[Ret 5.0 Pre-MoP] - Panda-ring to all players - Page 4

Ronark · 05/10/12, 10:10 AM

I'd suspect they changed it from the AA speed to prevent Haste from double effecting Exorcism (through more AoW and SoB affecting Exorcisms eCD). Having abilities based off auto attacks to begin with is not noticeable in PvE- and less so in PvP. Most likely Blizzard will use CZ as a way to tweak PvE DPS instead of a rotation changer like AoW or Inquision.

Tobrexa · 05/10/12, 10:57 AM

I saw the AAspeed version of CZ as a way to balance ret around the fact that we are the slowest hitters out there in regard to procs off trinkets or weapons.
I thought the fact that only 2 abilities of our rotation are actually weapon strikes, led them to implement CZ in the AAspeed form to increase the chance such procs would go off, without having the problem of having too much of them by making hidden strikes of SoB (and such other possible candidates) count or too litte, if you took only actual weapon strikes (as in: the whole Gurth conundrum).

edit: I tested briefly the new CZ, and it acts as described in the tooltip (at least I found no immediate bugs).
I cogitated some more on the spell, and I have to say I don't like it. Not only it is rather implicitely random, as Exemplar pointed out, it is also frustrating not to be able to time cooldowns around it.
Either you are a lucky bastard and hit that spot with 3 stacks or you don't and this will have an non-neglegible impact on performance, even if all other variables are the same.

lîte · 05/12/12, 4:33 PM

Do we have the ratings required for 5.0 once the new hit/exp ratings go into effect? Haven't played around with reforging on the beta at all really and was curious if anyone has found what the ratings are for just at lvl 85.

Ronark · 05/12/12, 11:59 PM

No-- the Expertise > Spell Hit changes are not even implemented yet.

Ronark · 05/13/12, 7:18 PM

Pursuit of Justice is working as intended on the current build:

You gain 10% speed at all times-- in addition, you gain 10% for each Holy Power, up to a maximum of 3.

0 HP: 10%
1 HP: 10% + 1*10% = 20%
2 HP: 10% + 2*10% = 30%
3 HP: 10% + 3*10% = 40%
4 HP: 10% + 3*10% = 40%
5 HP: 10% + 3*10% = 40%

These values remain consistent across the board, whether increasing to or decreasing from them.

Ronark · 06/08/12, 1:09 PM

Reports on the Beta are saying that the new L90 abilities currently do not scale with mastery (which is a given for Ret, but none of the Healing spells work with Holy) or haste.

Exemplar · 06/10/12, 10:59 AM

Any L90 able to do a fully geared vs. naked test to ensure they (L90 talent abilities) do scale with AP? I would think they do, or they'd possibly be entirely obsolesced sometime during the X-pac, but best to test. Precise scaling numbers unimportant at this juncture since they're extremely likely to change between now and live.

You can also glance at the log and see if they ever Crit. If they Crit at all it's safe to say they use our Crit rate, since they're a directly cast spell (whereas some things like weapon procs can occasionally use their own unmodifiable value). Again, I would expect they do Crit, just nice to be sure.

Thodekke · 06/16/12, 2:03 PM

I would like to mention that there has been a nerf to our mastery on beta. Instead of providing 2.2% holy damage for each point in mastery, it's only 1% per. So... The bonus is equal to your mastery.

Not sure how this'll affect secondary stat weights, but I figured it should be mentioned.

Also, confirmed: Lvl 90 abilities DO stack with AP. Not sure about crits. I'm testing only Execution sentence, atm.

Ronark · 06/16/12, 8:44 PM

Originally Posted by Thodekke

I would like to mention that there has been a nerf to our mastery on beta. Instead of providing 2.2% holy damage for each point in mastery, it's only 1% per. So... The bonus is equal to your mastery.

Not sure how this'll affect secondary stat weights, but I figured it should be mentioned.

Also, confirmed: Lvl 90 abilities DO stack with AP. Not sure about crits. I'm testing only Execution sentence, atm.

The adjustment to our Mastery could be due to HoW now being added to the list of abilities affected.

Until we get closer to a release date i.e. the dust settles and mechanics don't change patch to patch, we won't be able to math out the viability of secondary stats.

arthureld · 06/19/12, 9:11 PM

Originally Posted by Exemplar

Any L90 able to do a fully geared vs. naked test to ensure they (L90 talent abilities) do scale with AP? I would think they do, or they'd possibly be entirely obsolesced sometime during the X-pac, but best to test. Precise scaling numbers unimportant at this juncture since they're extremely likely to change between now and live.

You can also glance at the log and see if they ever Crit. If they Crit at all it's safe to say they use our Crit rate, since they're a directly cast spell (whereas some things like weapon procs can occasionally use their own unmodifiable value). Again, I would expect they do Crit, just nice to be sure.

Before raid today, I was able to hop on and do some very quick testing. Basically, I watched the damage of each ability naked and with the vendor pvp gear available to 90s now (when naked, I did leave a weapon on to be sure I controlled weapon damage).

All three abilities *are* affected by AP. Each tick of Light's Hammer and Execution Sentence are able to be crits. As for Holy Prism, the bounce effects (if you target an enemy, the healing component or if you target yourself the damage component) definitely had crits in the log. I never had a crit on the primary target, however. This may be due to small sample size, so I wouldn't freak out about it yet. I will do some more testing later.

Another small thing I noticed (but only one incident, so I can't be 100% sure), but at one point, one of my trinkets procced due to a tick of execution sentence. As you would expect from dots with other classes, it didn't appear that the ES dot was affected by the sudden STR increase. Casting an ability during a trinket proc had the expected result.

Some notes that may help folks testing these abilities - when you retalent with a Tome of Clear Mind, the cooldown on the abilities are reset. Jeeves (and other vendors) sell these, so you can simply stock up on them to quickly recast abilities rather than waiting for the 1m timer on each.

EDIT: After a string of very unlucky RNG, I can now say that the direct component of HP *can* crit.

Ronark · 06/19/12, 11:35 PM

GC commented that they are looking at Crusader's Zeal, among other things:

We'll look at Crusader's Zeal again. Maybe the mechanic isn't even needed. We wanted it to be a source of crit, but we didn't want it to be a maintenance-y buff like Inquisition.

Most trinket procs have a generous proc chance with an ICD. Gurthalak was an exception, but had some wacky consequences as a result of our making it an exception.

We don't think the paladin 90 talents need to benefit from mastery. The healing component can be balanced around Holy healing and since all 3 talents are in the same boat, there shouldn't be talent choice consequences.

The Expertise to spell hit conversion is in and working (as far as we know). The UI may not be updated to reflect it yet.

Crit chances of players against mobs that are higher level than you are reduced by 1% per level difference, in Mists.

Akawa · 06/20/12, 6:40 AM

Originally Posted by Ronark

Until we get closer to a release date i.e. the dust settles and mechanics don't change patch to patch, we won't be able to math out the viability of secondary stats.

It seems we're getting there already: Beta Class Balance Analysis - Forums - World of Warcraft

We want to provide everyone with a quick update regarding the status of beta class design and balance, as well as start collecting more detailed analytics from you. Since you’ve probably seen us say many times in the past that we’re not yet in a place to start dissecting the numbers, it’s worth calling out that we now want you to bring it on!

Exemplar · 06/20/12, 8:50 AM

Originally Posted by Ronark

GC commented that they are looking at Crusader's Zeal, among other things:

I liked the Crit Suppression comment. First time I've seen them admit it exists, much less explain (the new version) so clearly. Definitely makes theorycrafting easier when they do so.

arthureld, thanks for the verification on AP scaling and ability to crit. When we get to more steady state we'll test everything for proper coefficients. Guesstimate of perhaps a month before numbers reach what Blizzard expects to keep (though there'll still be last second changes for half the classes - nature of the beast).

To veer off into ability discussion:
I'm somewhat conflicted about Holy Prism and Light's Hammer. LH may do more damage per cast (multiplying the stated coefficient by # of ticks is ~185.25 SP), but has the disadvantage of being tied to a ground location - like Cons it can be hard to ensure boss/adds are held within its radius. While Prism looks like it may do more damage overall (albeit target capped at 5) since it has a (much) shorter CD (82.3% SP * 3 times as often = 246.9%, also factor in the base damage 2 more times) and it has the advantage of burst.

What seems logical to me is the non-moving attack (LH) should do more damage since you risk part/all of it being ineffective, while the burst attack (Prism) should do less since it is, well burst. It's a relatively accepted tenet of game design that directly compared DoTs are inferior to burst since you may not get every tick - this is why DoTs generally get special secondary effects or overall do more damage (they average to the 'same' as burst when some of it is inevitably lost) The talents are somewhat counter-intuitive with the current design.

This leads into the fact that Ret don't have a consistent AOE attack, much less a spammable one. DS requires HP and we are losing both HW and Cons. The last talent can be an AOE, but with a 20 or 60 sec CD. This leaves us pretty weak in multi-target situations. Where's our multi-target HP generator?

Ronark · 06/20/12, 1:11 PM

Are you forgetting HotR? Much like on live, it proves to be more damage against 3-4 mobs at a time, depending on levels of Mastery with it scaling better for CS (HotR's initial hit is the only part affected by Mastery).

Thodekke · 06/20/12, 2:51 PM

HotR hits decently, and applies a debuff to all the targets it hits. 4% increased physical damage is nothing to sneeze at.

SoR feels really nerfed right now. That being said, with SoR, HotR, J, Exo, and DS, we do respectably in aoe situations. (Especially when we still have a heroic BLF. xD)