Thanks for the prompt replies you sexy amazing people.

That said, can I COMPLETELY IGNORE expertise? Like I mean run with 0 expertise. I already have badge shoulders, and perhaps use 245 Ony head with it. Beats using t9 head/shoulders, or should i get those?

I also have Heroic Victor's call, just don't know, if i'm gonna only use that as an expertise piece, I might as well completely ignore it, if there isnt too much of an adverse effect. =)

As Mutilate, ignoring Expertise is going to cost you DPS when you need to envenom with SnD at a < 2s and it gets dodged. Other than that (which isn't insignificant, that's a lot of lost damage), it's a DPS stat and has a DPS value, if all your other gear is a lot better than the stuff with expertise on it, then yes, it could be a DPS increase. That being said, the two T9 pieces with Expertise on it are both solid pieces and the 4pc bonus, while not amazing, is still worth going for unless you have a lot of ilvl 258 non-set pieces.

And you end up in this situation how often? I find myself clipping envenoms more often than I find myself with less than 2secs on SnD. Also, 6.5% is a pretty small number, it doesn't happen very often, and as ruptureless, you can just put 2 points in QR, thus making expertise even less valuable for rotation stability.

@Shaker
There are not many situations where your S&D drops to <3s if you are playing ruptureless. (Anub HM is one of the few encounters where it might drop to <3s)

@Xeqsit
QR only effects your finishers. Mutilate is not effected and your white hits can be dodged. Saying that Expertise is worthless is not true, but you don't need it for cycle stability. ('cause you don't have any real cycles)

Clipping envenoms is poor practice (meaning you're not pooling energy when you should which compounds to contribute to; lowered envenom buff uptime), but really off topic. Expertise is a bit of a dodgy thing in terms of stat value which is valued based on stability.

Generally I've noticed anywhere from 24-26 and you should be ok for stability any lower and you will notice dodged finishers which does cut into your DPS, especially when pooling energy to not clip envenoms. however...I wouldn't fret and drop an extra agi gem if I were at 24 from gear.

That said, as mutilate, the shoulders I am not crazy about by comparison to other pieces with less arpen and more haste on them. It's clear that at t9245 levels of gear envenom > rupture or pretty much a lot of other stats. Why bother with small amounts of arpen when unnecessary? the same applies to hit, most t9 also has copious amounts of hit (I'm currently approaching dw hit cap with 0 hit gems or socket bonuses). In terms of stat value and set bonuses, I itemize (personally) for what gives the most beneficial stats.
in short, go with what gives the most agility / ap / expertise / haste. I don't think anyone's lacking hit these days.

Generally, you clip envenoms so you don't cap out on energy, it doesn't happen very often, but it certainly happens more often than an Envenom being dodged with <2secs left on SnD.

Clipping Envenoms isn't exactly poor practice (and by clipping I mean using Envenom just as the buff wears off). From my understanding of game mechanics, using Envenom while under its own buff should give it the extra chance to proc your main-hand poison from using a finisher. And while in theory pooling energy is good to get Mutilates in under the buff, you will eventually hit an energy drought in that cycle - and the real question is whether that boost during the buffs outweighs the eventual energy pooling/drought.

The primary issue with the Mutilate cycle is whether a 3+ cycle is better than a 4+ cycle. Previous conclusions on the matter factored in elements that are no longer part of the cycle - Rupture in particular. The dice roll that comes with a 3+ cycle is based on a 60% RNG (on both energy and CP return), which has a high risk of failing completely or boosting your DPS significantly. If a 3+ cycle works in your favor, you're looking at way more uptime with the Envenom buff when the odds in your favor. During cooldowns/Bloodlust, you will want the Envenom buff up 100% during the duration, and pooling energy can cripple your output if Ruthlessness doesn't like you.

From my own experience, I would say the Mutilate cycle is probably too organic (i.e. RNG) to sum it all up in a few sentences. You can play it with a static rotation, always doing one thing if x = whatever, but it's really more important to pay attention to the environment and play on the fly. Are you about to change targets? Pool your energy and Envenom just as you change. You have 3 cps during Bloodlust and your Envenom buff is about to wear off? Refresh it. Both your trinkets procced? Pop Cold Blood on a 5 cp Envenom. The point is that even with all the math regarding Envenom cycles, you are going to squeeze the most DPS by simply using your head and adapting to the situation. Reciting a rotation from EJ in your head isn't going to help you make the right decisions in practice, and with a cycle as easy as using only one finisher, your raid awareness (and resulting DPS from it) should be heightened significantly.

to Omni
As far as using 3+ envenoms, I was wondering what you thought (or anyone really) if this is different now since envenom uses 2% more ap per cp for envenom's instant dmg (since the 3.2.2). I noticed a dps loss compared to using 4+ envenoms originally but I was also using rupture at the time so I'm not sure how much that affected it.

Also, you said to use envenom right before switching targets. I used to do this when it affected DP procs, but now if I have 4+ cp I throw on a rupture if I'm about to switch targets (as long as the previous target is not about to die or is about to go immune). I think extra damage from rupture ends up being more than the extra IP dmg considering wasted envenom buff during the switch. I think this is especially beneficial when your about to become incapacitated (like Icehowl's Massive Crash) to throw up the bleed instead of getting some instant dmg and completely wasting the buff. This also helps to refresh HFB right before getting back to the boss, allowing the chance for a little energy regen before you even get back to the boss.

The Envenom buff alone still applies to Deadly Poison, so it is still worth it to use it before a target change of minimal distance. If you are using a Ruptureless build, you should never really need to use Rupture. Even if you remove the buff component due to something such as a boss stun, a non-4pc T8 Rupture shouldn't be doing more damage than Envenom unless you are glyphed and have talents in it (which you shouldn't in a Ruptureless build). There's also no benefit from the DPE of Rupture in that situation because you won't be using any energy during the downtime - hence it is more profitable to dump as much energy as possible before a stun or transition.

As for the 3+ cycle, it's a lot of math (more than I have time to deal with), but it's fair to make a few assumptions. As you perform more and more 3 cp Envenoms (-> infinity), the odds of having the beneficial turnout will move closer to their true value (-> 60%). The less Envenoms you perform in a 'sample', the more possible it is to have a skew in the data (i.e. RNG bending you over). In a nutshell, it's a dice roll, and it's up to you to decide if 60% is good enough odds to take the chance of having your DPS skyrocket or plummet. It definitely has the potential to do more damage than a 4 cp cycle, and if you were doing 1,000,000 Envenoms it would almost certainly pull ahead. But when it comes to doing just a handful of Envenoms in a fight - you can flip the coin and hope for the best.

Why the developer's never changed the % on Ruthlessness to 100 when they did it to other talents like Initiative and Setup, I'll never understand. You could argue it makes the cycle more "interesting", but when you get a particularly bad streak of RNG that is completely out of your control, it's not very fun. The 4+ cycle basically just tries to outweigh bad RNG with guaranteed Relentless Strikes. My advice would be to just utilize both depending on the situation, since they both have different applications (such as using a 3 CP to keep the Envenom buff up on a mob about to die or during a CD/trinket). I typically only do the riskier 3 CP when I know it would have a significant impact on output if it succeeds, and I usually save CDs like Arcane Torrent/Cold Blood/Thistle Tea to recuperate from bad RNG.

Why do you think 3+ will pull ahead of 4+ if you do a lot of envenoms? Unless you discovered something new, 4+ cycles are still higher dps on average, with and without rupture. On average, due to relentless strikes, the DPE of a 4-point envenom is almost twice higher than the DPE of a 3-point envenom and that makes it a better rotation despite the gains from envenom uptime and combo point income from ruthlessness.

Like you said, the math behind the comparison is pretty involved. You need to rely on a spreadsheet or a simulation to show one way or another and as far as my testing shows, 4+ is still ahead.

Howdy guys,
I've been browsing for a while, looking specifically for information regarding ruptureless builds and cycles. I've done some testing on my own with the 51/18/2 build that I found a little earlier on this thread (maybe another thread, I forget), and compared the results to my standrad 51/13/7 build using rupture. I ran a couple 10-minute tests on dummies, and had a DPS difference between the two of less than 50 DPS.

Now, it is a definite possibility that I'm doing something wrong with this, because I did it really late at night, but I'm wondering, at which point does one's gear justify going rupture-less?

So I guess essentially what I'm asking is, at what specific threshold does it become a more efficient spec? Is it an AP requirement, or a crit thing, or what?

Also, in regards to poison swapping - Is there an ideal weapon speed for the dagger equipped with IP that you are swapping for? I had assumed since it is your offhand, you'd want a faster weapon as well, but then I got to thinking about it, and I don't really know. Also, if I've got a slower weapon that I'm swapping (I don't), would I want to fix my macro so that I'm swapping at say 4 or 5 seconds before DP debuff is finished, or leave it at the 3 second gap that I'm using right now?

I realise it isn't a major issue and that it isn't entirely unrelated to the discussion about 3+ or 4+ cycles, but has any modeling be done on how to best make use of the 4T10 bonus?
With only two pieces of T10 having armor penetration, there's atleast some chance we'll be using 4T10 down the line. Currently 51 18 2 pools to 60 energy before using Envenom for a 5-6 seconds Envenom buff. Getting a 4T10 proc or even 4T10+Ruthlessness (every 13 finisher or so) will more or less force you to clip the Envenom buff to not cap out on energy.

Is the only way - or well the best way - to address this issue to lower the amount of pooled energy thus reducing the change you'll benefit from Envenom on succesive Mutilates or can the cycle be adjusted in some way?

Simulationcraft shows the 51 18 2 4+ cycle to be superior to the 3+ cycle by some 60dps. The 3+ cycle has significantly higher Envenom buff uptime (12%) but looses around 1200 damage per Envenom relative to the 4+ cycle. Interrestingly, the Damage Per Ressource only drops from 700 to 697 or 4‰. This suggest to me it could be worth lowering the amount of pooled energy and react to 4T10 procs by waiting out the Envenom buff and use your free 3point Envenom just as the buff runs out. The pooled energy can then be used for a 3rd back to back Envenom buff.

Mavanas, the comparison isn't really the DPE of a 3 point Envenom vs a 4cp one, since both cycles use 4cp Envenoms. The real difference here is against another Mutilate (which has a worse DPE), and don't forget about the cp that is eaten during such a cycle. And as noted, as lackluster the 4pc T10 may be, the 3+ cycle has almost twice as much a chance to proc it (I envision it helping out a lot with bad RNG).

I'm not trying to champion a particular cycle here, but I thought it deserved a closer look. Do you by chance have the simulation sheet you used to come to your conclusions? I might have some time over the holidays to look over it.

I will let you know when it's updated, I am trying to optimize its running time at the same time as inputting the new changes. Btw dpe of envenoms is actually relevant because 3+ cycle has 3-point envenoms in the mix which are lower dpe. Also Bural, there was already next to no benefit from pooling energy for mutilate, and actually when we were timing envenoms to dp ticks it was suggested to not pull energy at all. So if not pulling energy prevents you from energy capping, that's the way to go.

I wonder if it might be worth testing whether it would be good to use rupture only when you get the 4T10 proc and are already sitting on an envenom buff, so that you don't clip or cap. Of course, you're bound to occaisionally get the proc twice in a row, but by then the envenom buff would probably have worn off.

Envenom by itself should already be doing more damage than Rupture+glyph, it would be better to clip than use Rupture.

Pooling energy means not using your next ability as soon as it is ready and you have enough energy to cast it, but instead waiting, and letting your energy bar fill up toward (but usually not all the way to) maximum.

You might do so for a variety of reasons:
* To wait for a particularly benficial proc or procs to occur before using your next attack (e.g. mongoose or berserking)
* To maximize your energy available if your next attack itself procs something beneficial for a limited duration, so that you can maximize the number of additional attacks you can make under that proc (e.g. envenom)
* Waiting for a particular buff or debuff to be cast by allies (e.g. heroism, hysteria, tricks, or a debuff which fell off a boss accidentally)
* For encounter specific reasons (e.g. a boss may be about to switch vulnerabilities to something more beneficial to you)
* While waiting for an ability to fully tick off before recasting/refreshing it (e.g. rupture)

I'm sure there may be other reasons as well.

To provide some examples of energy pooling in the current content:

-when H Jaraxas is about to summon a portal or volcano
-when Twin Valks are about to cast a shield on the Valk you aren't attacking
-when Burrowers on H Anub are about to make it to the raid group and you want to have as much energy in reserve for ToTT FoK as possible

I listed examples of when you may pool energy to get the most out of "burst" or an ability such as ToTT. As the previous poster mentioned, there are many reasons to pool and you will just have to pay attention to your raid group and find good times to pool.

Just remember, avoid pooling to full and losing out on energy regen if you can help it.

Hmm...I guess I kind of just assumed everyone did that.

@ Japp
If not Rupture, I wonder if it'd be worth having Vigor, possibly even the glyph, depending on how often we're capping energy from the proc, or even increased energy regen from increased crit %s and FA.

If you're energy capping you're either pooling your energy for too long or not mashing buttons fast enough. For this reason I don't think Vigor has ever really been a viable option for PvE.

it was my understanding that due to the envenom scaling changes, once you drop 4 part T8.5 you'll be dropping Rupture (assuming the rest of your gear is 232-258 also). And since you're not using the Rupture crit set bonus anymore you should be looking to regem AP in red and AP/haste in yellow and going Envenom only. I've only picked up one T9.245 item so far but my DPS certainly has been boosted nicely since going Envenom only.

I always assumed we should be at least waiting for envenom buff to fall off before envenoming again so we dont clip it.

I do have one question though, as I've heard differing opinions on this, but should we be clipping envenoms during bloodlust? I don't believe there is a current method to test this.