Last time I tested things on the PTR a few builds back, Judgements while using SoC triggered the badge libram.


edit: Just tried it on the PTR. I was able to trigger the libram proc with all 3 judgements. Just think of it as "Judgement of Light of Command". = P

1. Savagery is marginally better, but so little that lots of people won't even bother switching.

2. Don't strive for anything. Gem for str, and use good gear. Don't go above the hit cap.

3. Don't shoot for anything. Use good gear, never gem/enchant for haste.

4. Use JoL. Let the holy paladins and prot paladins do JoW.

You use JoL only if there is someone else doing JoW with 100% uptime. That means if you have 1 holy and 1 ret you do Wisdom. Having Wisdom up all the time is worth so much more than a harder scaling JoL.

I was thinking about this. Let's assume a Ret and Holy paladin. (Ret and Prot are obvious.) The Ret paladin guarantees 100% uptime on her debuff. The Holy paladin may not achieve that. Maybe there will be a spot with a lot of damage, and the Holy paladin can't spare the GCDs, so the Judgement drops off for a few seconds. Maybe another healer dies, so the paladin is forced to cover additional assignments.

Essentially, would you trade more healing from JoL for a greater assurance that JoW is up?

In an ideal world, the Holy paladin is able to maintain 100% uptime on JoW. But sometimes that becomes hard to reach, especially when things start to go wrong.

I don't use a single mana potion on KJ, I spam haste pots and can maintain max rank consecration most of the time (pauses during "image" spawns ). I do use Dark Runes occasionally (mainly at the start before the first dragon breath). Usual buffs are Demonslaying Elixir, Elixir of Major Mageblood and a Str scroll.

Not sure what your strategy is, but getting the mana breath every time under the shield and occasionally outside, as well as all the AoE damage flying around is enough to keep me on high mana all fight.

The basic stuff: Are you sure JoW is on all the time, does your shammy stick mana spring down? Otherwise if you're still going oom, your dragon controllers are doing it wrong.

My average at the end of the KJ fight is 2.1-2.2k with occasional ~2.3 spikes during the fight.

Looking at your gear, I'm surprised you haven't broken 2k at Brut during progression kills. What kind of party setup/raid debuffs do you have?


Anyway, not like any of this will matter next patch


I was talking about SoB since there's no point in using SoC in 99% of current PvE content anymore. I guess I misread his question In any case you won't be using the SoC libram anyway (which does still work with SoC yes) since you'll be using SoB, hence Libram of Avengement.


Guaranteeing that JoW never drops off is the main priority and overshadows the importance of optimizing JoL. I'm with toaster on this one.

If the spell coefficent on SoC that Redcape mentioned is intended, will that push it over the 1% difference with SoB? Or will SoB also have a coefficent of some kind? It will be interesting to see if these changes will go on live relatively soon and if it is intended.

Zurm, an anxious Rawr fan is looking for any news or update about the program. I normally pick up the most recent version at Rawr - Release: Rawr b16.1... and I'm currently seeing b16.1. I'm sure that the 3.0 version is a bit harder because of the massive amount of changes Blizzard pushes, but I'd love to know if there is an ETA on the project. Thanks very much for the hard work!


Redcape, you mentioned earlier that we shouldn't 'sacrifice' gear for hit. But is there a new minimum we should say to shoot for? Should we never gem for hit? I'm thinking of dropping out the S4 gloves and having the Hard Khorium ones made. And the fact that the Blood-Stained Pauldrons are better than T6 is frustrating. I almost wish they would remove the int from our T6/S4 gear... Ah well... I'll gladly find more +hit with all of the fun and wonderful changes we're getting!


One final thing... Is the FoL from Art of War still resetting the swing timer? Has blizz stated this was intented?

It was our first real night of attempts on KJ and I'm sure that had some to do with it. So, I'll chalk that up to learning curves.

As far as Brut is concerned, the normal group for melee when I'm present is 2 Rogues, Enh Shaman, Fury Warrior, and myself. The shaman does twist and wisdom was on the boss all the time, but I just run OOM. If I try to chain pot haste potions I'd be OOM even faster. I use Mageblood, Demonslaying, and Str scrolls. My rotation is CS>Judge>Exo>Con.

I make sure to keep CS priority with Judgement right after. Exo and Con when GCD don't clash with CS. Maybe I should not be using max rank Con, but who knows. I just find myself OOM so use mana pots instead of haste.

Of course I use AW up front (after vengence and DM:Crusade have maxed out) and then when Hero is popped.

Who knows.. ><

Simple question:

Do I need to hit the new hit cap or is it no longer a priority? There seems to be conflicting views on this question and was hoping that there might be a consensus at this point.

Zurm has 3.0 mechanics Rawr Ret mostly done, pending some minor debugging. I believe a new release is planned within the next few days (though don't quote me on this).


We're gaining more from Str than we are from Hit now, meaning if you gem and enchant everything with Str you'll gain more than gemming for the hit cap. However, exception are socket bonuses, the best course of action is probably to gem all red with 10 Str gems and all yellow sockets with 10 hit gems if you can net a meaningful socket bonus.

In a nut shell (since I've seen too many confused people ask this question): No, there's no magical hit (or haste) number to aim for. The only purpose the "hit cap" number serves (142 hit rating at 70) is to make sure you don't go OVER it and waste stats if you do get that much +hit some way.

Later on at level 80 STR will be pulling even further ahead at which point blindly gemming everything for STR is probably going to be the way to go. New release of Rawr should show case by case breakdowns in more detail.


Sounds like most things are in order. Do you use drum rotations (though you can kiss that goodbye in a few days if you did)?

Spamming max rank Consecration and going oom midway is generally not advised. For example, the way I deal with it is I have 1 button that has r1, r4 and r6 macroed depending on the modifier button I press (alt, shift or nothing). The goal is to spam non stop (for low rank mana efficiency), while making sure you use up all your mana when the boss is dead (uprank in the end if you got mana to blow and obviously during AW).

Anyway, again all this won't matter in a few days I guess, "ret history trivia" if you will :P In a way I think they're making Ret much easier to play by taking all the (frustrating) mana management out of it, not that I'll complain.

Still there some nice new ways to gain hit, such as the new Surefooted (10 crit and 10 hit) without sacrificing any strength. Personally I'll end around cap without really trying, mostly because of my BT off-set gear with loads of hit (eg [Helm of the Illidari Shatterer], [Heartshatter Breastplate]).

However, currently I don't have the [Libram of Avengement], nor have I ever really tried to get it. Guess I'll have to do some Blood Furnace grinding if I don't want to be stuck with a SMV-quest blue :/ I'm still not sure whether using [Libram of Divine Judgement] will increase that seal's damage enough to favor it over Seal of Blood, assuming no Avengement libram or if Seal of Blood is best, libram or not.

A 20 hit gem (yellow) or a 10 str/10 hit gem (red/yellow) is still sacrificing Str for Hit at 1:1 which is a loss at level 80.

As stated at level 80 STR will be pulling so much ahead you'll only want to socket pure Str gems in all sockets, despite socket bonuses. The only concession possible to make right now is that things might still be shifting around (the latest iteration in changes to Seal/Judgement coefficients for example) so we'll only know for sure and how much of a difference it is exactly (I'd go for hit cap if it turns out to be only a very minor loss) when we actually get there (WotLK live). Until then, all indications point to STR just being way too good to trade for anything else at that level, irregardless of cap or socket bonuses.

Anyway, I think most are asking about level 70 where those gems don't exist yet.


That's very true. I thought it was a new wotlk enchant, turns out it's the old Surefooted enchant simply being changed.

This makes it the default Ret enchant, nice catch!



Edit: Also one more note, for alliance the cap to consider will probably be lower, ~126.15 (8%) rather than 142 (9%) if you can guarantee a drenai (="alliance shammy" amongst others) in party.

I understand that you're sacrificing str for hit at the same ratio. The point is that you want to do that as little as possible and a str/hit gem loses you only half the amount of str that a pure hit gem does, while still getting you the theoretically beneficial yellow socket bonus which is your reason for not gemming pure str in the first place. If str outperforms hit at all levels, but hit follows it closely, then a yellow socket bonus you want to get is better acquired with a str/hit gem than a pure hit gem.

As an aside, do the crit damage bonus talents push crit to anywhere near hit? Would str/crit be valuable for those yellow socket bonuses, or is str/hit our new default orange gem until we're at the hit cap?

edit: and regardless of how powerful str will be, at some point in the content we will see socket bonuses which will make meeting a non-red requirement more powerful. Consider the [Pauldrons of Berserking], for instance. They have a socket bonus of 3 strength, and a red and yellow socket. By meeting that socket bonus you lose an effective 2 strength, at the gain of(most likely) 5 crit, or 5 hit were there str/hit gems available. Strength would have to be 2.5x stronger than the next available "yellow" stat for that to pull even. Is it truly that far ahead?

1% to hit is nice, not to mention the 3/5 expertise you guys get (and in some cases an extra trinket slot). Not a big discrepancy, but advantage definitely goes your way.

I'm a little surprised that hit takes such a back seat to hit. I guess I just expected Blizz to want us to have to itemize something other than a pure "hit harder" stat.

With all the new abilities we have, has anyone modeled the amount of crit that we need to make sure Vengeance is up, before stacking all of this str?

I haven't done any numbers, and as Avituus mentioned, we still have to wait for Wotlk to go live - a lot can change in this month.

But, your example is flawed, I think. [Pauldrons of Berserking]: you'd still lose 7str by gemming a 10str 10 hit instead of a pure 20str. Is 7str worth 10 hit? I'm inclined to say no, since 10 hit will be a lot less at 80 than at 70. Are you thinking in Wotlk-quality gems?

It should be a trivial amount. My napkin math seems to say something around: 7.69% crit for 100% vengeance uptime on a static target.

No, you gem 10 str and 5 str/5 hit(in theory). You also gain the 3 str you would not have gained if you had gemmed 20 str. This gives you a net 18 str and 5 hit, as opposed to simply 20 str. I'm using northrend-style gem combinations at level 70 power to illustrate the point. I know 5str/5hit gems don't exist. It would be 10str/10 hit. The point remains that going after a socket bonus with an orange gem will be more powerful than a yellow one as long as strength is as powerful as it is.

edit: and I'm comparing them at the level they're itemized for, 70. I'm simply pointing out that some socket bonuses will be worth going for even if they're yellow(though probably not if they're blue, other than the one for the meta), and when you do that, a combination gem will be better than a pure hit gem.

It's plausible, but it'd be after T7. If you socket for the socket bonus you have to understand that 10 hit at 80 is somewhere around .25% hit (according to WoWhead). So, in a red/yellow item, you're basically losing 10-(socket bonus) strength. The socket bonus would have to be around 8 to be worth it.

Really? Per item point, strength is worth five times as much as hit?

I have been wondering about this on the PTR! Now, the question I have is it worth to resocket for primarily strength now instead of the 10 str 5/5 str/crit that was gemmed for up until this point? Or is it better to leave things gemmed how they are and worry about it in WOTLK? It's easy for my mind to run off with random concepts so I just want to make sure.

Str/hit comes out in a month.

The "best" meta is still the RED (the new one has more agility), so you still need 2 blue and 2 yellow gems.

Actually the WotLK RED only requires one of each color gem. Other metas have had their activation requirements similarly lightened.

I understand what you mean, however I assumed Str is actually that more powerful. However, giving it a benefit of a doubt, I went to do some crunching and here's what I found out:


Looking at the high end WotLK epics (ilevel 213), 1 gem sockets are giving bonuses in the magnitude of "4 rating", 2 sockets are giving "6 rating", meaning it has doubled since TBC. Afaik statbudget wise, Str : Ratings = 1 : 1.


Hypothetical situation (level 80 version of Pauldrons of Berserking): Red + Yellow socket with a 6 STR bonus (best case scenario for a bonus)

If you socket all Str = 2x 20 STR = 40 STR (epic gems) or 2x 16 STR = 32 STR (rare quality gems)

If you match sockets (Str gem + str/hit gem) = 20 STR + 10 STR/10 HIT + 6 STR = 36 STR + 10 HIT (epic) or 16 STR + 8 STR/8 HIT + 6 STR = 30 STR + 8 HIT (rare)

According to Redcape's sheet (all calculations assuming it is correct) and given the gear in that sheet (which should give a ballpark range, but might differ slightly for case by case obviously):

1 STR = 1.2451 DPS for SoB
1 HIT = 0.7951 DPS for SoB

Gemming pure STR = 49.804 DPS (epic) or 39.8432 DPS (rare)
Gemming matching sockets = 44.8236 + 7.951 = 52.7746 DPS (epic) or 37.353 + 6.3608 = 43.7138 DPS (rare)

You're 100% correct. Gemming STR/HIT in WotLK does seem like the way to go if you can net a STR bonus.


Just to have all bases covered, lets assume some other bonuses (simplified with only epic gems as that would be in favor of pure STR gemming and we're trying to prove socketting with matching colors):

1. +6 HIT
2. +6 CRIT
3. +6 HASTE

Spreadsheet says: 1 CRIT = 0.639, 1 HASTE = 0.3933

Gemming to match colors would give:

*Gemming pure STR epics = 49.804 DPS
1. 30 STR + 16HIT = 37.353 + 12.7216 = 50.0746 DPS
2. 30 STR + 10 HIT + 6 CRIT = 37.353 + 7.951 + 3.834 = 49.138 DPS
2. 30 STR + 10 HIT + 6 HASTE = 37.353 + 7.951 + 2.3598 = 47.6638 DPS

So it remains true if it's a Hit bonus, but not true if it's a Crit bonus and definitely not for Haste bonus.


Conclusion? You're more or less right, gemming full STR as a general case at 80 is not the way to go (neither is it at 70), due to socket bonuses.

It seems for STR, AP, HIT, Expertise socket bonuses, gem by 10STR/10HIT in yellow (while under caps). For Crit, Agi and Haste socket bonuses gem pure STR (Crit/Agi sockets seem negligible losses, haste socket bonuses are utter crap with big losses).



According to spreadsheet, it's still Hit > Crit, despite crit damage bonus talents, STR/HIT gems > STR/CRIT gems.


This is a non-issue, you can keep vengeance up through the crit gained by talents alone



Note: All calculations are made based on the assumption that the numbers through Redcape's spreadsheet are correct. If someone finds an error in the spreadsheet, please let us know. At this point I'd really encourage more people going through the calculations if this is what we're going to base our WotLK math on.