Retribution DPS Theorycraft - Page 100

Gormal · 01/14/08, 4:29 PM

Originally Posted by Mordekhuul

Myndle, my Pally

I have been workng on heroic badges lately, in between raiding my warlock, and plan to do at least the minimum 10 arena matches plus battlegrounds as well, to get there faster.

I'll upgrade to Deep Thunder within a couple of days now. With plenty of void crystals saved up from my main, I am planning on Mongoose, unless the spreadsheet shows Executioner as a clear winner (I also need to research between Mongoose and Executioner in PVP, as until such time as I am able to switch mains, Myndle will be mostly doing lower tier raids and PVP).

Question - can Crusader Strike proc weapon enchants?

Executioner is inferior in PvP, the debate is between Mongoose and Savagery. I just put mongoose on my S3 sword, and am not unhappy with the trade from static AP. I've been toying around with Battlemaster's Cruelty and while it makes my damage more unpredictable, it has really helped us in 5s to burst someone down.

Yes, mongoose can proc off of a CS.

Ragnor · 01/14/08, 6:16 PM

Originally Posted by Gormal

Executioner is inferior in PvP, the debate is between Mongoose and Savagery. I just put mongoose on my S3 sword, and am not unhappy with the trade from static AP. I've been toying around with Battlemaster's Cruelty and while it makes my damage more unpredictable, it has really helped us in 5s to burst someone down.

Yes, mongoose can proc off of a CS.

Whether you go choose Mongoose, Executioner or Savagery largely comes down to personal preference. There is no clearly superior miles ahead choice at all.

Petru · 01/14/08, 7:29 PM

I've been reading these forums on and off for a while, particularly this thread of late but have never had the need to actually post until now. Firstly, I'd like to thank the participants for providing an excellent source of information. Secondly, thanks to Bellator for providing such a brilliant utility.

Onto my reason for posting - I have a question specifically for Bellator and the Upgrade Analysis tab on the spreadsheet. I'm currently wearing the [Arrow-fall Chestguard], which I accept is far from the best available, so I ran the analysis to look at upgrades available. It lists [Lightbringer Breastplate] as being 9.86 DPS increase, yet curiously lists the [Justicar Breastplate] as being a 9.88 DPS increase. This has me confused somewhat, as the Lightbringer boasts 12 Strength, 0.27% crit, 6 +dmg and 1.33% hit over the Justicar while both have three sockets to play with.

Am I missing something obvious here or have I somehow managed to fubar your spreadsheet?

Gormal · 01/14/08, 7:30 PM

I agree that none of the enchants are vastly superior, but executioner comes off as just a little too inconsistent for my tastes with respect to PvP. Mongoose provides the same benefit regardless of who you're attacking, while executioner gains will swing depending on the armor of your target. The increased dodge from mongoose is also a nice bonus as I find that I'm often a melee target.

Sigurd drew up some quick numbers to compare mongoose to executioner:

Originally Posted by Sigurd

Well, in PvP, executioner proccing against high armor targets is almost worthless, while against a low armor target is good.
Just some rough stats, in my current PvP gear I've got 10,112 Armor and 48.92% mitigation. When Executioner procs, it'd drop me to 9,272 Armor, and 46.74% mitigation - a difference of 2.18%. That's okay i guess..

Compare that to a clothie, a Warlock with ~2522 Armor (19.28% Mitigation). When Exe. procs it'd bring him to 1682 Armor (13.80% Mitigation). So you get an increase of 5.48% damage against him. Sad to say, around 5.48% is the maximum you'll get in PvP from an Executioner proc, unless their's extra Armor Pen (Faerie Fire, Sunders, Expose). Priests and mages have a way to increase their armor beyond what you get from gear (Ice Armor, Inner Fire).

Your worst case scenario is either going to be bear form druid (~14,220 Armor 57.37% to 13,380 Armor 55.90%) 1.47% increase, or a Warrior/Paladin with a Shield on (~16,793 Armor 61.40% to 15,953 Armor 60.14%) 1.26%.

I personally wouldn't use Executioner in PvP over Mongoose.

As for Savagery vs. Mongoose, people highly underestimate the uptime for 'goose. It's higher than 1PPM - closer to 2, since White attacks, SoC, JoC, and CS all have a chance to proc it. Logically it's understandable to assume "this 70AP is always 70AP, and it's never nothing, so that's better than ~5% crit sometimes" but the reasoning is flawed. It boils down to, for lack of a more fitting analogy, visible versus invisible damage increases. Savagery might seem better than Mongoose if you spend time looking at your character sheet, but in practice I can assure you, you'll almost always get better results from using 'Goose.

noth · 01/14/08, 7:33 PM

Originally Posted by Avitus

Complete 100% consecration uptime only works in many but not all fights.

[... trimmed lots of awesome info for the quote ...]
I'm sure most of this is known, but I thought I'd underline some things which are easily ignored, like just how good/important JoW is for us to function optimally and how big of a damage boost consecration can be if you can maintain it.

I'm slow getting back (I was out sick from work

)but thanks for the post!! We're currently slamming our heads against Kael which is a screwy fight, mana-wise, for me. Virtually no consumption right up till the weapons, then dump my mana pool in 1 fell swoop with consecrate, and start popping pots to keep goin' afterwards. I'm glad to hear that SA will be netting me some love in the future though!!

Mordekhuul · 01/14/08, 7:46 PM

I'm now working to get my current gear into Bellator's spreadsheet.

I need to input the horseman's helm as a new item, but when I do, and I hit "show details", it doesn't show 3 rows under the helm, but only two.

After some playing around, i can see that this is because the item creation page doesn't have a "b" option. It has r, y, and g. I selected 'g' to see if it would function as blue, but that seems to lead to the above mentioned error.

When I put in r,r,r instead, to test it out, the created item displays all three rows with no issues.

Valerys · 01/15/08, 3:35 AM

Originally Posted by Petru

Am I missing something obvious here or have I somehow managed to fubar your spreadsheet?

IMO it's better to manually test the different gear upgrades on the gear selection sheet. The analysis sheet stuffs Str gems into all your gear, which may not be the best choice for dps when considering some socket bonuses.

Avitus · 01/15/08, 4:41 AM

Originally Posted by noth

I'm slow getting back (I was out sick from work

)but thanks for the post!! We're currently slamming our heads against Kael which is a screwy fight, mana-wise, for me. Virtually no consumption right up till the weapons, then dump my mana pool in 1 fell swoop with consecrate, and start popping pots to keep goin' afterwards. I'm glad to hear that SA will be netting me some love in the future though!!

Ah Kael fight, I used to have a special "cheat" for this fight, namely [Major Dreamless Sleep Potion]

Admittedly last time I was there was some time before we got threat reduction, I would go all out on Kael, then run away to aggro break for 12 secs (right as I was about to pull aggro) and pop a Dreamless Sleep Potion.

With Alchemist's Stone, it would give exactly 5040 mana (and HP) which is a ton.

For P2 -> P4 (reset damage meters after P1) I'd usually end up in the top 3.

Noteworthy tips:

-Don't bother much in P1, make sure you enter P2 with full mana and no potions on CD.
-P2 (weapons), wings, heroism, consecration spam on the weapons, jotc, go all out
-P2 -> P3: Pop super mana pots
-P4 -> Once you mash kael down, run out of his range and pop a dreamless sleep potion = almost full mana again if you had alchemist's stone

-Make sure there's no tremor totem when you use Dreamless Sleep and that Kael just used his AoE arcane explosion thing
-If you can, make sure one of the holy paladins healing MT can stick a JoW on Kael at the start of p4.

Though mana management should be much easier now and there's no threat probs anymore so take this with a pinch of salt, this is what I used to do however

Avitus · 01/15/08, 4:43 AM

Originally Posted by Valerys

IMO it's better to manually test the different gear upgrades on the gear selection sheet. The analysis sheet stuffs Str gems into all your gear, which may not be the best choice for dps when considering some socket bonuses.

One thing to note is that also screws up socket bonuses, most importantly things with hit. So manually adjust your hit rating to compensate before running item analysis.

Gormal · 01/15/08, 5:50 AM

Originally Posted by Avitus

Kael'thas threat and mana conservation stuff...

If you loot the legendary axe, you'll still have threat problems as the weapon is just so insane. If you can loot the axe in P3, and pop that dreamless sleep between 3 and into 4, it will help you a lot. I'm a huge proponent of doing as much damage as you can as early as you can, but I've pulled aggro on Kael a few times thanks to huge crits and the axe proc when I push too hard. Any other fight in the game I have no aggro problems whatsoever even popping AW/trinkets within 10 seconds of the fight starting, but p4 Kael really hampers me.

Avitus · 01/15/08, 6:22 AM

Well, looting the axe is a given and not really optional, don't think you'd be meleeing without it.

Still, according to my guild's calculations, I'd have to be pushing 2500 DPS with salv and 30% thread reduction from talents to pull aggro off our warrior MT in most average fights.

With legendary axe and all, you would need to be using all cooldowns, have a stacked group and pretty much the best gear in game if you want to hope to achieve that number (my best so far at teron was 1950 sustained DPS in a stacked group, 1750 in a normal group with just enh sham and war) and somehow I doubt it still.

What sorta TPS does your MT pump out?

Mearis · 01/15/08, 8:11 AM

Originally Posted by Avitus

-Make sure there's no tremor totem when you use Dreamless Sleep and that Kael just used his AoE arcane explosion thing

What happens if he flame strikes where you are standing while using dreamless potion? That honestly seems really dumb.

CaptBooyah · 01/15/08, 9:06 AM

Originally Posted by Mearis

What happens if he flame strikes where you are standing while using dreamless potion? That honestly seems really dumb.

You bubble? DPSing without any mana.. you'd might as well be dead =]

Alternatively, you could always get yourself swapped into a group with a resto shaman for mana totem (yes, I cant remember the talented versions name) or maybe steal a mages spot in the Spriests group for 30 secs or so =]

After going all out after phase 2, I usually chill for phase 3, judging wisdom on Telonicus and auto-attacking/mana pot to get my mana back up to full... I've also thought about BoSac'ing the tanks for that little extra health kick from SpiA

Of course, we're still having issues with 3->4 transition, so maybe I should be just emptying myself out throughout 2-3 regardless.

flyingtoastr · 01/15/08, 9:30 AM

Originally Posted by Mearis

What happens if he flame strikes where you are standing while using dreamless potion? That honestly seems really dumb.

Bubble happens.

The only problem I've ever had with MDSP is other players being a little overzealous and cleansing the debuff off. Make sure to inform everyone beforehand.

EDIT: I'm updating the JoW list and I need one quick tidbit of info from you guys. Can SoC and SoB procs in turn proc JoW? Some of the people on the WoW forums are saying they can, which would result in a pretty sizable Mp5 increase, but I trust you guys more then them. Anyone have a combatlog or such that supports/refutes this?

Tekzor · 01/15/08, 10:29 AM

A question I’ve had in my mind for a while has been what the positive and negative aspects of weapon switching to take advantage of multiple weapon enchants would be. I use a Torch of the Damned with mongoose currently, but I was playing around with a Soul Cleaver with executioner and noticed that I could get both procs up at the same time. [Using Soul Cleaver instead of my Torch in a raid situation would probably reduce any gains noticed from the enchant procs, but if I grabbed a second Torch and put executioner on it…] GCD from weapon switch may be an issue, but since I will have to manage that manually, it should be avoidable. Has anyone tried this out before and was there any appreciable difference?