Do MB before SWP. Although SWP does more instantaneous DPS than Mind Blast, SWP has a very long duration, losing half a tick by casting MB first does not result in as much of a damage loss than delaying MB with it's relatively short 7 second effective cooldown.
Also in the notes at the bottom you stated that Inner Focus + DP is 3 seconds, Inner focus is an instant, not an instant cast, meaning it does not invoke the GCD. The same goes for potions, healthstones, and similar items but NOT Shadowfiend.
Ah thanks, I didnt think about that on the Innerfocus
Now for those who read that dont think its what I am following 100% of the time, I put that up just as a general "Is this how I should be thinking" kinda of a thing.
Ok just looking for some positive/negative feed back on this, I know its not a rotation but just a general of how I should be working my abilities.
Normally a raiding Combat Rogue I just wanted an alt and I figured if I am going to do it I may as well do it right.
Thanks
You're clipping the last tick on SW:P. Ideally you want it reapplied as soon as the last cast of it fades, no sooner. If you overwrite it before the old one fades you're losing damage, and wasting mana.
Also, during the first back to back mind flays clip the second one after the second tick, cast the mind blast sooner. Cutting the second off that mind blast will close the gap in your VT uptime.
Hopefully you're not expecting this to be a real rotation. You rotation is assuming no lag/interupts/moving, and spriests dont have a nice rotation. We have spell priority.
Basically at anytime while DPS'ing you need to be aware of your DoT's being up, and where you are at for SWD and MB cooldowns. Your goal is to keep VT and SWP up as much as humanly possible (without clipping) and have MB and SWD spend the least amount of time possible not on cooldown. Between doing these 4 things pack in as many mind flays as you can.
Mind Flay clipping is ending the mind flay right after a damage tick, so you are free to cast a different more important spell (any of the above mentioned) sooner.
Originally Posted by Tymir
Do MB before SWP. Although SWP does more instantaneous DPS than Mind Blast, SWP has a very long duration, losing half a tick by casting MB first does not result in as much of a damage loss than delaying MB with it's relatively short 7 second effective cooldown.
I've thought about this some. Wouldn't the best rotation be MB -> SW -> SW:P
Just like MB anytime SW is sitting there not on cooldown is a loss of DPS.
No again as stated above I know this is not a roation, just a way of thinking when I try and prioritize spells to use, nothing more. Just looking for things to do differently and I appeciate your feedback.
From my calculations the slightly lower DPS/cast time of SWD combined with the 71% (or more depending on haste) longer cooldown reduces the oportunity cost of delaying SWD enough to warrant casting SWP or VT before SWD.
Do MB before SWP. Although SWP does more instantaneous DPS than Mind Blast, SWP has a very long duration, losing half a tick by casting MB first does not result in as much of a damage loss than delaying MB with it's relatively short 7 second effective cooldown.
Also in the notes at the bottom you stated that Inner Focus + DP is 3 seconds, Inner focus is an instant, not an instant cast, meaning it does not invoke the GCD. The same goes for potions, healthstones, and similar items but NOT Shadowfiend.
From a mathematical standpoint, casting MB before SWP cannot be beneficial if SWP deals more damage per cast than MB. This is fairly simple to prove.
Let's say you have two players, Alice and Bob.
Alice prioritizes SWPain over Mind Blast. When SWP wears off just as MB comes off cooldown, she chooses to SWP.
Bob prioritizes Mind Blast over SWPain. When SWP wears off just as MB comes off cooldown, he chooses to MB.
Other than these two spells, their casting priorities are the same. They therefore will cast exactly the same number of Mind Flays, Vampiric Touches, SWDeaths, and Vampiric Embraces. The only difference is that Alice casts more SWPains and Bob casts more Mind Blasts.
These two shadowpriests will eventually get to the point where they are casting a Mindblast at exactly the same time, but Bob has cast one more Mind Blast than Alice over the duration of the fight. What did Alice do in those 1.5 seconds (minus haste)? Because Bob and Alice cast exactly the same number of "other spells", this means that Alice has cast one additional SWPain.
Therefore, as long as one SWPain deals more damage than one Mind Blast, you should always prioritize SWP over MB.
-----
This can also be proven with a much shorter logical arguement.
The oppurtunity cost of one Mind Blast is 1.5 seconds, modified by haste.
The oppurtunity cost of one SWPain is 1.5 seconds, modified by haste.
Since they have the same oppurtunity cost, you should cast whichever one deals more damage-per-cast.
This is starkly different from the Warlock argument, where the oppurtunity cost of Curse of Doom is 1.5 seconds per minute (modified by haste) while the oppurtunity cost of Curse of Agony is ~3.75 seconds (averaged).
You have several non sequitur jumps in logic but I can't discern where it's stemming from so I'll have to explain the whole concept from the top.
Imagine that SWP does 1/3000th of it's current damage per tick but lasts 3000 times longer, thus staying at the same total damage and the same DPCT. What has changed is the opportunity cost. In your post you said that the opportunity cost of both SWP and MB was equal, this is incorrect. Whichever spell gets delayed will have it's cooldown extended by 1.5 seconds but the end result is different depending on which spell is delayed (how you used that same 1.5 seconds).
A Shadow Word: Pain in this theoretical situation will tick for about 2 damage, delaying this SWP by 1.5 sec is half a tick, or an opportunity cost of 1 damage.
Delaying Mind Blast by 1.5 sec in this hypothetical situation results in a loss of (MB damage)(1.5/(CastTime+Cooldown))
Substitute in an average Mind Blast of 2900 damage and the opportunity cost of delaying MB ends up being 621.
Ditch the hypothetical situation for a real one, suppose you chose MB over SWP 5 times throughout an encounter. At the end of the fight this affords you a little over a whole extra MB at the cost of exactly 2.5 SWP ticks.
In the end, with current cooldown lengths and game mechanics SWP has to do nearly 4 times more average damage than MB for SWP to be worth casting first.
The lesson to be learned here is if ability damage, cast time, ect is held constant amongst the two abilities that are to be compared, then the opportunity cost of delaying an ability approaches zero as the effective cooldown of the ability approaches infinity. The question is not one of DPCT at all (unless the ability's DPCT is less than the filler spell of course) but one of cast time, cooldown length, and ability damage.
Many changes to the Priest racial abilities will be coming soon in a future patch. For the details read below.
In an upcoming build all Priest racials have been retired, except the following:
* Desperate Prayer - This is now the 11-point talent in Holy, Holy Nova is now a base ability. Cooldown also reduced to 30 seconds.
* Devouring Plague - Now a base ability. Cooldown reduced to 30 seconds, mana cost greatly reduced.
* Symbol of Hope - Now a base ability. Now restores 5% base mana every 2 seconds for 8 seconds to your party. Renamed "Hymn of Hope."
While this change does reduce the "uniqueness" of different Priests, we feel game balance as a whole will benefit.
Note: These new "racials" are not racials, they are trainable to all Priests. (Src)
Other than these two spells, their casting priorities are the same. They therefore will cast exactly the same number of Mind Flays, Vampiric Touches, SWDeaths, and Vampiric Embraces. The only difference is that Alice casts more SWPains and Bob casts more Mind Blasts.
These two shadowpriests will eventually get to the point where they are casting a Mindblast at exactly the same time, but Bob has cast one more Mind Blast than Alice over the duration of the fight. What did Alice do in those 1.5 seconds (minus haste)? Because Bob and Alice cast exactly the same number of "other spells", this means that Alice has cast one additional SWPain.
Therefore, as long as one SWPain deals more damage than one Mind Blast, you should always prioritize SWP over MB.
As Tymir pointed out in his example, Alice did not cast an "extra" pain, but rather gained 2.5 ticks of SW:P.
In the current patch you would need Pain to tick at around 1160 (using Tymir's average Mind Blast of 2900, divided by 2.5 to get the needed damage per SW:P) for SW:P's DPS to pull equal to MB's.
I'm too lazy to figure out the exact breakpoint, but I imagine you are both correct for varying gear levels.
I've spent much time over the last two days thinking about this problem (lol) and it's an interesting thought experiment. I've come up with at least 6 wildly different ways to look at the problem. I suppose it's all moot with 3.0 as SWP will refresh itself, but I am morbidly fascinated at this point.
I don't believe it's fair to consider Mind Blast as a 6second cooldown in this scenario. Mind Blast and SW:P can conflict with each other no more frequently than every 24 seconds (the duration of SWP). Whether you Mind Blast every
5.5 seconds or every 8 seconds, you can cause a delay in Mind Blast no more than once every 24 seconds.
-----
Consider the ways in which you can refresh SWP: 1) SWP falls off, MB is still on cooldown. You cast SWP. Your MB cooldown is unchanged, and you lose no SWP uptime. 2) SWP falls off, MB just came off cooldown. You cast SWP and then MB. Your MB cooldown is delayed 1.5sec. 3) SWP falls off, MB just came off cooldown. You cast MB and then SWP. You have lost 1.5sec of SWP uptime, and your next SWP will come 1.5sec late.
We will ignore situation #1 because it doesn't affect anyone. Let's again consider Alice (SWP first) and Bob (MB first). Let's say that over a certain period of time, both Alice and Bob have encountered 5 SWP/MB conflicts:
Alice: MB's cooldown has been delayed by 7.5 seconds. SWP has not lost any casting time. Bob: MB has not lost any casting time. SW:P has lost 7.5sec of uptime.
Woohoo, you say - Bob has gained 2,900 damage from that extra Mindblast, while Alice has lost 2.5 ticks of SW:P for 1600 damage. It's good to prioritize MB over SW:P!
----- Stop. Reality check.
Bob's total casting time is 7.5 seconds longer because he has let SWP fall off for 7.5 seconds! Alice's casting rotation takes less time because she can reapply SWP more frequently. We are effectively comparing a 24 second cast rotation to a 25.5 second cast rotation - apples and oranges! It is misleading to directly compare the two.
The truth is even trickier than this. The fact is, most of the time there will be no conflict between SW:P and MB and both players will refresh SW:P exactly the moment it falls off. (this is a thought experiment, so both of them can have 0msec effective lag. Maybe I should rename them Cameron and Cromartie.) Sometimes Alice will have a conflict and Bob won't - Alice will fall further behind in MB cooldown but Bob will not lose any SWP uptime. Sometimes Bob will conflict and fall behind, while Alice has no conflict and loses nothing.
If you look at a graph of total damage dealt, at every point from 1.5sec to 24sec, Bob will appear to be 1.5 seconds ahead of Alice. However, Alice gets to refresh SWP 1.5 seconds earlier. If you consider a DPS cycle as starting by refreshing SWP, Bob's DPS cycle is 1.5 seconds slower than Alice's. This is true if the conflict happens right away (24sec vs 25.5sec rotation), but also if the conflict takes several full cast rotations. (ie 72sec vs 73.5sec rotation)
----- The Answer.
There is only one point at which Alice and Bob can be directly compared. This is after Bob has delayed SW:P by 24 full seconds - that's 16 SWP/MB conflicts. At this point, Bob is ready to cast his Nth SW:P. His SW:P timer is 24 seconds behind Alice. This means that Alice is ready to cast her (N+1)th SW:P.
How many additional Mind Blasts has Bob gained over Alice?
The answer is surprising: Exactly one.
Other than MB and SW:P, Bob and Alice cast exactly the same number of other spells. Therefore, if Alice has cast one additional SW:P, Bob will have cast one additional MB. No matter how improbable this seems, it is logically certain.
What happened the 24 seconds shorter cooldown on Mind Blast? It's an illusion. Bob purchased a 24 second shorter Mind Blast cooldown at the expense of spending 24 seconds longer to cast his spells. In the end he only comes out one Mind Blast ahead, and it doesn't matter what the cooldown of MB is .
Don't believe me? Run a sim or better yet, construct a simple Excel spreadsheet. You will find I am 100% correct.
I made a dead-simple spreadsheet where you can only cast two spells (Mind Blast and SWPain) and time is divided into 1.5second quanta. There are two columns, one which prioritizes MB and one which prioritizes SWP. You can plug in any values for Mind Blast cooldown and SWP duration and you will get one of three scenarios:
1) The "MB first" rotation is grossly more efficient than SW:P first. (less conflicts)
2) The "SWP first" rotation is grossly more efficient than MB first.
3) The rotations are roughly equal, and for every extra MB you get, you lose a full-duration SWP.
What's interesting is that scenario #3 is what happens under "realistic" conditions of 24sec SWP and 6sec MB CD. #1 and #2 are unrealistic in any case, because your filler spell rotation is unpredictable, and combined with lag this will tend to equalize the overall number of conflicts.
I've spent much time over the last two days thinking about this problem (lol) and it's an interesting thought experiment. I've come up with at least 6 wildly different ways to look at the problem. I suppose it's all moot with 3.0 as SWP will refresh itself, but I am morbidly fascinated at this point.
I don't believe it's fair to consider Mind Blast as a 6second cooldown in this scenario. Mind Blast and SW:P can conflict with each other no more frequently than every 24 seconds (the duration of SWP). Whether you Mind Blast every
5.5 seconds or every 8 seconds, you can cause a delay in Mind Blast no more than once every 24 seconds.
-----
Consider the ways in which you can refresh SWP: 1) SWP falls off, MB is still on cooldown. You cast SWP. Your MB cooldown is unchanged, and you lose no SWP uptime. 2) SWP falls off, MB just came off cooldown. You cast SWP and then MB. Your MB cooldown is delayed 1.5sec. 3) SWP falls off, MB just came off cooldown. You cast MB and then SWP. You have lost 1.5sec of SWP uptime, and your next SWP will come 1.5sec late.
We will ignore situation #1 because it doesn't affect anyone. Let's again consider Alice (SWP first) and Bob (MB first). Let's say that over a certain period of time, both Alice and Bob have encountered 5 SWP/MB conflicts:
Alice: MB's cooldown has been delayed by 7.5 seconds. SWP has not lost any casting time. Bob: MB has not lost any casting time. SW:P has lost 7.5sec of uptime.
Woohoo, you say - Bob has gained 2,900 damage from that extra Mindblast, while Alice has lost 2.5 ticks of SW:P for 1600 damage. It's good to prioritize MB over SW:P!
----- Stop. Reality check.
Bob's total casting time is 7.5 seconds longer because he has let SWP fall off for 7.5 seconds! Alice's casting rotation takes less time because she can reapply SWP more frequently. We are effectively comparing a 24 second cast rotation to a 25.5 second cast rotation - apples and oranges! It is misleading to directly compare the two.
The truth is even trickier than this. The fact is, most of the time there will be no conflict between SW:P and MB and both players will refresh SW:P exactly the moment it falls off. (this is a thought experiment, so both of them can have 0msec effective lag. Maybe I should rename them Cameron and Cromartie.) Sometimes Alice will have a conflict and Bob won't - Alice will fall further behind in MB cooldown but Bob will not lose any SWP uptime. Sometimes Bob will conflict and fall behind, while Alice has no conflict and loses nothing.
If you look at a graph of total damage dealt, at every point from 1.5sec to 24sec, Bob will appear to be 1.5 seconds ahead of Alice. However, Alice gets to refresh SWP 1.5 seconds earlier. If you consider a DPS cycle as starting by refreshing SWP, Bob's DPS cycle is 1.5 seconds slower than Alice's. This is true if the conflict happens right away (24sec vs 25.5sec rotation), but also if the conflict takes several full cast rotations. (ie 72sec vs 73.5sec rotation)
----- The Answer.
There is only one point at which Alice and Bob can be directly compared. This is after Bob has delayed SW:P by 24 full seconds - that's 16 SWP/MB conflicts. At this point, Bob is ready to cast his Nth SW:P. His SW:P timer is 24 seconds behind Alice. This means that Alice is ready to cast her (N+1)th SW:P.
How many additional Mind Blasts has Bob gained over Alice?
The answer is surprising: Exactly one.
Other than MB and SW:P, Bob and Alice cast exactly the same number of other spells. Therefore, if Alice has cast one additional SW:P, Bob will have cast one additional MB. No matter how improbable this seems, it is logically certain.
What happened the 24 seconds shorter cooldown on Mind Blast? It's an illusion. Bob purchased a 24 second shorter Mind Blast cooldown at the expense of spending 24 seconds longer to cast his spells. In the end he only comes out one Mind Blast ahead, and it doesn't matter what the cooldown of MB is .
Don't believe me? Run a sim or better yet, construct a simple Excel spreadsheet. You will find I am 100% correct.
I made a dead-simple spreadsheet where you can only cast two spells (Mind Blast and SWPain) and time is divided into 1.5second quanta. There are two columns, one which prioritizes MB and one which prioritizes SWP. You can plug in any values for Mind Blast cooldown and SWP duration and you will get one of three scenarios:
1) The "MB first" rotation is grossly more efficient than SW:P first. (less conflicts)
2) The "SWP first" rotation is grossly more efficient than MB first.
3) The rotations are roughly equal, and for every extra MB you get, you lose a full-duration SWP.
What's interesting is that scenario #3 is what happens under "realistic" conditions of 24sec SWP and 6sec MB CD. #1 and #2 are unrealistic in any case, because your filler spell rotation is unpredictable, and combined with lag this will tend to equalize the overall number of conflicts.
under your calculations how long, in a straight stand up fight, before you have to make this choice 16 times?
Last edited by bol : 09/18/08 at 7:16 AM.
Reason: not enough thought given to reply
Excuse me if I am being dense; if all other spells are cast in the same quantity and alice casts an additonal SWP but bob casts an additional MB; does this in itself not disprove you comment about bobs cycle taking 24 seconds longer, as they have cast the same number of spells. The only difference being that Alice has cast a SWP which will deal slightly more damage than Bobs MB (ignoring the fact that BoB's MB damage is now and Alice's SWP will need a further 24 secs into the next cycle)
There is only one point at which Alice and Bob can be directly compared. This is after Bob has delayed SW:P by 24 full seconds - that's 16 SWP/MB conflicts. At this point, Bob is ready to cast his Nth SW:P. His SW:P timer is 24 seconds behind Alice. This means that Alice is ready to cast her (N+1)th SW:P.
How many additional Mind Blasts has Bob gained over Alice?
The answer is surprising: Exactly one.
How did you get 1?
My spreadsheet shows 3 extra MBs cast by Bob. After roughly every 5 conflicts Bob is up 1 MB over Alice on my sheet.
Other than MB and SW:P, Bob and Alice cast exactly the same number of other spells. Therefore, if Alice has cast one additional SW:P, Bob will have cast one additional MB. No matter how improbable this seems, it is logically certain.
What happened the 24 seconds shorter cooldown on Mind Blast? It's an illusion. Bob purchased a 24 second shorter Mind Blast cooldown at the expense of spending 24 seconds longer to cast his spells. In the end he only comes out one Mind Blast ahead, and it doesn't matter what the cooldown of MB is .
Don't believe me? Run a sim or better yet, construct a simple Excel spreadsheet. You will find I am 100% correct.
I made a dead-simple spreadsheet where you can only cast two spells (Mind Blast and SWPain) and time is divided into 1.5second quanta. There are two columns, one which prioritizes MB and one which prioritizes SWP. You can plug in any values for Mind Blast cooldown and SWP duration and you will get one of three scenarios:
1) The "MB first" rotation is grossly more efficient than SW:P first. (less conflicts)
2) The "SWP first" rotation is grossly more efficient than MB first.
3) The rotations are roughly equal, and for every extra MB you get, you lose a full-duration SWP.
What's interesting is that scenario #3 is what happens under "realistic" conditions of 24sec SWP and 6sec MB CD. #1 and #2 are unrealistic in any case, because your filler spell rotation is unpredictable, and combined with lag this will tend to equalize the overall number of conflicts.
So, ran the sim on the shadowpriest DPS spreadsheet. Want to know my results:
The DPS was the same, so I say "It doesn't really matter".
Why?
With a time period of LCM(7.5,27) you get roughly 135 seconds between conflicts. With a DPS of 283 (850/3) for SW:P, and 333dps (2500/7.5) for Mind Blast, you have (333-283)/135 = 0.35 DPS difference between the two rotations. Random resists, crit rate, etc. are going to affect your DPS much more than choosing one over the other.
Originally Posted by PiousFlea
The Answer.
There is only one point at which Alice and Bob can be directly compared. This is after Bob has delayed SW:P by 24 full seconds - that's 16 SWP/MB conflicts. At this point, Bob is ready to cast his Nth SW:P. His SW:P timer is 24 seconds behind Alice. This means that Alice is ready to cast her (N+1)th SW:P.
How many additional Mind Blasts has Bob gained over Alice?
The answer is surprising: Exactly one.
How did you get 1?
After roughly every 5 conflicts Bob should be up 1 MB over Alice.
Other than MB and SW:P, Bob and Alice cast exactly the same number of other spells. Therefore, if Alice has cast one additional SW:P, Bob will have cast one additional MB. No matter how improbable this seems, it is logically certain.
What happened the 24 seconds shorter cooldown on Mind Blast? It's an illusion. Bob purchased a 24 second shorter Mind Blast cooldown at the expense of spending 24 seconds longer to cast his spells. In the end he only comes out one Mind Blast ahead, and it doesn't matter what the cooldown of MB is .
Don't believe me? Run a sim or better yet, construct a simple Excel spreadsheet. You will find I am 100% correct.
I made a dead-simple spreadsheet where you can only cast two spells (Mind Blast and SWPain) and time is divided into 1.5second quanta. There are two columns, one which prioritizes MB and one which prioritizes SWP. You can plug in any values for Mind Blast cooldown and SWP duration and you will get one of three scenarios:
1) The "MB first" rotation is grossly more efficient than SW:P first. (less conflicts)
2) The "SWP first" rotation is grossly more efficient than MB first.
3) The rotations are roughly equal, and for every extra MB you get, you lose a full-duration SWP.
What's interesting is that scenario #3 is what happens under "realistic" conditions of 24sec SWP and 6sec MB CD. #1 and #2 are unrealistic in any case, because your filler spell rotation is unpredictable, and combined with lag this will tend to equalize the overall number of conflicts.
So, ran the sim on the shadowpriest DPS spreadsheet. Want to know my results:
The DPS was the same, so I say "It doesn't really matter".
Why?
With a time period of LCM(7.5,27--2pcT6) you get roughly 135 seconds between conflicts. With a DPS of 283 (850/3) for SW:P, and 333dps (2500/7.5) for Mind Blast, you have (333-283)/135 = 0.35 DPS difference between the two rotations. Random resists, crit rate, etc. are going to affect your DPS much more than choosing one over the other.
So I'm now on day #3 of working on a variety of logical, mathematical, and spreadsheet models to try and solve this problem. I have spent hours and hours trying to analyze this problem and I have to admit that I am stumped. There are good arguments for both sides of the debate and I've convinced myself both ways several times.
I wrote about 10 pages of analysis then deleted it because it was stupid.
My conclusion is that this problem is stupid-complicated, but even with wildly optimistic napkin math it will not change your DPS by more than 0.5% either way. So I agree with your "doesn't matter" comment and feel really stupid for having spent countless hours on this dumb problem that will magically go away once patch 3.0 is out. I could probably write out extensive thought experiments from now until the release of v3.0 and not convince myself either way.
Oh, and the previous spreadsheet that was in favor of SW:P? It had a bug in it.
Looking at different meta gems, consulting maxdps.com and seeing that chaotic skyfire diamond is coming out on top in wow 3.0, with almost double dps as msd or the ember diamond. Strangely enough maxdps.com also lists csd as superior atm too... Anyone know if this true?
So I'm now on day #3 of working on a variety of logical, mathematical, and spreadsheet models to try and solve this problem. I have spent hours and hours trying to analyze this problem and I have to admit that I am stumped. There are good arguments for both sides of the debate and I've convinced myself both ways several times.
I wrote about 10 pages of analysis then deleted it because it was stupid.
My conclusion is that this problem is stupid-complicated, but even with wildly optimistic napkin math it will not change your DPS by more than 0.5% either way. So I agree with your "doesn't matter" comment and feel really stupid for having spent countless hours on this dumb problem that will magically go away once patch 3.0 is out. I could probably write out extensive thought experiments from now until the release of v3.0 and not convince myself either way.
Oh, and the previous spreadsheet that was in favor of SW:P? It had a bug in it.
Idd, you'll see that in the end you cast the same amounts, the little difference has todo with the lenght iof the fight.
Do you get killshot with your MB fresh on CD, or is it the last tick of SWP, both situations you can't really predict.
Both of them can be modeled as DOTs that deal D damage over CD seconds. For these purposes, Mind Blast deals D_mb damage and SWP deals D_swp damage. Similarly Mind blast can be cast every CD_mb seconds. Also important is the casting time (just for completeness as they both have the same casting time), CT.
The damage per second of mind blast (NOT damage per cast time) is DPS_mb = D_mb/CD_mb. Therefore, the damage lost by casting SWP first is DPS_mb*CT_swp = D_mb*CT_swp/CD_mb. Similarly the damage lost by casting MB first is D_swp*CT_mb/CD_swp. The actual numbers will vary, so I will not go into them here.
Summary: if D_mb*CT_swp/CD_mb is greater than D_swp*CT_mb/CD_swp, then cast Mind Blast first. If not, cast SWP first.
The argument of whether you get an extra MB nuke at the end of the fight is not particularly useful, but could probably be modeled in a similar way (25% chance of getting an extra MB nuke = 25% damage of a MB). In any case, it should lead to the same result.
Edit: I would also like to address Damage per Cast Time (DpCT).
Damage per cast time is only useful when determining if a damage spell is worth casting at all. All of your damage spells can be boiled down to DOTs (SWD, VT, MB, SWP), and spammable spells (Mind Flay). Without taking into account special effects such as mana regen, all of the dots should have a higher DpCT the spammable spell. If one does not, then it should never be cast (neglecting mana considerations).
Once you have established which DoT's are worth casting, you can do the calculation I show above to determine the ideal priority. This also addresses a possible point of confusion with my calculation which is "what if the cooldown on MB were to be the same as the casting time, then you would never cast SWP even though it does more damage!" As soon as you take away the cooldown of MB, it would become your spammable spell, and the equation would no longer be relevant.
Edit2: Taking into account Twisted Faith
Twisted faith is the high-tier Wotlk talent that increases MB's damage by 10% if SWP is on the mob. This complicates the maths a bit.
(1) Damage Lost by casting SWP First: This remains the same
D_mb*CT_swp/CD_mb
(2) Damage Lost by casting MB First: This must now take into account the additional 10% of MB's damage that is lost.
D_swp*CT_mb/CD_swp + D_mb*0.10
Again, if (1) is greater than (2), cast MB first. Please note that this is also useful for determining whether SWeath should be cast, and in what order.
Last edited by hexpoll : 10/13/08 at 11:46 AM.
Reason: improving the maths more, and nobody has responded yet
This is an analysis of casting priority based on Damage per Second (DPS) and Damage per Second Casting (DPSC).
All spells are placed in one of two buckets.
<Spammable Spells> Mind Flay (MF)
<Cooldown Spells> Vampiric Touch (VT), Mind Blast (MB), Shadow Word:Pain (SWP), Shadow Wordeath (SWD), and Devouring Plague (DP)
Damage over Time spells are in the Cooldown bucket, because they have the same effect. After X seconds, they have done Y damage, and must be cast again. All <Cooldown Spells> must have a higher DPSC than the spammable spell, or they are not worth casting. Additionally, if any <Cooldown Spell> is off cooldown, it has priority over the <Spammable Spell>. This is the only place where DPSC comes into play.
From there, this analysis assumes that all spells happen to be off cooldown (ex. the start of a fight) and you must choose which spell to cast in what order. We will calculate the damage lost by delaying each spell by the time it takes to cast another spell. Fortunately, all our <Cooldown Spells> have the same casting time, making this easier .
I am not Specced Shadow, and am not in the Beta, so I will use Phallacie's data from Patchwerk from this report: Patchwerk : Phallacie. If you don't like the numbers I get from it, please insert your own data instead! Also, I will be using 20% Crit for the hell of it (0.20 crit in analysis from base-1).
Shadow Word: Death
Average Hit = 3106, Cooldown = 12 seconds, Casting Time = 1.5 seconds
Average Damage = 3106 * (1+<Crit>) = 3727
DPS = <Average Damage> / <Cooldown> = 310
DPSC = <DPS> * <Cooldown> / <Casting Time> = 2848
Mind Blast
Average Hit = 3687, Cooldown = 6 seconds (modify if you want), Casting Time = 1.5 seconds, +4% Crit
Average Damage = 3687 * (1+<Crit>+0.04) = 4572
DPS = <Average Damge> / <Cooldown> = 762
DPSC = <DPS> * <Cooldown> / <Casting Time> = 3048
Mind Flay
Average Tick Hit = 1632, No Cooldown, +4% Crit
Average Tick Damage = 1632 * (1+<Crit>+0.04) = 2024
DPS = <Average Tick Damage>/1 = 2024
DPSC = DPS (Spammable)
Before I develope a casting priority, lets have a summary:
Damage Per Second Casting (DPSC)
SW:P Infinite
DP 3584
MB 3048
VT 3034
SW 2848
MF 2024
As I stated before, all <Cooldown Spells> must have a higher DPSC than the <Spammable Spell>, and this is the case. Therefore, all of our cooldown spells are worth casting when available.
Damage Per Second (DPS)
MB 762
SW:P 351
SW 310
VT 304
DP 224
MF 2024 (Spammable)
Now, assuming this list of spells is all available to us off cooldown at the same time, every spell we cast delays receiving the DPS contribution of the other spells by 1.5 seconds. Therefore, to minimize the lost DPS, we could just run down down the list of spells in order of DPS. This is not quite the case, however, with the presence of Twisted Faith. MB will be a little more tricky, so lets run through the list of Lost Damage.
<Lost Damage> = <DPS of spell> * 1.5 seconds (This is why I am glad all of our spells have the same casting time)
Lost Damage
MB ????
SW:P 527
SW 465
VT 456
DP 336
Mind Blast
The above forumla would give us <Lost MB Damage> = 1143 if we were to delay this until after SW:P (the next on the list). In this case, MB would always have priority over SWP. However, we need to take into account that the damage will be less if SW:P is not debuffing the target.
Case 1: Cast MB then SW:P
<Lost Damage> = 527 + <Average MB Damage> * (0.1/1.1) = 943
Case 2: Cast SW:P then MB
<Lost Damage> = <MB DPS> / 1.1 * 1.5 = 1039
For Case 1, we are adding the lost damage from the lack of Twisted Faith to the lost damage from delaying SWP.
<MB with TF> = <MB no TF> * 1.1
<MB no TF> = <MB with TF> / 1.1
<MB with TF> - <MB no TF> = <MB with TF> - <MB with TF> / 1.1
So, lost Twisted Faith Damage = <MB with TF> * (0.1/1.1)
For Case 2, we are looking at the damage that could have been done if MB had been cast first. Note that the MB damage would be missing 10% of its damage from Twisted Faith.
The result of these two cases is that for the level of damage and crit I assumed you should cast Mind Blast BEFORE SW:P to maximize DPS, even though you lose some damage from Twisted Faith. This may not be the case for all gear levels.
Hey Hex, maybe I'm missing something, but shouldn't you include the cast time of MB in the "cooldown" time, if you're modeling it as a dot? I don't think the cooldown gets initiated until after the cast completes, does it?
Kalaghan, you're right! That will likely switch the order between SWP and MB. Thanks for catching it.
I can rerun the numbers, but it would be cool if someone could post the damage of their spells in the current content (perhaps a WWS report?). I'm not shadow specced, and am not particularly progressed in general so can not do this, and do not want to go make assumptions about what is current. The major purpose of my post was to show the underlying calculations and method that anybody could use to determine the highest DPS priorities.
Also, with the recent news about DOT's scaling with crit and DP being buffed in general, the results of this have been made pretty obsolete.
09/08/08, 12:42 AM
-> SW:P 
.
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