara, Hyena, Bat, Owl, Nether Ray considered) -'- For arena PVP
Utility: Sporebat -'- For when I'm Survival and care only about providing max benefit to the raid

Since the patch, my impressions and goals have shifted around somewhat, but if Spore Cloud stacks as a separate armor debuff (which I tentatively believe it would, since it's an AOE and not a proper debuff) it would definitely fill my utility slot over say, a snake or a nether ray.

I have tested spore cloud together with druid and it is minor armor debuff, does not stack with FF. Also dps increase(thus armor reduction) was exactly same as from FF. So spore cloud may be good minor armor debuff filler as it does damage too.
Of course does have possible drawbacks, like it is aoe effect (may be good and bad thing, bad for CC, good to apply debuff to pack of mobs in single cast). Its listed armor debuff is less than druids, but in test on target dummy I did see same dps increase with FF and spore cloud.

I'm inclined to agree with you there. With Monstrous Bite, the Devilsaur is definately looking as though it will give the best DPS output out of all pets.

As for Utility, the Sporebat is indeed the most useful, keeping in mind that you are SV

Why would you take improved stings for leveling?

I'll be using this build to level up mainly in instances with a group consisting feral druid, retri pala, fury warrior and a priest so needless to say TSA won't be wasted.

For the Serpent portion of Chimera... I don't know if that is worth it, but 30% more for that one is nothing to sneeze at with a similar or +1 level mob.
And I agree on RR. After I tried it in MH I was astounded to never reach below 80% mana due to all the kills I got. It is just a superb talent for solo or AoE. I can easily imagine grabbing a Gorilladin as MM and then just AoE whole armies of mobs down and still be at 90% mana afterwards. Should make leveling pretty fast.

Erm, what's the point of applying serpent sting on mobs that die in 5-8 seconds with pure steady shot spam? :<

Why? The Armor debuff does not stack with Faerie Fire. At least I am fairly sure it doesn't. Anybody tested this?

Fastest way to level up in LK is going to be in a group, as Osse is planning. You still want the improved stings as your shot rotation will be sting, chimera, steady, <dead mob>. The improved stings give you more damage on the chimera shot's sting bonus portion, so it's not a waste.

With regard to a leveling spec's, as full BM or full surv there isn't much debate, as both of those trees are inherently well suited for them I think.

For marks, there seems to be a debate over "what will be more useful", as most of the fights will be very short and having enough time to setup the marks dps rotation will be iffy. Not sure if this has been explicitly mentioned, but marks is not strictly burst dps. I would call it delayed burst, as we have to setup the shot rotation with a HM, sting, then shot rotations which take up many GCDs, and then the burst comes.

However I feel that this is the wrong way to look at a leveling spec. At level 71, you can be full marks and have scatter shot, as well as some nice close range talents from surv to get to it. These are not very impressive in a raid environment but leveling is not a raid environment, and neither is a 5 man at level 73. You should expect to have to mix it up in close range, trap, kite, and many other things that would be unheard of in a 25 man raid.

You have to remember these encounters will not be as clean and scripted as major boss fights. Things will be hectic and a good leveling spec should accommodate this.

WotLK 5 mans even in heroic mode are much like TBC raids since the 3.0.2 patch, you can pretty much zerg them, group up the trash and aoe them all down, no CC or kiting required.

No. You get full credit from the chimera shot bonus no matter how long the sting is up. So the burst is HM, sting, chimera, steady/auto until dead (you won't need another chimera on normal mobs.)

That was just confirmed in this thread, which dilutes my choice for a sporebat. In that case, I think I would rather have a Nether Ray for an interrupt, as many raid encounters are built around that. Whatever it is, I'd certainly like for it to be a Cunning pet so I can use it for a mana pot.

I did some samples with my current raiding spec which includes improved stings.

I tested two different combos for what I would expect to do to one mob in an instance. I can pull both combos off in under 11 seconds. I used both combos thirty times on a level 70 dummy. I did not have hunter's mark up as I don't think it's worth it to put it up on a mob that dies within 10-15 seconds. (Please proof me wrong with numbers if you feel so.)

Combo 1

Serpent sting, chimera shot, steady shot, steady shot, steady shot, steady shot

13.4k average damage per combo, counting a tick of sting so the mob needs to be alive for 13 seconds for this combo's damage to be accurate.

Combo 2

Chimera shot, steady shot, steady shot, steady shot, steady shot, steady shot

14.5k average damage per combo, mob needs to be alive for 10.5-10.8 seconds for this combo's damage to be accurate.






Assuming you want 5/5 efficiency and 2/2 RR for your leveling build:

With combo 1 one you'll need to sacrifice some neat dps talents to get three points in improved stings so the spec would look something like this.

Where as with combo 2 you can spec like so, gaining 3% damage multiplier to non-periodic damage.





You will also get more improved steady shot procs with combo 2 and it uses 178 less mana per combo.


Please say if I missed something or if you have a better idea for instance leveling.

I believe Rapid Recuperation is bugged right now giving back more mana that it should when under rapid killing. I get back almost 1000 mana after every mob I kill right now, so I don't think Efficiency is needed for now until Rapid Recuperation is fixed.