My group was Enh Shaman, Arms Warrior, Fury Warrior, Rogue, Ret (me!). Four of us were drummers, which equals constant drums. We had CoR and a survival hunter, and 2 bloodlusts, the first one at 4 mins, upon which I used haste pot/trinket and AW for the second time, and the second following that. I also used demonslaying exlir and scroll of strength V.

Personally, I'd stick with the CE/Harbingers. Soul Cleaver may be slower but it's just far worse in general. Seal twisting should serve to enhance your existing damage, you don't want to go too far out of your way to accommodate it if it means sacrificing things. Just use your best gear, and twist when you've got a window to do it. If you think it is a bit tight, or you think your weapon speed may have changed during the swing (quartz doesn't adjust according to haste changes until after the current swing), just wait.

A thing to consider if you are wiping on Brut is that unless you are checking recount or whatever the exact moment the tank dies your dps will go down and the numbers will be unrepresentative of your real dps because he is running around while you are wiping. My advice is to practice the technique, don't worry too much about doing more dps, just worry about not screwing up the rotation and getting caught without SoB on a swing. Just get comfortable with it, the dps will come. If your guild is wiping on the boss they are probably more interested in reaching the enrage with live tanks and managing burns rather than maximizing dps. Everything should fall into place when your raid is ready to kill the boss.

It's in post http://elitistjerks.com/772863-post4437.html

I believe the conclusion was it is only better for both factions if you are using DMC:C with the Alchemist stone. Although if you are a BloodElf ret paladin, haste pots still win.

Iirc it was with Alchemist's Stone only yes.

Personally the last few months I've switched to using haste pot + AW -> Fel mana pot -> haste pot + AW + heroism for my Brut potion rotation now and use Shard of Contempt + DST as my trinkets.


Yea sorry about that, I was halfway through writing such a thing at the time when this thread had reached "critical mass" and we were being flooded by the same questions multiple times a day, however things seem to have quieted down significantly now.

Additionally since TBC content has pretty much ended (as well as disbanding my old guild of 3 years), I've gradually started losing interest in the game, I don't think I'm alone in this. Don't think it warrants a new thread anymore at least for the time being.

Okey, I'm really tired of trying to slough through nearly 4600 posts to find the data I want which *should* be on the first page with the rest of the 'need to know' information.

Can anyone direct me to hard evidence proving that Executioner < Mongoose for (nearly) all situations? This isn't a point I'm contesting directly, I just want to know where this 'common knowledge' is coming from.


I am not asking you to spell out again for the umpteenth time (assuming it's been done already) why Executioner is not as good as Mongoose.

I am not asking to be ridiculed for not searching for the information, because I believe it is unreasonable to expect someone to wade through a thread this ridiculously long for information any other class would have right on the front page.

I am not trying to start a multi-page tirade about the pros and cons of either enchant.

I am asking for some direction to the work that must already have been done for people to so strongly hold to the idea that Mongoose is *the* weapon enchant.

Theres a whole thread on it, i personally haven't read it but if your looking for answers you should check it out:
[Raid] Executioner vs. Mongoose, preliminary numbers

The basic stuff i do know is that ArP scales well when stacked but unless you have a certain amount, the gain from agility + the atk speed far outweighs the ArP.

A paladin gets less from ArP than most physical dpsers since a fairly decent portion of a paladin's dps is holy, which already ignores armor. So Executioner doesn't affect anything close to 100% of our dps and that is why mongoose is almost always better. For the maths look at the link Chrix posted.

Yeah this is what I'm doing also.

With 2 piece T6 and demonic runes it's not a problem to use 2 haste pots and use max rank exo + r6 consecration (switching to 1 when low)

I forget the exact number but there is a certain amount of ArP that will make executioner more effective than mongoose. I know that once I get my endgame set from sunwell, executioner becomes a better enchant due to all the ArP that is on the sunwell gear.

Use Rawr for details.

Anyone know the best way to get Ret Paladin EP Weights to be concise? I tried the spreadsheet linked on the first page and then plugged the numbers into the Equivalence Plug In (eqp - Google Code) and it seemed very wrong. Especially with reagrd to Strength and Armor Pen.

Here is what I got: http://www.outlandriders.com/images/epweights.jpg

Any input on whether those look correct or if I am doing something wrong?
Thanks

The threads I linked a few posts ago contain the numbers to which you refer, Salty. Against high armor bosses, it ends up being somewhere in the 800-1000 passive ArP range with full raid buffs and full -armor debuffs on the target.

Hence I said almost always

[EDIT]I went back and fiddled with rawr abit and used the best (or 2nd/3rd best if it had ArP) items and got 1102 ArP from gear (5112 ArP and 2.25k dps fully buffed). Even in that case rawr says Mongoose is better albeit by a minimal margin.

I agree, the stats which aren't so easyily scaleable such as ArP doesn't allow for the proper mapping of the executioner

enchant. At this point because noone has really gives a constant ArP already factored into the equation based on gear

already used/owned, we have to keep stats based person to person at this point. Now,going by the base 1ppm - 840

ArP per target, and 1000 base ArP(which we will call D), we can safely assume that executioner over a raid will increase

dmg by 5.56 % averaged out. Now,if you scale mongoose in the same fashion heres where the numbers become foggy

to me.Will D, because of the base stat with the mongoose enchant improve overall dps, or because of the factor of the

ArP needed for the executioner to improve dps along the same line or supass mongoose is 1000?So in reality the more

ArP which you already have stacked on your gear the more efficient it works twords your overall dps advantage. In the

same breath though, just like most things in wow,there is a ceiling which to operate by. On a cloth boss consider this, if

you are operating with a warrior tank keep in mind the value of his sunders. I don't have the math offhand rightnow,

but once that warrior has gotten to the 5 mark and devastated, that effectively reduced that bosses armor to almost

zero. So the more ArP you stack on your gear for a fight of that nature,you lose overall affectiveness,and thus dps.So

what it really boils down to is the Paladins' versatility as a class. Retadins are shunned for the most part, and accepted

at best, but not heralded. You need to use your own decision making process when going into these fights about what

gear to stack where, and what bosses to use that ArP gear to its most affective stat.Will executioner still help you in

those fights? Of course, but the base ArP needed on your gear for most other boss fights wont be needed there, use

your head, and you will see a difference in the way you play, and the way in which your raid group values your slot as a Retadin.

Nice post, there's some merit to the mathematical breakdown, however there's several things that seem to have been rushed and ignored giving an incorrect conclusion (imo).


1. For PVP: He doesn't consider vengeance stacks. While it's true that resilience lowers the damage when you do crit, more crit percentage means more frequent vengeance stacks (which you can't as easily keep rolling on a 350-493 resilience target as you do in PvE). 5% -> 10% -> 15% more damage with vengeance stacks is a bigger benefit than any other damage buff you can possibly get. Mongoose gives you 5% additional chance to proc vengeance.

2. For PVP: He doesn't consider the ~5% dodge (defensive bonus) you get whenever Mongoose is up. I'd rather eat an Overpower every now and then and let the warrior burn his rage and waste his gcd stance dancing than not have ~5% extra dodge on occasion which work against rogues, hunter pets, ferals, other ret pallies, enhance shammies and all warrior attacks except overpower.

3. For PvP: Clothies are already squishy, hitting them slightly harder when executioner procs isn't going to seal the deal any more than the extra crits you'll get with Mongoose, in both cases, with or without procs, clothies are squishy and not really the issue here. It's the heavily armored warriors, ferals and shield wielding healers that are the real problem when you're trying to frontload a lot of damage and executioner is actually CRAP against them (taking 840 armor off a 10-20k armor target gives you pretty much nada). Mongoose is just as good against the heavily armored targets where it counts and you actually NEED more damage as it is against the squishy clothies.

==>Conclusion for PVP: It seems he just bypasses the whole argument by saying "hey Mongoose sucks in PvP since crits hit for less with resilience". Given the points I've listed above, there is no way I can agree with Executioner being superior in PvP. PvP is non-scripted so you can't really break it down into math perfectly and expect that to be realistic, but for all things considered, the higher chance to keep vengeance stacks up alone pretty much seals the deal in favor of Mongoose. Additionally as a damage buff (where it counts => High armor targets) as well as a defensive buff, Mongoose is simply far superior.


4. Faulty general logic: He is unsure of how the haste mechanic works for Mongoose and disregards it in all calculations, then adds it as a throwaway comment later on. The haste gained from Mongoose is definitely NOT like SotC, instead it works like any other haste effect in the game that increases your autoattack and WF DPS with no penalties.

5. PvE in practice: For the point to be reached where Executioner overtakes Mongoose, Sunder/Expose, FF as well as CoR are always assumed to be always on. This is correct, any raid should always run with these debuffs. However, it is also very common for at least FF and CoR to occasionally drop off. Now considering the advantage executioner has at a certain ArmPen point is very slim, instabilities in FF/CoR uptime can pretty much nullify that.


==> Conclusion for PvE: At no to low armor pen, Mongoose is always better. At a "certain point" (which Rawr can semi-accurately tell you based on your gear and other stats) Executioner overtakes Mongoose.

In reality, the "certain point" is actually a "window" where you stack ArmPen high enough where Executioner overtakes Mongoose, but not too high on low armor bosses where the additional ArmPen is wasted and Executioner becomes worthless.

If you manage to land in that window, then yes, Executioner will be very slightly better theoretically. In practice FF/CoR uptime can further taint even this conclusion. For all other purposes (especially PvP as explained above), I'd stick with Mongoose.

As explained, Rawr is your best bet to check which enchant is best for you, though as previously explained it does (very slightly) undervalue Executioner.


Extra cookie tip: An often ignored fact when comparing Retri math to MS Warrior math (our closest relatives for theorycrafting purposes) is that for both Executioner as well as Mongoose there are big differences.

-Executioner: As explained, warriors will gain more here. While ArmPen will increase 100% of their damage, it will only work for 70% of ours!

-Mongoose: (Often ignored fact) We gain a lot more from Agility than warriors do! At level 70, Paladins gain 1% crit and 1% dodge every 25 agility. Warriors require 33 agility (!) per 1% crit and 30 agility per 1% dodge.

With BoK, 120 * 1.1 agi from Mongoose is worth 5.28% crit and dodge for us (4.8% without BoK), but only 4% crit for Warriors (3.63% without BoK).

=> Too many people jump to conclusions based on what they hear/read on warrior forums. Executioner is a LOT better for them and Mongoose is A LOT worse for them. Don't get confused.

Thanks for the walk-through Avitus, I wasn't completely able to get all my thoughts coherent for that post, but you fixed it up all quite nicely. I hope all of that combined mumbo-jumbo was able to answer your question Petersen.

Come now Avitus. Melee classes already have major problems with ret pallys due to armor and lack of snareability, the dodge chance is negligible.

Mongoose is not "just as good" between lightly and heavily armored targets. Your crits are going to be just as worthless against a hoy pally with mongoose up as without.

And the haste from Mongoose really is nearly worthless. The only time that haste would matter is if it allowed you to get an extra attack in. On a given 6 minute brut fight, assuming a perfect 1 PPM, Mongoose will give roughly a passive .5% haste rating. With a 3.5 second weapon that is going to drop your swing timer by a massive .02 seconds. Over those 6 minutes you are getting less than .6 more white swings from that haste (in other words, you're getting nothing). We are not rogues, we don't attack fast enough for it to make a difference.

You are incorrect in stating that Rawr will tell you where to use Executioner and where to use Mongoose. Rawr has no idea how to handle Executioner. There is a massive difference between 210 passive armor penetration and 840 burst.

And if we're going to use the "you need x debuffs QQ" argument; mongoose crits are also lowered in damage when the boss doesn't have those up.

And that is all.

The haste from mongoose might combine with some of the passive haste on your gear to produce an extra swing, however - for example, if you already had 0.5% passive haste, having mongoose on your weapon would grant you an extra swing whereas having executioner would not. The "haste is only good when it gets you an extra swing" cuts both ways - if Brutallus dies 0.1 seconds before you would have swung, then the extra haste from mongoose would have gotten you an extra swing.

And it is well known that armor penetration increases in effectiveness as the target's armor value approaches zero (up until the point where it hits zero and additional ArP becomes useless). Furthermore, that worthless crit on the holydin will still stack vengeance, as Avitus pointed out.

The ArP coming in burst rather than sustained should only matter in PvP or if it can be reliably combined with other procs or cooldowns. Otherwise it will simply average out over a 6 minute fight.

by the time you are able to acquire an apolyon, you will be sitting with ~250 passive haste; you can't just walk up to KJ fresh out of bt. Hell my swing timer is already coming close to sub 3.0...

aaanyways for pvp it's all null and void, deathfrost all the way baby. Yeah, i said it...

I have just offered to take up the reins for Rawr.Retribution, with Zurm's departure. If anyone has any questions, comments or suggestions about Rawr, either new or previously unaddressed, please send me a PM. I also regularly check this thread so will probably see any feedback left here.

Mitigation and Executioner are on near the top of my list of things to fix in Rawr.Ret. To that end, it seems to me that the best way to model Executioner is take the damage increase it gives times the uptime. This would paint a far more accurate accurate picture than the current passive ArP.

Because crits don't pierce armor. You lose crit damage to mitigation just as you lose normal swing damage. If you're going to use the argument that Executioner loses damage from FF or CoR falling off (which they should never, and if they are you need to find some new locks and boomkin) then you also need to adjust the values of Mongoose, as its crits will also be lower.

The point of inflection where 1 crit rating equals 1 attack power (IIRC) is somewhere around 4500-5000 attack power raid buffed. Before then crit rating is always subpar to attack power. Since it takes slightly more Agility to equal 1% crit than crit rating the PoI attack power level is even higher, meaning you can not call Mongoose a blanket 120 AP.

If you're confused, ret pallys don't get extra attack power from Agility like Rogues do. All we get is the crit.

The only endgame (Tier 6) Ret Pally weapon that was slower than a 3.5 is [Torch of the Damned]. Every other Best-in-Slot weapon has been a 3.5 or faster ([Cataclysm's Edge], [Shivering Felspine] or [Apolyon, the Soul-Render]). Combined with the haste from sunwell crap you'll be looking at sub-3.2 swing speeds most of the time, I was being conservative in my calculations.

I'm not saying Mongoose is a bad enchant. Hell, I use it on my Felspine. There is an awful lot of people who don't like armor penetration for some odd reason here though.

5% dodge is 5% dodge. It's a buff that shouldn't be downplayed.


Eh, no? And: Vengeance.


You can't handle haste like you are trying to. As explained by others, it cuts both ways.


Read up, I actually said it slightly undervalues it. The difference isn't as massive as you think, though I hope changes to Rawr will shed some better light on where it lies exactly.


There's a very large difference between when those aren't up for Mongoose and when they aren't up for Executioner. "Exponential increase" and all that, remember?


Look, I don't really have a problem with Executioner as an enchant, however there are certain things like PvP where it's a clear cut win for Mongoose at least in my eyes. For PvE Executioner seems a pretty situational enchant to me, with a lot of flaky dependencies and minimal benefit when all dependencies are met, so why bother? Unless I'm really focusing my gear on ArmPen as a primary stat, I wouldn't get Executioner.



Aramul, you got PM

Why wait for Rawr? I have a calculator here, why don't we figure it out for ourselves?

Let us take a nice 6200 armor boss. Throw the debuffs up on him. Now he's at 2190 armor. We'll use Best-in-Slot plate sunwell gear which happens to have a bit of armor penetration ([Band of Ruinous Delight] + [Stormrage Signet Ring] + [Hard Khorium Battleplate] + [Crown of Anasterian] = 798 passive armor penetration) with a nice enchanted Apolyon with Executioner (note that with the haste in this set you have 250 passive haste rating, giving you a swing timer of ~2.93 seconds).

Without Executioner the boss will be sitting at 1392 armor, or about 11.6% mitigation. Now we have 2 senarios. The first is how Rawr handles Executioner, as a 210 passive penetration. The second is the way Executioner actually works, with 45 seconds at norma levels and 15 at high piercing.

In the Rawr model the boss' armor is lowered to 1182 armor, just under 10.1% reduction.

In the real model you have 45 seconds per minute at 1392 armor (11.6% reduction) and 15 seconds at 522 armor (4.9% reduction).

Pretending you have 4500 attack power and 35% crit (not unreasonable) you'll be looking at these baseline numbers for white and CS attacks.

White baseline: 1598.36
CS baseline: 1758.19

With percentage modifiers (Improved Sanctity Aura, 2-handed Weapon Spec, Vengeance x3, Crusade, Blood Frenzy; combined total of 133.2% increase) you'll be looking at the following for normal hits.

White normal: 2129.02
CS normal: 2341.91

And of course, crits at 200%.

White crit: 4258.03
CS crit: 4683.82

Now for the fun part.

Rawr model for Executioner
Armor level is static 10.1% reduction.

Reduced normal white: 1913.99
Reduced crit white: 3827.97

Reduced normal CS: 2105.38
Reduced crit CS: 4210.75

At these levels (with a 2.93 second swing timer and 35% crit as outlined way above) you will be looking at 881.87 DPS from your white swings and 473.71 DPS from your CS. This gives you a combined total of:

1355.58 DPS

Save that number.

Real model for Executioner
Armor level changes between 11.6% and 4.9% reduction.

Without Executioner (11.6%):

Reduced normal white: 1882.05
Reduced crit white: 3764.10

Reduced normal CS: 2070.25
Reduced crit CS: 4140.50

DPS without Executioner: 867.16 + 465.81 = 1332.97

With Executioner (4.9%):

Reduced normal white: 2024.70
Reduced crit white: 4049.39

Reduced normal CS: 2227.16
Reduced crit CS: 4454.31

DPS with Executioner: 932.88 + 501.11 = 1433.99

Now, assuming Executioner is a 1 PPM and persists for 15 seconds it will have a 25% uptime. To determine the actual DPS in the real model we will take:

(1433.99 * .25) + (1332.94 * .75)
1358.20

There is a difference between the two. It is small, only about 2%, but it is there. It is about 3 DPS. IIRC someone posted a picture of Rawr saying that in this gearset Mongoose is better by about 5 DPS (using the incorrect method of calculating Executioner), so in reality Mongoose is about 2 DPS higher. However, throw in another piece of Armor Penetration gear that is also technically Best-in-Slot, say [Leggings of the Immortal Night] and Executioner would start to pull ahead.

See how this affects Rawr recommending the wrong enchant now?

Its simple...there is no clear winner of Mongoose vs Executioner both in pvp and pve ... unless ur building on ArP, only than you can say Exec is better!
And about pvp: that 5%dodge u get is pretty useless coz its a defensive stat, when you get nuked by meele u need that...but if u get nuke u'll equip your shield not your 2h with Mongoose.

If u cant decide...than choose wich looks better ... and its done!

I choose Exec coz i think as Ret in pvp my major role is burst...and for burst Exec is the winner.