Incanter's Absorption and You

Tyrian · 02/03/10, 10:08 AM

Incanter's Absorption really could benefit from its own thread. It was often dismissed as just a gimmicky 'Good for Val'kyr Twins in TotGC' talent by some for a while, but that's changing: We're seeing the talent become extremely powerful and useful in many important Icecrown encounters.

IA been sporadically discussed in several threads, but lets consolidate and flesh out the discussion here: mechanics, theorycrafted DPS values, ways to leverage the proc and encounter-specific tips and tricks. There's lots of raid-wide damage on many Icecrown fights so far:

- Blood-Queen Lana'thel (Shadow Damage Aura)
- Festergut (Shadow Damage Aura)
- Sindragosa (Frost Damage Aura)
- The Lich King (Infest, frequently cast raid-wide Shadow damage)

Some of the things that can proc IA: Could also be summed up as 'anything that absorbs' - But there's a few items easily overlooked or forgotten::

- PW: Shield (Disc Priest)
- PW: Shield (Holy Priest, separate category due to much lower absorb value)
- Sacred Shield (Paladin)
- Frost and Fire Ward (Mage Class)
- Protection of Ancient Kings (Val'anyr proc)
- Divine Aegis (Disc Priest heals, after a crit)
- Mana Shield (Mage)
- Mighty Magic Protection Potions
- What are the other major ones?

A specific concern with IA is: The talent can be great, but a Disc priests PW:S can make it amazing. Just how much value does the talent lose when you don't have a Disc priest around? The endwing bosses (BQL, PP) would ordinarily have Disc priests in most raids - so it shouldn't be too far fetched to assume access to that. Generally Disc Priests like to shield, and are happy to do it - it's their specs niche - so it shouldn't be too much of a hassle/surprise to your Disc priest if you make a shield request.

There's a few key questions:

- How does IA stack, and what are its rolling mechanics?
- Are there any other general mechanic quirks to IA's implementation?
- How much of a DPS upgrade per point is IA? How much does not having a Disc Priest in the raid affect that? What if you had 2 or 3 Val'anyrs in your raid instead of just 1?
- What situations is it worth only putting 1 or 2 points into the talent, instead of all 3?
- What talents from the bloated Arcane tree should be dropped dropped to pickup IA?

If you have encounter-specific IA tips, esoteric ways to maximise leverage of the proc, or have done some theorycraft/WOL investigations on the effectiveness of the talent under specific encounters and situations - consolidate it here with your findings!

Setia · 02/03/10, 10:29 AM

Incanter's Absorption does not proc on Putricide, as both Mutated Plague and the abomination's AoE are considered "friendly damage".

Here is a log (not mine, it's one of the top ranked mages on WoL): as you can see, he had Sacred Shield up throughout the encounter, yet had only a single Incanter's proc, presumably when he took a slime pool hit: World of Logs - Real Time Raid Analysis .

Rugz · 02/03/10, 10:58 AM

It may not be classable as a 'Major Absorption Method' but the Mighty Protection Potions can grant up to 6000 damage absorbed. I'm not sure if absorbs from this proc IA and there aren't any on my server's AH at the moment, I'll try and get hold of some for tonight unless someone else can confirm/deny it.

Edit: Confirmed

Saizul · 02/03/10, 11:24 AM

You missed Divine Aegis, coming from a disc priest. Not a huge effect but something you will see pretty frequently.

Tyrian · 02/03/10, 11:34 AM

It may not be classable as a 'Major Absorption Method' but the Mighty Protection Potions can grant up to 6000 damage absorbed

Pre-potting Mighty Absorption pots on Blood-Queen and Sindragosa would work very nicely. Would this mean a pre-potted Mighty Shadow Protection Potion (3/3 IA) is the best way to start the BQL fight? Currently a pre-potter ordinarily uses 15 second Haste / Wild Magic pots: then lose maybe ~2-3 seconds of the relevant buff using them whilst the tank is doing the countdown. A pre-potted Mighty Shadow/Frost Absorb will give more bang for your buck.

Furthermore, what type of absorb is used first - if you have a Disc shield (pre-pull) and a Mighty Absorb Potion Absorb buff? Even if the PW: S lasts ~10-15 seconds before the Protection Potion was eaten into, your trinkets / ring will still be midproc.

Saizul · 02/03/10, 12:52 PM

Mighty Shadow prot is4200 to 6000 dmg absorbed.

That's 630-900 SP for 10 seconds. I'm not sure how absorbs are prioritized (ie PWS > SS > potions?) but her first 1-2 shroud of sorrow ticks will eat the potion. In terms of stat points * time this is approximately equal to a speed pot, and better than a wild magic.

[Mighty Shadow Protection Potion]

Also, mighty shadow prot lasts 2 min, 1 min cooldown. So if you are able to time it this well, pop mighty shadow prot 1 min before pull. Then prepot with a speed as usual at the pull. You get benefit of both!

Jawesome.

Urit · 02/03/10, 1:07 PM

IA worked out nicely on Rotface when we did our achievement. Having no dps move out for slimes created a good amount of raid damage to be absorbed. Sacred shield and some PW:Shields really shined here.

World of Logs - Real Time Raid Analysis

ShowXdown · 02/03/10, 1:36 PM

I specced into 3/3 IA today. However we don't run a Disc priest (atleast in 10 player).

On lord marrowgar (10 player), IA can proc really good from Frostward and PWD, however due to that much movement the fight requires IA becomes less effective in this fight.

What i think where IA will really rock, are fights like BQL, Festergut etc, very low movement, and Aura Dmg.

@Saizul, isn't IA refreshing until you absorb nothing anymore? So with having PWD and Absorb Pot at pull + taking absorb pot u can "roll" the IA for atleast 20 sec. Which would be huge on fights where you start with with 4t10 and BL

Idyar · 02/03/10, 2:01 PM

I think answering the question about specifically how it "Rolls" is an important part to this thread. I constantly see IA refreshing but I am always curious if its overwriting with the newest absorb, even if that absorb might generate less spell power, or if they are "stacking" that is adding the amount until the buff falls off, or if it simply overwrites every time you absorb regardless of the scale of the damage absorbed.

angelamaria · 02/03/10, 2:16 PM

I'm quite interested in knowing which best talents to drop from the tree for IA. I run with 2/3 (undecided if it would be better to max out or if it might get wasted) already, would have placed it in Magic Absorption myself for progression if I wasn't taking IA. Arcane Meditation, maybe? I've seen builds that also drop Arcane Barrage, but as there are few ICC fights where you spend most of your time just standing still, I'm reluctant to let this go.

(I've already specced out of Arcane Stability and Student of the Mind, which seems to be likely candidates. Or I guess keep [some] Arcane Stability but give up threat reduction or hit+reduced mana cost to keep first tier in tree at a minimum.)

Urit · 02/03/10, 2:25 PM

Lord Marrowgar: Not sure how good a frost pot will be in this situation. Typically I am far enough within melee range that Coldflame does not come into play, at least not until the first Bone Storm. Would it be worth it to stand slightly out to try for an early absorb?

Festergut: Seems like a shadow pot would be good here. Gaseous Blight is pure shadow damage and will hit you early on.

Professor Putricide: Unfortunately a nature pot will not help here due to the friendly-sourced damage bug. Is this a bug that could get fixed in the future or is it intentional?

Blood Prince Council: Another situation I am not too sure about. Glittering sparks is pure fire damage that is apparently cast in a cone from Prince Taldaram. The timing of taking fire damage in this encounter is unreliable and could happen at a bad moment. Probably better off going with haste/wild magic here.

Blood-Queen Lana'thel: Shadow pot good for obvious reasons.

Sindragosa: Frost pot good for obvious reasons.

Lich King: I have yet to do Lich King and do not see any parses on WoL yet. Shadow or frost could be good here.

Saizul · 02/03/10, 3:28 PM

"Rolling":

IA does not roll in the sense that ignites used to, or corruption does. Each time you absorb you gain a separate 10 second SP buff for the appropriate amount. When these overlap, they stack. Each falls off individually at the appropriate time. In other words, there is no disproportionate advantage to always keeping the buff up.

Example -
0:00 you absorb 100 damage. Total +15 SP
0:05 you absorb 200 damage. Total +45 SP
0:10 first IA falls off. Total +30 SP
0:15 second IA falls off. Total +0 SP

Spec:
Talent Calculator - World of Warcraft

This is what I use. IMO no pushback protection is needed on the fights that matter, at least so far. This could change in the future. The flexibility of 36 yards is worth having. Arcane mind is a very weak DPS talent and I am willing to drop 1 point from it to get Arcane Barrage, which I simply find too useful too often to not take.

diag · 02/03/10, 3:29 PM

Frost warding + Incanter's absorption at Sindragosa:

Frost ward absorbs ~5000 dmg, i.e. 750 sp for 10 sec, according to rawr sp scales as 1 sp = 2 dps, so that is 15000 dmg, close to 14000 dps. More if coupled with CDs.

Frost Warding refunds mana for the cost of ~500 mp, the refund is around 5000*0.42= 2100 mp for continuous small dmg, however Sindragosa aura is 4500, so one frost ward can absorb at least twice, the expected refund is 3500. 3000 net mana gain equals to .15 of evocation. So frost ward saves 0.65 gcd of evocation.

In conclusion, frost ward is a 14000 dps ability that gives you 3000 mana.

-----------------------
Edit: the above sp calculation is wrong

Originally Posted by Omnia

There's also been some talk about the Frost Warding talent proc counting as a free absorb. Assuming that is correct (and given a frost tick smaller than the ward amount), each Frost Ward cast should give you a ~50% chance of getting 2 absorbs instead of 1. That would bring the Frost Ward contribution closer to 20k dps, or an average dps increase of ~3.5% dps over 30 seconds.

To include free absorb:

Frost ward absorbs ~5000*1.42= 7100 for small continuous dmg, i.e. 1060 sp 10 sec, or 2100 dps for 10 sec.
At Sindragosa(25N), aura = 4500, the expected absorption is 8800, i.e. 1320 sp 10 sec, or 2640 dps for 10 sec.

Note that the best case absorption for a 5000 shield is 4999 dmg aura, worst case is 5001 aura.

Naryo · 02/03/10, 6:52 PM

The max. of spelldamage (5% of your health) coult be reached by a Discpriest spamming Greater Heals (15-18k crit), a PW:S (5-6k) and Penance (4-5k/tick).
Divine Aegis grants you a shield absorbing 30% of the ammount healed.
If we assume a mage in raid envriornment has about 25k hp (correct me if I am wrong) the max. Spelldamage bonus is 1250. The damage that has to be absorbed to get this maximum is 8333.3
If you can find a cooperative Disc Priest, you can get hurt on purpose to increase your damage significantly.

Sorry for spelling mistakes and leaking maths.
(It´s late and I will check the thesises tomorrow in ICC 25)
So gn8 guys^^

Glavados · 02/03/10, 7:36 PM

Based on 25,000 HP

Incanter's Absorbtion 3/3 SP:

5% of 25,000 = 1250 Max SP HP wise.

1250 has to equal 15% of absorbtion from a shield.

One shield has to equal: 8,333 Damage Absorbtion.

Incanter's Absorbtion 2/3 SP:

5% of 25,000 = 1250 Max SP HP wise.

1250 has to equal 10% of absorbtion from a shield.

One shield has to equal: 12,500 Damage Absorbtion.

Based on 22,000 HP

5% of 22,000 = 1100 Max SP HP wise.

Incanter's Absorbtion 2/3 SP:

1100 SP requires a 11,000 HP Shield.

Incanter's Absorbtion 3/3 SP:

1100 SP requires a 7333 HP Shield.

I wonder how much priests are shielding atm and the scaling of Fire and Frost ward. As far as talents for IA 3/3 seems the best choice since you need a smaller shield, BUT is the extra talent in it worth more there than in another talent like magic attunement?